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Driving an MRAP sucks. What sucks even more is trying to explain to civilians what an MRAP is. Everyone knows the infamous “humvee,” but then you’re like, “Yeah I was a turret gunner in an MRAP,” and they look at you like you just shat on a baby’s forehead, so you have to sit there and break it down, “It’s like a giant SUV covered in armor.”
Okay that might be an exaggeration, but back to the point, driving an MRAP sucks. I was unlucky enough to be selected to get my MRAP license during my 2nd trip to Mojave Viper prior to my 2nd deployment to Iraq. Driving an MRAP is laden with subtleties in technique; for instance, in order to stay straight along the narrow two-lane highway from Camp Wilson to Twentynine Palms mainside, you have to narrowly line up the seem of the engine vents in front of you with the lines on the road. You can’t actually tell if you’re in the lanes using the mirrors and especially not using the windows–which are laughably tiny for such a massive vehicle–so you have to basically pray to whatever god you worship that you’re not swerving all over or off the road entirely.
The worst part of it was the night-time, off-road course at Camp Wilson. I basically almost killed about 5 Marines when the vehicle came about a cunt-hair away from rolling over off the side of a hill. The tall stature and top-heavyness of the vehicle causes it to sway in exponential momentum, which is especially awful when you’re a turret gunner of one of these things, which I was during the majority of my first deployment. I didn’t mind, actually, I got used to it. I actually enjoyed the MRAP more than any other vehicle, it was higher up and I felt like I had my own little world in the lead vehicle; a nest of pen-flares, flags, grenades and beanie-babies.
In Kickstarter news, we’re nearing the next stretch goal at $125,000!
I know all of this seems like some crazy amount of money, and in many ways it is, but there’s also a lot of costs going into this. With more backers, the price of producing the rewards and shipping increase exponentially. A lot of people are telling me, “DAMN MAN YOU’RE RICH YO,” and I’m like, “lol not really.” Being smart with the money, there’s a lot of things I’m obligated to fullfill to you all, and that’s my absolute first priority.
Just a reminder, there’s about 10 days left! As we near the end of this craziness, keep in mind that the only way to get stickers and coins and such is to back the campaign. As of right now, I’m only intending on producing enough of these items to safely cover all of the backers; and since we have over 2000 backers, that’s already a lot of shit.
So, get in while you can!
Otherwise, for your weekend libo brief, I’ll leave you with these words of wisdom one of my old First Sergeants used to bless us with every weekend:
If it looks like shit, smells like shit, it’s probably shit.
Don’t be the one to step in it.
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