P.T. Sucks ...

So Earl has been doing a lot for the past two weeks. Like I said before, he is currently in White Phase of his training, which only means that they are going to push him even harder and longer.

On the 19th Earl and his fellow soldiers were lucky enough to go on, what their Drill Sergent said was, a 5 mile road march. Some of the soldiers double checked the march length on a map afterward though and figured out that they had actually marched close to 8 miles. Earl and everyone else had to march 8 miles with 90lbs of gear on their backs.
Earl and his fellow soldier also got to fight against each other with pugil sticks (big q-tip like weapons). Earl won first in his weight class for his entire platoon and second in his entire company, which consists of about 250 other soldiers.
For some reason though, after all they went through for that day, Earl's platoon got smoked for 5 hours. So the Drill Sergents made everyone do hundreds of pushup's, situp's, flutter kicks, and so many other things that ... Everyone seriously thought the exercises would never end.

On the 20th Earl and his fellow soldiers in training got a wonderful chance to work on 3 hours of physical training (P.T.). The 3 hours included running up and down 40 feet of stairs 20 times in a row, carrying huge logs around a track, flipping 5 foot long tractor tires, carrying "wounded" soldiers, and running 3 miles to a shooting range.
The shooting range was nicknamed, "10 man" Location of hits and misses" (?). The soldiers have to shoot at pop up targets and are able to check where they hit the targets on a computer screen. Earl, of course, got a score of 38/40. Almost perfect.

Fun Random Fact: Earl's Drill Sergent Ward has taken to calling him "Obama" (it was only a matter of time ...) and everytime D.S. Ward shouts out "Obama", Earl has to answer back, "no new taxes!"

I got to talk to Earl on Thanksgiving, which was very nice. I would have talked to him for a good 20 minutes, but since I was in Bolinas and in a bad reception area, my cell phone cut out halfway through our conversation. I was happy to hear his voice though. He is doing good, he just talked about what he had written in his letters. They actually let the soldiers have a real meal for Thanksgiving. Earl was more than happy to be able to actually drink real coffee and eat real food. Earl even got a chance to eat non-dairy pumpkin ice cream!

So that's it for this week. For those of you who wrote letters to him, please continue to do that! He really does enjoy getting them, even if he doesn't always have the time to respond.
Thanks again to everyone for reading this.

Pugil Stick Fighting - Wikipedia

Mr. Eagle Eye

So here we go on the updates again ...

All last week and this week Earl has written about shooting his rifle.
His platoon got to practice at a "dry" firing range and a computer simulated firing range. After practicing without ammo for about a week they moved on to practicing with ammo at a real range. I was surprised to learn that the real firing range was a 45 minute drive away from where all the soldiers eat and sleep.
Earl was one of the first soldiers to shoot a real rifle. Thanks to his practice before leaving, one of the drill sergeants nick named Earl "Johnny Sniper", due to the fact that Earl shot all of his targets on the bulls eye. I think Earl was more than happy to be able to practice with and finally shoot a real weapon.

"Dry" Firing - Wikipedia

Simulated Firing Ranges

That's about it for this week. Not too much else going on.
Thanks to those of you who read this and make sure to check back next week for another update!

(One month until Earl returns for Christmas Break on Dec. 18th!)

Photos and Letters

In the past couple of days I have received a lot of stuff both from Earl and the Army.

After an entire month of waiting I finally received a packet in the mail from the Commander with all of our insurance information, military ID information, Earl's company information, Earl's Christmas Exodus information and Earl's graduation ceremony information.
I am so relieved to have received all of this, as I was kind of stressing out a week earlier on what was when and where.

The three letters that I received from Earl today were mostly about how almost the entire group of soldiers at Basic Training had become horribly sick with anything ranging from pneumonia, to having Mono and to having the H1N1 flu virus. Apparently 2 people have actually died while at Basic Training from being sick.
Earl got sent to the ER for 13 hours at one point for having a fever and a temperature of a little over 100 degrees. They then sent him to the Infirmary along with 80 other sick soldiers to rest and recoperate for 3 long days.
Last Saturday Earl was finally deemed healthy again and resumed his training.
Earl has made the switch at Basic Training from Red Phase to White Phase. There are 3 phases during Basic: Red Phase (3 weeks), White Phase (2 weeks) and Blue Phase (2 weeks).

More information on the phases during Basic Training can be found here.

A few days ago one of Earls aunts husbands was able to visit Earl during Basic Training.
Earls aunt and her husband (Clarke) have been emerged in the Army way of life for a little over 30 years. Clarke is a Chaplain (A chaplain provides spiritual and pastoral support for service personnel, including the conduct of religious services at sea or in the field.) and has the rank of Colonel in the Army.
Clarke was able to also take a couple of photos with Earl while visiting him and happily agreed to pass them on to me.





So that's about it for this week.
For those of you who have Earl's address, please continue to send him letters, he always looks forward to those.
And for those of you who are interested in what Earl is going through, I am going to add a few more links about OSUT Basic Training.

Thank you again to everyone who reads this and remember to check back for updates!


Ft. Benning - OSUT Phases

198th Infantry Brigade, 1st Battalion 50th Infantry (History and Information)

So, I got three more letters in the mail from Earl:

Letter One (dated 10/25)

He mentions that he his starting first aid training, which is about 3 hours long. He said that he had to struggle to keep his eyes open during class, because they had a road march before the first aid training. Apparently, if a soldier falls asleep during class, the drill sergents will make them hold their chairs up over their heads for a half an hour.
Earl also mentions that he misses home a lot, but that training is starting to become fun and that he is getting to know his fellow soldiers a little better each day. Earl doesn't seem to get chewed out much by the drill sergents, as he mentions that they don't know him too well ... Which is a very good thing.
Earl mentions that he will be able to come home for Christmas and New Years from December 18th to January 4th.

He also mentions that he is going to start sending me pages full of random observations from his little notebook (which he included with this letter).

Random Observations #1 - Drill Sergent C.
He is the head Drill Sergent and he is mean.
He doesn't come around very often, but when he does come around he likes to scream and freak out about everything. He loves to call people "penis".

Random Observation #2 - Drill Sergent Cr.
He is super strict, he has to have everything be perfect.
But he actually cares a little bit about the soldiers and wants them to learn and grow.

Random Observation #3 - Drill Sergent W.
This guy has spent 40 months in combat.
He seems like he has a loose screws in his head.
He carries around a coffee mug, and if any of the soldiers were to touch that coffee cup, they will die.

Random Observation #4 - GFT (Ground Fighting Techniques) Class
Part of the class involves getting punched in the face by a 6'7" 240 pound Drill Sergent.

Random Observation #5 - Trashing the Bay
The drill sergents completely trashed thier bay (sleeping quarters).
Beds were tossed, lockers were dumped out and trash cans were kicked over.
They were not allowed to go to bed until everything was spotless.

Random Observation #6 - Eating Meals and Laying in Ditches
Earl can apparently eat a full meal in 2 minutes and then run back to his barracks without puking (Im so pround of him ...).
At 5am he was laying in a ditch with his rifle covering his "battle buddy". They have to lay down every time they stop during a road march.

Random Observation #7 - Uniforms, Gatorade and "Fuck"
Earls uniform is either way too hot or way too cold, never "just right".
All the dirt around the base is just sand ... Where did it all come from?
With each meal the soldiers have to drink two cups of gatorade, but they've never seen a drill sergent drink a single cup of gatorade before.
Drill Sergent W. said the word "fuck" 180 times in two minutes. He can also put that word in to the middle of random words flawlessly.



Letter Two (dated 10/28)

Earl mentions that he doesnt like the weather in Georgia. The day will start out warm and by the afternoon it will get muggy and rain.
He learned how to do a "cross collar choke hold" in his GFT class.
He mentions that his in a platoon of 45 other guys and that they are all starting to work otgether as a team.
He also mentions that he wants an entire pack of oreo's, chinese food from Yet Wah and a whole pizza when he gets back, mostly because he is sick and tired of eating the same food every day.

Letter Three (dated 10/29)

Earl mentions that they have been learning about first aid the entire week and that he really enjoys learning how to save soldiers lives.
He mentions that he got a letter from Dan and that it was really nice to get some mail. His drill sergent made him do 40 pushups for the piece of mail, but Earls says that it was worth it.
He has been very homesick for the past week and misses everyone, but he's having a lot of fun and learning tons.


So that's about it ... I hope to get more mail as the week goes on.
Thanks for reading everyone!