Share you silliest moment in the military! I screamed around camp when red ants got the best of me. lol
Awe, that's not silly! That's very unfortunate and terrifying :-( Ants are little buggers. Glad you can laugh about it now at least.
Hmmm... Listing to Lonely Islands I'm on a boat every night before bed with some shipmates, working out how we were going to make a music video to it
Big hello and all the respect and good vibes to anyone who has served! Thank you for your service @AngelicTouch and I will stay tuned for funny military moments 🤷♀️🤪✌️
I was stationed at a forward supply point in Vietnam, as a member of the 121st Signal Battalion, 1st Infantry Division. At one point, our only pole lineman rotated home. and we didn't get a replacement. We had a lot of telephone lines to maintain, and nobody to do it.
Without thinking, I very stupidly said "that doesn't look so difficult." Guess who inherited the climbing gaffs. On my first try, I ended up with the gaffs on the wrong feet. The spikes were on the outside instead of the inside. It didn't take much smarts to realize that they wouldn't work that way, but eventually I got it worked out.
While he had a lot of phone lines. we didn't have any telephone poles. Or base was located on an abandoned French rubber plantation, so all of our phone lines were secured in the tops of the rubber trees. The first time that I had to go up to repair a line, was, shall we say, interesting. I put the gaffs on (the right way around), and very tentatively, started up the tree. By the time I had gone about 6' up, I was getting the hang of using gaffs, ant the rest of the climb went rather smoothly.
I got up to the level of the wires, and completed the repair quite easily. That's when my trouble began. All the way up, my gaffs had been punching little holes into the bark of this rubber tree. By the time I had completed the repair, sap (raw latex) had begun oozing out of the holes.
The rubber all over my hands and my fatigues were bad enough, but it had not occurred to me that I should have been wearing my helmet. It took me three days to get, at least most of the rubber out of my hair. I never did figure out how my predecessor managed to deal with that part of the job.
I'm wearing the same type of climbing gaffs in my profile photo, But there, I'm constructing a nesting platform for my resident pair of Great Horned Owls.
@AngelicTouch - I'll bet that you left out the funniest part. How did you happen to pick up the ants?
I had my basic training at fort Polk, in Louisiana. One day, we had the dreaded live fire exercise. We had to crawl across an open field, wearing a pack, and pushing our rifles. There were also several strands of barbed wire to squirm under. All the while, there was machine gun fire being sprayed over the field, about three or four feet above the ground. Along the way, I crawled past the edge of an ant mound, and picked up a few of them. I was lucky. The guy next to me crawled right over the mound. There was nothing to do but keep crawling. Ant bites are painful. but not as painful as 50 caliber machine gun bullets.
I was in Pakistan in the winter. It was the middle of the night and freezing outside. I had to pee. The latrines were on the other side of the camp. So, I got out of my cot and tent and peed on a tree right outside of the tent. I came in and the camp commandant, a USMC infantry Major lit me up. He was in my tent and heard the entire thing. Good times, good times.
I was a Spanish language interpreter. My central function was to deal with captured combatants who only spoke Spanish. Yet I was assigned to a cold-weather infantry unit. (Our camouflage was all white). The unit’s central function was to stand in the snow in Norway to keep Russians from marching that way into Europe.
Beat that military logic.
US Army veteran here. The silliest thing I did was raise my right hand, haha!
This whole thread brings me so much joy!! I am an active duty Navy spouse and would love to donate my time to other spouses who need some physical touch. Love that y'all are here and I love reading all y'all's stories!
The silliest thing I did was raise my right hand, haha!
Was waiting for that one \`(^_^),
@entwine Definitely wasn't funny then. What was the music video about? And if you could create one now, what would you create?
@justjennn lets connect! I love your vision for military! Lets cocreate some magic making for military families!!!
@MrMarkAndrew What did you raise your hand for?
@MrMarkAndrew Oh! To enlist! Hahahaha!! Ya, I got that!!!
@GreatHornedOwl Ouch!!
Hello )
Zonk
Marine Veteran here!
Hello. Retired Army here.
Navy Vet, present and accounted for ⚓️
Retired USAF. I was deployed at a Joint base in (redacted, ) as NCOIC of a maintenance shop, working nights 'cos that was our busiest shift. We'd heard that the chow hall was serving steaks for midnight chow, (which was a rarity) and although they were tough to chew, the grease covering them usually tasted good and therefore not a meal to miss. That night, one of our 'systems' was hard-broken so we couldn't break for chow. As we were in a compound roughly a mile from the main camp, this usually meant we'd end up eating MREs. I offered to pick up to walk to camp (in the dark), get to-go boxes for the 10 of us, and walk them back.
The walk there was uneventful and I was able to sweet-talk the cooks into giving us two steaks each. On the way back, I heard something behind me in the darkness. Backlit by light coming from the main camp, I was able to make out a dog-like shadow. (crap! It smelled the steaks! ) Still walking, I was able to reach my Surefire flashlight in my cargo pocket and turn it on right at the 'dog'. What I saw, was a jackal with one eye, one ear, part of its skull exposed, and mostly covered in something that gave it a black, oozy look. It reminded me of the zombie dogs in Resident Evil. I panned the light around to spot at least 10 more in the bushes off the trail, also looking horribly disfigured and diseased. I didn't have a radio at the time, so firing my sidearm would've been a BAD idea. Instead, I chucked a to-go box towards the one jackal behind me and started walking faster. Unfortunately, that only slowed a couple of them down. The others started closing in. I threw another, causing another couple to stop as I kept walking briskly. I repeated this until half the boxes were gone, I then realized the jackals that had first stopped had rejoined the chase more aggressively. I dropped the remainder of the boxes and took off in a dead sprint down the trail. I ended of running a half-mile with half the pack chasing me.
Once I got close to the compound, they stopped chasing me. I got to the guard shack and told the soldiers there what had happened, so they sent a squad to clear out the jackals. I got back to my shop, empty-handed, and explained everything to my troops... "What ha-happen was..." Luckily they were more amused with the image of me "chuckin' and runnin'" than they were disappointed with the lack of steaks...
@jaswbrown
What was the music video about?
Would have copied the Lonely Islands, "Im on a boat" music video... But anther group of people beat us to it. And we never ended up finishing it A group of sailors did one to Numa Numa that inspired us (even though they got in pretty big trouble)
Only things like this keep you sane at sea...hah. But at least no packs of zombie jackles chasing me at sea... @jaswbrown takes the stake on this thread.
And if you could create one now, what would you create?
Now that I'm off active and only reserves... I'm not as insa..uh, bor....umm, na I'm good. Although my college freshman English class I did turn the Godfather into a musical with custom lyrics. But I was still only about 2 months Fresh Off the Boat at the time...hah
Not sure I had any silly moments, but I’m glad to be out. I guess one thing I miss, strangely, is getting the same haircut every time!
I did 8 years in the army. There were many memories. I used a service to aid with my service connection
I believe in another life I was a Civil War veteran. I remember the first Battle of Manassas being very frightening.
Former Army EOD tech here.
Silliest moment? Using spray paint to deface a unit's callsign that was painted as a mural on a large wall in Iraq. Their callsign was "Lancers", I changed it to "Tiny Dancers". Their leadership was quite upset but my unit leadership thought it was hilarious... not that anyone could prove I did it. Never got in trouble for it.
I was a Hospital Corpsman in the US Navy. When I was in Clinical Laboratory Assistant School,we had Moruge Watch Duty. When we got a call during the night,my helper said that he was afraid to go to the morgue. I tried to calm him down by telling him,"Dead people can't hurt you. You should only be afraid of alive people who can hurt you." So,he accompanied me up to the ward that called us. When we got inside the ward,I saw a lady that was lying still in bed. She was not responsive. I told my helper,"Look,they forgot to take the blood pressure cuff off of her arm". As I started to remove the cuff on put the patient on the gurney to take the "body" to the morgue,a nurse said,"That is not the body! She is in a coma!" The nurse showed us where the body was. Here I am telling my helper to keep calm. But,if that patient had come out of her coma,while I was taking her to the morgue,I would have been the one to get scared and run!
Good Evening all.
Navy Veteran here. 1991-2004. Golden Shellback. YN2(AW)
NTC GREAT LAKES, IL USS LA SALLE NTTC MERIDIAN, MS NAS BARBERS POINT, HI VFA-22 (DEPLOYED ON USS CARL VINSON) COMSTKFIGHTWINGPAC, LEMOORE, CA CSFWP DET AIMD, LEMOORE, CA
There are alot of times that I miss being in the Navy. And there are times that I'm glad that I'm not...
Thank you veterans! I've often pondered how different my life would be without you. The USA - Land of the Free BECAUSE of the Brave.
Not a Vet but sending love to all my vets out there!