As most of you know, up until yesterday, I was a member of the Virginia Army
National Guard.
Yesterday, 22 FEB 99, I enlisted in the United States Army. Regular, Real
Thing, yadda, yadda.
On 8 MAR 99, I will be shipping out to "Europe". No idea where in Europe, but
somewhere. I will probably cancel this account on 7 MAR or thereabouts.
I will not be taking down the NRE webpage. I will be passing any notes and
information I plan to put up to my brother, who will be maintaining the page
in my absence. The page will, however, not be updated unless and until I
establish some sort of net access in Germany (Assuming 'Europe' doesn't turn
out to be an alternate spelling for 'Former Yugoslavia').
Good luck, take care, roll lots of D20s.
JimC
> Los wrote:
Regular,
> > Real Thing, yadda, yadda.
Of course, are there other MOSs? (As I said on the way home, to the 11B
recruiter and the other fellow with me who went 11B as well. At least
for those of us that _passed_ the ASVAB).
> John M. Atkinson wrote:
> Yesterday, 22 FEB 99, I enlisted in the United States Army. Regular,
Wow. Combat Engineer? Guess we'll have to have a bash at GZG-ECC....
Congrats John! I grew up in the Army (My dad retired US Army Infantry as a
Half-Bird) and got acquainted with the local Communist sponsored
terrorists in fun and exotic locales like Seoul, Korea; Munich, Germany; San
Juan, Puerto Rico; etc....
It can be tough, especially now with the Army's reduced force levels, but the
upshot is that with the reduced force, better opportunities for advancement
will arise! Are you Infantry, Armor or Arty? Enquiring
minds....
Michael Wikan Game Design Slave Zero Accolade, Inc.
http://www.slavezero.com
mwikan@accolade.com wikan@sprintmail.com "We sleep safely in our beds because
rough men stand ready in the night to
visit violence on those who would do us harm."-George Orwell
> -----Original Message-----
Congratulations and good luck!
> From: Mike Wikan <MWikan@mailhost.accolade.com>
to
> visit violence on those who would do us harm."-George Orwell
> John M. Atkinson wrote:
Congratulations! Take care! Come back home in one piece, now, you hear?
> 'Cause you left out the word "could", where I've put the "___"? :-)
> Feh. That's a typo, not a joke. And would be "should" in any case.
Both "should" or "could" fit. :-)
Congratulations! Be safe.
Is it safe to assume you're going in as an Engineer?
Hope to see you back "on line" sometime soon - once you "settle in" -
unless you're stuck somewhere in Kosovo...
Do you have to do any training or do you just go right in...?
> As most of you know, up until yesterday, I was a member of the
> At 02.16 23/02/99 -0500, you wrote:
Before you leave, I would like to thank you for your effort.
Really a very nice work!
If "Europe" should mean Italy, well, drop a line to the list and let me know!
Best wishes
> Mike Wikan wrote:
> advancement will arise! Are you Infantry, Armor or Arty? Enquiring
Oooohhh... Nice Troll.:)
> On Tue, 23 Feb 1999, John M. Atkinson wrote:
> As most of you know, up until yesterday, I was a member of the
oh, man, do we know...
> Yesterday, 22 FEB 99, I enlisted in the United States Army. Regular,
well, it's your choice. let me add one dissenting voice, just for old
times' sake. the army? get a proper job :-). seriously though, i wish
you all the fortune in the world.
is this a final career, or a prelude to greater things?
> On 8 MAR 99, I will be shipping out to "Europe". No idea where in
well, there are a few computers in europe, if you know where to look, so maybe
you can drop in every now and then, eh?
> The page will, however, not be updated unless
ah, you'll be able to get your email. come on, this is the us army! besides,
i've seen mail from the army field network before. observe this
post to ftgzg-l, back in the old days:
> On Sun, 25 Oct 1998, Allan Goodall wrote:
> Date: Sun, 25 Oct 1998 22:31:11 GMT
well, it looks to me like the signals corps deployed an ms exchange server to
bosnia. surely that's against the geneva convention?
anyway, good luck. i hope everything goes well.
Tom
> Adrian Johnson wrote:
Oh, yeah.
> Hope to see you back "on line" sometime soon - once you "settle in" -
:)
> Do you have to do any training or do you just go right in...?
Nope. I show up, go to nearest reception center (Ft. Jackson) to update shots,
make sure I have all the appropriate clothes, and take care of finance (Direct
Deposit, etc.) and other administrivia. Then fly straight to Stutgart to the
USAEUR replacement unit and from there to a unit.
> John M. Atkinson wrote:
...Snip...JTL
(Assuming
> 'Europe' doesn't turn out to be an alternate spelling for 'Former
> On Tue, 23 Feb 1999, John M. Atkinson wrote:
> Yesterday, 22 FEB 99, I enlisted in the United States Army. Regular,
Well... Looks like you followed your dreams or something:) (I gather you've
gone into Combat Engineering right?) So are you making a career out of this?
> On 8 MAR 99, I will be shipping out to "Europe". No idea where in
Does this mean you're cancelling all your mailing list subscriptions and won't
be talking on Usenet for a long time now?
Yet another running dog to spread American Imperialism across the
world...
:)
Best of luck!
> Chen-Song Qin wrote:
Regular,
> > Real Thing, yadda, yadda.
Yes, Yes, and Not Yet.
> > On 8 MAR 99, I will be shipping out to "Europe". No idea where in
For as long as it takes me to get settled, get set up, and find a way to get
back on from Europe. I understand there are ways to do it, but it may take me
a while.
Best of luck John. You'll be able to join us quickly if you don't get sent to
one of the former Yugoslavian republics. Europe is civilized and has computers
and internet connections. Again good luck.
Dave
> As most of you know, up until yesterday, I was a member of the Virginia
Hey! You can't just leave like that!
> I will not be taking down the NRE webpage. I will be passing any notes
Grrr. You really need to consult with us BEFORE you do this sort of thing.
> Laserlight wrote:
> Grrr. You really need to consult with us BEFORE you do this sort of
Sorry.:) BTW, your main page is now up, but Netscape is barfing over the rest
of 'em.
> John M. Atkinson wrote:
> Of course, are there other MOSs? (As I said on the way home, to the
You mean that you have to pass the ASVAB just to dig holes and lay barbed
wire???? ; )
Hehehehehehe!
> Thomas Anderson wrote:
> well, there are a few computers in europe, if you know where to look,
<smiles evily>
Yeah, that's what I hear too... my girlfriend (who lives in London for the
now) tells me that she once saw a computer over there. I think she mentioned
something
about it being a TI 99 or a Commodore 64... pretty hi-tech she said ; )
<ducks thrown objects chucked in his direction>
Anyway, keep your head down guy- and keep looking for the Spaghetti
MREs!! : )
John M. Atkinson wrote in reply to Adrian Johnson:
> > Hope to see you back "on line" sometime soon - once you "settle in"
-
> > unless you're stuck somewhere in Kosovo...
Several of my friends and aquaintancies have been stationed in NORDBAT
and whatever-the-name of the Scandinavian observers in Macedonia.
According to them, email is about the only reliable means of communications
with home. More reliable than telephone, since the emails usually got through
even when the signal transmission was too lousy to
hear what the other person said in a normal phone call :-/
Kosovo is less shot-up than Bosnia so far (ie, more telephone lines
surviving, etc), so I don't think there'd be a very big problem maintaining
'net access
I won't ask you to stay out of trouble; your presence on the list shows you
thrive on that. ;->=
Just no biting more than you can chew, and if you do find yourself in the
Balkans, avoid all Archdukes...
Stay safe, John; we don't want no more yellow ribbons.
The_Beast
> On 8 MAR 99, I will be shipping out to "Europe". No idea where in
As a side note John, how 'bout signing up for a Yahoo email account -
that way you could check messages from anywhere you can get internet access.
I'm sure you've thought of all this kind of stuff, but thought I'd suggest it
anyway...
> Do you have to do any training or do you just go right in...?
How long did you sign up for?
Another thought - are you a good shot?
My uncle was a REME (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineer) Gunfitter
-
he discovered early on that the British Army of the 1950's respected
marksmanship (and paid extra for it), so he did some serious training and was
regularly rated at the top level of marksmanship. Unfortunately, a "technical
expert" who was also good at the "pure" soldier stuff (please, no arguments
about how combat engineers are "pure" soldiers... there's no
slight meant and you know what I mean) was in high demand all the time -
particularly since this was the period of decolonialisation and the Brits were
fighting a bunch of small wars all over the place. He got sent in to
most of them. Malaya, Aden - even got asked to join the SAS when it was
building up in Malaya, but he was terrified of jumping out of airplanes so
there was no way he'd do that. The British army had a policy that NCO's from
support services in combat areas had to maintain their combat
leadership proficiency (everybody is a rifleman first and foremost!) -
and as he was a Sergeant, he had to go off into the jungle leading fighting
patrols. He was sent off with a Gurkha battalion, and had some rather scary
stories to tell about the Gurkhas. And their Kukris (and the skinning knives
that come with a Kukri...)
Anyway - the point being that watch out - I have no idea whether the US
Army has the same kinds of policies, but (unless of course you are going
*looking* for action) you might get more than you bargained for.
I just realized that sounds terribly melodramatic. Not what I meant, at
all...
> On 24 Feb 99, at 7:08, Randall Case wrote:
> Yeah, that's what I hear too... my girlfriend (who lives in London for
Nah, we have the mighty power of the Sinclair ZX81now;)
John, a bit late as I have been off for the last couple of days. I guess it is
congratulations but then again I think that Navy ( RAN of course) is the way
to go but then I'm biased. If the US Army has the same quirky view of the
English langauge as the Australian Defence Forces do then "Europe" with no
qualifier is likely to mean some unpleasant part of Europe. Do worry that
might only mean England where they serve warm beer! (duck) So good luck, don't
lose yourself, don't lose any bits of yourself, don't gain any metal bits,
find a girl, come home and most of all stay in touch if you can.