One shot....One kill

My dad was in the Air Force ROTC. He wanted to be a kc-135 refueler pilot. Well turns out he has asthma so it was going to be a desk job or get out. He got out. I was thinking about the Air Force for years and years it seems like. I went there a part of my life where I wanted to be a f-16 pilot. I remember thinking that I had the right body size for that. Kind of makes me wonder what my life would be like now if I would have really tried at all for that.

Then I went through some time where I thought I would be cool to be a sniper. Hell, I still do think it would be cool. To be able to take someone out half a mile away. wow. How different this blog would be if I went down that path.

For awhile I wanted to be an officer, then I didn't want to go through that much college.

So yeah. I was thinking about the military a LOT. And look how it all turned out. Even when I was getting out of the Air Force I was talking and checking out if I would be able to go into the Army as a Combat Engineer (21B).

Some of your duties as a Combat Engineer may include:

• Constructing trails, roads and field fortifications such as shelters, bunkers and gun emplacements
• Assembling floating or prefabricated bridges
• Operating various light or heavy engineer vehicles
• Placing and detonating explosives
• Loading, unloading and moving supplies and equipment using planes, helicopters, trucks and amphibious vehicles
• Operating or serving as a crewmember on a combat engineer vehicle, armored vehicle launch bridge or an armored combat earthmover
• Preparing and installing firing systems for demolition and explosives
• Locating mines by visual means or by using a mine detector

Well that didn't work as planned. Kinda glad that one didn't work out. It is kinda scary going from military to....not military any more.

So today is Veterans Day. I don't feel much like a vet. I don't think I did anything worth while. Sure I get VA health care, VA loan, and even a flag over my coffin when that day comes. Though, I just don't feel it.

Story time.

Ok someone needs to remind me that I got two stories I want to type up.

1. My 21st birthday (well that weekend)
2. Fuck, I can't even remember this one right now.

Oh well. I really should get some sleep. Bah!

Boat racing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, so this weekend is the start of boat racing! weeeeeeee yay woohoo. Only, the water is going to be so fuckin' cold. All that snow melt water.

Ok at lunch in the warehouse with a few co workers.

well the simple version to my store is this:

I slapped a chica in the eyeball with my meat.


Ok, the long version is a little different.

Well so this girl at work went to savemart to get her salad for lunch. She also got some ham sliced. Innocent enough, right?

Well while I was eating my teriyaki chicken bowl she thought she would offer me some ham. Well in the act of asking me if I wanted some ham, since I was sitting next to her, she ended up getting it a little too close to my face. It kinda touched my face.

What did I do about that? Oh I just said the first thing that came to mind...

"You may like getting meat slapped on your face, but I don't really care that much for it."

Oh man...that was just great!

(it is always great to get even too)

So later in the lunch. I ended up rolling up my meat (I said the word "meat" a lot today at lunch as you can tell) and smacking you in the face with my meat! Ha! take that! Oh yeah and I might have kinda almost slapped her in the eye with my meat. it happens.

Oh and she is getting married in about a month. Guess I shouldn't be slappin' her with my meat then

Other than that.....BOAT RACING!

A little oops

This morning I was working real hard. In doing so I was hanging out in the warehouse (Where house? There house!) We were talking about Josie and about people just fucking up their jobs. That is when we came to the conclusion that if you were to fuck up, might as well just man up to it.

...a little later that afternoon...

I was installing some blinds in a new home. They were left out for one reason or another. So there I was. Taking my time not to take too much time ;). Put the boxes by the windows. Opened up the box and started installing the hardware. Simple enough right. Oh wait...I got the ladder and opened that up next to the window. Then I installed the hardware.

So there I was installing the hardware... just kidding.

I get off the ladder to move it to the other side. That's when I see....IT. You know the IT you don't like to see. You know that little "this is not a step" thingy for a paint bucket or a drill or even a place for you shoe while you stand on it to reach a few more inches so you don't have to move the ladder and do the job right. yeah...that one. Well I guess it was too close to the window sill and might have just knocked some of the plaster junk off so there was a 3 inch wide by about 5/16 of an inch tall. That area was just metal no paint or anything. That was all on the carpet.

At first I thought about just cleaning up and walkin' away and leave it for someone else. hey! I'm only human. Then I thought about it. The superintendent has already walked the house. He knows that we have to come out and get the job done. He knows that wasn't there before.

So I called my window covering supervisor. Ya know...Professor X. And that convo went a little something like this:

"Hey man, I made a little oops."
"what happened?"
"well, I knocked some of the plaster drywall stuff off the window sill area"
"you mean on the frame area?"
"yeah"
"Well, maybe you should leave the blind on the floor so they can fix it."
"No, it's on the bottom. They can lift it up to fix it."
"Oh. Well thanks for telling me...We didn't see anything."
"Roger that..."


Holy fuck, we didn't see anything? He didn't ask how big of an area or anything. Just we didn't see it?! That's fucking crazy. It's not like I broke a ceramic tile while nailing down some tact strip. Or crack that SAME tile twice by two different people after it was fixed the first time.

This is just a simple retexture and paint. Simple.

It just tossed me for a loop...we didn't see anything. What an idiot.


oh on other news. I got a cat brush. You know for my cat.

Suicidal thoughts

No, I don't have any of those. But, I'd be a liar if I said I never did. I think most people get to that point sometime in their life. Where they think how much easier it would be if they just ended it now. To make all their pain go away. To have the choice of how to do it. Will your friends remember you? Parents?

Ok , so this is getting a little dark.

I do have a point, kinda, with all this. It is almost a part 2 of My Story.

So while I was going around and around with my 1st Sergeant. There was this other lady, about a week behind me in the whole getting out of the military deal. We've talked in the hall way. She also stayed in the same dorms as my self. She was an odd little cookie, not sure what she did though that got her to that point. Anyways.

A few weeks after I got out of the military, maybe it was months. I called a buddy of mine at the shop I used to work in. Well, we talk about what has been going on. Where I'm working at now. Things like that. Well I come to find out that she drove her car off a bridge or something. What ever it was, I guess she couldn't take it anymore. Thought she had no place to go. Who knows. She ended it all.

I on the other hand. Think I am a much stronger person for going through what I did. If that didn't bring me down, well ok it did. What I'm getting at, I'm still here. And one way or another I am going to make something of my self. Military or not.

My Story.

Story Time.

This story is going to skip a lot of the well...story. I'm going right to the end. This story took place over 12 months, you got the last week or so. Oh yeah, this all took place while I was in the Military.


The date: Feb / Mar 2005

I don't really know how to put all of this out here on this screen. It is a story about my character.
I can still remember the 3 worst days in my life. They were bad ones. two were planned one wasn't.

Starting this start with out the background is hard. I want people to be able to understand, but I don't think it's going to come across that well.

It is Super Bowl Sunday 2005. That is the first day back on base for about 4 months. I remember not being able to find my ID card, so we had to stop and get me a pass. I did find it later on when I got to my dorm room and emptied out my bags o' junk. It did feel good to be back, even if it wasn't my room. By this time my truck ('03 green S-10) was back here in Cali.

Anyways, later on that day I went down to the e-club to watch the game at the lil super bowl party they had going on. I had some beer. Called some friends, told them why I seemed to have fallen off the face of this planet. That was fun.

They didn't have me go back to work with my shop. To this day I still don't understand the reason for that. But, whatever. I liked what they had me doing better. I had time to eat breakfast, walk to work in the rain (I didn't mind at all), and drive around in one of those 4 x 6 Gator thingys. Now that was fun. Driving across the grass, in the mud, and just messing around during the day.

So it comes down to one person. One person with my career in his hands. That person would be the 4th Fighter Wing commander Col. Mike Holmes. Yes, a wing commander. The highest ranking person on base. In charge of almost 100 F-15s. Me. And everything else on base. He was the person that my job, dream (funny how people have used that word to me in the past few days.), plan, life, and just everything I wanted (or so I thought) to be.

That's a lot of power that one person has over me. But that is why he makes the big bucks and I don't.

I do have a right to send a package up telling him why I think I should stay in. Well fuck, this is MY life. I don't want some package to tell everything I want. I want to be there, I want to tell him face to face, I have no right to that. That's right folks, this is lil or E-nothing me wanting to go up face to face with the O-7 (I think) Wing Commander. How's that for a tall order.

First I talked to my 1st sergeant (that link will tell you about what a 1st Sergeant is). Who told me I should ask the defence people. I called, the paralegal chica said it can't be done. That it was in the Air Force instruction (AFI). Well humm...It can't be done, eh. So I called the 1st Sergeant back. I told him that I want to do it.

Heck, the defence people just give advice, that's the way I seen it. So, I took it and did my own thing with it. I filed it away in a filing cabinet. Light that filing cabinet on fire. Then I pushed it off a huge fucking cliff! That was all she wrote.

Now keep in mind he could easily just say "yeah you know what....nu uh" to me. As I got nothing giving me the right to a face to face meeting.

Funny thing is. My 1st Sergeant who was in for 22 years or so has never seen anyone ask, let alone do, anything like I am asking. And I'm doing it with such passion, such desire. That if anyone was going to beat the odds, it was going to fucking be me!

Well I don't just get to go up to the base commander and say "yo..what's up hommie..." First step it to talk to the Command chief Master Sergeant (more info here). That is the highest ranking enlisted person on base. You could call him the Commanders right hand man type of deal.

So I got the date and time to talk to he Chief. Holy cow, talk about freaking out. I'm about to do something that just about no body does. Walking back and forth. Making sure my uniform was just perfect, no strings hanging or anything. I even got an index card of the things I want to make sure I say. I remember waiting int he hall way out side of his office. Waiting to be called in. Just breathing. Not knowing what was going to come out of it. Not knowing what he was going to say. So many unknowns.

(damn I'm getting tried of typing this book now...)

So that meeting goes well. I say my story, then he replies with what he things. I can't really remember what all he, or I, said. But it did end good, or so I thought. He said something if having only a little hope could be a bad thing. There was a 99.9% chance of this thing going as planned no matter what I say or do. So I was reaching for anything and everything.

So yeah, I was having to sell my self. Sell who I was and who I wasn't. show to them that I was more than what I was on paper.

(ha, I still need to do my taxes)

Well as some point in time the Chief and Commander have their little meeting.

Well he is going to see me! Holy cow! That is just an unreal feeling. I get the chance to do what I've been wanting to do. I get so talk face to face to the wing commander. Talk about having some big balls ;)

Ok, so that feeling that I had to talk with the Chief. Yeah that was nothing compared to what I was going through now.

So I get to talk to him. I first meet up with the Chief, his office is just down the hall. He tells me what I need to know, what I need to do.

I go in the Commanders office. "Sir, Airman B. reports..." Now this is the formal military shit you see on TV. Well, more or less. This is the only time I salute indoors.

Well I got my meeting. The chance to say my peace, I guess you could say. I guess I made him think about it. It did take, what seemed like, forever to get back with an answer. That answer was...

I remember that phone call very well. March 26,2005. I was in my shop. I remember what I said to my shop NCO and the others around. Who were of course behind me in all this. "that's it, I'm out."





I had three days to get out of the military.


March 29, 2005. I got my last meal (well going away lunch), then changed clothes and left for the airport. I remember that drive so well. What we talked about. Just looking at everything alone the freeway for one last time.

Greatest Accomplishment....So far

Back in Aug of 1996 I believe. It was the summer right before high school. I was about 5'0" and maybe 100 lbs. Yup, if you are picturing a big ol' son of a bitch.....you would be 100% wrong :P

I was in Boy Scouts, this would end up being my last year in. The best part about it was the camping and backpacking.

I remember the Scout Master telling his stories of Mt. Whitney. Something he did years before. I forgot how it came about, but some how I told him that I wanted to go up and over Mt. Whitney.

He did all the planning. The trip was going to be about 60+ miles long. Oh the first time I heard that, my jaw dropped. I had no clue what I was getting myself into. 60+ miles of just hiking. Oh yeah, this isn't just hiking. Nope. This is backpacking, meaning that I had to carry all of my stuff on my back. That total weight was around 45lbs, or about half of my weight.

We ended up taking The High Sierra Trail from Giant Forest to the Summit of Mount Whitney. Well, I haven't look at that trail map, but that's more or less what we did.

I don't remember how it all went down..... or where we all set up camp. I got the info someplace, I just think it's in my 'rents house.

You wouldn't think it would be THAT bad, just 10 miles a day. Well one day we only did 4 miles or something like that. We also got done a day early! Did about 12+ miles that last day.

Well I remember that last day / night very well.

We set up camp about 12,000 ft. The top of Mt. Whitney is over 14,400 ft. The Whitney Portal (where the trail ends) is about 8360 feet.

So that up 2000 then back down 6,000 feet. It's insane!

Oh and the weather there. There are no trees at all around there. It ended up raining a lot that night and the winds pick up. It's just so unreal. I want to do it again. There isn't even sand or dirt to set up camp on, it's all rocks. We ended up waking up around 4 or 5 am to start taking down camp and start going up.

I remember looking around, all you see is up. Thinking, holy cow how are we going to go up that.

One thing though. Mt. Whitney may have been the goal and the highest point in the lower 48, but it didn't have the best view.

That would be Colby Pass. It is right between the Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. It's only around 13,000ft. I remember getting up to the top and the horizon going from about 20 feet in front of me to the other side of a big ol' valley! This was only the half way point, give or take.

Here is the view from where we set up camp, well just about. Can you see where we pass over that? Nope, didn't think so.

Here are all the pictures that I scanned so far. This isn't even half that I got. See if you can pick me out ;)

I was the smallest one, the youngest one, and the only one not married for this trip.

This would be one of my Greatest Accomplishment to date!