Long Ago In American Skies...
For nearly five years I toiled as a Sales Manger for the then MPTV Cable in Monterey/Salinas...
Started the ad department from scratch and we had great times peddling Cable TV ads, producing local TV shows and much more...
About midway through my stint on the Cali coast I had an opportunity that I just had to take...
My boss (the best I ever had) did NOT like to fly...He had been offered the chance to fly back to Washington, D.C. on a National Guard junket...It all came about because one of my sales guys was a US Army Medal holder and had lots of NG contacts...
Seems the Guard had invited like eight business folks
in all of Cali to make the journey...
I was hooked and booked and went early, early one morn to an Air Force Base outside of Sacramento...There we were briefed about our mission and hustled to a KC-135 tanker...
The plane was a military version of the old Boeing 707, but it's shape was quite different...The commercial version was wider a beam and the military was much more oblong (so that it could hold lots of jet fuel)...
The one thing I noted about the jet was the lack of windows...
Only like four small portholes along the entire fuselage...BUT in the rear was the "main event"...More on that later...
So we hit the skies at daybreak and headed to Washington, D.C.
I remember we had to buy the six buck box lunch...
but what a lunch it was...
TWO sandwiches, apples, chips and cookies...
More than one could eat...
We landed at Andrews AFB and then all hell broke loose...
President Reagan was on his way in on Air Force One...
They kept us in a bus by our plane and we waited...Above two jets screamed over the airport to make certain the sky was clear and then the gleaming silver plane ascended and touched down...After that we were on our way to our hotel in Crystal City...
As we went by the hangers that housed Air Force One and the companion planes I noted not one,but two layers of fencing around the facility...Our tour leader said that was for additional protection of the planes...You jump the first fence they shout at you to stop...You keep moving they kill you...Simple as that...Sounded like a very through defense system to me...
Crystal City is right by the Pentagon
and we were housed in a huge hotel...
Thought the name sounded a bit like a place in Russia,
but that's what they called that place right by the Pentagon...
Attended a welcoming cocktail party for just our small group
and then we had the night off...
One of the few down times scheduled on the two day trip...
I wanted to see the National Air and Space Museum
and rounded up a few fellows and we took a cab right there...
Went up to the guard and asked where
the ticket booth was and he laughed...
Then he said, "You pay every April 15th...It's free to all Americans"...
Nice...and what a place it is...Lindbergh's plane is hanging in the joint...
John Glenn's capsule is right at the front door encased in Lucite...
A Nazi jet fighter from the end of WWII is in "Mint Condition"...and on and on...A wonder for an aviation buff...
Next we went out for some chow and exploring Washington...
The city is intersected by two states and a territory and you go
from one to another over and over again...
We hit a dance club and there were much more ladies than gents around...
Went into the indoor shopping center in Georgetown
that Arnold took a whiz in when he was being shot at in "True Lies"...
and then we visited the best place of all...
Ronald Reagan was the President then
and I was just about a mile from this bedside...
Yep, the "bottomless" bar we were in was near the White House...
I was drinking quite a bit back then
and slammed down one after another...
Even took a nap while pulsating ladies were just a few feet away...
I recall saying to myself..."Golly, isn't America a great place!"
Next morn we awoke and headed over to the Pentagon for a briefing (they do a lot of those in the government) and had a General and an Admiral give us a lecture on the benefits of the National Guard...
Now in those mid 80's days I had sleep apnea real bad...
That plus the hangover and lack of sleep had me snoring
"big time" in the small auditorium...
The Naval guy attached to us that day slammed me
on my leg to wake me up...
I dozed off and on and finally made it through the meeting...
The Pentagon is quite the place...
You can walk from anywhere in the building to anywhere else
in less than five minutes thanks to it's pentagon design...
They even had a complete shopping area in the basement for all the staff...
And they have LOTS of staff there...
Walking here and there I noted desks and furniture from the WWII era...
and then the walls looked brighter and nicer and bam!
You were at the door of the Secretary of the Navy...
Luxurious plush blue carpeting...huge wood furniture and great lighting...
You can readily see the perks of the military..They hide nothing...
Next we did the White House...
They cut us in line and by-passed the tourists...
Didn't see the President but I was amazed what a run down dumpy look the First House of our nation had...Really sleazy looking...The huge hall where they have their parties and where the President walks down to the podium to speak for major announcements was postage stamp sized...
Lots of the rooms whee they do sit down interviews
looked like small phony Hollywood sets...
It was a great disappointment to me...
Onward to the Lincoln Memorial...Wonderful, serene place...
Then Arlington Cemetery and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier...
As you walked to the presentation area you pass by grave after grave of veterans interred there...
Our guide told me they have many celebrity vets there...Audie Murphy, some astronauts and many decorated solders...
In the background are over
FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND graves of heroes...
The ceremony is stunning...Gives you a lump in your throat and those fellows do this 24/7...EVERY hour regardless of the weather...This honors all our fallen vets...It is a prestige gig for all the soldiers in that regiment...
Highly recommend you see it once in your life...
We ended the day at the Vietnam Memorial...
I hated the war...Despised it...
But time tends to heal and the thought that there
were fifty thousand names on that wall was heavily impactful to me...
We saw the friends and family members taking paper and running a pencil over the name of their loved one...
Not a DRY EYE in our group...Not one...
We had a going away dinner and then an early morning departure
scheduled in our KC-135 the next day...
Once again...note the LACK of windows on the plane...
What happened the next day was more than a mind blowing experience...
It was FRIGGIN' awesome!
More on that next blog...
