Basic 8 David's Journal July 15 - 18th

2009 7 15-16

So we technically have not started basic training. That will start on Friday the 17th, but we still get physical training (PT) and if we mess up we get smoked. We had another real big smoking. I am guessing it was about an hour long. They break down all our muscles to total fatigue. I don’t have much time to write in a journal. I am non stop from about 0400 – 2000. We are then given one hour personal time from 2000 – 2100. And that time is spent taking a shower and organizing things. It is hard to think about writing during that time. I also was asked to give a talk in Church this next Sunday, so I need to take some time to prepare.

2009 7 17 Friday

It is officially day one of basic training. There were a lot of smokings. Our platoon did pretty good at avoiding them. We do pretty good at sticking together. I like everyone in my platoon. They are young, but I have no serious problems with any of them. We got issued some more equipment, and had some briefings on equal opportunity. We are still waiting to get our weapons. That will be nice to have them. That will be the final piece of our uniform to make us feel like soldiers. It will be fun to walk around town in my uniform. There is a lot of pride being a part of the U.S. Army.

2009 July 18 (Day two) Saturday
This was a tough day. It started early in the morning with our initial PT test, which is one minute of pushups, one minute of sit-ups, and a one mile run. I got 46 push-ups. I probably could have done more if my arms were not so tired. The sit-ups I only got 35. what happened was I started out real good. I was pumping them out fast, probably better than I had ever done before. Then I hear the DS say you can not put your knees on the feet to the person spotting me, and that none of my sit-ups counted. She said I need to start over. So I lie on my back for about 15 seconds and ask when do I start over? The DS looks at me and says I wasn’t talking to you, so I kept going and was able to manage 35 total. I am guessing I would have done more sit-ups than push-ups, which is a huge improvement. I am so happy they are getting easier. Then we went over to the track. They used some black gravel for the track. I started out fast for a little more than a lap and then found a steady pace. I was able to finish with a time of 7:20. It was fun to rub my time into some of the 18 year olds. I still need to work on endurance and keeping a fast pace for longer.

The rest of the day we spent doing the confidence tower, which is about 50 feet high. We needed to rappel down. I had fun. I have rappelled a few times already,. And I already had confidence in doing it. So, I went down in three jumps. The only problem was the person on belay was not as confident and stopped me about two inches above the ground and I ran into the tower. I didn’t hit hard, but embarrassing when a group of DS start laughing and saying that is what you get for trying to showboat.

We got to eat MRE’s for lunch, which is an easy to make military meal. It was fun. My meal was beef stew.

Well, there was a lot of talking going on watching the repelling, because it was sometimes very funny. One of my friends, Private C got a little ways down and lost his footing and starting crying to the DS to save him. The DS just laughed at him and told him to get off his wall. Then while he was trying to get down another DS took over at belay and started to shake his rope. It was not very nice, but still pretty funny. The DS’s have not been very nice to Private C.

After doing the tower we were punished for talking too much during the activity. We had to do what was called “The Granola Factory.” That is when we get smoked so hard that we throw up and the throw up looks like granola. So they took us to a covered area where the ground was hay and rubber. Then for the next hour and a half straight we exercised. I think we stopped maybe three times for water and that was only for about 15 seconds each. It was horrible at the time, but after we were done I felt such a nice sense of accomplishment.