The dozen or so pink plastic Flamingos we set out in front of our Consolodated Mess Hall/DFAC one morning while all the mess sergeants were fussing over getting every spot inside scrubbed and shiny were the result of a similar local discovery. WE had debated painting them OD, but were concerned that if we did, they might have been overlooked.

One of the guys on duty inside told us about the look on the faces of the assorted mess NCOs and officer when the inspection team staggered in laughing their heads off. The cooks couldn’t figure out what they’d found so funny.

Which would have been okay, except that our company clerk was a bit of a cartoonist, and added a little cartoon figure of a dead soldier lying at attention in the *personal item* space of the drawing.

Whereupoon, most of us went out and got little plastic GI Joe dolls or other military figurines to go in the appointed space. It being near Christmas at the time, some got little ornament figures of Santa, neatly shaved off his beard, and made up little fatigue outfits for him, right down to tankers CVC helmets made of miniature football helmets, spraypainted olive drab.

When the good colonel left our building, wondering why toy soldiers were so popular in HQ Company, he found a little GI Joe sitting on the hood of his jeep, with a tiny little cigarette in its mouth made out of a short piece of soda straw, and actually smoking, courtesy of a small chunk of dry ice within.

Whatever he said to the SMAJ and our First Sergeant was not reported. But our First Sgt always grinned when he told the story.