Posted on 08/05/2015 5:59:25 PM PDT by Kathy in Alaska
|
"Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre / mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen lytlað." "Thought must be the harder, heart be the keener / mind must be the greater, as our might lessens." |
|
‘Tis
One sees all kinds of things as duty officer, patrolling the battalion area in the middle of the night. One thing I was required to do was check the locks of various buildings to make sure there hadnt been a break-in.
As I approached this particular temporary wooden building of World War II vintage, I noticed a skunk with her kittens foraging on the lawn by the entrance. When I approached, the mother skunk went into her dance to warn that she was ready to spray. She stood her ground, and I could not get to the door to check it. After a while, I gave up, returned to battalion headquarters and wrote in the log:
Could not check building. Was repelled by skunk commandos who had it locked down tight.
Hurrah for victory!!!
We have great IT guys here.
Good evening, smokingfrog....great link. I’ll read the whole thing when I get home.
He was quite the interesting sailor.
Thanks, SP4 clerk. d:o)
I was a first lieutenant when I was teamed with another first lieutenant to teach a class on military justice. These things can be frightfully dull, but the Army likes to use skits in training, so the two of us worked on a series of ideas that would get the class involved. We decided to start off with my getting shot by my SP4 clerk. Then we would take him through the entire procedure from arrest to general court-martial.
My clerk went to the Fort Lewis Players and procured a blank pistol for the verisimilitude. We placed him in the back of the room, and then I began, Gentlemen, todays five hour block of instruction is on the Uniform Code of Military Justice. My SP4 jumped up, aimed the pistol at me and screamed, Die, lifer! He fired several shots and I hit the ground.
From the corner of my eye, I could see utter pandemonium. My clerk was mobbed by a group of senior NCOs who thought they were witnessing the end of their careers.
Grab him!
Get the gun!
The company first sergeant screamed, Break his finger! Break his finger!
Most of the students did the proper thing by hitting the deck. One private tried to open the window, failed, used his elbow to break the glass, and was attempting to jump out of the second floor before someone stopped him. Another soldier ripped up the rug, dislodged all the desks and attempted to crawl under the rug and hide.
My teaching partner calmed everyone down and said, Gentlemen, you have just witnessed a murder!
The soldier who had tried to hide under the rug was from the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn and had probably witnessed his share of gang activity. Pointing his finger at my teaching partner, he was in tears as he screamed, I didnt see nothin, man! I didnt see nothin!
I had a tough time keeping a straight face on the ground. My partner stood over me and chanted, My father can beat your father at dominoes, which was probably as close to Latin as that Colorado Presbyterian would ever get. I stood up and saw a whole room in shock.
The people from the Fort Lewis G-3 shop, who were there to inspect the class, said it was the best military justice class they had ever witnessed. But they were among the first to hit the deck.
My goodness....they did say give it up and repercussions. But WOW!
Warrant Officers are OK
But I tell everyone “don’t call me sir, I know both of my parents”
Knowing the rules is knowing the rules. How can you argue....LOL!
Oh they argue!
Daddy was in the combat engineers in WWII. He must have been a pretty good scrounger as he brought home a Luger, a P-38 and a .32 auto which he described as an Austro-Hungarian pistol. He also acquired a mint Leica 35 mm rangefinder.
His battalion was sent to Berlin soon after the war ended and most of the men would feed various German children who were in pretty sad shape. The two Daddy adopted were a brother and sister named Fritz and Ingrid. Those kids were how Daddy got the Luger.
It was the most desired souvenir of the war. One day Daddy just asked Fritz if he could get him a Luger. He said Fritz took off running and after around an hour brought him a sack which contained a Luger, holster and spare mag.
Daddy never asked him where he got it but was sure it had been buried as it had a lot of dirt in the sack.
Daddy later sold it to his first cousin who was the Florida Golden Gloves champion.
Thanks, ken, for sharing your story. I’m always amazed at the treatment, by the public, of our military depending on world conditions.
Humor In Uniform...always my first stop in reading the Digest when I was a kid.
My Uncle Glenn served on the USS Dragonet, a submarine in the Pacific. He tells the story of the time they were caught in a typhoon and had to ride it out on the surface. Three days of constant motion, occasional baloney sandwiches and seasickness.
He always said: "I was one of the lucky ones, I had a top bunk. The guys I felt sorry for were the poor bastards on the bottom."
Uncle Glenn turned 93 this year.
"Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre / mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen lytlað." "Thought must be the harder, heart be the keener / mind must be the greater, as our might lessens." |
|
Skunk commandos...LOL!
Did anyone ask you to explain your entry?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.