Phase Change

Wilson passed his PT test yesterday earning him Phase five. It didn't take him long to find someone willing to sell him an outrageous set of civilian cloths. He's the completely sacrilegious "viking" in our class.

5+

Pure awsomeness! No weekend formations any more!

Released for the Weekend!

When we returned from school this morning we discovered that someone put our Battalion crest in the sand. It must have taken allot of time. The flags and torch in the bottom right are a reference to the civil war when the "signal core" was founded.

The army will make NCO's(Non-commissioned Officers, aka Sergants) be AIT cadre if they want to "put them away" because they did something stupid. Several of our cadre have punched and even beat up officers. Another is here because of adultery and the rest are various things. There are only a few that chose this position, one of those I suspect is SFC Albers. He is awesome.





Sergeant Gerrero spent allot of time making a spider to put on top of the vending machines in the day room. Trash bags stuffed with shredded paper and eyes and mouth made with styrofoam cups.

A trip to the library.

My Verizon air card doesn't work with Windows 7 and as of now I can't find any solutions online that have worked. I sure hope they fix it soon or I'll be spending alot of time at the library. It is the only place on post with free Internet, but it is slow and a long hike. The rest of the company is doing a PT test tomorrow. I might just to see if I've improved. But because I'm on the half marathon team and that is this Sunday SFC Norgard and SFC Albers gave us a pass this time. I just received a call from a friend of a friend back home who might be able to hook me up with some good Christian fellowship here in the August area. I'm excited to say the least.

UPDATE: Windows 7 is awesome! I was able to figure out the solution to the driver issue.

It Arived!

Today at main call I received my copy of Windows 7. With this new version Microsoft wrote a totally new kernel. I'll see in a couple of days if it is all it's been made out to be. They sent it to me because I bought a computer so close to the the release.

Laundry Day

My laundry bag was looking pregnant as they say here so I devoted today to doing my laundry. If you have a "Christmas sack" they will throw it all over your room while you are at pt. The only problem is in a building with 450 soldiers there is like a grand total of three working washers and maybe one more drier. Our other option is to hike about a mile and a half to the laundry mat. It takes more time to do your laundry at the company than to hike there and do it and hike back because you not only have to wait but these don't always work well. I spent two and a half hours in the laundry room today because I don't like paying for things I don't have to. I don't really have anything better to do anyway. That sign saying that a work order was submitted is nearly four months old and the other one I took a picture of has never worked, even though people have tried. Another company just recently moved into some new barracks and they have twenty washers/driers per platoon. Each of their platoons are around eighty people. Part of the reason might be because they plan on us moving out of where we are eventually even though they don't have anything built for us to movie into, or even started for that matter. I have formation in an hour and I have to fold my laundry.

When it rains

Today was the first day we have ever been rained out of PT. I don't know why, it was just another Georgia rain. I don't think the sergants on duty wanted to be in the rain any more than we did. They just took roll and did room inspections then released us to do barracks maintenance. Because our room is real squared away it wasn't anything. We were given permission by our squad sergeant, SSG Robinson to use the extra wall locker for our cleaning products. We're glad for it because just last week we had our broom stolen while we were at class. Now we have a lockable place for our cleaning suplies with out storing them in our wall lockers.

Out our window from the third floor you can see the sidewalk we normally form up on. The truck that fills the vending machines in the day room is not deterred by the rain.

There is a bible study today at eleven. I hope we get released from cleaning soon enough to go.

Because the budget for supplies for our barracks ran out and we no longer have wax till the beginning of next year we are all stripping our floors to take off all the rest of the wax so everything looks uniform. It's not just about being clean, it's about looking the same. At least now with no wax we can wear our shoes in the building.

How to Copy a Program.

Step 1: Make image files out of the disks.

There are several very good applications out there for helping you do this but one of the best and free ones is ImgBurn. ( www.imgburn.com )
On their forum at http://forum.imgburn.com/index.php?showtopic=6379 you can find a tutorial on how to create image files.

Step 2: Copy the image files.
This may sound simple but it is where many people make mistakes. If you skipped the first step you wouldn't be able to copy these files and might end up copying something completely useless such as the PROGRAM FILES (hint).
This is accomplished by locating the files on your hard drive in windows explorer and right clicking then selecting copy. Then you open up the external hard drive or flash drive that you are using to transport these files and right click and select paste. Remember not to disconnect the drive until the files have finished copying.

Step 3: Mount the images.
Again this step is not possible if the first two steps were not preformed correctly. It is rather frustrating if someone is trying to share something with you and they failed to follow the first two steps. Daemon tools is the industry standard free software that works wonders when it comes to mounting virtual drives.

Step 4: Install the program as if you had the disk in.
You know how to do this.
********************************************

vs.


FAQ:

Do I need all the files?
Yes and no... all the files are on the images.

I copied the program off my desktop and it doesn't work on the other computer, why not?
That is just a link, nuf said.

I copied all the files in "Program Files" but it doesn't work, why?
Those aren't all the files, and the program needs to be located in the system registry to locate it's libraries.

What if I copy the registry files?
Go ahead, and try that.

Would it be easier to just copy the whole hard drive?
No.


For extra credit figure out which screen shows what should have happened.

Mail Call

Every day before we go to bed we change back into uniform and form up at 1450. The actual formation is at 1500 but they call fall in ten minutes prior to every formation and if you ain't there then you are marked FTR(failure to report) during the roll call. An FTR will result in at the least extra duty if not phase back. If the right Sergeant is on duty when you do it you could even get a negative counseling which will keep you from winning honor grad or distinguished honor grad.

I took this picture in formation while roll was being called. If you look to the left you will notice what looks like two ramps coming out of the windows on the second and third floor. Both latrine 2 is closed right now and DPW(department of public works) is doing maintenance. They use those rams to allow them to throw stuff out the window and into a dump truck they sometimes park there.

Another thing to notice is the painted rocks and raked sand. Those rocks are painted regularly and the sand is raked daily. Raking sand is one of those details they make people do when they want to waste their time but have ran out of things for them to clean. This is a daily occurrence.

Here at this formation Brown(old guy, aka "dad") finally got his off post packet and one of his POV packets back. The Army, or maybe just Ft Gordon, has a way of loosing paperwork at random. Never disciplinary paperwork, but always stuff that has to do with more privileges. You have to put in a packet off all sorts of information on your house if you want to move out of the barracks. This allows married soldiers to live with their wife and children while in AIT. Brown's wife moved here over a month ago. They have lost his packet several times, for some reason they signed it this time. He also got one of his POV(privately owned vehicle) packets back. A POV packet contains everything from prof of insurance to a record of the depth of tread on each tire. It was also lost once and he had to resubmit it. Just the sphere length and number of signatures required makes it prohibitive. When they called his name he ran up like a little kid. He has been daily inquiring about it till they finally did it two months late. It took him all of twenty minutes to call his wife to bring the car over and empty out his wall locker. We now have two blank lines on our room roster.

On Thursday last week we came back from class to discover that someone had stolen our broom. Below is a picture of the really trashy broken broom that Wilson "creatively acquired" today to replace it. We have to seep several times daily to keep our room up to standard. For right now we are keeping it in one of the spare wall lockers. Hopefully tomorrow one of us will walk to the PX(post exchange, think military walmart) and buy a real one.

And lastly I put a picture of Dean and Townes in Dean's bed sharing something on their hard drives. Because of the real lack of things to do here many have HUGE movie collections on hard drive. Both of them have been here just two months and already have over 1.5Tb of media. The sad part is they have probably watched all of it.

This morning in class after I finished a test and had to sit there waiting for Brown to finish his practical I read Proverbs 26 several times. Verse twelve jumped out at me. "Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him." It was encouraging because I have been down because I feel like a complete fool with no answer for everyone around me. No matter what I say to them they continue to give me advice. For example right now... Townes is telling me that my decision to have my parents to be completely involved in any relationship that would result in marriage is stupid. How I need to go out seeking and and dating. Garza is over here saying that I should just sin on the weekend and then repent the next Sunday. His nose is huge. I can't keep from looking at it. I wish I had a satisfying answer to tell them so they would just shut up.

We got out and ran with SFC Albers today. In forty five minutes we ran just under seven miles. If anything the one thing I've noticed is that the more we run every day the faster I am recovering. I hope after the race on Sunday we can continue to run during regular pt instead of doing conditioning drill one. Even FM21-20(standard Army pt) is rather lame. CD1 has to be the most retarded PT ever.

For closing, today marks one month exactly before Thanksgiving, I can't wait to see everyone again.

Back from the grave...

I purchased a Cannon SD1200IS today so I will be posting when I get around to it to show ya'll what life is like here. I live in Room 327 on a top bunk, that is the twenty-seventh room on the third floor of the barracks. It has taken me a while to get off post privileges each weekend, but now that I have them I'll be looking for some Christian friends off post to fellowship with. The church on post is just not my cup of tea. Instead of going today I spent time with some of my buddies at the library on my computer. I read the Bible and chatted with Steven. More than anything I miss having solid christian influences around me. Because I have been forced to live with and make friends with people I would have never on the outside I have grown quite a bit but I still need some good christian fellowship.
Here is a short list of most of my class and a couple of others. Brown is a forty one year old man who is a typical good old boy. Even though he is the old man in the group he acts just as much like a kid along with the rest. He sits for hours and plays games on his game boy when he doesn't have anywhere to go. Bigler is the Mormon, he's probably the least of a goof off than any one of us. He is the "room commander" that's why there is a star by his name. I am in the top bunk over Townes, a married 27 year old who spends hundreds of hours watching annime and occasionally talking to his wife. Then there is Garza who is in the class ahead of us. He is the only phase 5+, he has a car with an approved POV(privately owned vehicle) packet. Underneath him still on the window is Dean. An eccentric person who had two skulls(one with a halo and one with horns) connected by a scroll that says "Life's Eternal Struggle" done in great detail and covering his whole chest. That was last weekend. He also has more shoes than anyone else I know and wants to have the Converse star logo put on his ankles so he will be "always be wearing his favorite shoes even barefoot." Next to him is Barron, or "Red". He is a previous heavy pot smoker and gameboy person. Every time I come in here him and dean seam to be on those things playing pokimon. Wilson is on top by the door and is the last phase four in the room. He has done everything to phase up but pass a pt test. He is the "christian"/pagan/norse Viking who is from Georgia. He has to be the most perverted 19 year old I know. Then there is Bogle, who also spends all his time playing pokimon. I still haven't figured him out yet... even though he defiantly isn't christian he tends to have a rather high sense of honor and tends to do the right thing most of the time.
This is where I sleep with my computer and box from my new camera on it. Being in the center of the room in between two sets of wall lockers I have a decent amount of privacy.
This is Schumann, the guy I spend most of my time with out of anyone in my class out on Barton field. We are running a half marathon(13.1mi) next Sunday. He is a Texas "good-ol-boy". Growing up on a thousand acre ranch he was a hunting guide and Texas A&M student before he joined the army. He intends to finish his degree and put in a OCS(Officer Candidate School) packet shortly after he returns home. He enlisted because of the college loan repayment and bonus they offered him with this job. We spend allot of time discussing all sorts of things. He is my hard competition for distinguished honor grad. I currently have a two percentage higher GPA than him. But we test out of another annex tonight.