That unit armorer post reminds me of the time my 4ID unit promised my soldier he could deploy late so he could see his kid get born. Then someone decided he couldn't. So the company decided to make him the armorer so be would have to go to the course and would come out on trail.
Here's the twist: they made me counsel him that if he failed the armorers course for any reason, for example, taking his wife to the hospital because she was in labor and not getting the required class hours, they would give him an article 15.
I was so fucking mad that they punted that counseling down to me. I wrote it up, and we spent the session with me telling him how it was unenforceable and verbally advising him how to fight it if it actually happened.
So my understanding of this is that it's not that unusual in large cities, as people who receive the live virus vaccine (not used in the US, but used in other places) can carry the virus in their intestine and spread it through their stool for a time after getting vaccinated.
If you have the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV, commonly used in the US) this is normally fine, because even though the IPV doesnt give intestinal immunity picking up the vaccine-derived strain won't make you ill. The problem is for people who are unvaxxed or immunocompromised.
The reason we use the IPV, which doesn't provide intestinal immunity to the polio virus, is because live virus polio vaccines very rarely (like 1 in 2,000,000 rarely) can cause cases of paralysis, plus the stool shedding, and the IPV was deemed to be safer overall.
I sometimes get frustrated with my son's teachers at school because I feel like his developmental delay for well-documented medical reasons isn't always taken as seriously, because technically speaking there is nothing medically wrong with him *now*.
My son had an undiagnosed hearing loss due to fluid build up from too-large adenoids. He was nonverbal until he had the surgery to correct it, when he was 3. That was essentially three missed years of language and social development.
He does have an IEP and gets speech and social skill supports, but his primary teacher keeps getting frustrated that he has difficulty working independently on assignments. It's like... yes... because he's still playing catch up on those skills, even four years later.
My experience with enlisted PME is it primarily serves as a gut check to make sure everyone is passing height and weight and their physical fitness test and after that's done unless you actually commit an EO/SHARP/UCMJ/local law violation, you are going to graduate.
I remember someone being concerned at ALC if they were going to be able to get the required grades on all the projects and our instructor rolled her eyes and said they hadn't had an academic failure in over two years.
The only book we read was voluntary. The 1SG put together an after hours book program because he thought it was ridiculous that there was basically no reading, but he couldn't force anyone to go.
I don't think a toothache and a bad experience with a Jewish dentist is why the Buffalo shooter turned to racism. I think a bored teenage edgelord with unlimited access to the internet, whose family cultivated an interest in guns, found his way to predictable, unmodded websites.
Parenting in the 21st century is terrifying. There are plenty of families in rural America who like hunting and paintball and don't have kids who go this route. But the right combination of bored, teenage assholery and an enjoyment of shocking people, and it can go deadly quick.
17-18 is a particularly terrifying time, because you're losing what little control you have left. Legally, they can suddenly do a lot more. Most are smart enough to hide stuff from you that they know you wouldn't approve of.
It's not that I think that the Ukranians are definitively winning this thing, or that every story we see on Twitter about the war is true.
It's that Ukraine is having an honest to God, real "we shall fight on the beaches" moment.
I've asked myself a lot over the past day or so whether the Ghost of Kiev is real, for example. And I think it's besides the point. The narrative is real to the people of Ukraine right now, and that narrative has power.
This may all end horribly. It may even be likely that it will. But the nation that voted at 92% for independence in 1991 has decided to risk their lives for the chance to hold on to that freedom. I'll honor them for it, for however long they stand.