M3 Lab (AIT - Fort Gordon) Day 131

A photo of me on a laptop in the M3 lab with the young Hawaiian to the left.

(The lighting is mostly red in the lab to make it more "real" I guess)

The hall guard woke me up early today at 4:15 and said to get dressed in ACUs and see the sergeant. I asked him "what for" and he said he didn’t know. So I got up and got ready, but one thing that I’ve learned not to do when I’m forced out of bed early is not to go pee. There were about 10 of us at RBK that had to get up early. We were told to get in the duty van and it took us to Charlie company where we were told we had to do a pee test. This time I was ready to go and stepped up near the front of the line. I went and got it over with quick...no more waiting and drinking water and waiting and drinking more water.

There was a chick there who was obviously on some sort of medication. She ended up falling off the chair and just stayed passed out on the floor! She was totally out of it. I’m not sure how they planned on getting her to pee in a cup.

I then met up with PFC Metal and the young Hawaiian to go to the medical clinic. PFC Metal had to setup another appointment for his ears and the young Hawaiian and I had to get our smallpox shot checked out. The doctor took a look at it and said yep, it looks normal (it looks like a huge puss filled zit on my shoulder). I mentioned how sick I’ve become since getting the shot and he said it’s normal...great. If I don’t get any better by Friday I may head in there and get checked out again.

Today in our M3 class we went to the lab. We worked in teams to setup and connect a network and computers together. It was basically what we’ve been setting up in the Cisco Packet Tracer simulator, but with real equipment. We even had to take shifts guarding the door to the classroom with a rifle. Anyone that wanted to come in had to show their ID.

The exercise took the entire day and we still didn’t quite finish. We made some good progress, but not all of the teams were able to get everything completed.

It’s Tuesday and like every other Tuesday we have mandatory training. This time it was MAC (Modern Army Combatives). Me and everyone else who just got the smallpox shot were unable to participate, so we just hung out in the Charlie day room watching TV until the training was finished. When PFC Metal came back he said it was pretty stupid training and we took off to RBK to call it a night.

A photo of the lab showing two of the work areas

Our MOS-T sergeant running some cable through the raised
flooring in the M3 lab. 

No PT (AIT - Fort Gordon) Day 130

Walked by this at the hospital on base...I've seen a lot of vending machines
in my time (I've even owned a few), but I've never seen a flower vending
machine. Insert $20 and get flowers for your sick loved ones at the hospital...lol

No PT this morning...this is starting to sound like a re-occurring theme now. I had all good intentions to do all the pt this week after missing so much last week. Turns out that we have a lot of stuff to try and take care of before we leave here and I’d rather try and get them done early before school so I don’t miss any. We are also required to have a battle buddy at all times, so when one person has an appointment two people have to go. 

This morning I went with PFC Metal to the hospital so he could get his ears checked. I also tried to get my glasses ordered at the same time, but that didn’t work out. Turns out they only accept walk-ins for glasses on Mondays and Wednesdays @ 13:00 now. So this means I’ll be missing some school. After we finished up, we went to the Starbucks that is located near the exit and then called a taxi. The hospital is actually quite a ways from the school house and although it is walkable, we wanted to make it to class on time. We arrived while there was still the formation in front and had the cab driver drop us off on the side of the school house. I think he wanted to pull right up in front of the formation and let us out...that would not have turned out very well. 

In class today we did another practice exercise that took the entire day. We use the Cisco Packet Tracer program to setup a semi-complex network. 

I’m still feeling a bit sick, so I took some more TheraFlu. That stuff has been working awesome, but I think there is only enough left for a morning dose. I’ll have to see what they have at the shopette tomorrow.