On a Wing and a Prayer...or If Nuns Had Messerschmidts

With some serious apologies to the Monty Python crew....


Page_1 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_2 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_3 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_4 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_5 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_6 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Page_7 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Laura looks so cuuute in that flying helmet!    

(Indeed... so very cute that I felt compelled to track down said flying helmet. )

davidd wrote:Laura looks so cuuute in that flying helmet!    

(Indeed... so very cute that I felt compelled to track down said flying helmet. )

The goggles are not the correct ones however

ThePhotogsBlog wrote:

davidd wrote:Laura looks so cuuute in that flying helmet!    

(Indeed... so very cute that I felt compelled to track down said flying helmet. )

The goggles are not the correct ones however

So I discovered. The set I purchased did not include goggles either. But... not that Nora LeValle would intentionally copy Laura Neville's personal style or anything... I was able to find the same "military police" tinted goggles... which actually look better than the originals, if "historical accuracy" is not required.

davidd wrote:

ThePhotogsBlog wrote:

davidd wrote:Laura looks so cuuute in that flying helmet!    

(Indeed... so very cute that I felt compelled to track down said flying helmet. )

The goggles are not the correct ones however

So I discovered. The set I purchased did not include goggles either. But... not that Nora LeValle would intentionally copy Laura Neville's personal style or anything... I was able to find the same "military police" tinted goggles... which actually look better than the originals, if "historical accuracy" is not required.

The originals are a real pain, which is why I'm not using them. Like you said, historical accuracy not required. I was thinking the riposte might come from the flying nun squadron....

Well that's some slang if I've ever read some, Laura really needs to build an air raid siren, maybe set up a few more AA guns around.

Theboo-bomb wrote:Well that's some slang if I've ever read some, Laura really needs to build an air raid siren, maybe set up a few more AA guns around.

I stole almost all of it from a Monty Python sketch called "RAF" Banter, substituting only a few words here and there to keep it relevant to K-Troop.

They're very cute

That was fun to read. A bit of wackiness is always a joy.

Stryker2011 wrote:That was fun to read. A bit of wackiness is always a joy.

It's something I've been itching to do for a while now.

very cool set up and figures, and super fun photostory! thanks for sharing!

Haha yeah I had to think of Monty Python too. Totally fits your troop. Great posing and photogsGraphy as always.

As a kid I visited a swiss air force base. We learned they used some coded accent/language of French, Italian, and swiss German for long range communication,  only the pilots and some air force crew can understand it.

Ovy wrote:Haha yeah I had to think of Monty Python too. Totally fits your troop. Great posing and photogsGraphy as always.

As a kid I visited a swiss air force base. We learned they used some coded accent/language of French, Italian, and swiss German for long range communication,  only the pilots and some air force crew can understand it.

That's fairly common in armies recruited among linguistically diverse populations. During WWII, the US military used Native American radio operators speaking in Native American tongues, which the enemy could never understand. The most famous are the Navajo, but I believe there were others as well.

In the battle of Dien Bien Phu, two of the top French Paratroop officers were Bretons and spoke to each other on the radio in their native dialects which the Viet-Minh could not understand.

I'm sure I've read of plenty of other instances, but those are the only two that come to mind at the moment.

I don't know how accurate it is, but I've seen old movies in which the WWII American soldiers speak in Pig Latin to confuse the enemy.

Pig Latin was a popular fad in the States in the 1930s and 1940s, so most kids probably grew up being somewhat familiar with it, but I imagine it would be quite challenging for a non-native English speaker to grasp quickly.

davidd wrote:I don't know how accurate it is, but I've seen old movies in which the WWII American soldiers speak in Pig Latin to confuse the enemy.

Pig Latin was a popular fad in the States in the 1930s and 1940s, so most kids probably grew up being somewhat familiar with it, but I imagine it would be quite challenging for a non-native English speaker to grasp quickly.

Especially since there's more than one form of Pig Latin.

"The name code talkers is strongly associated with bilingual Navajo speakers specially recruited during World War II by the US Marine Corps to serve in their standard communications units of the Pacific theater. Code talking, however, was pioneered by the Cherokee and Choctaw peoples during World War I.

This from Wikipedia

Other Native American code talkers were deployed by the United States Army during World War II, including Lakota,[3] Meskwaki, Mohawk,[4][5] Comanche, Tlingit,[6] Hopi,[7] Cree, and Crow soldiers; they served in the Pacific, North African, and European theaters.[8]"

Yeah, that would have confused the enemy. Imagine Germans or Japanese trying to understand Lakota or Mohawk.

Today, I suppose we might also look for guys who speak Klingon.

Interesting stuff, pig latin sounds great and is structured quite logically from what I take...reading the Wikipedia article.

Sadly the first time I heard about the Windtalkers was from watching the movie of the same name. It's about Nicholas Cage winning the Pacific War singlehandedly, hip shooting his smg. There are also Windtalkers in the background somewhere. I guess there is code talking to be heard too, but it's hard to understand through the loud music, screams and shooting accompanying Nic Cage's superhuman exploits.
But it got me interested in the topic, at least.

Oh and  I found the language I mentioned earlier, it's the Swiss Airforce's Bambini Code.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bambini-Code

It has a vocabulary of about 500 words, some are in the article.


Perhaps you can develop/hint your own kind of code language, mixing Spanish, Japanese, English regional accents etc.? Katroopian or something. Would be very interezting.

Ovy wrote:Interesting stuff, pig latin sounds great and is structured quite logically from what I take...reading the Wikipedia article.

Sadly the first time I heard about the Windtalkers was from watching the movie of the same name. It's about Nicholas Cage winning the Pacific War singlehandedly, hip shooting his smg. There are also Windtalkers in the background somewhere. I guess there is code talking to be heard too, but it's hard to understand through the loud music, screams and shooting accompanying Nic Cage's superhuman exploits.
But it got me interested in the topic, at least.

Oh and  I found the language I mentioned earlier, it's the Swiss Airforce's Bambini Code.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bambini-Code

It has a vocabulary of about 500 words, some are in the article.


Perhaps you can develop/hint your own kind of code language, mixing Spanish, Japanese, English regional accents etc.? Katroopian or something. Would be very interezting.

I think Laura's RAF modified banter would be confusing enough, though Katroopian sounds interesting as a challenge.

 I can't believe you guys handed me this one on a platter:

Ovy wrote:Katroopian or something. Would be very interezting.

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Funny stuff, David, sounds like they've got it all covered.

Lauging my head off!

Pew Pew first, confirm who they are firing at later seems to have worked this time around. Good for those guys!

Sheer brilliance Dave! loved it!