Original G.I.

22. January 2005 · Comments Off on Original G.I. · Categories: General, Military

As best as can be determined, the term “G. I.” is an abbreviation for “government issue”, and according to historian Lee Kennet, it was first a term of mild contempt, originating in the insular, peacetime American military. While small, it was a proud, professional and penny-pinched force, and those who were serving in the Depression era military contemptuously regarded their issued uniform clothing and accessories as shoddy, poor quality, not worthy. It was a point of honor for careerists to do better, and so they laid out their own funds for quality tailoring, better-quality boots, and fine bespoke accessories. (This is still done, especially when new uniforms are approved, but not available at the BX/PX Uniform sales— those who want to look very, very strac will order items out of various catalogues which specialize in this.) Looking militarily sharp was everything, down to the sergeants and privates, and in those hardscrabble days, when the Army could pick and choose, it was about all there was. That and the pride that comes of being among the elect, or as they would come to think of themselves after 1942 as “the Old Army”… which was defined by the military magazine “Yank” as “ a large group of first-three-graders who spent the pre-war years thinking up sentences beginning with ‘By God, it wasn’t like this in the ______”.

And it wasn’t… because of the draft, which ballooned the Army and the other military services to proportions not seen since the days of the Civil war, eighty years previous. Draftees or patriotically motivated volunteers or every variety in between, the “new Army” arrived with a different set of expectations, one of them being that they would not put up with much of that military chickenshit. Attitudes about deference to officer rank, to saluting, and to going overboard with the military sartorial splendor of the “Old Army”… no, issue kit would do, none of this fancy-nancy parade ground soldiering.

The cultural clash between the old corps and the new wartime influx was marked and noted almost immediately, with the old peacetime army NCOs scorning the new elements as “GIs” or “government issue”, meaning “second-rate, unprofessional soldiers”. But the new Army took it as a badge of pride, chanting cadence counts like “It won’t get by if it ain’t GI”. Just get the damn job done, with that they were issued, was the attitude; once that done, you won’t see me for dust in this-here military machine. So, they eventually stormed the Omaha beaches and crossed the Rhine with their government issue, and took back the Pacific Islands, one by one over the following three years. All during the war, though, officers of the Old Army school like Patton, fretted over how slovenly and unmilitary the G.I.s would tend to look if left to themselves… the Army that they won WWII with, was so very unlike they had been schooled with, in the hard two decades after the first world war.

“Oh,” said my daughter recently about one of her friends, “He’s a 9/11 baby.” That is, someone who had enlisted into the forces after 9/11, into a military where it should have been impossible to get around the understanding that a military was an organization dedicated to killing those designated as the enemies of this country, and blowing up their stuff. Someone who had— like those who swarmed to enlist after Pearl Harbor— enlisted into a wartime military… but a military whose initial core was formed over a scaffold of officers and NCOs who remembered how it had been…before.
“Only Sgt. ____ and I remember how it used to be, “my daughter lamented, during the same conversation. “Deployments used to be cool, and fun. We like to go on them… now, it’s either Afghanistan or Iraq.”

A peacetime military does have those discrete charms; and make no mistake, for about ten years, it was a peacetime military. The Soviet Union imploded with a pathetic whimper, not the terrific bang expected when I enlisted. There was a certain fatalistic expectation of mushroom-shaped clouds, all during my first few years, and a low-level degree of terrorist activity aimed at those in uniform, then Desert Storm, and then… everyone shaking their heads in the brilliant sunshine, wondering where all those threats had gone. The only thing we were left sure of, was that there was always a use for a military…and that it was a good thing to stay in top form, to practice the skills, and clamor to go on those deployments, and polish those boots, and carry on with what we had always done, against the day when we would be called on again… just as they had in those days of the “Old Army”.

Additional Pictorial Proof of Service

19. January 2005 · Comments Off on Additional Pictorial Proof of Service · Categories: General, Military

Our Daily Brief contributer, Capt. Loggie sent me this and asked me to post it
CPT Loggie in Africa

He is the shortest of the five gentleman, and to also asked me to let everyone know that he is (a) single and fancy free, and (b) on his way to Afghanistan next month, from where he will send more pictures.

Memo: Throwing Stones at Frogs

19. January 2005 · Comments Off on Memo: Throwing Stones at Frogs · Categories: General, Media Matters Not

To: Ms Boxer @NY Times, and other Major Media Players
From: Sgt Mom
Re: OpSec

Here at the Daily Brief, a collective blog of present and past members of the various military services, one of the very few general guidelines I have established concerns the practice of OpSec. OpSec, or Operations Security, can be boiled down to one simple concept; never give away anything you know that someone might use to kill you or someone else. Mind you, a determined and lucky spy can eventually find out whatever they want to know, but as a military broadcaster I considered it a point of honor to make them work as hard as possible. All the imps in hell would have to be fitted out with long winter underwear before I would thoughtlessly spill something on the air, or in print about a scheduled operation, or the specific location of a high-ranking officer, vulnerabilities in our base structure or security… any number of items which might be considered valuable bits of essential information to a hostile power.

Because, you see, if I did… people might die.

Let me repeat that again: people might die.

People I knew, or didn’t know, people who wore the same uniform, or no uniform at all. They would be painfully, messily, permanently dead, because of my story, a story which would be so much archived wastepaper, or magnetized tape by the next day.

I couldn’t cope with knowing that I had lightly and thoughtlessly handed over information to an enemy which resulted in those deaths.
I realize of course, that you may be unused to consider this; in certain rarified worlds, speculation that someone is a CIA agent may just get one snubbed at trendy cocktail parties, or not invited in the first place. There is no harm, no foul there, in passing on airy speculation about who works for whom. Unfortunately, carelessly repeating speculation, without analysis or even going to the extent of a debunking has the unfortunate result of validating it. In the real world, this often has fatal results, and in this current instance has put you into the position of appearing to paint a big fat “x” on the forehead of an Iraqi blogger for the sake of a jazzy headline with your name under it.

I prefer to attribute this lack of care on your part to ignorance, rather than malice. I beg you, in this time of war, to carefully consider how certain elements in your future stories may be used by those of hostile intent
As the poet, Bion of Smyrna observed “Though boys throw stones at frogs in sport, the frogs do not die in sport, but in earnest.”

Sincerely
Sgt Mom

To the Farthest Shore

17. January 2005 · Comments Off on To the Farthest Shore · Categories: Ain't That America?, General

Found this amusing nugget here; apparently this B-grade German movie actress spent a year trying to break into the Hollywood A-list, without any appreciable success, and now is going the media rounds back home in dear old’ Deutschland being (understandably) ungracious about the experience… and generally slagging off the rest of the country—seemingly without ever setting foot outside the fabled environs of So Cal show-biz. Well, it’s kind of like going to the Cannes Film Festival, and then holding forth as an expert on all of France, past and present. Or hitting the highlights of New York, and Disneyland and Hollywierd, and assuming that is all there is and all you ever need to see of America. I would make the following suggestions for an itinerary to a traveler from another country who wants to get a more nuanced idea of what lies between the coasts.

1. Don’t fly— it’s too easy then to miss what a big country it is, and how varied. Rent a car, or a camper-van, and drive— it’s how we do it. Drive across the country, from north to south, east to west, on the interstates when you have to, but the secondary roads are more fun. It’s a big country. There are stretches of interstate in the West where it can be 100 miles to the next gas, and nothing in sight constructed by humans save the highway itself. A hundred and fifty years ago, it took six months for travelers on foot, horseback, ox-drawn wagons or mule trails, making fifteen miles a day if they were lucky, and following barely visible trails from the Missouri River to the west coast. There are still wide-open spaces… quite a lot of them actually.

2. This trip, pretty much avoid any place that has had big movie or a long-running TV show set in it. Fargo ND and Paris, TX are exceptions.

3. Stay in campgrounds, B and B’s, family run-hotels in small towns. Eat at non-chain places well off the road, especially if half the vehicles parked out front are battered pickups with local plates, and half are well-kept vehicles with out of state plates. Find these places by chatting up people you meet, around mealtimes, and ask them where they would go for a good bite to eat.

4. Shop at a big American supermarket a couple of times: doesn’t matter which one. A Smiths, Food Lion, HEB, Ralph’s, Albertsons. Even a super-Wal-Mart.

5. Go to a local little-theater presentation, a Friday-night football game in a small Texas town, a weekend farmers’ market/swap meet, a church pot-luck supper, a Civil War re-enactors encampment, a state fair, a Rocky Mountain rendezvous, a military base open house, a town festival— strawberry days, artichoke days, pioneer days, whatever days. Go to an arboretum, a public garden, a rally of whatever sort of vehicle takes your fancy and fits your schedule; antique cars, motorcycles, old airplanes. Stop to look at historical markers, roadside attractions, strange and wonderful local creations. Take the scenic route, the long way round, pull off and take pictures at the look-out point. Sleep under the stars once or twice.

Take a couple of months to do this, and you’ll have a better idea of what it’s about than all our movies and television could ever give you. These suggestions and any others that may be added by readers in the comments go double to any of our own major media creatures who were gob-smacked by the results of the November election.

Response to Kevin’s “Milblogger” Challenge

14. January 2005 · Comments Off on Response to Kevin’s “Milblogger” Challenge · Categories: General, Military

For pictorial proof of service… voila!

Incredibly dorky semi-official photo, taken while on staff at AFRTS-Sondrestrom in 1982, by a photog who clearly had a brilliant future at the DMV taking drivers’ license pictures…

Memo: Field Guide to American Military Personnel

13. January 2005 · Comments Off on Memo: Field Guide to American Military Personnel · Categories: General

From: Sgt Mom
To: Media and Other Clueless Civilians
Re: Correctly Identifying Branch of Service

Mother: “There’s another dead bishop on the landing, vicar sergeant!”
Detective: Uh, Detective Parson, madam. I see… suffragen, or diocesan?
Mother: ‘Ow should I know?
Detective: It’s tattooed on the back o’ their neck.
(Monty Python’s Dead Bishop Sketch

Our branch of service is not, in fact, tattooed in such an inaccessible location, but one wouldn’t know it from the frequent and hilarious mis-identification in various media, all of which amuse and exasperate current and veteran military personnel no end. Foreigners can be cut a little bit of slack, especially those whose first language is NOT English, but there is no excuse for our own professional media creatures, who are supposed to pride themselves on their grasp of nuance and exactingly observed details….. because the service branch is machine-embroidered/stenciled in half-inch letters directly above the left-front pocket of the BDUs, cammies, utilities, fatigues, or whatever.. People, you look like pretty silly, when you make a mistake like that.

Know also that when you refer to Marines as soldiers, or label an Air Force forward air traffic controller as an Army infantryman, you have not only demonstrated a certain lack of attention to detail, but you have also managed to insult the respective members of the services involved. Somewhat chauvinistically, we all take pride in our respective services, and detest being mistaken for… ugh… THOSE OTHERS! While all the forest-green or desert cammies are worn by members of all services, there are certain differentiating criteria instantly apparent to the cognoscenti… unless you are at a considerable distance.

In the interests of informing and educating the general, non-military public, I offer the following additional tips for those who suddenly have to become conversant with the US military uniforms of the various branches, their ranks, and specialties.

1. The class A uniform, roughly equivalent to proper business attire should be sufficiently distinctive to the most casual observer; although the Marines and Navy do play fast and loose with some variations, generally the Air Force is wearing medium blue with aluminum-toned buttons, the Army dark green with brass buttons, and the Marines in a lighter sage-green with black buttons. The Navy is usually clad in black, when not in white, and occasionally in khaki. The last name of the person in the uniform is displayed discretely over the right-front pocket, opposite any display of ribbons denoting awards and decorations, which may be seen as a sort of color-coded professional resume. Do not presume to use the service members’ first name. If they have one, it is strictly reserved for close friends and family. The first name for public use is their rank, “Private, Lance Corporal, Sergeant, Captain, et cetera”, although upon closer acquaintance such familiarities as “Sarge” or “Ell-Tee” are somewhat acceptable.

2. The enlisted ranks for all services, usually displayed prominently on the upper sleeves of both the class A and utility uniforms differ significantly as to service. Generally the bigger the insignia, and the more stripes the higher the enlisted grade, although one can be forgiven for being a little foggy about just what equals what. (I myself have never quite worked out the equivalents between the Army private and specialist ranks.) Officer insignia are more standard, across the services, and therefore simpler, although the Navy again does interesting things with gold braid. Look for officer insignia on shirt collar, shoulder epaulettes or on headgear.

3. Standards of personal grooming are most strictly enforced in all services. Unless under extremely trying circumstances, male personnel are clean-shaven, although certain allowance is made for neat and short mustaches. Army and Marine males more often sport that particular haircut known as a high-and-tight, which appears as if they had shaved their heads entirely and then parked some small and short-furred dead rodent on the very top. Air Force and Navy men are not immune from this fashion, and it is occasionally seen among the more direct combat oriented specialties. At one point, Navy men were permitted to grow short beards, and sometimes Army Special Forces personnel are now allowed them, especially when snooping around in the wilds and attempting to blend in with indigenous personnel. But these sartorial heresies generally make the higher military powers hyperventilate, and so were (and are) of limited duration.

There is one hair rule for female personnel of all services which is “Above the collar!!!!” which in practice means their hair is either short enough that it does not touch the collar of any uniform combination, or wrangled into some sort of neat bun. Cpl. Blondie informs me that in the case of female Marines, the rubber bands and hairpins necessary to perform this function must be in all cases completely invisible. Army and Air Force women just need to use those implements which match their hair color.

4. Curiously enough, Army and Air Force personnel may be differentiated from Marines at some distance, when all are clad in BDU (forest or desert) if it is a hot day, and everyone has rolled up their sleeves. Marines will roll them straight up, with the paler wrong-side of the sleeve fabric showing. Army and Air Force personnel must perform an intricate sort of origami-folding to the sleeves which leaves nothing of the wrong side of the fabric showing.

My direct personal knowledge of these matters is some years out of date, so if any of the other members of the collective (or our readers) have corrections, or further tips or recommendations, feel free to chime in.

Wishing you the best in field-spotting the Services— Remember, it’s written right on the front of their cammies!!!

Sgt Mom

San Francisco Collision

12. January 2005 · Comments Off on San Francisco Collision · Categories: General, Military

(Recieved from a new applicant for the Daily Brief Collective— my hotmail account is frelled during the day, this is the first I could get to it– Sorry for delay—- Sgt Mom)

At 10 January 1634 local (100134 EST) the USS SAN FRANCISCO returned safely to Apra Harbor, Guam. The ship moored with her own line handlers in a normal submarine configured mooring (AFT draft is 27′-10” (normal AFT draft is 32′) and FWD Draft is above the draft marks with the waterline at the point the towed array faring begins; 0.8 degree STBD list and 1 degree Down bubble indicating by naval architecture calculations that 1 A/B and 2A/B MBTs are most likely flooded). The severely injured Machinist Mate (Engineroom Upper Level Watch at time of grounding) was evacuated immediately and transferred by ambulance to Naval Hospital Guam where a fully staffed medical team was standing by. He is conscious and in stable condition. Approximately fifteen additional injured personnel requiring medical care subsequently departed the ship and were transported to the hospital after taking a moment to meet with family members.

Crew members from the USS CORPUS CHRISTI, HOUSTON and FRANK CABLE assisted in line handling and various return to port evolutions such as propulsion plant shutdown, shore power cables, and rig for surface. Standing by on the pier was a full complement of watchstanders from USS CITY OF CORPUS CHRISTI (and SAN FRANCISCO stay-behinds) to satisfy all watchstanding requirements for reactor plant shutdown with follow-on import forward and aft watch sections.

Following the grounding on 8 January, the ship transited on the surface at 8kts with surface escort, USCGC GALVESTON ISLAND to Apra Harbor, Guam. Due to deteriorated weather conditions on the evening of 9 January, the Commanding Officer shifted bridge watch stations to control and shut bridge access hatches to maximize watertight integrity in light of reserve buoyancy concerns. The ship maintained stability throughout the surface transit with continuous operation of the Low Pressure Blower on the Forward Main Ballast Tanks. SAN FRANCISCO has experienced no reactor plant, propulsion train or electrical system degradations as a result of the grounding. The Commanding Officer shifted the Officer of the Deck’s watch to the bridge on 10 January in preparation for piloting into Apra Harbor.

The critically injured Machinist Mate (Auxiliaryman) passed away yesterday afternoon as a result of his injuries. The MM2 was in Aft Main Seawater Bay at the time of the grounding and his body was thrown forward approximately 20 feet into Propulsion Lube Oil Bay. He suffered a severe blow to his forehead and never regained consciousness.

Emergency medical personnel, including a Naval Hospital Guam surgeon, Undersea Medical Officer and Independent Duty Corpsmen, arrived on the ship via helicopter transfer to provide immediate medical care and prepare the crewmember for medical evacuation on the morning of 9 January.

Unfortunately, the sailor’s condition deteriorated and he died onboard while under the care of the embarked physicians. Just moments prior to the sailors death, I spoke with the Sailor’s father in preparation for their pending travel from Ohio to the West Pacific to see their Son. Since then I have passed on to his Dad my condolences on their son’s death and reassured them their son’s remains would be treated with utmost respect and dignity.

His father expressed great gratitude for the extraordinary efforts made by the Navy to save his son’s life. He told me his son loved the Navy, having just reenlisting earlier this year and wanted to make it a career. That when he called home he always talked about the many friendships and the wonderful camaraderie the crew of SFO exhibited. Prior to sailing, he was really excited about the pending ship visit to Australia. The parents are considering traveling to Guam, with Navy support, at some point to meet the crew and partake in a memorial service for his son.

For the remainder of the transit, the embarked medical trauma team administered medical care to the other injured personnel. Their careful attention and evaluation augments the ship’s Independent Duty Corpsman’s heroic efforts since the grounding.

Submarine Squadron Fifteen COMMODORE, Captain Brad Gerhke and Captain Paul Bushong, Commanding Officer of the Submarine Tender USS FRANK CABLE have mobilized their assets, staffs, crews and local Navy Community to provide comprehensive support to the SAN FRANCISCO. Professional counselors, medical personnel and Navy Chaplains are scheduled to meet with the entire crew to provide grief counseling and assistance throughout the next several days and as required over the long term. Brad has been meeting frequently with the SFO families and they are doing remarkable well. The entire Navy community in Guam has come to the SFO’s families’ assistance. I have talked to Kevin Mooney’s (SFO Skipper) wife, Ariel. Her state of mind is positive and resolute, with a courageous and upbeat view of the trying days ahead.

The ship’s Main Ballast Tank damage and deformation has degraded maneuverability and mandated the use of two tugs to moor in Apra Harbor. A Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard/NAVSEA Material Assessment Team comprised of a structural engineer, MBT vent expert, air systems expert and naval architect arrived in Guam with special ship salvage and recovery equipment to stabilize the ship pierside as soon as possible. The team, led by Captain Charles Doty, commenced a seaworthiness and repair assessment upon the ship’s arrival. Once additional buoyancy measures are in place and tested satisfactory, the Low Pressure Blower will be secured to allow divers to enter the water to conduct an inspection.

While this grounding is a tragedy, with a through investigation led by Cecil Haney, we will find out all the facts and then ensure we learn from the mistakes. But, I too believe we have much to be thankful for today, and much to be confident in. An operational warship has returned to port on her own power with all but one of its crew after sustaining major hull damage.

The survival of the ship after such an incredibly hard grounding (nearly instantaneous deceleration from Flank Speed to 4 KTS) is a credit to the ship design engineers and our day-to-day engineering and watch standing practices. The continuous operation of the propulsion plant, electrical systems and navigation demonstrates the reliability of our equipment and the operational readiness of our crews as a whole. The impressive Joint and Navy team effort which resulted in SFO returning to port safely says volumes about the ingenuity and resourcefulness of all our armed services. For all who participated in this effort, thank you and your people. We are all eternally grateful to each of you.

Could you get this posted, please? Those of use who rode these ships understand only too well what happened on the 8th, but this is a very coherent account of the incident. The death of the young 2nd class petty officer will be especially hard for the crew, because we always think in terms of one die, all die; we never are prepared for losing a single shipmate.

Thanks
Boyd G.

PS: This document has been released for distribution by the Navy. I just got back confirmation.

Bound Down With Anchor Chains

11. January 2005 · Comments Off on Bound Down With Anchor Chains · Categories: General, Media Matters Not

The actual report on the Dan Rather/60 Minutes/Memogate fiasco seems like a bit of a hiccup after the fact, an anti-climax, now that our election is over and JFK part Deux returned to richly deserved near-obscurity on the national scene. Events have overtaken it; with over 150,000 dead following the Indian Ocean tsunami, and the Iraqi elections coming up at the end of the month… the moving finger of history moves on, leaving gleeful humorists to make biting references to “Gunga Dan” and the “See BS Network”, and wondering if “anchor”— as in something heavy and leaden, dragging everything else down into the watery muck— might be the appropriate word after all.

At least with the dust somewhat settled, and with the results of an in-house investigation in hand, it can be seen that once again, as James Fallows observed so cogently in “Breaking the News: How the Media Undermines American Democracy”, a reporter is never so apt to get the whole thing wrong as when he or she goes into a story already assuming they know the end of it. Or as Stephen Den Beste (pause to genuflect, deeply) in the comments here termed it “Conclusion first, evidence later”.
It is the nature of serious reporting to dig, to search out the useful and relevant facts of a story, and to pursue with diligence— it can be a good thing to be a bit monomaniacal about something you believe in. Persistence is a good thing, sticking with it in the face of odds is admirable and expected, but…

And this is the big “but”— maintaining your belief in something incredible by discarding every iota of contradictory evidence, especially concerning a matter in which you have no personal expertise, even to the point of disregarding the advice of those who do— that is folly. It is forgivable, or at least understandable as a personal quirk in someone who reads their horoscope in the newspaper, or believes in herbal medicines. It is not something that we as a free people can overlook when committed by a member in good standing of the major media clerisy. When the evidence for a major story can be thoroughly dismembered, and discounted as so much trash and fakery and wishful thinking, and Dan Rather and what was once a major and respected news source can be left like the Emperor, standing in knock-kneed and unseemly nakedness, it is proof that as far as the news business goes the moving finger is indeed moving on. News we can use? It looks like we’ll have to do it ourselves. James Fallows ought to be pleased, at any rate.

And as for major media melt-down, it has happened before, and not all that long ago, either: Big, well-hyped story, fronted by well respected reporter? Check. Undone by
veterans and other experts getting in touch through the internet? Been there. TV producer relying on wishful thinking, dodgy evidence, and discounting every indication to the contrary? Done that.
Only, we get pajamas, instead of a tee-shirt.

Swept Away

10. January 2005 · Comments Off on Swept Away · Categories: General, World

Of all the appalling things about the tsunami in the Indian Ocean, the thing that is the most horrifying to me— after the horrific loss of life, and knowing that after two weeks those who are missing are most likely dead, and that many localities were so thoroughly swamped that there is no one left to report the others missing, no one who will ever come and pick out someone among the pictures of the known dead, and so many of the bodies will never be found at all— are the pictures and accounts of people going out onto the sand flats to look at the fish flopping around, and the pools of water left, when the sea mysteriously and unaccountably withdrew.

There are accounts, here and here, and here, of a few people (and even animals) who knew what it portended, and either fled in good order or raised an alarm, but I am left somewhat boggled at how few people recognized the signs and portents. It is something I have know for so long that I cannot remember first being told it; that if the ocean tide ever, ever unaccountably pulls out— gone, vanished, fish left flopping, no water left— than you should run, run as fast as you can, as far as you can, inland, to the highest farthest bit of ground you can get to, because all that water will come back, crashing down in the biggest wave imaginable. This is knowledge on the order of “bears crap in the woods” and “the Pope is Catholic” sort of thing, even “lost in the woods, follow a watercourse downstream” sort of general basic survival knowledge. Or so I thought.

A quick poll of my nearest and dearest and assorted acquaintances give mixed results; William, Dad, my daughter, all knew this, three or four of my co-workers— all Texas natives— didn’t. I can chalk it up to a general scientific interest, or having lived in a coastal, seismically active places… but still… I thought this was just one those these things that people just knew. Especially if you lived close to the ocean. Readers thoughts on this: did you know, before December 26th this year, that if the tide suddenly and unaccountably runs out, that this means danger so profound that you should drop what you are doing and run for your life?

Good Home (s) Wanted

09. January 2005 · Comments Off on Good Home (s) Wanted · Categories: General

One of my co-workers at the public radio station where I moonlight on Saturdays is as much of a sucker for our dumb chums as I am (What??!! Is that possible?— yes it is, pipe down!) and is looking for homes for a quartet of kittens which she rescued from short and miserable lives on the street. She is not looking with all that much energy, and she is much too young to be the stereotypical cat lady. The kittens are now about seven to nine months old, at about the last point where they could easily adapt to a new home. They are feline HIV negative, free of feline leukemia, neutered and vaccinated, and acclimated to living indoors. Two are calico females, one is an orange long-haired male, and the fourth is a short haired white-and-orange-trim male. They are also used to dogs and other cats. If interested, contact diane@tpr.org. and be prepared to make a good case for her judicious consideration.
Alas, I have no charming pictures— use your imagination!

All Hail, to Sparkey!

07. January 2005 · Comments Off on All Hail, to Sparkey! · Categories: General, Site News

Canny and wisest among engineers, who over last weekend installed certain software plug-ins to repel the disgusting deluge of spam-comments! The latest deluge has been unleashed upon us (they must be on some sort of regular schedule) and not one of the disgusting things has been posted onto the weblog! It is most especially marvellous, because a record-breaking number of 685 over the last to hours, of the most disgusting comments ever created by the mind of … well, whomever… has just been attempted to post to this weblog and not one of them has made it any farther than my hotmail inbox!
Well done, Sparkey! (Gilbert and Sullivan mode on)

Let’s hear three cheers! I’ll lead the way!
Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurray!

(Gilbert and Sullivan mode off)

Carry on… (I had a post about the Roger Tory Peterson Guide to Identifying Members of the Military to finish, but I left the floppy at work. Sorry. Finish on Monday. E-mail me or comment if you have any useful tips by which members of the various services can be differentiated from each other.)

Notice to Readers and Members of the Collective

07. January 2005 · Comments Off on Notice to Readers and Members of the Collective · Categories: General, Site News

The contributor known as Phantom has tendered his resignation from the Daily Brief and has requested that all his posts be removed. I have complied with his request.
That is all. Carry on, people.

Confined to Quarters

05. January 2005 · Comments Off on Confined to Quarters · Categories: General, Military

The Air Force powers that be made occasional institutional stabs at calling those quarters designated for the single enlisted types �dorms� or �quarters�, much as they tried referring to the mess hall as a �dining facility�. They were usually roundly defeated by hundreds of years of traditional nomenclature; while official documentation made a wistful show of calling it a dormitory, everyone else�especially those living in it— went right on calling it a �barracks�, even if it did rather look more like a college dormitory building, and less like the open-bay with fifty bunks and lockers arrayed with precision in two open rows the length of the place, which is what most civilians think of as a barracks.

Such barracks do still exist, of course; in basic training, for one, and on deployments in the field, for another, but in the main junior enlisted military personnel living on-base doss down in a wide variety of buildings in varying degrees of newness and repair, at bases and posts in practically every time zone. Generally, the older the building, the greater the odds that the room will be a small one, and not have to be shared with a roommate (or several), but the latrine/shower/washing area will be a central shared facility. There may even be a common lounge or day-room, sometimes even a kitchen attached. Newer barracks offer larger rooms with a semi-private bathroom, but the additional onus of having to share the place with a roommate. In any case, the walls are painted in some institutionally invisible no-color, and furnished in one of three basic styles prevalent in the military world: GSA Tacky, El Cheapo Danish Moderne or Budget Motel Functional� or an unappealing combination of all three.

Whether the barracks is old or new, privacy and quiet are almost nonexistent and aesthetic considerations minimal at best. Growing up in a large family, attending a rackety boarding school, or residence in a commune may be the best preparation for barracks life. (For certain life situations, the barracks life may be a material improvement.) It is my experience that only young troops, blessed with physical stamina and low expectations really enjoy it. With maturity comes a longing for peace, privacy and not to have to put on a robe and slippers and schlep down an icy corridor at 2 AM to take a pee� let alone having a teen-aged airman, all bright eyed and bushy-tailed at 6 AM pop into the women�s latrine while you are attempting to apply foundation, blusher and mascara and chirp, �Gee, Sgt Hayes, you�re the same age as my mother!�.

No, after a certain age, you only want to share a bathroom with teenagers to whom you are related by blood. Also, after a certain age, you really, really want to keep a degree of separation between the people you work with, and the people who are privy to your off-duty life. Such a degree is just not attainable when living in a barracks. A degree of quiet is not attainable either, because many of the other residents appear to have been raised by wolves, have purchased expensive stereo systems courtesy of the BX Deferred Payment Plan, and are charmingly clueless about the offense given when cranking up their latest CD rattles pictures on the walls� of a room three doors away. At 2 AM. That the building was constructed by the lowest bidder anyway, and the dividing walls appear to be made out of sheets of Kleenex and a thin skin of plaster only intensify the amusement when a guy who works for you takes to noisily and energetically schtupping the women who live on either side of your room on alternate evenings. And the two women cannot stand each other� oh, yeah, you don�t need to watch a soap opera when resident in a barracks, just being there provides all sports of entertainment.

Eventually it all begins to pall; you get sick and tired of other peoples� messy love lives, drinking bouts and jam sessions all conducted at top decibel. You also get sick and tired of the interest that other people are taking in your life� especially the tedious official interest taken by your command, the barracks management and assorted high-ranking nosey-parkers in the state of your devotion to housekeeping in what is after all supposed to be your home. On a regular basis, any assortment of these interested parties can demand entrance to your room, and inspect the state of the refrigerator seals, the windowsills, whether the bed is properly made and what you have left on the top of the dresser. Such interior inspections are not performed in the married housing areas, which house personnel of the same rank and which are also maintained by the military. Of course, even a government landlord has a vested interest in making sure that all quarters are not allowed to degenerate into slum hood. And some few military personnel— single and married alike— do give the impression of having been raised by wolves as far as housekeeping abilities go. But still, the different treatment rankles.

Most military people tend towards the fastidious side of the scale and eventually the single ones living in the barracks tire of repeatedly proving it to every Master Sgt. Tom, Major Dick and Colonel Harry who wants to satisfy themselves about how the troops are doing by tromping heavily through your not-so private bed-sitter. So after a couple of years of barracks life, the older troops decamp� either marrying or renting a place of their own, were one can at least leave an unwashed coffee cup on the end-table without exciting unfavorable comment from someone who doesn�t live there also. They do spend the rest of their lives, though, being rather exacting about lining up shoes, and hanging shirts just so.

Excuse The Faint Odor of Lysol….

01. January 2005 · Comments Off on Excuse The Faint Odor of Lysol…. · Categories: General, Site News

We have just finished cleaning up after being swamped with a sudden surge of porn spam. Comments were turned off, while we updated our spam-repellant filters, and scoured all the old posts, and wished torments involving fire ants, jars of honey and spiked clubs on the perverts who originated the stuff…

Mom’s Christmas Butter Cookies

21. December 2004 · Comments Off on Mom’s Christmas Butter Cookies · Categories: Domestic, General

Mom’s favorite Christmas cookie recipe came originally from one of those post-war commercial give-away cookbooks which have provided James Lileks with so much materiel for “The Gallery of Regrettable Food” when they attempted to shroud whatever foodstuff they manufactured in as many culinary guises as possible. This particular collection was from Pillsbury, however, and was first worn to tatters (besides being liberally splashed with vanilla, smears of butter and sprinkled with flour, sugar and other substances), then lost for a time— it turned out that my sister had it— and finally lost permanently in the fire last year. But before that happened, Mom had submitted the recipe for the Valley Center Art Association Cookbook; the original book is gone, but the recipe lives on.

Sift together: 2 ½ c. flour
1 tsp soda
1 tsp cream of tartar
¼ tsp salt

Cream together with electric mixer:
1 c butter
1 ½ c. powdered sugar

Add: 1 unbeaten egg
1 Tbsp vanilla

When well-blended, add the dry ingredients. This makes the basic cookie dough, which must be chilled before forming, and baked on an ungreased cookie sheet or parchment paper at 400 deg. The greatest thing about these cookies is the number of variations that can be done with the basic recipe; they can be simply rolled out and cut with shaped cutters… or you can do any of the following:

Snowballs: Stir in 1 ½ c. finely chopped walnuts, chill and then shape into small walnut-sized balls. Bake at 400 deg. For 8-10 minutes, and roll warm cookies in powdered sugar.

Cinnamon Balls: Shape plain chilled dough into walnut-sized balls, and roll in ¼ c. sugar mixed with 2 tsp, cinnamon. Bake at 400 deg. For 5-8 minutes

Chocolate Rolled Cookies: add 2 ounces of unsweetened melted chocolate to basic dough. Chill, roll out and cut into shapes. Spread half of the cookies with a frosting of your choice (Mom always favored peppermint-flavored icing) , and top with remaining cookies to make a sandwich cookie.

Fruit/Nut Balls: Add 1 Tbsp. grated orange peel, 2 Tbsp orange juice, ½ c. mixed candied fruit, and 1 c. chopped nuts. Chill, shape into walnut-sized balls and bake at 400 deg. 5-8 minutes.

Jelly or Chocolate Balls: Form chilled dough into walnut sized balls, and using the end of a wooden spoon push a hole into the top of each one. Fill the indentation with jelly (apricot, currant or raspberry) or melted semi-sweet chocolate. Bake 4-5 minutes.

Winter Solstice: Christmas At the End of the Earth, In the Dark

20. December 2004 · Comments Off on Winter Solstice: Christmas At the End of the Earth, In the Dark · Categories: General, Military

North of the Arctic Circle, the day of the winter solstice is barely half an hour long, and isn’t even a day, merely a few minutes of heavy grey twilight before the shades of night swoop in again. All during that year I spent at Sondrestrom Airbase, we included the time of the sunrise and sunset in the daily weather report and forecast. As the year rolled by, we were keenly aware of the days waxing, and then waning. From the time of the summer solstice, the minutes of daylight were inexorably chipped away. Lake Ferguson, a short distance downhill from the on-air studio windows froze over, and then snow fell, blanketing the lake, and the low tundra scrub, and the bare grey granite mountains, all alike in clean pure white. On one late autumn day, I watched as the sun, which was sliding down the western sky behind me, turned all of that expanse— lake, mountains and shoreline, all of it to pink, while the sky above it was a clear, icy light blue. In all the world from the studio window, only those colors, the cotton-puff pink, and the clear sky blue. In a few more weeks, though, all the daylight colors drained out of the little world at the head of Sondrestrom-fijord; just the dark and the lights from the base amplified in billows of saffron-colored vapor from all the ventilators and chimneys, the stars above, and filmy electrical-green wisps of the Northern Lights, like a shred of torn silk scarf blown and twisted in a galactic wind.

It takes a year in the far North to appreciate the winter solstice, and to understand how deep the urge to note and celebrate the passing of the shortest day of the year, how powerfully our ancestors in that part of the world longed for light and life to return to their existence again. So powerful was this urge that it pulled in the celebration of the birth of Christ, which— if celebrated in the early church at all, most likely took place in the spring.
We anticipated and rather dreaded Christmas, because once the last rotator and garbage-run flight was made a few days before the holiday, we would have no military flights in or out until well after New Years’. After all, the flight crews and support staff at McGuire AFB would want time off to celebrate the season, but it left us all feeling rather more isolated than usual. 17 pounds of letter mail and multiple parcels for everyone did help a little. And I discovered that there are some Christmas songs that simply cannot be aired at a remote site.
“Don’t freaking play that freaking song again!” said the caller, “You do, and I swear I will come up to the station and cut my own freaking throat in the studio….we don’ need to be reminded about being home for Christmas only in our freaking dreams! You wanna put the whole freaking base into a suicidal depression?”
No, DJs at AFRTS stations really can’t air gloomy sentimental favorites like:

“I’ll be home for Christmas, You can count on me
Please have snow and mistletoe and presents on the tree
Christmas Eve will find me, where the love light gleams
I’ll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams.”

It’s not like the audience needs to be reminded about the situation; cheerfully raucous things like “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” and the dogs barking “Jingle Bells” always went over much, much better.

We did what we could with strings of lights, and baking cookies in the tiny kitchenette in the officers and senior NCO barracks, and the dining hall laid on a lavish feast for Christmas Day. The dining hall was crammed with Americans and Danes, military and contract personnel and the NCO club manager brought over crates of champagne, which he sold in the foyer as we went in to dinner, and to admire the vast center table full of hors ‘oeuvres, ornamented with piles of fresh fruit, and vegetables, bowls of candies and crackers, smoked hams and yes, a lovely smoked turkey— which was quite real, by the way (by custom and practice it was given to the base fire department for later snacking) plates of cheese and bread rolls, cut vegetables and dips… oh, yes, a feast— and it was just for nibbling, to tide us over until the main courses were served. The base commander welcomed the Danish Liaison officer, who was serenaded with Christmas carols, the champagne corks were popped, and the feasting commenced…

Say what you can about a military dining hall, they can certainly do the Christmas and Thanksgiving feasts; and the farther out on the edge of the world, the more it is appreciated, and the most fondly remembered. Even if, at the time, most all of us would rather have been somewhere else.

Oh!!! Christmas Tree!

18. December 2004 · Comments Off on Oh!!! Christmas Tree! · Categories: Domestic, General

It really takes a gift to find yourself on a soggy-wet mountainside in on a Sunday afternoon in December, with a fine drizzle coagulating out of the fog in the higher altitudes, slipping and sliding on a muddy deer track with a tree saw in one hand, and leading a sniffling and wet (inside and out) toddler with the other.
Yep, it’s a gift all right, born of spontaneous optimism and an assumption based on the map on the back page of the Sacra-Tomato bloody-f#$*%^g Bee newspaper, and a promise to Mom. Said map made the %$#*ing Christmas tree farm look like it was a couple of blocks, a mere hop-skip-and-jump from the back gate of Mather AFB’s housing area, an easy jaunt on a pleasant Sunday afternoon, a lovely and traditional Christmas pastime, choosing your own tree from the place they were growing in!

I was taking leave the next day, and driving home to Hilltop House from Sacramento, and my job in the Public Affairs office. It would only be the second Christmas I had spent at home with Mom and Dad since going on active duty (and it would be the last one for ten years). And Mom had made a confession;
“I haven’t gotten the tree yet. The ones at the lot look horrible, all but dead.”
“I’ll buy one here and bring it down, “I said, spontaneously. “There was a bit in the paper this morning about a local Christmas tree farm. I can tie it to the roof rack.” My car of the moment was a VW station wagon with an immaculate interior and a very useful roof rack. If it didn’t fit into the back, like the unfinished chest or drawers I had bought for my daughters’ room, it went up on top, lashed about with bungee cords and rope. I had brought home a lot of stuff that way.
“Perfect, “said Mom. “Stick the trunk end in a bucket of water overnight, so it won’t dry out on the way down.”

We set out bravely enough, early in the afternoon, my daughter strapped into her car seat, and the map from the newspaper open on the passenger seat, where I could refer to it, easily. Past the housing area BX shopette and gas station, out the gate, a couple of turns, and there we were, tooling along a pleasant country road in the mild winter sunshine. On the map it looked as if I would stay on this road for a couple of miles, until it intersected with another road, one with a couple of wiggles in it… into hills, perhaps? It looked as if the tree farm were out in the country and fairly easy to find, not hidden in a jumble of other businesses, intersections and traffic. Soon, empty fields and meadows opened up around us… stood to reason a Christmas Tree farm would be out in the country. Maybe the next mile or two would bring me to the turn-off, the road with a couple of wiggles in it…

Fifteen minutes… twenty minutes… half an hour, still no intersection. Forty-five minutes, and it was very clear that the map was deceptive about the distances. I had gassed up in anticipation of the long drive the next day, so that was not a problem, but if I had not already told Mom I would come home bearing a fresh-cut Christmas tree, I would have turned around and gone back. An hour went by, and the road began to climb. Good heavens, we were nearly to the gentle dun-colored foothills, where the clouds had begun to pile up against distant jagged blue mountains of the Sierra Nevada. At last— an intersection ahead! I slowed down to verify against the map. Yes, the right one. Pretty soon, it began to climb, looping farther and higher into the hills, up into the cloud layer. I ran the wipers to clear away condensation, hoping that the distance along this new road was not as deceptively mapped. I had definitely not counted on two hours there and back. This had better be worth it.

There was a sign, at least… a sign, a gap in the undergrowth, a dirt road leading up into the trees, but the condensation had become a drizzle by the time I pulled into a parking lot, which was merely a couple of cars haphazardly stopped in a roughly mown field around a plain red-painted shed with a deep overhanging roof. The door was open, there were people there, but not as many as there were cars.
“Here, “said a teenaged girl at the cashbox. She handed me a tree saw, and a mimeographed sheet with sketches of the various types of trees with attention to their needles, and a list of prices— so many dollars per foot of tree. “Just cut down the one you want, bring it back here and we’ll figure the price.”
I took the saw, and stuffed the sheet in my shoulder bag, and looked around.
“Where are the trees?”
She pointed out the door, where the dirt road continued up to the top of the hill.
“Up there. They’re all over. Just find one you like.”

My daughter began to lag, halfway up the hill. I looped the tree saw over my arm, and picked her up. The ground was very wet, either sloppy mud, or slippery grass. We had at least come away from the house with coats, but my light-weight tennis shoes were soon saturated. Coming down the slope on the far side, I skidded and sat down rather heavily. Great, now I was wet and muddy to the waist, as well as my daughter. The trees were scattered, not in neat, easily accessed rows, among taller trees and long thickets of grass. It began to rain. I had to put my daughter down and let her walk, but she was not happy about that, and began to sob, quietly.

We would have to find a tree, soon… and close enough that I could drag it… and the saw… and my poor daughter back to the shed. The most convenient trees were either too large, or the more expensive varieties.
There… there was a tree, with the long graceful bunches of needles. It sat on a slope, but it was just a little taller than me. I sat my daughter down, and put my purse in her lap—
“Here, watch this, for Mummy,” and picked a place on the tree’s trunk, about four inches above the clay and clinging soil, put the saw to it and went to work. Mercifully, it only took a few vigorously-expended minutes. I slung my purse and the saw over my arms, picked up the tree and my daughter, and began the long, unhappy, sodden forced-march up over the top of the hill and down towards the sales hut. Some Christmas excursion— wet, pissed-off, on a soggy mountainside with a lopsided Christmas tree, a wet and wailing toddler, and a hour-plus drive, and a longer one in the morning… oh, Christmas tree!

I did soak the trunk of it in a bucket of water, before lashing it to the luggage rack for the drive south the next morning, though that may not have made much difference.
“It’s so fresh!” Mom said, rapturously. “It smells marvelous! Never mind about the flat place, we’ll put that against the wall, and no one will ever know… really, I wonder how long it’s been since the ones in the lot have been cut! I really wonder about that, now.”
“You probably don’t really want to know, “I said. “Merry Christmas… and you owe me $10.”
“Is that all?” Mom said.
“Oh, yeah, “I replied. “That’s all. Merry Christmas.”

Belief in “Sandy Claws”

15. December 2004 · Comments Off on Belief in “Sandy Claws” · Categories: Domestic, Memoir

I don’t think JP and I ever held a firm belief in Santa who lived at the North Pole with a workshop of elves, and went around on Christmas Eve with a bag of toys for the good children and a sack of coal for the bad ones. We just accepted it as a polite and gentle convention, a sort of insider and mutually agreed-upon fiction, as sparkling and as insubstantial as the fake snow in the department store window displays. Being the children of a research biologist, we knew darned well from a very early age that it was just not possible for creatures without wings to fly… and that reindeer most certainly did not have wings as original issue. Dad, with logic and first-hand observation did his part in keeping us from certain pernicious heresies, but I think it was Granny Jessie who very quietly let us in on the joke at a very early age, without saying another word.

We— JP and I, later joined by Pippy— would spend the week or so before Christmas with Granny Jessie and Grandpa Jim, in the tiny white house on South Lotus, a house quite overshadowed by the enormous oak tree, the avocado tree, and Grandpa Jims’ grove of dark-green, shiny-leaved camellia shrubs, and on one day, during that week before Christmas, we would walk up to Colorado Boulevard, past the corner Italian grocery with the aromatic smoked cheese and salami hanging in the window, and sacks of chickpeas in the back. We always went in, but hardly ever bought anything, although Granny Jessie did once pick up one of the peas, and showed us how it really, really did look like a chick. The stock in the Italian grocery was suspect, and alien, too exotically spicy for Granny Jessie, who preferred plain American groceries from Don’s Market, around the corner on Rosmead Avenue.

We were not going to go to the grocery store, though, but down-town to the mercantile heart of Pasadena, to the department stores on and around the cross-avenues; Lake, Los Robles and Marengo. Sitting on the long bench at the back of the bus, on the way we passed the City College campus where Mom had gone to school, the famous Pasadena Playhouse where Granny Jessie took us for the children’s matinees, a pleasant jumble of Californa Beaux Arts and Spanish colonial buildings, all tricked out with tile and plaster facades, spiked here and there with grey gothic fantasies intricately cast in concrete, and one or two storefronts in the very latest 1930ies Moderne. Downtown offered generous sidewalks, almost promenades really, all garnished with palm trees, and a number of department stores in fairly close proximity: Hertels, where Granny Jessie had an account for many years, Bullocks, which had a very hoity-toity tearoom on the top floor, May Company and J.C. Penny— both of which were rather more upscale then than now.

And Granny Jessie soberly walked us around to all of the department store Santas, all three or four of them, during the course of one day. Hertels may not have fielded a Santa most years but Bullocks went all-out, with an elaborate set, sparkling with glittery fake snow. We would be solemnly perched on Santa’s red-velveteen knee, and queried as to what we wanted most of all for Christmas, mumble an answer, and be given each a small red and white peppermint candy cane.
“Want did you ask Santa for?” Granny Jessie asked.
“A train set… a swing set…Lincoln logs…a Freddy the Pig book… a play house… a wagon.” We would reply confidently, and be marched on to the next department store to put in our Christmas request in duplicate or triplicate.

No, we always knew it was a pretend, a game, but it seemed to amuse everyone to continue playing it. Besides, we usually did get something very close to what we had asked for— Clever Granny Jessie!— even if it came with a gift tag saying it was from “Sandy Claws”… written in Mom’s handwriting.

(JP and I, at May Company or J.C. Penny, circa 1957)

Valley Center Christmas Update

13. December 2004 · Comments Off on Valley Center Christmas Update · Categories: Domestic, General

As predicted last month, Mom and Dad’s new house will not be finished in time for Christmas. Although they may have all the roof complete and tiled, in between the holidays, all the inside work— the interior partitions, with the drywall to be installed and mudded, and all the tilework, not to mention the kitchen and bathroom cabinets and painting the whole place— will take another three or four months.

Mom has already picked out the paint chips for the inside; a very deep creamy-yellow. I saw it in a page in a catalogue and thought how perfect it will be in the house, once finished. In the late afternoon, when the sunshine comes through the solarium, the inside of the house will glow like a Japanese paper lantern. They already have collected a large storage unit of furniture and linens and things, to fill up the new spaces, replacing as much of the china and knickknacks from odd places like the AmVets thrift store…
“Very nice things there, “Mom said, “If you know what to look for.”
I think that the things from thrift stores and swap meets, and second-hand shops replace more nearly those things left to the fire a year ago October, all those things a little worn with use, dear with familiarity, not particularly valuable in themselves, but comfortably shabby.

I have already sent Mom her Christmas present, which was much appreciated: a large cardboard hatbox, filled with framed photographs. Some time ago, I had re-photographed many of the family photographs, or taken copies of them. (And oh, how I wish now I had taken many more!) Over the last month I bought a mixed lot of frames (at the thrift-store) and proper mats, and scanned and adjusted my collection of photographs— a good many of the originals turn out now to have been left in the house. The frames and mats are all color-coordinated so they can be hung in a group. For now, they are in the storage unit, but Mom appreciated them enormously.

Blondie and I will celebrate Christmas here in Texas; she is able to come home on leave, and we plan to re-do her bedroom with new paint and curtains, and stencil the floor as I have done in the rest of the house. Something about all that house-building and painting, and refurnishing… it’s catching, I think!

Memo: Tired of the TV Same-Old, Same-Old

09. December 2004 · Comments Off on Memo: Tired of the TV Same-Old, Same-Old · Categories: Media Matters Not

To: Those Providing Our TV Entertainment Content
From: Sgt Mom
RE: Why Your Audience Is Slipping Away

1. Recent remarks from insiders in the entertainment industry just confirm my long-held suspicion that large chunks of the American audience are held in contempt by those who are rewarded generously by the American entertainment machine; a contempt which I suspect is only equaled by their absolute ignorance of the world outside the nice bicoastal media wonderland. “Throw the rubes another ration of crap,” seems to be what they are saying privately in the corridors of media power, “Derivative, warmed over, cliché ed and shop-worn krep, the same old lame concepts, plastic people and hackneyed plots, garnished with gunfire and laugh-tracks… they’re too stupid to appreciate anything better.”

2. I have watched TV on a somewhat erratic basis for… um… over four decades, now, going from a TV-less household as a child, to working as a military broadcaster, from no TV to having friends record stuff for me, from cable to the basic local channels, so this has not been a solid and consistent TV-watching four decades. But I have seen enough to know that I have seen enough. The good stuff shines like an occasional rare beacon in the sea of krep, and I embrace it happily, and watch it on tape or DVD over and over, but the rest of it can be dropped into the Marianas Trench for all I care.

3. A lot of TV is worse than a vast wasteland, now— it is a swamp of toxic sludge, recycled every season, over and over. One feels stupider, and coarsened for having watched much of it one time around. Seeing the same old, same old come around, yet again— for how much longer can the same old leftovers be served up again, and made to look entertaining?

4. For one, I am tired of laugh-tracks on sitcoms… If it is funny, I will laugh. A gale of recorded laughter will not revive a desperately un-funny line, and will not make a televised sows’ ear into an Oscar Wilde silk purse.

5. I am quite thoroughly sick of shows about doctors, criminal lawyers, and police officers, and all the many permutations. Yes they do interesting work, and any of these professions afford an easy excuse to be involved in other people’s lives and problems, but for the love of mike, aren’t there any other interesting jobs out there? Even shows about reporters, lifeguards and firefighters haven’t been beaten into the ground nearly as much as the big three. There have been occasional shows about truck drivers, the staff at radio and TV stations, the inhabitants of small towns, the military, and farm families, amongst others, so we know that you are capable of moving beyond law, crime and medicine.

6. Cease and desist immediately from painting children and teenagers as wiser, more tolerant, more worldly and cooler than their chuckleheaded parents. Get over the Sixties, already. If we need to have our parental authority undermined, that’s what our children’s disreputable and idiotic friends are for.

7. Please try and get out of Southern California, and New York City. While they are interesting places, where live many people who wouldn’t consider living anywhere else, there exist great swaths of the United States which are just as scenic, and have just as much to offer. I don’t just mean zipping in for a couple of days to shoot exterior scenes before scuttling back to a sound stage in Burbank, but actually staying around long enough to get a sense of place. The only damned thing on TV that even comes with in a mile of reflecting where I live….is a freaking animated feature!!!

8. I wouldn’t go so far as to demand that you cast actors who look like normal regular people in everything, but casting a size-0 stick-insect-with-tits girly-girl, or a male-girly-girl underwear model as a character doing a job which in the real world may require physical presence, upper-body strength, and the ability to handle heavy objects will blow a lot of your credibility… even before the stick insect or the underwear model open their mouths.

9. Please remember that most of the world knows Americans only through the medium of movies and television, and if what is reflected there is so distorted that us Americans barely recognize ourselves, what must the inhabitants of Uhlan-Bator or Zambia think? Thanks so much for picturing so many of us as violent, vulgar, amoral barbarians.

10. I am trying to remember when I last bought something I saw advertised on television. Nothing comes to mind, but then I am down to watching only a dozen hours or so a week, and much of that is recorded… and my VCR skips through the commercials.

Sincerely,
Sgt Mom

Kids Living Dangerously

07. December 2004 · Comments Off on Kids Living Dangerously · Categories: Domestic

This post last week attracted a long and amusing thread of comments, with many and varied accounts of juvenile risk-taking, and experimentation with speed, height, bodies of water and devices of an incendiary or explosive nature, along with much marveling on how little comment all this attracted from parental units and other authority figures at the time… in sad contrast to the interest such activities would arouse today.

By and by large the activities and amusements cited fell into two rough categories; assorted juvenile hell-raising, and deeds of derring-do, over which the parental units would probably have come completely unglued if they had only known about them. The other category covers the casual unconcern by parents in an era not to terribly long ago, of certain practices which now are almost mandatory, yea, even enforced by fear of accusations of child endangerment. Surely the world was not any more or less dangerous thirty or forty years ago than now, but my parents were remarkably insouciant about all of us— JP and I, Pippy and Sander— walking several miles to and from school, alone or with other children, but no adult accompaniment.

We hiked around the deserted chaparral hills for hours, outside parental supervision, climbing trees and rock slopes, rode bikes and horses without helmets or anything remotely resembling safety gear. We were expected back at a particular time, and to confine our wanderings within certain bounds— anything from the back yard, to a good few square acres or miles. If there were seatbelts in the back seat of the Plymouth station wagon, I don’t recall them ever in use. As for infant car seats? No such thing; baby and toddler, Sander traveled in my lap or in my mothers’. Mom and Dad were careful, responsible parents, but the common practice of that time seems like the rankest kind of carelessness compared what is now required. (And of which I approve most strongly!)

Ah, but the other sort of adventure, of the unstructured, free-form sort! Our father trapped live snakes, and allowed us to handle them, and hung a length of rope from a tall, leaning tree to make a Tarzan swing, and taught us some wilderness craft, but a lot of the experimentation with explosive and/or flammable substances related by other commenters—other than bashing coils of caps (for cap pistols) between two rocks to make them pop, or scorching leaves with the suns’ rays focused through a magnifying glass— were absolutely forbidden to us. The risk of setting the hills on fire was all too great, and in fact we were uninvolved witnesses when a neighbor boy did indeed start a brush fire with a mis-aimed firework; a fire that could have engulfed three or four houses on our street.

We did indulge in a lot of wheeled recklessness, though, starting with JP and me attempting to ride a go-cart down a rocky hillside trail with a slope more nearly vertical than horizontal. The wipeout was instantaneous and most spectacular, and I was washing dirt and grit out of my ears and nose for days. The roads around Redwood house, paved and not—undulated like a the slopes on a roller coaster ride, best appreciated when ventured in a self-steered little red wagon… especially on that final steep slope which abruptly terminated in four busy lanes of vehicle traffic on Foothill Boulevard. It was, on the whole, a good thing that Mom never actually witnessed us— JP on the bicycle, Pippy in the wagon, and me pushing Sander’s stroller, a cavalcade of kids and wheels and dust, racing downhill at top speed, bouncing over the ruts and rocks, and letting the stroller coast when I took my hands away. Well, that was really reckless… but anyway I could run faster than the stroller could coast, so never mind that there was another block of bumpy road and then a lot of traffic. No, I could grab the stroller before there was ever the least danger to our baby brother. It was just exciting, all of us barreling down the road…. Or climbing trees and rock faces, or letting go the rope swing at exactly the right moment to fall into a tall pile of raked-up pine needles, and I wonder, reading the other comments, if this sort of risk taking didn’t serve a deep purpose, and never mind the scrapes and bumps, and bruises, the occasional stitch and sprain and fracture.

On the day that I took the training wheels off Blondie’s bicycle, I spent the afternoon pushing her on the bike up and down the yard, until we went out on the road in front of our house and—gaining in confidence, she performed increasingly less-wobbly figure eights. On the second day, she challenged her best friend to a race, in the alley behind the apartment building at Chalet San Lamberto, and hit a bit of broken pottery, and went flying over the handlebars— scraped elbows and knees and nose, bruises and blood everywhere, followed by a quick trip to the Clinica Montpelier for an x-ray. But on the third day, she was careful and judicious about the need for speed, and I wonder now if that was the most salutary way of learning it. Better perhaps to chance it on skateboards and bicycles, and risk scrapes and cuts as a kid, than to be swaddled around with parental supervision and safety gear, only to cut loose later with motor vehicles and other dangerous adult toys and amusements when one hasn’t developed a sense of risks and consequences.

Keeping them safe may not be the main thing; it may be better in the long run to teach them —somehow!– skills at living dangerously.
Not that it makes it any easier to watch…

12/07/41 Another Sunday, Another War

06. December 2004 · Comments Off on 12/07/41 Another Sunday, Another War · Categories: History

Note: This is not of my own writing, but something I clipped from the L.A. Times around 1971 or 1972, and tucked into my paperback copy of Walter Lord’s “Day Of Infamy”. It was written by Jack Smith, who was then and for many years, one of the columnists at the L.A. Times. I thought at the time, and still do, that it was one of the most evocative short pieces ever written about that day—Sgt Mom

It was 30 years ago, as I write this at last; a Sunday morning. It doesn’t matter any more, but I’ve always wanted to write it down anyway, while it was still vivid, and before to many anniversaries had passed.
At approximately 8 o’clock on that morning we were standing in the front yard of Bill Tyree’s rented house, out in a valley back of Diamond Head. It had been an all-night party and Tyree was standing in the front door in his pongee Chinese housecoat with the dragon on it, waving us goodbye.
In those days there was nothing necessarily dissolute about an all-night party, especially on Saturday nights. We were night people, and there was always an excuse for a party, always some correspondent on his way out to Manila or Jakarta to cover the war we knew was going to break out in the Far East. The honoree this weekend was a United Press man from New York who was leaving on Monday for the Dutch East Indies.

It had been a good party. We were all keyed up and full of war talk and we envied the correspondent, who would be there when it started. That very morning the banner on the Honolulu Advertiser had said WAR EXPECTED OVER WEEKEND. Japan was expected to attack the Dutch Indies, or if they were insane enough, the Philippines.

We stood in the yard, all quite sober; but drunk perhaps, with a subconscious excitement and a benign fatigue. It was a bright morning. The pink was fading from the sky. There is no exaggerating the beauty of Hawaiian mornings. Sometimes, after these parties, we would drive out to the lagoon at dawn and watch the Pan American clipper come splashing in from San Francisco or Samoa; a flamingo landing in a pink pool.
I don’t know how long we had been standing there in the yard when we heard a thump; one of those deep, distant, inexplicable sounds that make human beings feel suddenly very small and cold.
“It must be the gas works” somebody said, and we laughed. Days later, when we were all together again, we agreed it must have been the Arizona blowing up.

We piled into the major’s car. The major was a press relations officer for the U.S. Army in Hawaii and he knew everything. He and the correspondent got into the front seat, my wife and I in the back. As we drove along Kapiolani toward Waikiki I looked up idly into the sky and saw a silver plane flying high along the shoreline with puffs of dark smoke bursting just beneath it, I was wondering what this phenomenon might signify, when a second plane flew over, provoking more puffs, and then another.
“Something funny’s going on up there,” I said. The major stopped the car and we all got out and stood in the street, looking up into that lovely sky. Another plane came in over Diamond Head and the puffs appeared, futile and somehow comical, like bad stage effects.

The major put his hands on his hips and swore;
“Damn it, I’ve told them not to pull this kind of stuff without telling me.”
We got back in the car and drove into downtown Honolulu, past the quaint old Iolani Palace, the only royal palace in America. The palace air raid siren was going full out. We were no longer frivolous. Things were out of joint but how, we could not guess. The major dropped us off at our apartment.
“I’m going to the fort,” he said, “and see what this is all about.”
In the apartment I started to undress and went out on the balcony in my underwear. A plane flew over. I had no idea what it was; but what the hell, we were making new planes every day. I heard gunfire, but gunfire was not unusual on Oahu in 1941.

I went inside and lay down. “Something funny is going on, “I said, “but I’m too tired to think about it. I’m going to bed.”
There was the sound of someone running up the stairs to the balcony, pounding at the door and shouting; “The Japs are bombing us!”
“I know,” I said, knowing it as if I had never not known it, “You’d better put some coffee on, “ I told my wife. “It might be a long day.”

The Golden Age of AFRS-Athens

03. December 2004 · Comments Off on The Golden Age of AFRS-Athens · Categories: History, Military

Another military broadcaster who served at Hellenikon AFB has set up a website focusing on his time there in the early Sixties…
And Costas, the civilian engineer was STILL there when I was there, in 1983.
A station never lets go of a senior broadcast engineer, you know— because chances are, they are the only one who knows how it all is wired together!!
Check it out!

Rites, Practices and Legends#13: “The CO”

02. December 2004 · Comments Off on Rites, Practices and Legends#13: “The CO” · Categories: Military

“Beloved by all my crew – A really popular commander”
Capt. Corcoran, HMS Pinafore

I worked more often for an NCOIC in my AFRTS time, since broadcast detachments were nearly always headed by an NCOIC, with a commanding officer usually geographically distant from the hurly burly of daily management. They descended on us occasionally, or we had a TDY to our broadcast squadron headquarters, and sometimes not even that; I went for a year in Greenland and only laid eyes on our erstwhile squadron commanders’ signature twice, and spoke to him on the phone once.. As far as the two stations in Greenland were concerned, the commander of the Arctic Broadcast Squadron could not be described as a ‘hands-on’ manager; it was more like ‘hands in fur-lined gloves in a parka 5,000 miles away, who only on occasion remembered that we existed at all.’

With one exception, the really, really great commanding officers that I did work for, were when I was working outside my career field, and actually close enough — like being in the same building, instead of a couple of countries or a continent away— to be any sort of judge. There may very well have been excellent commanders and leaders of persons in Air Force Broadcasting, but I was never close enough to know this for sure.

The first on my personal best list was Major Azuna, a stocky, second-generation Japanese-American, who had been many things in a knock-around active-duty career; enlisted air crewman, navigator, instructor, and eventually the commands’ go-to guy for sorting out troubled and underperforming units. He was Mather AFB’s Public Affairs Officer when I worked there, having come from a triumphant sorting-out of the supply office, and would go on to launch the bases’ first Family Support Center (and retire in glory as a full colonel.) As far as I knew, Major Azuna had no background in logistics, PA, or social work and less knowledge, at least at the start when he took over each of these activities; but he was an absolutely dynamic leader and manager of people, and unerring in his handling of those who did know the field.

He soaked up other people’s expertise like a sponge, and forgot nothing; he routinely called each one of us — officers, NCOs, the airmen and civilians — into his office for talks about our various projects and duties. We would be peppered with searching, and intelligent questions; what were we working on, who had we talked to, what were the problems we were running into, what had we done to resolve problems, why were we doing it that way, what did we need to make a better job of it. Twenty minutes with the Major left one feeling very much as if every brain cell had been vacuumed out of your skull and wrung dry of information. And he did this with everyone, from the junior airmen on their first assignment, all the way up through MSgt Chuck who had twenty years of various PAO experience, our reserve officers who had pretty much the same, and our two GS employees who had twice that.

The Major channeled about a hundred years of cumulative knowledge from that one little office, and never missed a trick, steering the office back to the best that it could be. Sometimes on a slow summer afternoon, he would drift around to the junior troops’ desks and ask
“So, what are you doing?” and when the answer was an honest, “Nothing much, sir.” He would say, “OK then, go home.”
Yay! Released from the duty day early! — but the corollary to that was that if there was something going on, something to finish— you stayed late to get it done. That assignment was one which I really hated to leave. So was the next stateside assignment, over a decade later, to Detachment 8, Combat Camera at Hill AFB, and the commander was another major.

Aside from the same rank, and being a gifted handler of skilled and knowledgeable technicians, Major Fowler was as different from Major Azuma as it was possible to be. He was sardonic, and hip, easily bored and very, very sharp — the character that Will Smith tries for, in the movies. I wound up working on many of his projects because when he came up with a scathingly brilliant notion and shot out of his office looking for someone to work it, chances are that I would be the first NCO he fell over. I was pretty well tied to the production library, two doors away from his office.

Escape was fruitless, and besides I was amused by his jive street dude persona.
“Sgt Hayes!! Can you get me a price on twenty pounds of cod?”
“Very well, sir— will that be fresh or frozen cod?”
“And cornmeal. Gotta have cornmeal!” I am sure that what I called my ‘Sergeant Jeeves act’— hyper-competent and totally unflappable also amused the Major. He came from Louisiana, and was an expert cook. The unit barbeques and cookouts were legendary, especially when he brought his propane-fired bottomless soup kettle, and fixed gumbo for the whole unit, flavored with Andouille sausage sent by his mother especially from New Orleans.

It took a few months to progress from “Sir, there is a problem, and the solution is A, B, C or D, which do you prefer?” through “Sir there is a problem, and the solution is A, B, C or D, and I favor D for the following reason,” to reach “Sir, there is a problem—” And he would cut me off and say, “Deal with it. Brief me later.” I found a little pin at a science fiction convention with Captain Picards’ stock command ‘Make it so!’ and gave it to the Major, who was absolutely tickled. He kept it on his desk, and just waved it wordlessly, when the occasion demanded.

The staff of Det. 8 had room to be creative and excel, and the rewards for it immediate; we racked up dozens of high interest productions, not just for the Air Force, but for the DOD and other government departments. As a video production unit, there was almost always something interesting going on; in master control, any of the four edit suites, the graphics work station, the audio booth. There were also two mobile production vans, off on TDY for weeks at a time, acquiring video; there were hundreds and thousands of hours of stock video in the library, and when I got there, none of it was indexed and catalogued. I took it as my project to do so, and the Major agreed. Up to that point the various producers had just kept the location of various interesting bits of stock footage in their heads. He assigned me the services of our occasional reservist, who was a computer genius, and designed me a database which allowed the stock library to be searched, once reviewed, and logged in. The library became rather a showplace, a popular spot on the tour of the unit where we could show off how quickly we could locate very specific footage for prospective productions.

The Major was very restless, easily bored, and more often to be found out of his office than in it. I was always reminded of what someone once said about Teddy Roosevelt— “You must remember; the President is about ten years old.” And like a small boy, he was somewhat of a tease, but a good sport about being teased himself. One day he was amusing himself by playing around with the newly-installed public address microphone at the receptionists’ station in the foyer, tapping on it, and blowing into it, and after about five minutes of this, I walked very quietly down the hall and said,
“Well sir, now that you have blown in all of our ears, are you going to give us a kiss?”

I did think for about half a second that I might have gone too far, but I hadn’t – he laughed uproariously. One more good thing about the best commanders; they will put up with a bit of cheek, as long as it stays ‘in house.’

Fall into Winter: The Perfect Day

30. November 2004 · Comments Off on Fall into Winter: The Perfect Day · Categories: Domestic, General

Fall, the most gloriously transient, fleeting time of the year is most especially welcomed in South Texas. The brutal summer heat looses its’ death-grip, afternoon sunshine falls like a golden benison, and the nights are cool and breezy. All over the city, is the echo of windows being opened, and the sounds of children’s voices coming from the scratch game of toss or basketball at the end of the cul-de-sac is not masked by the roar of the air conditioning compressor fan.

Here, the leaves shred out gradually from the trees, not in a spectacular rush of color, not like the mountain aspens and sycamores in Ogden, when Blondie and I lived in Utah— a great golden blaze against the grey wall of the Wasatch Front— which lasted only a week or so, and fleetingly carpeted the ground with gold, like a vision of Tir nan Og or the mallorn wood of Lothlorien. Our winter here does not usually include snow either; not for us the vivid spectacle of a certain small maple tree, which grew next to the old base library at Misawa Air Base, and whose leaves in fall turned the color of blood and hang on to the branches for a good while, well after the first winter snows blanketed the ground in pure white. Dark red, long-fingered maple leaves blazed against the white sugar snow, one season into the next without a pause.

This last Sunday was a perfect day, perfect shirtsleeve fall weather; warm in the sunshine, a hit of chill in the shade, perfectly balanced between the two seasons like the sulpher-yellow butterfly balanced on stalk of fuzzy purple Mexican sage blossoms. I walked around my neighborhood at midday… so many people out mowing lawns, the chorus of suburbia must be the sound of a power mower, the scrape of a rake gathering leaves, the snick of clippers. A man out in the street expertly hurls a football to two boys who catch it, fumbling and toss it back to him; on another two boys and two girls are tossing a baseball across the street, from one sidewalk to the other.

At that house, a man is bringing plastic tub of Christmas ornaments out of the garage, and strings of icicle lights are uncoiled on the lawn. Farther down the block, another man pegs a series of giant candy canes along the edge of the lawn and walkway, linking them together with a string of lights. A stack of decorated wreaths here, another skein of lights being attached to the roof-edge by a woman on a ladder. An older teenage boy brings out a wire-form deer out of the garage— there may be a whole flock of them pastured on this lawn by next morning. One of my other neighbors has a flock of penguins in felt caps, made from tall bleach bottles, who settle on his lawn around an igloo decorated with tinsel every year.

The rituals of suburbia, the rites of the season, on that one perfect day between fall and winter; I ought to be at home, baking a loaf of whole-wheat bread, writing my Christmas letters, packing up the gifts to be mailed to my sisters’ children, to William, and to my parents…. But I linger outside, relishing this one perfect day, reluctant to go inside, not while the sky is a pure, clear blue arch over head, and the air is mild, and butterflies dance around the spires of sage.

If It Were Any More Of a Dog, It Would Shed: The Joy of Very Bad Movies

28. November 2004 · Comments Off on If It Were Any More Of a Dog, It Would Shed: The Joy of Very Bad Movies · Categories: General, Media Matters Not

We have to face the fact that most movies— since the inception of the art form—are agreeable mediocrities, neither very good nor outstandingly bad. Such movies are the backbone of the television schedule, an agreeable way of passing an hour or two, and evaporate from the memory almost as soon as the titles roll, as consumable as Kleenex. I certainly watched enough of them as a broadcast technician, since the AFRTS television package accommodated as many of them as do the bargain bin at K-Mart.

While there might very well be a rough-cut gem among them, the chances are rather closer to %100 that a journeyman director, mediocre actors, a hackneyed script and low budget will produce a mediocre or even dreadful movie. G-I-G-O (Garbage in, garbage out) applied to human endeavors long before the invention of computer programming. This is what conventional wisdom expects, and most times conventional wisdom is not disappointed.

I only consider movies for my personal hall of badness if I have actually been suckered into paying money and sitting in the theater for them, and I’ve been able to avoid doing this since seeing the Kristy McNichol vehicle “The Pirate Movie” sometime around 1984 or so. Life is too short, first-run tickets at the multiplex are closing in on $10, and you will never, ever get those two hours or so back of your life. In the case of something as stupendously awful as “Battlefield Earth” the critical brickbats flung at the screen were several times more amusing than the movie itself, not that anyone was really expecting all that much from L. Ron Hubbard’s oeuvre.

A horrendously bad movie resulting from the confluence of a much-respected top director, riveting source materiel, talented actors and a lot of money…. Ah, that is a cinematic pratfall to be relished. It is puzzlement, a train wreck, the stuff of prolonged analysis, of knowledgeable discourse on exactly how this degree of suckage was achieved at such cost, and who is at fault. It appears that Oliver Stone is the unhappy auteur of the moment, with “Alexander the Great”. Even those few good reviews for it are somewhat restrained in their enthusiasm, and the rest of them are poisonously amusing. A friend of mine reported guffaws and snickers in the audience during the death scenes— surely not a good sign for Mr. Stone’s directorial pretensions. It all rather reminds me of Michael Cimino’s mega-flop “Heaven’s Gate”, which got worse and worse with every dollar and edit spent.

So, pass the popcorn and enjoy— and let us know in the comments about this, and other horrendously awful movies you have ever seen. Be vicious… and be amusing.

Great Warks!!!

23. November 2004 · Comments Off on Great Warks!!! · Categories: General, Military

Since I was fairly well-read (even for an English major) and had attended public schools, and a state university at a time when one could be assured of having indeed received an education thereby, I was not entirely taken back to encounter seriously surreal aspects of the military. Basic training was one long adventure in surreality, even after I divined the general purpose— which was that it was a long series of mind-games intended to weed-out the unfit and maladjusted, while administering a sort of collegial hazing on the rest of us, until we were pronounced fit to become One with the Elect.

On that happy day and long-looked-for day, most of the other girls had already departed by bus to various training bases, but two of us who still waited on school dates, orders and travel vouchers for slightly more exotic courses dragged our duffle bags down to the base shuttle bus stop and crossed the training side of Lackland AFB to the World War II-era barracks that housed the female airmen assigned to Personnel Processing Squadron, or as everyone ordinarily referred to it as “casual”. It was a sort of holding tank for the handful of us who had graduated from Basic and were stuck awaiting further orders, and the much greater number of those who had washed out of Basic for any number of reasons— injury, inability to adjust, incapacity or baying-at-the-moon insane— and were waiting on release from the service.

It was not too bad a place, after the rigorous discipline and supervision of basic— we had base liberty after duty hours, and took our leisure over meals—but the housekeeping in the ancient barracks was overseen by a dyspeptic female TSgt, who was not actually a TI but had the same command of scathing sarcasm. One of the other graduates showed the two of us around the open bay, where two ranks of bunk beds lined up on either side of an open aisle, and put us wise to how things were done;
“Never walk up the center aisle, in your shoes. Socks are OK. Walk up the side aisles, if you can.”
“Why?” I asked reasonably.
“It’ll scuff the polish on the floor! They come around and inspect on Fridays, and everything has to be perfect.”
Indeed, the polish on the center aisle was perfect, the old industrial linoleum gleamed with a dark, adamantine luster, fit to warm the heart of any NCO standing at the open door to the bay, and looking down the length of the building and the ranks of bunks on either side of that unbesmirched expanse. I knew very well how much work it took to buff and polish linoleum to that degree of perfection, it was only sensible to try and preserve it as much as possible, but still…

“And you can’t put trash in that trash can,” said our guide. “Or any of them, really. That’s why they’re turned upside down. The only one you can put trash into, is the one in the washroom.”
“But why have trash cans, if you can’t put trash into them?” I asked.
“You have to have trash cans, “our guide explained patiently. “You just can’t put trash into them. They have to be clean for inspection.”
My very first bit of military surreal. Floors you couldn’t walk on, trash cans that weren’t for trash. If I hadn’t read a lot, I would have really been boggled.

These are some of the books that dealt with the experience of being in the military— the real bits, and the baffling bits, and the tragic and the surreal. Discuss amongst yourselves and add the ones that are your particular favorites:

Herman Wouk— “The Caine Mutiny”
One of the characters described the military (specifically the Navy) as a vast, complicated, sophisticated bit of machinery, designed by geniuses…to be run by idiots.

Richard Hooker—- “M*A*S*H”
When I first read it, I was in college and thought “Funny— but the language and jokes and morals—eeeeuuuuw!” Then I read it again after my first tour and thought “Well, seem normal enough to me.”

George McDonald Fraser— “The General Danced at Dawn”, “McAuslan in the Rough”, “The Sheik and the Dustbin”
Absolutely priceless. I never worked with a real McAuslan, but I heard about a couple of them, second-hand.

Lloyd Little —- “Parthian Shot”
Expert scroungers at work!

(Add your own favorites and suggestions in the comments)

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