She's alive!

No really, I am! There was some concern for a while as to whether I was actually turning into a zombie, but the danger is temporarily past. Of course, next week is another story.

What am I referring to? Why, the madness known as Farnham of course. It is where we go to do our field training. You know, camping and going to the range and stuff. Sounds like fun, eh? Actually it is. Fun like an amusement park ride called the meat grinder.

I'm sure with most platoons, it's not quite so bad. They didn't get a lot of the more "interesting" things that we did. I heard that some of the other people that were there at the same time actually got something like 6-8 hours of sleep a night. For us it was more like 3-4. And it wasn't even sleep deprivation week. That's what's coming up starting Monday.

No, despite sitting around outside in the sleet for 12 hours and then running a couple kilometers with our rucksacks on, it wasn't so bad. Despite being woken up in the middle of the night by "fire alarms" and "first aid scenarios" that involved carrying people around the campsite for a half hour or surprise topography practice at midnight, it was actually alright. After all that, the 13 km ruck march on Friday was a piece of cake. We decided at the end of the week that...you know, it hadn't really been all that terrible. Sure it was hard. Sure we didn't really like a lot of it while it was happening, but once it was over...well, all that was left was to brag to the other platoons about it!

The only really unfortunate part about the whole thing was the number of people that got injured. 2 had to leave the platoon and at least 5 others couldn't take part in a lot of the activities since then, and some still might not finish with us because of it. Of course, the rucksack running is very much against the rules so if anyone going to basic is reading this and worrying - don't. Our sergeant is a little crazy and doesn't really care if he gets in trouble. Which he supposedly is, so this next week is either going to be slightly less unmanageable than we expected, or we are going to experience an as yet undiscovered circle of hell.

But in other ways we really did have a good time. It was cool to get to know our instructors out in the field, and we could tell that they were having more fun, and talking to us differently. Not when they were giving us hell of course. But other times, like out practicing topography, or learning hand signals and section movements. We did a lot of neat things, and of course the obstacle course was fun. And we definitely left with a feeling of accomplishment - at least for the 5 minutes it took everyone to fall asleep on the bus ride back.


So what have I been doing since then? Honestly, not a heck of a lot. Week 10 has been really slack, with a lot of annoying little things that just need to get done. Needles and the barber and such. We found out our next postings, which was cool, and had a couple of classes.

Wait, how could I have forgotten the gas hut?? The first three days of this week were straight classes on gas attacks, and how to put on the mask and suit quickly and things like that. It was pretty fun, but weird to be sitting down all day after week 9. A lot of people were worried about actually going into the gas hut (yes they actually gas us with "CS gas" which basically makes your eyes and lungs burn and your nose run if you get any), but everybody passed and only one person actually panicked, but then made it on the next try. Some people had pretty red faces when we finished though. I think it was harder on the tall people - they get more gas first! I was fine, didn't get any in my mask, but had to hold my breath a reeeaallly long time while I changed canisters and had trouble getting getting the threads in line while screwing it on with my eyes closed.

Yup! It was fun stuff. We all felt disgusting afterwards though, with "decontamination lotion" (basically olive oil) all over our faces and hands and heads and sitting in our suits and gas masks for a couple of hours. I can count on one hand the times I have wanted a shower more than after that. Funny, most of the other ones happened here too.

Oh well, on goes the battle! Obviously I'll be gone next week. I may try for another update tomorrow, but if not, it'll be next weekend, if I am still alive and un-undead. I may just turn into a ravening monster instead, as people who have lived with me and seen me in the morning may well remember and fear.

We shall see.