Day 23 - White phase test, pt. 2

The day started off well, but quickly soured. We did 30/60s for PT, and then had a phase banner relay race, which our platoon won handily. Yes!

But then came our in-bay inspection, which went badly. We lined up, standing at attention, around the rectangular center of our bay, and waited for the company commander to arrive. When he came in, he stormed through the door and started yelling at guys about for eir memory work. We messed up a lot of "questions."

One guy froze up after the first line of the Soldier's Creed. Another mistook a General Orders for one about Weapon Safety. And I stumbled on doing a right shoulder arms. I think the only good part was our bunks (which were awesome, but small consolation).

We were all pretty discouraged from the whole fiasco, but there wasn’t time to mope around. We went out to the AT4 range (that the shoulder-fired anti-tank weapon) and shot practice rounds at rusted out tanks. They look like 9 mm rounds, but when fired they expand and look like orange balls flying through the air. The oldest and youngest guys in the company got to fire live rounds, which was spectacular.

For lunch I scored #13 Chesse Tortellini. It’s had spiced apples and a chocolate Ranger Bar in it, so I was really fired up, but didn’t get a chance to eat then because I ran out of time eating the tortellinis. I swear I will never make that mistake again. From now on, I’m eating the dessert first.

After that, we went to the M203 range, where we shot the 40mm orange practice rounds from the M4-mounted grenade launchers. I almost hit the target with the two attempts I was allowed. (They may not count that, but in my book, “almost” still counts with grenades).

Again, we had dinner in a classroom, but we had more time than before. There’s some confusion as to whether we’re in white phase or not. It’s not clear, and we’re not getting straight answers about it, but both drill sergeants left earlier than normal today.

Curious…