Dana perino recalls her experiences as White House Press secretary and her life thereafter, and Gernot Wagner looks at Climate Change and more. Visit booktv. Org. Booktv, 48 hours of nonfiction books and authors. Television for serious readers. First up this weekend on booktv geoff dyer talks about his experiences while living aboard the uss george h. W. Bush. [inaudible conversations] hi, everybody. My names clay smith. I am the Program Director of this festival so thank you for being here. Con fronting the confronting the drizzle or the mist or the rain or whatever we want to call it. Youre not here to hear from me, youre obviously here to listen to geoff dyer. Let me tell you a little bit about geoff and he and i will be in conversation for a while and then well open it up to questions from you all. Geoff dyer is the author of four novels two collections of essays and seven genredefying titles and they are but beautiful, the missing of the thome, out of sheer rage, yoga for people who cant be bothered to do it [laughter] the ongoing moment and xona, a book about the film stalker. He is the coeditor of what was true the photographs and notebooks of william getny. Hes a fellow with the Royal Society of literature and an honorary fellow of Corpus Christi college at oxford. A selection of his essays won the National Book critics circle award for criticism. Thats the official bio of geoff dyer. The more sort of informal and briefer one says that geoff is one of the most intriguing and wide ranging intellects writing today period. Hes written about world war i jazz, photography, d. H. Lawrence with razor sharp insight and wit. Hes a sol ideal revealing openminded writer are. When an editor asked him where of all the places on earth hed like to spend time to write about this lanky british individual chose an american Aircraft Carrier, and that is why we have his latest book another great day at sea life abrothered the uss george h. W. Bush. You all can meet geoff after the two of us talk here for a bit and get him to sign his books for you. We want you to remember that sales of books during this weekend actually benefit the festival and help insure that we can continue to produce this event in the future. So we hope youll meet geoff after the two of us talk here for a bit. So thanks for coming, geoff. Oh, thank you clay. Great to be here. Thank you all for coming. Is that really how this book got started, that you were asked where of anywhere on earth would you like to spend a little time in order to write about that place, and you said, oh an american Aircraft Carrier . Yeah. Well ill give you i can give you quite a thorough eczema nation of that. Explanation of that. As you know every College Everywhere has a writer in residence and you know, even some prisons have writers in residence. [laughter] i mean, in addition to the ones who are, you know [laughter] who happen to be writers. And there was once this rather strange gig as a man was writer in residence at Heathrow Airport for two week, and he wrote a short book about that experience. He enjoyed that so much that he set up this foundation called writers in residence, the idea of which was to put writers in residence in some interesting places. And in exchange for that, you would write a book about your experience. So, you know, im a professional writer which means i will do anything to get out of the house. [laughter] so is when he called and said was there somewhere id like to go i immediately liked the idea of it. And then as i thought of where i might like to go it became very quickly apparent to me it would be a real waste to go anywhere that that i might have access to in my normal life, you know . Be even a super luxurious sort of overthewater bungalow in that hitty which, of course, i liked that kind of stuff that here tee. But the thing is i could go there under my own steam and with a bit of ingenuity, i could probably arrange it for free as well. So, you know, there was no need, there was no point thinking of so very quickly, i mean the thought process narrowed down to somewhere really somewhere military really, somewhere that you couldnt get to in your own life. Britain doesnt have an Aircraft Carrier because were were still kind of bankrupt from fighting the second world war. And theres one being built i think. But in any case, i wouldnt have wanted to be on a british Aircraft Carrier. But i said to him if he could get me on an american Aircraft Carrier, i would do it. And time went by, about four months i think, maybe even less. He called back and said okay thats it, youre on. Youve got to just, you know, when are you free to fly to bahrain . And from bahrain we would fly onto the carrier. And then it was really striking to me how painless this process was because, you know im here in america on an 01 visa, and its a real headache getting a visa. Its incredibly time consuming, and you have to call in all sorts of favors from people to get to write letters for you whereas getting on this Aircraft Carrier, strangely, involved no effort at all. So when i did the first public event in london when the book came out i said was it really as easy as it seemed . He said, no, it was actually the most difficult thing hed ever been involved in. [laughter] and at one point he got a call from a really quite high ranking sort of Public Affairs person in the u. S. Navy who said, look ive discovered there are two geoff dyers both of whose names are spelled in exactly the same way. One seems to write these sort of layabout novels, the other is a perfectly respectable journalist with the financial times. Please tell me its the second one. [laughter] but, you know, he was educated as a philosopher which means hes able to fudge these issues of truth and falsehood. Anyway they ended up with me. [laughter] and thats thats how it, thats how it, thats how it came about. Yeah. So you this may be besides catch 22 the funniest book about the military that i have ever read. And one of the funny things about it is yourself. And you write quite honestly that you have a total inability to get used to things that you dont can really want to get used to. And when you showed up on the ship you had asked for a room of your own [laughter] well, its not only had i asked for a i mean, i was really adamant that i had to have a room of my own. And they wrote back and said he has to understand that sometimes there are sort of 400 people to adorn. Hes going to get quite sort of vip treatment by sharing with just five other officers. And i was able to write back no no, no for me, actually, id rather share with 400 than 5 because the more people are diluted, the better really. Its better to share with five than one other person, i think, in a room. I mean, obviously, there are many circumstances in which id be very happy to be in a room with someone on my own. This wasnt one of those circumstances where i wanted to, where i wanted to avail myself of those privileges. And so i wrote back and said, oh you know, i have to have a room of my own because ill be typing at night, and ill keep other people awake and they said, you know with planes coming in to land and taking off, you know, we wont be able to hear you. [laughter] so then i, you know, the next sort of thing, i said, oh, you know, my prostate is shot to hell i need to pee twice a night and ill wake people up. [laughter] and then it went on until eventually, you know, i sort of this was, you know, the thing is i really had to have my own room. I just felt i couldnt bear it. I mean, im an only child. I have no brothers or sisters. And as my wife is always saying in not entirely fond terms, you know im incapable of sharing. [laughter] so anyway i resigned myself to sharing this room and i was really dreading it. And then i should have added as well each writer in this series went to the institution that they were going to be in residence on with a photographer. So we land on the carrier, and they take me, you know, im thinking, okay theyre going to take me in the snapper. I refer to this distinguished photographer never by name, only as the snapper throughout the book something that he was not too happy about when he finally saw the proofs of it. Anyway, they took me to my own room, not only to my own room, i ended up in the Vice President ial suite. The thing is that basically i took on the might of the u. S. Navy and won. [laughter] and as, if you its always nice witnessing other peoples humiliation, isnt it . But if you look at some of the reviews on amazon youll see that this, my insisting on my getting my own room is the first of many things that antagonize some of the reviewers on the amazon site to the extent that one of the great ones it begins Something Like is it possible to loathe a person youve never met just on the basis of their writing . But the great thing is youre not buying the book on amazon youre buying it here, so we dont care what these incredibly antagonistic people say. [laughter] so you write very honestly in the book. I mean, you didnt like the food. It was never quiet. You felt like you never fit in. You write the Aircraft Carrier, quote smelled like a gram with 50,000 cars in it, each suffering a major fuel leak. And yet your writing about it is funny and witty, its kind, its even generous. So were you taking notes on the ship and writing, you know, at night, or did you sort of have the remove of some time and distance to sort of recast your thoughts . Well, a bit of both. You know, i certainly was taking notes all the time because it was one of the most intense experiences i was only on this ship for two weeks. Each day was jam packed, and id be seeing one incredible thing. And, you know, that would make quite an impression on me, and then that would be instantly overlain with another incredible thing. So yeah, i was taking notes all the time. Actually, it was rather wise of me to have insisted on my own room. Im used to slobbing around at home in my sort of pajamas, and im not used to spending the days with other people, and i was meeting a lot of people for the first time with all of the you know, it was really enjoyable but with all the demands that sort of made on me and noticing stuff. Every time i got a moment id come back to my stateroom, shut door with a huge sense of relief and start writing it up. It was essential to preserve what to preserve my impressions while the memories were sharp because, you know, every time i went back to the room id already been to sort of four amazing places. So is, yeah, it was really it was necessary to take those notes. But then, of course, i had many months to rewrite, to rewrite the whole thing properly when i was back. But, yeah, i really did and anyone who writes knows how important it is to make notes. Yeah. Well would you read a little bit from oh, yes. The book . Certainly. Do you know, it was funny because clay suggested i read a piece, and from its an interview with somebody on the ship. And its funny its one of the most satirical pieces in the book. I said god, i really dont want to read that bit. I dont want to come here and people will just think ive gone onto this incredible ship and ive just been making fun of it. So i thought id read you two other passages, the second of which will be another bit of sort of making fun at someone, but thats, i feel okay about that because the person that is being made fun of is myself. [laughter] but i thought it was probably best if i just describe to you so what happened, we flew from bahrain in this on this plane, and as we came in to land we missed the arresting wire to went round again. Then we landed successfully caught the arresting wire. Once we sort of checked in as it were then we were back where of course, i was really impatient to be, on the flight deck, you know, which is where all the action is as it were. And ill just, yeah, ill just describe my First Impressions of the flight deck. There was a lot to take in or not to be able to take in, like the size to have the flight deck. How big was it . Impossible to say. It was as big as it was. There was nothing to compare it with. Well, there were people and jets and tons of other equipment. But there was nothing bigger than it. Except the sea and sky which always serve to emphasize the lack of Everything Else. So in tangible physical terms the carrier was the world and as such, was all that was the case. I was not the first writer ever to set foot on an Aircraft Carrier. One of my principled successors has been hauled predecessors has been hauled up for fiddling his expenses. This time the editor had him banged to rights claiming taxi fares during the period when hed actually been onboard the carrier. [laughter] i know, said the journalist, but have you seen the size of these things . [laughter] id heard another story about two brothers working in different sections of the same character who didnt set eyes on each other during the seven months of their deployment. It didnt matter whether these stories were factually correct. Carriers are big, big as small towns, big enough to generate stories about how big they are. The flight deck is not only big, it is also overwhelmingly horizontal. Thats what the carrier has to be a pure and undisturbed length of horizontality. One remains that way whatever the sea pitches it. Pitches at it, excuse me. The teams in their colorcolded jerseys and float coats reminded me of a time id visited the Chicago Stock Exchange with the traders in their colorcoordinated blazers on the dealing floor, all gesturing and clamoring in repeated daily ritual that made perfect sense. The consequences of which were potentially catastrophic. Here, too the funks of each team the functions of each team were clearly differentiated according to a color cloald i did not yet understand except for the brown shirts. We were on one of the most technologically advanced places on earth but the guys in greasesmeared brown jerseys and float coats draped with heavy brown chains looked like they were ready to face the burning oil poured on them from walls of an impression national castle. The combination of medieval chains and Science Fiction didnt quite cover it though. There was also an element of the biker gang about them. All things considered, theirs was one of the toughest, roughest looks going. No wonder they stood there lounging with the grace of heavy gunslingers about to sway into a saloon. Every gesture was determined by having to move in this underwater weight of chain. I couldnt keep my eyes off them. They werent posing, but in this silent world everyone is looking at everyone else. Sorry, its silent because on the flight deck youre wearing these really really intense ear protectors. In this silent world everyone is looking at everyone else the whole time. All communication is visual. So youre conscious if youre a guy with a load of chains hanging round your shoulders like an ammo belt that youre the fulfillment of some kind of fantasy. Not a sexual one, more like a fantasy of evolution itself. And they werent swaggering there was just the grace that comes from having to minimize effort if a task is to be properly done, especially if a good part of that task involves standing around waiting with all that weight on your shoulders. The air was an ecological disaster. It was hot anyway and the heat reared up from the deck, dense with the fumes of jet fuel. Whenever a jet maneuvered towards the catapults or back to its parking slot or to the elevator, there was a wash of superheated wind like death valley with an oil gale blowing through it. Critics argue that the First World War and the invasion of iraq were all about americas insatiable need for oil. What did we need this oil for . Well to sustain our presence here to keep flying missions. The whole enterprise wreaked of oil. Planes were taking off. The fact that craniales insulated us from the ear and skysplitting noise emphasized the tremendous forces at work. There was an accuse sense of thousands of years of history and refinement the refinement of the urge to make war and the need for oil in order to do so converging here. I think well leave it at that for the moment, and ill read the other passage later on if we have a chance. Yeah, yeah. So you write about the size of the ship, but theres also, i think, you write that theres about 5000 people yeah. On that ship. It is a huge place, but you could never really get away from other people. Well, thats right. Yeah. Its this vast thing, and there are 5,000 people onboard, and i didnt realize that it was going to be as, you know, as crowded as a bombay slum is the phrase i use. [laughter] you know, i was naively thinking because it was so big i thought there might be Tennis Courts onboard. So i was expecting something of a cruise liner. And what it really reminded me of very much my dad, you know, when i was a 17yearold i used to borrow my dads car to go out, and he would never let me park it in his garage because that was always crammed so full of tools and paint tins that it was very, very difficult to maneuver the car in, and he never trusted me to do it. And it was very like. That every bit of space on this huge thing was used. And, you know underneath the flight deck, which is big and empty, of course theres the hangar deck where, you know, 66 planes are being store ised and repaired. So stored and repaired. So really that gives you a sense of all the stuff thats going on there. So, yeah, theres, theres its very, very crowded. Yeah. So did the navy put any conditions on you . I mean, one of the interesting chapters here is that you got to interview the, im sorry, i dont remember the exact term, but sort of the director of the brick. Oh, yeah. The prison on the ship. And there wasnt actually anyone in the prison at the time but did the navy say to you, you know, you cannot talk to this person or that department or no. They were absolutely i mean, at first when the snapper and i were told that we would always be escorted by this guy, i thought, oh, yeah, man, the pigs are trying to stop me from seeing stuff. But, in fact theres lots of it its very easy to have accidents because, you know, its an industrial environment as much as anything. The flight deck as the guy said the flight deck is the safest most dangerous place on earth. So, you know, you have to be very closely escorted when youre on the flight deck. And just nor more generally just more generally you have to have an escort because its so, you know, its on seven levels, they all look the same. Honestly, the photographer and i would still be trying to find the exit door now if we hadnt had the escort. And whenever whoever i said i wanted to speak to or wherever i wanted to go, you know they arranged it. There were really no restrictions put on me. I didnt go to the reactor room, i mean understandably, and there was just this incredible openness really. They couldnt have been more, more accommodating. Yeah. You interviewed a number of Service Members on the carrier. Is there one who still is fixed in your mind as being the most memorable . Oh, yeah. Well, there were so many. I mean, the other thing and i should say, of course i complained about the food, but by complaining about the field, its all at my expense, you know . You know, i knew i was going to like it. Aye always liked, like many english people, i first came to america when i was in my late 20s, and i loved it, so i knew i was going to like it on the carrier. In many ways, this was a concentration of americanness. Admittedly, a sort of version of america that i hadnt really seen. It would be, you know, bible belt midwest kind of thing. But still you know, i knew it was going to be a very sort of not surprisingly, an american experience. And, yeah i did really, really love it. And i met loads of incredible people. One of reasons the brig was empty, you know the navy has evolved since the days of captain bly and the mutiny on the bounty. Theres two reasons. One of the reasons that i think british people love being in america is the incredible politeness of American Society and the politeness that ive always associated with america was raised to some incredible level on the carrier for quite, you know obvious reasons, you know . Politeness is a way of making your way through the world painless. And it doesnt, you know, so its just a way of keeping just of things going. So the captain of the ship had really created a very, very nice atmosphere. These kids are all, you know, crammed together for seven months. The other thing i think that had had a huge effect on making it so, you know, i should have said this actually. Obviously, its a military ship, you know . Beneath the politeness there is that iron, inflexible discipline which has to be there in a military all military organizations are rigidly hierarchical. You cant run a military thing like a whole food coop, you know . [laughter] where you spend hours or days saying why were not going to get the soy milk from this supplier anymore because, you know, anyway. So its incredibly hierarchical, very, very polite, and the other thing i think made life so much easier for everybody when i went to this Oxford College which was founded in whichever year it was and then after about, god i mean 600 years probably they made this momentous decision while i was there they were gonna allow women in. And in this Oxford College there was this kind of thing hey they didnt there was no problem at all. Why didnt we do this 500 years ago . And similarly, i cant remember the exact figure, twofifths no maybe a fifth of the crew member were women. And that was another of the great thered been so much resistance to it, and then it was a similar thing. And one of the older, higher ranking officers on the ship said to me after all this fear about what women would do to the whole, you know, was it just going to become, you know incredible thing where all anyone did was flirt all day, they actually said the only real effect was the boat smelled a bit nicer, he said because the guys showered more. [laughter] so yeah, it was, you know, the military weirdly has had, you know the military was at forefront of racial integration. So its a funny, its a sort of funny thing. It felt like a very, you know, very progressive place. I didnt see any one of the it was a funny thing after id been on the boat for this two weeks, and, you know, and when i flew off the boat, there was some, there was a woman flying off with me, and she wasnt in her sort of uniform, she was just wearing a normal tshirt, and she had long hair. You know, i was kind of noticing her, shall we say. So i wrote about this in the book, and another comment on amazon was from one of the crew members who said Something Like, yeah you know i read that bit about him sort of eyeing up this woman. Yeah hes a bit creepy. [laughter] so basically i was the only creepy guy on the boat. [laughter] i was also the only guy on the boat that called it a boat. [laughter] the politeness the sort of heightened politeness that you mentioned seems pretty important because you do write that, quote, for everyone except the pilots and helicopter crews, the carrier was a kind of prison ship. So these 5,000 people onboard who had to stay on the ship much longer than you did, is it because of that politeness that theyre able to withstand it or well theres all sorts of things. I mean, theyre kept incredibly busy as well. Another of my assumptions i assumed there would be a bar [laughter] where i was, you know, where i was really looking forward to racking up some expense claims. Of course theres no bar. And, you know, theyre kept incredibly busy. Theyre working you know, the kids are basically college age, you know . And when i was at college, you know a lot of that time was spent drinking. [laughter] you know . Theyre really, theyre working really hard and then when their long arduous days end, theyre either work out so theyre all theyre in the gym a lot or theyre passing exams to try to get, you know to work their way up to the next level. Its really very impressive. And i should have said when you asked about did i meet some impressive people, the captain was incredibly impressive. Even more impressive in a way i thought, was the way that for five days on the carrier he was outranked by admiral of the whole fleet came to stay on the ship. And she which i think is incredibly cool in itself admiral nora tyson from kentucky, she was an english major. So it was just a really, you know, a lot of the people hadnt i mean, a lot of the kids i was talking to they were of course, as youd expect people who didnt have much else going on in their life, and many of them were those kind of kids who werent academically gifted at all. But from the age of 12, theyd be able to sort of repair a bike puncture. Maybe that doesnt sound impressive to you. Okay from the age of 5. [laughter] obviously, this is a mechanicallyminded audience. [laughter] yeah. But i think the single most impressive guy i met was this guy with this amazing name. He was from birmingham, alabama and his name was clinton stonewall iii this africanamerican guy. And when he introduced himself like that, clinton stonewall iii from birmingham alabama i said jeez, i mean is it possible to get more history into one name. [laughter] and he was just an extraordinary guy and gave this amazing speech when he was promoted. It was just incredible speech. And at the end of it all of his friends were going up to him and, you know in that sort of very punching him on the back and all this kind of stuff. And i sort of went up to him as well and congratulated him. Honestly, my vision was all smeary because i had tears running down my cheeks in a rather pathetic way, but it was just so impressive. Yeah. Do you want to read one more passage . Sure. So i thought this is i mean one of the things about the book w yeah, its really im glad you said it was funny. And the humor comes from just this kind of, you know, collision really between, you know theres this world, you know where everyone had, you know, everyone is told what to do all the time. Id come from this life where you know from college onwards identify just done whatever ive just done whatever i wanted 365 days a year. So this kind of collision is quite interesting, i think. I was always selfconscious on the boat, and i know it should be called a ship, but i just loved calling it a boat. [laughter] never felt like i was blending in. The crew members were too busy with their long shifts, their chow and Everything Else that occupied their crowded days to pay me any mind, but i felt as though i stuck out like a hitchhikers thumb. I kept circling back to joan didions sly declaration of her advantages as a reporter in slouching towards bethlehem one of which was that she was, quote, so physically small that people forgot all about her. I, on the other hand was probably the tall, thinnest and to my great chagrin, oldest person on the boat. I was forever in the way constantly saying, sorry, and excuse me. And generally ganging around place never more conspicuous than when i was athe tempting to lurk unseen on the edges of the gym like peter crouch looming into the penalty box. Hes a very tall, skinny english footballer. There was a line to get into the gym, and there wasnt a lot of space once you got in. It wasnt just that the room was small, there was also the small matter of every person in it being twice the size being the size of two people. Arms were as big as legs, necks the size of waists and so on. Three guys were running marathons on treld millings. Treadmills. The rest were inflating themselves with weights. They favored baggy shorts or tshirts or singlets to prove that however big they got, there was always room for further expansion. Even the guys who didnt look that big, they were plenty big. The bald guys looked like their skulls were pumped. [laughter] inked and slinky the mermaid on a bicep had had become six months pregnant by the time a set of reps had been completed. [laughter] ive always been intimidated by gyms have never been able to enjoy the towel around the shoulder confidence of somebody who knows he can bench press 250 pounds or even knows what that means or how much 250 pounds actually weighs. I just know i dont like lifting heavy things. [laughter] especially since i had this wrist injury which stopped me playing tennis which means ive gone from being fit and thin looking to just a feeble streak of unshouldered manhood whose only saving grace is he doesnt take up much space and leaves plenty of room for others. [laughter] i slunk in the corner like a whipped pup wondering if a tattoo of a bulldog would have made me look more or less pathetic. [laughter] the room was straining with grimacing biceps. Breath came in fierce snorts. There was the clank of heavy metal being laid roughly to rest. I was conscious that i was staring at these arms and chests with an intensity that might have been construed as homoerotic. Anthony bennett, the fit boss, was standing next to me wearing a tshirt and biceps. Hed grown up in a military family but was actually a civilian supervising the exercise program on a ship. From what i could see his job resembled that of a bouncer, stopping people getting in. The gym was filled to capacity, so he was operating the old one in one out policy that you get at overcrowded nightclubs. I didnt know what to say but feeling i ought to ask a question i said how big can a human arm become before it stops being a limb and morphs into Something Else . [laughter] excuse me, he said . And so i changed my tune and came up with a different question still physical but less meta. I said are you the fittest person on boat i said . A lot of people fitter than me. A lot of people fatter than me, i quipped back. Then fearing that conversation was taking on a slightly unhinged quality, i asked him about the food and its compatibility or otherwise with fitness and well being. Most people eat healthier on the ship than they do at home, he said. This seemed stockily plausible. Stockily plausible. I nodded in a way that i hoped did not seem too snooty. We stood without speaking, armed folded his massively mine meagerly. Like spectators at a muscular orgy. He smiled shook his head, said hed ask around. Well better make room for somebody else, i said, squeezing past him as though id just shattered the world bench press and reps record. So theres lots of encounters like that. [laughter] yeah. So i think weve got time for a quick question or two. Does anybody have a question for our tofueating, snooty guy over here . [laughter] oh and the microphones are going to come around to you all so just wait. So you got to pick the two weeks on a boat, what would you pick for your next two weeks if you had a choice of anything . Oh, good question. Im really i would love to, id love to go into space. So i mean yeah, id be really up for that, yeah. I dont think itd be as easy to make happen a. Oh no, youre quite right. No. But if you have any influence yeah im certainly ready for that. [laughter] steve. Did you have to submit the manuscript to the pentagon before it was published . No, i didnt, because there was all of these books these great books that have come out of afghanistan and iraq youll find that in all of them that the writers always end up saying how, you know, accommodating the military were because, you know, the great thing about a book, its published so far after the event theres not really any case to be made for it general diagnoses, you know, Operational Security jeopardizing Operational Security and this is so anecdotal and observational. There was yeah, there was nothing you didnt get close to combat, i assume. Well, i saw the planes taking off, and they, you know, and then theyd land again. But really it wasnt, you know even if whatever the planes had been doing i wouldnt have seen what they were doing. It just really wasnt an issue. And also, you know the truth is that the military comes out of this looking, you know, pretty well and justifiably so. Theres the bigger question which i dont get into of whether the aircraft should be there at all. You know, that seemed to me a whole other question, whether iraq should have been invaded. Fortunately we havent got time to get into that now. [laughter] what did you think of the experience of being caught in the arresting gear and actually the catapult to launch you off the ship with . What did you think of that . Oh, yeah. That was great, and on the, on the way out the plane i was taking off on, i was sitting backwards. So the g force was going to throw me back into the sort of straps. And they made this big fuss about youve got to strap yourself in really tight and you know all this. And the buckles were right over my collarbones. So and it was really noisy and i yelled to the guy whos like the Flight Attendant i said, the buckles are over my collarbones, and he said in that kind of what do you want me to do about it, sir . [laughter] i was sort of like on a plane, you know, could you bring me a gin and tonic . I said im worried that its going to shatter my collarbones. And he said its not going to happen. I experienced the g force but there was no problem at all. So it was exciting, and i liked that. If there had been room for me to have gone up in a twoseater f18 in the passenger seat, i would, of course i love all this stuff. But, you know, there are some twoseaters, but the person, the navigator is fulfilling a function that i would not have been able to have fulfilled myself. Yeah. Yes, sir. Lets wait til the mics going to come to you. During the vietnam era i served and i had a cousin that was going into the navy. And they went to a Swimming Pool during basic training they went to a Swimming Pool . Swimming pool. And he said the drill instructor said who can swim here . Jumped into the 9 foot. Who cant swim . He was one of them, my cousin. Go to 3 feet and go like this. [laughter] so he didnt know how to swim. Did you happen to find out if they had a pool on that ship, or did these guys could swim or not . Because my cousin couldnt swim, but he was in the navy. Yeah, yeah. They didnt have a pool, but earlier in the deployment when i was there, they had a party up on the flight deck, and earlier which was amazing, one of the great days of my life. Earlier on theyd had this thing, i cant remember what the name for it is, but they sort of stopped the carrier, and they had this thing where they can jump off the carrier and swim around. So that would be a way of discovering if you could if you could swim, yeah. [laughter] and, again, i love jumping off high places into water so all of that stuff i was really up for. But, you know i couldnt really ask the captain to stop stop the boat for a day so that we could all clown around in the sea. So no pool and no bar sounds like it was great. [laughter] any other well, it was great. Thats what i really want to emphasize. It was amazing. Any more questions . I have a question. [inaudible] yeah, go ahead. You need the lets wait did you get any feedback from any of the personnel on the ship after they read your book . Yeah. The question was whether i got any feedback from the personnel. The guy who chaperoned me around we got on so well. He was an amazing guy. I mean, we its this thing you know . What is it, i mean, obviously on a ship like in the other thing as well as politeness, i mean theres a lot of joking and bantering, and im english so im always up for that. And so we, we really had great great fun. And it was endless teasing. He was a real born again christian really evangelical. I mean a zealot really. And, you know im every bit a zealot as an atheist. And we just had so much time just joshing around like this. And same with all of this so yeah, i really got on with everybody, and i heard from quite a new people including admiral nora tyson saying how much she liked the book. And apart from the person who said i was creepy [laughter] anything ive heard has been really quite positive. And not i mean, the thing is about the book that its, you know, really, you know when im making a fuss about not liking the food, you know im not unaware that im behaving like a spoiled brat and a jerk, you know . So its a thing of buying into that really. You either find it funny or you just find me, find the author a sort of pain in the neck, you know . I know which side im on [laughter] find myself incredibly charming. Well, lets thank our pain in the neck for coming down. [laughter] [applause] and geoff is going to go and sign books up on the second floor, so just meet him up there. Thank you. Sure thing. [inaudible conversations] booktv is on twitter and facebook, and we want to hear from you. Tweet us, twitter. Com booktv or post a comment on our Facebook Page facebook. Com booktv. Here are a few of the book festivals well be covering this spring on cspan2s booktv. This weekend well visit maryland for live coverage of the gait thers burg book vest fall with tom davis and martin frost as well as former Senior Adviser to president obama david axlerod. And then well close out may at Bookexpo America in new york city where the Publishing Industry showcases their upcoming books. Then on the first week in june, were live for the Chicago Tribune printers row lit fest including our threehour live in Depth Program with Lawrence Wright and your phone calls. Thats this spring on cspan2s booktv. Andrew krepinevich and barry watts talk about their biography of Andrew Marshall head of the pentagons office of net assessment, the pentagons think tank, from 19732015. The coauthors are former members of marshalls staff. This event was held at the nixon president ial library and museum in yorba linda, california. [applause] tonights