I don't want to beat a dead horse dead, but I do believe that "thank you" cannot be said enough to our veterans and members of the armed forces. There are a few members of my family who are or were in the armed forces. Most recently, my son-in-law is serving in the Coast Guard. While you may think that the Coast Guard is somewhat of a safe and easy life, it is not. The Coasties risk their lives everyday to protect our shores and boarders here at home. The fact that they are not in a war zone in the Middle East does not mean that they are cozy and snug at home every night in their beds.
When my son-in-law was stationed in Florida, he would go to sea for two months at a time to track down refugees that were attempting to sneak into the U.S. in make shift boats and under cover of darkness. These refugees were not without guns and were intent on their mission to reach the Florida coast. My 
son-in-law, Ben, had a few encounters with the refugees. Another mssion took him to Columbia to spejnd some time letting the drug cartels know that the U.S. is serious about keeping drug smugglers out of our country. Ben told me of one encounter with a drug boat in which an open gun fight was taking place between the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter and the speed boat that the drug lords were using. It was not the safest place to be to say the least.
In addition to being placed in harms way, Coasties are uprooted every three years and relocated from one side of the country to the other. It is anything but an easy life.
My father was at the White Sands Missle Range in New Mexico during World War II. White Sand was the military base where the atomic bomb was developed. While my father was not an engineer or other type of scientist that worked directly on the development of the atomic bomb, he and my mother and older brother were all in harm's way if anything went wrong during the testing that regularly took place. They did not do that work out in the middle of the desert for no reason.
In addition to Ben and my father, I have an uncle who spent 2-3 years in a German POW camp during World War II, an uncle and a cousin who served in the Korean War (Conflict), and my brother was in the National Guard. I was eligible for service during the period in the seventies that they used the lottery plan to determine who was or was not drafted. Fortunately I had a high number and never got close to being drafted.
I have more recently been involved in making presentation to Vets at VA hospitals here in the State of CT in an effort to help them deal with hearing loss. I have an ongoing mission to reach out to Vets with hearing loss and do what I can to help them through that issue. The #1 war wound today among the service people that are returning from the Middle East is hearing loss and it is a growing concern. I am attempting to educate them as much as possible regarding the technology that is available to reduce the problem and how they can othewrwise cope with this hidden disability.
To all our Veterans and current members of the Armed Forces, I say "THANK YOU" for keeping me and everyone in our country safe and protecting our rights and liberties. We couldn't do it without you.
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