Stories

As I approach 75 years on this Earth it has come to my attention that when I look in the mirror I do not recognize the person looking back at me, have any of you experienced that? Lately I write stories about The Life and Times of me, when my memory works and I can remember The Life and Times of me. Occasionally I write a good story and it's actually factual well close to it anyway. I write these stories so my family and friends have an idea what I did those 41+ years away from home. Living the life and having fun in Waco Texas, the US Army worldwide and the Department of Defense worldwide and now in retirement in Central Florida Robert Rob Bob Wayne Busby

Moments in my time

Saturday August 31st 2024 at 11:00 AM - Notes by me Robert/Rob/Bob/Wayne Busby. Those of you who read my stories/notes and view my photographs and collages know I have ups and downs physically and mentally. I'm dealing with all of those ills the best I can day by day. There are days you can't tell there's anything wrong with me and there are days you know something's wrong just by the way I write my stories/notes and post the photographs and collages. Every now and then I get on my soapbox and rant about various topics. Most of the time the rants don't mean anything. I was ticked off at that moment and thought you all needed to know about it. I've Been Told talking about my issues, The Good,The Bad, and even The Ugly are good for me mentally and somehow physically. So occasionally I do discuss strange issues in my life but that's all they are, discussion points. If you don't agree with me, don't worry, most of the time I may not remember the specific topics! My medical care is crazy at times, but it must be helping me because I'm still here at 74 years old going on 75. So the US Army/Department of Defense/Veterans Administration as well as my civilian doctors are doing something right in order to keep me physically and mentally operational. Living my wild and crazy life traveling the world for over 41 years has been exciting and retired life has been even more wild and exciting! However after 74+ years, I look in the mirror and wonder who that is looking back at me. I do not travel as much as I did previously but I do try and stay as active as I can even though that is not easy at times. I have mentioned many times there are days I cannot get out of my chair because of pain/depression or both and there are days I'm just so active I can't believe it. My body tends to let me know really quick when Ive done too much. Another issue I have is something called brain fog so when I sit down and try and write about The Life and Times of me and living my life with a parrot, I tend to lose my train of thought. Brain fog has arrived so I will try and keep writing stories and jotting notes about The Life and Times of me so my family, friends, acquaintances and maybe even family historians can keep up with my life.

 

Living with Pets – In Full Retirement

 

Most of us have had pets over our life time and have enjoyed those pets as much as those pets enjoyed us. Pets have a way of making us smile and enjoy life more while they become part of our family.

 

Ann and I have had dogs and cats while growing up, while trying to get through our work lives, but our Double Yellow Headed Amazon Parrot Josie is our first pet after we entered full retirement life.

 

Josie is a Parrot and Parrots need lots of attention, love, and just being with them.

 

Our Josie had two owners (Owner #1 three years – Owner #2 seven years) she found us, or should I say we found each other. Since Josie joined our family three year ago (Wow) all our lives have changed for the better.

 

Living with a pet or in our case, Josie allows us to live with her, after all after Josie entered our lives and joined our family, she like all pets took charge without us really knowing it but allows us to think we are in charge.

 

If those of you reading this have read other ramblings by me about the life and times of Josie, you know what a great pet a parrot can be and how much fun and excitement it is to have a pet that sings, talks, plays, and on occasion yells at you!

 

Josie has different routines with Ann and Me, she makes sure she keeps both of our undivided attentions any time we are in the room with her. Parrots can be happy in their cage and on their own if they must, but parrots love interacting with their owners and their owners’ guest. Remember a happy parrot is a happy parrot parent. Yep, having a parrot as a pet is like being the parent of a two or three-year-old child for the seventy-five years the parrot lives. We are all making our lives together fun and exciting since we will only have Josie for another ten years or so if we are lucky, that would make her twenty something when she moves on to her fourth parrot parent.

 

Josie is the center of attention at our home and when we travel, yep, Josie loves traveling in her parrot travel cage in the car and being out and about with us where ever we go.

 

I will continue to type more about the life and times of Josie, but for now I will type about waking up in the morning with Josie.

 

Every morning Josie and I have a wake-up routine, I enter the kitchen with is located across the living room area from Josie who sleeps on top of her parrot condo. Depending on the time of the morning, dark or light, Josie will be kind of napping or waiting on me.

 

Josie does not yell or go loudly crazy with calling the flock before or after I enter the kitchen, she waits patiently while making sure she watches every move I make. My morning kitchen routine is like one my father (RIP) had when he was alive, wake up, go directly to the kitchen, clean and straighten the kitchen, make coffee and then relax, in my case relaxing is having and sharing coffee with Josie. Ann usually sleeps in and Josie and I relax together quietly while waiting on Ann to wake and join us or maybe we join Ann in the master suite.

 

While waiting on Ann to wake, Josie and I write stories and make picture collages, watch Dinosaur Train and other educational programs for young parrots on public television, and Josie may even play with her toys or work on her cardboard box art project, have water and parrot fun food.

 

When Ann wakes Josie and I make more coffee, prepare a glass of cold water, and we all move into the master suite for our early or late morning calling the flock, eating, drinking, watching more educational television, reading (we all have light weight tablets to read our nook books).

 

Guess you all picked up on Josie having her own nook tablet for when she wants to read, but mostly once in the master suite she enjoys food, water, reading, watching us while we watch her, singing, whistling, talking, and generally just being loud calling our flock of three.

 

As the morning progresses, I get ready to get out and about for chores and other such fun things, while Ann and Josie get ready for some well-deserved one-on-one time with each other while I am out and about.

 

More fun and exciting moments with the Busby Flock to come once Josie proof reads what is typed and approves the release of Flock information – Smiles.

 

Living The Life of retired folks (Robert Busby & Ann McNabb Busby) is not easy, someone must do it, so we thought we would give retired life a shot in 2010, Ann retired in 2008 so in 2010 we were both retired.

 

We were both lucky in that we chose to work for Uncle Sam a long time ago in a land and time far far away.

 

Remember folks, brain fog tends to bother me every now and then so some of these thoughts may be off just a little, enjoy anyway.

 

Once we had lived our exciting lives prior to our meeting each other, we found ourselves single, we traveled the world, lived life to the fullest here there and everywhere, and found each other in the late 1980s. 

 

After several attempts at finding true love, traveling the world, and having all the fun and excitement we could handle, we both were single, met, fell in love, married and started enjoying life together.

 

Ann and I had no carry over physical/monetary  baggage from our previous lives so our retirements from Uncle Sam, Social Security, and of course savings are ours, so we have sufficient funds to live the good life, well a nice life, during our retirement years without having to work for a living.

 

Some of our retired life activities consist of me having fun riding my three-wheel trike, walking, and swimming, while Ann and I together read, watch television, talk to family and friends on the phone and computer, travel every now and then, take care of our Double Yellow Headed Amazon Parrot Josie, and spend a lot of time at doctor visits.  

 

If we had the energy, we would be involved in the many club and exercise activities available here in The Villages, Florida. Sadly, we hardly ever have enough energy to get out and about like we would like to.

 

Apparently, we had way too much fun while growing up, working, being married, traveling, and just having too much excitement in our lives, so we now spend many hours visiting doctors trying to fix our worn-out bodies.

 

While I am out during the day doing chores, taking pictures, and just having fun Ann and Josie are home enjoying the day without me.

 

Every now and then I write about my life in an electronic journal and even jot down some stories about the life and times of me and post those memories on face book so family and friends can see what our retired life is like and what life before retired life was like.

 

Since 2010 Ann and I have enjoyed traveling, having family and friends visit us, visiting family and friends, hosting numerous holiday parties, attending lots of neighborhood parties and enjoying life together.

 

The last several years we have slowed down some since we both have been advised by our bodies by way of terrible pain and breathing issues that we had way too much fun while growing up, working, traveling and even during the start of our retired life.

 

Living life as retired folks have made us writers, readers, television and movie watchers, photographers, gossips or is that teller of stories?

 

As many will tell you, retired life is not for everyone, some folks are just not wired to having fun each and every day, all day, with the ones they know and love.

 

Our families overall seem to have lived life till they were in there late 70s and mid 80s with some exceptions of shorter and longer life ages.

We are both now 71 and must look at the crazy idea we have now become Old and may not have lots of living time left.

 

Darn, don’t we all hate it when the life and times of us catches up with us and we may no longer exist.

 

Brain Fog is catching up with me quickly, so it is time to end this before I forget where I was going with this. More will follow once I remember to continue with this train of thought – Smiles.

 

Crazy Life

 

Folks War is Hell and no one civilian or military soldier should ever want a war, be in a war, or have to deal with a war, but we all know war was and is with us.

 

Those who fought in war or found themselves in a war zone know just how horrible war is.

 

There are many aspects to wars, all horrible and those who serve in the military or the civilians who live and travel in a war zone know the horror of war is different for each person who experiences war.

 

My life in the US Military from 1970 through 1991 was different than others who served in, for or with the US Military, we all experienced our military service differently depending on the dates of our service, our age, positions, jobs, and assignments.

 

Every now and then I jot down a few moments from my time in Vietnam just to get those moments out of my subconscious.

 

Writing my stories, I tend to leave the really bad stuff out or mention the bad stuff as light as possible, some reference to war actions are made but most of the time I report on the hum drum, causal, boring, day-to-day side of the life and times of me.

 

Looking back on the life and times of me found my life in the military had me focused on all that happened in front, to the side, above, below and behind me. Having a different perspective on life when I was twenty years old kept me alive and almost sane while my outlook on life these days helps me with the staying sane part of life.

 

Many of my war stories about the life and times of me in the US Army are posted here on Face Book so my family and friends can see and hear about the life and times of me from 1970 to 1991.

Guess we can say my daughter Julie caused me to look back at the life and times of me when she mentioned one day, she had no idea what my life was like in the Military since I was gone most of her life.

 

Here are a few views of some of my stories written about my life so my daughter, family and friends had some idea of what life was like for me while I was away.

 

One day while on guard duty at Nha Trang Air Base the bad folks decided to send about twenty rocket propelled explosive devices onto the airfield and blow a few things up. My partner and I took refuge in the revetment mini-bunker and watched as the blast happened all over the airfield. The entire assault only lasted fifteen minutes or so but what a crazy fifteen minutes. Sadly, we did not have a camera with us, or we would have had some neat photographs to share.

 

The attack was a real fire works type display which ended when part of one of those devices landed about twenty yards from our location. The device exploded in red, blue, and gray haze and a metal portion of the device slid those twenty yards right up to our mini bunker.  My partner not realizing the danger involved reached out, grabbed the piece of smoking red hot shrapnel followed by a very loud string of curse words, and a fast adaptation of Ouch Hot Hot Hot tossing the hot metal against the wall of the mini bunker.

 

My partner was not injured badly, did get second degree burns on both hands and later got a purple heart for being injured in a combat zone by enemy fire.

 

Another time at Christmas everyone who had a gun decided to shoot their guns into the air at Midnight on Christmas Day. That sounds great but that ammo fired into the sky only goes so far up in the air and then it falls back down to earth, and it will hurt if it hits you.

 

War makes folks do crazy things and those crazy things can get us killed if we are not careful.

 

Not thinking being part of an armed MP escort (MP Gun Jeep with three heavily armed MPs and 50 Cal Machine Gun) for the bar girls, dancers and singers who performed at the Officer and NCO Clubs was simply wrong and could get me killed.

 

Not sure how the unit commander would have written up me and my team being injured or killed while transporting civilians to and from a bar?

 

Going off the military post in a war zone to the bars for fun using civilian transportation was not simply crazy but stupid, my friends did this daily and nightly. The only time I ventured off the military base was for duty or going to the USO located off the base/post.

 

Pulling extra guard duty for extra money on the perimeter fences of the military post knowing the enemy was just on the other side waiting for an opportunity to attack the fence line.

 

Getting paid for being a lifeguard at the local pool and beach sitting on a tower which was a target for any bad folks who could not go to the beach or pool that day!

 

Flying with one of the flight crews on code intercept flight over enemy occupied areas so I could get pictures of Vietnam to send home showing I was really in Vietnam!

 

Yes, being young in the Military was wild and crazy and I am lucky to have survived that life, yet here I am typing about some of those crazy times.

 

Brain Fog has set in and my thoughts on why I write about the life and times of me in the military have flitted away, type at yall about the life and times of me later.

Wertheim Germany in the 1980s

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wertheim_am_Main

 

 

I write stories about the life and times of me so my family and friends will know what life was like back in the good old and not so good days in my life.

 

 

I feel it is important to try and capture some of those lazy, crazy, hazy days of smiles from our long-lost and not so lost past, so I will make every effort to get the information from those times from so long ago correct, but my brain fog may cause some issues every now and then.

 

 

As brain fog kicks in dates, places, names, and such may be just a little off. If folks do not like these moments, do not read them, move on to other stories that you may like – Smiles and Frowns.

 

 

In the late 1980s I (Robert Wayne Busby), when I was thirty something was a Chief Warrant Officer Two (CW2) assigned with the US Army (USA) Criminal Investigation Division Command (CID) as a Special Agent (SA) in Charge (SAC) of the Wertheim Branch Office (BO) at the US Army Post known as Peden Barracks, located on the side of a mountain looking down on the city of Wertheim, Germany.

 

In my day working with the USA CID our offices had totally different names and designations than they do in 2021 and many of those military facilities are no longer a military facility.

United States Army Criminal Investigation Command - Wikipedia

 

These days the US Army CID is identified as follows –

 CID units by state (army.mil) CID units worldwide (army.mil)

 

In the 1990s, working at a CID BO was a lot different than working at a CID District (Dist); Resident Agency (RA), or Field Office (FO), since there are usually only two folks in a BO.

 

 

A District Office in my day may have had as many as  thirty SAs assigned; an RA could have as many as fifteen SAs assigned; a FO could have as many as ten SAs assigned, but in my case I was the only special agent assigned at the BO, so not a lot of issues with who was in charge or who did what - smiles.

 

 

My boss was at the Würzburg FO in Wurzburg, Germany about twenty-five miles from Wertheim.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Würzburg

 

 

When I was assigned to Germany on my third tour of duty with the CID I was assigned to the Würzburg CID FO and worked there as a Team Chief (TC) for a year.

 

 

As more and more crimes were happening at Peden Barracks near Wertheim, Germany, our office at Wurzburg was spending a lot of time driving to and from Wertheim.

 

 

The drive was only twenty-six or so miles one way to Peden Barracks, but the drive was on the autobahn/interstate highway and then on a very small highway alongside a river that wandered up into the mountains, so the drive was not easy depending on traffic and weather. There were also various animal crossings that at times closed the roads.

 

 

Driving in Germany was dangerous, we had blizzards and snowstorms along with terrible icy roads at the most inconvenient times when responding to a felony crime.

 

 

Wertheim had a small group of MPs with three MPI taking care of any crime at Peden and was supplemented by MPs/CID from Wurzburg if need be.

 

 

Sadly, being the senior SA second to the SAC at Wurzburg assured I was the SA going to Peden Barracks too represent CID.

 

 

Then again it could have been because I did not always agree with the powers that be, was set in my ways, gave everyone hell if I thought I was right, but that is history now.

 

I enjoyed my time at Wurzburg, had a good place to live, enjoyed the work and the folks at the CID FO, but someone had to go to Wertheim and that someone was me, looking forward to a new adventure.

 

 

The assignment was not a bad duty assignment but could be lonely at times since I was the only CID SA assigned to Wertheim. My wife at the time was an MP/MPI and was with me at Wurzburg and Wertheim.

 

 

As long as I was available to investigate any CID cases (Felony Crime) that were reported to the Military Police (MP) at Peden Barracks, my time was mine and there were no Monday morning meetings that took all morning and all the rest of the fun office activities that took place in large CID offices.

 

 

Did not miss the back seat driving from the Wurzburg District Office which was co-located with the Wurzburg FO.

 

 

The draw back was being the only SA on duty, I was on duty twenty-four hours a day, every day, every week, every month!

 

 

Wurzburg was supposed to cover for me every now and then if I need time off and I covered for Wurzburg, but most of the time I was on my own.

 

 

Lucky for me I was a runner in those days, in fact if I missed a day of running, I was not worth being around. I set my office hours as 8:00 AM to 5:00PM in those days but was on call all the time.

 

 

My humble abode was on the second floor in a genuinely nice apartment in family officer quarters on Peden Barracks about three blocks from the MP station.  Every morning I would get up with the sun and go for a five-mile run through the farm fields located behind the old airfield.

 

 

My running days ended when I retired from the US Army in 1991, my knees and feet decided running in boots or just running all those years was too much and put me on a walking regiment.

 

My run would take me to the MP station where I would check in and advise the Desk Sergeant where I was running in case, the MPs needed to find me. No cell phones back then, and handheld radios did not have the best reception in the mountains.

 

 

My run took me past the post arch, movie theater, bowling alley and out the back gate.  The MP desk sergeant had a map of my running route so I could be found when and if needed.

 

 

While running I had a small battery-operated tape recorder (Walkman) with running music on it and would play the music loud so I could hear it.  Did not want to use headphones since I needed to be aware of what was going on around me, CID folks were not popular back in the day.

 

 

Running with a gun is always a hoot, fanny pack time, but one had to be careful, not that a Smith and Wesson 38 special with six in the cylinder and six in my two loaders would have helped much.

 

My music of choice was a tape of the 82^nd Air Born soldiers running in formation and doing the Air Born Cadence.

 

The farmers thought there was a hundred or so soldiers running through their fields every morning.

 

I also ran five-miles every night after work and enjoyed every minute of my runs since I was a runner in my soldier days all those years ago, not so much today – smiles.

 

 

 I had a running suit and shoes for every weather condition, and I ran in heat, wind, cold, snow, rain, ice, and any other weather situations.

 

 

Since I did not have CID office physical training daily, I had my own physical training daily.  On weekends I trained for a mini marathon, so I ran twelve miles on Saturday and six miles on Sunday. I trained for the Peden Barracks Regional Marathon held yearly.

 

 

Sadly, the winners were by age group and the first year my age group had a guest running team, the Swedish Army Long Distance Team, they took First, Second, Third and I took Forth.

 

 

My memories of my military days may not always be in the correct sequence they occurred in. Enjoy the memory but do not get hung up on the dates, times, and places, I will do the best I can to keep my memories in some sort of order.

 

 

More fun and exciting moments from the life and times of ME will follow when I remember to jot those down.

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