It was sure nice to be at home for the weekend. What a refreshing change from here. I waited so long to get here and I was so happy to leave. It was hard to leave the airport(for the second time) but it was nice in the thought that I only have 7 more weeks to go.
Even though it was a short week it sure dragged. We had guest speakers in APS ALL WEEK. We had a 4 hour class on Wednesday afternoon with a guest speaker on suicide. At about the halfway point in the class I am sure a lot of the troop was contemplating it. To top it off the RCMP hasn�t discovered air conditioning. All the APS and dorm buildings have absolutely none. You are sitting there in your uniform in +24oC wearing an under shirt, a long sleeve shirt, and body armour. Then you have to sit in a darkened room for 4 hours watching slides and listening to the presentations.
To top off the torture this week we were told to wear our high brown boots and wool breaches. WOW are those comfy. So I squeezed into my breaches and high browns first thing in the morning. It took me 10min to get the high browns on and get them laced up!! Then we went for breakfast and after that PDT. We have to pry our way out of them and quickly get into our PDT gear. Then after PDT we have to put our boots back on and make it to class on time which is normally only 15 min. Luckily, we were early for PDT and our instructor let us go 5 min early. So we had 20 min to shower, change, and be in our next class. We had PDT all week this week except Tuesday. Ground fighting is tough. Learning how to get out of head locks and such. I had one troop mate try one of the moves we learned on me during a fight. It involved carotid control with my judo gi. I was so intent on pinning him down that I didn�t notice he was even doing it until everything started to go dark. Wow you only let that happen once. Ground fighting is painful. The instructors encourage �compliance by pain�. Everything just hurts now. My neck is sore from having the crap wrenched out of it. I have numerous bruises on my arms in the shape of fingers. But even though its painful and just plain tough, you really learn a lot and are able to apply the stuff that the instructors teach you to the fight. I was used as a teacher's aid during last class. The instructor had no bones about shoving his fingers in my eyes and reefing back on my head to demonstrate the move. As I was tapping the mat signalling UMM this hurts, the instructor replied with �what are you tapping for?� Then proceeded with the rest of the demo which involved a lot of pressure points and plenty of pain. Lucky for me he did the same demo on another cadet so I could see the moves. And then we got to do them on each other.
Ok enough about pain...or maybe not. We had parade on both Thursday and Friday. On Thursday we were senior troop. That was fun. We had to supply troop commanders from our troop to lead the two other troops around the parade square. Its nice out so this was our first parade outside. The rules are a bit different outside but I think that we did rather well. Then on Friday we had parade again where we were second senior troop. After standing in the parade square for and hour in our very comfy high browns we then had drill. So quickly over to the drill hall for another hour and a half marching in our high browns. Can you say sweat? I think I could raise fish in my forge cap. After the Drill class we had a spare in which our troop had volunteered to set up the drill hall for the Commanding Officer's spring social. More work. We had to haul in 80 tables and a few hundred chairs, a bar, and a stage. After an hour of doing that we went to PT (physical training). oooo more work. But it was the last class on Friday and a nice day so I didn�t mind the three mile run.
A few people in our troop are starting to get their detachments already. Jamie from Newfoundland got a nice 3 man LDP (limited duration posting) in New Brunswick. All of the guys that got �F� division (Saskatchewan) found out their postings and they all are happy with them. So 4 down and the rest of us to go. I have heard that BC is the slowest so I am not holding my breath that I will find out any time soon. Hopefully sometime next week.
Its hard to believe but we are starting week 17. |
