Deigo Garcia day 2

Welcome to Diego Garcia: Go to the middle of nowhere and make a left. 
These people live on the edge.. of the planet.




We did allot today, so right upfront, I apologize for what I miss and the names I misspell or just get completely wrong. This entire day was so unbelievable. Thank You guys so much and get me outta here. I’ll try to get the names right!!!! Most of my blogs I like to have a mission, but with this one, it is more “what and who” then “what the hell are you doing, Riccadonna?” 

These are the Dogs with Rank!

That’s BRIX with us.

K-9 Unit: There is a lot of rain, so it has to be indoors. The K-9 is a super help full and allot of fun. I wish we could have got out to see the exercises, but you can see in the pics I am soaked in the rain. The dogs are very friendly, but I don’t want to test them out too much. It was my goal to get Kevin in the suit that the dog can attack but weather stopped it from going down. Brix came out and joined us. Brix smelled Kevin at the airport. I mean, he went right up to his crotch and would not quit sniffing, I started to laugh, but he turned over toward me and said: “smells like every NY based Navy guys ass”.  The K-9 unit was super cool, they also run the jail but don’t get much use out of it considering how small the island is, no one is dumb enough to do anything.

NAVY SECURITY AND POLICE: Chief Stogin/ Chief Alvarado. This was the part we all wanted to see- GUNS, GUNS, GUNS!  

The sound of the CHA-CHUNK will make a bad guy piss himself.

These are the guys who are the weapon experts. They introduced us to their weapons and how they are to be handled. Then they showed us a hilarious (but messed up) video of a DEA shooting himself in the foot during a weapons demonstration. They told me the scene from Rambo was completely fake, which made me happy. And let us handle- M240, M-16, Shotgun and a berretta 9mil. I have a feeling the boys are going to be close with Stogs for the rest of our trip. He was so cool laid back and just fun to be around. Once we were familiar with the guns, we went and shot the simulator. 

I act like I know what I am doing.

The Simulator

I was thrilled with my score. 2 scenarios with the M-16 (I went semi-auto): 6 total shots-all hits, 4 lethal, 2 non-lethal. I would have to have done 20 push-ups for the non-lethal. I did another one with the 9mil but didn’t get the score written down. I think the best is carol 0 for 21. She is incredible, laughing her ass off while firing away! It made me miss Kuwaiti.

Now this is fun

I’m giving it a shot: badump*

A Quick Intro to the gang:

MAC (Master at Arms Chief) Stogin- Chief- “If it goes boom on the island, its mine”. He is basically head of the Navy cops (one bad muther.. shut your mouth… but I’m talkin stogins).


MA1 (Master at Arms) Fiesta –he was a quiet and very cool guy.


GM1 (Gunners Mate) McGlaughlin- FATS (Fire Arms Training System), which is a gun shooting simulator which we got a kick out of.


GM1 Goltowski- not allot of pics with him because he took photos a bunch for us, but he is the badass with the shotgun.


MA2 (Master at Arms) Reese. He let us beat the piss out of him in the red man suit. What a great dude, he is the youngin of the gang, and you can tell he works hard and is liked, but balls busted allot.


MA3 Caudill- He is the very German looking dude who was a considerable help teaching us on aiming. I think he is the marksmen of the group.


MA3 Bockbrader- She was a female badass martial artist.


SELF DEFENSE and REDMAN:

ROBOCOP

The redman Suit is a suit that will make you not feel a blow to the body or head, so the police can practice moves, try weapons, and beat the crap out of someone on the squad without getting a trip to the hospital. 


I really loved their philosophy on the hand to hand stuff, and that is “I don’t want to hurt a fellow sailor, and I don’t want to be on CNN so get them down and unable to harm anyone until back up gets there” and boy do they have submission moves.

Stoggin and Brockbrader showed us some, and Reese let us go to town on him. It was so much fun and educational (like if I get in a fight, I need a red man suit). and again, Carol was the most fun to  watch “GET ALL BROOKLYN ON THEIR ASS.”

Get the bat stogs!

Who’s Next?

NOW OVER TO THE AIR-FORCE:

 War Bird- we got to look everywhere.

PACAF: MAJ Guillory and the B-52s. 

SSgt. S White our guide and KDJ and SSgnt white in the bomb bay 

 They call this tweaking the nipples. Carol could not wait! Behind Those nipples are cameras we are not allowed to see.

We were in luck and out of success at the same time. Out because a week ago, the Emmroy had a submarine hooked up and docked but in luck because the B-52s are here!! 






We showed up to the 

AIR FORCE TAGGING

airbase area of the island and as always with the air force- 












NICE AND AIR CONDITIONED. They always make things pleasant like that. … I love the B-52s, they look like Vultures or some sort of death bird, and they are like the American muscle car of the air force. Just like most awesome muscle cars, built in the 60’s, cranky to get running, always need work, in reality not the strongest or fastest car on the road, but it will scare the piss out of an enemy. Intimidation factor on these is unreal. They look sound and smell awesome. 

The Guys all up in the bomb bay, We have been dropping bomba all together all week, why not! Kruiser thinks we should be sponsored by SCOTT TISSUE.

BIG SHOW TONIGHT: Can't wait but will need a nap.

To be Continued next blog.

Diego Garcia

 Diego Garcia: aka Gilligans Island

Welcome to Diego Garcia: 86 degrees, bright and sunny paradise. There is a gentle breeze that keeps things fresh here. I would have been a horrible soldier in Nam; jungle heat is not for me. We had a long plane ride on a D-8 with several other people, and I started thinking there isn’t much lonelier than being on tour on the other side of the planet, and I’m here with friends. There isn’t much communication with the world I know, and this is nowadays. Imagine what an 18-year-old was thinking in NAM or WW2? 

I’m also coming somewhere to have fun and tell jokes about these long flights going to go into jungle warfare- that would have made me crazy. I really look up to anyone who was in a war. I am 29- would it be easier if I was 10 years younger- I don’t know. Hats off to you vets!

We are coming in for a landing, and we are in the middle of the Indian Ocean. I am very excited to be on the island. We go through British Security and watch some videos on safety. A dog sniffed Downey’s crotch at the airport, and he looked over toward me and said, “it smelled like every sailor that went through NY!” that was odd. We have 3 shows here, so we get to stay for a while. We met our contact and went to a fantastic Mongolian BBQ place on the beach and headed back. 


We are all travel logged. On the island, you need to fill jugs up with potable water for drinking. My view on clean water: I’m all about being green I just don’t want to poop that color.

The Philippians send people to work on the island, so the grocery has some weird stuff

 Where the hell is we!

 

The People In Charge

In Order: Command Master Chief Collins, Kevin Downey Jr., Left Tenet Logistics Officer Alex Flinton, Stephan Kruiser, Carol Montgomery, Command Officer Tony Chatan, Leigann Lord, Executive Officer Musgraves, Mark Riccadonna

We met some officers and they where excellent:



Tony Chamtan (sorry if I butcher the names it is off of memory) He is the Commanding Officer, He came across as a movie character of the man in charge. What a cool dude, out of Louisiana.

Musgraves, aka “The Cowboy,” one of the funniest executive Officers I ever met, cracking some great jokes during the meeting.

Collins: He didn’t say much at the beginning, he came across as the strict type, but once the Q&A was over, he cracked us up. He is a Command Master Chief out of the upstate NY area(by the Canadian border)

And last but not least, Logistics Officer from Manchester England Alex Flinton. I thought going in wow a powerful female AND British she must get razzed quite a bit, but she didn’t just hold her own she had us rolling on the floor laughing from busting chops.


 
 
 Leper colony remains (insert joke here)




This morning we woke up (Tues) to watch Monday night football. Its 5:30 AM, and we start making cocktails. Underground comedy tour. “We do more drinking by 6AM than most do all day”. We went to the radio and acted up, I’m a little nervous we were obnoxious.

We touched The INDIAN OCEAN.

We got to tour around after radio: Kevin, Stephan, and I were laughing that the birds outside our door are called Boobies, and the barking sound we hear is gecko lizards. Kelly Harkins (our guide I so rudely didn’t introduce you the reader to) showed us around and explained here the bright blue water is the lagoon (sharks don’t swim there) and dark water is the ocean (don’t swim there). 

There are wild donkeys they call it donkey gate (sounds like a government incident), Turtle cove where sea turtles come to lay eggs. The Brits made a lot of the island a nature preserve.
Because of the location, there are a lot of storms but not bad ones.

THE CREW: Underground All-Stars
 Stephan Kruiser, Carol Montgomery, Leighann Lord, Mark Riccadonna, and Kevin Downey Jr.

The base is a considerable fuel farm and ideally located to be the warning for anyone over here (this side of the marble) thinks of getting out of control- Britain and the US will spank you. The Land is Britons, and the buildings on it are ours. We have a few B-52s here, which was impressive, and France had a leprosy colony here, and we went to get pics, and carol freaked, saying she got leper juice on here. We were dying laughing, she kills me. This will be a fun stretch to do- in one place for a couple days; I hope the weather stops raining.

This is the plane, not the band.. just saying show respect!

Right: B-52. One of my favorite Air Planes EVER. It looks like a vulture.
BELOW: WEAPONS. NAVY STYLE, these guys are badass!

ABOVE: I am really looking forward to the show, but before this happens, we went to the weapons department (Navy) and got a great tour. There aren’t pics for obvious reasons, but believe me when I say there is enough firepower to start a big war on this little island. We saw warheads guidance systems and all the fun stuff

 These two on the left are Medal of Honor holders. They gave their lives to get those medals. the top one looks like Kevin’s brother (famous author) Pat Downey 
Below he looks allot like our fellow average white guy comic DJ HAZARD. We said NAVY guys either look like jolly underage, happy go lucky, or grizzled salty dogs. Below this is the clinic. If you get seriously hurt, it will take 3 days to get you out, OR if you can’t wait, the life vac to fly you out is somewhere around $250,000 just to get you off the island.

SHOWTIME: First show in Diego

In the Island Room all night for 3 nights in a row.



There was a good crowd, and they are the troops who are looking out for the other guys. They said they will get more people out.

 I wish you, as the reader, could view how horrible the color is on this SUV she is driving!

Our DD- Kelly. We only drove 2 doors down in her lime green SUV but we love her anyway for hooking all of us up. Kelly is incredible for getting us some amazing things coming up with the AFE, MWR, and Diego Garcia crew!