Very Slow Week

This has been a very long week.
I only got 2 letters from Earl. One on Tuesday and one on Thursday.
I think this may be due to two reasons:
1. I think the mailing system is slowing down a bit due to the holidays.
2. Earl mentioned that they have been very busy training. Since it's getting close to them leaving for Christmas break, I think that the drill sergeants are really pushing the soldiers hard.

Anyways, here's what I've got from Earl so far this week:

11/05/09

Today they had an 8 hour long finance class. Earl mentioned that he thought it was pretty boring, but that he learned one useful thing: Credit card companies are obligated to lower their interest rates to 6% if the person is an active duty soldier.
Earl has been working on "Buddy Team Tactics". Im not even sure how to explain this, so here's a link to some useful information on it: Battle Team Tactics.
They also got to learn something called "Fire Team Tactics".
Basically, I think, they're just learning how to cover and protect their fellow soldier (team member) with suppressive fire as the enemy is firing back at them.
On the 4th everyone went on a long 7 mile ruck sack march. Earl mentioned that he did well for the first 6 miles, but that for some reason he started to slack on the last mile.
I think today was their last official day of training. For the next week Earl mentioned that they would just be cleaning up the PT fields and around their barracks.
Yesterday (12/10) everyone got to learn how to shoot the M2 .50 caliber machine gun. Earl was very happy to try his hand at firing that thing.

So that's it for this week. Like I said before, not much to write about.
For those of you who might still be sending Earl letters, I think it would be best to stop writing him at the beginning of next week, as he comes home next Friday on the 18th and it takes some time for mail to reach him.

One Week Left Everyone!