Billy the Marine?

Sir, yes sir.

Can you picture freshman Billy Hild – yes, the same Billy Hild whose idea of the “bench press” is “benching the bar” – as a Marine? The few, the proud?

Apparently, one Marine recruitment guy thought so. He stopped Young Freshington and tried to get him to join – WHILE BILLY WAS ON A RUN!

Billy likes to carry on the Bucket Tradition of bringing back trinkets from his daily mileage. Back in the day, his old Spartan coach Mr. B used to bring back such treasures as Marlboro Miles (of course!), tools (including a pretty sweet Swiss Army knife), books (including The Bible), a sideview mirror and even (with the help of Dirt Baird) an entire bulletin board, which hung in my old office for years.

So far, Billy’s contributions had been admirable but a bit less creative. However, the business card of a Marine recruiter who tried to solicit him to join them while he was running … well, that’s a good start, and a good story.

If Billy starts doing 100 push-ups a day (that would be approximately 100 more than he currently does …), maybe he can become part of the few and the proud. For now, he should probably stick with distance running, going after Schab’s Tower record (48 + 5, for those keeping score at home), and bringing back conversation-piece items.

So far, so good.