Happy Birthday and Girl Scout Cookies for the Wounded

OK, quiz - who is that kid in the picture?

No, I mean the skinny, good-looking one on the right.Yeah, that's me at the tender young age of 21, which event occurred exactly 36 years ago today. So Happy Birthday, Rog!

Now I wasn't looking quite that dapper on the actual day of birthday. I was in basic then, and came down with pneumonia and was admitted to the base hospital.

I’d been at sick call all afternoon, so missed both lunch and dinner. By the time I got to the hospital, it was late at night and the mess hall was closed. Not my ideal way to spend my 21st birthday.

One of the medics went into his supply room, and came back with a few packages of cookies for me. That was all I got for my birthday dinner, but I was mighty glad to have them. He told me they were donated by a local organization, and that he kept them around for emergencies like this. I never knew who donated those cookies, but I’ll never forget what they meant to me.

Last year, on my 56th birthday, I got to pay that act of kindness forward. One of our Soldier’s Angels in Florida arranged for her local Girl Scout council to donate a bunch of cookies, and my wife and I arranged to have cases shipped to eight CSH’s.

So here is my challenge to you: pick up some Girl Scout cookies and I'll let you know a Combat Support Hospital in Iraq, Kuwait or Afghanistan to mail them to. Or go to the Soldier's Angels store and order a case there. We'll mail them to any deployed soldier you want, for only the cost of postage - $18.00. Such a deal, and I promise you'll make some sick or injured GI's day.

Might even be his birthday.

Rog

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