The Most Epic Switch

I've always been a PC guy. Mostly because of comfort. I was familiar with PCs and every time I jumped on one of my friends Macs, I was frustrated with the differences. Well, I think my PC days are behind me; I bought a 13 inch Macbook Pro yesterday and love it.

Hooray for finally catching up with the rest of the world!

Ranger Challenge

Whew! Ranger Challenge is over and its rather bitter sweet. The competition was the previous weekend and consisted of 9 different events: the Army Physical Fitness Test, erecting and crossing a river on a one rope bridge, land navigation, obstacle course, marksmanship, disassemble/assembly of a M16, hand grenade assault course, terrain feature identification, and the 10K foot march. It is all done in one day; you start at around 4am and it ends around 11pm. Its a pretty physically intense competition and, with teams from 6 different states, its pretty stiff competition.

We were able to place third out of 48 teams, which puts OSU at 9 consecutive years of top three finishes. This is even more impressive considering that of the 9 people that made up the team, 6 were new to the competition (myself included) and that we only placed first on 1 event, which means we were consistently in the top 5 for every event. The one event we did win was the 10K foot march. This is the last event of the day and is done in complete darkness. While carrying your ruck sack (~30lbs), your load bearing vest (~10lbs), and a M4 rifle (~7lbs), your goal is to complete the 6.2 mile course up and down the hills of Kentucky as quickly as possible. We were in fifth place before the foot march and we knew we had to win the event to have a shot of placing. We did just that.

We finished in 60 minutes and 27 seconds, nearly 4 minutes better than the second place team. The cool thing about the foot march is that its all about mental toughness. All the teams in the top 5 or so are pretty close in fitness level. The reason we won by such a large margin is that we were capable of enduring pain. We were able to suck it up. We ran for longer stretches and took shorter walking breaks. When we did walk, we kept the pace up to the point where we would pass other teams that were jogging. We sprinted down hills and jogged up them. We encouraged each other and mentally defeated the others. It was great.

And the thing is, we are going to be even better next year. We return 6 people and have 3 alternates who trained with us this year who were surely capable of being on the team this year. We also will have a great team captain (which we did NOT have this year), who will plan smarter training, better prepare us for the competition, and be more strategic for the events. Also, as much as I hate to say this, the three we are graduating tended to be towards the bottom of the team on most events. Next year, we expect to be going home with the big trophy. And the thing is, I think we can do so in dominant fashion. We have the personnel, the leadership, the work ethic, and the experience to do so. All we have to do is make it happen.

Good Music and Good Reads

As I mentioned before, my brother is playing basketball in Switzerland right now (his first game is less than a week away). As a part of his contract he not only gets a few paid trips back to the States throughout the course of the year, but he also gets two free round trip tickets for family or friends to visit him. I'm pretty pumped, because as of now the plans are for my oldest brother and I to visit him over spring break. This will be interesting because over spring break I turn 21 (the drinking age in Switzerland is under 21 but I will celebrate nonetheless).

Anyways, back to my point. My bball playing bro lives in the city of Lugano, which is home to the Estival Jazz, a very prominent jazz festival (Switzerland actually hosts a couple world famous jazz festivals, I don't get it). Unfortunately the festival falls in July, which is within the 3 months of the year where my brother will actually be living stateside again.

A couple years ago, the band Medeski, Scofield, Martin, and Wood played a pretty awesome set. This band is pure genius and I love them to death. They are funky as hell and have the best song titles. Anyways check these songs out. I think this one... Julia ...is my favorite.


Tequila & Chocolate


Chris Wood on bass gets it on this song...Tootie Ma is a Big Fine Thing


Little Walter Rides Again


As far as the "good reads" portion of this blog, I have been piecing my way through General McChrystal's assesment of the situation in Afghanistan (which can be found here). GEN McChrystal was recently on 60 Minutes and is a real no-bullshit kind of guy. He is also the Commanding General in Afghanistan and has a ton of experience in the Special Operations community... pretty badass. The assesment can get a little dry at times, but it is very interesting knowing what these guys are saying. I think right now, the US Army has some of its best Generals it has had since WWII. Patreus, Odierno, McChrystal...these guys are going to down in history the same way Patton, MacArthur, and Eisenhower have done so.

This definitely exemplifies the name of this blog

Back in the Nati for a little while, so that means listening to podcasts and roaming the web (Columbus means that too). Anyways, below is some random media that has been creeping up in my life.

Ive been reading a lot of the This I Believe essays that you often hear being read aloud on NPR. Some are good. Some are cheesy. Regardless, they are fun to sort through for the occasional gem. By the title, I thought this one was going to be one of those that make the site worthwhile. I was a bit dissapointed. I'm an avid fan of jazz. Actually, I think everyone is, they just don't know it yet (much like what Ben Zander says about classical music in this awesome tedtalk). One of the great abilities of jazz is that it can take you to so many different places emotionally. When Shaddox says, "Even the songs that take you to despair lift you," I was kind of disappointed. Although she does justify her sentiments well, I enjoy that jazz can just take you do despair. For example, check out this song:

Soulfull. Sad. Dark. However you want to describe it, I would never use the word "lifting". Nevertheless, that song is off the album Money Jungle with Duke Ellington on piano, Charles Mingus on bass, and Max Roach on drums. Its one of the best jazz albums of all times; check it out. Also, the album has a huge influence on the modern band Medeski, Martin, and Wood. Check them out if your in the mood for something funky.

Next we have this awesome song performed by two amazing musicians.

These two are awesome when separated (AC Newman with the New Pornographers and Will Sheff with Okkervil River). Together, they almost seem better. I prefer Newman's voice, but something about Sheff's relaxed vocals really seem to gel well with his counterpart. Thanks to achilles for turning me on to these two guys.

Waste of time? No such thing!

Pretty close, but not quite, the perfect round. Getting there, though. I think the perfect round would be all hole in ones except for twos on eight and seventeen.... only seven strokes to go.

I will be moving from one apartment to another this weekend, so unfortunately, I won't be able to play due to lack of internet. Hopefully there won't be too much rust come Monday.

You asked for it

I accepted your challenge Chemguy and here it is...a 33. This effort included seven hole in ones, one of which was on the 18th.

We have done nothing, cont.

As I mentioned before, I spent the last 3+ weeks working with Drill Sergeants to coordinate and execute the training for newly enlisted privates going through Basic Combat Training at Ft. Jackson, South Carolina. It was a great experience working with some really awesome Non-Commissioned Officers and listening to their advice to a soon to be Junior Officer. And it was through listening to them that I not only learned the most, but I was also humbled greatly and left feeling quite inadequate.

We were out on a firing range teaching the privates to shoot the .50 cal Machine Gun, M203 Grenade Launcher, and AT-4 Rocket Launcher. After a 4 hour block of instruction, I sat down to have lunch. Across the table from me was Drill Sergeant Jones, a 25 year old Military Police Staff Sergeant previously assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division. A bit heavier set than most you see in the military, DS Jones was built like a linebacker and was plenty strong. His size didn't hamper his speed either. On Company runs, he would be strides ahead of the fastest of runners, moving more like a safety. The combination of his physical presence and his booming voice, a medley of African American vernacular and southern draw, made him one of the Drill Sergeants on staff most feared, and respected, by the privates.

As any slick sleever (a term given to those who have not yet been deployed; it references the lack of a combat patch worn on the right sleeve of all combat veterans), I am pretty curious about what its like to be down range. Naturally I struck up a conversation on this very topic. We got to talking about his time in Iraq; he has done two tours. At one point his eyes fixed straight in front of him, on something that seemed be a hundred miles away. He spoke of a foot patrol his squad was doing in the mangroves surrounding a small village north of Baghdad. In the distance he saw a ladder leaned up against a tree, "I thought it was weird that this ladder was there, but I didn't put two and two together". Not more than a minute later, a complex ambush was unleashed on their position from the area in which he saw the ladder. RPGs initiated the attack. When the sounds from the deafening explosions tapered off, the sharp cracks of rifle fire gushed from the trees. At this point, DS Jones' account of the story become very fragmented; only staccato details sputtered out of his mouth. "I saw my team leader, SGT York, get hit. An RPG landed a couple meters behind him. The way he was laying, there was no way he was going to make it." SGT York's team loaded him up on a poleless litter. This litter, a staple for combat units, is nothing more than a piece of plastic with a few straps used to carry the thing. Moving a grown person on one of these things in speedy fashion is damn near impossible, let alone someone who is wearing a full combat load. They called for a medical evacuation via helicopter. It came within a few minutes. Unfortunately, it came 300 meters behind their current position. They carried the injured team leader through an atmosphere dense with lead from cover to cover, returning fire as best they could. When they got to the helicopter, it was hovering a few stories off the ground, firing towards the enemy position. The pilot radioed in: the area was too hot, the helicopter was taking too much fire, it had to move back another 300 meters. The men on the ground obliged. Of carrying the limp body of SGT York that distance, DS Jones said, "It was probably the hardest and easiest thing I have ever done. The adrenaline is fucking crazy".

When DS Jones' unit returned to the states, SGT York was standing there, waiting for them as they got off the plane. "I didn't think he was going to live, let alone be able to walk again. I just cried and gave him a hug." SGT York apparently made a full recovery, exemplified by the fact that he is currently enduring his first deployment to Afghanistan and the third of his career. And what did DS Jones say about the whole thing? "It was a goddamn mental lapse. A ladder in the middle of a mangrove. It was fucking stupid. I should've seen it coming."

And the thing is, of the 14 Drill Sergeants I worked with, every single one of them had stories eerily similar to this one. All have been deployed at least twice, some 3 times, and a few have done more. Some Drill Sergeants are happy to be away from their regular unit and teaching the Army's future. Others feel guilty. Tapped to be a Drill Sergeant because of their good performance as an NCO, they feel as if they have abandoned their fellow soldiers who are gearing up for another deployment.

How am I supposed to lead these people? If I'm selected to be an infantry officer, I will receive the most training possible for a junior officer. I will have completed the 4 year ROTC curriculum, a 6 week course on the basics of being an officer, a course specifically on infantry tactics, Ranger School, Jump School, and possibly other training like Air Assault School or Pathfinder School. Even so, none of this training equates to one minute on the line. Among all vocations, the profession of arms is perhaps the most difficult in terms of preparation, for in no other career does the practitioner get so little actual experience with his or her craft. Soldiers can spend a lifetime preparing for battle and never hear the sound of a weapon fired in anger, smell the residue of ammunition on the battlefield, see the carnage of dead and dying men and women, and feel the fear inherent to combat. How am I supposed to earn the respect necessary to lead my NCOs when they have spent 2 years in such environments?

So I say again, we have done nothing. This Army is full of NCOs who have sacrificed everything and are willing to do it again. I met another Staff Sergeant who shot a man in front of his wife and 2 daughters, killing him. They found explosives on the man, therefore making the death justifiable. But the Staff Sergeant didn't know that when he pulled the trigger. He was merely following the rules of engagement set up to keep him and his men safe. They happened to work this time. How does he feel about it? All he said was, "That one ate at me for a while. I have a daughter at home and I couldn't imagine putting her through a life without a father." And what about going back? "I'll do it if I have to. I'm no war junkie, but you get used to it after a while."

It is often argued that the men and women who endured WWII are of the greatest generation. Maybe they are, but I'm withholding judgment. It took about fifty years for the unheralded stories of bravery surrounding WWII to finally surface. I think given the time, equally impressive stories about Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan will come forth. Soldiers eventually hit an age where they feel comfortable talking about their experiences. We just have to wait until that day comes. I just hope that we don't stigmatize these wars so much so that the soldiers are too afraid to come forward, ashamed of what they have done. Honestly, I'm afraid that might already be the case for those who fought in Vietnam. And this is a tragedy, for multiple reasons. First of all, it robs those soldiers of the appreciation they rightfully deserve. Secondly, although learning from them cannot substitute for actual experience, these stories can help to prepare future soldiers for the first shock of combat and make the experience more manageable. In the military profession, you can learn from the experience of others, or fill body bags as the enemy completes your professional education. I support the former.

In two years, when I finally get sent to my unit and have my own platoon, I'm not exactly sure how I will be able to tell my NCOs what to do, but I will start with showing them the respect that they deserve. The most memorable moment I had while at Ft. Jackson, and probably thus far in my brief military career, was when these 14 Drill Sergeants stopped calling me "Cadet" and instead referred to me as "Sir", a title typically donned on commissioned Officers. Its a pretty big honor to have them consider me worthy of such a title and I promise, for the rest of my military career, I will never take the title of "Sir" for granted. Because for every officer, there are multiple NCOs who have sacrificed much more than we have.

P.S. Thanks to anyone who does read down this far.