It's a well known fact of life (and cinema) that a drill sergeant, second only to British Palace Guards, are the hardest people on earth to get to react to literally anything. Let alone smile.
People may try, and often, they will fail. But every once in awhile, they are able to coax a little wry grin from the drill sergeant. It may be because they did something dumb, or unexpected, but hey, at least it happened.
Reddit user AjskaCloud asked:
Soldiers of Reddit. What was something that was so funny even the drill sergeant couldn't help but giggle?
Here were some of those answers.
We were all thinking it.
Battery had a charged guy with the last name "White", and a brand new girl with the last name of "Rice". Sergeant-major was on a rant and informed us that if we messed up, he'd be all over us like white on rice. Someone helpfully snapped to attention and notified the Sgt. Major that both White and Rice were on parade.
seemed confused by the interruption, then incorporated the info, checked it over a couple times, and went red with embarrassment. I don't think he intended to imply that whitey hooking up.
Bless whoever the fast thinker was who called that out. He said what we were all thinkin'.
That's embarrassing
There were quite a few Puerto Ricans in my basic training platoon, and some of them struggled with English. We didn't mind helping them along, and of course, we took every opportunity to teach them the bad words first.
One day, at lunch chow, we taught one young fellow the word "queef", and what it meant. We weren't supposed to be talking at chow time, of course, so the drill sergeant honed in and made the young fellow stand up and tell him what they were talking about. He stood at parade rest and said, loud and proud, what he was taught. You could see that the drill sergeant wanted to yell at him for talking, but couldn't keep his composure, and the two got away with it this time.
Tree
In basic they made us keep our shower kit in a small Tupperware container so the rest of our stuff didn't get wet. Most people would dump the water out every day, but not this one kid. Kid already had the nick name of Tree because he was tall and talked/walked slow.
They do a wall locker inspection with a bunch of MTIs, and one finally get to Tree's wall locker. He pulls out the tub and yells "holy freaking smokes batman, what are you doing Tree, smuggling water?". Even the senior MTIs started laughing. Sadly it was Tree's last strike and he got recycled.
So dumb
My step brother who is in the marines and was crawling under barbed wire, instead of doing that he turned to his side and rolled. The drill sergeant laughed and said "You're SO dumb."
Army of one
In the recruiting slogan change from "Be all you can be!" to to the widely unpopular "Army of One" every time we noticed a DS looking at a private doing something silly we would yell "Army of one Drill Sergeant!"
That would usually elicit a chuckle before before they jumped the poor guy.
Hellcats!
I'm an Air Force Academy graduate. We had TIs, or Technical Instructors, present during Basic Cadet Training. They were there to make sure all training was done properly, and would yell at the upperclassmen cadre just as readily as they would yell at a Basic Cadet. There were 9 training squadrons, 4 flights per squadron, and each TI was assigned to watch over an entire squadron.
Our TI was Staff Sergeant Hartman. My squadron was the Hellcats, or H squadron. During formations, when our Cadet Commander reported in, we were supposed to yell "HELLCATS, HOOAH!" The Interceptor (I squadron) TI was good friends with Sgt Hartman, and was jealous of our chant, so he tried to get his Basics to do something similar. One day, during the noon meal formation, he instructed his Basics to yell, "INTERCEPTORS LEAD THE WAY!"
However, when the appointed time came, it was less than stellar. We of course rocked our chant, but the Interceptors faltered immediately. No more than a dozen people even started, and by the end, there was literally one voice left finishing the phrase.
When this happened, Sgt Hartman just happened to have been walking right beside me. I watched him turn around and literally double over laughing, all sense of military bearing momentarily lost as he watched his friend's best laid plans completely fall apart. But just as quickly as it started, it ended, and then he was back to TI mode.
Another fun one with those two was during the field portion of training. Sgt Hartman has just pulled up in a gator (small 4-wheeled open top vehicle, like a tactical golf cart) to where my flight was formed up waiting to march somewhere. He was having a conversation with some of the cadre when the Interceptor TI drove by our formation and his parking spot in another gator.
Sgt Hartman proceeded to drop bearing once again, breaking out a huge grin, holding up his hand, and giving the most Phoebe-from-friends open handed wave you could imagine to his passing buddy. Then it was immediately back to training mode with the serious faced conversation.
An "accident"
I had a guy who really wasn't cut out for the Army in basic. The morning of a 12k ruck march, he woke up but didn't leave his bed. When asked about it, he said he had an accident. Things happen, we are all stressed, but no one expected a massive poop snake to be lurking under the covers. The problem was, it was intact. It wasn't smushed or smeared at all. Eventually we found out that he intentionally pushed a log out to try and get out of the ruck march.
The Drill Sergeants sent him to sick call after they made him clean it up and after he left, they were hysterical. They have never seen someone go to such disgusting means to avoid training. He was eventually sent home.
We also had someone who was so bad at throwing, he was not able to participate in the grenade exercise for fear of casualties. They made him practice while we all did the exercise but he was never able to get the fake grenade more than a few feet from himself. A few times, he even managed to throw it backwards, Wii bowling style. They felt bad because he admitted to not having a father figure in his life but they were obviously holding back laughter watching his pitiful attempts and listening to his grunts.
Inhale/exhale
Drill instructor heard someone fart while we were watching some video about something, he then told us to turn on the vacuum. This meant we all inhaled like vacuums. He then said we better get it all and that he better not get a single wiff of it.
There was a new drill instructor that had never encountered this before so he quickly covered his face with his cover so no one could see him lose it, and immediately bolted off giggling to himself.yeet_Melody666
Wipe
2nd exercise at phase 1, we were in our shellscrapes (foxholes) at night, and our DS contacts us and we have to buy out. After we collapse our harbour area and are about to patrol out, one of the lads walks up to a member of our training team and asks, "Can I go wipe my arse Corporal?"
"What?" The corporal said dumbfounded.
"I was taking a poo when we were attacked, I didn't have time to wipe." He got to wipe.
Worth it
In our cycle we had a very knowledgeable class clown type, who was super funny but also super informed about everything military. One day he was doing impressions of a drill sergeant and had everyone cracking up, so the DS he was imitating heard the laughter and walked over to see what the commotion was about. Now, this DS was one of those that had the thousand yard stare, was super unpredictable, total BA, and was one I would've followed anywhere. He was probably one of the funniest and darkest people I've ever come across, and you simultaneously wanted him to be around all the time and never wanted to be within 100 yards of him.
So this DS comes in, asks what was so funny, and eventually gets the guy to do the impression of him. He stops, thinks for a bit, and then rounds up the entire company. At this point I'm thinking about how screwed this guy just made us (platoon punishments were his go-to, so we all were going to get it, not just him), and I am overcome with this sense of impending doom.
So he tells the guy to do the impressions, and after he finishes, the DS starts cracking up, and everyone else starts joining in. The guy then continues, and everyone is dying laughing. After 5 minutes of imitations, the DS suddenly gets serious and says, "Oh so you guys think this is funny huh? We'll see how funny you think it is later".
It was definitely worth it.ChristianSingleton
Sk8er boi
Very shortly after arriving to (Air Force) basic, you have to take whatever you brought in your civilian bag, and spread it out on the end of your bed. Pretty much everything gets locked up til you graduate, then you get it back.
The TI walks the aisle, looking at everything you've put out. One kid in my "flight" (what they call your training group) brought a skateboard. To basic training. He had it propped against the end of his bunk when the TI walked by.
I wouldn't say she giggled, but she made it about one step past before her brain registered what she had just seen. She almost fell over he own feet turning around to being.. addressing his problem.specialskepticalface
That doesn't sound safe
It was my first week in basic and we had just received our rifles. We were marching to the dfac in the morning to get breakfast and reveille started playing. Our drill Sergeant called us to attention and to present arms. At this point we had never been taught how to salute with our rifles. So we all looked at each other and just pointed our rifles to the sky with our right arms full extended.
Everyone in our platoon was standing at the position of attention with our rifles pointing to the sky when our drill sergeant turned around. He immediately started laughing and said he had never seen anybody do that before. We proceed to be a platoon of many firsts for him.
WAKE UP
We had all our bunks at the edge of the walls with an empty area in the middle. It had our rifle racks and a bed that was an example for how ours should look. Well near graduation we had to shave and fork our berets and a mannequin head was left on the fireguard desk with a beret as an example of how ours should look. Well we took the head and make a whole mannequin in uniform stuffed with clothes. It was positioned in such a way that the DS couldn't tell unless he walked around to the side of it.
He was calling names for accountability and was about to leave when someone told him he missed somebody and pointed to the bed. His eyes filled with rage as he walked over but instantly calmed when he realized what it was. He yelled "WAKE UP" and flipped the bed and walked out laughing.
That's funny
After laundry was done they threw it on the floor in a big pile. Your name is stenciled on every article of clothing so one guy would stand next to the pile, pick up an article of clothing, read the name and then throw it at the owner as we walked around him in a circle. So we took one of our mesh laundry bags and carefully cut it to look like a thong, then stole a pink highlighter and colored it pink and wrote our drill instructors name on it and snuck it into the laundry.
The day comes to pass out laundry and he sees it, loses it starts screaming, "WHO THE HELL OWNS THIS?!! I'M GOING TO OWN YOUR WHOLE WORLD!!!!" He picks it up, sees his name and had to leave the room he was laughing so hard.
Height
My drill sgt made me kneel so he could scream in my face. He was 5 foot nothing and I'm 6'3.
According to my boys, the other drills were giggling like school girls. All I remember is terror.
Good sense of humor
I had a somewhat short, Hispanic TI in basic that would occasionally "squeak" when his voice broke. He would almost always give everyone permission to laugh about it when it happened, guy had a great sense of humor about himself.
Don't play with my emotions!
Marine chiming in here, we were in first phase during boot camp and were in formation marching to the All Weather Training Facility, gym. We were still getting used to drilling our Kill Hat kept messing up the calls as he himself was new at calling drill so we kept tripping over each other's boots.
Out of nowhere we hear him draw his NCO sword and shout "Y'all better stop playing with my emotions before I slip and have an accident." We died laughing and he just walked off muttering to himself and trying not to laugh as well.
EW
Fort Benning
Drills were searching for contraband after a Private was found with chewing tobacco. One of the DS got a broom handle and started pushing the ceiling tiles up to see if anything would slide out.
A 'happy sock' fell out and hit him in the face. The other DS walked off into the office. He was cough-laughing the whole time.
We were smoked into oblivion.
Good self-esteem
One day during basic we had someone who my Staff Sergeant called Goon because of the way he marched.
During one of the daily line-up's the Staff discovered that Goon had a girlfriend to which he responded "how the hell is that possible? I want you run down to the toilet look in the mirror and tell me what you see."
Goon ran off and came back a few seconds later. After the Staff finished reading the daily updates he asked "so Goon what did you find out?"
Goon:"Staff I have discovered that I am one ugly MF-er!"
Goes without saying everyone couldn't really help but let out a roar of laughter.
He did look nice, though
OMG, I have the best story for this. Basic training, some dude was getting a reprimand from the course officer because he was a bag of fail. He got briefed by the platoon Sergeant beforehand to march to the door, salute the officer, and wait to be instructed what to do. But this guy was as dumb as a brick, so he marches to the door, and stands there looking stupid.
The Sergeant waits a good long while hoping this kid will clue in, and nothing happens. Finally he yells at him "WELL, AREN'T YOU GOING TO PAY COMPLIMENTS TO THE OFFICER?!" And he stammers for a bit and finally chirps out, "Um, uh, you're looking really nice today Sir." Sergeant yells at him to GTFO, and slams the door and the entire course staff nearly die from laughter. It took an hour for us to stop laughing long enough to call him back and actually give him the reprimand. I was on the floor with tears in my eyes.
For YEARS afterwards, anytime we would see that officer we would stop him to tell him he was looking nice. It never stopped being funny.
And another one
The gas chamber - as privates were sprinting out of the gas chamber they would 1 by 1 slam into a tree that was conveniently located directly outside of the exit door. The DS has a different privates doing jumping jacks and singing "another one bites the dust" as it happened.
I'm out
The food made us really constipated. Lots of people had to go get laxatives after not being able to poop for over a week.
So, it became tradition in my group when anybody was trying to take a dump and the drill sergeant wasn't around the person taking a dump would scream "GET OUT OF MY BODY!" or "IT'S FINALLY COMING!"...etc. (talking to the poop of course).
One day two guys were in the latrine (bathroom) trying to poop and screaming at the top of their lungs when the drill sergeant entered the barracks... He just stopped and listened for a while to what sounded like two men performing an exorcism in the bathroom.
He shook his head and just walked back out. We were his last group going through basic before he was going back to his regular job and I think that was the day he finally broke...
Schnitzel
Someone in basic threw their half eaten schnitzel into the toilet and tried to flush it. It didn't flush. He left
So we are all in are rooms as we hear one of our drills scream to get out and line up.
We line up and he was one of the super serious guys, 190meters tall, easily 100kg of pure muscle and always mean mugging everyone.
He starts screaming at us telling us that we are pigs. No one knew what went on. Then he started yelling "someone threw a schnitzel into the toilet" as he finished he started smiling. First time in months I saw the dude smile. Everyone started laughing hard. He got angry again and started repeating himself. He starts laughing once he hits the schnitzel part again. We all laugh again.
He just tells us we are dumb and someone better fish that piece of schnitzel out asap.
Ouch
Marine Corps, to preface.
We're doing the rappel tower in bootcamp, and once all of our harnesses (via plain rope) are secured, we stand at perfect position of attention 6" from the recruit in front of us to go down the tower. These harnesses were TIGHT, like feels like they're red hot tight. One recruit is leaning forward:
DI: Recruit, what is your malfunction?
R: This Recruit has his left testicle on the other side of the rope, Sir!
DI: pause, audible chuckle
DI: Fix it, Recruit.
the most high-pitched 'eeeeeeee'
R: This Recruit has fixed the problem, Sir!
Never forget, right Marines?
That is how birthdays work
Well one time when I was in basic training, my petty officer was going around asking questions to people. If you got it wrong, everyone had to do push ups. If you got it right, he just moved on to the next person.
I was in panic mode because all the questions before now had been really difficult, or maybe I was just stupid. In retrospect, I'm inclined to believe the latter.
Anyway, my turn came up and the interaction went as follows:
Petty Officer: DANDY-LOU, WHAT IS THE NAVY'S BIRTHDAY?
Me, ecstatic because this is one of the few bits of trivia my brain had decided to retain, relieved: SIR, OCTOBER 13th, SIR!
Petty Officer: WHAT YEAR?
Me, without missing a beat: EVERY YEAR, SIR!
The room was quiet for a moment as the horror sank in. Everyone laughed at me. The Petty Officer laughed at me. Not a mocking laughter, but a sincere, oh my god I can't believe you're this stupid kind of laughter. I wanted to die.
I had to do a lot of push ups.
Oh, honey!
Late for the parade, and this isn't my story, but from my brother in the air force.
During one of the first inspections, one of the recruits had a honey packet from Chick Fill A he had before going to boot camp and some spare change he left in his pocket.
The drill sergeants said "WHY DO YOU HAVE HONEY AND MONEY IN YOUR POCKET!" Which is something that can't not get a laugh out of everyone.
For good luck
Friends basic from years ago. During morning inspection the sergeant found a penny in someone's locker. Of course push-ups. So someone had the brilliant idea to put a penny in everyone's locker. 1" in and 1" from the left.
Sergeant walks in. Sees the first penny. Stops. Keeps walking. Finds more pennies. My friend caught a glimpse of him smiling and almost cracking up. He then snatches up a penny and screams at them. Push-ups.
A new fantastic point of view!
Navy bootcamp 2008, we had a big Samoan guy in our division who loved singing Disney songs. This dude started singing A Whole New World in a shower with 80 other dudes and all of us started singing along. I can remember our RDC just shaking his head and grinning.
Smart
When I was in basic training we were truly terrified of one our drill sergeants, and she told us specifically we could not turn the lights on until 4:30 in the morning.
One morning we had to be up earlier than usual for some reason so we all got up and just got ready in the dark to avoid getting in trouble. She comes bursting into our bay screaming at us to wake up.
The light from the hallway shines in a bit and and she looks around at us all getting ready and goes "why are the lights off, privates?" So we tell her that she told us we couldn't have them on before 4:30 and she just laughed and said "that's not what I... okay privates carry on" and walked out.
Worth it
One dude got literally sewed into his rack in the night. He had the top rack.
When "heave out and trice up" sounded the next morning, the guy tumbled off completely attached to all of his bedding... AND the mattress. Our RDC couldn't help smirking as he yelled at all of us for the next ten minutes.
IIR, the perps were quickly discovered and actually got sent back to the beginning of boot camp. We were like 6 weeks in at that point. Poor guys pulled off an epic prank and paid for it by going back to being smurfs again. I don't know if they still do that, but it was the major punishment de rigueur back in the mid 90's.
That's a bad look
A friend of mine is a helicopter instructor in the Army. She is also tiny. She's maybe 5'1" on her best day. Her job was to instruct the helicopter pilot trainees in the actual equipment after they master the simulator. This is the first time the trainees fly an actual aircraft.
She met the trainee in a classroom and went over the entire exercise they were about to perform. He kept saying, yeah, yeah, I got this. They walked out to the tarmac. He kept snickering. They get to the helicopter. He said "This is a joke, right?" She told him no and get in the aircraft. He laughed and says ok.
She talked him through the pre-flight. He made a big show of going down the checklist. Then she had him start up the engines and check the gauges. He did and said "Ok, who put you up to this?" She told him to lift off about 10 feet above the tarmac and hover. The aircraft rose.
That's when it hit him. This tiny 5 foot Army Major was his helicopter instructor and not some girl his friends found for a joke. He went completely white and started apologizing profusely. The rest of the exercise he would not stop apologizing. She had to help him set down the aircraft. He thought he was dead meat after the way he treated her. She was laughing so hard that she didn't punish him.
Brows
Dude was told he couldn't trim his unibrow, if he did he'd have to shave both eyebrows as well... so that's what dude did, shaved it all. DS lost it laughing and then made the private report every morning to have them sharpied on with a new expression every day
Added: The best ones were when he was given two squares as eye brows or a constant surprised look
Get your head our of the gutter
At a military college, during hell week cadets are standing in line at parade rest in the buff outside the shower waiting on their turn to go in. The expectation is that you look straight ahead at the back of the head of the person in front of you in line.
One cadet glanced at the instructor to his left, the instructor saw this quick glance and angrily demanded, "What are you looking at cadet?"
The cadet was suppose to be staring at the back of the head of his buddy who's last name happened to be Cox.
So without giving much thought to the current situation of thirty young men in the nude waiting on a shower - the cadet shouted back, "I AM LOOKING AT COX, SERGEANT"
After the laughing ceased, the sergeant regained his composure and the pushups began...
Worth it.
Yes, Sir!
Not a soldier but an airman, hopefully you still like the story.
We are out on the pad standing in formation waiting for breakfast just like any other BMT morning. We are at the end of our training so the MTI's tend to not harass you as much in your last week or so at basic.
Our MTI has a doctor's appointment or something so he has a female MTI in the squadron we have seen from time to time watch us while he is gone.
So she takes us all from parade rest to attention and addresses the dorm chief (lead trainee position in the flight). He lets out the fatal response of "Yes Sir!" to whatever she said to him.
She's a petite athletic looking redhead and would not be mistaken for a sir. She gets right in his face as it leaves his mouth and starting yelling, "AAAAAAAHHHHH! YOU MAKE ME SO MAD I JUST WANT TO WHIP OUT MY PENIS AND SLAP YOU ACROSS THE FACE WITH IT! IFFFFFFF I HAAAAAAAAD ONNNNNE!" there were 3 other flights with like 20-40 trainees each including their MTI's immediately dying laughing. Even she only held it together for a few seconds of being angry red in the face before laughing.
I think you would get in some serious trouble these days yelling great lines like that.
High five
We had inspections of our equipment at the end of AIT. Our Battalion Commander (a Lieutenant Colonel) was talking to this kid next to me. He mentioned he was from Michigan, and so did she. She asked where in Michigan and held up her hand (since Michigan is shaped like a hand, she wanted him to point on her hand where he was from in "The Mitten"). Instead this idiot high fived her and smiled.
The steam came from my DS ears like nothing I have ever seen. On graduation day a few days later, we all had a good laugh about it.
We are all in this together
Fort Jackson, October 31st 2002:
The entire male barracks of the company, except for two guys, decided to dress up for Halloween. Instead of wearing our proper PT attire for bed check, we all tore the sheets off of our bed and fashioned them into Togas.
Every night in Army Basic, you had to line up on both sides of the barracks with your toes touching a line painted in front of each row of beds. It was called "Toe the Line".
So the barracks door flies open and our Drill SGT walks in. He's not even looking at us. He's looking down at his clipboard and reading off names. He gets about halfway down the list of names and looks up for a half second... then he just stops and starts laughing.
Then his head snaps back up and he bellows, "Why are you out of uniform!!?" All but the two guys who wore their PT's yelled "TOGA THE LINE!" He starts laughing again but quickly recovers.
Then he says, "I wasn't talking about you, I mean you two losers who aren't wearing Togas!"
So those two guys get down to do pushups and the rest of us jump down and start pushing too. He yells again, "Why are the rest of you on the floor!?!"
We didn't even plan this part, but we all said, "If they go down, we go down!" It was something that one of our DS's had been drilling into us from day one.
Old McDonald had a farm
We had an inspection and we had to hold our money in the top of our shaving cream while at attention. One guy dropped his top and his change went clanging across the floor. The TI (Air Force) got up in his face and asked him if he was trying to make music for everybody by dropping money all over the floor and since he must be, told him to sing a song for the flight.
After a bit of more yelling while he tried to think of a song, the guy starts singing "Old McDonald". And the TI continues with the inspection. After a while, the TI tells him to go into the latrine so he can get a nice echo and so the entire flight is standing at attention with old McDonald ringing out from this disembodied voice.
Anybody whose been through basic probably had moments where you had to use all your strength to not laugh while the Instructor was railing on somebody and this was one of those moments. We were all dying and trying not to laugh, some were less successful than others and felt the wrath of the TI. Especially when the singer got into the less common animals from the song like "and on his farm he had a ...rabbit, eieio. With a fft fft here and a fft fft there, here a fft there a fft, everywhere a fft fft." We were all dying. And then the singing stopped.
"Airman White! Did I tell you stop singing!?!?" "Sir, no sir!" "Then why did you stop?!?" "Sir... I ran out of animals sir!" With that, the TI broke and thank God because it allowed the rest of us to break as well. We all laughed a long time after that.
Ouch
Gave me right instead of left. I walked full force into a brick wall.
Joke was on everyone around me I'm the only one who didn't get smoked because they all anticipated and went left.
The DI who gave the order didn't say much but the full bird walking by couldn't contain his laughter.
Everybody clap your hands
Navy boot camp in Orlando Florida in August of 1989. The company was split up in two, on either side of the center line facing the front of the bay. Our company commander had us doing 4 count jumping jacks where we all had to clap on the 2nd and 4th together. It had to sound like one clap.
There were 68 of us and even though we struggled, all of us eventually got it. Well, all of us but one. This poor guy just could not clap with the rest of us.
He was eventually pulled up to the front of the bay where he would lead the exercise. At the last second, every time, he would change his pace and ruin it. The company commander smiled throughout and eventually just keeled over laughing at this guy.
It's funny though that I don't remember being angry even though we must have been doing jumping jacks for about three hours in 100 degree heat. I do remember that the only reason we quit was because the cement floor was too slippery with sweat to safely continue.
Peanut Butter Jelly time
When my brother was in Marine Corps boot camp, there was this guy who snagged a whole bunch of packets of peanut butter from the chow hall and filled his foot locker with them, like some kind of comical Full Metal Jacket. For the rest of that guy's career he was known as Peanut Butter.
All the names
We all had these plastic name tags before getting our official ones stitched onto our uniforms. They were to be marked by first and middle initials followed by the last name.
For example mine said: AA Porg
Had a dude in my platoon whose (Not his real name, but same concept) tag said EJAT Smith. Naturally, the Drill Instructor asked him what the was up with his name tag.
Shouted with complete enthusiasm: "MY NAME IS EDWARD JAMES ALLAN THOMAS SMITH, SIR!"
Needless to say, the DI didn't expect him to actually have 5 names, nor did he expect to hear it so proudly stated. He covered his face with his hat.
"On our final ruck march on of the guys in our platoon got hit by a deer as we were going down the stair way to heaven. Drill sergeants messed with him until we graduated."
Subtitles
A latino friend of mine told me that when he was in training one of the drill sergeants would bully him for his accent. On one of the FTXs the drill sergeant asks him what his MOS was.
"25U, Drill Sergeant." "Communications? How are people going to understand you if you don't speak proper English." "With subtitles, Drill Sergeant." The other DS who was also standing there just walked away laughing.
We're taking notes. Some of these are comedy gold.
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When looking at a resume, it's easy to understand how prospective employers will assume someone is very intelligent based on their education and past experience.
But one shouldn't only assume someone's intelligence based on what they read.
More often than not, one can tell rather quickly that someone possesses above-average intelligence, based on how they speak, how they behave, or other telling details.
Redditor PadWanKenobi was curious to hear what people felt were the tell tale signs they were in the company of a possible genius, leading them to ask:
"What’s a sign of extremely high intelligence?"
Instant adapability
"Ability to intuitively and quickly understand complex systems and how lots of parts relate in a coherent whole."
"Like I work with some people who just keep tons of concepts in their head and easily integrate new information into their understanding of those concepts."
"They immediately know what questions they should be asking to better understand."
"And these are things they're currently working on, not like things they spent time studying in school over years."
"They just have a very strong ability to synthesize new information into their understanding."
"I sit in meetings distracted and confused having forgotten what we talked about in the previous meetings, and these folks just consistently have a solid handle on everything."- Ok-Control-787
Innate Problem Solvers
"They know when not to solve a problem."
"This took me a while to understand but the smartest people I know do this."
"It could be a really simple thing like ignoring emails from people asking for help."
"The supervisor or boss might have a quick and easy solution for the situation but instead of just handing it to the person that asked they let them figure it out on their own."
"They know who they can do this with and when to do it."
"If they did that with all of their underlings it would just create a mess."
"Another example that I can think of is planned chaos."
"Some people can predict exactly where things will go wrong and they could fix it before it creates a problem."
"They don't because nobody ever notices what's going on in the background when things are working perfectly."
"Once things fails then everybody notices and if you are the one person that fixed it you become the hero."
"They can also use then chaos to reach a goal they couldn't get before if things were working correctly."
"There's many examples of this in every day life that I didn't see before until I realized what was happening."- atapes
You know what they say about people with small hands
"If your hand is smaller than your face."- FallofTheKnight
The all knowing glow.
"When someone asks you a question and you push your glasses up while light comes out of it and covers your eyes for some reason."- JonEregor
Those giveaway behavioral quirks
"Wearing glasses and saying things like 'ah yes', and 'I see' while you pensively rub your chin."- iuytrefdgh436yujhe2
Encouraging others
"When they explain something they make the people around them feel smarter, not dumber."- redkat85
Being one step ahead.
"The capacity to understand complex things, see patterns where regular people don't."- Ostepop234
"They have this tendency to make you go 'Ohhh, why didn't I think of that?' when listening to them talk."- did_it_forthelulz
An endless love of learning
"A passion for knowledge and expanding understanding of complex concepts."
"The plumber can be just as insightful as the scholar."- KatatoniK94
Of course, one shouldn't always be fooled by what they see.
As many people are masters at appearing much smarter than they are.
In fact, one important sign of super intelligence is being able to separate those who appear smart, from those who actually are.
With each passing year of a marriage, couples will often discover that while they don't love each other any less than they once did, that spark their relationship used to carry has faded.
This will often lead these couples to look for ways to spice things up a bit.
Among the more popular experiments is inviting a third member to their bedroom.
Enticing as this prospect is, however, it's also easy to be intimidated by the reality of it, or even the mere suggestion of it.
"Men, what advice do you have for men whose wives want to bring a third into the bedroom?"
Make sure you want to do it.
"You need to be completely honest with yourself, ask if this is something you want and could live with."- Dame87
Proceed with caution
"It’s like frolicking in a mine field."
"You both better be SUPER into the idea, you can’t have one person who’s reluctantly agreed to go along with it."
"And established rules."
"A threesome sounds like fun and games until you’re watching your partner make faces and sounds that you only thought were for you in your most intimate moments together, and a burning jealousy comes out of nowhere and breaks your heart."
"I’m not saying it’s automatically a bad idea and I know people do polyamory successfully, but dear god be careful."- coleosis1414
Make sure you're an active participant
"I had an ex that was adamant that she wanted to be a swinger or whatever."
"The one time I decided to roll with it, I hit it off immediately with the other dude's girlfriend and had a blast hanging out with her all night."
"The other dude was a total creep, though."
"Also, my ex could not handle the fact that someone else was giving me the slightest bit of attention."
"So, needless to say, that didn't go anywhere."
"Turns out she didn't want to be a swinger, she just wanted to have sex with other people behind my back, which she had no problems whatsoever with."- Ted_Denslow
Look out for ulterior motives
"Just remember that if you bring this up and your husband is against it, that could be the beginning of the end of your marriage."
"For a lot of people their partner saying 'I am seriously considering having sex with other people and I'm checking with you if it is ok', is a deal breaker."- gamerplays
Consider a test run?
"Go to a bar together separately."
"Watch them flirt/interact with someone else."
"If you get jealous, it's probably a bad idea to bring in a third."
"If it turns you on, go for it."- SinSlayer
Query people with experience.
"It’s something my wife and I have talked about."
"We both agreed that opening the Pandora’s box is not the way we want our relationship to go."
"While it sounds fun, we have seen way to many relationships derailed because of it."- DarthDujo
Consider going whole hog.
"Bring a 4th."- xxemrgmi
Evaluate your relationship first.
"Make sure you and your partner are secure in your own relationship before having another person join."
"Have boundaries, and no secrets."
"From my experience it doesn't usually work out in the end."- Thick-Procedure455
Just don't!
"Don't do it."
"For a long time, my ex harbored a fantasy of watching me have sex with another woman."
"Hey, who knows why any of us are wired the way we are?"
"After contemplating the idea together for a while, we decided to approach one of her more attractive co-workers, who had made a series of flattering comments along the lines of "you're so lucky" and "he's so good-looking'."
"She enthusiastically agreed."
"Our first meet-up was of course awkward, but the second, third and following were pretty good."
"In fact they got progressively hotter, as we all got more comfortable with each other's boundaries, erotic likes and dislikes."
"However, over a few months these occasional kinky weekends transitioned into the co-worker asking more frequently and aggressively to be invited over."
"We tried to explain that we had intended these threesomes to be rare and exotic highlights in our sex life, not regular occurrences, but she didn't take the message to heart and instead became increasingly insistent, bordering on smothering."
"After being turned down one Friday, that night she unexpectedly showed up at our door anyway, carrying a weekend bag and wearing nothing but a raincoat, stay-ups and heels."
"While that was quite a sight, it definitely creeped us out, as it made us finally realize the whole arrangement was descending into 'play Misty for me' territory."
"My ex and I agreed that her unexpected and unwelcome appearance signaled the end of future three-ways, at least until we were able to cool our own selves down, reassess, and perhaps later find a less demanding and insistent third."
"Things subsequently got very sticky at work for my wife, as her co-worker, with whom she had to interact closely, strongly resented being permabanned, and kept demanding to know 'what she'd done that was so awful'."
"Coworker eventually asked to be transferred to another office, but by the time that process was over and done, the discomfort / guilt / pressure / confusion my ex was suffering both at home and at work had begun to take its psychological toll."
"I must confess it didn't help that our own sex life was simultaneously going through a rough patch."
"Long story short, we ended our decade-long relationship less than a year after breaking off the threesomes, chiefly due to trust issues and growing sexual incompatibility, both perhaps triggered by our experimentation."
"Ever since, I've regretted agreeing to that first three-way."
"If I hadn't been so damned eager to take a bite of forbidden fruit, we might have kept our relationship intact."
"But I guess this can also be put down as what sometimes happens when you ignore that old advice, 'don't sh*t where you sleep'."- theartfulcodger
When venturing into the unknown, it's always wise to gain some first hand experience, to hear a variety of pros and cons of what you're possibly getting yourself into.
That way, deciding whether or not it's for you will become increasingly clear.
It's also important to remember, that it is always ok to say "no".
People Share Their Best 'You Either Die The Hero Or Live Long Enough To Become The Villain' Experiences
"You either die the hero or live long enough to become the villain."
Though not necessarily a universal truth, all of us have witnessed unfortunate moments in our lives where we've seen this saying become a reality.
Be it seeing our favorite public figures take a serious fall from grace, someone we know and admire eventually disappointing us in a devastating manner, or even seeing ourselves turn into someone we promised we'd never become.
One Redditor was curious to hear people's examples of this saying coming to light, either from a personal experience or seeing it happen to a well-known, public figure, leading them to ask:
"Who is your example of 'you either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain'?"
Jim Jones
"Jim Jones."
"He originally stood up for civil rights when it was really unpopular."
"Was hospitalized and accidentally placed in the black ward."
"When the doctors found out, they tried to move him, but he refused."
"Then he became a cult leader and used his power and influence to end the lives of a thousand people."- Crvsby
Earning a position of power
"Working in restaurant kitchens."
"You either burn out young, or become the boss that everyone hates."
"There's exceptions, but that's the rule."- grandpas_old_crow
Henry Heimlich
"Henry Heimlich, inventor of the Heimlich Maneuver."
"Made up a bunch of untested uses for it, treating people having asthma attacks, and drowning victims were the two I remember that he publicly talked up."
"Later, he funded an experiment that involved injecting people with Malaria to see if it would treat other conditions.
"The experiment was found to be unethical by American review boards, so he conducted them in Ethiopia." - User Deleted
Philippe Petain
"Philippe Petain."
"In WW1 he led the French to victory at Verdun, one of the worst battles in human history."
"In WW2, after France was beaten, Petain was the head of state of Vichy France."
"Guy went from the Lion of Verdun to the biggest Nazi collaborator in France."- arthuranymoredonuts
Our bodies
"Every organ until it gets cancer."- SuperBaconjam
Conor McGregor
"Conor McGregor."
"He had the whole country behind him here in Ireland at one point bar people who thought combat sport is grotesque."
"He was witty, original, backing himself up and having a Hollywood like rise to stardom."
"Now he's someone who the whole country is ashamed of, goes punching old men, clearly sleeps around on his wife while she's at home with the kids, just a walking caricature of himself."
"He didn't listen to his own advice."
"Get in."
"Get rich."
"Get out."- StephenPigot2020
Turning into our parents
"My dad used to annoy me by calling my Pokemon cards 'Pokey-Mans'."
"Now my kids have them and I do the same thing and it annoys the sh*t out of them."
"Thanks for the (Pokeyman) gold!"- rumpel4skinOU
Benedict Arnold
"Benedict Arnold."
"Almost died during the revolutionary way, if I recall correctly, and if he had he would have been remembered a huge hero, and a martyr."
"Instead he lived and changed sides, and is remembered only for his being a traitor."- uniqueperson22
Be it someone we knew quite intimately, or someone we admired from a far, it is always heartbreaking to see someone evolve from someone we love, to someone we utterly hate.
Sometimes we do things that have to be done.
And some of those things live in life's gray area of right and wrong.
What comes as a surprise to some is when we don't care if we're wrong.
We may still technically be in the right.
But morally and ethically, there may be some issues.
But still, many people don't care.
Redditor BirdyPizzawanted to see who would fess up about some of the worst things we're responsible for but have no shame.
"What is the darkest thing you have ever done and don’t regret?"
I've stolen from department stores that overcharged. I was arrested. I didn't care. So there...
The Grief
"Five years ago my dad suffered a catastrophic stroke. Left paralyzed and robbed of his speech and ability to communicate he was a shell of the once vibrant, charismatic man he once was. He was moved into skilled nursing where he lived for nearly two years, he was miserable."
"On my last visit I told him it was okay if he wanted to leave us, that we would miss him but he should go. A week later I received the call that he had passed. Instead of immediate grief I felt relief. Relief that he was finally free. The grief came later and I still miss him every single day."
theroadtoeverywhere
Things Missing
"Got into a car accident and had to stay with my mom for a couple days to figure out what to do. Went back to my apartment (I had two roommates) and everything was missing from my room. Long story short one of my roommates had everything hidden in her room."
"I called and told her the things were missing from my room and she came up with a lie that a couple girls came to look at my room (I was moving out bc of the accident, long story) and that they must have taken my things. She had everything I owned. Including my grandmothers perfume bottles, stuffed to the back of her closet, under her bed, behind her dresser etc."
"So I packed all of my stuff up. Then took a giant black garbage bag and stuffed as much of her closet in it as I could. Took it to the middle of nowhere, dug a hole and burnt it. She called screaming at me that her stuff was missing. I told her the two girls must have come by and taken her stuff too."
udntsay
Violence
"I hit my uncle left right and center when he was trying to choke my father to death. I was 16 years old at that time, a very skinny girl. I beat his face neck and every part of him that I could target with so much intensity that my knuckles turned blue the next day. I had an animalistic rage that day trying to help my father get away from his death grip. I hate my uncle even today."
"I got anger issues because of growing up around him. And I don't regret beating him that day at all. He was physically abusive to his wife as well. One fine day, his wife retaliated by beating him blue with a stick. And he stopped being physically violent towards her post that."
avadakebakra
Danger
"A neighbor like 10 years ago was neglecting their dog badly in the heat. The dog escaped often and ended up at the shelter a lot. One day she jumped the fence and got her tie-out cable stuck on the fence. (She was not in danger of choking.) Neighbor put her on a 3-foot-long cable tied to a doorknob, no water, 90 degree day. I let some kind folks steal her, watched the whole thing and said nothing to stop them."
Oh-Oh-Ophelia
Goodbye
"When my father was dying and in pain I was the one who told the doctors he had been through enough and we couldn't see him suffer anymore. Doctor injected him with something, I assume a morphine mega dose and he passed peacefully moments after. Euthanasia may not be legal in UK but compassionate doctors know what's what. I don't regret it because my pa made me promise I would have his back when he got sick or old. I'm sad he got sick and never got to get old."
Express_Evidence_23
That is a lot of mess. But sometimes we have to do what we have to do.
Toxic
"One of my ex best friends in high school was a real narcissistic lunatic. Had so many egotistical fantasies about what he deserved but I remained his friend because we met through my close friend (his girlfriend). As I started realizing what a terrible person he was I convinced him to go after his fantasy of a harem by asking to add a 3rd to their relationship, that led to a fight between his gf."
"I called her about it and asked how she felt about him adding someone to their relationship and about him sleeping with her. She said she knew nothing about that and started crying because he cheated on her. I basically helped orchestrate their breakup and have no regrets. She is happy with her first child now and he is in a toxic af relationship with 3 kids, 2 of which aren't his and his partner is 8 years older than him."
skijeng
My Buddy
"Had to make the choice to take my dad off of life support after he got Covid this year. He was sedated for a couple of weeks and one of his lungs collapsed and I couldn't watch him fall apart anymore. My dad was a bulky dude. Constantly did a lot of outdoor work and to see him bone skinny and have no muscle left killed me and I knew even if he somehow got through it, he would have been so miserable and depressed in that state he was in. I don’t regret it. I think it was the right thing to do by him. I’ll never not miss him though. That was my buddy."
CarterS20884
The Ruin
"Turned a close friend into the fish and game. He would poach mountain lions and bears. His whole family would literally shoot them and leave them. He would brag about it. I couldn’t stand it and felt that I needed to stop him. He’s in prison and so is his uncle. I know I ruined his life but he was literally killing so many mountain lions and bears."
Donkey-Puncherr
School Daze
"In middle school, there was this group of boys that would corner me in the hallway and try to scare me. I was the perfect target for these little b**tards. I was short, skinny, and had (and still have) and anxiety disorder. One day I just had enough, and asked a friend if I could have an extra pencil, sharpened it as much as I could, and when I saw one of them in the hallway, I stabbed the hell out of his leg. Sh**head got what he deserved."
leserolith3
Wow... we really are a dark and secretive people.