Official Member

Well I'm officially a member of the Royal Military College of Canada. Over a week ago I ran the annual first year obstacle course that marks the end of FYOP (First Year Orientation Period). This year's course had an additional 3 obstacles bringing the total to 13 obstacles (more then any other Shoal Lake boy has ever had to run! So suck it up Henk!). It was about 2 hours of pain, sweating, dirt, mud, yelling, cheering, fun, water, fatigue, endurance, etc, etc. I don't think I've ever been dirtier in my life and I've had some pretty dirty events in my life (changing oil and having it spilt all over my body, PMU chores, etc). Check out facebook for the obstacle course pictures and if your a parent (Wanda and Tammy lol get your children to show you!). At the bottom is the pic of me after the course with a clean sweater and my college coin (coin that all RMC students get with their number inscribed on it, there's a great deal of traditions to go along with the coin. But they're all drinking traditions and I don't have the time to describe them lol.) Oh and that's a picture of me and Brucie (the ideal cadet statue with his gaitors on backwards). Those leather things on my ankles are gaitors and they suck a lot. Ok so due to my lack of technical ability the picture of me with coin is on the bottom and my pic with Brucie on the top. FYI the blue college uniform I'm wearing with Brucie (my 4s) is what I must wear to town until I earn the priviledge to wear civilian dress.

So after the obstacle course I went out to town with my parents who came down to Kingston to visit. Which was awesome and bad all at once. It was awesome to see my parents but seeing them made me more homesick then I was when I was 12 years old at Air Cadet Basic in Penhold, AB (and I was super homesick then). But it was good. They stayed to watch my badging parade on Saturday when I became an official member of the college. It was an awesome feeling to become an official member of the college and 8 Squadron (the best Squadron in the Wing). On Sunday we had the Memorial Parade for all the fallen cadets of RMC. The first years lined the parade route, which was an honor but a little unfun because weapons drill is not easy after being fatigued from the roughest, most stressful month possible. Sunday I also had to say good-bye to my parents and watch as they left for Manitoba and left me back in Kingston. Oh well in 69 to 70 days I'll be planting my feet on Friendly Manitoban soil and having a lot of fun for three weeks. So lock up your daughters and watch out. Just kidding you don't have to lock up your daughters but watch out for me having lots of fun.

So my first week as a normal RMC student went fairly well. Though my homework is piling up higher then Mount Everest and making it hard for me to see my bed from my desk. I work out 4 times a week, because I didn't perform well enough on the RMC PT test but in my defense I was bagged from everything that was going on when I did my test so passing it at the end of October shouldn't be a problem and I should be out of my mandatory work outs, so then I'll be able to work out on my own. Hmmmm algorithms class blows. That's just a little FF (fun fact). I have no idea what goes on in that class. At least calculus is sorta easy to follow along with. But algorithms I have no idea what's going on. Somehow I managed to get a good mark on the one quiz though so that should float me until I figure out what an algorithm even is.

Right now I'm on leave in London visiting relatives. It's pretty sweet. I got to meet my cousins husband (I was a bad cousin and never attended the wedding). I slept in till quarter till 3 which is the longest I've ever slept in till but then again I haven't napped in over a month or gone to bed before 11 in over a month so the sleep was needed!! So yeah, that's all that's new right now. Hopefully I find some time to make a post on the differences between SLS and RMC this weekend. Should be a good post where I manage to excercise my creative writing skills and reflect on my days as a carefree student at the best high school in the world (sorry Strathclair) and discuss my current days at the coolest college in the world (sorry U of M).