Getting psyched for Christmas...

If you have followed this blog for any time at all, you know I really love almost every season of the year.  I really enjoy the spring and the rebirth of the flowers, grass, trees and animals that come with that season.  I particularly like the fact that Spring signals the beginning of another season of golf -- the quest to hit my 3-wood better and more consistently off the tee, and to cut down on the number of three putts I make.

I like the Summer because it is so enjoyable to take our little boat ("Miss Pam") over the the lake and just cruise around for a while in the evening.  It's only 10 min. from the driveway to the boat ramp.  Lake Loramie is a pretty nice little lake, and we really enjoy it.  I especially liked it when we could take Bailey (our dog) with us. 

Fall is nice because that means football.  Maybe even more than Spring, I like to play golf in the Fall.  I really enjoy the scenery and cling to every last day I can tee it up.  I played 18-holes on November 25th and it was absolutely beautiful.  I hate to admit it, but that might be the last day for this year.

And now, to the point of this article.  Winter.  I love the Winter because it brings crisp days, and challenges one to go out and "see" what's going on.  I kinda like driving the Jeep (and previously the 8 Chevy Trail Blazers I owned) around on the country roads just to see the snow-covered woods, the fields glistening in the bright sun, and the birds flying in the crisp skies.  I really used to enjoy flying in the winter because the plane seemed to jump off the runway.  Takeoffs and landings on the snowy landing strips proved to be quite an adventure, but once airborne, it was such an effortless, and always much more smooth flight.

But then, we always get to Christmas.  I love this time of year for the bright lights, the Christmas trees and decorations, the attempt at heightened civility by people in the stores and on the streets.  I also love it for the things I know that happened long, long ago.  I love to go to Christmas Eve ceremonies at church, and really, really like the sounds of a choir floating from speakers on the streets and in the parks. 

Once when I was stationed in Germany during the first Gulf War, I had the occasion to hear a German Boys Choir sing at midnight on Christmas Eve.  The little town church was situated in a valley with huge mountains all around, and I was walking around the perimeter of the base talking to my troops who were on guard duty, when the sounds of the choir came up the hill.  The snow was crisp, the cold air was biting at my fingers and cheeks, but that sound just really hit me.  I have never forgotten that night and still think of it on cold Ohio nights when the snow is falling. 

Pam and I just put up our tree today so I took a picture of it.  One thing I really like is how the lights reflect in all the windows of "The Pentagon" (our room overlooking the pond) -- it's like there is a whole forest of Christmas trees just on the other side of the glass.  It is really cool to sit out there at night with all the other lights out, just reading and listening to music on the stereo (is that dating me calling it a stereo?).

And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so?

It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. 

And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before.

What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store? 

What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more?  

(Dr. Seuss)

Hooah

A little break from the Army stories...

How about a little break from the Army stories. 

There was a movie not too long ago about a bucket list.  You know, the list of all the things you want to do before you "kick the bucket."  Well, before the term became fashionable, I had a list of things I wanted to do before I kicked the bucket, and one of them was to hike on the Appalachian Trail.  I was pretty naive about what all this would encompass, but one of the young men at Troy High School had just completed it, the whole thing.  He left right after graduation and finished some time in the early fall.  He told us about some of it, and one of the other teachers and I decided to give it a try.  

We really didn't prepare all that much, and didn't work out getting the legs in shape, so you can guess how this was fated to turn out.  Anyway, our spring break came at school one year and off the three of us went.  The young man kinda figured we could handle a short 12-mile climb in the weekend we had allotted for it.  He selected an area in Tennessee that he was familiar with (I think he picked an area where he thought two old guys wouldn't get themselves killed) and we set out.  The weather was very nice all the way down -- upper 60s during the day and lower 60s at night. We got there, and met up with some friends of his and set plans in motion to start the hike early the next morning. 

Well, the next morning was a bit of a challenge.  Clouds moved in and there was a slight drizzle.  We had rain gear so we thought we could outwalk it and started up the trail.  "Up the trail" is a slight exaggeration -- actually we climbed a pretty good mountain trail with lots of switchbacks, rocks, drizzle and falling temps. We had only been out a few hours, when the temps had dropped considerably, and the drizzle changed to rain, then snow, then freezing rain.  But we kept going and after about four hours, had managed to cover about three miles of the hike.  It's amazing how little progress you really make  (as opposed to how much you think you make) when climbing like this. 

I thought it would be really fun to take my 2meter ham radio handi-talkie with me and see if I could talk to the world from atop a mountain in TN.  Good idea, bad planning.  Batteries tend to lose their charge in this kind of weather.  I didn't bring any spare batteries because our guide kept saying to keep the weight down.  I also remembered my drill sergeant from basic training who once said, "If you pack it, you're carrying it.  Noone will take it for you."

Here we are taking shelter from some of the wind during a break.  Took this picture by setting it out away from us on a rock, setting the timer, and running back up the hill to get in the shot.

The scenery was pretty good, at least until the snow storm hit.  We were lucky to find one of the trail shelters and have a bit of cover for the night.  You can see in the picture how much wind would get through this thing.  We actually put up our tents inside the barn and slept there overnight.  When we got up the next morning, the barn was filled with snow and our tents were ready to cave in.  Obviously we didn't have any warm fires to cozy up to either.

This is one of the guys, Pat, who went on the hike.  You can see how the barn was built -- lots of snow and wind moving through all night long.

The whole route we planned was going to be 12-miles.  So far, we had gone six.  Well, I wasn't too smart in math, but I knew if we turned around now and went back to our start point, a couple of things would happen:  we probably would survive this thing, we would still get our 12-miles in.  Just not the way we had planned.

That evening I got sick from some of the mountain water that my purifying kit didn't purify.  Also, I think I slept for 12 hours straight.  But we made it, whatever "it" was, and I crossed that off my list.  I also got a greater admiration for the efforts of those who hike the whole trail.  I also marvel at those who did this back in the days of the settlers. 

I must admit, I've had better spring breaks.  But not any as challenging as this.

Backpacking:  An extended form of hiking in which people carry double the amount of gear they need for half the distance they planned to go in twice the time it should take. Anonymous

Hooah

The Brickyard...

I would say that if a polling company were to survey Americans across the country as to what the role of the Army Military Police is in the scope of today's national defense, most of them might say "They are cops."   There might be some who, if they have been paying attention would say "They run the military jails."  And there might also be some who know they run the Enemy Prisoner of War Camps.  But I doubt that many would know much if anything about their combat support role as "Light Infantry" kinds of troops.  Now I don't want my combat arms friends thinking that I'm saying MPs are on a level playing field with them in terms of missions and roles.  But I am saying, the role of the MP has changed.  They are not our father's MPs any more.

One of the things we started doing back in the early 80s was taking on a combat multiplier role, thus the Army started to designate certain units as "CS" units.  This changed their role and training.  They began to learn more and more combat skills, field survival skills, and things like "calling for fire," "dismounted land navigation," and "movement to contact (mounted and dismounted)."

One of our favorite exercises was what we called "The Brickyard."  It was an abandoned brickmaking plant which we got permission to use for training.  The mission was to sweep the area, clear the buildings and secure the site for future operations.  There were lots of interesting aspects to this training, including insertion into the area via helicopter (see below).

The troops spent a great deal of time learning these tactics, drawing up and rehearsing their plans, conducting squad and platoon drills, learning and executing leader drills, and so on.  This consumed the better part of a three-month training window, and when the actual week came to carry-out the exercise, so did the freezing temps and snow. 

This was one of the leader briefings prior to the troops departing the rally point.

Here the troops were getting one last bit of warmth.  They had just finished doing a weapons and ammo check.

They are now off to the objective.

The "point man" (left) has moved into position to get a quick look at the objective.  The other picture shows some of the assault team moving into position via an abandoned garage.  This team moved around the kiln shown here and another team moved and mirrored them down the other side of the brick kilns.  The outside perimeter guards provided security and a snatch team for any bad guys who might try to get in or out. 

The pictures below show the bad guys who were playing the role of OPFOR (Opposing Forces).  They were local residents, former military and some local law enforcement officers.  We also had some of our guys and Soldiers from other units who were not busy at this time along to help out.

All in all, this kind of training was very productive and probably a little ahead of it's time for MPs.  But it proved very beneficial when these same kinds of troops went to Kuwait, and to Iraq and Afghanistan later on.  The MP Corps decided to put a lot of money and time into this kind of training for it's Combat Support units and built a wide array of urban terrain/mock villages at various posts.

On a personal note, once we had secured the site we spent the night there.  This was down in a valley out in a very remote location.  I think I mentioned snow earlier -- well we traveled light into this mission and really didn't have much in the way of cover, or blankets, etc.  This was the absolute coldest night I ever spent in the field.  All of us were wet, the wind picked up and it got really, really cold.  Even the chopper ride back to the base was cold.


People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf. - George Orwell

Hooah

Obstacle course at Campbell...

One thing about cleaning out a room, especially the "Army Room," you are almost certainly going to run into an old box or two (or more) of photos.  And although I was not very good at writing down the names of all the soldiers in the pictures I took over a 38-year career, I certainly took lots and lots of pictures and, for now at least, remember the events like they were yesterday.   Some of these kinds of things aren't done any more in the Army, and that's a shame because we really built some pretty solid teams this way. 

These pictures were taken at Ft. Campbell, KY.  We were conducting some training there back in the late 80's and had the opportunity to take advantage of this leadership course the post had just completed.  It's kinda like a big jungle jim course built around certain leadership/team leader tasks and some Soldier tasks.  It was pretty cool, and our teams and squads went through it very successfully.  The individual stations required creative thinking and leadership and were "run" against the clock.  All in all, the teams and squads had a great time doing this and really came together in a lot of respects -- in ways that we couldn't at other posts or at our home station.

I don't know if any of the  Soldiers in these pictures will even see this entry, but if any should, I hope they would send me the names of some of them. 

Most of these same soldiers were with me when we were gone for Desert Storm in 1990.  Those sure were good troops.

Nothing encourages creativity like the chance to fall flat on one's back into a cold, dirty pit of slop water in front of your fellow squad members.

Hooah

You gotta love 'em...

This entry and the one that follows came from a recent cleaning I did in my study. 

There comes a time in every officer's career when he wonders if the things he is doing are right...if he is leading troops in the right direction and preparing them for the possibilities of having to actually take this "stuff" to the battlefield.

Well, that inspired this picture.  It was taken in Alabama during a field exercise where we were tasked with setting up a "field" prisoner of war camp and teaching other kinds of soldiers what we do and how to process and guard enemy prisoners -- on the off chance that they would some day have to do this.  Of course they absolutely hated it, saying that was not their job, blah, blah, blah.  Little did we all know that it would be just about everyone's job when we went to war in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

We had just completed the construction of the camp. and had gathered the commander, CSM, and staff out by the sign to take a picture.  We took a serious one for the record, and then took this one.  There have been times over the years that everyone in that picture thought this might have been the better one for the record. And I dare say that there might have been both Soldiers and superiors who felt the same way.

In case you are wondering, I am the one on the bottom row, right end.  It seems that everyone expects the Executive Officer (XO) to know what's going on all the time and to know where we are going (especially since most XOs are former S-3s and usually experts in land navigation).  That's why I took that pose.  You can fill in why the other staff officers and OPNS SGM took the one of "see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil."

But aside from some of the fooling around Soldiers always do, this was an extremely professional group, and really did a lot to bring credit to all those who performed this Enemy Prisoner of War mission in the last 15 years or so.  Combat commanders soon learned how much of a combat multiplier units such as ours could be for them on the battlefield.


But anyhow, back to the picture.  One thing I always remember about my time in the service is what the CSM (top, right)always used to say:

Being in the army is like being in the Boy Scouts, except that the Boy Scouts have adult supervision.

Hooah

Oh, crap...

I was cleaning out my study this week and ran across some pictures that made me chuckle a bit.

This one is from an incident when I was a young company commander.  It seems that a young Soldier got a little too rowdy one weekend evening in the company area, and was brought in front of me by the First Sergeant.  After I chewed him out for acting in such a manner as to bring discredit to the Military Police Corps, I had to assign him some sort of punishment.  I didn't feel like pursuing UCMJ punishment, so I handed down some "non-judicial" punishment, also known as "turning him over to the 1SG".  That kind of punishment usually meant more and didn't harm anyone's future in the service.  I mentioned to the 1SG that the latrine looked a bit dirty and could use a "good" cleaning.  So off he went with his Beetle Baileyish-looking private in tow.

Several hours later, the 1SG returned with the young Soldier who claimed that the latrine was now cleaned. With the 1SG smiling in the background, the young troop said he had done a good job, and he wanted me to see it before any other troops got in there to mess it all up.  I told him if he was that proud of it, maybe he should take a picture of it so he would remember it the next time he thought of screwing something up. 

Well guess what, he (or the 1SG) had anticipated what I might say and whipped out an instant picture he had shot.  I almost laughed!!  He said he had learned a lesson, and I dismissed him.  And then I laughed to myself.  He (or the 1SG) had anticipated what I would say to him and took the picture.  When we would be out training, I would always tell them they had to anticipate what I or some other of their leaders would do in a certain situation and either plan ahead or already be doing it.  I would tell them that we wouldn't always be there to tell them what to do.  It seems someone had gotten the message.  I expect he may have sent other pictures of him doing latrine duty home to his girlfriend.  Probably had some good stories later to tell over a dinner table.

I love it when a plan comes together.  And aren't these good looking crappers.  Anyone who ever spent any time in the service remembers this set-up.

This kinda brought back the old line my drill sergeant used to hammer into us when I was in basic training...

If it moves, salute it; if it doesn't move, pick it up; and if you can't pick it up, paint it.

Hooah

One of the last beautiful sunsets this fall...

We have had a couple of beautiful days this past week, warm and sunny.  It's kinda remarkable too because it's the second week of November.  We've had snow before this in some years.  In fact, I played golf twice this week.  Yesterday it was in the mid-sixties and two of the guys who were playing wore shorts!

In any event, there sure was a beautiful sunset the other evening.  The sun was casting a golden glow on the pond and the corn in the background.  There were even some maple trees that still had brilliant red leaves to show off.  

I took some pictures, and while I was doing so, I noticed one thing -- the sun really goes down fast this time of year.  I took a picture and went to take another one and noticed how much the light had changed in just a minute or so.

It's a good thing I got these pictures yesterday, because it rained most of last night, and today brought a cold front with 10-15 mph winds all day.  All of the maples are now bare.

I was also walking around down by the pond and happened to see a whole bunch of fish.   There were bluegills, minnows and quite a few mid-size bass.  I suspect they will be heading for the deeper waters soon enough.  I told them I would be looking for them next spring.

If I can put but one ounce of golden sunset into the life of any person, then I shall feel that I have had a hand in doing the work of God. 

Hooah

First Field Trip...

Last week, the preschool (a.k.a. Big boy school) that Quinn attends in Brooklyn took a field trip to a petting farm located in Queens.  It was his first field trip ever, and I think it was his first trip in a school bus.  What a day.  Doug said it was supposed to be about 45 min. away via the expressway, but the traffic that morning turned it into a 3-hour trip getting there.  He said the kids did alright, but some of the parents got a bit frazzled.  Anyway, they got there just fine, and were greeted by the guides who asked "Who wants to take a pony ride."

That was the start of a great day for them.  And when I saw the pictures, I had to think back to some of my childhood, growing up in a rural Ohio setting, surrounded by farms.  I spent many summer days working for neighbor farmers, cutting, raking and baling hay and straw, stacking it in barns, cleaning out pig pens, showing pigs at the county fair, and even milking goats for one old lady who got sick and had us look after things for a while.

Seeing Quinn in these pictures really brought back some memories of good times.  How lucky he was to have gone on a trip like this. 

I really don't know what kind of chicken this is, but I am totally surprised he is holding it.

When he was telling us about the pigs, he said, "They stink."  Maybe some day I'll tell him about the summer I slept in the hog pens with our pigs during fair week.  I don't recall it being that smelly, but then we were just teenagers and may have smelled as bad as the surroundings and just didn't know the difference.

This picture really surprised me, him being out there in the middle of the sheep.  He really doesn't like our dog, Bailey, coming up to him.  Maybe he's growing up.  Maybe it's just because all his classmates were there too.

And what would a field trip be without a bunch of worn out kids sleeping on the bus on the way home. What a great experience.

To bring up a child in the way he should go, travel that way yourself once in a while.

Hooah