You'd Have Thought I'd Remember............
Some of these things.
But sometimes I need a reminder.
A couple of important things in American history happened on December 16th.

In 1773 - The Boston Tea Party

In 1944 - The Battle of the Bulge began.

Years ago, I worked as an agency nurse in the ER at a VA hospital for a short while. The clientele at the VA is always a fun group. They are all sick as hell, old as dirt, have some kind of craziness associated with substance abuse or all of the above.

But they ALL have at least one interesting story to tell if they feel like it.
We had an old WW II vet with pneumonia and I caught a glimpse of his chest xray while walking by and about shit myself.
There were metal pieces all over this guy!

I asked him where he got all that shrapnel from and he replied, "The Ardennes Forest. Battle of the Bulge. December 1944".
He told me it was from "Those Damn, Nebelwerfer's. Bastards were setting the fuses to go off in the trees, so you got metal AND tree limbs killing ya!"

Now, I'm pretty good on my WWII history, but I had to look up just what a "Nebelwerfer" was .
Looks like this.


Nasty little rocket/mortar bastard. Some had 5 barrels, this one has 6.
Effective bastard, as that old gentleman can attest to.

I never met any Vets from The Boston Tea Party, so I can't relate anything personal on that.

Except that, I Approve the next one.

Update- Ace of Spades has a link to some good Life Magazine photos of the battle.

Gratuitous Picture for a Friday Night-
Have a Cthulhu Christmas.