In honor of my good buddy who is leaving us soon, I decided
to compile his greatest hits. Just know
that this is the Reader’s Digest version.
He’ll most likely get an entire chapter in my book.
So, at virtually every official function in the military
there is a POW/MIA/KIA ceremony. It’s a
very somber event where lights are turned down and taps is played at the
end. Its effectiveness largely depends
on the narrator’s ability to inject the proper feeling into it. Here’s a sample of it:
-
The table set is small—symbolizing the frailty
of one prisoner alone against his oppressors…REMEMBER
-
The tablecloth is white—symbolizing the purity
of their intentions to respond to their county’s call to arms…REMEMBER
Well, like I said, this is usually done at formal events.
However, we were doing wake-up one class and my buddy took it to a whole
new level. After kicking on doors and
waking officer candidates up at 0445, the flight commander gives a short speech
where he introduces himself, the staff that is with him, and lays out his
expectations. Well, without realizing
it, he breaks into the POW/MIA ceremony.
It went something like this:
-
“I’m Capt X, your flight commander for the next six weeks…(dramatic
pause) REMEMBER!”
-
“With me is Maj Kallstrom, the Director of
Operations…(dramatic pause) REMEMBER!”
And on and on it went.
It was the second funniest thing I’ve ever seen at a wake-up. The first is a whole separate blog. The best
part was that it was completely unintentional. But to his credit, at least he
nailed it.
Capt, now Maj X, is also notorious for ripping off classic
one-liners. Here’s a sampling:
-
After his flight came in last in an Air force
knowledge challenge, he lifted their spirits by saying “Way to represent,
Losers. Enjoy your MREs.”
-
To a student who’s hat stuck off the front of
his head a good couple inches, he quipped “Your hat looks like a canoe on top
of a Volkswagen.”
-
After asking a trainee who he was rooting for in
the NCAA basketball tournament and the student replying that he didn’t watch
basketball, he offered up this jewel: “I bet you can play some Warcraft, huh?”
-
While marching his flight and not being happy
with the formation, “You’re as crooked a dog’s hind leg.”
This next one I posted in a previous blog but it’s worth
repeating. This occurred during an
actual interview for a senior position on the AMS staff.
-
Question- “Why should we hire you?”
-
Answer: He leaned forward, got an intense look
on his face, pointed at the board president, and boomed “Because I’m ready to
lead today!!! I don’t need to be
trained! I don’t need to spun up! I’m ready to lead today!”
-
Seriously, the intensity and force he spoke with was shocking. You got
the impression that if he had continued it would’ve gone something like this--
“And if you don’t hire me, I will hunt you down and take your firstborn. Hire me now, on the spot, or I will destroy
all of you!” I think the board
president, a female colonel, actually recoiled in fear at one point. When he left, she looked at me and asked “Why
was he so angry? Is he always that
intense? And where can I get a smoke to
calm my nerves?”
Nothing really bonds you like witnessing insanity
together. And, trust me, we witnessed a
lot of it together from both staff and students. This next event involved the single craziest
officer candidate that I’ve ever seen come through AMS. I wrote a whole blog about her previously. She
quit, decided not to quit, accused me of throwing her out, decided to stay, and
then quit again all in about 10 hours. As
she storms off for the final time, I tell another staff member to call the
commander and get him down there so he can witness the insanity while my buddy and
I chase her down. We catch up to her and
asked her if she really wants to quit.
She says yes so we start explaining the procedures to her. She goes off again saying, “I’m a
failure. I’m a failure” because
everything had to be said twice. I’m not
sure who she was trying to convince. She
had definitely failed at being rational.
As she’s chanting about her failure, I hear my sidekick come back with
one of the best lines ever. He says,
“That’s neither here nor there right now, we just need you to sign the
paperwork.”
And, finally, my all-time favorite Maj X story. We used to get student critiques at the end
of every week of training. You can probably
imagine what people write when they can do so anonymously and you’ve been
yelling at them for 5 straight days.
Everybody on staff constantly griped about it and, yet, we couldn’t wait
to get them every week. You know,
because every so often you got a classic like this:
-
“I was uncomfortable hearing Capt X correct a
student in the bathroom with his gentals in his hand.”
A couple of things. First, that’s an exact quote, not a typo. The kid said “gentals”. Secondly, you can read that a hundred times
and not be clear on who’s gentals were in who’s hand. I’m sure you can imagine the ridicule he took
over that one. After reading it, I vowed
to never correct a student in the bathroom again.
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