Last Full Week of the Corps

As you may know, Thanksgiving is just around the corner. What you may or may not also know is that the Corps is about to start winding down. This is the last full week of classes before the end of the semester, since next week is Thanksgiving break/t.u. game and the week after that is dead week. As such, we should be getting our Corps Brass either Friday or Saturday, which I am very thankful for. During the past few weeks, our class has messed up everything. What do I mean by everything? I'll tell you.



One of the things the fish do every formation is blow calls. Blowing calls is basically a training thing to make sure we have our heads in the game before any event. What happens is one fish and one buddy will come out of their hole about ten seconds (we have to time it exactly to official government time) before the official time for first call. The one who is blowing calls will be wearing a pot (Corps speak for an old hard hat) and carrying a horn. The two fish run down to the end of the hallway, blow the horn, and announce what event is happening, who the senior in charge of it is, who the junior in charge of call to quarters is, and who the sophomore of the day is, as well as the temperature and uniform of the day. We've messed up calls more times during brass than we've gotten them right. It's silly little things like not knowing exactly what the temperature is, not falling out exactly on time, or getting the uniform wrong.



The next thing we've been messing up is getting near the guidon. This is something that we pay dearly for. The guidon is the symbol of our outfit, and the sophomores smoke us hard when we get near it, walk behind it at chow, or, in some cases, actually run into the guidon bearer. I don't know how we keep not seeing it, since the bearer is the tallest sophomore we have, and the guidon itself is about seven feet long with a blue flag on top.



Then come the "various other". We've geen having a general lack of effort in things like uniform drills, inspections, campusologies, and things of that nature. In some cases, it's just stupid mistakes like missing words we can't know, but in the case of uniform inspections, some people just don't spend enough time on it. I'm pretty sure we're going to get smoked hard for the "various other".

On an upwards note, Bonfire is this Saturday! On a down note, we have guard room Saturday-Sunday! The outfit with the best Bonfire tradition was actually given guard room duty on the night of Bonfire. I've actually been out to cut logs once, and it was an experience. We actually got to talk to our sophomores like normal people and learn some special secrets from them (like exactly how to make a shoe look good). We also spent all morning cutting down a huge tree, and were ready to carry it out of the forest when someone at another site dropped their log and broke someone's leg. The leadership at the cutting area decided to suspend the carrying of logs for the rest of the day, so I'm not even sure if our log got out of the forest.


I'm actually doing alright now, though I was on the verge of a total breakdown on Tuesday. I haven't been getting enough sleep (actually, I think I'll get one full night of sleep this week, and that was on Monday) and I have a hard time keeping from smiling at the stupid things the juniors and seniors say. Another problem I'm having is that, to keep from smiling, I'm biting my cheeks, so they're now totally raw, which keeps me from eating quickly. Now the sophomores think I'm one of the limpest fish in the outfit. I've picked up recently, and actually managed to survive a good bull session without smiling once! (That's a big accomplishment, really)

First Week of Corps Brass

Corps Brass push officially started on Monday! This is the part of the fish year where we get to prove to our upperclassmen that we are, indeed, capable of being good little fishies in the Corps. Up to this point, apparently, we have been in a kind of "probationary fish" stage. Now we will get the right to actually wear the Corps symbol on our collar in the place of one of the A.M.U.'s that we normally wear.

To prove that we can be good fish, we have to accomplish a number of goals over the next few weeks. One of those is daily uniform inspections. In one of these inspections, a sophomore goes over you with a notecard and measures your brass, checks your shoes and belt buckle, and generally finds everything that could possibly be wrong. On the notecard, they record all the "cuts" on the uniform so that we can fix them later. In all seriousness, I actually like that part of brass, because my uniform is finally looking how it should. We also can ask questions about how to fix things like deep scratches in brass, scuffs on shoes, and other things like those.

Another thing that's been happening during this week is we're getting smoked a lot more. I'm not sure if it's because it's Corps Brass or what, but we've messed up a lot this week. First, we forgot to run Batfish on Monday. Batfish is the daily delivery of the Battalion, the school newspaper, to our upperclassmen's doors. We had to do a class set (112) of pushupsfor that. The very next day, we forgot again. Another class set. Also, several people didn't do the required amount of Personal Call to Quarters (PCQ) for the week, so we had to do another class set on Friday. Needless to say, we're all more than a little annoyed at the person responsible.

One interesting thing that came out of out Tuesday PT was a six-mile run. We ran from the quad all the way to George Bush Library and back again. I did pretty well, but I can't say the same for all my buddies, or even some of the sophomores and juniors. One sophomore actually complained audibly to his buddies in front of all the fish. Doing better than the upperclassmen in a run makes us all feel great.

Another thing that has changed during Corps Brass is that the good bull from the juniors and seniors has almost completely stopped. Usually, the juniors and seniors don't miss a chance to mess with our minds, do weird things, and generally relax with us (in a wierd, upperclassman, sort of way). It's fun, and it gives me a chance to practice not smiling in the hallway.

I'm still doing alright here, but I'm exhausted. I think I've stayed awake through one whole class this week, and that was the Air Force class, where bad things happen to those who sleep. The late march-in and lack of tasks should give me a chance to catch up on sleep, though.