Best Drill Instructor/Drill Sergeant stories

When I was in bootcamp at San Diego in May 1966 one of the first things they made us do was write a letter home telling our parents to inform all our family and friends not to visit or send us packages. Well, I had an uncle who lived in Anaheim who just had to visit his favorite nephew, so of course I found myself standing at attention in front of the company commander. And as I stood there staring at the blackboard behind him, I realized that every 15 minutes of every single day was choreographed, that it mattered not one whit how well or bad we behaved or performed, we were gonna be rewarded or punished according to that choreograph. I kept the information to myself, and laughed to myself at how easy the rest of my time in bootcamp was.

Fort Leonard Wood 1972 July Hot! DI asked if anyone knew how many inches in a meter to convert rifle velocity! No one knew; except Me of course! I stood up and said 39.37 inches in a meter! Sir! He said you sure about that answer? I said Yes Sir! He said sit down Mr ASA Spock!

i had many funny DS stories. the best one... my last name at the time was DILLOW (rhymes with pillow) one time my DS called me private DILDO, to me it was a common mistake in the civi world so i didnt blink twice but the platoon started with the giggles. DS wanted to know why everyone was giggling and I told him. DS snapped to attention and said "DS apologizes for calling you the incorrect name. Do you wish to report DS for the unintentional sexual harassment?" I said "I am smart enough to know that that was not sexual harassment and I am old enough to not care, can we resume weapon cleaning?" I was in my 30s when i joined and it was in 2003 so rules change with the times.... but it was funny to see a DS go to attention for me

While in basic, Ft. Gordon 1968, getting ready for IG inspection discovered i had no dress green jacket. Either it was stolen or never got issued in the rush of things at initial issue. Told my plt DI and he later brought in his dress green jacket and gave it to me. he said he had orders for VN and didn't need it. He was considerably larger than me and said just DX (direct exchange) it through supply.
That could have cost me almost a months pay. T
Thx SSG Johnson.

The Drill Sergeant asked me why I didn't help mop the floor during fire watch last night. I told him I was hiding in the latrine, jerking off. He started laughing and walked away.

I joined after finishing college. When I was in basic, I was the only regular army in my platoon. The rest of the platoon was either Reserves or National Guard and the majority of them were 17 yo. Whenever we went to chow regular army would line up on one side and the Reserves and Guard would be in the other line, except, of course, my platoon. It wasn't set as to which side was which so you would have to yell either first or last and which component you were. Since I was the only regular army, my drills always had me at the front of one of the two lines. When my turn came, I would yell my last four and say, "first and last regular army in the door drill sergeant!" Every meal for weeks, I would get the snide response, "well whose behind you?" or "I don't think so soldier." They always thought I was being a wiseguy, and each time my drill would explain my situation. So glad I was switched to their platoon the first day (they were trying to make the platoons roughly the same size so a few of us were shifted). They were good men. I wonder where they are now and how they are doing.

When I was in basic training in 1979 my grandma sent me 26 dozen cookies. Our TI let us eat as many as we could for two hours. Awesome TI - she even helped, motivated (nicely) me when we were running our last 1.5 mile test.

Mine was in boot camp we had a Drill Sergeant Scoggins and all through about a month in he was hard a hell on me but I got it my mos was 13 Bravo FA I had no real idea what that was because my Recruiter told me about being a tank recruit so in AIT we got to the field for the beginning of our training but there was no tanks and when I saw the 105s I was to use for the next 6years I asked for permission to speak I asked where was the tanks at and within a heartbeat Drill said where is the paradise I was promised and with a big smile dropped me for more than the normal 20 pushups because we were laughing so hard I couldn't count out my pushups still to this day I tell that story

I started smoking regularly at boot camp. Early 80s I get to Fort Lost in the Woods. One day we are out on a 20 mile road march. Now we stop for a brief pause and the top sgt says: "those who got em, light em, those who don't, pick up trash", I started smoking that day.

Another day we are at ease in formation and DI says who here smoke? Smokers raise their hands. Who smokes menthols he asks, some raise their hands. Who smokes Camel non filters? And a couple of guys raise their hands. He says to the Camel smokers. Bring me your smokes, and they do, he proceeds to take one from each pack and sends them back to their prospective locations in the formation. He lights one and says; "who says beggars cant be chosey"! To this day, 38 years later, I have not forgotten him.

My ASVAB, DLAB and Diddybop (morsecode) test scores were really high, since nobody was passing the DLAB, my Army recruiter was going to get me in any way he could. But I was 4'11" and only weighed 82 pounds. Military standard was minimum height was 5' weight was 93 pounds. I needed two waivers, height and weight, which was finagled at Miami MEPS. I get off the cattle truck at holdover this happens:
Sgt IO: "how the hell did you get into my Army"?
Me: De plane, boss, de plane. (you would have to recall a show called Fantasy Island to appreciate where I was going with that). I thought that was hella funny, but he clearly didn't share my sense of humor.
Sgt. IO: "Drop and give me 500". I did 5, not 500
Me: permission to recover drill sgt?
Sgt. IO: get your goat smelling ass out of my site.

Evey minute of it was equally as blissful. We were the first unit integrated with one platoon of females and 3 platoons of males. FUN TIMES.