Merry Christmas from Wounded Times

It has been a busy year for Wounded Times with topping off over 23,000 post, over 200 videos and many local veterans events but it has been a blessing. 

Covering the news has been terrible at times when we see so many veterans suffering but renewing when we read stories of veterans doing all they can for others.
I had to return to working for a paycheck because while Wounded Times is popular, few have donated to keep the site going.

I wish I could have done more videos this year and attended more of the events I was invited to, but there are just not enough hours in the day.

With over 10 million views on my profile, if everyone chipped in a dollar, I'd have my news station by now but maybe next Christmas Santa will pull off a miracle.

So, dear readers, here's a recap of some of the events I did manage to cover.

Last Christmas


January

Lt. Nadd's plane came in late.  Uncle Sam waited on stilts for over 45 minutes.

Cathy Haynes 

Patriotic lady brought gator

Orlando Honor Flight Always There With Smiles

1Sgt. Daniel Kalagian 812th MPCO back home on December 7,  2013

Korean War Veteran and Bride

VFW Post 4287 Orlando

Motorcycle Escorts

Budweiser Clydesdales 

OK, I made them do this.  Blame me.

Honored Couple

March

April

May

Oviedo War Memorial Honors 385 Fallen

August

October






Deland Florida American Legion Post #2093 was dedicated to Sgt. Adam Quinn, of Fort Bragg, killed in Afghanistan in 2007. 

Deland American Legion Sgt. Adam Quinn Post

Deland JR ROTC

Jay Conti Sr Florida Department Commander designed this car

This lady painted all the tiles

Patriot Guard Riders

When the flag passed by, everyone saluted!

UPDATE A friend of mine saw me coming and snapped this picture. As tired as I look here, it was less than halfway to the end. Thank God he didn't see me at the end.

December

Yes, the owner let me sit on her bike.

The Grinch showed up with a bigger heart

Orlando Police Officers did a fabulous job escorting!

This is Betty.

And to cap things off, there was the movie Terrible Love that we worked on for 3 years winning the Austin Film Festival Audience Award.

Join us for the second screening in the 2015 Audience Award series: Terrible Love, Monday, February 2nd at 7:00PM at the Alamo Drafthouse Village, located at 2700 West Anderson Lane, Austin, TX 78757. The winner of the 2014 Narrative Feature Audience Award and a bittersweet autopsy of mental illness and lost love, Terrible Love tells the story of Rufus, a wounded veteran returning home from Iraq with post-traumatic stress disorder, and his devoted wife Amy. They promised themselves never to leave each other, but that promise is put to the ultimate test when Rufus’ PTSD becomes violent. Terrible Love dives head first into the heart-breaking effects of PTSD, the relationships it hurts, and the lives it threatens.

Soldier Comes Home From Afghanistan Gift Wrapped for Mom

The heart-melting moment a soldier surprises his family by jumping out of a gift box after nine months in Afghanistan
Patrick Conwell, of Nashville, Tennessee, made his creative entrance at a party where his parents and sister were expecting to learn the gender of his brother's baby
Daily Mail
By ERIN CLEMENTS FOR MAILONLINE
24 December 2014

A soldier who recently returned home from Afghanistan has given his family a heartwarming holiday surprise by jumping out of a gift-wrapped box.

Patrick Conwell, 31, enlisted the help of his brother Matthew, who told their mother, father and sister that he and his expectant wife would be hosting a party to reveal the gender of their baby - and that the giant box next to their Christmas tree contained either a pink or blue balloon that would signify whether they were having a boy or girl.

Instead, Patrick, who had been in Afghanistan for the past nine months before returning home to Nashville, Tennessee, was waiting in the package, clad in fatigues and bearing a green balloon.
read more here
Dec 23, 2014
Coming home from Afghanistan and surprising my family under the guise of a 'reveal party' for my brother's new baby, December 2014.

Louis Zamperini Captured By Grace, Saved By Christ

Review: ‘Unbroken,’ improbable and incomplete
Charlotte Observer
By Lawrence Toppman
Posted: Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2014

According to the film “Unbroken,” Louis Zamperini had 30 percent of a remarkable life. By the time he was 28, he had competed as an Olympic distance runner, enlisted in the Army Air Force, crashed on a bombing run, survived six weeks on a raft at sea and endured terrible torture in a Japanese prison camp before coming back to the United States.

There director Angelina Jolie leaves him, seven decades before his death last July.

We don’t see his alcoholism and post-traumatic stress disorder after coming home, the decay of his marriage, the vengeful hatred that led him to strangle his captors in his nightmares. Nor do we see his conversion to Christianity after a 1949 Billy Graham crusade in Los Angeles, an event he credited with saving his sanity, marriage and perhaps his life. He was able to forgive his tormentors, even going back to Japan to try to do so in person.

Perhaps the filmmakers were afraid his devout faith would consign their movie to the low-attendance ghetto where Christian movies often land. Maybe they felt the story was too long and complex. (In that case, it should have been a miniseries.) Maybe Jolie, who’s not a Christian, couldn’t figure out how to convey what Zamperini went through after faith healed him.
read more here


This is what was missing in Unbroken.

From Billy Graham Crusades

Billy Graham Evangelistic Association to Release New Documentary Film About Unbroken’s Louis Zamperini
December 15, 2014

Charlotte, N.C., Dec. 15, 2014 – The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association will release a new documentary film on Dec. 25 called Louis Zamperini: Captured by Grace. Zamperini is also the subject of Universal Pictures’ Unbroken, the movie based on the best-selling book of the same name by Laura Hillenbrand.

Captured by Grace is a compelling, documentary-style film that chronicles Zamperini’s remarkable journey—from Olympic runner to WWII prisoner of war—all the way to his return home and encounter with Jesus Christ at a Billy Graham Crusade in Los Angeles in 1949. The film includes recent interview footage of Zamperini sharing his complete story in his own words.

Zamperini DVD“I started to leave the tent meeting, and I felt awful guilty about my life,” Zamperini says about his experience at the 1949 Billy Graham Crusade held in a constructed tent on the corner of Washington and Hill streets in Los Angeles. “Yes, I had a lot of great times, a lot of great experience, a lot of escape from death, but I still didn’t like my life after the war. I came home alive. God kept His promise. I didn’t keep mine, and so I went forward and accepted Christ.”

“The heart of this story is when I found Christ as my Savior,” Zamperini continues. “That’s the heart of my whole life.”

Captured by Grace can be viewed online starting Dec. 25, and will be available via DVD as an offer of appreciation with any contribution to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. The special DVD includes several bonus features: the short film Zamperini: Still Carrying the Torch; footage from Louis Zamperini’s visit to the Billy Graham Library in 2011; Louis Zamperini’s testimonies shared from 1958 and 1974 Billy Graham crusades and more. For more information, to watch a short trailer for the film, or preorder a copy, visit www.billygraham.org/unbroken.

Zamperini, who passed away earlier this year, visited Billy Graham in June of 2011 at his home in Montreat, N.C. At age 94, he also visited the Billy Graham Library where he signed copies of the New York Times bestseller Unbroken and greeted many WWII veterans. Up until his passing, Zamperini was an inspirational speaker and shared his life-changing testimony at several of Graham’s Crusades, including San Francisco (1958) and Los Angeles (1963, 1974).

This coming New Year’s Day, Will Graham, at the request of the City of Torrance, will represent his grandfather Billy Graham at the 126th Rose Parade on Zamperini’s hometown float. The parade’s theme for 2015 is “Inspiring Stories.” Zamperini was selected earlier this year to be the Grand Marshal of the annual event, and despite his passing, the Tournament of Roses Committee decided to use the opportunity to honor his life.