I still remember it to this day. I was sitting in homeroom, bored out of my fucking mind, when I heard my favorite band, Godsmack, on the TV during Channel One. I snapped to attention and was completely enthralled for the next minute. That Navy commercial made me think I’d be flying planes off aircraft carriers while listening to “Awake” if I enlisted, so much so that I dropped out that day to sign up. Little did I know that I’d be in for a rude awakening. Who thought that the Navy makes you do stuff like exercise and shave? It’s total bullshit.
They really should have provided more information in that little clip. Apparently, the Navy is all about hard work, discipline, and respecting authority, and these are definitely not where my skill sets lie. At no point did narrator Keith David mention just how seriously they frown upon a serviceman leaving his base without permission to do whippets in the parking lot of a nearby TGI Fridays. Seriously, you’d think that would be covered as a disclaimer at the end of the commercial, like when those cholesterol medication ads talk about how they’ll make you shit blood or go insane or whatever. I can’t be the first Navy recruit with this complaint.
So there I was at my court-martial, where no amount of professed Godsmack fandom helped me. Seriously, I even quoted the lyrics to “Voodoo” when asked to plead my case. I thought this would be a smack in the face of everyone who called me an “unbelievably stupid asshole” for choosing to represent myself. The judge didn’t think my likening the Navy’s inordinately strict curfew to a “snake biting into my veins” was as profound as I had hoped, and I got slapped with a Dishonorable Discharge. Thanks a lot, Channel One.
So now I’m back home, with no jobs and no prospects aside from an upcoming audition to sing for a Godsmack tribute band. Seriously, I’m not even allowed to buy a gun now to defend my family/play with while I’m drunk. Can you believe that? Let this be a lesson to you going forward: do not be fooled by any nu-metal appearances in upcoming military recruitment advertisements, because that absolutely does not mean that you won’t have to do stuff and/or have responsibilities. Now, where did I put that application to sell knives for Cutco?