Alex Kramar

I got a certificate of appreciation for being a smartass once. I was on active duty at the old Walter Reed, and we had a training standdown- so the OR’s were closed, but naturally, we kept the recovery room fully staffed with absolutely nothing to do. One of the reps for the sanitary wipes for equipment came in and handed me two types of wipes and said to “try these, and let us know which one you like better’ - something about the government having to give different vendors a chance. So me being bored as hell and in the good old days before cell phones, I took two stretchers and put them in front of the nurses station. I wiped them both down with the different sanitary wipes, I timed how long it took to dry, noted on the streaks, the smell, the feel of it on my hands, the packaging, how easy it was to grab the box – everything. I then wrote up a three page comparison giving the pros and cons of each, before finally giving a recommendation for one of the products. I turned it into my supervisor, who promptly forwarded to my section head, who forwarded it to the division chief, who sent it to the chief nurse of Walter Reed Army medical (a full bird, who eventually retired as a general officer) who apparently loved it. The hospital admin then took it to the vendor, and the vendor was so pleased that I ended up getting a certificate of appreciation from WRAMC for my contributions to “the government acquisitions process’. Not bad for a bored lieutenant in the recovery room on a Saturday.