Regular readers will probably remember that I recently asked for readers to submit any any funny military stories they had. Well my new friend Sam has submitted one that I think is pretty good, and so I have allowed him to post it up here.
When I was stationed at Fort Sam Houston for nursing school there was a brand new facility opening as part of the hospital. For those non-military, the hospital in Fort Sam is the top dog of all Army medical centers. The new building was called the “Center for the Intrepid” and is a rehab facility for all the amputees coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan. The grand opening was a big to-do, canine-equestrian extravaganza with guest speakers/performers like Hillary Clinton, John McCain, John Mellencamp, and Rosie O’Donnell. I get the first three: major political figures and a celebrity who made very large contributions to build the facility. I never did understand why Rosie was there. But, then again, there’s a lot of people that don’t understand why she is here.
Needless to say, all the equipment in this building is state of the art and beyond anything I had ever heard of, let alone seen. My squad was lucky enough to be part of a tour through the facility about 2 weeks before they started receiving patients. The tour guide was a Captain and was showing us the various high-tech gadgets for treating the amputees and helping them cope with their new prosthetics.
One of the facilities in the building was installed on a concept so simple that I never would have thought of it. It was a fully furnished apartment.
The object was to allow the amputees to get used to doing routines chores like laundry, making dinner, vacuuming, etc. with their new prosthetics. And this apartment was NICE; a very plush pad indeed.
At this point the tour guide mentions that the whole building and equipment cost around $55 million and then asked if there were any questions before we moved on. Being the resident joker/smartass of my squad I raised my hand and asked, “So, what’s the rent go for on a place like this?” OK, kinda funny; a few people laughed until I decided to follow up. You know that voice in your head that’s supposed to inform your mouth when you’re about to say something really stupid? Well, that voice apparently was on vacation that day. Now, in my head, it was just the first metaphor for the money spent on the facility.
The follow-up statement was, “This place must cost an arm and a leg!”
Unfortunately, as you can imagine, it was NOT received well. The guy was a full-bird colonel next to me who, if looks could kill, would have cut me in half on the spot. All I could think about was how that’s not what I meant and I feel so small right now they won’t have to open the door as I could walk underneath it. Of course, my whole squad, who knows my sense of humor, thought I did it on purpose so I had to explain again after we got outside that I really didn’t mean for it to come out the way it did. I never did live that one down.
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