coming home with a broom at the masthead

[serinde]

My military-history-nerd self has been in remission the last while (in spite of arkham1010's continual attempts to lure me with the pure crack of games like Silent Hunter 3), but then Mr. Internet threw this up on my doorstep, all unwitting: They just found the wreckage of the Wahoo in the La Perouse Strait.

I realize that sentence will mean nothing to probably 99% of the Gentle Readers, whereat I encourage you to, first, ask Wikipedia, and second, if you have any liking for a good solid yarn, hie thee to the library and check out Wake of the Wahoo[1], which is a terrific book and I've loved it since I was a kid; it was written by the boat's yeoman, who was detached for reassignment a mere fifteen minutes before her final patrol. So, anyways, lots of nostalgia this morning, for sitting in the basement and talking to Dad about patrol strategy while he was painting miniatures, for hauling around the dictionary-sized volume of United States Submarine Operations In World War II during junior high for a little light reading (much to the WTF? of my classmates), for endless games of the original Silent Service and finally achieving the highest rank of World's Greatest Submarine Commander, etc.

[1] The copy I have, from the original printing, that's the whole title. Where did this trend of having a paragraph-long subtitle stapled onto every nonfiction book come from? It's lame.

Comments

[elibalin.livejournal.com]

U-Boat wrecks found off Orkney Islands. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/north_east/6172692.stm)

[zonereyrie.livejournal.com]

Wee, I'm in the 1%. ;-)

[heliumbreath.livejournal.com]

I read a lot about the war when I was younger, and do remember the Wahoo.

(You must have a lot of readers, for those who do know to only be 1% thereof.)

[xlerb.livejournal.com]

YKIOK; but, for myself, I'm going to have to stick with more conventional forms of nerdfulness.

(OTOH, I did recently have occasion to use the word “palimpsest” in anger, FSVO anger, but it's a long story.)

[nancaurelia.livejournal.com]

I'd also recommend "Blind Man's Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage" by Sherry Sontag, Christopher Drew, & Annette Lawrence Drew. And of course there's a submarine museum in New Lebanon, CT. Karl worked on submarines during the Cold War, so I have been... educated some on the subject.