You're listening to software, radio, special operations, military meals, and straight talk with the guys in the community.

Welcome to another episode of Soft Rep Radio. And I am your host, Rad, and today I have a very cool special guest who has a lot of people that love him out there that submitted him to the show.

And he goes by the name John Maddog Nelson. He is Ranger Qualified, 11 Bravo Infantry in the United States Army. And something tells me he's probably airborne as well and has a few other creds.

That hangs off his chest. So welcome to the show, John.

Hey, thanks for having me, Rad. I really appreciate you giving me this opportunity to share some of my stories with you and your folks. I appreciate it next.

Well, listen, you were recommended by one of our listeners on Soft Rep, okay? And you probably know Brian. Brian, thanks for submitting to Soft Rep throwing John under the bus to be put on to this platform to talk to all of us out there.

But it's stories from guys like you, John, that make Soft Rep and our Soft Rep Radio so cool, right? It's like, you're here we are. You can tell your story. I know you're a Ranger. I know a Ranger Qualified. I know your sapper. I know you know how to like put some decor together. Probably you're like cleared out of a field.

Yeah, there's a couple of things I know how to do. I'm not too shabby.

Where do they mad dog come from? So it's funny because we are a little mad dog, you know general madness, mad dog madness, but a couple of decades before that, you know, I was 15 years old and I played an immense softball league while I was going to high school and my uncles were former Marines and a lot of guys were full Marines as well, former soldiers on the softball team.

They kind of recruited me as a young kid to play on the team, be one of the guys. And so by hanging out with all these older veterans, they came up with this nickname and they called me mad dog one day.

And it kind of stuck. It stuck with me. And so that stayed with me as like a nickname for me. I had several other ones, but that was one that really stuck on me. And then when I came into, you know, like I said decades later, back into the military, I had served in the Marine Corps.

I was out for 15 years, 9-11 happened and I pursued to come back in and I was given the opportunity to serve in the Army National Guard. And from that way, that moving forward, that nickname stuck. And when I was given the opportunity to be a platoon sergeant, I called my platoon, the mad dogs.

And all our call sign was mad dogs. So that stuck with me. And I made that all a part of them. And so I shared that part of me with all of my soldiers that served me my platoon and it stuck with me. That was my call sign mad dog seven.

So you have a bunch of mad dog pups out there. I love that.

Now, is it my understanding that prior to 9-11, you were just in a kind of a more docile place in the military, just hanging out, cleaning your stuff, making sure everything was ready to go to a battle.

It was really just Kosovo and Bosnia kind of kicking off that were publicly talked about. And then all of a sudden 9-11 happens, you know, the twin towers are hit and you're where.

So, you know, I had served at the duty of the Marine Corps in 1989 to 92. And then I got out and I pursued some other ventures.

I was a boss and police officer. I was a patrolman for a couple years, moved on to other things in my life, had a debt to pay, had a pay. It's a debt to society took care of that.

And like I said, it was a 15 year break between when I was released out of the Marine Corps when honorable discharge and I was attending college at Mass Bay Community College just outside of Boston and Wellesley.

And I was having lunch. I was in the cafeteria and I sat down and had a sandwich in between classes and I saw on the TV screen and showed the twin towers and one was already smoking up and being damaged.

And I looked over one of the young students next to me. I was in my early 30s and I elbowed the guy and I was like, hey, what's what movies this?

I haven't seen this movie. This must be a new movie or something. You know, I thought it was like a Bruce Willis action movie or something. And he looked at me and was like, right.

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