Congratulations to the following members of Team McChord who were named the "Best of the Best" at the 2014 Annual Awards Banquet Feb. 20.

Key Spouse
Jennifer Longoria

Civilian Category I
John Draper, 62nd Aerial Port Squadron

Civilian Category IIA
David Devine, 5th Air Support Operations Squadron

Civilian Category IIB
Eileen Rodriguez 62nd Operations Support Squadron

Airman
Senior Airman Janaya Mosley, 627th Force Support Squadron

Read more...

Here at the Weekly Volcano, we love to crack a few cold ones and dig through the weird world of Craigslist. From stripper poles and hobbit feet, to marijuana and awkward walking partners, we've reported our favorite finds.

It's time again for another installation of "Found on Craigslist."

Let's start with the nut that inspired the hunt for more Craigslist gems. (Thanks for the lead, Vince.)

Meet Plagiarism Paul, who lives in Elma and takes selfies while dressed in capris to help solicit some sap to do his college essay. Compensation is "up for discussion." 

Perhaps the best category - freebies! Sifting through the free toilets and other garbage, here are a couple that grabbed our eye:

Free: Righteous wood encased TV from the 80s

"Are you throwing an 80s party and short on decorations? Are you infatuated with wood encased electronics? Are you retro? Do you like to watch old music videos on a TV that would bring back some memories? What about playing your original Nintendo on this bad boy? Are you still hanging on to that old cable box from the 80s with the dial on front of it that will let you watch contraband cable channels through the lines when you hold it between channels or cram some baseball cards in behind the dial? If you're into bringing back old memories and providing yourself with hours of joy, this TV is for you! Help this TV fulfill its final destiny with one last hurrah before it heads off to the appliance recycling pile!"

Kudos for your efforts on a marketing plan, Craigslister, but something tells me you will be taking it to the recycling pile after all.

This one just has a funny headline: Large Collection of Pain used in various projects (Spanaway)

Next: We all know you can buy "greens" on Craigslist these days, but what about this bag? Any takers? Hmm? Beuler? 

When we have seen Charlie Sheen on television - beyond the sweats, the wide red eyes, excessive talking, cigarette-smoking and orange liquid-consuming antics, he looks great. And he's an honorable guy, too. The last few days have been filled with reports of him demanding everyone to stop referring to his porn star girlfriend as a porn star even though she is in fact a former porn star.

So maybe Charlie Sheen's not such a crazy idea as host of National Geographic Channel's Vietnam War two-hour documentary Brothers in War. He has received four Emmy nominations for starring in Two and a Half Men. He's also got Oscar cred. Sheen starred in Platoon, which won best picture of 1986, and he appeared in Wall Street (1987) opposite Michael Douglas, who won a lead actor statuette for his performance in that Oliver Stone drama.

Let's take a look at what brothers in war is about, via a news release. ...

In 1967 the boys of Charlie Company went to war in the Mekong Delta, the homeland of the Viet Cong, and entered a foreign land of murderous heat, unforgiving jungle and a new age of guerrilla warfare. This "band of brothers" journeyed from boot camp to combat and, for the lucky ones, back home - experiencing their horror, their pain, their misery, their happiness and, above all, their camaraderie together. Now, nearly 50 years later, they're uniting once again to share their stories of courage under fire with the world.

Through gripping first-person accounts and digitally remastered archival footage, including the soldiers' own home movies and personal audio tapes, Brothers in War recounts the harrowing combat experiences of the men of Charlie Company - one of the last American combat infantry companies to be drafted, trained and sent to fight together in Vietnam. Fittingly narrated by Charlie Sheen, who rose to stardom after his 1986 performance as a Vietnam soldier in "Platoon," the two-hour special premieres Wednesday, March 26, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on the National Geographic Channel (NGC)

Hmmmm.

We ask again: should Charlie Sheen host National Geographic Channel's Vietnam war special Brothers in War?

Quite often the journalists stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord lead off their reports and feature stories with soldiers doing or saying something awesome. It's a natural lead paragraph. Soldiers and airmen perform spectacular feats. With such a lead, the story grabs a hold of us and never lets go.

One of our favorites at JBLM, Staff Sgt. Christopher McCullough, wrote a report on Arrowhead MPs training with pepper spray. This report doesn't lead off with quotes or colorful descriptions. It just makes a statement. And McCullough nailed it.

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. - Pepper spray shows up on television and in the news quite often. There is a good reason for that. It hurts. It really hurts.

In order to certify their ability to carry pepper spray, military police officers with 3-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 7th Infantry Division held training Feb. 21 at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.

Pepper spray, also known as oleoresin capsicum, OC spray, OC gas, and capsicum spray is a chemical compound used for riot control, crowd control, and personal self-defense. It irritates the eyes, causes tears, pain and even temporary blindness.

This mandatory training teaches the MPs what it feels like to be hit with OC spray and also forces them to work through several obstacles while under its effect.

Read McCullough's full report here.

GRAB A CUP AND READ THE MORNING REPORT FOR 2.27.14 >>>

Armed men seized the regional government headquarters and parliament in Ukraine's Crimea and raised the Russian flag.

A Democratic bill enhancing health care, education and job-training benefits for veterans faces an uphill climb as the Senate approaches a showdown vote on the $21 billion legislation.

The Pentagon has named acting Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michael Lumpkin as the point person for efforts to bring home prisoner of war Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.

People in the United States remain divided on how to handle military spending, according to a new poll. 

The U.S. Air Force intends to issue a request for proposal on its new long-range strike bomber this fall.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) filed cloture on legislation that would expand veterans healthcare programs and provide them with tuition assistance, a move that signals he will not allow any GOP amendments to be considered.

The Marine Corps' senior enlisted adviser told lawmakers he believes focusing on the commissary benefit as a potential source of defense budget savings is a mistake.

The U.S. Army will request money to buy 100 new UH-72 Lakota Light Utility Helicopters in the fiscal 2015 budget.

The proposed drone replacement for the U-2 spy plane is still years away from being as effective despite retirement proposal.

The Pentagon has a detailed five-year spending plan that adheres to federal defense spending caps should sequestration return in 2016. Just don't expect to see it anytime soon.

U.S. Sen. John McCain says he wants to block two nominees for high-level Pentagon jobs - but the Senate's "maverick" is about to find out a hold isn't what it used to be.

The Army has disqualified 588 soldiers as sexual assault counselors, recruiters and drill sergeants for infractions ranging from sexual assault to child abuse to drunken driving.

Despite "daunting fiscal challenges and strategic uncertainty," the Army will continue to be the best in the world, says Sgt. Maj. of the Army Raymond F. Chandler III.

The Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization, or JIEDDO, is still relevant and is needed for future conflicts, but its size is expected to shrink significantly.

President Barack Obama announced that retired Army Master Sgt. Jose Rodela will receive the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest award for military valor, during a March 18 ceremony at the White House.

Humanitarian assistance and disaster relief efforts are the key for Airmen involved with the multilateral exercise Cope North.

Army introduces four new mountaineering, climbing kits.

Lobbying isn't decreasing at all, and instead it's simply going underground.

How wolves change rivers.

A new app will prevent your distracted ass for getting hit by a car.

Every state's favorite music.

Oscars primer so that you don't have to spend every day until the ceremony airs at the movie theater.

Oscar snubs get particularly brutal when you start tallying how many phenomenal directors never won a Best Director prize.

Let's watch a prank.

THURSDAY, FEB. 27 2014 >>>

1. What does your mind go to when you hear the names Miss Massive Snowflake and Rainstick Cowbell (two bands currently nearing the end of month-long west coast tour)? If you were picturing a pair of twee indie bands or cutesy folk-rock, you'd be wrong. Miss Massive Snowflake and Rainstick Cowbell are Shane de Leon and Scott Arbogast, respectively - two fiercely idiosyncratic Portland performers that manage to find common ground together. Read Rev. Adam McKinney's full feature on Miss Massive Snowflake and Rainstick Cowbell in the Music & Culture section, then check out with Dionvox at 10 p.m. in Le Voyeur.

2. Well holy crap. Honestly, we see an event title like "Sewing & Stitchery EXPO" and our eyes instantly glaze over. Sounds like about 11 old ladies in a double wide crocheting death certificates, right? Wrong. Completely false. As it turns out, the Sewing & Stitchery EXPO overtaking the Washington State Fairgrounds through Sunday is freaking gigantic - "the nation's largest event for sewing enthusiasts," according to hype. Apparently, "The Expo is the foremost venue for the home sewing industry attracting leading authorities including Susan Beck, Michelle Muska, Lisa Shaw, and Pati Palmer." Do we have any clue who those people are? Of course not. But they sound important. And we're not in the home sewing industry. Maybe, just maybe, after this weekend we will be. It runs 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. today.

3. The city of Olympia and The Washington Center for the Performing Arts will celebrate the new renovations at The Washington Center beginning at 5 p.m.  The celebration is open to the public. Featured entertainment includes Ballet Northwest, Masterworks Choral Ensemble, Student Orchestra of Greater Olympia and Ed Echtle, Historian, which begins at 6 p.m. if the whole program isn't funny enough for you, stick around for the Center's popular Comedy in the Box show at 7:30 p.m.

4. The folks at Valhalla Coffee Co in Tacoma take their roasted bean biz seriously and prove it by hosting #TNTNW - aka Thursday Night Throwdown Northwest - showcasing local barista talents making latte art from 7-9 p.m. The $5-buy-in-winner-takes-all event is open to the public. Festivities include beer, pizza, prizes and like-minded individuals for those who appreciate the fine art of coffee.

5. South Puget Sound Community College's production of Playboy of the Western World isn't about Hugh Hefner's life. Turns out this Playboy is a satirical look at Catholicism and Irish peasantry, and the "playboy" in question is actually a character named Christy Mahon who, true to the early-20th century meaning of the word, is a trickster or hoaxer. The original 1907 production supposedly caused a riot in Dublin when it was first performed, but don't expect the same reaction at 8 p.m. in the Kenneth J. Minnaert Center for the Arts Black Box Theatre.

BONUS: As we mentioned, Vicci Martinez plays The Swiss tonight.

LINK: Thursday, Feb. 27 arts and entertainment events in the greater Tacoma and Olympia area

The time has finally come.

Maybe you filled out the Weekly Volcano's Best Of Olympia survey and maybe you didn't. But either way the Best Of Olympia edition is on the street today.

That's right, yo! It's like Christmas but better. It's like a trip to Disney World, only not lame.

Every year the Weekly Volcano produces Thurston County's, shall we say, best Best Of reference guide. Yes, Yelm, you're in there, too. Where's the best burger? The Weekly Volcano fills you in. Where is the best place to buy shoes? The Weekly Volcano tells you. Where's the best place to showcase your talent? The Weekly Volcano even tells you that.

Like we said, it's on the street today, tucked carefully inside the Weekly Volcano.

Oh, if your name is Annie Johns living in the 98502, you won our readers' poll contest. We'll be contacting you by email with your Red Lion Olympia prize package.

Where the dirt road narrowed is where the gunfire on the left began.

Quickly recovering from the surprise attack on their three-vehicle convoy, soldiers spilled out of the trucks and returned fire.

The woods echoed with the sounds of M4s and an M240B.

As the firefight escalated, two soldiers sustained wounds. While one soldier began to apply first aid, the convoy commander - with a telephone in one ear and a radio in the other - coordinated his soldiers while calling for a quick reaction force for aid.

Within seconds the attack ended.

The woods were silent.

A moment later, Sgt. 1st Class Fernando Perez called together the soldiers assigned to the Distribution Platoon, Forward Support Company, 14th Engineer Battalion for an immediate assessment at Joint Base Lewis-McChord yesterday.

He reminded the dozen soldiers in front of him to remember to use the Field Standard Operating Procedures they had learned.

>>> Sgt. Ricky Schneider, Distribution Platoon, Forward Support Company, 14th Engineers, takes cover during an ambush while calling for support. Photo credit: J.M. Simspon

"Your convoy commander gave a very good brief," Perez said. "What made it particularly good was the fact that he made you guys repeat it back to him."

After touching on a few minor discrepancies, Perez told his soldiers to mount up and head for the next objective.

"You're doing good; keep it up," he said.

As the Army downsizes its force and trains to fight in a more conventional manner, its training has to keep pace while remaining combat ready.

A forward support company is a mobile and multi-functional unit that includes a field feeding section, distribution platoon and a maintenance platoon organized to provide support to a combat or combat support battalion.

"We have to be able to get up and move, sometimes without the use of convoy escorts during day and night movements," Perez explained.

"This training sharpens that ability."

>>> Soldiers assigned to the 14th Engineer's Distribution Platoon run for cover during an ambush on their convoy. Photo credit: J.M. Simpson

The 14th Engineer Battalion will travel to the National Training Center later this year in order to sharpen its convoy skills.

"We may not always have the electronic warfare capability; we are relying on our eyes and ears as we shift back to a more conventional way of fighting," Perez said.

"We have to be able to deal with ambushes, IED attacks and indirect fire, and this is valuable training for us to get."

GRAB A CUP AND READ THE MORNING REPORT FOR 2.28.14 >>>

A massive veterans legislative package that would have expanded a host of post-military benefits was sidelined after Senate Democratic backers failed to find enough support among their Republican colleagues.

A senior defense official says the U.S. Army and Defense Department are being unfairly vilified in the media over military budget cuts when Congress is really to blame.

The Pentagon's fiscal 2015 defense budget proposal will cost the Army another six combat units, shrinking the active force to 28 brigade combat teams by 2019.

America's 25 most awkward allies.

In April, the U.S. Army plans to unveil a new camouflage strategy that could result in soldiers wearing Marine Corps desert and woodland patterns into combat. 

President Barack Obama's mandate to reduce U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan by the end of 2014 is U.S. Transportation Command's top priority, Air Force Gen. William M. Fraser III told Congress yesterday.

Special operations forces will be prepared for any decision made on the post-2014 U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, the commander of U.S. Special Operations Command told Congress yesterday.

The threat in cyberspace is changing so rapidly that law and policy lag behind, the nation's top cyber commander told congress yesterday.

The Pentagon's chief information officer discussed the vast opportunities mobile computing provides and its critical role in improving support for the Defense Department's 600,000 mobile device users.

Staffing at the Defense Health Agency has grown by roughly 80 percent since the organization began coming together, but the Defense Department still expects zero growth - or even a decline - in employees once duplicate services are eliminated.

Soldiers who have used the Distributed Common Ground System-Army say that it's an intelligence game changer.

The Army, Marine Corps, Air Force and Navy have named Tobyhanna the Depot Source of Repair, or DSOR, for the Gray Eagle (MQ-1C) Unmanned Aircraft System Ground Control Stations.

Twenty-five years of Oscar hosts, ranked.

There are so many negative things that can be said about ABC's Mixology. It is tactless, boring, occasionally offensive and. ...

Fashion trends more dumb than the newest fashion trend "normcore."

The best restaurant in the U.S. is a tiny shack in Hawaii.

Herding reindeers looks a lot like trying to control alien locust swarms.

Found in translation

FRIDAY, FEB. 28 2014 >>>

1. Survival Knife, C Average and The Narrows play at 9:30 p.m. in McCoy's Tavern. Take it away Meg Cunningham of Survival Knife: "I am beyond excited to play this show." "It's a perfect trifecta with The Narrows, gracing us with their heavy, epic, mind blowing self as always. Survival Knife, well ... I'm in this band so all I'll say about us is, we'll bring the noise and won't disappoint. Then of course, C Average. If you don't know Cave rage, well ... that's sad. Riffage from the valleys of beyond. Come one and all."

2. Though it gets a lot less press than Woodinville, the South Sound also has a number of wineries. The South Sound Wine Trail ventures through Olympia, Lacey and Shelton. Participating wineries are tucked throughout Thurston County and include Madsen Family Cellars, Medicine Creek Winery, Northwest Mountain Winery, Scatter Creek Winery, Stottle Winery, Vina Salida and Walter Dacon Wines. The best time to tour the South Sound Wine Trail is during the annual Wine and Chocolate Passport ride, which is Feb. 28-March 2. The wineries invite the public to taste their vinos paired with delicious rich chocolates. A passport costs $30 in advance, $40 at the doors, and includes samples from six of the participating wineries. Participants need not visit all wineries in one day. For full event details and map, visit southsoundwinetrail.com.

3. Puyallup River Brewery releases We Are The Champions IPA today at its Puyallup River Alehouse. To pair perfectly with the Seahawks-inspired brew, the Alehouse hosts a taco night, beginning at 5 p.m. Puyallup River Alehouse has partnered with Sweet and Savory catering, so hand-fried corn tortillas and fresh ingredients will be paired with the newbie brew, which drops at 7:30 p.m.

4. Flutist Darrin Thaves - an instructor of flute at California State University, Long Beach - joins the Tacoma Community College Orchestra for a little Elgar, Molique and Haydn at 7:30 p.m. in TCC's Building 2. Expect Thaves to go off during the Molique Concerto in d minor for Flute, Op. 69.

5. Speaking of classical music, the next Jacobsen Series concert at University of Puget Sound will spotlight the diverse talents of its School of Music faculty members in a classical evening that evokes the mischief of the French cabaret and the enchantment of a music hall. From the Music Hall to the Cabaret: Chamber Works by Weill and Poulenc will be held at 7:30 p.m. in Schneebeck Concert Hall.

LINK: Friday, Feb. 28 arts and entertainment events in the greater Tacoma and Olympia area