Inprocessing Week at BOLC II

As it turns out, the Army computer system here at Ft. Sill is even stricter than it was at LDAC.  I can't even get onto Yahoo Movies, let alone blogging sites.  Luckily, there is an Atlanta Bread Company in Lawton (it's like a Panera's!) with wireless so I was able to change my blog settings, and can now update via email.

BOLC II itself isn't too bad.  We are only halfway through the first week, but the cadre keep saying we should make our mistakes here rather than later, so it isn't anywhere near as stressful as Warrior Forge was as a cadet - the evaluations don't exactly affect us in the same way, and we aren't all getting ranked against each other.  We have the evenings off, and have been getting done with duty by 1700 for the past few days.  Despite that, the days seem incredibly long, perhaps because we get up early (4 am this morning), and then don't really do anything too productive.  We've been getting a few briefs and classes, but mainly we've been working on getting different paper work done.  The dining facility is also rather nice although we are sharing it with a large group of Air Force soldiers who are preparing for deployment, and tend to pull up by the bus loads. 

Oklahoma is extremely hot, and I'm not that impressed by Ft. Sill, either, especially after Ft. Lewis.  The clothing and alteration store closes at 6 in the evening.  That just seems so early.  Of course, I've had some problems adjusting to post hours since places like Burger King close at 9 when in the real world drive thru's are open until 11 and later.  Lawton, which is the closest town, is not too horrible just yet - at least they have a large book store, and apparently a mall though I have no clue where it is.  We have been hearing stories though about some of the trouble previous LTs got into - I'm not sure how much is the truth, and how much is just cadre using scare tactics to encourage us to behave responsibly.  Although, the story about a group of lieutenants getting into a fight with the police outside a bar was rather funny (by the way, that is one of the bars that isn't off limits to us).

I'm in a room with two other women, and oddly enough, we all went to Germany for CTLT last summer after completing 10th Regiment at LDAC.  There are actually a ton of people here from exactly that same regiment, and it seems like everyone else is from OCS (officer candidate school - this is a way for enlisted soldiers to become officers) or West Point.  All the West Pointers had about two months of leave after graduation so many of them are in this cycle of BOLC because their leave is now up.  They've already been here a week or two longer than the rest of us so they have even less to do at the moment.

Anyway, as I said there is not much going on here yet.  We have our first real training event on Friday - a road march (although I guess we did have a diagnostic physical fitness test this morning - I did horribly but passed).  That evening we also have a meet and greet with the cadre, and then we have the weekend off.  Not that my roommates and I have any clue what to do in Oklahoma - other than sleep in at least one of those days.  For the most part we have weekends off although we are working through next weekend; in return, we have a four day the following weekend, and then a three day for Labor Day.  As for time out in the field, we spend one night out there in the 4th week, and then every night in Week 6, so it shouldn't be that bad.  There definitely are advantages to being a lieutenant rather than a cadet.