May 2014 - Argghhh!

Both the Master and Mistress of Argghhh! are down with the plague. We've got the bonfires lit to burn off the bad air and to ward off travelers, and the Dead Cart drops by daily... Here's something to tide you over.

Putting some Castle militaria in context. Clearly a posed photo. The bubba behind the shield is pretending to be ready to throw his grenade, yet the cap is still on the bottom, where the fuze string (that you pull before throwing) is. Besides, everybody is awfully calm for the enemy being in hand grenade range, with the machine gun being unmounted and unloaded... But I'm all about the Trench Shield Grenade Boy is standing behind. Because we have one, a battlefield recovery from Cambrai.

February 19th (just a few days after my last post) I fell and broke my left leg in two places. It was all MY fault. Out walking with The Wife and dogs wearing little more than slippers(!) I stepped into one of the few patches of slush left. My right foot shot out in front, and all my weight came down on my left leg. Sounded like popcorn popping just before the loud cursing began. No surgery, but two casts and various braces later I still have about three more weeks of stumping around. Oh yeah, AND...

Two or three times a year some of us older folks get a bit tangled up in memories (or memories of memories). Late April and much of May are my primary dates.

[NB:Having just spent some hours updating the Medal of Honor posts from 2009, when I did one post a day for a year, this day seems the appropriate one to reprise the series, updated with all the new awards since 2009 - the Armorer] There were no Medals awarded for actions on this day until 2014, when Rivera's' award was made. His award resulted from a review of awards for possibly having been downgraded due to racial prejudice. The abbreviated citation is not unusual with those awards. Korea...