The Trip from Germany to Taszar, Hungary
My National Guard unit the 139th ROC traveled from Frankfurt, Germany to Taszar, Hungry via bus in August, 1997. In Austria, in the middle of the night, we stopped at a McDonald’s to eat a very late supper. I had eaten at McDonald’s in Germany and Holland prior to this, so it was not a shock to find one here.
In spite of this, it was a surreal scene. The mountain air was chilly and it was foggy. Everyone that worked at McDonald’s was wearing Mexican sombreros and what appeared to be bits and pieces of Mexican peasant clothing from a sitcom. There were posters and signs showing tacos, burritos and more of the stuff you’d expect to find at Taco Bell.
I did not have much time to enjoy the sights and sounds of an Austrian McDonald’s that was stuck in an episode of the Outer Limits.
Sitting behind me in the bus was a fake ranger. He told us that he had been a ranger and we all looked up to him because of this. During our bus ride he kept having nightmares and would wake up screaming and kicking, not exactly what you’d expect from a ranger. Later on we found out that he was a poser – but that’s another story. When he would jerk awake he would kick me in the back and got me good a few times.
I told him to stay awake so he would stop kicking me, and it quickly devolved into a stupid “did not-did too” type of argument popular among four-year-olds.
Out of the darkness came a voice that told me to “stop whining.”
In the Back to the Future movies, Marty McFly would go ballistic if you called him chicken. At that time, my psycho button was to be accused of whining.
I went zero to psycho in two seconds and yelled, “F*** You!”
All noise in the bus died. I then heard the chem sergeant say, “You need to add “sir” to that.”
No guts, no glory. I then yelled, “F*** You, SIR!”
At McDonald’s everyone else ran into the store to sample the Austrian tacos and hamburgers. I stood at attention by the bus while my captain tried to chew me out for dropping the F-bomb on him. The short version of his rant: I was not allowed to drop an F-bomb on an officer and if I did it again, I would get written up, blah-blah-blah.
My mind kept wandering because the food smells. All I could think was, “could you hurry up? I’m hungry!” Instead I nodded my head and said, “Yes sir,” as if I was paying attention to him.
That night I got a Quarter Pounder combo and also got away with “murder.”
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November 21st, 2008 at 1:58 am
Man that takes balls of steel.
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November 21st, 2008 at 5:14 am
Heh… I’ve done that a couple times on accident. Not the f-bomb mind you, but some other various things that are considered just as bad. Things like telling the anonymous voice behind me “Quit being a moron! You’re bloody stupid to think that is true.” only to find out it was the DO (2nd in command of the base) who had spoken.
Captcha: half Rambler – a Mech Rambler stuck in second gear?
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November 21st, 2008 at 7:01 am
I was a mechanic working under a jeep an a creeper one afternoon, and since jeeps were rather small, I was sticking out from under it. About the third time someone stepped on my legs I grabbed the frame of the jeep and shot out from under the jeep calling the idiot who had stepped on me every name in the book. I shot to my feet, still yelling every profanity I could think of, and found myself face to face with the Brigade Commander. Needless to say, I saw my new SP/4 rank being turned into a bare collar, especially since the Colonel was considered a harda$$. He saw the look on my oil covered face and busted out laughing. HE then apologized for steping on me and told me that next time, I should at least clear the jeep before I started swearing.
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Dave Van Domelen reply on November 21st, 2008 8:54 am:
If nothing else, they can hear you better once you clear the jeep.
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November 21st, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Don’t say anything in any sort of silence on the band bus. It will be taken in the worst manner possible.
Probably need to add that to my list…
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November 22nd, 2008 at 8:24 pm
They had an extra truck right? You know… for your balls.
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November 23rd, 2008 at 8:40 pm
I just got back from a weekend trip. The bus was late this morning, so I figured I would catch a little more sleep.
I went straight into REM dream-phase when I closed my eyes, and I had a whole series of those dreams where you’re walking and then you lose your footing, followed by a soccer dream… anyway, I woke up with everybody standing around me asking if I was all right, or having a seizure because I was spazz-kicking in my sleep.
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Al Li reply on November 28th, 2008 10:25 pm:
Did you sleep at all during the weekend? Seizure-like twitches normally don’t happen to me unless I’m REALLY sleep deprived.
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December 10th, 2008 at 10:07 am
I e-4 that I was got My full bird col to drive in grounding stakes for me in august while i sat back against a tent relaxing in the shade chatting with him… My MSGT wasn’t thrilled. I got yelled at dispite the fact that HE initiated the conversation and HE openly asked to take over for me becouse i had been on my feet and working for 19 hours and had a flu. Gotta love the rank system
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February 1st, 2009 at 9:23 am
I was an engineer Captain, project managing a deployed HQ project, I had a Signals LTCOL working with me doing the comms fitout for the building and sort of flying top cover for me. This one morning, it was like everyone had put “dickhead sprinkles” on their breakfast cereal as we were having a particularly crap morning on site.
We had to pass through a series of punch code locked gates to get from one compund to another, which were starting to show their age. The LTCOL was having some issues getting the code to work when the Wing Commander(0-5) of the sirforce element on the base came up behind us and made a smart arse remark about operator error and army guys being dumb. Now this guy was a real slug, the kind that gives the airforce their deserved reuptation within the forces, and we really weren’t in the mood for any shit.
Knowing my Colonel was gritting his teeth trying to to kill this guy, I turned to the Wing Commander and said, “Sir, I can’t tell you to go f@#k your self, but the Lieutenant Colonel here sure can.”
The Wing Commander stopped dead in his tracks and blinked, meanwhile the Colonel and I passed through the gate and left him standing there, wondering if an Army Captain could say that to a Wing Commander.
For some reason the day seemed a little brighter, if just for a while.
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August 25th, 2011 at 2:17 am
“I had eaten at McDonald’s in Germany and Holland prior to this, so it was not a shock to find one here.”
Am I to assume you weren’t aware that there are McDonald’s -restaurants in Europe before you saw one?
if so, take a look at this: http://englishrussia.com/2007/11/11/first-mcdonalds-rest-in-russia-20-years-ago/#more-1632
yes, there WAS a McDonald’s restaurant in Moscow during the Soviet times.
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