FORT LIBERTY, N.C. — Following reports that base garbage bins at Fort Liberty were overflowing with uncollected trash, garrison commander Col. John Wilcox announced a groundbreaking new program that he promised would solve the garbage problem in no time.

“I’m amazed no one’s thought of this before,” said Wilcox as he glanced at a formation of soldiers humping full trash bags toward the closest empty dumpster a mile away, “but what’s old is new again. This morning I signed a directive that each company at Fort Liberty will immediately establish a sub-surface freely oxygenated tactical incinerator emplacement, or what you and I know from the good old days as a ‘burn pit.’ This is an innovative way to deal with the breakdown in timely waste disposal for which I as garrison commander have absolutely no responsibility, as well as getting the troopers out there for a little extra PT.”

Wilcox broke off to briefly counsel the soldiers who had just passed him.

“Oh you doggone troopers better not be walking that trash across my grass! I don’t care if it’s another quarter-mile to walk around, seems like ya’ll could use the exercise! Look at you, gasping like you’re sucking in airborne fungal spores in your barracks or something! You ain’t a bunch of legs, hump that trash, hooah?”

The garbage situation is one of a growing number of quality of life issues identified across the Army, but Maj. Gen. James P. Isenhower III—make sure you call him “the Third”—claimed that the trash issue was related to the mold problem upon which he had recently commented. “Colonel Wilcox doesn’t have a trash problem, he has a discipline problem, and I’m glad to hear he’s properly identified the source,” said Isenhower the Third. “These Gen Z folks got a lot to learn about adulting, and I can’t think of a better way to teach those troopers at Fort Liberty some grown-up lessons. They’ll get to work with their hands, learn basic skills like how to light a fire—and 20 years from now when they’re heading to early graves from cancer and lung, heart, and brain diseases, they’ll remember how good they had it when a little mold on the walls, ceiling, and in their drinking water and HVAC system was the most they had to worry about.”