do you have a spare Christmas card?

[mimitabby]

hey, remember this? don't do it!

It's a great idea -- send a Christmas card to a hero. That's the message in an e-mail making the rounds.

It says..."When you're making out your Christmas card list this year, please include the following: A Recovering American Soldier, c/o Walter Reed Army medical Center."

As I said, it's a wonderful thought, but don't waste your time doing it. A letter addressed this way won't be delivered.

Because of security concerns, the medical center can only accept mail made out to a specific soldier at the facility, per Department of Defense regulations. And because of privacy rules, they can't give out those names.

"The U.S. Postal Service has also been helping out by not accepting these letters, packages or cards," says Walter Reed Deputy Public Affairs Officer Terry Goodman. "But sometimes some will get to Walter Reed, and if they do they are returned to sender."

Goodman says you can send an electronic greeting to the recovering soldiers there. For instance, tens of thousands of text messages were sent around Thanksgiving.

"The soldiers really, really enjoy and love the support that they're getting from their fellow countrymen," Goodman tells me.

Go to the Walter Reed web site for a list of ways to show you care.

[OakLeaf]

You can send a card through the Red Cross.

[Tuckervill]

You can also use anysoldier.com, which I think was inspired in some way by Ann Landers.

http://anysoldier.com/

When my son was in Iraq, most of the care-package stuff was unnecessary. He was in Baghdad at Camp Victory, so he had access to the PX and the local markets. He was getting first run movies before they were released over here, for instance (I'm sure they were bootlegged, but he had no way of knowing where the Iraqi's got them.) It seems to me that a lot of the information still going around is leftover from the very beginning of the invasion, before the infrastructure was in place to support the soldiers in style.

Of course, there are troops in certain areas where they don't have access to that kind of infrastructure. My suggestion is to find out the latest information and what they need the most, and only send that. And send your holiday greetings through the sites already mentioned.

Karen

[mtbdarby]

I don't know how many of you sent cards but I did, and I got it back Christmas Eve.

So I did a little digging and here's what I found:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22114832/

Remember the good ole days when this would have been delivered? A sign of the times, I guess, so for next year please go through a charity of your choice.

[Trek420]

Bump!

I was reminded of this thread because there was an email circulating throughout work today with the OP suggestion. I knew we'd come up with a bunch of good ideas here on TE. Had to excuse myself from work and "I know I have the info someplace"

Since I'm working on my holiday cards (which somehow never seem to get out till New Years) maybe others are too.

[mary9761]

If one would like to do something for recovering soldiers, there is always the possibility if you live in an area with a local veteran's hospital to donate toiletries etc. You could also check your local American Legion, VFW etc as they nearly always have a program year round collecting items for the veterans in hospitals etc.
Just a thought.