Thunderstruck

See you back here in 30 days.

How to Prepare for a Deployment to...

This pre-deployment training/prep would have helped me immensely.

How to Prepare for a Deployment to Iraq

1. Sleep on a cot in the garage.

2. Replace the garage door with a curtain.

3. Six hours after you go to sleep, have your wife or girlfriend whip open the curtain, shine a flashlight in your eyes and mumble, "Sorry, wrong cot."

4. Renovate your bathroom. Hang a green plastic sheet down from the middle of your bathtub and move the showerhead down to chest level. Keep four inches of soapy cold water on the floor. Stop cleaning the toilet and pee everywhere but in the toilet itself. Leave two to three sheets of toilet paper. Or for best effect, remove it altogether. For a more realistic deployed bathroom experience, stop using your bathroom and use a neighbor's. Choose a neighbor who lives at least a quarter mile away.

5. When you take showers, wear flip-flops and keep the lights off.

6. Every time there is a thunderstorm, go sit in a wobbly rocking chair and dump dirt on your head.

7. Put lube oil in your humidifier instead of water and set it on "HIGH" for that tactical generator smell.

8. Don't watch TV except for movies in the middle of the night. Have your family vote on which movie to watch and then show a different one.

9. Leave a lawnmower running in your living room 24 hours a day for proper noise level.

10. Have the paperboy give you a haircut.

11. Once a week, blow compressed air up through your chimney making sure the wind carries the soot across and on to your neighbor's house. Laugh at him when he curses you.

12. Buy a trash compactor and only use it once a week. Store up garbage in the other side of your bathtub.

13. Wake up every night at midnight and have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on a saltine cracker.

14. Make up your family menu a week ahead of time without looking in your food cabinets or refrigerator. Then serve some kind of meat in an unidentifiable sauce poured over noodles. Do this for every meal.

15. Set your alarm clock to go off at random times during the night. When it goes off, jump out of bed and get to the shower as fast as you can. Simulate there is no hot water by running out into your yard and breaking out the garden hose.

16. Once a month, take every major appliance completely apart and put it back together again.

17. Use 18 scoops of coffee per pot and allow it to sit for five or six hours before drinking.

18. Invite at least 185 people you don't really like because of their strange hygiene habits to come and visit for a couple of months. Exchange clothes with them.

19. Have a fluorescent lamp installed on the bottom of your coffee table and lie under it to read books.

20. Raise the thresholds and lower the top sills of your front and back doors so that you either trip over the threshold or hit your head on the sill every time you pass through one of them.

21. Keep a roll of toilet paper on your night stand and bring it to the bathroom with you. And bring your gun and a flashlight.

22. Go to the bathroom when you just have to pass gas, "just in case." Every time.

23. Announce to your family that they have mail, have them report to you as you stand outside your open garage door after supper and then say, "Sorry, it's for the other Smith."

24. Wash only 15 items of laundry per week. Roll up the semi-wet clean clothes in a ball. Place them in a cloth sack in the corner of the garage where the cat pees. After a week, unroll them and without ironing or removing the mildew, proudly wear them to professional meetings and family gatherings. Pretend you don't know what you look or smell like. Enthusiastically repeat the process for another week.

25. Go to the worst crime-infested place you can find, go heavily armed, wearing a flak jacket and a Kevlar helmet. Set up shop in a tent in a vacant lot. Announce to the residents that you are there to help them.

26. Eat a single M&M every Sunday and convince yourself it's for Malaria.

27. Demand each family member be limited to 10 minutes per week for a morale phone call. Enforce this with your teenage daughter.

28. Shoot a few bullet holes in the walls of your home for proper ambiance.

29. Sandbag the floor of your car to protect from mine blasts and fragmentation.

30. While traveling down roads in your car, stop at each overpass and culvert and inspect them for remotely detonated explosives before proceeding.

31. Fire off 50 cherry bombs simultaneously in your driveway at 3:00 a.m. When startled neighbors appear, tell them all is well, you are just registering mortars. Tell them plastic will make an acceptable substitute for their shattered windows.

32. Drink your milk and sodas warm.

33. Spread gravel throughout your house and yard.

34. Make your children clear their Super Soakers in a clearing barrel you placed outside the front door before they come in.

35. Make your family dig a survivability position with overhead cover in the backyard. Complain that the 4x4s are not 8 inches on center and make them rebuild it.

36. Continuously ask your spouse to allow you to go buy an M-Gator.

37. When your 5-year-old asks for a stick of gum, have him find the exact stick and flavor he wants on the Internet and print out the web page. Type up a Form 9 and staple the web page to the back. Submit the paperwork to your spouse for processing. After two weeks, give your son the gum.

38. Announce to your family that the dog is a vector for disease and shoot it. Throw the dog in a burn pit you dug in your neighbor's back yard.

39. Wait for the coldest/ hottest day of the year and announce to your family that there will be no heat/air conditioning that day so you can perform much needed maintenance on the heater/ air conditioner. Tell them you are doing this so they won't get cold/ hot.

40. Just when you think you're ready to resume a normal life, order yourself to repeat this process for another 12-15 months to simulate the next deployment you've been ordered to support.

Military Rules by Service

More military rules (by service); I have to do this to get mentally prepared for a month at GTA, Germany. It's therapeutic.

Marine Corps Rules:
1. Be courteous to everyone, friendly to no one.
2. Decide to be aggressive enough, quickly enough.
3. Have a plan.
4. Have a back-up plan, because the first one probably won't work.
5. Be polite. Be professional. But, have a plan to kill everyone you meet ­ even your friends…
6. Do not attend a gunfight with a handgun whose caliber does not start with a "4."
7. Anything worth shooting is worth shooting twice. Ammo is cheap. Life is expensive.
8. Move away from your attacker. Distance is your friend. (Lateral & diagonal preferred.)
9. Use cover or concealment as much as possible.
10. Flank your adversary when possible. Protect yours.
11. Always cheat; always win. The only unfair fight is the one you lose.
12. In ten years nobody will remember the details of caliber, stance, or tactics. They will only remember who lived.
13. If you are not shooting, you should be communicating your intention to shoot.

Navy SEAL's Rules:
1. Look very cool in sunglasses.
2. Kill every living thing within view.
3. Adjust speedo.
4. Check hair in mirror.

US Army Rangers Rules:
1. Walk in 50 miles wearing 75 pound rucksack while starving.
2. Locate individuals requiring killing.
3. Request permission via radio from "Higher" to perform killing.
4. Curse bitterly when mission is aborted.
5. Walk out 50 miles wearing a 75 pound rucksack while starving.

US Army Rules:
1. Curse bitterly when receiving operational order.
2. Make sure there is extra ammo and extra coffee.
3. Curse bitterly.
4. Curse bitterly.
5. Do not listen to 2nd LT's; they can get you killed.
6. Curse bitterly.

US Air Force Rules:
1. Have a cocktail.
2. Adjust temperature on air-conditioner.
3. See what's on HBO.
4. Ask "what is a gunfight?"
5. Request more funding from Congress with a "killer" Power Point presentation.
6. Wine & dine 'key' Congressmen, invite DOD & defense industry executives.
7. Receive funding, set up new command and assemble assets.
8. Declare the assets "strategic" and never deploy them operationally.
9. Hurry to make 13:45 tee-time.
10. Make sure the base is as far as possible from the conflict but close enough to have tax exemption.

US Navy Rules:
1. Go to Sea.
2. Drink Coffee.
3. Deploy Marines

Rules of Combat:

20 Rules:

1. Friendly fire - isn't.
2. Recoilless rifles - aren't.
3. If it's stupid but it works, it isn't stupid.
4. Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
5. If your attack is going really well, it's an ambush.
6. Five second fuses always burn three seconds.
7. The easy way is always mined.
8. Never draw fire; it irritates everyone around you.
9. When you have secured the area, make sure the enemy knows it too.
10. No combat ready unit has ever passed inspection.
11. No inspection ready unit has ever passed combat.
12. If the enemy is within range, so are you.
13. Military Intelligence is a contradiction.
14. The one item you need is always in short supply.
15. Interchangeable parts aren't.
16. The worse the weather, the more you are required to be out in it.
17. Field experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.
18. No matter which way you have to march, its always uphill.
19. Every command which can be misunderstood, will be.
20. There is always a way, and it usually doesn't work.

Sometimes fellas learn them the hard way...

Sergeant Gavin Cox - Hero!

My buddy, and fellow soldier, sent me this awesome story about a boy who's wish was to be a soldier.

FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas, March 27, 2008 – Gavin Cox could have traveled to any exotic locale or tried any profession in the world, but this 5-year-old with leukemia had just one wish: to be a soldier.

His wish was granted March 18 when he became a soldier for the day here.

“He could have chosen any activity during this break in his treatments, to include Disney World,” said Gavin’s father, Troy Heminger. “He wanted to be a soldier.”

During a solemn ceremony in the Army Medical Department Center and School command conference room, the little boy stood proudly on the conference room table surrounded by soldiers of all ranks. Dressed in an Army combat uniform, Gavin was promoted to the honorary rank of sergeant in the Army Medical Department by the installation commander, Army Maj. Gen. Russell Czerw.

After spending the day with Army medics, Gavin and his family left San Antonio the next day for Fort Hood, Texas, where honorary Sergeant Cox would spend another day in the Army as a soldier with the Army’s combat units.

Thanks to Make a Wish Foundation and the U.S. Army for making this happen. The story brought a lump to my throat. It reminded me of how fortunate I am and not to take anything for granted. I've enjoyed my life as a soldier and welcome SGT Cox to the ranks. Gavin is on my hero list!

Farwell to a Great American

Charlton Heston, 1923-2008

I meant to post this earlier...

LOS ANGELES - Charlton Heston, who won the 1959 best actor Oscar as the chariot-racing "Ben-Hur" and portrayed Moses, Michelangelo, El Cid and other heroic figures in movie epics of the '50s and '60s, has died. He was 84.

The actor died Saturday night at his home in Beverly Hills with his wife Lydia at his side, family spokesman Bill Powers said.

"Charlton Heston was seen by the world as larger than life. He was known for his chiseled jaw, broad shoulders and resonating voice, and, of course, for the roles he played,"

He is one of my favorite actors and conservative 'activists' (see National Rifle Association). He also participated in the big Civil Rights march in 1963. My top Heston movies:

1) Ben-Hur (1959). 11 Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Actor. 'Nuff Said!

2) Planet of the Apes (1968). Loosely based on the novel La planète des singes by Pierre Boulle.
An excellent SCI-FI movie with one of the most memorable lines of all time: George Taylor (Heston)- 'Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!' Check out the Forbidden Zone for more Apes stuff. By-the-by, Charles Heston makes a cameo in the 2001 Tim Burton re-make.

3) Khartoum (1966). Heston as General Charles 'Chinese' Gordon taking on the Mahdi (Lawrence Olivier) and his army during the Battle or Siege of Khartoum (March 1884 - January 1885) in the Sudan.

Other notables: The Ten Commandments, The Omega Man, El Cid.

Heston's family said in a statement. "No one could ask for a fuller life than his. No man could have given more to his family, to his profession, and to his country."

And now...The Doors

I was a big Beatles fan in junior high and high school. My dad gave me some of his original Beatles LPs (Rubber Soul was one of my favorites) and I started listening to them, on vinyl; and they sounded great. And now...Somewhere between college and the present, I've become a fan of The Doors, probably one of my favorite bands of all time. I had heard them before, as I grew up listening to classic rock-n-roll, but somehow during my college days, I became drawn to their unique sound. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame notes:

"The Doors emerged amid the turbulence of the late Sixties with music that was as intense and complex as the times that spawned them...The group’s dark, brooding personality came largely from singer Jim Morrison. Musically, the other members of the Doors - keyboardist Ray Manzarek, guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer Jon Densmore - combined classical rigor with freewheeling, jazzy improvisations, providing Morrison a platform from which to declaim his poetical lyrics in a portentous baritone."

My favorite song is none other than 'Love Me Two Times' from the album Strange Days. It's also one of my favorite songs to perform at the local karaoke joints. Good times, great oldies.

Saviors from Space

I'm a big SCI-FI geek and rarely miss an opportunity to catch the latest movie at the theater. Science fiction movies usually do pretty well at the box office. Probably the most noteworthy, oldie-but-goodie, is The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), adapted from the 1940 short story "Farewell to the Master" written by Harry Bates. Like so many movies of the era, their storylines were often set against the backdrop of the Cold War. The Day the Earth Stood Still is no exception. But there is another element that is often missed by moviegoers. There's a great deal of religion mixed in. Probably the most overt example can be found in the Star Wars movies and its use of the Force. George Lucas admitted that he "put the Force into the movie in order to try to awaken a certain kind of spirituality in young people. . . . I think there is a God. What that God is and what we know about God, I'm not sure."

There's a more subtle expression of religion in The Day the Earth Stood Still in addition to Klaatu's stated belief in "the Almighty Spirit":

Scriptwriter Edmund H. North transformed the alien emissary Klaatu into a Christ-figure, implying that extra-terrestrials would be the true saviors of mankind. He did this in a subtle manner, having Klaatu adopt the earth name Carpenter and through the alien’s death and resurrection. North considered it his "private little joke" hoping "the Christ comparison would be subliminal."

In your spare time, sit down to watch Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal, and Billy Gray, who played "Bud" in Father Knows Best, and see how many New Testament, Christ-like allusions you can find in The Day the Earth Stood Still.