Re: boot camp and military stories
 

A story from my grandpa that just came to mind.

I'm not sure what rank he was, but the story involves a sergeant that was higher than him, yet he had to lead a group. Anyway, doesn't matter.

Him and his group had to do some kind of mission in the forest, and crossed a road. A sergeant crossed that same road a bit further, waved his arms and yelled 'hey!!'. My grandpa decided to be a smartass and didn't acknowledge him at all. The sergeant got pissed and complained to the captain. When confronted, my grandpa said 'well he didn't salute, he just yelled at me, and my name is <his name>, not "hey!"'. The captain agreed and he got away with it, which seems surprising to me now that I think of it.

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

I have so many good memories from boot, both good and bad.

The best thing about boot was the lines the DI's came up with.

We had this huge black guy in our platoon, 6'6" 270lbs. We're standing in line and our Senior DI is walking around just messin with everyone, and then he gets to Jackson.

DI "Where are you from?"

Jackson "Sir, Buffalo Sir."

DI(without missing a beat)"Oh my God, the rest of these men all came from normal parents."

I bit my lip so hard I started to bleed.

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

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I have so many good memories from boot, both good and bad.

The best thing about boot was the lines the DI's came up with.

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While in boot camp I thought our company commander (CC = Drill Instructor) was an extremely quick witted fellow, but I soon learned the truth.

He used all the following lines on at least one occasion:

- "How tall are you?" (recruit answers). "I didn't know that stacked sh*t that high."

- "Where are you from?" (recruit answers). On an occasion when someone says texas (or other rural state): "Only steers and queers are from texas, and you don't have horns."

- He would often say something like: "Wipe that stupid grin off your face, or I'll make you choke yourself. And I'll make you choke yourself with my hand, not your hand." (Choking was actually threatened a lot, for almost any reason, though he never laid a finger on anyone).

These and a number of other lines made him look smart, but then years later I saw the wonderful movie Full Metal Jacket (the first half depicts boot camp), every one of his f*cking lines came from that movie. The last line above actually made a lot more sense after I saw the movie (choke myself with your hand?)

Incidentally, one reason that the first half of Full Metal Jacket is so good is that the actor who plays the drill instuctor actually WAS a marine corps DI. I guess it is not necessarily the case that my CC watched the movie and stole all the good lines to use on us. Maybe CC/DI training simply involves learning a lot of good stock one-liners and funny sadistic things to make people do when they screw up. Boot camp is much, much funnier than people think (unless you are identified as a screw up, ala Full Metal Jacket -- then it tends to be not so funny).

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

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What do you all think about female military officers, specifically Navy?

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I never had a problem with an officer being female per se. My friend on the carrier does have a funny story about a girl on his ship who was arrested by the Navy for prostituting herself while on deployment. She took all her Navy Johns down with her. How was she caught?

When they got into home port after a long deployment she immediately went out and bought a new corvette with cash. The cash purchase was reported to the IRS (any cash purchase over $10K gets reported to the IRS), and they subsequently asked her where all this money came from that she did not pay taxes on. Navy got involved and then she was toast, but she did not go down quitely (so to speak).

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

jackflash,

if you like r. lee ermy(sp?)[the drill instructor] you should check out his show on the history channel. its called "mail call" and he takes letters and answers them in pretty long winded fashion. I enjoy it.

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

[ QUOTE ]
jackflash,

if you like r. lee ermy(sp?)[the drill instructor] you should check out his show on the history channel. its called "mail call" and he takes letters and answers them in pretty long winded fashion. I enjoy it.

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Mail Call rules, R. Lee Ermy was actually hired to give the original actor lessons on how to be a drill sargeant, but once he got on set, kubrick found himself actually doing some of the things (as an unforced reaction to the yelling) that R. Ermey was yelling out, and decided to hire him. He also let him improvise a lot of scenes which doesnt happen in kubrick movies.

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

We were almost at the end of boot camp practicing for the graduation parade and our DI is teaching us some routine we would have to do and he catches one of the guys kind of glancing at a C130 in the sky.

He tells the guy to pay attention and he does. Ten minutes later and the same guy gets caught doing the same thing and our DI yells at him "since you can't pay attention to me and you would rather watch a damn plane, go on, go catch the plane."

The kid kind of stares at the DI for a minute "I said run after that plane!" So the kid starts running in the direction of this plane and as the plane banks and cicles he has to do the same thing. It was sooo funny to watch this plane just kind of circling overhead and this kid running after it. The plane just kept circling too, he had to do this for probably an hour while the rest of us learned our routine.

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

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We were almost at the end of boot camp practicing for the graduation parade...

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Graduation parades are a hoot-especially in the summer in the South...

There's always some idiot who locks his knees and then TIMBER [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

Re: boot camp and military stories
 

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Black people cannot swim

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Re: boot camp and military stories
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
We were almost at the end of boot camp practicing for the graduation parade...

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Graduation parades are a hoot-especially in the summer in the South...

There's always some idiot who locks his knees and then TIMBER [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

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happened to a kid right behind me. His face smashed the deck and he started kinda seizing. the corpsman woke him up and the kid was dazed and just said "what the [censored] just happened?" Turns out he broke his jaw and chipped three of his teeth...it wasn't even that hot out