undercover broadcaster

Another day, another misappropriated government dollar. Day 6 ended with a whimper, and a small surprise. We’ve been trying to set the tone for the past almost-week, by showing no emotion, no smiles, and no mirth for these knuckleheads. I did that the last time and earned the sobriquet “Candy Drill” from my peers. No biggie – just a rookie mistake. So in the process of learning from that mistake, I decided to play it serious until it felt right to let my guard down.

I have not quite felt that yet, but apparently my battle buddies feel it already.

I came in from a marathon training meeting to find two of them teaching an Army Values class in the bay, all the Joes on their heinies around Ol’ Drill, seated in big black chairs – with Joe looking like an acolyte awaiting the wisdom of the cult leaders. An apropos comparison, if you think about it.

Anyway, I rolled my chair out and things got jokey talking about Army Values, especially after MOS’s entered the field. See, I made a point not to talk about my real job, as my three drills are all combat arms guys – 2 infantrymen and a cavalry scout. It kind of makes me pale in comparison in the eyes of a brand new troop coming in. Hmmmmm, who to listen to? The guy who shot people in the face in Iraq or the guy who shot TV stories in Iraq?

“Too easy, Drill Sergeant, too easy,” as they say.

Well, without giving away the farm, they now know I’m not a grunt – although I have the same little badges the grunts do – but when they kept asking me, I left them hanging.

Anyway, to tie this all together, I feel like I let a little control slip tonight by getting a little looser with them. Once you let it go, it’s gone forever.

So I guess I’ll have to smoke the balls off them tomorrow.

Too easy, Drill Sergeant, too easy.

Hello, new Soldiers... goodbye, voice....

We're four days into the new cycle and I'm already waylaid by "screamacitis." That's a condition where one loses their voice by repeatedly hollering at trainees. You'd think that I'd have learned by now how to conserve my voice, and not blow it out so early in the game, but I guess in my youthful exuberance I forget these things. A lot of times it's a matter of trying to keep up with the Joneses, if you will. There a re a few of my battle buddies who have those natural command voices and can carry their voices with little effort. It's a little harder for me, as I'm use to having a microphone to carry my pearly tones to the masses. So in the process of trying to get my voice to carry back to the cheap seats, I project from my throat instead of my diaphragm, and as a result I sound like I recent had a tracheotomy.

So ends day 4.

I had overnight CQ last night, and now that we fall under a new "weapons immersion" program, the privates actually have their rifles with them 24/7. We have racks in the bay to lock them up in at night. Before this new policy, we simply had Joe hang his weapon on his bedpost at night before he went to sleep. Not exactly the most secure method, but it taught him how to be responsible for his weapon AND it got him used to having it around all the time, much like Soldiers operating in Iraq and Afghanistan had to get used to it.

The new policy really is more eyewash than anything. If you read the policy, you'll see that the higher-ups want the training value of having weapons around all the time, but are restricting how those weapons are handled, almost to the point of silliness. Here's an example: anyone who's ever seen a basic training company eat chow out in the field knows that a detail is drawn from the so-called duty platoon to serve chow. 10, maybe 12 Soldiers in all ground their weapons and don aprons and gloves to serve their peers hot chow. They ground their gear and weapons immediately being them in the designated chow area. That used to be fine. Now, there's a requirement to have 2 -- count 'em, 2 Soldiers to act as weapons guard.... just on the chow serving team's weapons! So no every time you take a chow detail, add 2 more troops to the mix just for weapons guards. During physical training, we're required to have 2 guards per platoon -- we could always cover that because there's always going to be a few privates on profile to fit that bill. Well, now for EVERY platoon there needs to be 2 guards. We'll be taking healthy bodies out of the PT formation to be weapons guards. Ridiculous.

Oh, well... whaddaya gonna do? Ain't no sense in fighting city hall on this one.

So, I've been enjoying my "recovery" day from CQ -- my children are treating me like I've returned from a year-long deployment, by hanging on my every word and deed all day. My daughter has been within an arm's length of me all day. You'd think that only being away for four days or so wouldn't be a big deal, but with the cycle break/leave I just came off of (graduated the last class the week before Thanksgiving, then three weeks of leave during Exodus), they got used to having Dad home. I think the best thing about the first few weeks of the cycle is that since we train locally the whole time, and aren't away from the company area very much, everyone can drive by and get a little huggy break during certain times of the day.

Well, let me wrap this up. I'm gonna have a little dinner, relax, and go back to work bright and early tomorrow. I almost wish my Soldiers could read this so they'd be clued in how bad their day is going to be tomorrow. Their lack of motivation is going to result in a little physical exertion tomorrow!