A CO with a sense of humor is a very good thing.
reminds me of a story:
When I was a lieutenant, I served as an infantry platoon leader in the 101st Airborne Division. We came down on orders for a six-month peacekeeping assignment in Egypt with the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO—great gig). We did a month back at base, South Camp, and a month at a patrol base outstation. At South Camp I had my own room, but at the outstation I shared a room with my company commander.
Our commander, an Infantry captain and West Point grad, was loved and respected by all. I got along with him very well. He was extremely physically fit and loved to show off his body, which to be honest looked pretty amazing. A cultural norm that I think a lot of people outside of the combat arms won’t really understand is how prevalent nudity was in the Infantry back in the all-male days, and how humorous we often found it. It was really pretty common in the field, and our commander was no exception. My commander slept naked (it was Egypt, I get it) and would take his time getting ready in the morning. While I was used to it, having been an athlete and having gone to a military junior college and been a member of a major national fraternity, before being in the Infantry, I would still just rather not have to look at another dude’s junk. One day we were in our room at the outstation and my commander was taking an inordinate amount of time to get dressed after returning from the shower.
“Hey sir, could you… I don’t know… put some clothes on?”
He turned to me, hands on hips, in his full birthday suit, “Nope!”
LOL, well alrighty then. I never asked again.
One of the things that CPT K. (pseudonym) prided himself on was making his bed. As mentioned, he went to West Point and he made his bed the same way he did as a cadet, using a ruler to make crisp hospital corners and (I think?) a dollar-bill-sized fold on the blanket. He would notice and get annoyed if his bed was disturbed during the day, like if someone put heavy mail for him on his bed, or of a friend of mine came by my room to talk and sat on it (where else are they going to sit in this tiny room). Once the soldiers became aware that it bothered him, they would often come in and make tiny changes to his bedcovers to see if he noticed. One at least one occasion they tried to short-sheet his bed but he immediately noticed when he came back to the room and it didn’t work.
He always noticed when someone screwed with his bed, and always blamed me. Somehow I was responsible for what happened in a room I wasn’t in, that wasn’t locked and that everyone in the compound had access to…
Anyway, one of the reasons CPT K. was well liked was because he was a champion smack talker. He was equal-opportunity about it, kind of “these verbal hands are rated E for everyone” kind of thing. He also enjoyed practical jokes. One joke he did to me almost caused an international incident but that’s a story for another day. And he could take it as well as he could give it, which all of us appreciated.
One day when he was away at a late-afternoon meeting I decided to give him a little payback and I short-sheeted THE SHIT out of his bed.
In case you don't know what that means:
How to Short Sheet a Bed: 9 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow
This was a pretty significant feat; if not done correctly, short-sheeting is pretty obvious on a bed with just one top sheet and a thin wool blanket. And it’s especially true when you’re dealing with someone who is conditioned to look for things being done to his bed and knows he has a practical joke target on his back. I used a clipboard to make the sharpest hospital corners. The blanket fold was done just right. Everything was smooth and tight, just like Sylvanus Thayer himself intended. And then I waited.
I was in bed reading a book (because "books" was still a thing back then) in bed when my commander came back in the early evening, just after dark. As he was getting (fully) undressed for the evening, he was running his mouth, talking smack to me about something or other. I just smiled in anticipation.
When he went to get into bed, he got about half of his left leg in before it stopped abruptly, causing him to kind of stagger and hop around on his right leg, which was still on the floor outside of the bed. Holding onto the blanket fold on the top of the bed, he pushed harder with his left leg, which of course did nothing. I don’t remember if he fell or not but it probably makes a better story if he fell, so yeah let’s go with that. But at any rate, remember he slept naked so can imagine what that looked like. And I’m like three feet away on my own bed while this is happening… jiggling hairy man-bits everywhere. And I’m just giggling into my book.
Anyway, at some point he rips off the covers and finds that he has been short-sheeted. He let out an expletive and then burst out laughing. “Good one. Did you do that?” he asked me. I just shrugged and probably said something like “Sir, wouldn’t presume to guess who would have committed such a heinous offense.”
He said “Right, I’ve got something for this.” He got dressed and grabbed his rifle, flak vest, and helmet. I didn’t know what was about to happen, but figured if the commander was getting dressed, I probably need to, too.
CPT K. went outside and hit the alarm to signal a base alert. Now when I say “base,” it was a platoon-size outpost, just my platoon and some support personnel from the company and battalion. So instantly all of my guys come tumbling out of the barracks trailer in their boxers and briefs, pulling on their boots and vests and grabbing their machineguns and grenade launchers. We did alerts regularly, I think maybe weekly, so this was not a surprise. And it was early enough in the evening that no one was asleep yet. After everyone was in their fighting positions and behind their weapons, CPT K. stalked along behind the line in mock outrage. “Right. We are in our battle positions and we are going to stay here ALL NIGHT until we find out WHO SHORT-SHEETED MY BED!!!!” The soldiers burst out into laughter at the knowledge that someone had finally got him. He laughed too and then ended the alert and dismissed everyone.
The alert was his way of letting everyone know that we finally got him. I thought it was really cool that CPT K. could make himself the butt of a joke in order to help keep up morale. Well done, sir.