Over one third of his life since this nation was attacked was spent putting rounds down range and defending the freedom we all hold so dear.  Spent feeling the grit of sand on his face from a dust storm or helicopter landing, hearing rounds crack over his head so often it became common, going through cycle after cycle  to get ready for and then deploy to combat.  Growing from a private or tabbed spec-4 to a team leader to a squad leader and finally to a PSG, leading men into harm’s way the entire time.

You can’t read a story about SFC Vogeler without reading how devoted and loving a father and husband he was.   His family by all accounts was the center of his life, and it showed in how hard he worked to be a father and husband when he wasn’t deployed in our nation’s service.  When he died he left two children, a wife, and soon to be born baby behind.  Having such a great family is no easy task with the extremely high divorce rate amongst Special Operations troops.

SFC Vogeler was so respected for his faith and the strength of his character he was ordained as a minister, mostly so he could perform the rites of marriage for his troops.   Search his name and you’ll read the stories of how his guys might not have always believed as he did, but he was the only person they’d have trusted to officiate the day that they said “I do.”

Part of me isn’t sure how to finish this up.   How to convey to anyone reading this just how incredibly dedicated a guy like a Lance Vogeler is.  To tell you how much everyone in our nation should be thanking whatever God they believe in that we have men like him kicking doors down in the middle of the night and teaching young Rangers how to do the same.   To show you just how hard it is day in and day out to grind the way he did, as a member of the Ranger Regiment for our freedom.

I personally didn’t know SFC Vogeler, but if I’d remained on active duty and had been blessed enough to stay in the Ranger Regiment, I’d be in roughly the same spot he was in that day in the Helmand Province.  Same pay grade, same level of responsibility, same everything.  I loved being a Bat Boy, hands down the greatest time in my life.   I also haven’t forgotten how hard it was.  The all night patrols, the marathon marches, week after week of getting 3-4 hours of sleep a night in training and in combat to do things I still can’t believe I was able to do in the middle of the night under a set of PVS-14’s.  I did it for 5 years and two tours.  He did it for nine years, twelve tours.  I led a team, he was leading forty hard charging muldoons out into harm’s way, and until he died you’d never have known he was doing it.

Isaiah 6:8 goes: “And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then I said, Here am I; send me.”

SFC Lance Vogeler went again and again and again to keep us free and to keep us safe.  People wonder sometimes why I am so proud to have served in the Regiment, it’s because I was blessed enough to serve with men like him.

Rest in peace brother, and one for the Airborne Ranger in the Sky, you will be missed.

RLTW!

I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a fallen comrade; this is the heart and soul of the Army’s Soldier’s Creed. Inside of your military’s proud ranks we often look to a precious and rare few who, against all odds, adhere to these core beliefs and either give their lives in service to these ideals or show such an indomitable will that they come out the other side. We hear stuff like this in the military all the time. Lately in the war on terror it’s been all about men who made the ultimate sacrifice. Some of us have often wondered what it’d take for a man to be considered for our nation’s highest award and survive. Finally, after nine years of fighting in the war on terror, we will have a hero in the ranks that has lived to tell the tell, (now) SSG Salvatore Giunta.
SSG Giunta will be awarded the Medal of Honor for actions under fire as a member of “Battle Company” 2nd Battalion, 503rd Infantry, 173rd Brigade Combat Team out of Vicenza, Italy, while serving in the now infamous Korengal Valley, Afghanistan, which if you haven’t read Sebastian Junger’s “War” or seen “Restrepo,” both of which deal with fighting in the Korengal, you definitely need to check those out.

It was there that then Specialist Giunta’s unit took heavy fire from an L-shaped ambushed and the two troops up front were severely wounded right away, and worse, they were instantly separated from the rest of the Platoon. Specialist Giunta sprang into action and started maneuvering his team to get his buddies back, despite the enemy trying to do their best to stop him. He took a round to his front plate, he kept going. He took one to the AT-4 on his back, which thankfully didn’t go boom, kept going. He got to hand grenade range of the Taliban fighters and started chucking grenades, he kept moving. The LT. was on the radio trying to get air support but the friendly’s were just too close to the bad guys, even for the AC-130’s on station, didn’t matter to Spc. Giunta, he just kept moving. Finally getting to point man, SGT Brennan he saw two fighters, including a man suspected of being an HVT, Mohammed Tali, trying to drag SGT Brennan off. Tali died and his buddy ran off with a few new holes in him, all courtesy of SSG Giunta.

Then he brought his buddy back while rendering first aid. Ultimately, and unfortunately, Sgt. Brennan would die on the operating table at Camp Blessing, Afghanistan. But he wasn’t left. His family was able to honor their son and pay their respects.
There have been some who’ve said “he only is getting this for politics and all the Junger stuff,” or “I read story X and all that guy/girl got was a Silver Star, they should have gotten an MOH instead.” My personal thoughts on that: shut it.
No air support, in the middle of an ambush where American technology counted for little and the enemy owned the terrain, out gunned, out manned, and his buddies cut off from the rest of the platoon, it didn’t matter. Salvatore Giunta decided that he wasn’t going to tap out, he wasn’t going to quit and he sure as hell wasn’t going to leave his buddy to fall into the hands of Taliban. Dude blasted an HVT and brought his buddy back, what more to do you want? SSG Giunta, thank you for showing us the courage of the American soldier, for being the latest in a line of heroes who remind us just how great the men and women who serve us every day really are.

The game plan had been to be on our best behavior. It was the night before Tim Kennedy’s title fight. Nick had been abused, much to my amusement (Hey, I’m not going to lie about it) by Tim for the past three days as he acted as Tim’s throw dummy/punching bag in the days preceding the fight, so he wasn’t really in a dancing mood. Furthermore, we’d extended the offer to have Ranger Up super fans, Sarah Fetters and her father Doug, come along for the trip. The Fetters are wonderful people, but we hadn’t met them before, knew they were strong Christians, and we weren’t sure what Ranger Up level they were comfortable handling, so Nick put me on strict orders to be good and not purposefully try and instigate a Sodom and Gomorra situation. Finally, our buddy John Tackett had been cleared by Home-6 to come out, with her giving me strict instructions not to let him get arrested or end up in another homoerotic workout video. Orders firmly in hand, the command decision was made to have a chilled night in the hotel bar for a couple of drinks, no more, and retire to bed at a reasonable hour. Sometimes, my friends, you don’t go looking for trouble, trouble just finds you…

John Tackett’s Perspective

There she was – rail thin with a nose that didn’t quit. She spotted right in on Tommy from across the bar. He was like catnip for this skank. As she began moving, I took in the whole of her: shorts a size too small and showing off thighs as big around as the average guys arm, she locked onto our little Batboy like a heat seeking missile. Tommy was doing his boisterous, laugh and talk too loud thing as I watched her walk snatch a drink from the bar and drunkenly saunter over. She stopped inches away from him and cleared her throat.

Tommy’s Perspective

“Excuse me, did you say something?” I asked slightly surprised to find the girl right next to me. We’d seen her around the weigh-ins and hotel all day, talking to different fighters and hanging out with some bearded dude who looked like he also had an affinity for things that made you super skinny. As so often happens in my life, opening my mouth was a bad idea.
“I didn’t say anything,” she said smiling, as she moved uncomfortably close to me.

Sarah Fetter’s Perspective

It’s always a bit of a surreal experience to meet people in person that you have previously known only through a computer screen. So after introductions all around, I joined the Ranger Up guys in the hotel bar. I sat down to listen and observe. I knew of most of the people there so when a chick walked up and started talking to Tommy I thought “she must be with them or they know her from somewhere”. As she continued talking and using Tommy to prop herself up, I began to see the truth…this was a Ranger Up story in the making. They literally did nothing to provoke this encounter, but nevertheless, they would embrace it wholeheartedly. Enter: The Crazy Chick.

Tommy’s Perspective

“So are you guys here for the fights?” She asked us, still staring at me. Tackett, Nick, and Joe Namee, owner of CTC Austin (the gym Tim trains out of) all looked at me wondering where this was going.
“Yes,” I told her. “We are all friends of Tim Kennedy and he’s fighting for the belt tomorrow night.”
“Oh, wooooooooow!” She slurred at us. “That’s so cool, so like what do y’all do?”
“Nick and I make t-shirts,” I tell her pointing over to Nick. “What do you do?”
“I’m a bartender in Austin, it’s a pretty cool job. Here you want my shot?” She says suddenly putting a shot of Jager in front of me.
“You didn’t roofie this did you?” I asked her. Normally this is a joke. I was not kidding.
“NOOOOOOO!” She squealed laughing at me. “I’ve been roofied before, and I’d never do that with a drink!”
“I’ve been roofied too,” Nick calls out, giving out a factoid I didn’t know about him before, but yet didn’t surprise me.
“Did you get roofied by steak, cause that’s how I’d do it,” Crazy Chick chirped merrily.
“Excuse me, but umm… what?” Tackett asks her, recovering his wits faster than the rest of us had and asking the question we all were thinking.
“You guys have all seen the Hangover right?” We nod. “Well you know how they get the tiger calmed down by feeding it the roofied steak? That was my idea. I came up with that years ago! If I was ever going to roofie someone, that’s how I’d do it, with steak.”
“Your parents must be proud,” Nick quips.
“P.S. Why do you have a preferred roofie method?” I ask. Teamwork is important at Ranger Up.
“Because what guy turns down a free steak? Seriously if a girl walks up to you and hands you a steak, are you going to turn it down?”
She’s serious, that is what none of us could believe at first. Somewhere inside her chemically altered head this was not only a good idea, it was THE idea in terms of delivery method of a narcotic designed to make you black out. Had we taken a moment to really chew this one over (no pun intended, but if Nick wants to note that if he had written this part, it would have been intended) we might have tried to change course (again, Nick notes this would have been the second level of the pun), but we simply had to know the mechanics of this thought process.

“But how are you going to get the steak into the establishment? And for that matter, what if they don’t serve food? Or maybe it’s like 1am and the kitchen attached to the bar is closed, or for that matter what if the place serves food but not steak, only burgers. Would you then roofie the burger?” Nick asked. Enquiring minds now legitimately wanted to know. Alack, all we got was a puzzled look on Crazy’s face. “Huh, I never thought of all of that,” she said, genuflecting on these new developments.

“For that matter,” I intoned, “isn’t it so much simpler just to put the roofie in a drink that you know will always be at the party? I mean isn’t that why the frat boys on every major college campus use that method, because with drinks it’s that easy?”

Little did I know mentioning higher education was about to turn this from “interesting night” to “shitshow” in the blink of an eye.

“Hahaha, that never happened to me at (insert Texas regional school here) when I was in undergrad and I don’t really hang out with frat boys now that I’m in grad school.”

“You’re in grad school?” Nick asked a touch surprised, as we all where. “What are you getting your degree in?”
“I got my undergraduate in business management and I have my master in English education.”
“Cool, when’d you graduate with your masters?”
“Well, technically I’m still getting my masters,” she answered.

“So you don’t have it,” Nick asked, “You’re a candidate for a masters degree.”

“Well yeah, I guess, but it’s still better than what you guys have,” she said sarcastically.

Uh, oh. I already know the second she decided to get cocky Nick was going to start really fucking with her, and I will have no choice but to support him.

“Where you going to school?” Nick asked.

“Token Regional Texas School”, she answered.

“Oh, so it’s like a Bachelor’s degree.” Nick asked with a smile on his face, the rest of us started giggling.

“What, screw you! (Insert Texas regional school here) is a great school, and I coulda gone to UT!!!” It was here she made her first mistake. You either do something in the Ranger Up world, or you don’t. It’s that simple. There’s no room here for woulda, shoulda, coulda- a price must be paid.

“So why didn’t you? You know if you could get in and all, why’d you just settle for like, another bachelor’s degree?”

“What, fuck you!” Crazy screamed at Nick, catching the attention of several tables nearby. Then she compounded her problem.

“So where do you have YOUR degree from!?!?” She screams, literally, at Nick.

Nick, has two of the most prestigous degrees on the planet with a BS from West Point (I confess to my fellow NCOs, I do in fact work with a ring knocker) and an MBA from Duke. Act like a jackass though he may, but unless you have a pair of degrees from the Ivy leauge, you’re not going to up pedigree Nick.

That said, there is a fine line between making fun of someone who deserves it and coming off as snotty, which is oftentimes the case when people turn to educational elitism.
I can tell Nick doesn’t want to go down this path, and uncharacteristically, he backs down, saying, “It really doesn’t matter. I was only joking. I’m sure it’s a great school.”

She persists. “No seriously, asshole, where is your degree from?”

Knowing Nick had absolutely no intention of name dropping, and being the person responsible for this chick being at our table, I figured it was my job to save the crack head from herself.

“You don’t want to do that with him,” I interject quickly.

“Oh really, I don’t huh?” She sneered at me. “Why not? Seriously, where’d you get yooooooooour degree from.” She once again taunted towards Nick. Strike two.

“Sweetie, you really, don’t want to play that game with him.” I tell her, making what I think is a passable attempt at being nice. Nick’s face is one of pure Zen, waiting to see which way this choose your own adventure is going to go.

“Whatever, come on big shot, where’d you go to school?” Strike three, you’re out. At least I have the good Karma of knowing I tried to save her from herself.

“I received my Bachelors Degree in Mechanical Engineering from West Point and I have an MBA from Duke,” Nick said calmly and nicer than I think I would have, had I been in his position.

“Oh that’s suuuuuuuuuuch a big deal!” Crazy Chick fired back, reminding us for the 8th time that night she had the maturity of a 5 year old.

“Better than a bachelors and a half,” Nick coughed out with a smirk.

This is the part where Cameron goes Bezerk

“FUCK YOU! I HATE YOU!!!” Crazy screamed, making me wonder if security was going to be called.

“I hate you!” She said leaning in towards him, poking him in the chest. “I hate you, I hate you so much I want to take you upstairs and hate fuck the shit out of you!”

Nick looks over at John and me: “Did she just say that?”

“I believe she did, Nick,” John replied. I concur.

Nick turns to Doug and Sarah Fetters: “I’m sorry”. They laugh. Clearly, they are ready for the full monty.

I put my hand on Nick’s shoulder. “Nick, I’m not sure if you’ve ever been in a situation like this before, but I’d take her up on the offer, if nothing else it’ll be an adventure,” now that I was off the hook for our melodramatic friend’s presence it only felt right I should stir the pot a little.

“I fucking hate you guys!!!” She yelled in reply, for the 5th or so time.

“Why do you hate me, I didn’t do anything to you. I was supporting you and your desire to hate fuck Nick, why are you mad at me?!” I asked, feigning being upset out of the right corner of my mouth while trying not to burst out laughing out of the left. Tackett somehow kept his look of mirthful serenity in place.

“You’re right, I’m sorry I’m going to go buy you guys some shots!” She exclaimed, happy again and suddenly turning and running towards the bar. The collective group was left to exchange looks of shock.

“Did that just happen?” Tackett asked, breaking the bemused silence.

“Yes, I believe it did,” Doug Fetters answered.

“I think she just gave me syphilis,” Nick added.

Ten minutes later she came back with a tray of Jaeger shots.

We quickly downed the shots, this times sans roofie jokes, while our new friend announced to the group that she loved the UFC and was its master.

Sarah’s Perspective

She proclaimed with a great deal of (I’m sure) heartfelt emotion that “I’m just realizing that I know more about UFC than aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaall of you!” Oh, and this might be a good time to mention she is going to take over Dana White’s job someday. Apparently, her bachelor’s in business management and her ha-masters in English education, along with a bartending resume and a rich Daddy that works for the oil company are the perfect combination for such a career path. God help us all.

Nick’s Persepective

After such a profound proclamation of knowledge to a group of people she clearly must have known were in the fight industry, I was expecting her to regale us with tales of Sakuraba, Severn, or maybe the Frank Shamrock/Tito Ortiz fight. Perhaps discuss the up-and-comers that she felt were on the rise? Something – anything – that would show that somewhere in that seventy pound body there was a functioning brain.

I started asking her simple questions like “Who are you favorite fighters?” After floundering for a bit she came up with Randy Couture and Chuck Liddell. Now I love me some Randy and Chuck, and they are two of my favorites of all time, but if you proclaim universal mastery you better come with something stronger than that. I can pull a random dude off the street that’s never watched a UFC and the three guys he’ll be able to name are those two and Brock Lesnar.

Tom and I throw her more softball questions so she doesn’t lose it again, but when she didn’t know who Mike Goldberg was, I simply asked her, “Have you ever actually watched a UFC?”

She, of course, loses all control of her body and voice once again.

Tommy’s Perspective

It was at this point, dear friends, I did what any sensible person would do: I E&E’ed the fuck out of Dodge. Seeking shelter and refuge at a table of Strikeforce employees across the bar from us, I sat down and started talking about the fights. Two minutes or so later I get a text from Tackett: ‘help.’ As I am deep in conversation I don’t hear the text chime rock off.

John Tackett’s Perspective

Buddy’s only half the word Tommy.

Nick’s Perspective

When Tom the coward abandons us, she reasons she will not be having sex with Tom tonight and as I am closest to her, she makes me her next target of opportunity.

“I’m going to sit on your lap,” she proclaims and starts pushing the table aside.

“Please don’t.” I answer.

“Trust me. You’ll like it,” she slurs as she continues towards me like a coked out, disease-ridden juggernaut of crazy.

“Nicholas Palmisciano!” comes the stern maternal voice from Ginger Kennedy.

“I’m not doing ANYTHING!” I shout like a four-year-old to Tim’s wife.

Sarah’s Perspective
At this point, as it finally dawns on Crazy chick, in between doing shots and crying, that Nick isn’t going to let her straddle him in the hotel lobby, she tries a different tact to get near him – using me. Apparently, we needed to stick together and if push came to shove, I was going to fight the RU guys on her behalf. Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

To further increase this tie she decides to try and sit next to me. In order to accomplish this she has to squeeze herself and her enormous purse in between the tables. There is not enough room for a drunk/crazy/high chick with a purse the size of Rhode Island to navigate, so she ends up spilling Nick’s drink on him.

She spends the next 20 minutes randomly proclaiming “I am innocent in this situation” to whomever is sitting by her. Then she passes out at the table for the first time.

Nick’s Perspective

She didn’t spill me drink. She rocketed my completely full Hendrix Maritini, straight up, with three olives, or as I like to call it “A little slice of heaven brought down here on Earth” into my groin. This was not a beverage to be trifled with. There are people’s lives that mean less to me. Furthermore, I now looked like I had wet myself. I wanted to gut her right there on the spot and turn her into a Ranger Up wall trophy, but it was the Fetters’ first day with us. I instead used the diversion to flee, leaving Tackett trapped between the wall and the skank.

John Tackett’s Perspective

I hate you both.

Tommy’s Perspective
Finally she passes out and John crawls over the table to join us. Ten minutes or so after Tackett joined me I look back to see Joe’s morally flexible nephew, Ryan leaving the bar with our friend.

Nick is shouting “Don’t do it” at the top of his lungs while the rest of the BAR laughs. This is made all the more awesome because they enter into a clear elevator and the entire establishment watches their ascent.

Ten minutes later he comes back alone.
“What happened?” I asked him as he sat back down and ordered another drink from the waiter.

“She told me she had a bottle of Gray Goose in her hotel room for the first person who’d claim it so I called her bluff. She walked up to some door, didn’t have any sort of hotel key in that purse of hers, told me her friend had the key and he’d be along shortly and she’d just wait. She also told me really loudly that this guy wasn’t her boyfriend or some shit. Anyway, she said to just leave her so I did.”

“You can’t just leave her at the door!” Joe told his nephew, “dude that’s messed up!”

Be that as it may when Ryan went back to find her she had disappeared.

I saw her the next day at the fights, sitting next to her friend that “wasn’t her boyfriend.” She thanked me for a wonderful “fun” night and hoped we could hang out again. Swear on my combat scroll.

Short version: Great book. The dude used these concepts to create a multi-billion dollar company. A major premise in this quick read is to build a specific culture for your company and to only hire people that fit that culture, even if others are extremely talented but don’t mesh. In Hsieh’s Zappotic World, this means hiring happy people that see the beauty in the everyday, value everyone’s opinion, treat people with dignity and respect, and want to spread happiness.

Extrapolated to the Ranger Uptiverse, we need to find sarcastic, absurdly confident, opinionated, attention-whore narcissistic alcoholics with virtually no feelings and whatever microscopic remnant of human feeling they have left needs to be buried under an admantium skin so thick that if the Titanic had been made from it, everyone on board would simply have been enjoying salt water slushies and we wouldn’t have had to endure that shitpot of a movie.

The Newb

So no shit, there we were: Ranger Up had grown to the point where it was time to hire another fulltime designer and we put the feelers out. We culled through over a hundred applications and finally made a job offer to Wrongfit Wrongcompanysteinawichano. Before I go on, I’d like to state, for the record, that Wrongfit is a very talented artist – we did, and still do, love his work. Moving on…Wrongfit’s job offer was made and he accepted – all he had to do was survive his final interview – spend a night partying with us at UFC Ultimate Fight Night 21 where we were going to support our friend and Ranger Up fighter Jorge Rivera.

Jorge Rivera is the man.

We should have been tipped off when he asked us if he could bring his parents with him to visit so they could help him “look for an apartment.” We should have been tipped off when he showed up pear-shaped at the age of 23. We should have been tipped off when Jorge, Holly, Matt, Tim, and everyone else we knew asked, “Is that REALLY your new designer?” (Tim Burrill flashback moment: All I remember is a pillow with legs, I’d say legs and arms but I don’t recall any arms. And he seemed soo confident for a man raised on estrogen.)

Instead we gave him the benefit of the doubt.

The Beginning of the End

The last thing I remember about leaving the bar is bartering with two girls about how long they would kiss Wrongfit simultaneously. They were shrewd negotiators and talked me down from 38 minutes to seven seconds. Nonetheless, Wrongfit left Jorge Rivera’s afterparty by hammering back two tequila shots and telling me that it was the best night of his entire life. Life seemed good.

Crigger and Whitney are happy...

Quote 1 (after she had called Wrongfit a wetback and we told her that was kind of fucked up): Stereotypes are based off of statistics.

Quote 7 (this was just a random racist comment for no reason): My grandparents live in the outskirts and we’re known as gringos. Por favor. Muchas gracias senor. I hate wetbacks. They call white girls gringas.

Tracy Lee, Jordan, Lauren, Blakely and especially Nick are happy...

Kris McCray and his dad are happy...

The Next Morning – Tommy’s Perspective

I am completely dead. While Nick got to go to the after party and the afterafter party I was chugging Monster Energy Drinks and driving a 15pax van full of wounded warriors back to Bragg. There is absolutely no way I’d have traded going to said parties for the privilege of driving those troops back and forth, but by the time I got to my boy Jim’s place it was 5am, my phone’s battery was on life support, and I was more than a little cracked out from the deadly combo of caffeine overload and a lack of sleep. I slapped my phone on the charger and tried to catch a couple of Z’s on Jimmy’s couch. At about 7:30am my text chime goes off. It’s Wrongfit.

“Hey man, I’m back in Durham. Nick ditched me last night. I tried to find him in the lobby, couldn’t, so I hopped in a cab and came back here.”

Lex McMahon and Ross Pearson are happy while Nick remains happy...

And then there's Tommy...

The Next Morning – Nick’s Perspective

I wake up at about 8am. I don’t want to be up, but I am about to drive Jorge Rivera to the Warrior Transition Center at Bragg, so I sit up, pop some Ranger Candy, down a Gatorade and look at my phone. I have multiple texts from Tom. The key one states the following: “Dude. I don’t know what the fuck you did to him last night, but Wrongfit is pissed. He took a cab back last night to his parent’s hotel in Durham. I think he is quitting.”

I, of course, thought Tommy was kidding. It was too absurd of a story to comprehend, and absurd stories are sort of my thing. I mean, I left him two doors down and now he was three hours away in Durham? Good one, Tommy. I’m assuming McMahon had something to do with this as well.

I text Tom back something along the lines of “Sure he did. How was the drive last night?”

Seconds later I got back an angry text from Tom about how the kid really did go back to Durham. I chuckled and shouted to Lex, half-awake in the other bed that the newb got so drunk he thought a cab ride to Durham was a good idea. I texted to Tom “Classic Ranger Up night. Good that on day one we already have something to screw with him about.”

Back to Tom

Nick’s dismissive texts are not helping me out and I’m starting to fear that he really did run the kid off. Wrongfit’s an art kid. Art kids are sensitive. Neither Nick nor I have been particularly sensitive at any point in our lives, let alone when we’re three sheets to the wind. Ok, time for a more direct stance on the situation:

“Nick,” I text, “you need to call him and fucking apologize, you ditched the kid, and he’s not a Ranger man. Durham is extreme, sure, but you need to fix this!”

I get a “Seriously? Well what do you want me to do man!?” back.

“Call him!” I text

“Ok.” I can tell Nick’s not happy but, in my mind I think “Well dude, you did this.”

Two airborne minutes later I get a text back from Nick “I think we’re cool, I told him some day we’d all laugh about this later.”

I call Wrongfit, “Hey man.” I tell him as I pick up, “Nick said he talked to you…”

“Yeah man, he tried to make a joke out of it. A joke out of just up and leaving me like that!”

“I am not very happy right now”, Wrongfit goes on “I was kinda wiggin out dude, and that cab ride was like 300 bucks, man.”

This was getting worse.

Wrongfit continued, “I left my bag in your van man, I’d really like to get it back.”

“As soon as I can get back to Durham and hook you up bro, I will,” I tell him, finally, firmly getting pissed. “I’m sorry about this Wrongfit, I’ll make sure this all gets sorted out.” My mind is racing. So far this kid has told me my president/business partner/friend ditched him, then dismissively made fun of him over it, generally seems to have acted a complete and utter fool, and really doesn’t seem to care.

Ok, phone call time:

“Hey buddy,” Nick says by way of usually phone greeting.

“Dude…” I start, my best “What the hell, Sir” NCO tone kicking. “What the hell?!? What happened?!”

“Nothing dude! He was fine when Lex and I left him, he was with Reed man!”

“Nick,” I started in. I’ve already charted the course in my tired brain and I wasn’t going to take dissipation of responsibility at this point, no sir. “He was YOUR responsibility, I mean come on dude, what were you thinking, you just up and left him?” In hind sight I still wonder why I believed the fucking art kid over my Ranger Buddy, particularly since his modus operendi is more along the “sharpie a phallus on the passed out guy” motif, rather than abandonment. I guess I’ll just take my major minus for droning out right now please.

Back to Nick

I’m driving with Tim O’Donnell and Jorge Rivera on my way to Fort Bragg and I am pissed off at Tom. He seems to think I did something nefarious to this kid. I am almost yelling into the phone, while Jorge chuckles. “I LEFT HIM TWO DOORS DOWN TOM. Not in the bar. Not on the street. TWO FUCKING DOORS Down!!!! We tried to take him back with us, but he wanted to stay with this awful girl. He’s a grown fucking man. How is this my fault?!”

And…Back to Tommy

“Wait what?” I asked Nick. That didn’t marry up at all to what Wrongfit had told me on the phone. Nick is a lot of things, including an asshole that could potentially run a new employee right out of the company in less than 24 hours, but he’s not a liar.
“Yeah man, he was with some annoying, evil, fucking chick, dude, and he was trying to mack on her! What was I going to do, call him after he’d been gone for 45mins and ask ‘hey Wrongfit, you having sex? No? How about now? Yes?! Great, that’s awesome buddy!’”

The gears are starting to turn in my head, and slowly tumblers are starting to click into place.

“Alright dude, alright but how the hell did he end up in cab back to Durham?”

“How the fuck should I know!?!” Nick fired back, not really calming down. “Why the fuck didn’t he just get another room in the same hotel, why didn’t he call me? HE DIDN’T CALL ME! Or why didn’t he call you or Whitney, or Lex or any one of the other fucking numbers he had. Why was his first reaction in this easily solvable situation to call his FUCKING MOM?! When’s the last time you called your mom to solve one of your problems, Tom?”

Hmmm, these are all good points, and they’re all points that are adding up to more minor minuses for me and major holes in Wrongfit’s story. Suddenly, I’m starting to smell Type-B-isms.

“You’re right dude, you’re right,” I tell Nick.

I try calling Wrongfit back and get his voicemail. Issue or not, Wrongfit was going to have to wait because we all had to get over to the Warrior Transition Center for Jorge Rivera to sign some autographs for the troops that couldn’t make it to the fights.

I got there early, and about 20 minutes later Jorge, Nick, Lex, and Tim walk in. Nick barely looks at me as he starts helping Jorge out. I corner Lex.

“Dude what happened last night man?” I ask him.

“Man fuck that kid!” Lex said. “Bro, we did everything for that kid last night and we left him with a girl he was trying to mack on and he knew where to find us, you know, fifty fucking feet away! Fuck that kid.”

I am now officially annoyed. Half an hour later, my phone rings. It’s Wrongfit.

“Hey dude, you back yet, I need my stuff,” he tells me by way of greeting.

“No dude, I told you, I have to stay here a little longer for the signing, but umm dude- did Nick and Lex leave you in a room with some chick last night?” I ask.

Jorge was the RIGHT fit with the troops...

“And did they tell you where the room you all were supposed to stay in was?”

“Umm, yeah they did. I knocked quietly man, but they didn’t get up.”

You’re kidding me.

“Why did you knock softly dude? For that matter dude why didn’t you call Nick or Lex, you had their numbers right?”

“Dude when they didn’t answer the door I figured they were asleep and I didn’t want to wake them up. So I went to the lobby, and no one called me. No one came down to the lobby to check on me. I was in the lobby for like half an hour, 45 minutes. Nothing so, like, an hour later I figured the best thing to do was just go back to Durham so I called my Mom and then hopped in cab.”

Rage. Starting. To. Build.

“Ok dude, well I have to do this signing for the wounded troops. As soon as I get back I will call you and we can get you, your stuff and figure out the hotel room for tonight and stuff like that.” I tell him, pure professional voice.

“Ok dude, ummm, what time do you think that’ll be?” Wrongfit asks me in a whiny voice.

“As soon as I can make it happen, man,” I tell him in reply. Get fucked Jr. is what I was thinking.

“Ok…” Wrongfit tells me, slightly downtrodden. To this day I still wonder what the hell was in that bag, he was a relentless fucker about getting it back.

“Dude…” I started as I went up to Nick, “he never called you did he?”

“NO MAN! That’s what I have been fucking telling you!!!” Nick exploded at me.

“Dude I’m sorry,” I started. “He never told me that he was in a hotel room with a girl he just said you and Lex disappeared and he never mentioned at first that you’d told him the room or anything like that. He made it sound like you guys just up and got pissed off at him or something and were all like ‘fuck the new guy’ and left him on the cold Charlotte streets. I’m sorry dude.” I tell Nick.

“Wait, he never told you about that?” Nick asked me.

“Nope.”

Jorge remains 100% the man...

“Here’s your stuff dude,” I told him as I handed him his pack.

“Thanks man,” he tells me, refusing to make eye contact.

“Dude, look I was talking to Nick and Lex and like I have to ask this, why did you think that coming back here was a good idea? I mean, bro, it wasn’t like they just up and ditched you like you kinda made it out to be. They left you a couple rooms away with a chick bro.”

“I knocked man!” Wrongfit whined back. “And then I went down into the lobby and waited for awhile and nobody came to get me.”

“Dude you even said you didn’t knock loud enough for them to hear you man! Come on dude. Also, why didn’t you call me? Or call Whitney? You had both our numbers right?”

“Well… yeah, I guess.”

“Ok, so why didn’t you call us, dude we would have handled the problem, for that matter why didn’t you just crash in Reed or Tim’s room?”

“Dude, I didn’t know them, I wasn’t just going to stay with someone I didn’t know!” Wrongfit’s whining was getting worse the more commonsense was shined on the situation.

“Ok, so you’re in the lobby, you haven’t called anyone, you didn’t really knock on the door for the room, what made you think it was a good idea to take a $300 cab ride back here man? You could have gotten a room at the hotel for like half that.”

“It just seemed like the best idea I had at the time!” Wrongfit exploded in a whiny, annoying emo kid voice. “Look man, when I was in that lobby I was interviewing you guys too, you know. No one came and got me, no one called me, no one checked on me to see if I was ok. No one did anything for me, so I did the best thing I could think of called my mom. I had to have my parents cover the cab ride for me man!”

I have a choice, I can either beat the ever living hell out of the kid in the parking lot of the hotel, or I can walk in, pay the night for the room we’d agreed to pay for him, and just leave.

I choose option B.

“How’d it go?” Nick asked me as he picked up the phone.

“If I ever see the little fucking shit again I’m going to rip his whiny bitch throat out. You aren’t going to believe what that fucker had the gall to say to me,” I yelled into the phone. The circle was now complete. I was full on Ranger pissed.

“What’d he say?”

“Oh, just that he was ‘interviewing us’ when he was sitting in the lobby with his thumb up his ass and that it was the ‘best idea he had’ when he hopped in the fucking cab!”

“You’re kidding me?”

“Nope, I wanna kill that little fucker, and dude, I’m so sorry I ever doubted you like that.”

“I don’t need an apology man. All I want to hear is all I am and all I ever will be I owe to Nick Palmisciano.”

“I hate you, Nick.”

The Piece De Resistance – Nick’s Perspective

The phone rings.

“It’s Wrongfit!” I announce to Tom.

I pick up the phone.

“Hey,” comes my curt greeting.

“Uh, hey man. How is it going?”

“Fine. What do you need?”

“I figured we could talk. After the way I was treated and…you know…the fact that my parents had to see all of this…I don’t really think I am ready to come down here to work for you guys yet. I think we have to build that trust up over time. I’d still like to design for you though from home.”

“Wrongfit, did you enjoy the fights last night?”

“Yes, a ton.”

“Did you like being a VIP at the afterparty?”

“Yeah man, it was awesome!”

“Did we introduce you to girls?”

“Yes, you guys were cool about that.”

“Did we pay for you to fly down here and party all weekend?”

“Yes, you did, but…”

“I’m not done. Did you tell me this was the best weekend of your life Saturday night?”

“Yes, but…”

“Okay, so to be clear, right up until the point that we left you two doors down in a hotel room with a girl you made clear you wanted to hook up with, this was the best weekend of your life?”

“Yes, but then…”

“Then what? Then you decided that rather than knock on the door so we could hear you, call any of us, get another room, or hell, even crash in the lobby, your gut instinct was to call Mom?”

“You guys left me…”

“Yes, we did. Two door down. Look man, you’re a nice guy, but you and I have arrived at the same conclusion – you are not right for this company. We are a small company and every person has to be responsible. I’m not mad that you got so drunk you couldn’t make a rational decision. Hell man, I’ve torn a hamstring breakdancing and rubbed Gorbachev’s birthmark. I’m not mad that we had to pay $300 for your cab fare. I’m furious that you are not taking responsibility for your actions. I didn’t make you drink. I didn’t tell you to stay in that room. I sure as shit didn’t tell you not to wake us up to get in the room – quite the contrary. And as for the calling Mom thing…Wrongfit, I can’t promise much, but I can tell you that if you hang out with us long enough, you’ll do dumber things than this. We can’t have you calling mom every weekend. You did all of those things. You made all of those decisions. It is YOUR fault you’re embarrassed right now. 100% YOUR fault. “

“I don’t see it that way.”

“And you never will, which is expressly why you cannot work here. I want all of our artwork turned in by the end of the week. If you need a reference about the quality of your work, I am more than happy to give it.”

“I don’t want it to end like this man. I like you guys. You just didn’t look out for me.”

“Wrongfit, we looked out for you more than you will ever understand. Good luck.”

I hung up the phone, opened up facebook, and updated my status:

“We ran out our new designer in less than 24 hours.”

I lean back and stare blankly as the comments fill up underneath it…

I look up at Tom:

“Fuck, man. That sucked…but, at least we’ll get a good story out of this one…”

Her eldest son, an Army Staff Sergeant at the time, went overseas in service to our great nation and wrote back home telling her that some of the guys in his artillery battery didn’t have anyone writing them or sending them care packages. If you’ve been overseas, you know how common a story that is. How many of your brothers and sisters don’t have someone back on the home front reminding them they’re loved and how thankful they are for their service, there’s just… nothing.

This didn’t sit well with Patti, at all. So our hero did what people of action do, she got some friends and family together, got the names of the guys who weren’t getting any mail, and started writing and sending this nation’s soldiers care packages.

Still the stories kept coming.

There were always more service members who didn’t have mail, or care packages, or the feeling that someone back home cares, a feeling that as any combat vet will tell you is absolutely paramount. And what about our wounded warriors in places like Landstuhl Germany or Walter Reed or Bethesda? What about families at the Fisher Houses around the country, everyone at BAMC in San Antonio, the Naval Hospitals up and down the West Coast?

Patti and her small band decided that more needed to be done. Through the help of the World Wide Web Patti started realizing that she wasn’t the only person that had a deep seated desire to serve the troops overseas, and that she wasn’t the only person to see the need. A simple act of kindness and care sparked into an idea to do more, and the fire started to burn hot.

Patti and her rapidly growing band of patriots and supporters of the troops overseas started to get donations of money, gear and toiletries. People started to offer other services like quilt making or baking for the troops. It kept growing and Patti was at the front of the charge every step of the way. It grew and it grew. In 2004 her organization officially got 501(c)(3) non-profit status, and the modern version of Soldier’s Angels was born. As of 2008, the last time they released any data, there are over 200,000 Soldier’s Angels volunteers around the world. Men and women empowered and totally committed to the simplest, yet unbelievably powerful, mission statement:

May no soldier go unloved.
May no soldier walk alone.
May no soldier be forgotten,
Until they all come home.

Soldier’s Angels has over twenty active programs including letter writing, care package sharing, quilt making, baking for the wounded and their families, computers for the wounded (through Valor-IT, which our good buddy Matt Bernard helps out on), getting airline miles and travel arranged for the families of the wounded, and a host of other things. At the forefront of all of this is Patti Patton-Bader. She’s not only the founder but she’s also the President of Soldier’s Angels to this day. If you noticed the Patton part of her last name and wondered, she is related to the late General. She’s his niece. After spending five minutes with her there will be no doubt in your mind the Patton family’s fighting spirit is alive and well in his niece.

Patti, you’re so much more than a hero to so many people, even if you’ll never see it that way. Thousands upon thousands of service members have been given joy and a brief respite from the battle field because of you and your leadership of one of the most fantastic service teams ever assembled. The dozens upon dozens of Solder’s Angels volunteers we have worked with all have your same infectious smile on their face, and all will do whatever they can to help our fighting men and women. Just like you they all help for nothing more than the belief in it being the right thing to do.

Patti is also the first Hero I’ve written about that I’ve also met. Within twenty minutes of this being published she will probably send me a Facebook message or call me on the phone to tell me that I’m out of my mind for doing this and that Nick and I are crazy to think of her like this. Patti, that’s just not the case.

For the thousands of troops you have touched, for the tens of thousands of letters and care packages and hundreds of thousands of smiles you have brought to the faces of our nation’s warriors, thank you from the bottom of our collective hearts.

There’s an old saying that says everything happens in three’s. If that’s the case, douchebags of the world, please stay the hell away from Nick. You don’t want to be the third troll to try and pick an unprovoked fight, or if you are- just remember I told ya so.

The strange and curious case of d-bag number two started on a perfect early summer night. Team Rhino fighter (and resident hottie) Jordan McDonald had just won via 1st round TKO, the after party was awesome, Nick and our buddy Rob were properly socially lubricated, and even though I’d drawn DD duty, I got to drive Rob’s M-3, top down, chilling out, and Rob encouraging me to rip it through the gear box. Life is good.

Enter the toolbags.

Sitting at a red light in downtown Myrtle Beach I hear a voice behind us.

“Hey fuckers, yeah you, you fuckers, you want to fucking go?”

I turn to see a Civic full of drunks, one of which is leaning out of the back car window to yell at us. Why is he yelling at us? None of us have any idea. We had not seen this gentleman all night, nor did we know him or anyone else in the car, he just thought it was a good idea to yell. “Yeah you! Fuckers, let’s fucking go!”

“BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! WHAT?!” Rob busts out, laughing the drunken cackle of a man who cannot believe a perfect stranger would utter such words for no reason.

Since Tackett and I had been working covert Ranger Ops in Vegas let me take a moment to ask the question, what is it in the water these days that makes the youth of America think this is a good idea? Has the bulk of plant Earth totally, completely lost situational awareness and perspective on when it’s a good idea to fight?

We didn’t say anything to these guys, they are in a car behind us and we had never seen them before in our entire lives but yet this dude starts flapping his gums. Oh and the car you just started yelling at has two Army Rangers and a guy who has Brock Lesnar’s mass and twice his aggression when it’s go time. Genius idea assclowns.

Rob’s completely justified laughter only spurs more shit talking from our new acquaintance. The light changes and their car speeds off. Sober and wanting nothing to do with a car of drunken morons, I give them a little distance before putting the car in gear and heading down the street after them. Unfortunately, the next light is red.

They stop.

I stop behind them.

The car door opens. Shit talker’s friend gets out of the car, at a stop light, at 2am, on a major street in Myrtle Beach, SC.

“Seriously?” I mutter under my breath.

“What the fuck?” Nick says from the back seat. The buddy starts walking towards our car.

“What’s so funny?” He asks, stopping right in front of Nick’s position in the back seat, driver’s side.

“Seriously, are you fucking serious?!” Nick asks the now slightly perplexed guy. Nick shakes his head, let’s out a heavy sigh and in an oddly calm and low voice cuts right to the chase: “I think this is really fucking dumb, but if you guys want to fight then I will get out of the car and fight you all right now.” It was the kind of deadpan response that said, “This may be Myrtle Beach, and we may be from out of town, but we are not your dad’s golf buddies.”

Shit Talker’s friend, his bluff completely called, turned to look at me.
“No one is fighting anyone,” I calmly tell him. “Your buddy talked shit, we laughed at him for it, that’s it. Now go back and get in your car,” I finish with my “don’t fuck with me, I’m an NCO” voice on full display. Rob starts giggling.

Shit talker hangs his head, and without another word of any kind, heads back to his car, jumps in, and they speed off. Nick finally erupts.

“What the fuck is it?” He asks Rob and me. “Is there some sign on me that says ‘fuck with me,’ really? I swear to God the next retarded motherfucker who tries to start shit with me for no fucking reason is getting pounded! I’m sick of this shit!!!”

Somewhere lurking, is douchebag #3. When we will run into you and what mutant form of popped collar, self entitled, drunken lunatic fringed, basket case you will be – I’m not sure. I do know, however, that messing with the 5’8” by 5’8” Italian in the Ranger Up shirt with a shit eating grin on his face is the last thing you want to do. So, honey bunny, as the great Samuel Jackson once said “Bitch be cool.”

The Dumb Ass Chronicles: Tempting the Mighty Gods of War

“Hey Doc,” I said uncoiling the string on the pyro I’d just pulled from its stock cardboard packaging.  “I’m about to do something dumb and you won’t be able to stop me, so don’t even try.”

“Yeah, like I could fucking stop you even if you hadn’t said that,” Doc T growled wearily at me as I finished putting on my gloves.

I looked up at him with a wicked, knowing little smile on my face as I finished getting the simulator ready to go.

* * *

In hindsight there is part of me that is amazed I can still type what happened next while looking at my computer screen with both of my eyes.  Never mind hear the gloriousness that is Lizzy Hale’s voice coming through my headphones.  Usually, when one taunts the Gods of War in such a brazen and callous way he ends up in the hospital or worse, as opposed to simply a weeklong shaving profile.

It’s like pissing on a rain turtle in March at Ft. Lewis, WA while calling the Rain God a pussy on the only partly sunny day you’d seen in the two weeks you’d been out in the field.  You know that it’s going to pour rain as soon as that last drop of piss hits the ground, because your insolence demands it.  There are some things you just don’t do.

As I was uncoiling the method of my own destruction, I wasn’t thinking that way.  I was too busy reveling in another field problem being done.  Enjoying the tired haggard looks on my students’ faces from my latest operations plan.  Too proud, too confident I’d been there, done that.  Too tired myself to notice I was holding a mine simulator booby trap and not a detection “whistler” noise-making device.

I had done this dozens of times before with whistlers. At the end of our field problem all pyro must be expended and rather than take the five minutes to rig all the leftovers up to something, spool out the wire and detonate, we just grabbed the fuckers and threw them as we pulled the string.  It takes a whistler about a second and a half to activate, more than enough time for it to hit the ground a safe distance away from you.  Whistlers are all white.  The pyro tube I was holding in my hand was yellow with a white top.  What had I been telling my students for the past two weeks? Oh yeah “attention to detail,” that’s right.

“You sure about this?” JJ, a fellow instructor, asked me. I just smiled the same “I’m invincible” smile that Bellerophon must have had on his face as he mounted Pegasus and tried to ride to Mt. Olympus.  I grabbed the end of the string firmly, lowered the end of the pyro tube towards the ground, and pulled the string.

Click!

I heard the click and two things happened as fast as my synapses could make them so.  I turned my head the other way and thought:

SHIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!

BOOM!

The booby trap went off about six inches from my hand and two feet from my face.  I stumbled back as my ears rang and eyes watered.  My nose felt I’d just gotten done sparring with my old Muay Thai coach when I wouldn’t listen to him about covering up after throwing a hook to the body.  The whole experience reminded me of the time I was a private and my Spc-4, Goldsworthy, had thrown a flash bang at my feet without telling me about it.  I hadn’t liked eating that banger, and I certainly wasn’t a fan of what I’d just done to myself.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  You jackass!”  JJ said from on top of the wall, laughing so hard that he almost fell off.  “You should see yourself right now!”  He choked out, trying to keep his balance.  “You, (smirk) should, AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”  He gasped before finally giving up and just continued laughing.

“God damn it,” I said wiping my fingers across my upper lip, confirming the blood trickling out of my nose.  “Doc you got any ice?”

“HOLY SHIT Sargent!  You’re bleedin pretty good!”  One of my students told me as he rushed over, staring incredulously.  The look begging to know why the hell I thought that had been a good idea.

“I’m fucking fine, go away.  I just need some ice,” I snarled, ignoring the pleading eyes of my PFC.

“No, first you need to get that cleaned out, and all I have is alcohol swabs,” Doc T told me with a smug, satisfied, smirk.

“Come here.”

“That sting?”  Doc asked as I winced as he ran the first swab across the gash on my cheek.

“I’m fine,” I growled, determined to not let the sting show anymore, but failing miserably.

“Good,” Doc T told me smirking as some of my students started to crowd around.  “I’m going to have to do this at least twice to each.”

There’s a lesson to be learned here, I think…something about safety maybe?  I vow to never do that again…to be an example.  Hold on, one of my instructors is on the phone…there’s some extra C4!

Be right back!

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Tim and Tommy Do Best Ranger

 “You ready to go?”  Tim asked me as we climbed into his little white car.  It’s the last car you’d expect an SF guy to drive, let alone an SF guy that is one of the top 185lb mixed martial artists in the world.
 
 
“Yeah sure,” I said with a slight yawn.  “Let’s do this.”
 
 
This was the Best Ranger Competition, the greatest military endurance race in the world.  It’s been compared to the Eco-challenge or an Ironman triathlon, but both events pale in comparison.  For 60+ hours the 48 two-man teams have to shoot, ruck, navigate, climb, run, and jump their way through one of the most sadistic and grueling series of trials ever to cross a Ranger’s mind.  If that wasn’t bad enough the pre-requisite for this crucible of pain and suffering was the successful completion of Ranger School.  You had to have survived that 62-day kick in the nuts just think about doing it.  Of course the first topic Tim and I discussed was how much we want to compete in Best Ranger some day.  Hey, we’ve never claimed to be smart. 
 
 

We highlighted that fact by leaving from Ft. Bragg at 2230 the night before Best Ranger started.  It would begin at 0600 the following morning.  “We should make it right when it starts,” Tim confidently intoned on the phone that morning.

 
“You know we could just leave this afternoon, dude,” I pointed out.
 “I have to train for my fight,” was what I got in response.  Images of being used as Tim’s punching bag that weekend because he was pent up and angry at his lack of training flashed through my mind.  Morning person or not, I was suddenly very cool with leaving in the middle of the night.

 “Also,” Tim told me as we started driving.  “I’m not allowed to eat crap food, and you’re going to make sure I don’t.” 
 “You’re twice the size of me and a professional fighter.  What, exactly, am I going to be able to make you do, Tim?” 
 “I’m not allowed to eat crap, Tommy.” Tim reiterated.   This new responsibility was immediately tested when we pulled into a South Carolina gas station for gas and caffeine. 

 Tim went right for the nut raisin mix and “good snacks.”  I got zingers, two hot dogs, and Cool Ranch Doritos. 

 
 “That’s not very nice,” Tim told me as we got into the car, my mouth full of a delicious Ball Park Frank.  “Inside of me is a fat kid just busting to get out. That’s why I have to be really careful of what I eat.”

 “Is that why after they retire all fighters get fat for a little bit?”  I asked him as I took a bite out of my first Zinger, ignoring the look of lust on his face.

 “Yes,” Tim said simply as I stuffed anotherfatty, sugary concoction in my mouth.  He did not look amused.

 “I always wondered about that,” I said, finishing off the first Zinger and moving to the second in the pack.  Hey, I didn’t have a fight coming up.

 About 2:30am I racked out for about an hour and a half, only to wake up in the ghetto.  Not a bad area of town, not a “lower class” residential area, the flat out ghetto. Complete with a sleazy motel that appeared to have at least two working girls walking men into upstairs rooms and the homeless guys coming up to the car to ask for change.

 “Your turn to drive,” Tim says smiling and hopping out of the car, not caring where we are.

 An oddity of everyone in the Ranger Up universe is that we all drive manual transmission vehicles, and Tim is no different.  What is different about Tim’s car is that the top of his shifter isn’t in anyway secured to the rest of the shift lever. 

“What the hell?”  I asked out loud as the black knob was suddenly no longer able to assist me in shifting to 2nd gear.

 “Yeah, it does that,” Tim remarked as he quickly fixed the problem.  “Oh, and Tommy,” he told me as he reclined the seat a little more and stretched out. “I accidentally opened your Red Bull when you were asleep and drank it.  Night.”

Ass. Hole.

 We arrived at the Ranger Training Brigade looking and feeling like zombies at exactly 0600, right when the competition was beginning.  We linked up with Mike and Candyass (pronounce Can-dis, not candy-ass, weirdos) who are in charge of running the event and dealing with sponsors like us.  The hooked us up with a schedule and packet of info.  We were told that the competition had just started, with a run in body armor instead of the tradition al PT test to kick it off.  The run was going to end at the start of the Darby Queen obstacle course, another traditionally early event in the competition. 

 Damn, they look tired already.  I thought as I watched the first two teams come down the chute at the end of the first event.  The course must have been muddy and extremely wet judging by the uniforms and mud splattered numbers of the contestants.  With barely one event done it was clear that Best Ranger was already living up to its reputation as a suckfest.  It seemed like barely ten minutes past before the teams that had just done a buddy body armor run were getting lined up, sans body armor, and getting ready to run the Darby Queen obstacle course.  Many already looking tired and displaying the “you’ve got to be kidding me” look on their faces. 

 We also linked up with Uncle Jimbo and Matt from Blackfive.net, who were down at the competition to film and do some reporting for the website.  While this meant that they got to go places in and around the competition that mere mortals and a “VIP, Sponsor” like Tim or I could not, it also meant that they had to walk around with the pink brand of a media credential around there neck. 

 “I have to keep telling all the guys we aren’t your typical press weasels,” Matt told us about two minutes into talking to him at the Darby Queen.  “And pink, really?  Pink?”  Matt said shaking his head. Press 0 Rangers 1
At the starting point of the Darby Queen we had the privilege of running into Ranger Regiment’s Special Troops Battalion Chaplain, Jeff Struecker. 

“I have to go shake his hand,” Tim said when he saw him standing off to the side.   I completely concurred.
Now, if you don’t know the name and/or you are scoffing at that, Google him right now.  Seriously.

Jeff (and he has told me repeatedly over the years to call him that, which is the only reason I’m not writing Chaplain Struecker) is a literal living legend of bad assness going all the way back to the Ranger assaults into Panama in 1989.  His military accomplishments read like something out of a Hollywood script and the stories that I’ve been told about him from men that served with him when he was still kicking down doors are the stuff that would get rejected by Hollywood as unbelievable, which is fine with him. 

Jeff loves his Rangers and all the soldiers he has the chance to come in contact with more than anyone can imagine and is one of the nicest people I have ever met, and (oh yeah) also won Best Ranger in 1996.  He was out to cheer on the seven teams from the 75th Ranger Regiment and went so far as to get all the guys that were watching the event from Regimental headquarters run alongside the teams as they went through the final portion of the Obstacle course.  There have been many Chaplains in my chain of command, and frankly many of them I’ve just put up with because I felt like I had to.  That is definitely not the case with Jeff.  He is one of the best people I have ever had the privilege of meeting.  No matter what your religious preference (or lack there of) he is an awesome human being and a man anyone on the planet would be proud to associate with, unless it’s the guys his Ranger’s are tryin to kill. 

He was also gracious enough to do an interview with the guys from Blackfive.  You should definitely take a second to see if they’ve posted it yet, it’s well worth the time. 

As the Darby Queen wrapped up Tim turned to me and said, “I’m hungry.”  It wasn’t what he said, or even how he said it.  It was the look in his eyes.  The one that seemed to say “if we don’t find me food or aren’t at least moving towards it in 10 seconds, I’m going to eat you whole.”  Tim told me that in order to keep his training up at a high level he has to consume 4,000 calories a day, and apparently we were failing at that mission.  A massive Cracker Barrel breakfast later and it was out to the weapons ranges for machine guns, moving targets, and the first of two stress shoots for the competition.  The Best Ranger committee threw a fun wrinkle into this year by making the weapons for the moving target range M-1 Garand rifles instead of the M-4’s.  I thought it was a cool little twist, but judging by the amount of misses I’m not sure that the competitors thought that. 

At the machine gun range I also ran into one of my RIP (Ranger Indoctrination Program) TACs tailgating and waiting for the 75th teams to shoot.  I only wish I’d had the idea first.

Following the shooting events it was day land navigation and the always-brutal 18 mile  Russ Rippetoe Memorial foot march for the competitiors, and a nap and the welcome event (complete with free beer) for Tim and I.  Tim can’t drink – this whole training for a fight thing again – so I drank for him.  I gave it my all until the keg was floated.  We had the privilege of talking to the family members of those who started the Best Ranger Competition, men who served and fought during D-day, Korea and Vietnam among other places.  

The following day we headed over to the Army Combatives School so Tim could work out with his fellow Ranger up fighters Damien Stelly and Andrew Chappelle.  Also there was the Godfather of Modern Army Combatives, Matt Larsen, who also runs the gym. 

You will, however, have to tune in next week to find out about what happened- it is a story in its own right.  Complete with me getting the shit kicked out of me, Nick being Nick (even if he was 500 miles away) and all sorts of other Ranger Up insanity.
A pit stop to get Tim fed and we were back out at the Best Ranger Competition for the day stakes.  At the end of the first day the field had been whittled down to 29 teams with SFC Blake Simms and SFC Chad Stackpole of 4th Ranger Training Brigade in the lead by 29 points over US Army Special Operations Command team, and former winners, MSG Walter Zajkowski and MSG Daniel Jenkins.  MSG Zajkowski won in 2007 and MSG Jenkins took home the title in 2002.  My boys in the 75th Ranger Regiment were in 4th and 5th place and trying to catch the 3rd place team of MSG Eric Turk and SGM Jesse Boettcher, who were also from US Army Special Operations Command.    While some competitors were wilting, SFC Stackpole and SFC Simms seemed like they were just getting started.  Seeming to get stronger as the competition was going, they set the standard for the Day Stakes and powered on through the night land navigation lanes. 

Tim and I, however, were powering up to go to the bar, the glorious Ranger institution that is Scruffy Murphy’s in downtown Columbus, GA.  You are told as a Ranger private that if you and your Ranger buddy are ever in trouble you should yell “Ranger down!” and help was on the way.  If you ever yelled “Ranger down!” in Scruffy Murphy’s odds are you’d end up having the guys from B-CO 3rd Ranger Battalion fighting the A-CO 4th Ranger Training Brigade instructors, and heaven help the newly minted 21 year old specialist from 3rd ID if he got caught in the mix.  It is one of the few places on planet Earth that there are Budweiser “welcome home” signs that have a Ranger Scroll on them, seriously.

Tim and I linked back up with Matt and Jimbo, already two pints of Guinness into the night when we arrived (good for them) when Jimbo handed me his phone.

 “Hey here’s what Nick just sent me,” he cackled.  I took his phone and read:

 If Tommy passes out, shave him clean. Nick.

 Awesome, thanks Nick.

 A quick pint of Guinness in my hand and the night was ready to begin.  Some of Tim’s friends showed up and as they were all sitting around B.S.ing I was talking with Matt and Jimbo, when she walked in.

 This girl exists in every bar across America.  She will do anything for attention, anything – up to and including walking around in horrifically bad, two sizes too small pink lingerie like it was a dress, pink argyle socks and black fishnet gloves like Madonna wore back in the early 80’s.  She’ll do this, mind you, even though she looks like a troll and hobbit got together and produced offspring.  She’s the girl that if you see your men out at the same bar you go over to tell and tell them they will be doing PT with you at 6am the following morning if you see them even so much as talking to her.  Then you reiterate the need to always be at MOPP level- 4 because, well, they’re privates and you know better.   In short, she’s the one person you hope would just go away.  But she never does, she just churns through the bar like a tornado. 

 “What the fuck is that thing?”  I couldn’t help but blurt out when she walked in, hands over head and 90% of her bra showing from under the cheap lingerie and loud enough that I could hear every word that came out of her mouth over the live band.

 “Oh man, what the hell?”  Matt said next to me, turning away from the train wreck that had just walked through the door.  I, on the other hand, turned to the group of girls that seemed to be talking to her on friendly terms.

 “Ok, I’m sorry to have to do this because I know it’s what she wants, but what the fuck is up with your friend?”  I asked the girl closest to me.

 “Oh she’s not my friend!”  The girl told me, her look clearly expressing distain and disgust.  “I have no idea what she’s doing, she just came up to us and talked to us.”

 “Got ya,” I said as I turned back to Matt.  “I bet her mother was a meth addict or something, cause dude- that’s just horrific.”  Matt just smirked.

A nice person just lets it go at this point.  They accept that there are people in the world like that and that’s all there is to it.   I’m not that person.

 “Hey,” I said walking up to her by way of greeting.  “Does your mother know that you’re out here tonight like this?  Seriously, don’t you think that it’d worry her a little bit that you forgot your clothes?”

 “I don’t care about my Mom, she’s an asshole,” Pinky told me.  I couldn’t help but wonder where The Brain was.

 “I hate to quibble, but wouldn’t your Mom technically be a bitch, if anything?”  I asked.  “I mean I don’t know but that just seems like it would fit better, even if I do think you’re being a bit harsh on Mom on the eve of mother’s day.”

 “My Mom’s a crackhead, I could give a fuck what she thinks.”  Pinky said turning away and prancing away towards a new group of people.

 “I guessed the wrong drug,” I told Matt as I found my way back to my barstool.  “It was crack, not meth.”

 The night settled into an ok time of having a beer and chilling with friends, when I felt an arm around my shoulders.  I started to turn to see who it was when I got flash banged from a camera going off.  As the cobwebs cleared from my head I see Matt smirking from behind his camera phone and Pinky scurrying off.  Thanks, Matt (asshole).

 The night resumed its laid back vibe of hanging out with friends and telling stories about the stupid things you’ve done in your life.  Tim, who went to SF as part of the 18X “SF baby” program, met a kid “Z” who had just graduated basic and was headed to Airborne school and then SFAS.  Good dude, and after being told Tim holds just about every record there is for an SF baby remarked, “that’s cool, I’m going to beat them.”

 “I like you, good luck, and you don’t have a prayer.”  Tim told him. 

Day three found us late to the helocast event.  Tim’s phone was supposed to be the alarm clock, but he mis-set it and we woke up late.  When we arrived and checked the board the team of SFC Stackpoole and SFC Simms had the competition all but locked up, firmly in the driver’s seat.  A link up with some friends and a double-checking of the standings, coupled with an 8-hour drive and the decision was made that it was time to go.  As we drove back we got a text confirming the winners.

 Congratulations to SFC Blake Simms and SFC Chad Stackpole of 4th Ranger Training Brigade for an almost wire to wire win in the most arduous military competition in the world, Best Ranger!  Congratulations are also in order for MSG Walter Zajkowski and MSG Daniel Jenkins, who placed second, and a team of my boys, Sgt. Michael A. Malchow and Sgt. Jesse A. Collins, of the 75th Ranger Regiment fought on to the Ranger objective and placed 3rd.   Below is a list of the 24 teams that completed the competition.  For something like Best Ranger that is one hell of an accomplishment in and of itself.

RLTW!!!

1st – Team 21 with 2,483 points – Sgt. 1st Class Blake A. Simms and Sgt. Chad E.W. Stackpole, 4th Ranger Training Battalion, Ranger Training Brigade, Fort Benning, Ga.

2nd – Team 22 with 2,396 points – Master Sgt. Walter J. Zajkowski and Master Sgt. Daniel E. Jenkins, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Fort Bragg, N.C.

3rd – Team 7 with 2,165 points – Sgt. Michael A. Malchow and Sgt. Jesse A. Collins, 75th Ranger Regiment.

4th – Team 8 with 2,151 points – Staff Sgt. Brandon K. Farmer and Staff Sgt. Luke R. McDowell, 75th Ranger Regiment.

5th – Team 31 with 2,138 points – Staff Sgt. Michael C. Mutchie and Staff Sgt. Miguel A. Antia, 4th Ranger Training Battalion, Ranger Training Brigade, Fort Benning, Ga.

6th – Team 46 with 2,094 points – Capt. Samuel E. Linn and 1st Sgt. Robert F. Carter, 5th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division.

7th – Team 23 with 2,050 points – Sgt. Maj. Jesse D. Boettcher and Master Sgt. Eric J. Turk, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Fort Bragg, N.C.

8th – Team 29 with 1,976 points – Sgt. Jeremy K. Billing and Cpl. Troy V. Jenkins, 75th Ranger Regiment.

9th – Team 43 with 1,970 points – 1st Lt. Thomas M. Halverson and Michael J. Luth, 4th Brigade, 4th Infantry Division.

10th – Team 27 with 1,920 points – Staff Sgt. Benjamin C. Hunter and Staff Sgt. Ian B. Hunter, 75th Ranger Regiment.

11th – Team 16 with 1,904 points – Staff Sgt. Raylan J. Heck and Staff Sgt. Adam J. Angisanio, 6th Ranger Training Battalion, Ranger Training Brigade, Camp Rudder, Fla.

12th – Team 33 with 1,864 points – 1st Lt. Chris S. Migliaro and Sgt. 1st Class Jordan A. Martell, 4th Brigade, 4th Infantry Division.

13th – Team 24 with 1,863 points – Maj. Jose D. Salinas and Maj. Edward A. Sedlock, 199th Infantry Regiment, Fort Benning, Ga.

14th – Team 17 with 1,852 points – Sgt. Edward F. Killmeier and Spc. Michael E. Pierce, 75th Ranger Regiment.

15th – Team 20 with 1,779 points – Maj. Pete S. Kranenburg and Sgt. 1st Class John S. Przytulski, 1st Special Warfare Training Group.

16th – Team 26 with 1,735 points – Capt. Ronald L. Garberson and Capt. Anthony B. Aguilar, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Fort Bragg, N.C.

17th – Team 49 with 1,638 points – Sgt. 1st Class Mark E. Breyak and Sgt. 1st Class Steve W. Fields, Special Warfare Center Noncommissioned Officer Academy.

18th – Team 5 with 1,592 points – Sgt. 1st Class Derek G. Wise and Sgt. David M. Paul, 25th Infantry Division.

19th – Team 14 with 1,554 points – Capt. Stephen P. Magennis and Capt. Todd M. Tompkins, Maneuver Captains Career Course, 199th Infantry Regiment.

20th – Team 45 with 1,534 points – Capt. Lloyd B. Wohlschlegel and 1st Lt. Raymond A. Kuderka, 25th Infantry Division.

21st – Team 38 with 1,516 points – 1st Lts. Anthony J. Kivlehan and Alex B. Armstrong, 4th Brigade, 4th Infantry Division.

22nd – Team 35 with 1,492 points – Capt. David M. Cochrane and Staff Sgt. Anthony L. Fuentes, 6th Ranger Training Battalion, Ranger Training Brigade, Camp Rudder, Fla.

23rd – Team 28 with 1,310 points – Capt. Robert B. Killian and 1st Lt. Grant R. Barge, 10th Mountain Division.

24th – Team 34 with 1,297 points – 1st Lt. Lauren A. Gore and 1st Lt. Benjamin R. Juvinall, 4th Brigade, 1st Infantry Division.

Standing on the Cliffs of Pointe Du Hoc

by

Tommy Batboy

One of the first books I remember reading as a child was from a series of books on World War II. I was seven or eight and I picked the book because even as a child war fascinated me, and the title was simple: D-Day. Twenty years later, as I got out of the Eurovan in a recently paved asphalt parking lot, I thought of that book again for some reason.

“Just down that path and to the right are the cliffs, I’ll be waiting here for you,” my driver told me.

“Thank you,” I said a little nervously. After years of wanting to see it, after all the stories my old squad leader had told me, all the reading, and the privilege of talking to some of the battles survivors; I was about to go stand on the cliffs of Point Du Hoc.

If you where a Private in the 75th Ranger Regiment, you grew up knowing about Point Du Hoc. If you were a private in 2nd Ranger Battalion you learned it the way Catholic grammar school children learn the Bible. On D-day the men of 2nd Ranger Battalion drew one the hardest missions of the invasion: Scale the sheer and unprotected cliff faces of Point Du Hoc to destroy the captured French 155mm artillery pieces – the big guns that could rain hell on both the Omaha and Utah landing beaches – the guns that could jeopardize the success or failure of the Normandy landings. The mission was equally impossible and critical and its success hinged on Colonel James Rudder’s 225 men. They were equipped with ladders borrowed from the London fire department and ropes with grappling hooks.

Tommy Batboy at Point Du Hoc

The mission started poorly. The land craft got mixed up and the Germans spotted the Americans on their way to the cliffs. When they got there, they had to scale the cliffs under heavy fire. The Germans were putting grenades in mason jars before dropping them, using the glass to increase shrapnel and lethality. Firing straight down at the men at the base of the cliffs as they climbed proved incredibly lethal. 225 men started; by the end of the two-day mission only 90 were fit to fight.

In the time that it took me to walk 150 meters, I’d be standing where these proud and brave men had fought, and where many of them had died. An eerie feeling of the past settled over me. I started to walk down the path and towards the cliffs. Rounding the corner and coming face to face with the bunker complex was surreal. Unlike many of the battlefields of World War II that have been paved over or converted to tourist traps, the French government has left Point Du Hoc unchanged. 65 years later there are still 5 foot or deeper gouges in the Earth where American Naval fire or German counter battery fell. Even with all the effects from the rain and wind and weather, sixty-five years later the Earth still looks horribly scarred from the events of that day. If you stare closely you can see where American and German rifle fire chipped away at the reinforced concrete on some of the bunkers. Written in rusty, twisted rebar, cold crumbling concrete and a cratered surface similar to that of the moon, you can see the ugliness of what D-day was for those brave men.

A ringing cry shook me from my daze, turning to my left I saw a group of French teenagers, who appeared to be on a field trip, running up one side of a shell crater and out the other, playing grab ass in hopes of impressing the girls that were along on the tour.

I got very angry for a second. Remembering how The Weid, my first squad leader in 2nd Battalion, took our squad through the battle on a dry

The Barbed wire and concertina wire still sit at Point du Hoc.

erase board in the squad room. I remember him explaining that once the Rangers made it up the cliffs they found nothing but logs where the guns should be. The German Army, fearing Allied aerial bombing had moved the guns in-land. Even despite the bad and the rapidly mounting German counter attack the men of 2nd Battalion still fought on, found the guns a mile and a half inland, and completed the mission. I started thinking about meeting two of the men who’d climbed the cliff when I was at the Ranger Hall of Fame Ceremony in 2004, hearing one tell us about watching his friends get shot off the ropes as they climbed – telling us there was nothing to do but to just keep climbing. I was amazed at the matter-of-fact way he said it, and wondered if I could have been half as brave if it had been me on that rope going up the cliffs. The area is listed as a graveyard on the French registry, to see kids disrespect it like that was not an easy pill to swallow.

A deep breath later I started to move towards the cliff faces themselves. Fifteen feet or so from the cliffs there is a fence with signs written in both French and English telling you to stay back for your safety. “They didn’t serve in 2nd Bat,” I told my friend as I hopped right over the fence and marched towards the barbed wire ringing the cliff face, undoubtedly meant to keep people like me from getting right up on the edge. I walked right up the to wire, found a spot that got me just a couple of inches closer and leaned.

“Oh my God,” I muttered, watching the waves crash against the base of the cliffs below me. There is nothing, nothing to protect a man as he climbed. It is as sheer and steep a cliff face as I’ve ever seen. To say these men had no protection but the covering fire from the landing craft is a gross understatement. The moment I looked down I understood why so many men died in training on the Isle of Wright.

I understood even more deeply than I had before why the 6th stanza of the Ranger Creed is “Readily will I display the intestinal fortitude required to fight on to the Ranger objective and complete the mission, though I be the lone survivor. Ranger’s lead the way!” Through all the adversity, all the hell, through the rifle fire and the grenades, the glass and, even the heavy boulders thrown their way; the men of the 2nd Ranger Battalion climbed. They knew that their buddies were dying and were scared that they might be next, but still they climbed – hoping at least one of them would make it to the top to complete the mission.

Never in my life have I felt so humbled as I did in that moment.

Still standing concrete bunker at Point du Hoc

After taking some pictures and walking around I climbed back over the fence. I walked through the bunkers. I walked around and in the craters. Feeling the chilly, brisk early spring breeze on my face, I stared out into the English Channel, dreary and gray with low clouds that reduced visibility. I wondered what it must have been like to ride in those landing craft, pondering just how much the men that had ridden in them knew. I marveled at the bravery and strength of character a man must possess to take that ride. I wondered what Colonel Rudder would say about my generation of Rangers, and hoped that he’d think we were living up to the standards his men had set on this spot. Standing on the cliffs of Pointe Du Hoc I said a silent prayer of thanks for the sacrifices of Col. Rudder and his men.

“What time is it?” My friend asked me quietly.

“It’s time to go,” I said, checking my watch and turning back towards the path that led to the parking lot.

We walked slowly back towards the van as I looked around the top of the cliff and then back into the English Channel. I was thoroughly humbled by the courage of conviction it must have taken my forefathers to take in the same view on that fateful day in June so many years ago.

RLTW.

by

Tommy Batboy

My heart dropped when the “breaking news” chime on my computer went off. The headline read “Airliner Crashes Into Hudson River.” If I was amazed after the seeing the headline, it was nothing compared to the first sentence – none dead, only a few passengers and crew injured, and they were already on their way to the hospital. How on Earth was this possible? I thought shaking my head. An airplane crash-landed onto the river in New York City proper and everyone is okay? 

That doesn’t happen on accident.

The AP said the tale of US Airways flight 1549 was one “of luck and heroism,” you can take the luck away from this story. The men and women on that flight owe their lives to Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger and his amazing crew aboard the airplane that day.

As the story continues to get discussed, people continue to focus on the luck involved. Yes, they say that Sullenberger’s actions were heroic, but there is a sentiment that that it was really the luck that saved the day – that this was a one in a million type of thing. The guys at Ranger Up and most of you out there aren’t big believers in luck, because Lady Luck, my friends, favors the well-prepared. Whenever someone mentions that the situation was lucky, please tell them to dig a little deeper into this story and learn about the man who saved the lives of 150 people that day. We’d argue that the only luck involved here was that Captain Sullenberger was the man behind the controls.

Well before Captain Sullenberger sat down in that ill-fated cockpit on 15 January, he had graduated at the top of his aviator class at the Air Force Academy. He flew F-4’s before moving on to fly for US Airways, which he’d done for 29 years prior to that day. In that long and decorated career he devoted himself to becoming a subject matter expert in all facets of his job, mastering such skills as glider landings. He devoted himself to studying how pilots and crews react in moments of crisis. He put the hours in the simulators. He stayed at the cutting edge of training. He knew what was at stake if he should ever fail. Long before he ever found himself in the middle of a crisis, he’d spent years preparing for such an event.

Then the day came.

With perfect poise he put his wealth of training to use and executed a flawless emergency glider landing. He was so in control of the situation that he had the presence of mind to land the plane in the section of the river that would facilitate the easiest transport of the passengers and crew to hospitals and treatment centers. Once the plane hit the water, the crew got everyone off the crippled aircraft like a well-oiled machine. Smoothly and carefully the doors were opened, the boats were deployed and the passengers exited from the plane. Finally, after everyone was off the plane Captain Sullenburger walked up and down aisle, twice, just to be sure no one was left on board.

That is not lucky. Nor is it a miracle or any of the number of things people are trying to make it out to be. It was the culmination of decisive actions by a leader refusing to fail at his mission. It was what happens when a person spends his or her life always striving to get better and refusing to compromise. It was heroic. Everyone at Ranger Up has been more and more amazed by Captain Sullenberger the more we find out about him. Not just by his actions last week, but also by the lifetime of vigilance he exhibited – by the hours he’s spent getting ready, just in case. He never let his guard down.

Captain Sullenberger is the manifestation of the thing that all great NCOs and sports coaches have been telling us since as early as we can remember – the game isn’t won on game day – but on the practice field.

Thank you, Sir. Not only for keeping all those people on the plane and in the city safe, but for caring enough about the people under your command to prepare for the worst. You knew the day might come, and when it did, you stood ready.