Survey says:

I’ve seen this on other blogs and finally decided to give it a try. 

So if I’m 56% open  minded, that means I’m 44% close minded.  Hmm, I didn’t think I was that judgemental.  Guess I have some things I need to work on.

You Are 56% Open Minded

You are a very open minded person, but you’re also well grounded. Tolerant and flexible, you appreciate most lifestyles and viewpoints. But you also know where you stand firm, and you can draw that line. You’re open to considering every possibility – but in the end, you stand true to yourself.

How Open Minded Are You?

Airborne Buddy

For anyone who doesn’t know, these are Airborne wings, also called the “parachutist badge.”

These can only be earned by members of the armed forces (though primarily those of the Army branch) who attend (and successfully complete) a 3 week course appropriately dubbed “Airborne School” at Fort Benning, Georgia.

I went through the course in June of 1995, immediately following my Basic Training and AIT (Advanced Individual Training) classes on the same Army base. My MOS (Military Occupation Specialty) at the time was 11C (Infantry Mortarman) with an Airborne contract. In other words, I was Airborne Infantry.

Airborne School itself consists of 3 phases, each phase lasting one week.

Week 1 is Ground Week: Mostly running and practicing PLFs (Parachute Landing Falls) in sawdust pits. This is where we’re taught how to land without hurting ourselves. We’re also taught how to maneuver in our parachutes using what are called “pulling a slip”. By pulling down on 1 or 2 of the 4 “risers” you can [somewhat] control which direction you’ll drift. We may have practiced exiting the aircraft during this week as well.

Week 2 is Tower Week: More running and PLFs, but this time with the more realistic drills of jumping from the 30 foot towers and for some of us, the 150 foot tower. (And if you hate heights, these drills downright suck because you can SEE THE GROUND RIGHT THERE!) The 30 foot towers are just a mock up of the aircraft and we’re taught the proper procedures of exiting the aircraft – step out, tucking your chin to your chest and grasping the reserve ‘chute attached at your stomach, and couting to 4 as you slide down a wire to the mound about 50 meters away.

Oh, and just a side note, if anyone “falls out” of a platoon run for any reason, they are automatically ejected from the course.

Week 3 is Jump Week: No more running or sawdust pits or towers, but a lot of the same old drills. This is the week when we’re taken up in either a C-130 Hercules or C-141 aircraft and actually get to jump. One of the jumps is a mandatory “night jump” which usually just takes place shortly after dusk so we can get an idea of jumping in the dark. This is the preferred method of troop insertion in real-world missions so it’s harder to get shot at by the enemy while airborne.

There are two types of Airborne School graduates: The “5 Jump Chump” who only gets in his or her 5 aircraft jumps in order to earn the coveted wings and get back to their Non-Airborne unit, and the “Career Airborne” troop who, upon completion of the course, is bound for an Airborne unit. I was of the latter.

My first duty assignment was with SETAF (Southern European Task Force), specifically the 3/325 ABCT (Airborne Battalion Combat Team) which was based in Italy…ah, Italy!
I spend my first two years of active duty service there.

My final 13 months of [initial] active duty were spent at Fort Bragg, North Carolina which is home of the mighty 82nd Airborne Division. I was assigned to the 1/504th PIR (Parachute Infantry Regiment) and went from being a mortarman to a TOC (Tactical Operations Center) driver and RTO (Radio Telephone Operator.)

Don’t you just love all those acronymns?

All in all, I had around 33 jumps. I lost count after awhile and I don’t think my jump record accurately reflects all the jumps I did in my airborne career.

I’ve jumped from a number of aircraft including the C-130, C-141, C-5, CH-47 Chinook helicopter and the UH-1 Huey. The helicopter jumps were my favorites.

I’ve landed on several DZs (Drop Zones) with a myriad of terrain from soft sand, to gravel, to the pavement of a runway, to a 6 inch puddle of water (why is it that I’m seeing stars when I look down? Oh shit! It’s water!)

But I was lucky. No major parachute malfunctions. No major injuries to speak of (just the one minor static line injury that yanked off my watch and a layer of skin from my wrist).

My father was Airborne, so I wanted to be.

I call my son my “Airborne Buddy” which I hope doesn’t force him to think he has to follow in my footsteps.

Airborne Infantry was certainly a worthwhile experience, but I want better things for my children.

Stay out of harms way if you can help it.

Airborne!

Hot Wheels

In my previous post, I mentioned how satisfying it was to introduce the toys and movies of my youth to my own children.

Last night, I realized that the door swings both ways.

A few weeks ago, I’d decided I was tired of listening to the same old movies that our kids watch in the family van (Toy Story and Toy Story 2) and buy a couple new ones I thought they might enjoy. One of them was the animated movie Hot Wheels: World Race.

To listen to it, it’s mostly just the sounds of squeeling tires and roaring engines mixed in with a few lines of commentary. I figured it couldn’t have much of a storyline or a plot. Being based on the popular toy cars, how could it?

Scott wanted to watch it in the house last night and since I couldn’t find anything else to watch on television (we still don’t have cable or satellite, so our channel options are severely limited) I said okay and watched it with him. It was actually pretty fun to watch.

The computer animation is very well done and is easy to watch. Some of the characters are a little cheesy, but that can easily be overlooked, especially when most of the emphasis is on the cars and what they can do (there are teams of racers who are assigned cars with special abilities.)

And there’s a decent plot! Complete with an evil female mastermind who’s after the Wheel of Power (a source of limitless energy) and an army of sleek robot racers!

Scott was kind enough to fill me in on some of the details that I wasn’t aware of (such as a well crafted Wheel of Power decoy to fool the drivers) It’s always fun to hear a 3 year old’s running commentary.

What I really loved though, were all the elements of the toys put into the movie, to include the orange racetrack that the cars run on. Remember those? Piecing together all the segments of track leading from the top of the couch, down into a loop-de-loop and across the front room floor! It’s all in the movie!

Anyway, it was a sweet ride, from start to finish.