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my dad is a badass
he's not very big, but the shit he's lived through has made him a pure badass
in Vietnam, he was atunnel rat (they give you a flashlight, a knife, a gun and send you down in these tunnels that are really just sewer pipes
He was reported KIA twice (he somehow managed to jump out of a truck before a laaz rocket destroyed it (to this day he doesn't know what made him jump out of his truck. (these two KIA reports caused my grandmother a huge amount of stress...my dad still has them as souvenirs)
When he worked for US Steel in the iron ore mines in Atlantic City, Wyoming, his crew was unloading a truck with a bunch of huge pipes they used to move the sludge and a couple of the support bands snapped and his leg was broken in 4 places and he had to have pins inserted...after it healed, he took them out himself (as strong as he was, he was a pussy about doctors ;-))
When he was born, he had allergies to almost all synthetic fabrics, so my grandparents had to get rid of their drapes, carpeting and couches, chairs, etc. that had fabric on them. He had to have specially made clothing and had severe asthma. He wasn't expected to live past 2.
In 1979, he was involved in a hunting accident which led to him blowing 1/4 of his jaw off (he slipped going down and embankment and tried to push his gun away, but it got caught in the jacket and went off, came within about an inch of taking his whole head off) he fell down the hill and slid under the ice (this was winter time and river was covered with a thin layer of ice).
He managed to break out of the ice and in -10 weather, started walking into town, (his hands were numb and he couldn't open his truck to get inside (which turned out to be lucky, because he probably would have fell asleep and bled to death). The cold weather kept him from losing too much blood (he kept packing it with snow). A police car finally picked him up and when they did his pants were frozen to his legs. He was 10 miles out of town and had walked nearly 4 miles before they picked him up.
His body temp when they got him into the hospital was 89 degrees. They didn't even know if he'd survive the night. The doctors told him he was probably going to lose his toes, fingers, arts of his ear, nose and right hand due to extreme frostbite.
They had to do a treach (cut a hole in his throat) so he could breathe because they had to wire his jaw shut.
He managed to survive all that and ended up not losing any fingers, toes, etc. He got out of the hospital a full month before trhey expected him to and healed almost completely. To this day, he has a noticeable scar on his chin and a little droop on the side of the mouth. He has problems when the weather gets cold but instead of moving to a warmer climate, still lives in Wyoming where he can hunt and fish and live where he loves it.
I once saw him defend my mother from a man who was about half foot taller and 100 pounds heavier then he was. he broke the guys nose and cracked his shin bone. I was so proud of my dad that day.
To this day, he still hunts and fishes, but had to give up mountain climbing and major hiking because they recently had to fuse his spine (from all the injuries over the years).
He also did a stint as a boxer, and was set to go Golden Gloves before Vietnam. He tried to make a comeback in the late 80's but his surgically reconstructed jaw (they didn't have the kind of plastic surgery then they have now) couldn't handle it. Even though he was 3-0 in his comeback, he knew all it would take was one good shot to the jaw and it would be shattered.
He's a major badass...
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