Back when I was a young Buck Sergeant in the U.S. Army, I ran into trouble trying to re-enlist. It wasn’t because the Army didn’t want to keep me around, even under Clinton they were smart enough to try and keep an NCO who’d maxed his promotion board.

No, it was the Company Commander who was holding up my re-enlistment because he knew I was going to take the option to bail on his ate-up unit as a part of my package. My enlistment was up in 2 months, and he wanted me to somehow take care of it after I joined them on a 3 month excursion to the Middle East. Apparently other people had jumped ship and his ass was in a sling trying to find competent NCOs who’d prop up his house of cards on their backs.

Whatever, I was 23, and resigned to GTFO of that mess on to either a cushy job as the BN Signal NCOIC (setting myself up for a relatively lucrative IT career as a civilian), or joining the 160th Special Ops Aviation Regiment on the way to trying out for Special Forces.

But I was getting the run-around with paperwork because of Captain Dirtbag, and my ETS (end time of service) date was fast approaching.

So one morning I was running Company PT and leading the formation in cadence on our 4 mile run. Something came over me and I channeled the spirit of Marshall Mathers and improvised the following cadence, on the spot, which was to be repeated line-by-line, by the entire company as we ran. (For those of you unaware of Army culture, I’m including footnotes so this makes more sense to you.)

Sergeant Coffee¹ what is up?
Will you tell me why, I can’t re-up²?
Is it DA³, is it the M-TOE⁴?
Or is it because of my C.O.⁵?

In hindsight, I could have gotten my ass put in a sling over this, and how. One of the senior E-6’s, upon me finishing my little improved cadence, exclaimed “damn!” with wide-eyed amazement and involuntarily covered his mouth out of shock. It’s a wonder how I got away with that, especially since I’d been yelled at for calling other cadences that were simply politically incorrect. Such as:

You go into the playground
Where all the kiddies play
You em-ploy your Claymore
And blow them all away

With a left-right-left-right-left-right-kill.
Left-right-left-I-think-I-will”.

For you paranoid breeders, that cadence is older than dirt and common in units without sand in their vaginas or concern for being politically correct. I do not own any claymores and would not be happy if someone used one on a playground. Besides, this isn’t even the worst cadence I’ve ever heard. That would go to an ex-Marine who was our unit Armorer in Panama:

(To the tune of The Beverly Hillbillies themesong):
Now listen to a story ’bout a man named Jed
Poor mountaineer, barely kept his family fed,
Then one day he was porking Ellie Mae
When up from his stuff come a-bubblin’ spray.

Next thing you know Ellie began to swell
Kin-folk said Jed this is what you do:
Get a can of Lysol and a coat hanger too…

I swear to god, this was an actual cadence, pretty much word-for-word, called while running the hills on Fort Clayton, Panama. And to top it off, there was a female Lieutenant running with us who called the guy out of formation and with tears in her eyes, chewed his ass for it. As we kept running by I could still see the hint of a remorseless grin on his face.

Anyway, that’s my fuzzy memory for the day.

1. The reenlistment NCO, in charge of getting me to stay in the Army.
2. Reenlist, duh.
3. Department of the Army.
4. Modified Table of Organization and Equipment – basically a unit’s inventory including soldiers.
5. Commanding Officer.

I have 42 unread private messages on Bullshido. Just figured I’d share that.

The new video for “Pork and Beans”:

I’m not sure if I should think this is nifty or roll my eyes at it. If only there was a word between “huh” and “meh”, that’s what I’d use. Wait, duh, there is a word for that:

“heh”.

That’s exactly what I think of this video. “Heh”.

I was born in KC and grew up in Texas. So while an appreciation for country music and mullets, or a predilection for window decals of Calvin pissing on random things never took hold (thank FSM), I did develop a taste for good barbecue.

Creative license and a desire for meaningful backstory might get me to suggest that a love for BBQ was one of the reasons I left California and moved back to KC. I’d be blowing smoke up your ass if I did though. Mundane crap such as the cost of living, traffic, taxes, and hippies, and the general douchebaggery of many Californians (particularly the Bay Area) were the real reasons. I wasn’t thinking so much about food as I was about paying 20% more for everything and the privilege of waiting in lines for an hour or more just to get it. The Bay Area would be a wonderful place if it had half the people and a quarter of the Nanny-State devotees.

But much like Kalib Starnes’ MMA career, I digress.

We ducked out for lunch yesterday and visited Holy Smoke BBQ here in Lee’s Summit, MO. I won’t drone on too much about how good this place is. I’ll just leave it at that: they’ve got the best BBQ in Kansas City.

And that ticks me off a bit, to be honest. Here’s why: they’re a “Christian” restaurant.

Don’t misunderstand me, I don’t care if the owners are Christian. Actually, that’s 100% accurate; I don’t care that the owners are Christian. It doesn’t make the food taste any better (or worse), and just comes off as passive-aggressive proseltysing. To their credit, they don’t completely beat you over head with God’s “comforting” rod (lol, Psalms). But once you realize that the “Holy” in “Holy Smoke” goes beyond just another trite pun-based restaurant name into sanctimonious jerk territory. We get it, you believe in Jesus. You and the other 85% of the country.

Either the owners are really sincere about their beliefs and want to interject it into all areas of their lives, or it’s just an arguably clever marketing device. “Oh yeah, well I love Jesus more because I eat only Christian Barbecue!” Apparently there was a contestant on this past season of American Idol who staved off going home/being voted off the island/whatever by singing “God Bless the USA”. Using Jesus in your business is a similar tactic and betrays either a lack of confidence in your product or a sincere belief that it sucks. Which is sad, because these guys really do make ridiculously good food.

And if the owners really are sincere in their beliefs, that’s perfectly fine. For the most part, Christians are great people when they’re not trying to abuse Democracy in order to vote Jesus into schoolbooks and Science out of them. But frankly I just find the whole idea of Ideological Food annoying at best, and completely repugnant at worst. If it didn’t taste good I wouldn’t eat at a “Flying Spaghetti Monster’s pizza joint”, or get a “Libertarian Sandwich,” or drink “Second Amendment Coffee”. There’s just something completely distasteful (pun somewhat intended) about interjecting your beliefs into a restaurant or food product in general. (You hear me Ben and Jerry?)

All that aside, yeah, this is some great food. I ordered “The Summit” and here’s where the regret comes in. It’s an angus beef hamburger, covered in bbq sauce and cheese, along with two other meats of your choice. On mine was brisket and sausage. Yes, I ordered a BBQ Cheeseburger with Brisket and Sausage. The whole thing was a tower of savory angina and I enjoyed the hell out of it. I had to casually toss aside the vegetables (they kept sliding off the tower o’ meat) so this sandwich had no redeeming nutritional qualities other than the massive amount of protein.

Oh, and they have sweet potato fries. Hell yeah.

I realize I spent most of this post rambling about everything but the food, but honestly it’s so good there’s really not much to say about it. I just wish they’d have one less side on their menu because I can do without the Extra Jesus. Still, the “Regret” isn’t about handing over money to Christians, some of which will undoubtedly go towards them trying to spread their meme. It’s because that burger was probably 1000 calories (of awesome) and I had to get up this morning and work out twice as hard for having eaten it. Hell, I’ll probably work out twice today just to make up for that. Jesus.

Why didn’t the bad guys just shoot Robocop in the mouth?

For the record: I do not support violence against police officers, or robots. I did however, recently read (more like “listened to the audiobook while commuting”) “How to Survive a Robot Uprising“. But I’m pretty sure by the time the robots start coming for us, most of the information in there (such as using their limited sensory equipment against them to avoid getting robowned), won’t do much good.

We do seem to be slipping down that slope, on the inner tube of technology, pretty damn fast. That’s why I’m making this blog post now so when the robot hive-mind sifts through Archive.org in the year 2037, they’ll see me as a loyal supporter and spare me the coming holocaust while my neighbors get turned into fuel.

Never hurts to think about the future.

A few weeks back I did a short interview with the guy from the BJJ blog “Punch Kick Choke”. Here’s the first question and you can follow the link at the end to read the rest of it.

So, Mr. Fletcher- your name strikes fear into the hearts of ninjas everywhere and makes grown LARPers cry in shame. Tell us a little about the man they call “Phrost.”

Well for starters “Phrost” just a username I’ve had for about 10+ years now and at this point I’m kind of stuck with it. I tried to change a while back but the people on Bullshido vetoed the idea.

Honestly, I’m not really that interesting. I’m a judge with the Kansas Athletic Commission and the ISCF, and I have a humorous 0-2 MMA record. The last guy I fought posted the footage on YouTube and the comments are overrun by people who have sand in their nether-region because of what we’ve done on Bullshido. They’re good for a laugh at least. One of them read: “Is that Bill Duff?”

I was a Sergeant in the US Army and ran the Signal/Communications section for a Military Intelligence battalion. I smoke cigars, generally eat like crap and hate doing cardio; so I’m no physical specimen in any sense. I play too many video games in the little free time I have. Basically I’m just a geek who likes fighting; both as a fan and a participant. I use semi-colons way too much; like this. I believe that we’re all compelled to violence in one form or another, and it’s much more healthy for us to express this by kicking someone’s ass (or at least trying to) in the relatively safe and controlled environment of a Combat Sport, than it is to deny the impulse only to have it emerge in an anti-social or even criminal form.

Besides, kicking someone in the head is just good family fun.

I’m also a Skeptic, and I capitalize this for a reason as a “Skeptic” is someone who uses critical thinking, logic, and science to arrive at their own personal knowledge of things. This is different than the more common use of “skeptic”, meaning essentially “someone who doubts everything, regardless of credible evidence. I’ve come to the conclusion that most people simply don’t know how to think; not what to think, how. And I believe this is the root cause of why so many get victimize by frauds and scams.

So in a nutshell I guess I’m a sanctimonious, condescending prick with a love of fast food, guns, America, and violence; or in other words, a true product of the Reagan years, minus the religion. (I’m an Atheist.)

And the rest, you can find here:

Punch Kick Choke interview.

Ever since W.J. McBride’s closed there hasn’t been a shepherd’s pie in this town worth a damn thing. I’ve been trying to find an “Irish pub” here that served a decent plate of it and as of last night I’m 0 for 2.

I’ve got things to do so I’m not going to elaborate very much, but what kind of freaking Irish place serves risotto?

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great looking Irish pub, and the band was playing “Whiskey in the Jar” and such, and our bartender was cool. But my wife’s fish and chips came in a metal vase/basket, and the “pie” was basically a round “cake” of ground beef under a matching hockey-puck of what tasted like instant potatoes, all resting in a puddle of some kind of sauce.

Shepherd’s Pie is one of those meals that’s supposed to stick to your ribs, put hair on your chest, and make you gain 10lbs before it even gets to your table. This version, however, was more like something served by a French chef whose Irish boss is banging his wife. It’s almost as if the chef resents having it on the menu to such a degree that he felt the need to create a hostile parody of the dish in the same way that Satanists parody the Catholic church with their Black Mass.

I don’t consider myself to be a restaurant critic, and frankly don’t care for hoity-toity food-as-art. I’m still pissed about the $300 bill from Picasso’s in Vegas for some goddamn pigeon and a thimble of rice. But the appeal of Irish cuisine is that it’s basically celtic comfort food. And this dish was about as comfortable as a Jewish family at a Farrakhan rally.

Is there any “Irish” place in KC that can get it right?

Posted by Bullshido Forums Bully “Chemistry” in this thread:

So we are now a weapons free campus…