| Week 13 has come and gone. Wow, it lived up to its name as hell week for the most part. Mainly,it was from the stress that you put on yourself for all the tests that had to be done this week. The week started with the timed 3 mile run on Monday. A nice sunny +13 oC I ran it in a T shirt in 23:01. Then something strange happened. Tuesday started to cool off. Then when we woke up Wednesday morning it was -20 and snowing. Lots!!!!. By Thursday we were pretty much snowed in. Where once there was no snow we had 4ft drifts. Crazy. So far Saskatchewan is not looking very appealing as a place that I would like to be posted. Ok getting back to the week. We had our firearms benchmark test on Monday. I had been shooting great in practice shoots. I was worried about stage #2 which had been giving me trouble in practice. It's 8 rounds in 20 seconds at 15m, 4 rounds standing and then 4 kneeling. I think I was focused too much on that one because I shot stage #1 way too fast. Stage #1 you have 2 min to shoot the target at 25m standing, kneeling, and laying down. I scored the worst score I have ever shot on that target. GRRR made me mad. On stage #2, the one that I was most worried about, I shot near perfect with only one round slipping outside the 5 ring. Oh well, I still got a �P� but it wasn�t the �P� I was looking for. We then had our PDT test on Tuesday. This one was a major test. It combined everything and anything that we had learned up to that point. There was no room for error this time. We had the possibility of getting an "S" (Superior), a�P� (Professional) or a �U� (Unsatisfactory). If you get a �U� in PDT you get two weeks to practice and get it right and then you re test. If you get an 2nd �U�, you go home. How the test works is, one of our troop mates is dressed up in a big padded suit. He is given instructions by the PDT instructor and then left in a room. The PDT instructor then comes and briefs me as to the situation that I am being called to. I could get anything from a co-operative, resistant, or a combative subject. I am not permitted to talk specifically about the scenario but my subject was, of course, combative. I had to take him down forcefully and cuff him. I did rather well. I received a �P� which made my week. That was the only thing that had me worried as I got an �NI� in the first PDT test. I guess the stress and the rapid change of weather got to me by Wednesday because I was not feeling well at all. I went to the medical centre before lunch and they had me lay down. I think that I was sleeping about 10 seconds after my head hit the pillow. I slept right through lunch and partially through the next class. We were having a PDT lecture that I didn�t want to miss so I dragged myself out of bed and, against the wishes of the nurses, went to classes for the rest of the afternoon. Then I came back to the Medical centre at 3:30 because the last class was a spare and slept again until 6:15. I felt a bit better after that and was able to grab some supper. I went to bed early that night. Now I just have an annoying cold. Sniff Sniff... Something is going around the troop because two other people were sick this week as well. That was pretty much it for testing for the week until Friday where we had our BOLF (Be On the Lookout For) drive. That was a blast. The road conditions were horrible but the drive was fun. We had 5 cars in a designated patrol zone. We had to locate the subject vehicle, radio his location and help coordinate the other patrol cars to that area. I really enjoyed that drive. It helps that I received a �P� on the drive and I had a good time doing it. To top off our week we tested for our �Blues� on Tuesday. If we passed we would be able to wear the regular RCMP pants with the yellow stripe down the side instead of the plain blue �McDonalds� pants we have been wearing. Testing is in three parts. The first part is Drill. We nailed that. Personally, I think that it was the best I have seen us do the drill moves yet. We then moved on to �stage 2"of the testing. The RCMP rank structure. My room mates had been grilling me for 2 nights backwards and forward and upside down the ranks and what they were represented by, among other things like all the divisions. I was ready. Unfortunately Cpl Furland didn�t ask me any questions. We are allowed to get only 2 wrong. Well we got 3 wrong. End of the test. We then had a spare set up for drill already the next day. We asked if we could try again. So after much review we tried again. Still no luck , but we were soooooo close. My head is now full of what seems like totally useless information. For example, the first dog used by the RCMP was named Dale, the regimental number of the horse �Nero� in the museum is 295. There was stuff that I guess I should know, like the force officially became the RCMP Feb 1st 1920. Still way more stuff to pack in there. We hope to re test again next week. Well thats about it for this week. This is a weird weekend. We have very little homework and nothing pressing coming up. It's nice but strange at the same time. We have our Sgt Mgr�s (Four chevrons pointing down with a crown) inspection coming up on Thursday. That will be interesting. We also have our staffing interview where we get to hear what is open in Canada and where we might have a chance at going. I can�t believe it but here comes week 14.. . |
| April 4, 2003 |
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