…but first some movies! As far as the title, concerning the USS Cole…please scroll below. I know, things are very lopsided as a result of not blogging lately. We know when I’m on a roll and when I’m not, ha ha! Either way, hope everyone’s year has started off great!

This month is a good month as far as movies and it looks like I will be atypical of myself and actually line up these movies to be watched! Lately this past couple of days I’ve been convinced by Heather to watch The Bucket List…I’ll try to watch The Orphanage at some point in time, but in keeping with the momentum it may not be till it comes out on DVD. She also convinced me to watch a “classic” which has given me astounded looks as to why I haven’t watched it yet…Animal House. Already up on queue starting this upcoming weekend and throughout the rest of the month is Cloverfield, the Roscoe Jenkins movie, Rambo, Meet the Spartans…and a few others, just forgot them off the top of my head!

Before I go on, the TV is on in the other room and I’m listening to this strangely dressed Filipino guy on American Idol (the Dallas, TX audition episode) sing his heart out and now my head’s spinning, lol. Filipinos representing…had Venus represent in the opening episode of American Gladiators earlier…wow… That’s inspiration, those that watched her episode!

Okay, to The Bucket List. I went and watched this with Christine and we both agreed we enjoyed it. However, the next day, as I tried to tell it to Wayne…there wasn’t much I could say. I then realized that even though I did enjoy the movie, I can’t say that it was a really good movie…what I can say is that this movie may be more depressing the older you are when you watch it. I would keep this one away from hospitals, not really meant as a joke either. It’s an enjoyable movie and I did get my laughs as the movie was indeed trying to invoke it…but it is a painful subject for many that is very much so soothed with Morgan Freeman’s character, though some of that is taken off by Jack Nicholson’s character. Score: C+

Animal House…what a dated movie. Heather isn’t the first person to give me that “How did you NOT watch this…” look…I remember specifically I got this look from many shipmates of mine in the Navy…so I guess it was time I caught up on some movies, eh? Well, it’s pretty much a raunchy campus fraternity movie…pretty much sums it up, eh? I did get my laughs though not as much as I thought, maybe because my shipmates and I did funnier, crazier (to a point) stuff in the Navy. I guess it depends, we didn’t get in trouble either…but oh well, to each their own. One thing I enjoyed was Jim Belushi’s character, Bluto, and his role and ability in the movie to make a scene (and evoke a laugh) and saying little, if anything at all. Score: B

So anyways, something happened about a month ago. I have thought of it a little bit before I decided to post it. And today, well…I needed to post it.

Most of you are aware that I rarely care about the whole online bit. Facebook is nutty in that regards with everyone filling out weird online interactive stuff. Didn’t really get into that, quite honestly. Same on MySpace…a few comments here and there and if you blink, you’ll miss my twice a year bulletin. However, in my attempts to make myself easy to find and accessible to communicate, I have planted myself to online networks which I gather a decent amount of traffic. Also, to make things easier for those so they don’t have to sign up for anything, I try to make my profiles fairly public, but took it a step further with my own site which just requires you know how to pull it up on your browser.

About a month ago, I received a message from a Sharla Costelow. Her son had found one of my USS Cole videos on YouTube and sent me a message. I didn’t know how to reply. Those that have a good knowledge of the Cole attack on October 12, 2000 know that her husband, Chief Costelow, was one of the 17 to lose their lives that time. What only a few know is that the first person I had come across to help was Chief Costelow himself.

Me being and FC and he being an ET, we were in same departments but different divisions. The most we had was some small talk here and there, nothing really notable in my memory…except for one time in CSMC, everyone was talking about something about me…at that time it had to either be my virtually bottomless stomach or all the tools and gear that were attached to my belt. Also, I had arrived while our berthing was fairly full and I got a middle rack in the overflow section of our berthing. When Chief Costelow made Chief, they decided to turn the overflow section into the new Chief’s berthing as there was no room elsewhere. So I had a few hours to empty out my rack and move to another one, while Chief Costelow would take the rack I initially inhabited.

Those are the only two times I really remembered any interaction, and I thought about that shortly after I stood my first of several long watches in Yemen. Shortly after going to check our berthing about fifteen minutes after the explosion, I found several people had carried Chief Costelow over in front of the ship’s store…while I never asked, I’m sure he was in the Chief’s Mess during the explosion. I helped the rest of the guys lift him onto a stretcher and then Marlon and I took either side of the stretcher and began a wobbly transit to the starboard side and then over to medical. This is easier said than done, and I’ll leave it at that. We made it to medical but obviously the list of injuries was seemingly lengthy and we were redirected to the flight deck. Out there, several were doing first aid care and after turning over Chief Costelow, I proceeded back in to continue assisting in several tasks. Later that day, I do believe I saw they had moved him up to the midship quarterdeck…but I was on another task at that time and continued on with it. That was the last time I ever saw him.

Other than a lingering (but not justifiable) tinge of regret that I should’ve been as aggressive about security back then as I was since the Cole was rebuilt, I have no other thoughts of guilt…so I don’t know, it was just some bit of uneasiness of how I was to respond to Sharla. Eventually I did though and it all turned out well. Surprisingly for me, she is from Texas…I look forward to meeting her and her family someday.

That was about a month ago. Lately, when I think I’ve peaked of MySpace’s usefulness to me, I’m proven wrong. I’ve also found Terry on here, who shortly vanished after transferring to San Diego. When the USN and IRGCN had a little even the past week, Eric had found me. Well, today I got a MySpace message from what appeared to be a teenage girl. Well, it was from a teenage girl…the daughter of LTJG Triplett, an officer who also lost his life on the USS Cole on October 12, 2000. Apparently found out about me with my USS Cole vids on YouTube as well.

So now I put out this blog. Mainly because of LTJG’s daughter, in a two pronged manner. First the timing, then also because I am unable to send her a message through the only way I know (MySpace) as you have to be her MySpace friend to send her a message, so I guess I am in hopes that she will see this, that I thank her for the message and that she enjoyed the videos…and that I wish her well and the best in her life.

It is also probably time I also answer a question that I’ve gotten from a lot of people. Yes, I will be putting up another USS Cole video…the Cole is one of the proudest, if not the proudest, moment in my life so far. I’m really critical about this video, so it’s been really slow in the making…which I thought up two years ago, please bear with me for those that want to see it.

Before I close, it was good to hear from Agnes again…congratulations on your engagement and your countdown out!

Well, I guess that’s it for now.

…or is it? I’m sure, especially all my fellow Sailors, have seen the whole big news bit concerning the US Navy vs IRGC gunboats event that is permeating the world current affairs topic earlier today.

So to no surprise, I’ve gotten a lot of queries to my thoughts of the incident. Hating to be an armchair QB, I went and started to nose around to see what was going on and get as complete a picture as I could. Everything seemed to be going well as I started formulating my thoughts. While on my lunch break I started coming across some odd developments. After doing more checks after work, I really don’t have any comment except to wonder what is going on. I had just posted my thoughts a few minutes ago…

There’s not much wiggle room in lots of waterways. Hormuz, Gibraltar, Suez Canal…couple that with all the vessels going through these waterways and…well… Just an idea of what we’re talking about…take into account the Iran owns some of those waters makes it even smaller.

I don’t like it either, but having vessels get close to ships have and still happen a lot and several times it’s scared the crap out of me.

This is what I mean about the true story…I’m not sure what to comment on yet. I can say a little about our capabilities and procedures, but there’s not much of a point. Yes, I think the Navy has a ways to go and while that’s something to consider, that’s not what’s really making me wonder.

The threatening radio call and dropping objects were mentioned in an earlier morning release. Since then, those parts of the story have been removed. No mention on the Navy’s site, the DOD site continues the trend. U.S. 5th Fleet Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff gave the briefing in the morning…go to Fifth Fleet’s website…no mention of the incident, not in the Top Stories (though one of the involved ships, USS Hopper (DDG 70), is mentioned in an unrelated story)…not anywhere. That’s absolute incompetence or just a little on the odd side.

I don’t bother with most of the news media, they’re just jabbering what they’ve been fed. They’ve botched plenty of the submarine news and even the British boarding team, I don’t expect them to comprehend this.

Yeah, I’m not a big fan of when the news reports Navy incidents. I hope I’m wrong…but that’s just really weird. Unless it explodes to something bigger, I don’t really care as to what had happened. If it’s something of learning value, hopefully there will be more clarity in a few days, weeks or months. But for now, there’s gonna be more online QB’ing and I’m not going to bother getting mixed up in it.

I remember a while back we were considering making the IRGC a terrorist group, I guess that didn’t happen or I’d be very disappointed that there was no call for “Batteries Release!”

Hey everyone, hope your year has started out fantastic!

Me…it’s good…though it’s crazy. But let’s keep things upbeat for now, though I do have much to mention…I’ll leave that for another time. It’s Friday evening, should I bother working myself up? Thought so!

So, a SEAL I have respect for has put up a few tidbits on things. They are stuff that are actually pretty important to me…not as much now as when I was on the Cole, but it is all around useful advice. I was going to break it down, then I realized how my blogs on MySpace and on my site post the newer ones higher…so no point.

Speaking of, MySpace and all its errors can get aggravating…especially when a task of posting a blog takes about five minutes and it takes me almost half an hour of “Back” and/or “Refresh” buttons in earnest that the page will load properly. If this persists, then I really shouldn’t waste my time with it…we’ll see…

So, to the postings!

Failure

“If someone asked me what the most important ingredient to real learning was I’d have to say, “Failure”.

Remember messing up something you really wanted to do well, especially in front of an audience? Few lessons sting like that type of failure, but the next time you tried you sure had prepped the battlefield and set yourself up for success, didn’t you?

It’s critically important in our firearms training to set our goals high enough that failure will certainly occur as we attempt to reach our goal…”

“…It is during times of failure and our subsequent efforts to recover that we truly grow.

The first time I was a SEAL Platoon LPO I knew so much more about our training and logistics that I controlled too many aspects of our daily activity. I wanted us to never make a mistake. Well, we really didn’t, but THAT was a mistake. I was not mature enough as a leader to understand that I needed to “stay in the rafters” and let the guys do their best to reach the goal the way THEY saw fit. Later, in my next platoon LPO slot I reserved my episodes of swinging in from the roof for times when someone was going to get seriously hurt or major equipment damaged. I had learned to dial a measure of failure into the younger SEALs’ learning curve, so they too could grow and mature.

How many firearms instructors consider “failure” as a critical part of their curriculum?

I would rather pay for an instructor who has thoughtfully added failure into the learning equation than one who ran a “feel good” course.”

Next, final post…

What’s the difference…

“About 5 years ago I was instructing a rifle marksmanship course to a Task Unit from one of the Teams on the Blackwater KD range. The days were long and involved the guys shooting many courses of fire with their M4’s. Each day as we finished up the carbine drills the snipers in the group would peel away from the rest of the guys when the TU left the range and the snipers and I would move back to a comfortable range (for snipers) and make use of the last hour or two of light before sunset (and sometimes with NVD‘s a little more than that).

On one such day we set up on the 600 yard line and the TU snipers started going to work on the steel swingers out there. The guys would reconfirm 100 yard zeroes by setting up a cardboard target on the berm ahead of us and generally work on their wind calls and sniper marksmanship at their own pace. After 20 minutes of steady “pings” which indicated about 9 out of 10 shots per man were registering with steel I noticed that everyone was still shooting on their bellies and utilizing their bipods. One of the proud young snipers called out to me, “Hey, Chief. I’m ready for war.”

“Oh, yeah?”, I said. “What will you do if the grass is this high?”, and I motioned with my palm about mid thigh height.

The youngster’s face wrinkled for a second and he asked, “Shoot from a sitting position?”

I just shrugged. And he got the message.

So he set up and started banging away at the steel again. The other guys being copy cats, of course, eventually followed suit. The firing was pretty steady but the corresponding “pings” were less regular than before.

Soon enough my cocky young antagonist called out again. “All right, Chief. I’m ready for war again!”. Hmmm…I guess he’d reached “good enough”.

“Really?”, I said. “What will you do when the grass is this high?” This time I planed an imaginary line across my chest with my hand.

That’s when the firing trickled to a halt and I got the crazy look from several faces. We were losing light fast and I could see these guys re-living the 200 yard standing string of fire from the countless Navy quals they had recently endured with the M4…and not fondly, either. I motioned everyone to one end of the 600 yard line and asked for the Mk 11 of the SEAL who was camped out there. He gave me his Mk 11, told me its dope, and issued me a cheesy grin for my trouble.

Now, I had never actually attempted to hit a 12” plate from 600 yards offhand with a Mk 11 before, much less under the environmental conditions we had. But, I thought I had a ripe opportunity to make a point and I went for it. The guys were shooting to their individual comfort levels and nothing more and I ,one the other hand, was mentally in a different place .

I stood in front of the gathering and let the rifle hang in my wrists at arms’ length. I closed my eyes, breathed and thought about every single thing I was getting ready to do. I “pre-shot” that round mentally and even followed through with calling the imagined shot in my mind’s eye. When I was confident that I had already “shot” the round perfectly I raised the weapon. As I looked through the glass I saw the target cruising easily through the crosshairs again and again. After a couple of deep breaths I slowed my sinus rhythm and heart rate. That disc still eluded the crosshairs with ease., but even still I could put the brakes on it,…just in time…with….my… BANG ! ( and follow through with a shot call to myself- 6 o‘clock).

Nothing.

Once more I raised the weapon. I breathed, held…steady, steady, ….some brakes,…tension coming on the trigger…more tension….crosshairs approaching 12 o’clock and .. BANG! PING!

I lowered the Mk 11 and saw astounded faces.

I opened the bipod legs and rested the weapon on the ground.

“Do you all know the difference between you and I?”, I said to the group. There were a few opinions offered but none really hit the mark.

“I’ve never done that before. Never even tried it. But the difference between you all and I, is that I believed I could do it in my heart. Ok, we have about 15 minutes of light left and the range is still hot.”

One by one they moved back to their firing points and sooner or later they all gave it a try. I could see them look back at me after several shots went down per man with no effect. “What the…?” Before we called it quits a couple guys did hit the gong. But the point had been made.

I’ve crossed paths with many of these guys since that one particular long training day. I’m proud to say a couple have commented that my demonstration made all the difference for them being able to personally rise above the marksmanship plateau they were resting on.

This narrative is relative. I happened to be the example needed by those guys at their level that day. I seek my own personal examples to keep me pushing myself. Ask yourself, though, when you do see someone shooting far beyond your own ability- “What’s the difference between them and I?”.

Earnestly seek that answer and you will certainly improve.

Belief in self can be very powerful.“

Yes, it is…and I’m not going to mention anything about 2008! Except it’s gonna be a bummer…everyone’s going to be back from vacation and the almost tranquil commute to and from work I’ve had these past two weeks is going to become the craziness…I’m willing to bet nobody’s New Year Resolutions included learning to drive better!

So I left of quite some time since my last post. Let’s see…oh well, why drag this out. Let’s just move on to the past week on out. Everything before that…lessee, Chip, Dylan and I went to the Gaylord Texan…ate good food…didn’t bother with ICE! as there was a lot of little girls everywhere. Turns out it was some major cheerleading contest or what not. Also enjoyed the start of the Christmas festivities seeing Jason, Kerry and Melissa…Jason now rolling in his new and blue Rogue!

Christmas was great, enjoyed a downtown view on Christmas Eve, attended church at a church I haven’t been to since I was a child…at lots and lots of food. Presents were great as well. I still win awards for lame presents given out, and I’ve taken my gift wrapping skills (or lack thereof) even a notch higher!

Last Friday, one of those presents (from Dylan) was to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra on one of their two shows in Dallas. I first heard of them, I don’t know why, during my later years on the Cole and played their Christmas CD regularly in Radar Two. This would be my first time to see them as well as my first time in American Airlines Center. As to be expected, traffic was horrible. Coming along was my Mom as well…traffic was just pathetic. I always wondered about traffic in the whole Victory area.

Needless to say, this is the first show ever that I was late to…and they even delayed the show starting for about twenty minutes. Aside from the lateness and all that, we just arrived at the last half of the very first song. It was good music and an impressive show. First half of the show mainly focused on their Christmas music and a Christmas story they have up. The later half (the show was about three hours long) was more of a “fun” half with various different songs. Even did a feature with Paul Rodgers. The technical presentation and the stage was the best that I have ever seen with snow, lights, lasers and such. A very impressive setup. Overall an outstanding concert that I would like to return to next year. I place them third underneath Glenn’s shows and Kodo as my favorite shows. Speaking of Glenn, there has been some official mumbles that Glenn may include Dallas in the list of cities for December 2008 to debut his newest Christmas show. Why am I already excited?…I have a whole year to wait…ugh!

New Years was good. There have been some considerations to do the whole Big D NYE event (and this has nothing to do with you, Sean!) in Victory Park. At the last moment, I decided to stay traditionally indoors with family however, and that was fine enough for me. I enjoyed my toasts and drinks in a ginormous Soldats wine glass (this may have something to do with Sean…).

Well, 2007 was an incredibly swift year and it doesn’t matter who I’ve talked to…I have not come across anyone that has said otherwise. At one glance, it may have seemed I didn’t notice it go by…but being the 365 days that it is, it has been filled with many notable events. Many good and many bad, many in between.

As I’ve said to some, 2008 is going to be a busy year for me, at least. Take the lessons learned and build from it to better my life.

First lesson, and coincidentally…laugh, of the year: Quit texting acronyms, especially military type acronyms, to civilian friends! I can be fairly bad at that…this happened even a week ago, when I was asking Jason for a SITREP (SITuation REPort) and well, yeah…didn’t know what I was talking about. This morning I get a call from Heather asking if I was arrested on New Years Eve…some of you got my New Years text where I mentioned that I wasn’t going to Victory Park due to COP (Change Of Plans)…

So yeah, let’s see if December 2008 has me keeping my acronyms to a minimum! Welcome to 2008 everyone! Time to go back to work…ugh!