Basic Training Lessons

Basic Training was a really great experience for me but at the time it was a shock to my system because I was experiencing things that I had never experienced before. When I joined (took the Oath at MEPS), it was the day before my 28th birthday, which is the age cutoff for the U.S. Air Force. So, I was the oldest in my flight. My first day of basic training was my birthday and we were so busy and on the go that I didn’t even have time to even remember that it was my birthday. The intake process was so involved because we had to get issued our gear, our uniforms, get immunizations, fill out form after form, etc. …just so much to do. We finally got to bed at 3 a.m. after being up for 23 hours straight and then one hour later at 4 a.m. just as we were finally dozing off, the Training Instructors (IT) came back in yelling for us to get up and get dressed and be outside for Reveille in 5 minutes. Before we went to bed at 3 a.m. they told us what to have ready to put on in the morning, so we had our clothes laid out and we just had to rush to get them on and get outside.

After Reveille, we went to breakfast then went back to our dorms to learn how to clean. When we all walked into our dorm room our IT’s noticed there was a girl still asleep in her bunk. LAWD, all hell broke loose… We all got yelled at for that one. She got screamed at and we did too for allowing her to be left behind. One of the biggest lessons in the military is never leave anyone behind. When one falls, we all fall. When one fails, we all fail. When one succeeds, we all succeed. So, the TI’s gave her the nickname, “the Sleeper”.

First Call Reveille

Marching on the Wrong Foot

Have you ever marched on the wrong foot? I have and it can earn you a new job… I was made a Road Guard because I was always on the wrong foot. I am 5 ft tall and was the shortest girl in my flight, so everyone else’s stride was wider than mine and when we marched, I was always double-timing to keep up with everyone else. When we marched, we had to be uniform and stay in line and even with our row and column. We had to march everywhere we went and stay in formation and on the right foot and be in synch with everyone else. I was the shortest and the Sleeper was the tallest, so she was always on the wrong foot too. So, the TI’s made both of us Road Guards. We had to march a few feet behind the flight and when the flight was coming up to a street intersecting with the street that we were marching on, we had to run up ahead of the flight and stand as a guard with our hands out to stop any potential oncoming traffic (other flights marching or cars) while our flight past the intersection, we had to run to catch up with our flight and get back in our place a few feet behind the flight.

From Baby Flight to Mother Flight

A few days after Basic Training started, we were introduced to our “Mother Flight”. We were told that we were their “Baby Flight”, the men who came in with us were our “Brother Flight”, and the men that came in at the time our Mother Flight came in was our “Father Flight”. So, the Air Force rotates their new class of Air Force recruits in on a schedule so that when one flight graduates, their Baby Flight is halfway through Basic Training and now that they are graduating, their baby flight becomes Mother and Father Flights, and they each get a new baby flight in that they can mentor. The cycle continues because the first three weeks they are breaking you down to get rid of the mess that you were so that the last three weeks of basic training they can build you back up into the outstanding soldier that you need to become. Whenever we were anywhere near our Brother Flight, if we tried to talk to them or even look at them, our TI’s would scream at us to “LOOK AWAY! THEY ARE BALD & BROKE! DON’T EVEN LOOK AT THEM! LOOK AWAY!”

Our Mother Flight would mentor us and show us tips to make things easier and how to do things when we cleaned our dorm to pass inspection, etc. Once our mother flight graduated and we became the Mother Flight to the new incoming baby flight, we were able to give some good advice to them as well. We mostly passed down what we had learned from our Mother Flight, but we did pass down a really good tip that our TI’s were impressed with.

When you are in a flight of 50 women, and everyone has to go to the bathroom at the same time it can be time consuming for all to stand in line to wait their turn even if the bathroom has 4 or 5 stalls. We were not allowed to Lolly-Gag and take our time so we were still getting yelled at to hurry up even when it wasn’t much that we could do to speed up the process, so we tried to come up with ways to get the flight in and out of the stalls as quickly as possible. We were required to be in uniform at all times unless it was lights out. To be in uniform was to be completely fixed right and our uniform worn correctly with nothing added to or taken away. For example, if we were in uniform and our belt buckle was undone, we were considered out of uniform. So, one time I was in the stall and once I finished using the restroom, I came out with my buckle undone and my tee shirt untucked so the waiting airman could go in and use the stall while I stood by the sink to tuck my shirt in and buckled my belt before washing my hands. Well, when I came out of the stall my TI walked in to yell at us to hurry up and she saw me with my shirt untucked and my belt buckle undone. She tore into me and then another airman came out with her shirt untucked and buckle undone, while the waiting airman went into that stall, and so on. Our TI look at me then her and I said, “we do this to make the line go faster because we can get dressed out here instead of in the stall so the other airman can get in the stall faster”. She looked impressed and said to carry on. This is just one of many examples of how we came up with ways to make it easier on us and our baby flight.

The two belt buckles are examples of the type of belt buckle that I used while I was in the Air Force. The top buckle was worn with the Battle Dress Uniform (BDU) and the bottom buckle was worn with our dress blues.

Does Salvation Fix Vices or the Heart?

If you ask a Christian how they know they are saved, they will most likely tell you that the know they are saved because Jesus changed them from the person they once were to a better person and that Jesus took away their vices.

They will tell you how they used to smoke, curse, drink alcohol, had pre-marital sex, had a porn addiction, or did drugs. They will tell you how they don’t do those things anymore because Jesus made them a new person. They believe that God gave them a free will to change their evil ways. They believe that vices are sins.

In the picture above the Christians see the woman on the left as a sinner because of the way she looks and the woman on the right as righteous because her appearance is more modest and conservative by the way she dresses. The depiction says, ‘When she picks up the Bible and starts to read it…” It shows a woman that gradually changes from the appearance of a streetwalker to a college girl. But did her heart change at all? Is she still angry and resentful towards her fellow man? Is she still subject to words? Does she still have an ego? Does she still have “fear, doubt, worry, insecurities, etc.”?

But the Christians will also admit that they are still a sinner and that they sin every day. They will admit that their heart is still wicked because they have pride, they speed or break the law in some minor infraction, and some will even admit to having road rage, and they usually admit to having lustful thoughts. They believe that sins of the heart are ok because God is always willing to forgive us if we ask because we are human, and no one is perfect except Jesus. Because they say that Jesus is God, so he was the only one who could possibly be sinless or perfect.

If as 1 Samuel 16:7 says that God looks on the heart while man looks on the outward appearance, then why wouldn’t salvation be of the heart and not of the vices or the things that we DO?

Photo by Brian Banford on Pexels.com

On the outward some may seem better than another based on their outward appearance but only God knows our heart. Many people have a dark heart, and they don’t even realize it. They’ve deceived themselves into believing into their own intellect that they are righteous because they do things on the outward for people that they see as less fortunate as them or less than them. the truth in that we may as humans look on the outward appearance of our fellow man, but we cannot see their heart unless we ourselves have a heart of love, God’s perfect love. Otherwise, if we are in a fallen state, then our heart is dark, and we cannot see the light in others unless God allows us to see that light.

One thing I know for sure from experience, when you go and forgive by realizing you are wrong to judge yourself and others, then God will forgive you and you will immediately have peace, patience, and all of the other fruits of God’s spirit and the fruits of Satan’s spirit will be removed from you forever. Then God will fight the fight of the vices and they will fall away as you grow in the spirit by doubting every thought and stand quiet before God in silent prayer. Be Still and know God and as you do then God will fight the battle for you and destroy the ego that made a home in you when you were turned away from your father and you retreated into the darkness of your imagination.

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How to Add a Website Link to iPad Desktop

There may be times when you want a shortcut link to a particular website saved to your iPad desktop, but some browsers do not have the option to save to desktop. See below for the steps to add a website link to your iPad desktop. This will work on the iPhone as well.

Safari is the default web browser that comes with the iPhone and iPad; it is Apple’s browser. However, many people prefer to use a different browser of their own preference. My favorite is the Google browser, but I also use Chrome and have used DuckDuckGo in the past as well. There are a number of web browsers available from the Apple Store such as, Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Brave, Firefox, DuckDuckGo, Opera, Google, etc. I have not tested all browsers but the ones that I do use do not have the option to ‘Add to Homescreen’. But the Apple Default Web Browser, Safari does have this option.

  1. From your iPad, search your app library for Safari or ask Siri to open Safari for you.
  2. In the URL box, type in http://www.BlogsbyBG.com and hit enter or Go.
  3. At the top bar of the Safari window to the right of the url box, there is a share icon. Tap this icon. It looks like a square with an arrow pointing upward.
  4. Scroll down a bit until you see the option to “Add to Home Screen”. Tap this option.

5. The Add to Home Screen popup box will display, showing the icon and the name of the website that will be added to your iPad home screen.

6. Tap ADD in the upper right corner of that popup box.

7. The website link will be placed on your iPad desktop.

8. If you want the icon on a different screen, then you can move it by editing the Home Screen.

Normal Common Sense

Logic and Common Sense go hand in hand… however, if you have anger then you cannot usually do things in a commonsense way. God is logical and common sense and Satan is emotional and goes off of intellectual knowledge and feelings to make decisions. I love what Jesse is pointing out here with this man in his church congregation… If you hold on to the past, you will never be free; we have to doubt every thought of the past and reject all thoughts of the future because neither exists. All we have is the here and now. God lives in the present and time does not exist for God or his people.

Forgive and Forget the Memories of it…

Jesse Lee Peterson on the Dr. Phill Show

Not a fan of Dr. Phill at all but when my preacher is on his show, I have to share the clip. It’s interesting how brainwashed people are to be so politically correct that they are visibly shocked and offended by the Truth. Amazing!

JLP on Dr Phill – 11/29/2022

The segment that Jesse was on was dealing with Population Control and how people or certain groups of people are not having enough children to sustain the population or grow it. Dr. Phill told Jesse that he had pissed off everybody by his comments. But Jesse brings up a good point. Tell me in the comments what you think of Jesse’s statement. Do you agree or disagree with him?

I remember when I was in College, I had determined in my heart that college would not turn me away from God because I had observed people who had gone to college came out atheist or agnostic. I remember a biology lecture where the instructor went on and on about how the Earth was overpopulated and how we as humans owed it to our fellow man and the Earth to stop having so many children because we were on a so-called pace to not be able to sustain ourselves in a few short years, etc. I remember rejecting that idea right off the bat. I could see that it was a lie because God said, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth’ and I do not recall anywhere in the Bible or in my spirit where he ever rescinded that command. So, I didn’t buy into it, but I know that a lot of students believed it. This message was also being pushed in the public schools and in Hollywood and the media so over time society has accepted it as normal, but it is not normal; it is anti-family, and it is anti-God.

Happy Thanksgiving

I am thankful to God for allowing me to hear the Truth because the truth has truly set me free. I’ve always heard that scripture but didn’t really make a connection to it until God opened my eyes and let me see that something was missing in my life and in my salvation. As a logical thinker and a common sense person, I knew something was wrong with what I was being taught in Church and what I was being taught the scriptures meant or how I was interpreting the scriptures.

I was a seeker of God, and I knew that I needed to stand quiet before God in order to connect with Him spirit to spirit so that I could follow His lead. I called this ‘Standing Quiet Before God’. Over time I could see that there was something missing in the teachings of the Christian church if we were so focused on changing the outward (aka the vices) and ignoring or accepting the things of the heart because I knew that the bible says that God looks on the heart, but man looks on the outward appearance. It did not make sense to me that I still had the fruits of Satan’s nature when God said we shall be known by our fruits and if the fruits of God’s nature could not be obtained until we got to Heaven, what’s the point? Didn’t Jesus say that if a tree does not bear fruit, it should be cut down and cast into the fire? I was taught against ‘once saved; always saved’ but I knew that God said that no one can take us out of his hand once we believed. But time and time again I have seen Christian people fail and even myself from time to time over the years… and I and I’ve seen others go back into sin and it was usually the same vices that we were set free from when we first got saved but whenever a storm blew in, we were pulled back into the same sin. But if God delivered me from that vice, why was I pulled back into it? It didn’t make sense to me. I knew something was missing. I knew that sin was of the heart and not the vices.

I didn’t understand how I could be saved but still be a sinner with a flesh when the Bible clearly says that you won’t sin after you have believed. God circumcises our hearts; cuts away the flesh. It also says that light and darkness cannot dwell together nor have fellowship with each other so that told me that I could not be righteous and still sin in the same body at the same time or go back and forth between the two. Jesus said that the Kingdom of Heaven was within me so why am I looking for Jesus to come back in a cloud to rescue me from this dark world? If I’m in the world but not of the world, why do I care about the hell that’s going on around me? I’m supposed to be a light in a dark world for others to see and find their way to the light. Also, this notion that the sin in the world is grieving the Holy Spirit inside of me didn’t make sense either because ‘the world’ didn’t bother Jesus when he hung out with sinners. I realized that I was judging the world around me and I knew that if I judge anyone then God would judge me with the same measure. I also realized that Jesus had peace within, and he was not defined by the hell in the world around him nor was he bothered by it or grieved by it. So, I realized that if I was feeling anything about the hell around me, then that means that I have no peace within and if I have no peace within then the Kingdom of Heaven was not within me. How could I have Jesus in my heart and still have internal conflict of any kind?

So, in a nutshell, I’m thankful for God waking me up in 2017 and giving me perfect peace and helping me grow as I walk with Him. God has led me my entire life to this point and because I was always a seeker and an observer, I was able to see the light that God put out there for me to see and it led me to Him and to perfect peace and to the fruits of His spirit and now the hellish world is without while I have peace within and nothing or nobody can take me out of his hands.

God Bless You!
God has been good to me!
lol Just a little Thanksgiving humor…
Thanksgiving Selfie…

A Country Boy Can Survive

After Basic Training, Tech School, and working with my US Air Force Recruiter in my hometown for two weeks, I was finally ready to report to my first duty assignment… the 314th Airlift Wing, Little Rock Air Force Base, Arkansas.

As a single Airman, I was assigned to a co-ed dorm to live. I didn’t have a roommate, but I did have a suitemate. A suitemate is where we each have our own room but share a bathroom. We both had to keep the bathroom clean, but I was responsible for my room, and she was responsible for her room. We had a dorm master who inspected our rooms once a month and we were on rotation so each week he would inspect but because there were so many it rolled around that each person or suite was only inspected once a month and we knew when so we could make sure it was clean for inspection. He would also pick a suite or room that was the best for the month and that Airman would get an Air Force Award. I did get an award while I lived there.

The dorm was co-ed so there were men and women who lived in the same building and on the same floor, but men were suitemates with men and women were suitemates with women; we did not mix the sexes on sharing a bathroom. When I first got there, I had a suitemate, and she was loosie-goosy like my sister. Meaning that she never remembered to lock or unlock the door, so I was often locked out of the bathroom because she locked my side of the door and forgot to unlock it. She often left her side of the door open when she had people over for a party and since I worked shift hours, when I would work 3rd shift, I would sleep at odd hours when others were awake. It would be awkward when I would wake up and go to the bathroom in my night gown and she’d have her door open to the bathroom and people would be there looking in to see me going into the bathroom. I was in a fallen state then, so I did have anger and this type of thoughtlessness annoyed me.

One Friday afternoon, I got off work and went to the gym and worked out. I went back to my dorm to grab a quick shower because I was meeting some friends to go out and realized that my suitemate had locked me out of the bathroom, and she was gone for the whole weekend. I had to go down to a guy in my unit’s room and ask him if I could use his shower. He was on his way out too for the weekend and I barely caught him, but he let me use his shower and just asked me to lock up. I am thankful that he trusted me to be in his room with him not being there. My suitemate was transferred out to a new duty station after a while and from that point on until I moved out, I did not have another suitemate.

There was a guy that lived in the room right across from mine who always played his music really loud, and he only played one song over and over again all day long and all night if there was a party in the dorm. It annoyed me and everyone in the whole dorm. He drank like a fish all the time and played the song, “A Country Boy Can Survive” by Hank Williams, Jr. When I was on shifts where I had to sleep at odd hours, he would turn the song up so loud that it would wake me up and I’d go over and ask him to turn it down, but he would not, and we always had beef about it. I never reported him to the dorm master, but he did eventually get written up over it and he even got reprimanded at work for being a drunk. I think they made him go to rehab. But he accused me of ratting on him. I told him, I wasn’t the one who ratted him out and that I never told on him, but I was the only one who would confront him about it while everyone else would go behind his back and complain about it. I told him that one of those people probably ratted him out. The reason I believed that was because when I had dorm duty one week everybody came to me and told me that they were so annoyed with him over playing that song over and over again, but they didn’t want to start any fights with him, so they just let me argue with him. I was thinking, ‘yeah, I could use some backup here…’ But he did try to do better after he got back from rehab. I moved out not long after that because I finally got my BAQ / BAS. That is the basic food and housing allowance so that I could live off base. When I first got there, I had to apply for it and then be put on a waiting list because they give preference to families, and then to married couples and then to singles.

A Country Boy Can Survive by Hank Williams, Jr.

For a long time, I hated this song… I would not listen to it at all for years after this experience. But now I like the song and have it on my iPod and listen to it in several playlists. I don’t know what changed my mind about it. I think it was forgiveness. Holding on to unforgiveness makes you hate anything related to a memory of someone that you hate. But true forgiveness causes you to forget and then you are free to enjoy things that really are not related to that experience in the slightest. I don’t know where this guy is, but I do wish him well and hope he has a better life today than he did back then. Whatever was making him drink like that was torment, so I pray that he found peace.

Dorm Duty

Dorm duty is a week that each Airman that lives in a dorm gets to be off from their normal job and gets to help out the Dorm Master around the dorm. We had to clean the common areas like the kitchen, the breakroom, the game room, the hallways; buffing the floors, emptying the huge trashcans that was always full of beer and pizza, and we got to mow the lawn… which was the best part because we got to drive the riding lawnmower. For some reason I loved riding the lawnmower. I just felt like I was doing a man’s job and it was something that was easy to me not like emptying the huge trashcans that were really too heavy for me to empty.

Photo by Erik Mclean on Pexels.com

Bible Thumper Thursday!

Let this sink in…

You Can Be Free

If you can really see this for yourself, you can be free.

Never Trust an Angry Person

Never trust an angry person; they will turn on you the moment that you disagree with them or the moment that you do not go along with what they want you to do. This is true for anyone who has one iota of anger. Anger is a spirit, and it is wicked. You cannot control a spirit; it is the nature of Satan, it is evil.

When I was in basic training for the United States Air Force, I experienced this firsthand. In basic training, I was in a flight of about 50 women. In the military, especially in basic training the goal of the drill instructors was to break us down and then to build us up. We had classes where we had to learn military rules and the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), so we had to study for written exams as well as take physical agility tests and learn military discipline and readiness in all aspects.

From sun-up to sun-down we were always on the go; we never had any idle time unless we were in line for chow or some tasks that we were doing. Even in idle time while in line waiting to get into whatever activity we were about to do or perform we always had to be productive. On day one, our Drill Training Instructors (TI) asked if anyone had a college degree. Of the ones who had college experience they picked the one who had the most college and make her our “teacher”. They said if we were ever in line or standing idle waiting for anything that she was to go up and down the line and drill us on our written exams; the UCMJ, or military history. They gave her a teacher’s book with the answers, and she was to ensure that we were studying even when idle or standing in line.

We all got along for the most part and our “teacher” was friendly and was friends with all of us. I am the type of person who has always gotten along with everyone anyway, so I never had a problem with people in groups like that. I am a kind person, but I am not what you call nice just for the sake of ‘getting along’. I believe in doing the right thing even if it hurts someone’s feelings.

One Saturday, it was our Flights turn for KP duty. KP is “Kitchen Patrol”. We had to help out the kitchen staff with washing dishes, scrubbing floors, pots and pans, putting away the clean dishes, etc. When we first arrived, we were each given a specific duty and I was put on Pots and Pans. The ‘teacher’ was selected to put away the clean dishes and she was given specific instructions where everything was to be placed. I remember wondering how she was going to reach some of the high shelves that some of the dishes had to be placed. I am 5 ft tall, so I was always assessing how high things were to make sure that I had what I needed in order to reach what I needed to reach. I was therefore glad to be on pots and pans because there was not an issue with reaching anything. We were told that if we worked well together and if everyone kept up with the pace and made good time that we might be able to have a break after lunch and before dinner started. They said that we would not have enough time between breakfast and lunch to take a break and that turned out to be true. But halfway through lunch cleanup it did look promising that we could actually take a break.

Pots & Pans!!

That was until our teacher became bored with putting away dishes and decided to walk around asking everyone to switch with her. Everyone said, “NO!” She took their answer and moved on to the next person. She came and asked me to switch with her and I told her that it would not be a good idea because we were all making good time and her job was not ideal for me because I would have trouble reaching a lot of the shelves and it would be time consuming to go and find a ladder. I felt it would put us behind and then we would not get a break. In the military, when one falls behind, we all fall behind; we work together as a team and win or fail as a team.

The ‘teacher’ became furious with me for rejecting her request to switch jobs. She would not accept my rejection of her request when she had accepted everyone else’s “NO” up to that point. She became angry with me and held a grudge against me for several days if not more. That night after lights out, I stayed up to write her a note to explain further why I rejected her offer and tried to make amends to her, but she refused to understand my point of view and stayed angry with me, so I dropped it and forgot about it. I did not remember it again until we got to tech school where she accused me of being a racist and reported me to our computer hardware instructor. Thankfully, he had an opportunity to get to know us and he told her, ‘Awe, she’s not a racist! Go sit down!” So, nothing came of her accusation there, but it did remind me of this instance in basic training when she became angry with me and refused to see the situation with common sense. I have not had any contact with her since tech school, but I do wish her well.

Photo by Timur Saglambilek on Pexels.com

WYSIWYG

WYSIWYG (pronounced wiz-ee-wig) is a type of editing software that allows users to see and edit content in a form that appears as it would when displayed on an interface, webpage, slide presentation or printed document. WYSIWYG is
an acronym for “what you see is what you get.”

Luke Combs – What You See is What You Get!

Exposing Fair-Weather Friends

President Trump is exposing so called “Friends” and “Supporters” like 90 Going North… I guess it’s that time once again to see who is loyal and who is not. Nobody needs fair-weather friends.

If she thinks he’s angry… she doesn’t know him that well. She’s seeing her own anger.

Satan is the accuser of the brethren so anytime someone accuses you of something, most if not all of the time, they themselves are guilty of that very thing. God said that we should know ourselves. KNOW THYSELF!! What we are is reflected onto others… meaning that when you are an angry person, you see everyone else as being angry. Most people are angry who have not forgiven or been called by God to do a particular task. If you really observe President Trump, you will see that he is not an angry person. He’s a man of strong action and fights back against those attacking him just like Jesus did when the religious leaders of his time attacked him. But Jesus was not angry. There’s no way that he could possibly be angry because anger is the nature of Satan. Anger is evil. Anger is hatred; it is murder! Yes, Jesse is right about President Trump, he has more love in his little pinky finger than his haters have in their whole bodies combined…

You cannot trust an angry person! They will turn on you the moment that you disagree with them or the moment you don’t go along with them in what they want to do. I don’t care who it is. It could be family, spouse, life long friends, coworkers, etc. Anger has become a religion. The so called ‘Church’ is even teaching that anger is good and that God is angry and Jesus was angry. That’s because they know not God nor do they know His son, Jesus. They have only read about them in the Bible but their hearts are far from God and Jesus. But you have to have God’s perfect love in your heart before you can recognize it in the hearts of others. Everyone judging the President are wolves in sheep’s clothing.

This situation is a perfect example of how thoughts can bring on emotions and that can snowball more thoughts to where you overreact to a situation and act out and burn bridges that you will most likely regret later. If she had stood quiet and not listened to gossip and not believed into lies about her ‘friend’ (the President) then she would not have overreacted to perceive so called ‘rudeness’. What is “rude” anyway? That’s a made up word to describe the offense that you picked up from someone’s words. Words are matter of fact. Anyone who is offended by words is a weak person. I thought Candace was a strong woman? Why is she so weak that she can’t handle words? Anyone who picks up offense for any reason is an evil person with anger/murder in their heart. They have no love. She was never a friend to the President. She was using him for an ego boost and to gain something from him like power and fame. And the moment he didn’t cater to her ego she turned on him and started lying about him. She’s maligned his character.

She can make it right by seeing for herself that she was wrong to judge him and then going to him and apologizing to him for what she said about him publicly. Then God will forgive her for playing god. God has already warned us not to judge others because we will be judged by the same measure.