“Did anyone give you a package to carry?” the security dude asks me. Before I can even think of an honest response, “No” jumps out of my mouth.

I’ve traveled so much that it’s just automatic anymore. All I want is those prying, uncaring, cynical eyes off of me so I can go to the bar and down a tranquilizer before boarding yet another overcrowded flying shitcan. So it was a surreal astonishment when a TSP agent said, “over here please” one afternoon last Christmas before guiding me to the “rape booth” for an uncomfortable violation of my personal space. Here’s how the play-by-play went:

TSP: “Did anyone give you a package to carry for them?”
Me: “No.”
TSP: “Okay.”

Guard 1 looks over at Guard 2 who’s intently studying a bag on the X-Ray. I recognize the bag as mine.

Me: “Oh shit.”
TSP: “What Sir?”
Me: “Nothing.”

Guard 2 gives the super-secret ‘nod of knowing’ to Guard 1, who turns to me.

TSP: “Come this way Sir.”
Me: “Why are you pulling out gloves?”
TSP: “What gloves?”
Me: “Those gloves.”
TSP: “Just a precaution. Nothing to worry about until you see a tube ‘o lube.”
Me: “Don’t joke.”
TSP: “Am I laughing?”
Me: “Is that a question or an attempt to coddle me?”
TSP: “Do you need coddling?”
Me: “Grief counseling will be in order if you break out anything labeled ‘petroleum jelly.’”

Guard 2 gives another nod and I’m sure they’ve just had a telepathic conversation about my impending bodily violation. More guards gather on the fringe, including one with a vicious looking canine. I suddenly know how a steak feels.

TSP: “Sir, I’ll ask again. Did anyone give you anything…”
Me: “It was my mommy!” I blurt out.
TSP: “Your mommy?”
Me: “I mean my mom.”
TSP: “What did she do? Make the big bad boogie man come to town?”
Me: “No! Those closets were terrifying!”
TSP: “Do you have something to hide?”
Me: “No! I mean yes. I mean whatever’s in there, it’s my mom’s fault.”

My shaky voice fails to convince the guard. A rare, uncomfortable silence ensues and although I welcome the lack of sarcastic questions, I want to run. The bomb sniffing ninja dog forces me to reconsider.

TSP: “Do I need to ask?”
Me: “She gave me a gift to give to my sons.”
TSP: “Is it in your bag now?”
Me: “Yes.”
TSP: “But I asked you already if anyone had given you anything and you said no.”
Me: “I know. It was a Pavlovian response.”
TSP: “A what?”
Me: “He had a dog…”
TSP: “I know who Pavlov was.”
Me: “Then why did you…?”
TSP: “Because I’m a bit dismayed to be categorized as a canine experiment. My job isn’t incredibly difficult, but I’m on the front line of stopping another 9-11, sir!”
Me: “I’m not trivializing your job.”
TSP: “But you compared it to Pavlov.”
Me: “I did, I’m sorry.”
TSP: “What’s in your bag?”
Me: “I don’t know. My mother gave me a gift to give to my boys.”
TSP: “You said that.”
Me: “And I was telling the truth.”
TSP: “Finally.”
Me: “I’m not lying.”
TSP: “But your credibility is in question, wouldn’t you agree?”
Me: “You got me there. Please put away that tube. You told me I didn’t have to be worried unless…”
TSP: “We’re going to have to open the gift.”
Me: “And ruin the surprise for my boys?”
TSP: “Would you prefer I open something else?” He holds up the tube for emphasis.
Me: “Sucks for them. Is that a taser?”

“Here’s the wires,” Guard 1 says as he pulls an iPod out of the upper pocket of my backpack.
“The machine says something underneath is organic, though,” Guard 2 interjects, shooting me a suspicious shoe-bomber look. “Cut it open.”
Guard 1 gives the perfectly wrapped box a Jack-the-Ripper and slices it open so efficiently I have an “Iron Chef” flashback. Three guards finger their weapons as the dog drools over my filet-like thigh. I get the feeling everyone has visions of themselves on the cover of Time thwarting another 9-11 and each one wants to be the first to put two in my chest.

“Fed him lately?” I jest as my piss hits the floor next to the drooling dog.

“Are you kidding me?” Guard 2 suddenly lets out as the final piece of wrapping falls away to reveal…Playdo. “Fucking Playdo,” he laments. “Beneath an iPod!” Fourteen guards gently lift their trigger fingers as the brightest part of their day fades away in abysmal disappointment.

“I don’t get it,” I say.
“The X-Ray machine saw an organic material beneath a group of wires. Looked like a bomb,” Guard 1 confides in me as he powers down his taser. “Guess you’re good to go.”

I was allowed to leave unconfined and more thankful than a thoroughbred in a barn full of fillies. But not fourteen steps later the universe taught me a valuable lesson as another man zipped past me. A man running, whether it’s from fear or joy, makes no difference to a dog. We’re all steak to a canine. You just have to be faster than the steak next to you.

Ranger Up brings back the Two-Martini Lunch

Who says you have to wait until the sun sets to drink? Getting schnokered in the middle of the day was an executive privilege going back to the days of Romans, Mead, and the always entertaining Coliseum until a bunch of clumsy, tea-totaling Jodies ruined it for all of us by losing too many fingers in wayward heavy machinery accidents. Just when we thought the hell of public bra burnings and pepper spray-laced political conventions was over, America got a conscience, kicked the hard-living Rat Pack to the curb, and mumbled “I’ll never drink again” like a sorority chick on an early morning walk of shame. Overnight, getting buzzed at work was a bad thing.

Well, this is America where unnecessary indulgences are a rite of entrepreneurial passage, so Old Blue Eyes would be proud to know that Ranger Up’s World Headquarters in Raleigh/Durham is a den of gin and vermouth-laced iniquity and profanity between the hours of 1130 and 1300. Wars, laws, and trade routes have been fought over booze, so this small company has tapped into the siren song of libation to get a leg up on the competition. Gird your loins.

“There simply isn’t enough self-righteous egoism in the workplace anymore,” says Ranger Up CEO and Supreme Overlord Nick Palmisciano while killing his first slightly wet, three-olive Hendrix martini. “All these rhinestone and foil wearing, faux hawk coiffed pantyweights don’t know jack about being a revolutionary. Two fingers of your favorite poison was a lunchtime staple for our fathers, but ever since the Carter Administration, everyone’s been uptight about drinking at work…even when we were in the Army. What kind of crap is that?”

Chief Marketing Officer Garrett Schemmel, barely competent after a pair of sugar-rimmed Appletinis, describes the new tactic this way: “One martini is nothing more than an unsatisfying appetizer…like the Minnesota Vikings…and we knew three was too much when a hide-and-seek game didn’t end until we discovered Tommy six days later camping in the rafters like a caveman. Two is just right. It stimulates the creative brain cells, which in turn kill the unproductive ones. So it’s really like brain cell Darwinianism. The weak cells die off leaving the herd stronger…until nap time of course.”

So far the net effect of the two-martini lunch has been limited to a Jackson Pollack wall covered with plans of unrealized world domination, lists of esoteric nonsense like “Kama Sutra uses for peanut butter,” and a collection of crayon drawings depicting RU employees bloodily decimating the greatest MMA fighters. “It’s mostly jibberish with an occasional nugget of stupid,” says Tim Kennedy, who enjoys a vodka martini without vodka. “I don’t know how a fully automated flux capacitor will turn a profit, so I crossed it out and wrote ‘V-necks’ because that shit’s money.”

“We’re still not sure who wrote, ‘I’m a genius surrounded by small vocabularies.’ but I suspect it was our resident curmudgeon, Crigger,” says Tommy Batboy as he polishes off a Tropic-tini and eats the orange, rind and all.

Of course, combining booze and work invariably has its downside. Recently Ranger Up had to let go of their temporary worker, Danielle, because she used the term “inappropriate touching” one too many times. The company also suffered a setback when Tommy donned a Beefeater outfit and trudged the hallways with a giant axe looking for a Queen to behead in order to ‘add realism to the martini coven.’ Thankfully Nick streaking by wearing only fuzzy bunny feet gave Whitney the chance to sweep his leg and put him in a triangle choke before the company’s lawyer woke up.

“It’s not Bacchanalian orgy, at least not a good one,” says Whitney, “but replacing food with intemperance at lunch certainly helps dull the ringing dissonance of Tommy’s apoplexy and dampens Nick’s irritating capriciousness. I mean, it’s cool…as long as they don’t bring back Thighmaster Thursdays. Disturbing.”

Proudly brought to you by the Rhino News Network

Uniforms by Kelly Crigger

Gene Simmons is a narcissistic introvert who oozes old-guy-trying-to-be-young skeeziness with death hungrily watching over his aging frame. But when he donned his stud-riddled body leather, Pimptastic high heels, ghoulish makeup, and battle axe bass to front KISS, he was as close to being a God on earth as Rock and Roll has ever seen. He was a growling, intimidating, fire breathing, groupie-mongering man’s man who you simply didn’t fuck with for fear of him throwing you through the portal of hell and into the River Styx. But even Simmons freely admitted to being a completely different person once he removed his makeup and returned to reality.

So here’s the quandary: does the same thing happen to Soldiers? Do we act differently in uniform when we know we’re representing something bigger than ourselves? If so, does that also mean we lose those standards when we lose the uniform?

We’ve all seen the recently retired soldier sporting a fresh new soul patch and a gut that eclipses his or her view of their genitalia. They walk around rubbing their bulbous bedsores like Santa Claus and repeat the mantra, “I never used to be this way.” In reality they were fat mines waiting for something to trigger them. They secretly saw their military career as a race with the 20-year mark as the finish line where buttons popped and work ethic failed. Their uniform was the only thing positively influencing their behavior and once they lost it they turned into obese assclowns.

Here’s where it gets personal – I work in an anachronism of bureaucracy-a DoD agency that’s roughly 35% military and 65% civilian. But around half of those civilians are former military. They once had standards of military bearing and passed (I assume) a PT test every six months. Yet every day I see them committing some of the laziest acts that would make Kirstie Alley’s Nutrisystem commercials seem credible.

You see, our building has two sets of glass and steel front doors. One set is opened normally-by grabbing it and opening it (go figure). The second set has a special feature-a handicap button that opens the door when you press it. Genius, right? For the handicapped, yes. For the perfectly healthy with 100% of their physical faculties at their disposal, no.

Yet every day I see physically able people forego the normal doors, push the button like lab rats expecting a reward of cheese, and enter the building after they open automatically. Twice now I’ve even held the regular doors open for people who pass me by and push the handicapped button. How lazy do you have to be to bypass someone holding a door open for you and go in a handicapped door when you’re not handicapped?! Ironically, almost none of the handicapped people in my building use the special door anyway. They’re respectable citizens who’d rather not be pitied and use the regular door so no one feels sorry for them. Amazing.

I have a simple fix for this. I’ve hooked up one of those old TA-312 phones to the handicapped button and built a hunting blind thirty feet away. When an able bodied person touches that button, they’re going to get a dose of death row electric chair voltage…or at least the few volts that I can create by feverishly turning a hand crank.

This isn’t the only atrociously lazy trend. I work on the third floor and have to go down to the basement to eat lunch and almost always use the stairs (if you know anything about me, you know about my…extracurricular activities in stairwells). Once in a while I take the elevator when my bunions haven’t been massaged or I need to hear the sweet sounds of Norah Jones. Invariably someone with two perfectly good legs will get on the elevator on floor 2 and ride it down to floor 1. Seriously?! You have to be galactically lazy to ride the elevator down ONE FLOOR!

I have a present for these folks as well. It’s called silent but deadly. I’ve vowed to let the air in my colon build up to the rupture point and then ride the elevator down three flights solely for the purpose of floating an air biscuit the second someone gets on and presses a button one floor below where they embarked. In fact, I’m not even going to hide my cheek ruffling and may push out a cloth ripper, just so they are very clear about my disdain.

Gene Simmons would be proud.

Every time I think I’m doing okay, someone is there to remind me I’m just fooling myself. On top of that I am a recent addition to the quadragenarian club who needs Nutrisystem to drop my love handles and suddenly life isn’t nearly as glamorous as it once was. The inevitable spiral into inconsequence that claims us all has officially begun, just as it will for all of you too. Before you morph into an irascible curmudgeon, look for the warning signs:

It all started with RU Nick. He was here in DC a few months ago and I mentioned to him that I had recently run five miles in my fastest time ever – 38:30.

“Hmmph,” he snorted in that, ‘I’ll be polite and not say anything, but I really want you to notice that I just said hmmph’ way.’ I should have ignored him.

“How fast have you run it?” I asked, knowing full well I wasn’t going to like the answer.

“Oh…something like 3 minutes,” he said. I think he actually said twenty-four minutes, but all I really heard was, “I laugh at you, old man.”

Shortly after that I was in Boston training Muay Thai at Mark DellaGrotte’s Sityodtong gym. Afterward a skinny welterweight asked if I wanted to grapple. Inside I snickered. I was an above average grappler and had rolled with some very good people. But just two minutes later this feral whelp had handled me like a naughty dominatrix clad in skintight leather with a riding crop. Despite my seventy-pound weight advantage, I had no answers for his skill. He didn’t submit me, but the only move that saved me from it was brute force – I reversed direction and bench-pressed him across the mat. Once again RU Nick was there to scoff at me from the sidelines.

I’ve been into Crossfit for years. I’m good at it. Then I did a Tim Kennedy workout. Soon you’ll soon see a blog from me entitled “Fuck Tim Kennedy.”

The final mortal wound to my vapid self-confidence came last weekend when I entered an intramural swim meet to support my unit’s quest to win the Fort Belvoir Commander’s Cup. I swam competitively for years and have continued to swim nearly two miles every week so I entered the competition convinced of my own superiority and sure I would leave the meet with a slew of middle-aged bikini babes asking “who WAS that guy?” in my wake. After all I was in the 35 and up category. How many decent swimmers could there be in this age group?

Apparently a lot. I got smoked. Smoked isn’t even the right term. I was the meet’s dog bone – chewed up and buried in my Speedo’s. It was beyond embarrassing. Oddly, I finished in 12^th place out of 20 entrants in every event and did nothing to contribute to the team except frighten children in the stands by screaming “FUCK!” when I lost. I have since tossed out my Speedo’s because my pathetic performance was surely caused by inferior textile engineering. Thankfully RU Nick was not at this event or there would be a picture of me on the Rhino Den in my Speedo’s and we would no longer have any readers.

Now, I’m under no preconceived notion that I am able to match the physical feats of my youth. After all, it’s called getting old for a reason. But lately it’s gotten ridiculous. It’s one thing to lose a step, but losing ten seconds off of my fifty-meter swim time is a soul-crushing bitter pill that undoes all the hard work and therapy I’ve endured just to believe in myself.

Besides being a lamentation on the natural order of things, there really is a message to this rant. All you young studs out there partying all night and running a five miler the next morning like it’s nothing – your days are numbered. The specter of death might not be loitering at your front porch, but the aches and pains of age, which can be considerably worse, are coming. The mysterious joint popping, uncontrollable flatulence, and out-of-breath groaning after a mere flight of stairs are anxiously awaiting just around the corner and if you don’t think so, there will almost certainly be someone there to prove that you’re just fooling yourself.

Probably RU Nick.

Get Kelly’s Book, Title Shot: Into the Shark Tank>>

After thirteen months in print, my first book finally got a piece of hate mail yesterday. Contrary to popular belief, I was actually thrilled to learn that my words sparked enough emotion in someone that they took the time to hunt me down and fire off a message. Of course, I have to defend myself or you savvy Rhino Den-arians wouldn’t respect me. I turn to you for an opinion.

On page 61 I described what happened when a ring girl with disproportionately large breasts positioned herself right next to me during a fight. Someone yelled and when I looked to see who it was all I see was this young lady’s mammary glands mere inches from my nose. I described it as, “an eclipse of silicone, a blackout of boobs, and an obscuration of juggs” to give the reader the full effect of what the moment was like. One professional stripper (should I use exotic dancer?) and avowed feminist didn’t take too kindly to it.

She said I’d oversimplified her profession by focusing on one body part instead of looking at it holistically. But isn’t every occupation oversimplified? Instead of calling someone a trucker, should I describe him as “a man or woman who is hired to transport goods across great distances using a large vehicle, commonly an eighteen wheeled semi-trailer” so he or she is not offended? I consider myself much more than a soldier, but don’t take offense when someone oversimplifies my profession by calling me a “Troop” or even “Joe.” Baby killer is over the top, but those days are mostly gone.

I think what really offended her was this passage on page 78:

“The strange thing is,” Julie said, “I actually don’t like violence and I cringe from guns and gore. I don’t like to hurt people either.”

“Why do you do this then?” I asked.

“Because it pushes you to your limits. It tests you to be more.”, I thought, But even strippers aspire to be more or they wouldn’t get implants. “Couldn’t you get that out of soccer or basketball?” I asked.

Her response was this:

“The ONLY reason she buys huge breasts is to make more money because she feels forced to, because that unnatural look is somehow what men have come to consider “better.” No sane, clear-thinking woman believes bigger breasts will make her “better” and yes, it really is offensive that men actually believe that’s the thought process behind expensive surgery – cutting ourselves open and implanting huge foreign objects that are just plain uncomfortable, unsafe and pretty useless other than to get in the freaking way in yoga class.”

Forced to? So all strippers are forced to have augmentation surgery now? Is that covered under the Obama health care plan or the public option? Is it not true that exotic dancers augment their breasts in order to generate more income? Wouldn’t that be considered an investment? I say yes, and further contend that I was making an analogy to show how everyone strives for self-improvement, even if it’s only superficial enhancement for financial reasons. I’m betting if the sentence had read, “Even strippers try to better themselves through yoga,” I would not have gotten an email even though the message is the same and still oversimplifies the job.

I can live with these criticisms since they come with being a writer, but this comment struck a nerve:

“Misogyny is so pervasive, so ingrained in our society, that it’s common for even the most intelligent men to simply not see it around them, in our culture or even in themselves, their behaviors and communications. And yet it’s stupefying really, that you would make such crude jokes about strippers on the same page where you introduce the topic of these amazingly courageous and inspiring female fighters. And that you would further demean my entire gender after 80 straight pages of uplifting prose about your own marginalized brothers in the MMA. Am I alone in seeing the irony here?”

I’ll leave that to the readers here to decide, but let’s break down this attack a little bit. Misogyny is defined as the hatred or contempt of women. As a champion of women’s right to fight in MMA, a fan of The American Women’s Veterans Organization on Facebook (thanks Genevieve), and a wholehearted supporter of Soldier’s Angels, I can hardly be described as someone who holds women in contempt. That’s a stretch.

Demeaning the entire female gender? How? By using the word boobs? Boobs boobs boobs. Is it offensive to say I like boobs? I can’t imagine why. The word can be found in Webster’s dictionary and is commonplace in English terminology. Should I refer to them as mammary glands? Maybe the more politically correct term is breasts, but if I was politically correct, would you even want to read my book? What about the restaurant chain, Hooters? They’ve come under fire for their name and theme, but stood steadfast in their ways and continued to be successful.

I’ll go out on a limb and say I like fake boobs too, despite so many men disdaining them as unnatural. After witnessing the devastating effects childbirth and breastfeeding have on a woman’s body, it’s not my right to criticize self-enhancement. If a gal wants to alter her appearance to boost her self-confidence or just to give her a better shape so dresses fit better, then I fully support it. I don’t hear any women complaining about the endless male enhancement or erotic dysfunction product ads pervading the internet and TV. Hell I’ve admitted to farting in public stairwells and not a single person objected to it. What does this say about our priorities people?

Out of an 80,000-word book, this reader decided to let two sentences stand out as offensive and hone in on that. That seems like someone who only hears what they want to hear. It’s biased and reflects this pervasive attitude that everything we read should be safe, soft, non-thought provoking dribble that furthers the “I love you and you love me” liberal gonorrhea. What happened to the good old days of feminism when higher wages were the demand and bra burning was all the rage?

“Trust me when I say I know breasts are beautiful and sexy and that men rightfully love them. But to equate bigger with better, while simultaneously diminishing the hard work that really does make a stripper “better” is offensive, even to non-angry, non-feminists.”

I don’t have a point to sharing that part. I just thought it was cool to hear a stripper say breast are beautiful and sexy. Maybe I am juvenile.

A note to those of you who want to express your opinion to a writer; there’s a right way and a wrong way to go about it. I think we’ve all just learned the wrong way. The right way is to say “Hey, dude. This sentence on page XX would be better if it read, “blah blah blah.” I would have welcomed that and maybe even changed my ways. But to call me a misogynist, crude, and a juvenile? I’ll just take it as a compliment and move on.

What do you non-angry, non-feminist’s out there think? Sound off.

Check out Kelly’s book and see what all the fuss is about>>

The Hoffman Device

by

Kelly Crigger

Some things don’t mix. Oil and water. Liberals and common sense. The Spears family and responsible parenting. As a new Observer / Controller (OC) at The National Training Center in 1999, I had recently learned why officers don’t drive military vehicles . I was about to learn why officers don’t carry pyrotechnics as well.

A quick bit of background – The National Training Center at Fort Irwin is a beautiful and harsh environment smack dab in the middle of the Mojave Desert. Its greatest asset is its size (that’s what she said) because it can accommodate the full spectrum of tactical operations for a heavy brigade combat team. Since the Army strives to make training for combat as realistic as possible, we have a plethora of toys that replicate the sights, sounds, and even the smells of the battlefield. If it goes BANG for real, then it has to go BANG in training. So how do you replicate the muzzle flash and bang of a tank without actually firing a round? Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Hoffman device.

The Hoffman device is basically a quarter stick of dynamite with two small wires leading off of it because it’s electrically primed and detonated. This extremely powerful simulator gets plugged into a housing tube at the base of a tank’s main gun (kind of like a cock ring) and when the gunner pulls the trigger it goes BANG very loudly.

So there I am driving my HUMVEE across Fort Irwin on a heat cat 4 day to join my OC (Observer / Controller) team on Hill 720 when I see something on the side of the road. It’s everyone’s job to keep the desert policed up, and I, in particular, always had a garbage bag full of troop detritus in the back of my rig. But this trash was different. On the side of Barstow road, discarded with complete apathy, were six Hoffman devices.

“What the fuck?” I muttered as I brought my Tarantula 62 mobile to a halt next to them. “Some lazy schmuck…”

I picked up the Hoffmans, threw them in the back of my Hummer, and sped away, sweat stinging my eyes from nearly a hundred degrees of oppressive heat. Across the desert I roamed to link up with my OC team 30 minutes later up inside a hidden wadi where they were conducting resupply ops. Every OC team has a network of these wadi’s where we could relax, fuel up, and eat chow well away from the prying eyes of the Blue Force troops being trained. I parked my Hummer on line next to my buddy, Greg’s, shut the engine down, and discarded my Kevlar helmet.

“Hey,” I said scratching my head before covering it with a black ball cap. “Who should I give these to?” I threw my thumb over my shoulder and pointed to the Hoffman’s laying in the bed.

“Jesus Christ!” Greg responded, nearly spitting out his chicken and rice. “What the fuck are you doing?” he said leaping like a Lord out of his truck to get a closer look.

“Uh…helping police up the desert. We’re all conservationists, you know.”

“You’re going to kill us!”

“Really? I can’t imagine how.”

“Those things can be detonated by static electricity! And you have six of them!”

I removed myself from the Hummer with a sudden sense of urgency. “Then why are you trying to get a closer look?” I asked. “Isn’t that counter productive?”

“For the same reason I want you to taste something when I’ve already determined it’s disgusting,” Greg said. Even when death was on the line, we always found the time to act like immature siblings. “Where did you find them?” he asked.

“In the desert.”

“And you drove all the way here with them in the back of your truck?”

“How do you know it was a long trip? I didn’t say where I found them.”

“Doesn’t matter. There’s over a full stick of dynamite three feet from your head.”

I was caught in moment of stupidity and found relief only in the words of a former Battalion Commander’s mantra. Admit nothing. Deny everything. Make counter accusations.

“I didn’t know static electricity could set them off. Maybe you should have educated me better,” I responded, trying to turn the tide of the conversation.

“Maybe you shouldn’t have gone to a public school,” he said with no hint of jocularity. “It’s pretty basic physics. Movement equals electricity equals charge equals Crigger pink mist in the sand.”

I abandoned the counter accusation strategy in favor of sympathy. “Why you got to be so hurtful to a brother?”

“Because you deserve it,” he responded.

Time to change the subject. “Why are you backing away?” I asked.

“They can still go off, you dumbass.”

Unbeknownst to me, Greg was actually leading the conversation away from ground zero. Not only was he successfully berating me, but he was saving my ass while doing it. Bastard.

We stopped shuffling away from the trucks at a comfortable minimum safe distance for six quarter sticks of dynamite. There’s no defined arc in any manual for such a weapon, but we figured a hundred meters was at least out of the kill zone. In hindsight it wasn’t nearly far enough for shrapnel.

Within minutes the entire team knew of my thickness since two OC’s standing a hundred meters away from their trucks attracted some attention. An hour later an EOD Specialist came to take my Hoffman’s away, shaking his head as he left.

Winston Churchill once said, “There’s nothing more thrilling than having the enemy shoot at you and miss.” I’m paraphrasing, but his intent is clear. For me dodging death has always brought forward three emotions – euphoria followed by a nervous breakdown followed by a realization. Some things don’t mix.

by Kelly Crigger

We all have microorganisms in our bowels that digest the stuff we eat and then let off waste in the form of gas that builds in your lower intestines until you feel pressure to release it. It’s usually a mixture of methane, nitrogen, oxygen, and CO2, depending on what you ate 8 hours ago. Farting is a biological fact that happens to all of us and is the body’s way of saying, “shit is about to happen.” Yet, despite several Wikipedia pages on flatulence, it’s socially unacceptable to do it, admit it, or even talk about it. Some of you are cringing just reading this, and some of you at this very moment feel the pressure building up and need to find an outlet for it. Ranger Up is here to help.

I work in a cubicle farm where the “walls” are merely 4 foot dividers that even PR Cole could look over. If I were to let my sphincter vibrate and expel the gasses inside it, I’d quickly become “that flagellating guy” and have a stigma forever. It took me too long to get over the death of disco to go through that again. Sometimes it’s fun to gross out a car of wasted college kids while following the paper boy at 0500 and picking up all the papers he throws out. But that’s one of only a handful of scenarios that justify ass gas. To relieve my pressure at work I choose stairwells. There are three in my building that I am particularly fond of.

The first one is tight and runs from the top to the bottom of the building, which increases the risk factor of playing a one-man round of “pull my finger.” Its carpeting muffles sound well, but there are so many turns and floors, I can never tell if anyone is in there with me. I could step on a duck and then turn the corner to find my boss staring me in the face. Not being terribly witty on my feet, I would probably blurt out “whoever smelt it dealt it!” Forget any ideas of promotion.

The second stairwell is halfway between the cafeteria and my cubicle, so I have time to walk and let the jumpers shuffle their way toward the door (I rarely let single jumpers out the door). It’s a big, open space that only has one switchback so I can see everyone in the area. It branches off into the designated smoking area so it reeks of cigarettes and covers all air biscuit odors. But the big space is empty, which only tempts me to squeeze out the cloth ripper just so I can hear it echo off the walls. I always fear letting a loud one go will happen just as someone is returning from their smoke break, but this hasn’t stopped me from tempting fate.

The last stairwell is one of those grandiose, double stairways that you see in European palaces, only ours leads down into a cafeteria and deposits you in the middle of many tables. The sounds of patrons chewing and talking muffles everything, so I can get away with bubbling up the ghost, but it’s a double-edged sword. The eau de ass is difficult to mask because my farts don’t just float way harmlessly. Like grenadine in orange juice (I used to bartend), they tend sink to lower atmospheric levels, so as I’m walking down a replica of the Titanic staircase, the air that was recently in my colon has already beaten me to the dining area. Ruffling the cheeks here after a night of chili and beers is unwise.

Farts are a design flaw. We should have a chimney on the top of our heads and they should be the center of social attention when someone belches one out. “I feel the same way myself” should be just as common as Gesundheit. This story really has nothing to do with the military. I’m just relieving a little pressure.

“I’m thinking about joining the Army,” a guy named Hunter says to me.

It’s not a statement I expected to hear at a UFC 100 pre-fight party, especially from a guy with perfectly coiffed, shoulder-length blonde hair who drove to Vegas from LA to help market his new product, “The Party Starter.”

“Would you do it again?” he asked.

Whether it was the new protein-infused vodka or the sleep deprivation of hustling through the biggest MMA weekend ever, something made me scroll through my military career like Chuck Bartowski having an intense intersect flash. I saw myself in this kid, a relative term if ever there was one since he was 24ish. He stood on the precipice of a life-altering decision just as I had in 1986, yet we were tempered by blacksmiths of different mettle. For me military service was somewhat mandatory. My entire family was made up of Army Officers, most of them attending Virginia Military Institute or West Point. My sisters even married into or worked for the Army. Sure I could have refused to join, just like France could have refused to fight Germany and instead let them roll in unopposed…both times. Hunter wasn’t raised under the crest of the 41st Infantry Regiment and Vietnamese Ranger MACP skulls, so this decision was foreign to him. All I could do is recall the highs and lows and let him decide.

“Okay, dude,” I started off, making sure to speak his language to build rapport. “Here’s the 411 fo-shizzle. For one thing, the fact that you’re even contemplating military service sets you above ninety percent of our population. America has an all-volunteer military, which half the world cannot claim. It produces something conscription cannot-a professional corps of NCOs and soldiers who want to be there making a difference. The yearning of the human spirit is to be free, not dependent, so if you don’t find improving a less fortunate person’s life rewarding, then the service is not for you.

If you decide to join, don’t put it off another day. I enjoyed college a little too much and ended up taking a fifth year, which jacked up my timeline just enough that I missed out on Desert Storm and the Iraq invasion. You will have to move frequently, but will develop a new strength for adaptability that makes you stronger than the hometown homebodies you grew up with. The Army showed me the great big world out there and taught me the joys of trying new things. Without the eclectic souls who make up the Battalions I’ve been assigned to, I’d never have tried sushi, snowboarding, or rugby and learned the acceptance for strange things that came with it.

The Army showed me there are 2 billion women in the world and pining over the one that got away was stupid and shallow. I realized quickly there was not one single, perfect woman out there for me, but instead three or four who were extremely compatible. On a bigger scale that principle led to me never expecting perfection. If the world were perfect there’d be no need for country music.

Before the Army I bought into the absurd notion that posturing myself for the future was more important than enjoying the moment and that careerism trumped having fun. Next thing I knew my first assignment slipped away and I missed out on more raucous times with my fellow Lieutenants than I care to think about. See your buddies across the room there? Have more beers with them when you can. I still wish I had one more chance to drink with Gary Derby before he deployed and I never saw him again.

Leading soldiers is like King Arthur’s famous line after drinking from the Holy Grail: “I never knew how empty was my soul until it was filled.” The burden of leadership is an exhausting, frustrating thing of rapturous beauty that only a privileged few know and is only matched by having kids (and somewhat by owning a house at tax time). The cliché “One door closes and another one opens” is true – if I had made it through SFAS and become a Green Beret, I never would have met my wife. SERE is the best training in the Army, but the debilitating claustrophobia I developed from it was barely a good trade off.

Parachuting is both terrifying and thrilling and you’ll always remember your first and last jump. ‘Jump out and count to four’ does not mean scream the Lord’s Prayer when you reach five. A straight line may be the shortest distance between two points, but when driving a HUMVEE in the desert, it’s only slightly safer than kicking Brock Lesnar’s nutsack. “It seemed like a good idea at the time” is not an adequate excuse for a stupid mistake, especially after driving across the desert with eight Hoffman devices in your HUMVEE. By the confused look on your face, I can tell you have no idea what I mean.

Without the Army I never would have walked the lonliest strip of fence on earth (the Korean DMZ), flown over the Amazon rainforest in an open-doored helicopter, cruised down the Rhine admiring ancient German castles, or driven across the barren middle eastern deserts. I should be proficient at Hangul, Pahstun, and Spanish by now, but I was a typical American who believed in his own superiority and thought everyone should speak English instead. Being range OIC does not give you carte blanche to blow up anything (see “it seemed like a good idea at the time” above).

It won’t take you long to realize that discipline is at the heart of military service and will set you apart from civilians. I’m not saying discipline is non-existent outside the military, but it is a foundation within the ranks. I no longer think it’s better to pass the ball when the big game is on the line. I want to take the shot myself. Yet there’s a fine line between pouncing on an opportunity and rushing into a mistake. I still don’t know the difference, so I’ve learned to trust my instinct like a good Jedi and do whatever my gut tells me to.

If there’s a drawback to military service, it’s the frustration of defending people who really don’t deserve it. Let’s face it-there are some real shitbags in America who benefit from our sacrifices. That’s the irony of liberty-the blanket of security that we provide is universal. Freedom doesn’t take one’s social standing or moral turpitude into consideration. It covers everyone and anyone equally, whether they’re an upstanding citizen or a drug dealing pedophile.

The Army’s greatest lesson is that you can do anything. The old phrase “what does not kill me makes me stronger” came from a soldier who was tested and did not break. The Ranger tab that my father coveted was actually not bigger than me no matter how intimidating the mantra on his wall was. He had a plaque that read, ‘If you kill for fun, you’re a sadist. If you kill for money, you’re a mercenary. If you kill for both, you’re a ranger.’ Earning my own tab was not as daunting as he made it seem and I graduated with a confidence that has never faded.

A career in the Army will provide ample amounts of pain, humiliation, heartache, and embarrassment alongside the joy, honor, and pride that comes with being molded into a man. There’s no reason to upset the balance of the universe by cheating it out of whipping you into shape.

Hell yes I’d do it again.”

Hunter was both equal parts terrified and elated by my diatribe. Life is a series of decisions and I have no idea which one he’ll make, but at least he isn’t going into it with blinders on.

Headphones maybe, but not blinders.

When I wrote my book, Title Shot (shameless plug), I accidentally called Ben Fowlkes, Ben Knowles, much to my eternal chagrin. Despite eighteen edits of that book, no one caught it until I was breezing through it one day and said, “Who’s Ben Knowles?” While it might seem like a small mistake, 8,000 copies of my book are in circulation, so a lot of people are probably asking the same question. I would say that inviting him to debate with me this month is one small way of redressing my transgression, but in fact he’s a savvy and articulate MMA writer, so having him on here will only boost the IQ of this forum. In other words I get the better part of the deal and still owe him for douching his name up. Let’s do this!

Issue #1 – Can the WEC successfully transition to a pay-per-view forum?

Kelly – After this last WEC, yes. It was exciting and their brand name is bigger than ever. Not only that, they should do it as soon as possible so the fighters who deserve a bigger payday get one. The gate draw at WEC 41 was $868,000 and the payouts were $212,000. That’s better than most MMA promotions, but pales when put side by side with the UFC and Strikeforce. The difference? Pay-per-view. The WEC has two of the best fighters in the world with Miguel Torres and Mike Brown along with a slew of younger, lighter guys who want to knock them off. The WEC is also the clear world leader in the 135 and 145-pound weight classes so Zuffa’s gamble to buy it two years ago is paying off in spades. Now it’s time to pay the men who make it great-the fighters. That won’t happen until they jump to pay-per-view. Is the time right to do so with most Americans tightening their belts under the weight of an economic recession? Maybe not. But their product is at an all time high and their current crop of marquee names isn’t getting any younger. What do you think, Knowles?

Ben – Great, you fix the mistake about my name now, after I already went through the trouble of registering BenKnowles.com. I was finally going to have my own hardcore pornography site, and without even embarrassing my own parents, but I guess there’s another dream deferred thanks to you, Kelly. But on to the WEC. Can they make a successful transition to pay-per-view? Depends what you consider successful. They aren’t going to do UFC numbers that way, or even Affliction numbers. That’s because a) not enough people even know what the WEC is, and b) those who do are already used to watching it for free. Everything about the WEC – the size of the arenas, the production value, the experience level of the fighters – gives off a minor league vibe. That’s cool when it’s the little brother to the UFC, bringing us a few fun fights on Sunday night. But will fans make space in their budgets for a promotion of all little guys, only a few of which they really care about? I highly doubt it. With a UFC pay-per-view once a month or so and Strikeforce on Showtime, I can’t imagine MMA fans are really sitting around hoping for a new way to spend money watching fights on TV. Like you, I’d love to see the WEC fighters get paid more, just like I’d love to see teachers get their salaries increased. That doesn’t mean I’m personally ready to write the check for either.

Issue #2 – A Karate Master is the UFC Champion and an over-the-hill boxer knocks out Tim Sylvia with one punch. Are these the first signs of an impending Armageddon?

Kelly – Yes. I am on my way to Montana to hole up with Fowlkes, sharpen sticks, and await fiery balls of death to fall from the sky. After Machida beat Rashad Evans, he exclaimed to the world that Karate was back! I don’t buy it. I think Machida is back, but until Shotokan produces another belt holder, I’m still in the doubters camp. However, you can’t help but revel in the moment. On the verge of UFC 100, a momentous occasion in our sport’s history, the style that was disproven at UFC 1 when Zane Frazier got pummeled by Kevin Rosier, is now on the top of the UFC’s most contentious division. Wow. The only thing more shocking than that would be a boxer knocking out a former UFC heavyweight champion. Okay that was a shitty segue, but even my normally reserved jaw was on the ground when I saw Ray Mercer floor big Tim Sylvia in less than a minute. Tim’s got a massive reach that stymied Andre Arlovski and frustrated Jeff Monson and earned him the UFC heavyweight belt when no one believed in him. To get KOd by an aging Mercer is downright laughable. But if he fell and no one heard it, did it really happen?

Ben – Dude, it happened and people heard it. That’s the stuff viral video is made of, even if they don’t know the long, sad history of Tim Sylvia’s Quixotic quest for fan acceptance. I’m actually not terribly surprised by it, mostly because Sylvia has done enough dumb stuff at this point (let’s not forget that he originally wanted to box Mercer) that I almost expect him to stumble upon the worst case scenario in any situation. With that guy’s luck, he’ll be the first pro to lose on “Bully Beatdown.” As for Machida/the fate of karate, it’s going to take a lot more than one very talented fighter atop one UFC division for me to dig my old karate shoes out of that weird-smelling trunk in the basement. He’s got a style that people aren’t used to yet and he implements it well thanks in part to his superb athleticism. He’s not some 98-pound weakling who was transformed into a killer by the power of karate. Let’s let him defend the title a few times before we proclaim Machida-Do as the next revolution in MMA.

And Crigger, if you ain’t never been to Montana, don’t ever come to Montana. Because you wouldn’t understand Montana.

Issue #3 – Is it completely ridiculous for the UFC to put Kimbo Slice on TUF 10?

Ben – Of course it is, and not just because Dana White spent the better part of a year calling him a no-talent bum, either. Mostly it’s because, judging from the early promos for this season, they’re basically building the show around a 3-1 fighter who has beaten no one of substance. It would be one thing if he was treated as just another UFC hopeful, but he’s not. He’s their big draw this time around and they want everyone to know it. In that way the UFC is sort of like the CIA of old, back in the glory days when they used to assassinate democratically elected leaders and install brutal dictators. He may be a son of a bitch, the thinking went, but he’s our son of bitch. It’s the same thing with Kimbo. He was a phony sideshow attraction when he was with EliteXC. He’s still the same fighter he was back then, only now the UFC can profit off him, so it’s cool. Then again, this is the tenth season of a reality show. What did we expect?

Kelly – Zuffa has never had to build a season around one guy, so I’m interested in seeing how they do it. I don’t think Kimbo should be treated differently than any other fighter wanting to get in the UFC. If he wants to fight, then he, along with the four former football players in this season’s TUF, need to pay their dues. You have to remember that Dana White is a guy raised by a single mother in south Boston. He’s grounded in the philosophy that you get respect when you earn respect, although he’s been known to bring in guys for ratings reasons only, (namely Brock Lesnar). I was disappointed in the last three seasons of TUF before the US vs UK throwdown, so I’m all for a little entertainment in the house (minus the wanton destruction of a place nicer than I’ll ever live in). Does he have what it takes to train full time? Will he be too tired from having to work out twice a day? Maybe he’ll get bored and stage streetfights for money in the back yard with his old Miami buddies. Whatever he does, it will be interesting to watch, if for no other reason than he might make a bet to shave his beard if he loses to someone.

Issue #4 – What’s the deal with Japanese MMA? Is it all about Super Hulk tournaments and other similarly silly competitions from here on out, or is there hope for a revival?

Ben – The only hope left for Japanese MMA lies with the lighter weight fighters. Dream has one of the world’s top welterweights in “Mach” Sakurai and one of the most exciting lightweights in Shinya Aoki, but they have to find a way to build up contenders for them to face or else the Japanese public will continue to lose interest in MMA. If that happens the money gets weak, and if that happens the Japanese promoters will probably respond by staging more freak show fights. That seems to be their fix for everything. It’s not all that surprising since the Japanese have always felt more comfortable with a mismatched circus bout than we have, but that’s not a sustainable strategy in the long term. Watching Jose Canseco flail around against Hong Man Choi or Bob Sapp tap out to a one-handed leg lock, I can’t escape the feeling that the line between pro wrestling and legitimate MMA is getting blurry across the Pacific. As the UFC, WEC, and Strikeforce strengthen their popularity and their payouts in the U.S., the ambitious young talent in Japan will leave home in greater numbers to pursue both.

Kelly – First you bag on Kimbo, then you slam Hong Man Choi. I get the impression you don’t like the entertainment aspect of sport fighting. You Montanans are so practical. I don’t think it’s the farcical side of Japanese MMA that’s the problem, but their inability to attract higher caliber young guns from the U.S. You would think the American market is rife with guys who can’t get into the UFC or WEC and want to travel to Japan to test their skills, but it’s not. For a while there, WVR and Sengoku were getting guys like Jorge Masvidal, Ryan Schultz, JZ, Chase Beebe, and other exciting young non-Asians to come over and fight. Lately, not so much. I don’t think it’s because those guys prefer spending the best years of their careers in Bellator or sub-Zuffa promotions in the U.S., but because the Japanese promotions can’t offer enough to lure them over. In the heyday of Pride, over half of its stars were foreign-Brazilian, European or American. When Pride died, they spread to the four winds and drained the talent pool, leaving Dream very little to build off of as you pointed out with Sakurai and Aoki. It’s quizzical indeed to look at the land of the rising sun, where the martial arts were developed for centuries and the warrior spirit is reveled as next to Godliness and not see more world-class homegrown competition. Maybe the bursting of the Pride bubble exposed the Japanese MMA landscape for what it was-entertainment only.

Get Kelly’s Book, Shark Tank, at RangerUp.com>>

The older I get the more I hate being around people. Maybe that’s not fair. Maybe it’s crowds that I hate. But crowds are made up of people, otherwise they’d be called herds or gaggles. They sure aren’t prides because they do stupid things, so fuck that. It’s people I don’t like.

One early morning trip through the Washington DC airport puts me in a bad mood because of the people that surround me. A businessman gets pissed when the TSA agent refuses to let him go straight to the front of the line to get through security. Just past the security area I can’t find a place to put my shoes on because a lady has sprawled her entire family out on the benches provided by the airport. A teenager struggles with the English language while she orders a coffee. “Uh…like…me want a mocha. Giggle giggle.” As I get money from the ATM, a group of mid-twenties douchebags stands over my shoulder talking loudly on their cell phones. Whether or not they were trying to scam my PIN doesn’t matter. Stand somewhere else before I stick a pen through your windpipe. Two teenagers banter with each other while bits of their sausage crossanwich fall out of their mouths to the floor. My mom would have slapped the stupid out of me for that.

I feel like I’m walking through a zoo peering curiously at the bewildering animals on display. Or am I the one truly on display: a fossil of a bygone age? We all made fun of stoggy older folks when we were kids, but they had white hair, napped on your couch, and smelled like menthol. I used to listen to Robert D. Raeford rant about my generation on the radio and laugh at how stereotypically curmudgeon he was. Little did I know the truth he spoke or how wonderful my parents really were until I became one. I’m only forty and barely removed from my physical prime. Just a few years ago I would have dove into a mosh pit without even thinking about it. Now, I get violent when my personal space is violated and need a Rockstar if I plan on staying up past 11.

I don’t expect conformity and believe personal nuances make us unique, but even the most basic social decorum and sense of compassion for others seems to be dead. An airline stewardess walks past me and drops a napkin, leaving it because she probably thinks, “someone gets paid to pick that up so I’m not going to.” Across the gate I see an elderly woman looking for a seat. No one gets up to offer her one.

I wish life were like basic training. I want to leap out of my seat and lock everyone’s boot heels together so I can put the fear of God into them, which might be the heart of the matter. As a career military man, I expect everyone to have the same sense of discipline and selfless service as me. The reality is that’s simply not true. Those of us with military experience are truly different from the rest of the world. It either changes us or amplifies the best parts of us. It makes us see things in black and white. Do this. Don’t do that. 1000 hours means 1000 hours, not 1001. There are two types of people-the quick and the dead.

I would entertain the thought of pulling a Georgia O’Keefe and moving out to a desolate part of the country, like Wyoming or Montana, to be a secluded cattle rancher, but I’m afraid of the militant anti-government groups who congregate there. They’d find out I moved in, learn about my military background (probably from Semper Fi Hank) and try to recruit me to stockpile supplies and await (or hasten) Armageddon. I would refuse, not because they’re completely bat shit crazy or because I don’t fancy declaring war on the US government, but because I don’t look good in their mid-80’s field jackets that they seem to have an abundance of. Besides, I wouldn’t be much company to them. Before long I’d bitch about the wide-open prairies, the majestic views, and the unholy clean air.

And that there are no people around.

MMA Takes on PTSD

by Kelly Crigger

“I hate being medicated,” Marine Lieutenant Lee Stuckey says through a thick Alabama accent. “But without it I can’t sleep right. I get night tremors, sweats, the works.” Stuckey’s situation is not uncommon among veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is an anxiety disorder than can develop after exposure to a terrifying even or ordeal and is estimated to affect one in every eight veterans returning home from combat today. With two combat tours and a close encounter with an IED outside Camp Fallujah, Stuckey’s lucky-he has all of his limbs, his eyesight, and no serious loss of motor skills.   

But his return home brought a new set of challenges. Stuckey was placed in the medical platoon at Camp Lejuene, North Carolina with his fellow PTSD Marines. Although designed for rehabilitation, the environment was depressing.

“Marines get frustrated with the traditional treatment of talking it out,” Stuckey says. “Guys would just go back to their barracks rooms and drink away their pain all night. It just wasn’t a good situation.” 

An avid martial artist, Lieutenant Stuckey took it upon himself to drag a few Marines out of their lethargy and into Camp Lejuene’s Semper Fit gym. There they met Chilean immigrant Andrea Lucie, a fitness instructor who was exploring new ways of dealing with PTSD through a complex regimen of yoga, meditation, and breathing techniques for rehabilitation. But it was her background in martial arts that really got their attention.  

“A Muay Thai combination is hard for a patient suffering from Traumatic Brain Injury,” she says through an accent equally as daunting as Stuckey’s. “But it helps them focus because there are repetitive movements that they have to remember and it’s a disciplined act. Marines are disciplined people so they relate to it.” 

Before long Lucie was getting positive results and despite not having a degree in psychology, she designed her own plan that revolved around the thing Marines know best. By combining exhaustive MMA workouts that tapped into their adrenaline, yoga, and meditation for relaxation, Lucie found her Marines were adjusting to their surroundings better and sleeping more restfully.  

“Marines are more interested in physical challenges like MMA and traditional martial arts,” Lucie says. “They’d rather hit something than talk about how they feel.” 

That makes sense since young American men don’t join the US Marine Corps to sit behind a desk. They join to be fighters and even when their bodies are broken or their minds are suffering, they want a way to reconnect with their warrior ethos. Mixed Martial Arts does that and more. 

“MMA humbles Marines,” says Stuckey. “It shows them they don’t have to be aggressive that it’s okay to admit when you’re suffering. Marines are a culture of not showing weakness, so instead of seeking help when they have PTSD, many Marines just act like nothing’s wrong.”  

Lacking the money for a true medical study, Lucie presented her experiences to the Combat Operations Stress Control Conference in San Diego, California and got a good reception from the brass there. But attaboys don’t fund research, so what she and her colleagues are seeking now is someone to support a formal study on the linkage between Yoga, MMA, and PTSD. 

Lieutenant Stuckey doesn’t need a study. He just goes to sleep without a cocktail of medications. “If I have a hard MMA workout I don’t have to take the meds and sleep better than ever, but if I miss a workout for some reason then I still have to take them.” Sometimes it doesn’t take a shrink to figure out how the mind and body work.

Nick did a nice job of hitting the basics tenets of leadership from the eighteen million books on the subject from the West Point Plebe reading list and his time as a junior officer.

Keep in mind, though, that he also thinks men can wear pink. While I’m certainly not claiming this as a complete list, here’s my “old man” addendum to Nick’s list…and when I say addendum, I mean here are some real gems from someone with two decades of what matters most-practical experience. 

Know what it truly means to “take care of troops.”

I had heard the phrase, “take care of your troops” for years, but never actually quantified it until a Battalion Commander sat me down in an OPD and laid it all out on paper. Ironically he was a pretentious nerd, so this was his one moment out of the douchapotamus tank. Taking care of troops is not limited to spending umpteen hours in the field or turning some poor finance clerk into pink mist when a soldier isn’t getting paid. Taking care of troops is much more holistic than that. It’s making sure they’re physically fit with a long-term PT program that’s as individualized as possible. It’s making sure their living conditions don’t resemble Cabrini Green. It’s making sure they know how to identify a suspicious man in the streets and escalate a conflict from “Get on the ground” to “Get a bodybag.” It’s making sure the chow in the mess hall isn’t dumpster debris. It’s making sure they’re tactically and technically proficient at their job and know the meaning of one shot, one kill. It’s ensuring they have a will and updated SGLI. It’s making sure their equipment isn’t rusting hulks of T-Rex poop. It’s setting all the conditions for them to be a great soldier and more. There are a hundred little facets to taking care of troops that have to be known and lived. It’s not a cool mantra to throw around when you want to seem like you give a shit in front of the old man.  

There are two sides to every story.

A lot of your time as a leader will be consumed doing the things you detest, but they’re absolutely essential to taking care of troops. UCMJ is the worst. I would rather pluck the underwear out of Tommy Batboy’s ass crack than end someone’s career or even set them back in their path to earning stripes, but sometimes it’s justified and even necessary. Always remember, though, that there are two sides to every story and you must listen to both. It is a pernicious leader who assumes the guilt or innocence of a soldier before both sides of the story have been fully vetted. Even if your First Sergeant barges into your office proclaiming “Sir, we gotta get rid of this piece of shit!” Stop, think, and gather all the facts. Never come to a conclusion or form a judgment until you’re certain of the truth.

Be consistent.

If you punish a troop for an offense then you can’t let another troop off the hook for the same infraction unless you want your company to become the cub scout den of the Battalion. I had a Brigade Commander who had a favorite Captain. One day the golden boy got drunk and took a swing at a Major. It was clearly a violation of UCMJ as well as thoroughly embarrassing since he missed his target completely. No matter how much the Commander liked this guy he knew he had to throw the book at him or it would have sent a message to the rest of the Brigade-as long as you’re one of my boys, you’re untouchable. That’s Cosa Nostra leadership, not US military. The standards are the same from Private to General, so you have to be consistent in every aspect.

But don’t have absolutes (unless it’s the Swedish Vodka variety).

Don’t confuse consistency with absolutes. When I took command of a company I said, “Anyone who gets a DUI is toast. No questions asked.” That was stupid. Halfway through command I had a troop get a DUI, but there were extenuating circumstances. He got drunk and then got in his car and went to sleep in the back seat because he knew driving was a bad idea. Great judgment call on his part. But since it was December he put the keys in the ignition to get some heat going before falling asleep. When a cop found him, he got busted for DUI because in the state of Georgia having the keys in the ignition is enough to charge the driver with DUI. He was an E7 with a distinguished career and was one of the most trustworthy guys I ever knew. My statement that I would max out anyone who got a DUI proved to be an albatross around my neck and put me in a bad position. I learned that every situation is different and having an absolute stance on anything is about as smart as not wrapping your little ranger in MOPP 4 at a Haitian brothel.

Being responsible means you have to be an asshole sometimes.

This can also be worded as, “NEVER make a decision because it’s popular” and goes back to Nick’s point about doing the right thing always (I gotta throw the man a bone once in a while). True story-After a Field Training Exercise my Battalion had all our weapons turned in to the arms room except one-the Battalion Commander’s driver-who was on the road driving the old man around. The whole Battalion waited and waited for this guy to bring his weapon in so we could be released. Those are two hours I will never recover. As the Battalion Executive Officer (the XO-the second in command for you non-Army types), I could have sent them all home and been the cool guy, but it was against our SOP to release anyone until every weapon was accounted for. So we waited while I lit up every cell phone and radio net in Washington state to get Specialist Dumbass to bring his weapon to the arms room. Don’t succumb to peer pressure and make a decision to look cool.

Don’t have a zero defect mentality.

Throughout the 1990’s, when the Army was mostly in garrison for years at a time and we had little to do but have meetings and come up with sadistic details for troops who got extra duty. A pervasive attitude of “zero defects” emerged. If everything wasn’t perfect, then you were a shitbag. This was especially true at the company commander level because every company had to report stats like reenlistment, PT, weapons qualifications, USR, maintenance, exorcisms performed, blah blah blah. If the Battalion Commander saw one statistic from your company that was off, then your command mysteriously ended prematurely. It was stupid and we finally came around to realize that things break and shit happens. Having perfect stats only meant you were hiding something or fudging the numbers. It is simply unrealistic to expect your subordinates to be perfect. Instead, expect them to handle leadership crises correctly. When Private Snuffy sets his barracks room on fire, does Sergeant Smuckatelli handle it professionally or does he sit on his ass and throw a coat of paint on it? When Specialist Jones can’t figure out how to clear a weapon jam, does his Squad Leader show him or ignore him? Subordinate leaders must be willing and able to deal with issues quickly and efficiently instead of expecting them to never happen. Judge your subordinate leaders by how they deal with situations, not that they let one happen. Many times it’s out of their control.

Have the moral courage to speak up.

You’re in a meeting. Someone says, “let’s have a Battalion testicle licking contest” and everyone agrees. Before they get up and leave, if you don’t protest the group consensus and refuse to taste sweaty balls, then you’re a weak sycophant. That’s bad juju for an aspiring leader.  If you’re present when a bad decision is made, then you’re part of the problem. You can’t be a mousy, quiet guy (or gal) who lets others walk off a cliff without stopping them. This is especially true of Executive Officers. A good Company or Battalion XO simply MUST tell his boss when he’s fucked up. As a Battalion XO I had a Commander who was always late to meetings. The entire Battalion staff and commanders would wait for him well past the start time of every meeting. Finally after being 30 minutes late one day I pulled him aside and told him how he was wasting an average of 10 man hours a week by making everyone wait for him instead of working in their offices or training troops. Telling your boss he’s wrong is always never fun and I expected a Bloods versus Crips throwdown, but I was right and he knew it. In the end nothing changed and I learned that some people go right back to their bad habits (think Kirsti Alley and Weight Watchers), but I did the right thing.

Support your chain of command even when you don’t want to.

No matter how stupid a command decision might seem to you, you are bound by UCMJ to follow it unless it’s illegal or jeopardizes the safety of your troops. If the Battalion Commander orders everyone above the rank of E5 to be qualified as Tugboat Captains, then get a bright orange life vest and let your stomach grow until it droops over your dungarees. Support it and deal with it. The last thing you should do is announce your displeasure over a command decision to your soldiers. Let’s say a Company Commander suddenly tells you that he wants to see higher weapons qualification numbers from your platoon and tells you to add more range time to your calendar instead of training on the tasks you feel are more important. First outline in plain facts to him why you disagree (without using the words nefarious and Assholian). But if he won’t change his mind, turn around, move out and do it. Under no circumstances should you go back to your platoon and tell them what a douche he is for forcing you to go out to the range instead of work on CQC or convoy planning. Keep it to yourself and support your chain of command.

Support your troops even when you don’t want to.

Sometimes you have to endure personal embarrassment to support your troops. Smile and deal with it. I had an NCO who insisted on putting the company through Tae Bo for PT one day. I agreed to it and for an hour we were the laughing stock of Fort Stewart. Every platoon in the brigade ran by throwing mock kicks and limp wristed punches to mock us as we danced to a Billy Blanks CD. I felt like Bill Clinton caught with an intern (wait…that might be the cool part of being President), but I stood in the back of the formation giving it my all because he insisted it was a good workout. It wasn’t and we never did it again, but for sixty minutes I supported him the best I could.

Bitch in private and praise in public.

Some people think it’s an effective learning tool to embarrass a soldier in front of his peers in order to get him to change his negative behavior. Those people swear Tupac is still alive and think sex can last more than eight minutes (Crazy talk!). All it does is ostracize the problem soldier from the rest of his unit. Don’t get me wrong, soldiers who need an attitude adjustment should get one from an NCO named Spartacus who has prior convictions and emotional damage, but it should always be behind closed doors. Likewise a troop who deserves a pat on the back should get it in front of his peers as publicly as possible.

Sometimes fighting is alright.

Elton John was right. I had three troops go out on the town one night. Soldier A (drunk) insisted on driving Soldier B (drunk) and Soldier C (sober) home. When Soldier A refused to give up the keys to his car, Soldier C knocked him clean out and drove them all home safely. I gave him an Army Achievement Medal for looking out for his buddies.

Get Kelly’s book, “Title Shot: Into the Shark Tank”, at RangerUp.com

“Why don’t Officers drive ‘emselves around?” Specialist Barlow asked, yanking me back across the fine line between consciousness and dreamland.

“What?” I said.

“Hows come ya’ll don’t drive yourselves round? I mean, wouldn’t it free up guys like me to do Army stuff? Don’t seem real ‘fficient now, Sir.”

I was seconds away from dozing as we drove across Eastern Washington state after a training exercise, so it’s probably good that the kid kept talking to me since I was the TC. Besides the fact that he was a top notch troop, Barlow’s Louisiana drawl was entertaining, so I enjoyed his company as my driver. But he had a point. Officers were good enough to drive cars when not in uniform, why couldn’t we drive our own HUMVEE?

The correct answer was Officers needed to concentrate on the things that had a big impact – leading troops, making decisions, communicating intent, and trying to read a map but failing abjectly so guys like Barlow had someone to make fun of. But he didn’t want to hear any of that. He wanted a juicy tidbit of info that only the Battalion XO’s driver would know; an “Area 51” secret that I felt beholden to bestow, so I recalled a story to him to take up some of the long drive that lay ahead.

Even in an open desert, navigating at night is like getting a girl’s bra off when you’re seventeen and too excited to think, much less concentrate, on those tiny damn clips that were designed by a locksmith. At least with a bra you know there’s a reward for your efforts; a veritable pot ‘O gold at the end of the rainbow. For an Observer / Controller (O/C) at the National Training Center, navigating across a desert at night only ends with more work when you finally arrive at your destination.

An O/C was treated as a responsible adult with a great amount of levity. We were expected to be masters of the desert, so we didn’t have any drivers and our vehicles were bereft of windshields or doors. Somehow this was supposed to make us one with the Mojave, but all it really did was constantly expose us to its biting cold winds and soul-crushing oppressive heat. Physically it was challenging, but oh-so-rewarding on every other level.

I was driving my modified HUMMVEE near the whale gap during my second rotation in one of the darkest nights I’d ever seen. A Battalion from the 187th Infantry Regiment (the famed Rakassans) were preparing for an air assault mission on a night that seemed like eight feet up Satan’s ass it was so dark.

The Rakassans were mustered in small clumps over a huge Landing Zone (LZ) preparing to be picked up and I was on my way to their Battalion TOC to observe their battlestaff in operation and offer constructive criticism. I was wearing my AN-PVS 14 Night Vision Goggles, or NODS for short, but they didn’t work very well.

What the fuck is going on with these things? I wondered intermittently. It seemed that every time I switched my lights to blackout drive the NODS would wash out. Blackout drive turned on a small bulb on the front of the vehicle that emitted just enough light so the NODS would pick it up and illuminate the immediate road ahead. It was meant to keep the vehicle tactically concealed while giving the driver enough visibility to avoid anything in the road, like coyotes or rakassans. But for some reason every time I turned blackout drive on, my NODS would get bright and become almost impossible to see through. It was a weird proportional relationship that baffled me.

On a steel bracket in the middle of my truck was a squawk box that monitored two nets-the Battalion command net and the O/C net. With my attention focused solely on driving across a barren desert and not running over troops, I paid little attention to it, though. Some tidbits made it to my brain, like, “Someone doesn’t know his left from his right,” and “looks like we got a newbie.” It wasn’t until I heard my team leader ask, “Which idiot is driving across the LZ right now?” that I got concerned. I immediately stopped and waited.

“Okay, the idiot just stopped,” he said.

He can’t be talking about me, I thought.

“Now that you’ve figured out we’re talking about you…”

Oh shit. He is talking about me.

“Turn them off!”

I don’t know what he means.

“Any day now, cherry,” someone added.

“Don’t these newbies have to take a driving lesson before we put them behind the fucking wheel?” an NCO interjected.

It felt like God and every OC in the desert was staring at me, pointing, laughing, and I had no idea why.

“Blackout drive, shithead!” my boss yelled.

But I am in blackout drive, I thought. My fingers felt the light switch to make sure and I took my NODS off to confirm it. I am in…

And then I saw it-two headlights beamed a supernova of shame across the desert from my HUMMVEE! They shone like gazillion watt coastal lighthouses guiding ships into port as soldiers scurried about in the light like it was buy one whore, get one free night on the Las Vegas strip. It was so bright that bears emerged from their hibernation as a shower of ridicule and obscenity filled my squawk box. In a panic I started flipping switches and pressing buttons to turn them off, which resulted in nothing.

“Top switch goes left, dumbfuck!” Someone commanded as a group of Rakassans crept toward me with bayonets in their mouths to stab my lights out. Their Battalion Chaplain enlightened me to the fact that Jesus Christ’s middle name was “fucking.”

Something clicked under my fingers and the lights went off, earning a chorus of congratulatory remarks over the radio. I sat in the driver’s seat contemplating what to do next and believe me, ‘eat an MRE and don’t move until morning’ was at the top of the list. But I couldn’t because I was still in the middle of a Landing Zone and an air assault was about to begin. I had to move, and now. Don’t be William Wallace, I thought. Just beg for mercy.

Before I could act a voice came over the box.

“You’ve figured out the unlock button, James Bond. Now push the top one to the left.”

I ran my fingers over the confusing light levers. Believe it or not, HUMMVEEs have three levers that protruded from the main switch box. One points up, one points down and left and the third points down and right. It takes a special combination of unlocking the bottom right one and pushing the top one to the RIGHT to turn on the service drive-the bright white headlights that make cockroaches run. Unlocking the bottom right switch while turning the top switch to the LEFT turns on the blackout drive-the tiny bulb that barely emits anything unless the driver is wearing NODS.

Left=blackout drive. Right=service drive.

Left=normal. Right=dumbass.

The realization that you are an idiot is heavy. I wanted to slump my head over the steering wheel like JFK driving through Dallas, but had to put it aside and get off the LZ before a Blackhawk landed on me like the wicked witch of the north. When the voice on the squawk box talked me through how to operate the lights correctly, I discovered the switches were specifically designed to make turning on the service drive easier than turning on the blackout drive. It actually took two hands to turn on blackout drive instead of only one to turn on service drive. I was a moron, but in my defense the vehicle had not been adequately moron-proofed by the manufacturer.

“And that,” I told young Specialist Barlow, “is why Officers don’t drive military vehicles.”

Kelly “Thor” Crigger began his career as an enlisted Infantryman in 1986 and went downhill from there. After sixteen years as a tactical Chemo in prestigious units like the 3rd Infantry Division and the 1st SF Group, Crigger was forced to pay his dues and manage R&D projects in DC. It’s an incredibly dynamic (read: boring) job that can be summed up in an old 3M commercial-“we don’t make the cup, we make the cup stronger.” Snappy. It’s a cushy assignment that’s taken its toll on his physique, which more resembles an Oompa Loompa than a tabbed former paratrooper. Crigger has an advanced degree in International Relations, so he’s edumacated (read: got diploma online from Jamaica), and when you combine that with all the free time he has sitting behind a desk, it results in a lot of extramural writing. He has a penchant for cool words used correctly in a sentence, so if you ever meet him and sneak nefarious, endogenous, or arriviste into the conversation you’ll make a friend for life.

In 2006 he channeled his powerful lexicon into his passion for MMA and became a writer for Real Fighter magazine. Since then he’s written for a plethora of MMA outlets and is now a regular contributor to Fight! Magazine, Fightline.com, and MMAJunkie.com (name dropper!).  Crigger met the RU crew in passing (read: saw them handing out shirts) at the 2007 Army Combatives tournament, but developed a relationship when RU graciously agreed to carry his book, Title Shot, on their website and donate proceeds to the Wounded Warrior Project. Crigger is easily the most experienced (read: oldest) of the RU crew, so he has a lot of stories to tell and sage wisdom to hand out. He aspires to make the jump from sports writing to screenplays someday, but is currently between representatives (read: agent dumped him), so that dream is in a “wait” status.