Days 17, 18, 19, 20, 21

Day 17 Monday Did our convoy event today.  As how I lived this in a former life time, I was unanimously selected to be the convoy commander.  Our group did well, no vehicle got smoked so I guess that means we paid attention in class.  However that might not be the case in reality.  A serious training event as how the modus operandi of our enemy is to use IEDs.








In the evening we had in interesting visit from the Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Roughhead.  We were allowed to ask questions.  Mine, late in the game, concerend the new health care legislation and how it would affect the military.  He said Tricare will remain untouched with the exception of coverage for adult kids going from 23 to 26.  We shall see how long Tricare and VA health care benefits remain untouched.  Oh that is right, VA medical benefits for our veterans is a good service?!  He is a black-shoe.. I was not impressed!

 Also got a travel brief.  Glad I am not going to Udari Range! 

Day 18 Tuesday today we had a class on the code of conduct.  Although it centered around the Geneva convention, I would have really like to have known how our enemies view the Geneva convention.  I am sure they are huge supporters.  We also turned in weapons and other non essential gear. 

Day 19 Wednesday.  We really did not do a whole lot today other then prep to move.  Some folks were headed to the airport for a charter flight to the desert, others were waiting for a bus or in our case commercial flights, which we still did not have tickets.  Ugh!

Day 20 Thursday Our travel day after much much craziness to get the flights and stuff.  I do not like the center row of an airplane unless I can snuggle up with the people to me left and right!

Days 13, 14, 15, 16

Happiness is being behind a belt fed weapon!

Day 13 Thursday Machine Gun Day / Reflexive Fire / Stress Fire

Today was fun, we shot the M240 7.62mm, the M249 5.56mm, and the old faithful "Ma Deuce" at the heart thumping .50 cal or 14.7MM awesome. Unfortunately, with these weapons, there is never enough ammo to go around and we only got 25rnd per person to expend! Boy do they go fast!!!! Sad, but fun none the less.

M2 "Ma Deuce"

  M240

  

M249

Reflexive Fire was fun with lots of turning and shooting from the standing ready position. Stress fire was exactly that, we ran an "obstacle" course while shooting live rounds and the drill instructors were yelling at us.

Day 14 Friday Simulated night fire / Scenario Fire / Building Clearing/ IED Brief

A busy day however a bit relaxed. The night and simulated fire were all conducted in a darkened, "laser tag" building with rifles hooked up to a computer to monitor your "shooting" Kind of neat and an interesting business opportunity. building clearing was just your average class in the MOUT facility to learn how to clear a room or building if you had to. More or less a talk thought with a couple of hands on lessons. I never did kick down the door.

The IED brief was good, however the timing was poor, after lunch on a warm sunny afternoon after a long and busy week! Most of the class had a hard time staying awake which was unfortunate as the information delivered in the 2 hour class was good! This class should have been broken up with some of the more dramatic pieces being delivered the first day of the program to "shock" people into the reason why we are doing all of this training.

Day 15 Saturday Map Reading
Now this class should have been broken up in to smaller "chunks" and delivered from the start of the program. We should have had 4 hours of IED training vice 4 hours of map reading on a SATURDAY! ugh..

What was left of the day was used well and we rented some cars and explored our neighborhood in detail!

Day 16 Sunday Off Day
Not a whole lot was accomplished today other then mental recovery. Slept in late 730am. Went to the officers club for brunch, fantastic. A quick trip to the exchanges, dropped the rental cars off at the airport. Some phone calls, cab rides. Dinner was out on the town via the MWR van to Sumo's Japanese Steak house. My fried rice is still better!

I miss my Cup Cake

So I have begun my adventure fly fishing.  I can tell you the last few days have not been easy.  Little cup cake is going to have some challenges, especially with her mother.  The biggest challenge is for momma to stay awake until cupcake falls asleep in the evenings.  I can just see it now, momma sawing logs while little CC is playing with power tools in the garage!  Both will be just fine and the support network we have is fantastic. I think their social calendar will be full for the next few weekends! 

So I am off to the southlands to begin the training pipeline.  I will try and share as much as I can when I can.  I am confident my days will be busy hurry up and wait.  Some of you remember the commercial where the army bubba says, “We do more before 9am then most people do all day!”  Well, from my experience, this in some ways is true, however I have slightly modified the phase to, “We waste more time before 9am then most people do all day!”  So, I was a little disgruntled at jump school where I was up at 3am on my 21^st birthday getting ready to go jump out of airplanes when I should have been going to bed in a drunken stupor!  A story for another time. 

The double shot of Glenfiddich is starting to wane so I think I will switch mediums and read a little Glenn Beck.