I am proud to announce that the owner and employees of n-Space have asked to be the sponsor of all costs required in order to have a stained glass artist make a window and install it in the Chapel at Fort Carson in Memory of all Fallen Soldiers from 4-4 Brigade. 4-4 is newly flagged at Fort Carson after having recently been relocated there from Fort Hood and had no Memorial Window in the Chapel. Sadly we all know that the Brigade has had many of their Heroes Killed in Action on their current deployment to Afghanistan.
Jen from n-Space contacted me on behalf of the company a few days after we had issued the call for assistance in replacing the lost personal items of the survivors of the Battle at COP Keating. By the time I received Jen's email we had received all of the donations we needed for the Soldiers' personal items. I did have a couple of other projects I wanted to try to make happen. One was the Memorial window. I had sent out a handful of emails asking people and groups if they would be interested in donating towards that project when I received Jen's email.
Jen and I exchanged a additional emails and phone calls. She was so patient with me. I have no idea about gaming beyond Pong, Centipede and PacMan - yeah, I'm that old. So wrapping my brain around what n-Space does was way over my head beyond the basic concept that they design video games. LOTS of video games for LOTS of different systems.
I put Jen in touch with 4-4 Brigade Commander's wife. The two of them have worked together to iron out all of the details. I cannot tell you how much it means to me, to Jen and Dan and all of the employees of n-Space and to the Soldiers and family members of 4-4 Brigade that this has become a reality.
A HUGE HOOAH to n-Space's owners, management and employees for taking on such an important and meaningful task. Because of n-Space and their generosity the Fallen Heroes of 4-4 Brigade will forever be remembered in a meaningful way.
Thank you Jen, Dan and all of you great Americans at n-Space.
So all of you gamers out there (well and the non gamers, too) - go become a fan of and follow n-Space on their Facebook page. Go! Now! Leave a comment for them, too, please. Here are a few of the 100 employees you will be thanking. By the way, they are holding signs that say "I give a shit" and "n-Space gives a shit". AWESOME!
SGT Joshua Brennan was a beloved son, brother, nephew and cousin who is missed by all who knew him and loved him. SGT Brennan was shot multiple times on 25 October 2007 in an ambush during Operation Rock Avalanche. He succumbed to his wounds the following day.
Josh's father, Mike Brennan, has told me about the day Josh and his Battle Buddies were ambushed. It is one of the most harrowing stories I've heard. During the ambush the Taliban attempted to drag Josh away. His fellow Soldiers immediately came to his rescue. SPC Hugo "DOC" Mendoza gave his life attempting to save Josh from the enemy. Others on his team continued to fight the enemy and were successful in getting Josh back. One of those men has been nominated for the Medal of Honor for his actions that day.
A family member made this incredibly moving video to honor Josh. You'll need tissues to watch this.
My heart is very heavy today, on this second anniversary of Josh's death. Please take a minute to pray for Josh and his family. And say a special prayer for his cousin, PVT Joseph Brennan and his family, too. Joseph recently completed basic training and Airborne School. His family took him to the airport this morning (talk about timing) to board a flight to Italy where he will join Josh's unit, 173rd, 2-503, Battle Company and will deploy before the end of the year to Afghanistan.
So on this day of remembrance I send my love to the Brennan family. They are some of the greatest people I have ever had the privilege to know. Josh's father, Mike, and his mother, Janice, both served in the Army. Their son, Josh, gave his life defending our freedom. Now Joseph proudly wears the uniform of the US Army.
Rest in Peace Josh. Keep Joseph safe.
Read more about Josh here, here, here and on his mother's MySpace page here
There is a story about his dad and one of his uncles here.
And go here to read about and see photos of Joseph Brennan's graduation from Airborne School.
SPC Hugo "DOC" Mendoza died of wounds sustained when he came in contact with enemy forces using RPG, machine gun and small arms fire during Operation Rock Avalanche combat operations on Oct 25,2007 in the Korengal Valley, Afghanistan.
SPC Mendoza's family recalls him as a very giving person; a man who treated everyone the way he wanted to be treated. SPC Mendoza planned to become a firefighter once he left the Army.
He was laid to rest at Fort Bliss, TX.
We will NEVER forget you "DOC". Rest in Peace brave warrior.
23 March 1978 – 25 October 2007
Battle Company, 2nd Battalion (Airborne), 503rd Infantry Regiment
SPC Hugo Victor Mendoza was born on 23 March 1978 in California and spent most of his childhood in El Paso, Texas. He enlisted in the U.S. Army on 31 May 2005.
During his time in service, SPC Hugo Victor Mendoza completed Basic Infantry Training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, Medical Advanced Individual Training at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, and Airborne School at Fort Benning, Georgia. On 6 March 2006, SPC Mendoza reported to his first duty station at Caserma, Ederle, Vicenza, Italy. He was assigned to the 173d Airborne Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Battalion (Airborne), 503rd Infantry – The ROCK. SPC Mendoza was then assigned to Headquarters and Headquarters Company with duty as a combat medic in Battle Company. He immediately found his home among the combat warriors of 1st Platoon – The Celts. SPC Mendoza trained, deployed and fought side by side with his band of brothers in support of OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM VIII. SPC Mendoza distinguished himself in The ROCK as a heroic medic, charismatic Paratrooper, and an overall altruistic human being.
SPC Mendoza’s awards include: The Purple Heart, National Defense Service Medal, Afghanistan Campaign Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Army Service Ribbon, Overseas Service Ribbon, Combat Medical Badge, and Basic Parachutist Badge. SPC Mendoza has been submitted for the Bronze Star Medal for Service in support of OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM VIII.
Please go here and read more about what SPC Mendoza's family and friends had to say about this great American Hero.
SSG Larry Rouge was a husband, father, son, brother, nephew and friend to many. His father, Ismael Rougle is a Vietnam Veteran who served 25 years in the Army. SSG Rougle joined the Army in 1999 at age 17. He was killed by insurgent small arms fire on 23 October 2007 at age 25 during Operation Rock Avalanche. He was on his sixth deployment since joining the Army.
SSG Rouge was laid to rest on 8 November 2007 at Arlington National Cemetery. I encourage you to click on the link for Arlington National Cemetery to read more about SSG Rougle. A great American Hero who left those who loved him way too soon.
We will NEVER forget you SSG Rougle.
Additional links about SSG Rougle here and here.
Last night, on the second anniversary of his death, several of SSG Rougle's battle buddies joined together to remember him, SPC Hugo Mendoza and SGT Joshua Brennan (who I will post about tomorrow and Monday)
I can't say enough about the medevac teams, medics, Corpsman and all of those involved in treating and evacuating our wounded from the battlefield to the Combat Hospitals. I've had several Soldiers tell me about the unbelievable acts of courage the pilots and medics have done to get them out of harms way on on to those in the hospitals who are first rate, too.
God Bless them all and keep them safe.
From The Washington Post
It was March 26, 1970. Location: A few Godforsaken acres of jungle, pocked by B-52 bomb craters, and now a stage where American tanks fired blasts of sharpened buckshot at an enemy who fought back from subterranean bunkers and could not be dislodged.
Tuesday in the White House Rose Garden, almost 40 years later, President Obama
is scheduled to pay tribute to Gutierrez and about 80 other Vietnam veterans who fought in the savage, unnamed battle, which resulted in the rescue of a company of trapped fellow soldiers.
Gutierrez's outfit -- Alpha Troop, First Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment -- has been awarded a Presidential Unit Citation for its "extraordinary heroism and conspicuous gallantry" in the fight, and the soldiers have been summoned to be honored.
Please go read the the entire article and join me in being thankful for ALL of the men and women who have served and continue to serve our great nation.
UPDATED with additional photo and information
Forgive me for taking so long to write this post. Your response was HUGE and SWIFT. Great Americans - ALL of you.
The photo is from my friend Donna of Defenders of Freedom based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Donna, like many of you, learned about one of the Soldiers emailing home that they felt like no one back here "gives a shit" about them. Well, they'll soon know (if they don't already) that just isn't so! Along with the above photo, Donna and many other groups and individuals around the DFW area are sending photos much like the one above inside care packages to the 3-61 CAV Soldiers. HOOAH Donna!
UPDATE: The above photo was submitted by (and will have several copies printed and mailed to the Soldiers) the employees of n-Space. For all of you gamers out there you should go check out their website! I've been speaking with a lady in their HR department and I think they are going to help out in a big way on a project mentioned at the bottom of this post. Stay tuned! In case you can't read what they are holding up they are signs with the American flag that say either "n-Space Gives A Shit" or "We Give a Shit". HOOAH to n-Space!
Working together you all donated more than the Soldiers needed to get back on their feet. HOOAH to you all! Bob Connolly is in direct contact with the 1SG, CPT and CSM of 3-61 CAV. He has shipped all of the items they have requested and is holding on to a few "extra" items (mostly socks and toiletries which they will be able to use with so much time left in their deployment) until he gets the "go ahead" from them to ship. They are very limited on space and man power right now so they requested that the extra items be held for a few weeks.
I also want to thank all of you who shipped direct for letting us know what you were sending. That allowed us to make sure the men were covered but that it wasn't excessive - again due to space and manpower over there. I have completed a spreadsheet that I will forward to the unit leaders in Afghanistan as well as to their Rear Detachment showing all of the great Americans that came forward to work with us on this project. I know there were many others who worked through other channels or as individuals. There is no doubt those Soldiers are already feeling the love and will continue to feel it for some time.
I want to send a very special thank you out to the Gold Star and Blue Star families and to the Wounded and Active Duty personnel AROUND THE GLOBE who emailed wanting to know how they could help. I was more than touched by the emails each of you sent. There just aren't words enough to express how much all of you mean to me and to this nation.
Now I'll share a few emails with you from various members of the 3-61 CAV family:
From emails received from the Brigade Commander's wife:
I wish there were other words I could use to express our deep gratitude. I'll have to just keep saying THANK YOU!
Thank you! I have searched for stronger words to express our gratefulness, but I can’t seem to find any. Suffice it to say, we are overwhelmed by your support of our Soldiers and truly humbled as we realize how many strong Americans have rallied around the boys when they needed it most.
Thank you. Thank you.
From The Squadron/Brigade Commander's wife:
I am writing to say thank you for everything you have organized in the past week. I am truly awestruck by the scope of what you have accomplished along with Bob Connolly, and I guess I just wanted to say "thank you" on behalf of the families of those soldiers of Black Knight troop to all of those who have joined in your project. While the soldiers get the care packages, the families get to see that their husbands/sons/brothers are not forgotton and enjoy huge support for what they do.
From an email to Bob Connolly from B Troop's 1SG:
I thank you all for the support and for those who are going out of their way to donate God bless you and let everyone there know that we appreciate everything.
Bob and I want to add our "Thank You" to all of you who came together so quickly and so generously to make this happen. There wasn't one item on our "wish" list that wasn't filled thanks to those of you who either donated actual items or made cash donations for the items we needed to purchase.
I will be adding a couple of photos to this once I find them.
And don't forget to check out the American Legion's blog The Burn Pit (be sure to scroll down) to see the incredible things they are doing as well. Click here to get the most recent update but I'm told there will be an even more up to date post in the next day or two.
There is one more project I want to assist with for the Brigade. I'll be posting about that in the near future. It is very near and dear to my heart.
My doorbell rang this morning. Yeah. Saturday morning. I was still in PJs and grumbled all the way to the door. When I looked through the peep hole I saw a gentleman holding these
Aren't they gorgeous? And the bear is SO soft and huggable. I'm not sure Kelly knew that I love the aroma of lilies and that yellow roses are my favorite next to Tropicana roses. Knowing her she either knew or found out via her spies. LOL.
Kelly is the mother of one of my favorite Soldiers. (Relax men - I said ONE OF) Her son was wounded at the Battle of Wanat. Over the past 15 months we have become great friends after spending a lot of time visiting at WRAMC and in their home, at weddings and various ceremonies for the SKY Soldiers. And we have spent hundreds of hours on the phone and shared BILLIONS of emails.
Those of you who have relationships with the families of our Wounded know what a special gift their friendships are. Kelly and I have laughed, cried, screamed, rolled our eyes, hugged, cussed and shared gallons of adult beverages. The card with the flowers talked about the joys and sorrows we have shared. And the flowers actually brought sunshine with them. I mean REAL sunshine. Like many areas of the nation it has been cloudy and rainy here for a couple of weeks. Today the sun is SHINING and I attribute that to Kelly.
Like most, if not all, of the families of the Wounded and Fallen Heroes Kelly and her husband Craig continue to support our troops even while their son is healing. I could tell many amazing stories of all Kelly, Craig and their community have done to help support our military personnel but she wouldn't be happy with me if I did.
Thank you Kelly. I love you, too! I am more than blessed to have so many great Soldiers and their families who allow me to be a part of their daily lives. I love you all.
"I've got sunshine - NOT a cloudy day......"
A few weeks ago I was invited to be a judge at the Arkansas Blues and Heritage Festival BBQ Contest in Helena, AR.
NO BRAINER. So I called up Uncle Jimbo knowing he'd be on board to judge too. Alas...as much as it pained him to turn me down he spent the day frolicking all over DC and the surrounding area making videos. I know who he was frolicking with and don't blame him for staying in his AO. Besides, it was his birthday weekend.
Don't get me wrong. I tortured him ALL DAY with calls about all of the whole hog, pork shoulder and ribs I was HAVING to sample along with the Bloody Marys and free beer, water and cokes available to the judges. By the end of the day he was EXTREMELY annoyed with me. Oh well. SUCKER!!! Gonna be here next year are ya?
The competition began around 1030 hours with the Blood Mary Competition. Sampling 8 or so bloody marys wasn't a bad start to the day for the judges. Not to worry - the samples were divided between two teams of judges.
Next we moved on to the BBQ sauce division. I tasted 5 difference sauces. A couple were really good. One absolutely sucked. They were numbered, as this was a "blind" taste test,so I have no idea which team won. I left before the awards were announced.
My next "task" was to be a judge in the blind taste testing in the whole hog division.
Obviously the whole hog above was cooked via the rotating spit methods. Other teams will butterfly the hog for cooking. Either way it's quite a feat to cook a whole hog properly. During both the on-site and the blind judging the team is required to provide samples of from the ham, shoulder and tenderloin area. It's not easy to have the heat properly adjusted under each of those areas of the hog so, for example, that the less fatty ham cooks as tender and evenly as the more fatty shoulder.
As a judge in the "blind" taste test for the whole hog I had to sample and score the ham, loin and shoulder from three teams. Here's a picture of one team's sample
My next task as a judge was to go out, on site, with 2 other judges to judge the pork shoulder category. We were assigned to the VoodooQ team. They don't have a website so if you google for VooDooQ and find a website it's for a restaurant in New Orleans - not affiliated with this team. The members of this team are all volunteers for the Memphis in May International Festival and do participate in that festival's World Championship BBQ Cooking Contest along with their festival volunteer duties. I didn't get a picture of their product. Judging is a very serious business for these teams. They spend A LOT of time and money and expect the judges to be serious about it, too. Fair enough. However, after the judging time was over I did as if we could snap a quick photo,
Next assignment was on site judging of ribs. PORK people. PORK. This is REAL BBQ. I didn't get any photos of the pork on site judging but was assigned to judge the ribs of the team "Two Fat Drunks".
Back to the judge's tent for more liquid refreshments, funnel cake and deep fried twinkie to cleanse the pallet. Deep fried Twinkies suck!
The preliminary scores were tallied. Now it was time to send out on site judging teams to the top three teams in shoulders and ribs. As an aside, presentation counts for part of the score
My team of judges was sent to team Crispy Critters for the final judging on shoulder. I didn't find a link for the Crispy Critters but the link provided gives great info and a photo of the team.
Last assignment was to judge Team Central BBQ's ribs. God love 'em. They served both wet AND dry ribs. It's an absolute fact that on the BBQ competition circuit sauce is a must. Rare that a team will win with a dry rubbed product. But I do love dry rubbed, smoked pork. As a judge it is my duty to "go with the flow" on the sauce. And I do. As I mentioned before, these teams spend a HUGE amount of money and time to compete. Judges owe it to them to be fair.
I turned in my last score card. Said my "thank yous" and "goodbyes", took a stroll through the main street (Cherry street) and headed home - full as a tick and ready for next year's competiton.
Many thanks to Leslie and Jay for all the hard work they do to put on the competition and for including me as a judge this year.
The following photo is for Seavey - yeah, I gave him hell about not eating the corn properly!
DVIDs has a five part interview with 1LT Cason Shrode, SGT Jayson Souter, CWO Ross Lewallen (Apache Pilot) and CWO Chad Bardwell, Apache Gunner. 1LT Shrode and SGT Souter were in the TOC at COP Keating. CWOs Lewallen and Bardwell were in the first Apache to reach COP Keating.
I have been more than fortunate to meet many incredible members of our service branches. I can only hope that one day I will have the privilege to meet these honorable men and all those who worked with them during the Battle of COP Keating.
