Parade March at AIT

Dear Family: (October 20, 2009)

Thought I should try to get another update out since I’m going down to the library for a bit today and will have internet again.

There’s not a whole lot to report, every days pretty much the same here. We’re now studying alternating current in class which I find interesting since there isn’t a whole lot of AC involved with cars. As such we’re going much more in depth with AC than I’ve gone before and the oscilloscopes we’re using are significantly more advanced than the ones I’ve used before. However, the basic electrical background that I have and the fact that I’ve used an oscilloscope at all before still puts me at a distinct advantage here. I’m continuing to find that I’m glad I picked the path that I did and that I’m grateful for the training I have received.

Our instructor continues to make the class interesting which we all appreciate. We are switching instructors today and most of us are rather nervous but he’s assured us the new guy is good. He’s helped improve my abdominal strength as well as NCOs are apt to do. I am the youngest person in our class of twelve so I was assigned the job of being the safety guy which means I’m responsible for everyone removing watches, dog tags, etc. One day I forgot to check and we had five people leave stuff on. That meant I got to do 100 reverse crunches, it’s a very effective lower ab workout that I’ve decided to build into my daily regimen. He’s really cool though. We saw him angry for the first time last night though when a private was told to take out the trash by his class commander who is a specialist and he replied, “You do it.” That didn’t go over well.

We did have one exciting thing happen these last few days though. I marched in a parade. It was kind of a random thing but they took 24 people on nights down to Yorktown and we represented the US Army in this parade. We marched with formations from all the branches of service as well as a bunch of JROTCs and war recreation groups and stuff like that. It was only about a mile long and all we did was march along, do an eyes right as we passed a reviewing stand with a 1st Star and a bunch of other higher-ups and continue marching. It was still cool though. There were probably about 1000 people in attendance so it was a little parade but it was different. It was slightly maddening because the guy in front of me couldn’t keep in step (although to his credit we had to stay in step with the army band which was difficult at times) and the guy next to me kept falling back but oh well. Our sergeant thought we did well and a sergeant-major complemented us as well so it was good I guess. And if nothing else it was a fun few hours.

I’m now about 35 pages behind on my reading and won’t get more than a couple hours after getting back from getting my hair cut and going to the library but I’ll catch up. I hope everything at home is going well. Good luck with everything. I hope tomorrow goes well.