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Paygrade: E-4/Specialist
Service: US Army/Missouri National Guard
I served in the U.S. Army from 93 to 96 and the National Guard from 97 to 99.
In the Army, I was a Combat Engineer and after basic training did my time at Fort Hood in the 8th Engineer Battalion (currently in Iraq).
I was in Alpha and Charlie companies, as a engineer squad member, APC driver and then team leader. I was also the platoon sergeant's humvee driver for a while.
I spent my last year working in Battalion operations/S3, driving a command track for a battlefield TOC and working under the NBC NCO.
I did 3 National Training Center training rotations and was deployed for 3 months on Operation Safe Haven/Safe Passage. I was supposed to go to Sapper School but our unit's slot got cancelled due to Safe Haven. I never got above specialist as I didn't want to re-enlist.
After my discharge, I went into the Missouri National Guard and did a few years as an MP in the 1137th Military Police Company, where we did approximately nothing. I hated my whole time there.
Most interesting storys:
Army: Immediately after basic training, I was arrested outside a strip club my first week with a regular unit. Three of the guys from my new squad, all underaged (I was 23), came down to meet me and suggested we check out this strip club where they never carded anybody. I was broke and said I couldn't go, but they said they would pick up the tab.
So we went and had a great time. One of my buddies bowwed out early and went out to the car to pass out, where he pissed himself. Then another guy bowwed out and went out to the car where he puked on himself and then passed out. Me and my last friend turned out to be so popular that the strippers started buying us pitchers of beer when we ran out of money (when have you ever seen that happen?
).
At the end of the night I decided that we were to drunk to drive, so I called the CQ desk to have someone pick us up (another guy we knew was on duty that night), so we got in the car to wait, where I passed out.
Then I woke up to the sound of sirens and police lights flashing behind our car. The driver had decided to try and make it home after all, but the car had died in the middle of the street right outside the strip club and the battery was dead. A cop had noticed us and stopped to check it out.
The cop hauled everybody out of the car and made us push the car into a nearby parking lot. Despite the situation, everything was going great. I was talking up a blue streak about how someone was coming to get us, I had no idea how we wound up in the middle of the street, etc. I was convinced the cop was going to let us off somehow when all of a sudden a second prowlcar came screeching into the lot.
Out stepped a tough talking female cop, who hitched up her gunbelt and said "Well well well, what to we have here?" in the butchest way possible, with the thickest Texas accent I'd ever heard. Whereupon the the guys I was with busted out laughing.
One thing led to another and suddenly the parking lot was full of cops and the four of us were cuffed and stuffed into the back of one patrol car and taken to the station. We were never read our rights either. I could see the guy who came to pick us up across the street laughing with the original cop who detained us.
The driver decided to play it tough and started telling us not to say anything, so was taken off by himself and chained hand and foot in a solitary cell. The guy who pissed himself started into a rambling story about how he wanted to be a cop someday, much to the amusement of the booking officer. The guy who puked himself puked himself again.
In the morning, still drunk, we were brought before a judge, who looked about 108 years old, who tried to stick me with a huge fine for supplying minors with alcohol. Since I had no money to start with and didn't buy any beer, I said I would pled innocent to that charge. Everybody else plead guilty and agreed paid the fine to get out of jail. (And the guy who puked himself asked to be excused so he could go puke again.
)
The guy from the CQs office took our story back to the unit and our squad leader had to try and explain to the first sergeant why his whole squad had been arrested the night before. Word from the CO also came down that no one from the unit was allowed to bail us out, so we spent most of the next day in jail.
One guys girlfriend bailed him out, then he bailed another guy out, then the third guy got bailed out. Since my fine was double theirs, they had to borrow some money and I spent most of the afternoon alone with three guys who all assured me the cops had planted that crack on them and one guy who claimed the police were framing him for breaking and entering. Fifteen minutes before they were going to transfer me to county lockup, the other guys showed up and bailed me out.
They tried to slap an article 15 on all of us, but couldn't seem to reconcile the fact that we'd called the unit for a sober driver but had wound up being arrested anyway before he showed up.
When I eventually appeared in court, I pleaded no contest to the charge, and the cop who arrested did me a huge favor and told the judge I was the voice of reason and tried to keep the situation calm. The judge wound up dropping the charge.
After that I got the not-undeserved reputation for being the ring leader of the troublemakers. And eventually nearly our whole platoon was going to the strip club on a weekly basis and one time even the NCOs showed up for some guys 21st birthday party. The highlight of my career.
National Guard: Busted by a major from another unit while I was coming out of a gas station with a case of beer and trying to get into a National Guard Humvee. I was in civilian clothes and fortunately the guy didn't write down the bumper number or ask for my ID, although he did report it back to the unit. They could never prove it was me, but they never stopped asking question about it, either.
Service: US Army/Missouri National Guard
I served in the U.S. Army from 93 to 96 and the National Guard from 97 to 99.
In the Army, I was a Combat Engineer and after basic training did my time at Fort Hood in the 8th Engineer Battalion (currently in Iraq).
I was in Alpha and Charlie companies, as a engineer squad member, APC driver and then team leader. I was also the platoon sergeant's humvee driver for a while.
I spent my last year working in Battalion operations/S3, driving a command track for a battlefield TOC and working under the NBC NCO.
I did 3 National Training Center training rotations and was deployed for 3 months on Operation Safe Haven/Safe Passage. I was supposed to go to Sapper School but our unit's slot got cancelled due to Safe Haven. I never got above specialist as I didn't want to re-enlist.
After my discharge, I went into the Missouri National Guard and did a few years as an MP in the 1137th Military Police Company, where we did approximately nothing. I hated my whole time there.
Most interesting storys:
Army: Immediately after basic training, I was arrested outside a strip club my first week with a regular unit. Three of the guys from my new squad, all underaged (I was 23), came down to meet me and suggested we check out this strip club where they never carded anybody. I was broke and said I couldn't go, but they said they would pick up the tab.
So we went and had a great time. One of my buddies bowwed out early and went out to the car to pass out, where he pissed himself. Then another guy bowwed out and went out to the car where he puked on himself and then passed out. Me and my last friend turned out to be so popular that the strippers started buying us pitchers of beer when we ran out of money (when have you ever seen that happen?
).At the end of the night I decided that we were to drunk to drive, so I called the CQ desk to have someone pick us up (another guy we knew was on duty that night), so we got in the car to wait, where I passed out.
Then I woke up to the sound of sirens and police lights flashing behind our car. The driver had decided to try and make it home after all, but the car had died in the middle of the street right outside the strip club and the battery was dead. A cop had noticed us and stopped to check it out.
The cop hauled everybody out of the car and made us push the car into a nearby parking lot. Despite the situation, everything was going great. I was talking up a blue streak about how someone was coming to get us, I had no idea how we wound up in the middle of the street, etc. I was convinced the cop was going to let us off somehow when all of a sudden a second prowlcar came screeching into the lot.
Out stepped a tough talking female cop, who hitched up her gunbelt and said "Well well well, what to we have here?" in the butchest way possible, with the thickest Texas accent I'd ever heard. Whereupon the the guys I was with busted out laughing.
One thing led to another and suddenly the parking lot was full of cops and the four of us were cuffed and stuffed into the back of one patrol car and taken to the station. We were never read our rights either. I could see the guy who came to pick us up across the street laughing with the original cop who detained us.
The driver decided to play it tough and started telling us not to say anything, so was taken off by himself and chained hand and foot in a solitary cell. The guy who pissed himself started into a rambling story about how he wanted to be a cop someday, much to the amusement of the booking officer. The guy who puked himself puked himself again.
In the morning, still drunk, we were brought before a judge, who looked about 108 years old, who tried to stick me with a huge fine for supplying minors with alcohol. Since I had no money to start with and didn't buy any beer, I said I would pled innocent to that charge. Everybody else plead guilty and agreed paid the fine to get out of jail. (And the guy who puked himself asked to be excused so he could go puke again.
)The guy from the CQs office took our story back to the unit and our squad leader had to try and explain to the first sergeant why his whole squad had been arrested the night before. Word from the CO also came down that no one from the unit was allowed to bail us out, so we spent most of the next day in jail.
One guys girlfriend bailed him out, then he bailed another guy out, then the third guy got bailed out. Since my fine was double theirs, they had to borrow some money and I spent most of the afternoon alone with three guys who all assured me the cops had planted that crack on them and one guy who claimed the police were framing him for breaking and entering. Fifteen minutes before they were going to transfer me to county lockup, the other guys showed up and bailed me out.
They tried to slap an article 15 on all of us, but couldn't seem to reconcile the fact that we'd called the unit for a sober driver but had wound up being arrested anyway before he showed up.
When I eventually appeared in court, I pleaded no contest to the charge, and the cop who arrested did me a huge favor and told the judge I was the voice of reason and tried to keep the situation calm. The judge wound up dropping the charge.
After that I got the not-undeserved reputation for being the ring leader of the troublemakers. And eventually nearly our whole platoon was going to the strip club on a weekly basis and one time even the NCOs showed up for some guys 21st birthday party. The highlight of my career.
National Guard: Busted by a major from another unit while I was coming out of a gas station with a case of beer and trying to get into a National Guard Humvee. I was in civilian clothes and fortunately the guy didn't write down the bumper number or ask for my ID, although he did report it back to the unit. They could never prove it was me, but they never stopped asking question about it, either.
Nothing unusual, typical military stories of stupid officers, drunk buddies or silly situations that most people who passed boot camp could probably retell from their own experience. If I want to tell really funny, exciting or awful military stories, I refer to my drinking buddy who made 7 missions as a UN soldier in middle east and Bosnia.
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