Alright so there's a lot I'm good at and a nearly equal list for my, well not so good. But on that list is procrastination and journaling. The prophets say to do it, my mom says to do it, my schedule says don't you dare, there are Netflix movies to be watched. But I am putting off the natural Danny and doing this...
One of the really fun things I am getting prepared to do it called CQ. I will be known as a CQ warrior, it is really a joke. But USAFA demands it of their sophomores. If I were to describe CQ in a few short sentences I would describe it thus:
Sit at a desk at the end of a hall. Look down all three halls for permanent party (Sergeants/Majors/Colonels). If there is permanent party, stand up at attention, if the permanent party is an officer call the Squadron to attention unless you already have a higher ranking officer in squad. After he/she passes, sit down and resume Facebooking/homework (let's be honest, it is way to hard for this to happen)/ talking to whoever is chilling around the CQ. Once in a while make a call to a higher ranking CQ. Continue to be the secretary for the Squadron and get quizzed/hazed by the AMTs (Academy Military Trainers, they are Sergeants who make sure we are doing our job perfect). After your shift of 1 to 12 hours is up, run fast away from the CQ.
Things forbidden at CQ: Watching movies, playing games, falling asleep. I simply find it important to stay awake. The CQ stands for Charge of Quarters, it is supposed to be an alert system in the case of an "active shooter" or "bomb threat." I think it's a massive waste of time in that the benefit to cost ratio seems a bit off, but I'm not the boss or the man with the experience.
Anyway, that was a really long way of setting up the story I want to tell. So I was sitting CQ for A-hall, which has some different rules, like you only have to stand for a Colonel or General (crazy high rank, but it happens) and you have to wear service dress. A-hall CQ is allowed to watch movies and they must have two cadets sitting at a time, while Squadron CQ only needs one at a time. I think the two is in case we have an incident I am about to tell about. So I am sitting A-hall CQ, trying to write a paper for English but I just can't seem to escape from an online game. While there a Major walks up, chats a bit, and asks the borrow the phone...... in essence he ended up not reaching the guy and needed an escort across campus (since A-hall is open to visitors/guests/ and parties). This is why I think A-hall has us wear service dress and have two people there, so I could escort the guy across campus.
Well I am talking with him as we go and learn quite a bit of sweet stuff. He is stationed in Brazil, acts as a Brazillian Liason to the US, is a liason for the Academy (like Col Tafaute who helped me get in here), and does an untold number of other things for the government down there. Just before this place he was in Bosnia or something sweet like that. He is an academy grad, but has been a ROTC commander for an American University. When he found out I did ROTC he wanted to hear about what I saw in ROTC vs the Academy.
This is a topic I am particularly fond of because so many Academy cadets have a strong superiority mindset over ROTC cadets. I told him frankly that I enjoyed ROTC more because the camaraderie was stronger. I told him I thought they produced much better and less toolish leaders. I admitted that the training at the Academy far dwarfed that of ROTC just because we a permanently submerged in a military environment. I said I was still glad I came to the Academy because I believe there are things here I needed to be exposed to in order to have a successful career in the Air Force.
We talked about the quality of education here and at my two other colleges. I told him I was disappointed with the core classes and thought the other schools really did a superior job. I did mention that most of the classes not involved with my degree (economics, Military Strategic Studies, Military History, and such) were still really pretty cool. I still hate English, but can handle that one. I thought it was funny how he told me to really try to learn Spanish since he uses Portuguese daily. But it is probably sound advice.
In the end, he said that ROTC and Academy both produce some awesome leaders and some horrible leaders. He said for ROTC guys, they can quit ROTC and still be in college, but in the Academy you cannot quit the Air Force and stay in college. That makes ROTC guys have a bit more genuine motives. But he also said he didn't think ROTC guys would ever appreciate the Air Force as an institution like an Academy grad would having been through crap for four years. That was something I hadn't thought of.
In the end, we never found his guy, so I returned the Major to A-hall where he gave me a coin. I love coins. After that I continued to sit A-hall CQ for another few hours when all of a sudden tons of generals start walking into A-hall, turns out there was a meeting. So we start jumping to attention and Gen Gould sees us and comes over to shake our hands and say hi. I thought that was really cool of him because that didn't take much time but still gave us a really good impression of him just because shaking a 3-star general's hand is a cool deal.
I also had the opportunity to show a few Army guys around the Academy. The night before they are coming a senior (firsty) sends an e-mail begging for volunteers to do this. I figured why not and then he said we would have to be in service dress, but I had already committed so it was too late to withdraw. Service Dress is just hot and uncomfortable. But the Army guys were from the 101st Airborne, these guys have been a part of history ever since WWII. Turned out it was really good that I volunteered since I still knew all the stuff to talk about in the Academy as far a knowledge goes. I got to eat up on the staff tower with them (fancy food and fancy silverware). When it came time to drop them off, the Lt Col gave me a coin and another guy gave me an Air Borne patch. This is one of the few patches I would have ever wanted to wear if I had joined the Army, and it was even cooler knowing these guys were Rangers. As I was walking away, one of the guys tapped me on the shoulder. After I turned around he ripped his Airborne patch off his own shoulder and handed it to me. This thing showed wear, making it a lot more meaningful.
While showing them around, they had mentioned that they were all getting deployed to overseas in August. They mentioned different places, but the only one I caught was "Korengal Valley". That is the same valley that Restrepo took place in. It was/is considered the most deadly valley in the war. We watched a documentary on Restrepo, and well. Those guys might not all come back. I have always been ok with the cost of freedom. It is acceptable to me that men must die to keep tyranny at bay, and I feel completely confident in my decision to contribute to that price should the occasion call (of course I would rather make the enemy pay that price for attempting to take what I love so dearly, namely: freedom, family, religion, and peace of mind). But still I never had a major problem with that idea of death, but when I realized that this guy who ripped his own patch off for me might not return home, it really sunk a lot deeper.
In the end, those guys really improved my impression of the Army in general. Of course I have friends in the Army, and I love them, but as a whole I consider the Army the most pathetic branch. It's not that my stereotypes were wrong (they really just proved them right), but I did realize that they want so much the same thing I want. Yes, I should have realized that sooner, but I am a bit thick for being the best and brightest.
Funny annoyance, every so often we get pee tested. Without fail I always get picked. I hate it, we get a knock on the door at 0500 and have to go pee as someone stares us down. Yep, I got picked last week. Heard, then knock, opened the door, asked if it was just me and he said 'yeah'. At that point I screamed how much I hate urinalysis.
I have an econ teacher who has so far been very entertaining, but one day he was showing us his personal 'spending plan' (spending plan is a more positive word that budget). My partner in the class is another LDS guy, and he told me to check it out. Major Ratliff (the teacher) had a budget for tithing, fast offering, and church magazines. We decided to go ahead and ask if he was Mormon. Sure enough he was, we told him we were and he then even pointed to his food storage part of the plan. We thought that was just great fun to realize this. After that we were basically his favorite kids in the class.
SPARTAN RACE: I did one, without doing a play-by-play, it was super tough. Took 2ish hours to go 5 miles. I think we low crawled through mud for almost 1/4 a mile. I was so dirty and tired, but it was fun.
Avengers movie: see it, it is the best so far. Non stop funny awesome scenes, and they even managed to avoid being cheesy... ever. I was completely impressed.
Lastly, if you made it this far. You deserve to read. For Mother's day (I actually forgot until someone told me to remember) I decided to give my mom a treat by appeasing something she has been begging for almost six months for. I asked Willson on a date. I was nervous as crap, and even told her I had no idea what to do for the date. But I asked her on one. BOOM, done. Broke the year streak of no dates. Hope mom likes her present.
Sorry it was so long, but I needed to log it.
No comments:
Post a Comment