User blog comment:Griever0311/Ask A Marine Part Cinq/@comment-1260687-20100331235804

@Fluffylicious: I cut all ties with my former life when I joined up, so that I could focus entirely on the task at hand. I'm sure that if your relationship is decent that you guys will do fine. Just make sure that she and everyone else knows that for the first 5 months+ (depending on your MOS) that they won't be seeing a lot of you except for a week or so or a few days at a time. Deployments can last anywhere from 7 months to a year, but I've seen plenty of relationships succeed. The important thing is to do what YOU want in life. Changing yourself to fit someone else's paradigm of how they think your life should be will get you nothing but regrets. Chase what YOU'RE after, and make sure you've got someone that's cool with that, and do the same for them.

@DarthKenobi0: Fields of Fire, Gates of Fire, Starship Troopers.

@DarthKenobi0: We had plenty of Iraqi interpreters, but the people we're fighting aren't rational individuals; they don't hold the same values and ideas about life that a normal, rational person would - so, no, they don't turn.

@Sidewinder82: For an excellent rifle score, you've got to be able to drop 50 rounds into a human-sized target's chest at 200 (20), 300 (20), and 500 (10) meters.

@Sidewinder82: You can take things like bayonets, helmets, etc; no human parts or weapons.