Army Commentary (No Kittens, I promise)

Not to get all corny or anything, but I just wanted to wish everyone good luck with accessions. Last I heard, the information was being released some time this week, so I hope you all get the branches you want (thanks so much for your comments). Also, a new cycle of BOLC II ("Beware the Bowlock" - people at Sill might get that one; at least I hope the Bowlock monster has maintained his notoriety) started up this week; hopefully it goes well for everyone.

The Colonel's Moment of the Day, Monday:
He walked in carrying a huge sword. Apparently he saw our skit, and actually has a sense of humor. Of course, it would have been a lot cooler if he had walked in with the sword, and left again. Instead he hung around for a while, started playing shadow puppets in front of the projector and generally pissing our instructor off. After he left, our instructor told us how unprofessional and childish the man's behavior was. Additionally, he does not like the fact that the colonel likes to test his instructors by asking the same question three or four times in slightly different ways. When he came in later that day, he was carrying some type of wooden object, and then walked down the aisles, stopping to ask random people if they were learning anything. He didn't ask me but I had my answer prepared: "Actually, sir, you're kind of distracting me." Maybe he would have taken it as a joke . . .

Speaking of humor, when I walked into the school building Monday morning, the 1SG said to me, "I didn't know you had a sense of humor. I didn't know you even talked until Friday night." I guess my performance in the skit made an impression. Where's my Oscar?

The Colonel's Moment of the Day, Halloween edition:
He walked in during our afternoon history class dressed up as a giant pumpkin and threw candy at us. If all distractions and disruptions came with candy, I'd be much happier here.

For the past few days, we've been learning about movement planning. Our fun, sarcastic instructor from somewhere that isn't the South (he forcefully told us where he wasn't from, and that he says you's guys instead of y'all - does that mean Chicago or New York?) also gave us more random, entertaining, ironic tidbits:

• Back in the olden days when Eisenhower was a 2LT and hadn't created the interstate system yet, he participated in the first transcontinental convoy. The average march rate was 6 mph. I think they made better time on the Oregon Trail.
• At some point in the '90s, we were giving aid to someone in a program called "Provide Comfort" or something equally lamely named. Unfortunately, when you throw pallettes of MREs out of an airplane, they can inflict quite a bit of damage when they LAND on the recipients of this comfort. Now, the MREs boxes break apart as they fall but there are still some kinks in the system: humanitarian MREs come in the same yellow packaging as a certain kind of explosive - you do the math.

This afternoon, we had a very long history lesson. Turns out those four years of high school really payed off because I seem to have retained the basic knowledge of American wars and thus was dazzling the rest of the class with my participation. Also, since I had to give a brief about TC earlier this summer, I even knew what year we were established. Transpo wasn't actually its own branch until World War II, and had been part of the Quartermaster Corps up until then. At the moment, the Army is actually working on combining Quartermaster, Ordinance and TC into a logisticians branch so we're reversing history. Our instructor is not all too happy with the idea since the past has shown that transpo needs to be separate (hence the creation of the transportation corps). I guess we'll see what happens. They are already working on combining the captain's course but I should probably be out before the changes really start occuring. By the way, why is the Army making all these changes while we are at war? Let's add BOLC, shorten OBC and completely change the branches. Isn't a complete overhaul something we might want to save for peace time? I mean, I know a lot of these changes have been inspired by the war but these are things it might be better to develop after the war. We've all seen that BOLC wasn't exactly ready for actual LTs just yet.

Also, my classmates are now describing me as a "hardcore feminist" to other people in class. I guess that means my work is done.

A Lesson in Procrastination

Back in college, when I had a paper due the following day, I would procrastinate by dialing up just about everyone I knew, going to bed and then getting up at 2 am (I'd also watch clips of The Daily Show online since I had no cable, and surf the web - this was back before I got into the blogging thing so now I have even more distractions). Unfortunately, I already get up at 4 am, so with that approach I'd have to get up around 11 pm to write my stupid training schedule. Also, the people I usually call have taken to hanging up on me ("I'm busy" - then don't pick up!) or not answering their phone, so really, it just won't work. Anyway, consider yourself warned about this entry. (Kudos to anyone who gets the song reference in the title.)

Samantha

Since I haven't actually posted any pictures in quite a while (the last time I tried, Blogger was having issues - although I'm going to blame it on the hotel connection because as we know from my last post, my hotel is evil), so I'm going to out myself as the crazy cat woman in the making that I am, and put up pictures of my two Persians.

I have two cats, Caesar and Samantha. They live with my parents, and will continue to live with my parents even once I have an apartment, because while they might be my cats in name, when it comes down to it, they are my parents' cats. We got Caesar and Sam last June despite my mother's protests. Our cat Cleo had recently died, and my dad and I wanted a replacement - my mom wasn't as excited because as in most families when the child and husband want a pet, guess who gets stuck caring for it? The mom, of course.

In the past year, Sam and Caesar's personalities have changed quite a bit. Caesar used to crave attention while Samantha would start squirming at the thought of being held but now she is the "needy one." He was also a very bold kitten, and figured out how to climb over the toddler gate after two days. Now, he hides when we have company while Samantha comes downstairs to view the visitors with the proper amount of disdain. But enough talk, here are some more pictures.

Kitten Caesar

Sam in the Harley-themed bathroom

There's a reason we refer to him as Chubby

Oh the Drama

A few of us were already unhappy with our hotel based purely on its location, but Thursday morning, six people discovered that their cars had been broken into - despite the fact that there is a security guard here. Apparently the thieves took their time, too. One woman said that they had looked through her CD's and thrown them all into the back because they didn't like gospel. Since they actually had enough time to closely examine CD collections, you have to wonder about the level of security. The thieves really hit the jackpot when they broke into the PSG's car: 25 cent folders from Walmart. They actually stole the guy's folders (I guess if he fails any tests because he is disorganized, we'll know who to blame). I was parked in the back, fortunately, so they didn't break into my car (I had an IPod, a GPS and my CD's in there, too - needless to say, all of those things are in my hotel room now). We aren't really sure how this issue is going to be resolved but I know they've been told to speak to the JAG office so hopefully the hotel or the Army (they chose the hotel after all) will reimburse the victims.

The colonel still keeps dropping by class, but we have now noticed that he has a tendency to bring random items with him. For example, the last two times, he came into class carrying a huge knife (after he left, the instructor quipped that the colonel was going to cut himself). I wonder if he is trying to over-compensate for something? As part of our dining skit, we had someone randomly walking around on stage with a folding chair to represent the colonel.

We also made fun of the Transportation Song in our skit since it is probably one of the lamest military songs ever: "we load the trains so other lads can load the guns." It just makes TC sound like a bunch of losers. For our skit, I went up to sing it but instead broke into the first lines of "Born to Be Wild" and "Ridin' Dirty." Personally, I think it's time for a rewrite of the transpo song.

Dining in was a lot more fun than we expected but that may have had something to do with all the alcohol we were consuming during the intermissions. I know I had four drinks within my first hour of being there. Our skit went well - at least we kept each other amused but there may have been a few too many inside jokes for the rest of the classes to get it. Originally we had also planned on having someone walk around in an orange wig and blue sun-glasses to represent our TAC (who has recently been nicknamed "The High Lighter" and "The Great Pumpkin") but she talked to the person who was going to portray her. It wasn't worth any problems it may have caused, although after 22 years in the Army, you'd think she would have developed a thick enough skin to handle a few jokes. She actually didn't even bother to show up for the dining-in, which seems unprofessional to me but maybe she had a good excuse.

After dining-in, a lot of us went to a bar in the mall, and stayed there until about 2 am. It was a every entertaining night all together, but I mixed just a few too many types of alcohol - I had my first hangover in almost three years on Saturday. So much for me being able to handle my liquor. Obviously, I made great progress on my training schedule as a result. It's only 25 points, though. Every single test we've had is worth more than that.

The Things I Learn

Last night we had a final rehearsal for dining-in. It was absolutely excruciating. We already had a read through Tuesday night, and last night was the on-location walk through. Despite the fact that it is on Friday, the leadership was still arguing about important parts of the evening, such as how to set up the grog. Unfortunately, we had to have a combined dining in, so our representative has had a really hard time working with the other classes because even though they've been here longer, they have no clue what they are doing. Additionally, we are going to have assigned seating - basically, I had to pay $50 to sit with people I don't even know. Last night, we were sitting at one table as a class (only those of us actually involved in the ceremony or skit were there) and making fun of absolutely everything. The rehearsal was enough to drive us to drink: we all plan on being extremely intoxicated Friday night just to survive the evening. Our skit should be alright, even though they made us cut things out because we might offend someone. It's funny, the cadre keep telling us, "it's your dining in, so have fun with it, but remember we're watching you." Student status - it's the Army's very own panopticon. They sent invitations to quite a few big wigs, but I don't know how much brass is actually going to be there Friday.

Yesterday we learned about movement planning and management. We keep getting different classes on the same topics: last week we did hazmat and airlifts as part of Unit Movement, now we're getting the movement planning perspective. I don't know why they don't break it down differently, such as learn everything about hazmat or airlifts at once instead of getting several overviews. At least the instructor was entertaining: he shared his own experiences and stories, but also viewed things with an appropriate amount of sarcasm. For example, he told us that the Army was unable to deploy a division in 90 days so naturally, they've changed the goal to 5 brigades in 75 days because that makes so much more sense.

He also told us about two other things that just make me question our leadership (since I was so supportive to begin with): Wolfowitz had been trying to sell the concept of the axis of evil to Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton with no success. I muttered, "he found a buyer" to all those around me while another LT loudly announced to the class that "Texas will buy anything."

The other item was Rumsfeld's genius new approach to war: 10-30-10. It hasn't been implemented yet, but the plan is that we will go to war for ten days, rest for thirty and then go back for ten more. Now I don't see how it is even feasible to send soldiers for only ten days (wouldn't there be some minor issues with equpiment? Just maybe?) but obviously greater minds than mine have thought this out. I just want to know if we are going to be going to war in the same country every thirty days or if we plan on switching enemies every month. Maybe Rumsfeld has been reading up on his military history and discovered the blitzkrieg. Obviously he hasn't gotten to the part where Germany loses just yet. Or maybe they are counting on the invention of a transporter so we can just get beamed over Star Trek style. I know I shouldn't be quite so disrespectful to the country's leadership, being in the Army and all, but it's just so easy to make fun of this stuff.

Old men

We had our unit movement test yesterday - like most things here, it was talked up to be extremely difficult, and was a piece of cake. Not only was it open note, but the multiple choice questions were organized by section so I didn't even have to flip through my 300+ pages of slides but could just turn to the appropriate heading in the book. This is the only test that we have to pass though because in addition to being a transportation officer at the end of this course, I will be qualified as a Unit Movement Officer due to this test. I've noticed that this place doesn't really seem to be geared towards learning as much as passing the test. It depends on the instructor as well, but for the most part, the emphasis is on the upcoming examination so it tends to take away from the actual instruction.

The full-bird keeps dropping by our classroom - I'm not sure if it's because we have a reputation as a class (today, a new instructor told us, "I heard this class was screwed up, but I think you did a great job"), or because he has absolutely nothing to do. I'm honestly not that impressed with him but as a few of the other prior service LTs have pointed out, that's why he's at a school rather than an operational unit. I guess I get it - we're at war, let's have the good personnel leading the troops but wouldn't you also want good soldiers/officers etc. training the leadership of tomorrow? In fact, that is one of the reasons this place is so inefficient. When the 1SG came to talk to us way back, he told us that 18 months ago he lost his TAC officers so the NCOs had to take their place; all the able-bodied transpo personnel are needed down range so he finally asked for anyone that could read and write to fill the slots. Today, one LT accurately described T-School as the recovery place for all the hurt and wounded NCOs.

Today, we had a hands-on application of some of the class room training we had last week: we had to load up rail cars, and practice tying vehicles down with chains. The rail class instructor was one of the more long-winded guys we've had so far so I wasn't excited about spending the day with him, but I survived. There was another instructor that helped him out, and served as the safety officer. He retired in 1982, so I guess that explains his behavior but I don't exactly think that it excuses it: one of the LTs gave a safety brief at the beginning, and afterwards, whenever he referred to her brief, he said, "remember what that little girl said?" He also used the term "little lady" at one point. It's bad enough to refer to grown women as girls, but it's common within society, so I would have let him slide on that. Add in the word little, and it's just patronizing and sexist. Other than that, he didn't seem like a bad guy - an ass but also a bit amusing. The "little girl" was actually flattered because she's 29 and she's always excited when people think she's younger than she is. As a result, I kept my mouth closed but if he calls me little girl when we have him again, I'm definitely saying something. Other people were saying he's from a different generation but still, it's not like he hasn't been around for the past twenty, thirty years. And he even knew that he was doing it, because he was about to correct himself once, and then just said, "screw it, the little girl." I need to figure out the best way to be diplomatic but honest here so I don't feel like I'm always biting my tongue.

In unrelated news, we actually did PT yesterday! We went for a three mile run as a platoon so it was a nice, relaxed pace - plus, people were still complaining about being sore from Lucky Dip. Of course, being TBOLC, we couldn't do PT two days in a row, so the 1SG called zonk this morning at formation (although, that might have also been due to the unexpected cold today) so we all disappeared from sight and drove back to the hotel.

The Dip

Friday was the infamous Lucky Dip. At least, it's infamous by transpo standards. I wasn't quite sure what to expect since the cadre kept talking it up as a smoker that would separate the weak from the strong (physically and mentally) and provide us with a gut check. Given what I've seen of this place so far, I thought a lot of this would probably turn out to be talk. As it turns out, it was harder than I expected but not nearly as bad as it could have been (and as I feared before becoming disillusioned with this place).

The class before us said they were done by 1 or 2, so we are all looking forward to a short, but possibly tough day - we didn't get released until 4:30 which is pretty much business as usual. We started off the competition with a short smoke session which involved two NCOs yelling at us, and forcing us to do exercises such as the flutter kick and leg spreaders. After that, we had to distribute eight sand bags throughout the squad to carry with us for the rest of the day. Unfortunately, it had started raining as soon as we got to formation that morning so the sand bags weighed even more than they usually would. We then walked around from one location to another, picked up more equipment and did different missions. For two of the missions we had to drag vehicles from one location to another, but luckily we had a few big people on our team so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. We even had the best time for the 5-ton. The final event was an obstacle course - the monkey bars were spaced very widely, but other than that, this was definitely one of the "nicer" obstacle courses I've been on: only one or two of the obstacles really messed with my fear of heights unlike the course at Ft. Lewis. It also included a walk through a muddy river but I liked that part.

During the awards ceremony, we got a little speech from one of the colonels who told us about his time as platoon leader, when he only did PT twice a year. I should have joined the Army in the '80s - he didn't have to start physically challenging himself until he was a captain. It was definitely a different Army back then, but that's why it's always so weird having these people tell us about their time as PL - their experiences don't really seem to relate that much to what we are going to be doing. He also asked if any of us "hated this shit:" I was in the process of raising my hand when he said of course no one of us are going to admit to it because we are being watched. I wonder what he would have said if I'd been just a little bit quicker: that I have an extra-ordinary amount of personal courage (it's an Army value!) or am so honest that it approaches stupidity?

Next up, we had a major who of course wasn't about to be outdone. He told us that Lucky Dip was designed to be physically challenging, and he doesn't know what kind of physical conditioning we were getting at BOLC II but now we know what we need to work on. While I'm the first to say that BOLC has some definite problems, I am very amused by the fact that everyone feels the need to rip on it in comparison to TBOLC. In fact, except for the fact that we didn't do PT in the FOB (and an odd obsession with jumping jacks on the part of some LTs), we actually had a pretty good PT program at BOLC. It helped that we actually did PT there (PT for Thursdays has been reinstated by the way - apparently there weren't enough of us showing up to drink - of course, it's kind of hard when we all live eight miles away and are told not to drink and drive . . .).

Yesterday, I went to see The Prestige and Marie Antoinette. The Prestige was great but I found Marie Antoinette rather boring. Some of my favorite movies are slow-paced; I also like period pieces occasionally because of all the visuals (clothing included) but MA relied way too much on the pretty clothes and buildings. Also, I wasn't sympathizing with Kirsten Dunst's portrayal of the poor little rich girl who is oh so misunderstood in her new country. It wasn't Dunst's fault; the movie was just too slow and had too little dialogue to really get into it.

Tomorrow I have a test (which I haven't studied for - it's open note), and next week my training schedule is due. I was going to work on it this weekend, so naturally, I haven't even started it. The problem is just that none of this homework even interests me. In college, I never ran off to start papers early, but I'd be thinking about them, and I'd be interested and care. All our homework here just sounds tedious and boring. Also, they keep telling us not to reinvent the wheel, but they want original work which is amusing. In the real Army environment, if I ever have to write a training schedule, I'm going to find someone else's and change it to fit my circumstances because that's the way things are done in the Army. One of my friends had to come up with an SOP for his unit - he found one, and changed it around a bit but basically, 60% of it was someone else's work because "there is no such thing as plagiarism in the Army." Only 43 months left to go. I need to start looking into online classes or night school before my brain completely deteriorates.

Blog strong: random commentary about the past week

The past week has just been more of the same. Long power point presentations with much more information than I know what to do with (I don't actually like feel I'm learning anything useful; instead I just feel overwhelmed because it seems like I'm going to get to my unit and have all these responsibilities, and very little idea as to what to do) interspersed with the occasional BS. Last Thursday, for example, we all brought in our LBE and kevlar to make sure we had everything, and that it was fitting properly. At least that was the impression we had. When we got to formation, we got yelled at because our equipment wasn't ready to go - meaning we hadn't taped down the straps or blackened the equipment where the paint was coming off (not that black sharpie stays on longer than two seconds anyway). I had been planning on readjusting my LBE after seeing how others had theirs because while it fit, it looked weird (this LBE was a different style from the ones at both school and BOLC)- I don't think my torso is quite long enough. Anyway, let's just say, we were all in a terrible mood last Thursday. It did have one good result, though: the 1SG came by to talk to us and hear about any concerns or problems we'd been having - of course, he's leaving in three weeks so he isn't going to make big changes now but at least we got to tell someone about our TAC issues. When we had tried talking to the XO earlier, she had just kept making a similar response to all our comments without letting us end our statements or explain all of our side. Of course, the XO doesn't make the best impression - she once walked in with her hair in a pony tail (I know all you civilians must be thinking, "How horrible! A pony tail!" but the hair standard is above the collar, and since she outranks us all, she should be setting the standard - usually, she just looks like she either got done taking a nap or working out, because her hair is always a mess.)

Random items from the last week:

A C-130 can carry the weight of 71 African elephants. Why do I know that? Well, we learned all about unit movement this week which includes truck, rail, air and sea (actually, we haven't done sea, so I guess we didn't learn all about it). For some reason, the little video clip included that tidbit of information about the C-130. I wonder if this is supposed to come in handy during my Army career - Operation Dumbo Drop anyone? Or is elephant a common military weight unit?

Transportation officers don't do PT. Actually that isn't accurate. Everyone keeps telling us how important PT is once we get to our units, but here at OBC, we have better things to do, such as watch foot ball games, and drink. Yes, that's right - PT got cancelled on Wednesday because they wanted us to go to an intramural game Tuesday night, and we don't have it Thursdays because they want us to "get our drink on" every Wednesday night. Apparently, it's supposed to help us make connections with higher ranking personnel but the highest ranking person I've talked to while there was a 2LT.

The Army has a new slogan/campaign. "Army strong." While I realize that it's intended to be used as an adjective, as in "he's not just strong, he's Army strong," it also makes me think that the Army is made up of a bunch of illiterate cavemen: "Me Tarzan, you Jane, Army strong." I guess maybe I'm just looking for ways to make fun of this place. We saw one of the new videos for it last week in class, and while it wasn't half-bad, they went completely overboard with the music. "You must feel this emotion now because the music is swelling . . ." Oh, the joys of propaganda.

I hate the military's use of language. I really, really do. We got a speech about dining-in this week, and the guy who briefed us included words such as honor and ladies etc. Granted, he's a Vietnam era dinosaur, but it still doesn't quite excuse the way he kept talking about bringing honor to the family name, "being a man," and behaving like a gentleman in the presence of ladies. Excuse me, but we are all in the Army, so why do the guys have to pull out my chair? I hate words like chivalry, honor and patriotism. To me, they are empty words that have lost all meaning because everyone in the world describes themselves as honorable/patriotic/etc. I'm sure the fact that I hated Song of Roland plays into this, too - what person is stupid enough to choose honor and glory over life (of course, Roland had a messed up sense of honor, but I can't help but think that the Army has a similar concept).

Speaking of the Army and language, I have to write Army style papers. No more than 15 words a sentence. One of them has to be a letter of sympathy to the parents of a medal of honor winner - I wonder if I can avoid the words honor, heroic, patriot and great American.