I can't believe its been five weeks since I showed up to Fort Lee, its gone by really fast. Or I should say its gone by really fast for the most part. While the days go by quick, its the time in class that is killing me. It is really death by Power Point. It gets even worse when you see the total number of slides in each presentation. Anyway more details below, but first...
Song of the Week: "Memories" by David Guetta feat. Kid Cudi. Honestly it is a dance number and a song that can get your blood pumping, but to me its about 'chilling out', relaxing, and "letting it all go for the night".
Virginia So Far: The weather is starting to cool off, instead of being in the 90's it is now in the 80's and 70's. Much better for running and outdoor activities. The humidity is also dropping. It all seems to be going well and I am differently joying my time here now.
After finishing tactics during week three, we moved back into the classroom environment. All its been since then is Power Point. We have covered topics from Army Writing, Communication Skills, and How to Build and Effective Presentation (yes that was by Power Point) to Cultural Awareness and, most recently, Subsistence, which we have a test on Monday morning at 0600. I really don't know what else to put down because I have been taking it really easy and staying on post a lot. We are going to D.C. next Friday on a class trip, I will take photos and post some.
I know I am a little behind on posting so I going to try and knock out a few posts in the next few days and get you all back up to date.
Running: I happens when I want it to. (Not really upset or having problems with it, just really taking it easy and running how I feel. Its all good.)
Song of the week: "Ocean Avenue" by Yellow Card. An old song, but still a favorite. It always reminds me to have fun and take some risks. Most of all it reminds me to enjoy life one day at at time.
Virginia So Far: Well the weather has cooled off a bit and the humidity has dropped. I kind of like it here now. I am now settling into a somewhat normal routine, so its getting better.
Weeks 2&3 of QM BOLC are tactics weeks. Hold on now, if you are thinking its something like LDAC tactics you are completely wrong. They are not even remotely close. If I had to compare them books, the same author would have written them, but they would be from a different series. I'll go over in more detail down below, but most of my time was spent sitting around waiting to shoot or looking at power points. FUN.
The first week of tactics was convoy operations, range safety and basic small unit tactics. I did learn some stuff and I am glad I have the power point presentations to relearn from. We also spent some time on a simulator, which really didn't work on. I think we'll get more time with the simulator later on and it might work then. Friday morning (read 0200 on) was spent doing land navigation with a partner. We had 5 hours to find 10 points. It wasn't hard, there was just a lot of water everywhere making it one wet experience.
The second week was spent on the range qualifying on the M4. It took me a while to zero and get comfortable on my weapon. But once I got going, I was locked in. We also did some barricade shooting and some SRM. There was a lot of standing around as we could only have about a 5th of the class firing at one time. Overall, after being told that tactics would be the best 2 weeks of BOLC, I am now kind of worried for the rest of the course.
Much better that the first one.
I'll let you all know how the next few weeks in the class room are here soon.
