TEE Week

Just like everything else here, West Point had to break the conventional style of naming things and give finals a more militaristic name, Term End Exams (TEEs). Breaking with the norms of other schools isn't always bad though. For example, though I have never experienced finals week at a "normal" college, my understanding is that the week is very stressful. Here, TEE week is one of the least stressful of the semester. Why is this? We can finally put the military side of our existance aside for a few days. The time this gives us is amazing! A complete breakdown in military discipline probably isn't good, but it sure is relaxing.


Now that my tests are done it is time to reflect on the past year. Plebe year was at the same time the most horrible time in my life and far less problematic than I was expecting. Frankly, it isn't nearly as bad as people make it out to be. On the other hand, I will certainly not miss the hours spent on the wall with SGT Wasson chewing us out for this and that, taking out the upper-classmen's garbage at night, calling minutes (see "Minutes Explained") or being at the beck and call of any upper-classmen who has the slightest need. Servitude in general just isn't a pleasant situation to be in. One more week of virtual slavery and the plebe class will finally be recognized (this means that we are no longer treated as poorly, though we still don't have many priveledges) and recieve a promotion. I can handle one more week though, the end is near and coming fast.

The Things of Home

Well, another late night. I'm working on a math project but there's really nothing I can do with it right now so my thoughts wander. . .(I'm really not slacking off, my computer is figuring out a complex problem and has been for about half an hour now and takes over half my system resources to solve it, maybe its time to give up?)

The weather has been amazing and as I stick my head out the window for some fresh air the feel of the night is reminiscent of warm evenings back at home, walking the dog or playing games out back with my family. I still stand by what I have said, the "homesick" phase is long gone (that was part of beast) but still thoughts often return to the "good ol' days". Am I too young to feel nostalgic? Probably, but what can ya do? To put it in perspective, here is something I jotted down during one of the sessions of general conference:

"The things of home are never quite gone, they will always return to us--be it a scent, a flavor, a sight, a sound; the things of home will always find a way to return to us, and then, if we are wise, we will find a way to return to them."

This doesn't mean that we will run home to mommy and daddy when things get hard, but that those who are wise will find a way to keep home with them wherever they go. Homesickness? No, more like nostalgic, but it is nice to know that there are only a few days between now and my escape to home.

Well, its 1:20 in the morning and Mathematica (the math program on our computers) still hasn't solved this equation. I'm going to bed. Hopefully there will be an answer waiting for me in the morning. . .

Tom Ricks is a Biased Fool

The Washington Post seems to love posting bad articles about us. First they broke the news about the "West Point suicides" and now Tom Ricks is calling for the closure of the service academies? While his claims are mostly accurate, they are twisted to show only what he wants the reader to know: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/16/AR2009041603483.html?sub=AR

First he discusses the cost difference between West Point and ROTC. What he fails to include in his figures is that ROTC pays for more than just what is shown in the $130,000 he claims. When looking at figures for just the academics (which he did with ROTC) West Point, from what I have heard, is estimated at $180,000. What's more, ROTC programs vary from college to college. It is possible for ROTC to produce officers for less, but they also probably spend more on a good share of them.

Next he talks about West Pointers getting "community-college educations". USMA is ranked 6th in the nation overall and, I have heard, 1st for public colleges. But the education we receive is inferior? I beg to differ. He is right that most of our teachers do not have doctorates, but that says little about the quality of instruction. I would like to point out that the men and women who are teaching all have masters degrees, the department heads have doctorates and, oh yeah, our professors actually teach us. I have never been taught by an upper-classman about to graduate because the instructor is too busy doing research to be bothered with actually teaching. On the contrary, teachers are always available and more than willing to sit down one on one and help a struggling student. That doesn't mean there is a lack of research here, just that they are focussed on educating. There is constantly research going on in many fields and many of the research projects conducted by cadets are worthy of a doctorate degree in and of themselves. USMA provides a top-notch education.

Mr. Ricks' claim that three of the last six chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff have indeed been officers produced by ROTC; however, 50% is pretty good when you consider that the service academies only produce 20% of the military's officers. Seems like we are pretty well represented to me. Oh, and by the way, if USMA graduates don't go very far in the Army then how come EVERY 5-Star General was from West Point? Something just isn't adding up here.

As far as being educated next to future doctors, lawyers, etc., nothing would change. Countless "old grads" have become lawyers and we send some graduates directly to medical school. Since most of our teaching staff is made up of graduates, there is really no point in claiming that we don't produce teachers. Congressmen? There are always graduates involved in politics. Many congressmen are produced by this fine institution as well as Ulysses S. Grant and Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Having never been to the war college (you go there as a LT. Colonel before being promoted to Colonel) I can't really speak as to the quality of education that occurs there, but I can vouch for the quality of our senior officers. Meeting and greeting with foreign diplomats and officials is nothing new to them, they do not need to go to school to learn how to do it. Why don't you ask Gen. Petraeus about that Mr. Ricks? While you're at it, why don't you ask him about his under-graduate years at USMA before going to Princeton?

Tom Ricks may have reported on the military for ten years, but I would like to see him come to the Academy sometime and see what really goes on, he may be quite surprised.

Brainwashing

Well, I'm back. Once again it is not because of a time surplus, but just that I can't sleep. There's no burning blog topics for me to address so I'm going to talk about beast a little, answer a question I have gotten from a couple of un-named people:
No, I have not been brainwashed. I am the same guy I was before coming here. The only thing that has changed that you will ever witness (unless you try to attack me or my brothers) is that I have more confidence. I walk different, act different, but I still think and speak the same.

Lots of people talk about the "brainwashing" that the military does to you. It doesn't exist. There is a certain amount of indoctrination involved to going through military training, but there has to be. The things soldiers have to see, hear and do are unspeakable. While some say there is no adequate way of preparing for it, the Army gives it their best effort.

Yes, I do know things that would make most people more than a little worried if I started screaming them on the subway, but wouldn't you be worried if someone started screaming regardless of what they said? It does feel weird now, looking back at my previous limits and comparing them to now, and certainly the Spirit of the Bayonette, The Law, and many other such mantras are far from what I would have said in high school. But have I been brainwashed? No! Don't be ridiculous!

I have learned, I have grown, I have become a little harder (physically and mentally) but I have not lost my values and beliefs to what the Army supposedly wants me to think. One of the key elements that makes our Army so great is the ability of our soldiers to think for themselves. Couple this with the disipline to obey orders even if you disagree with them and you will have an unstoppable force. That is what we strive for, not a puppet collection.

Now, I realize that the people who would ask me about being brainwashed are not going to read this blog, but perhaps someone will find this post on Google and it may change their mind. Who knows? Frankly, I'm not concerned one way or the other, these posts are just to clear my mind so I can sleep. If you don't like it, don't read it!

Minutes Explained

Lunch break: I can tell nothing productive is going to happen so I'll blog and answer the "minutes" question. . .

Minutes are just one of the chores that "plebes" here at the academy have to do. Its not too bad, nothing painful, just one of those things that is annoying to waste time on. 7 minutes before every formation we start yelling out how many minutes there are before said formation (5, 4, 3, 2 + a 2 minute buffer). It has to be yelled by all the plebes who are calling at the same time and goes like this:

Attention all cadets, there are (5, 4, or 3) minutes until assembly for (formation, i.e. breakfast) formation. The uniform is (uniform). (5, 4 or 3) minutes remaining.

For the last minute:

Attention all cadets, there are 2 minutes until assembly for (formation). The uniform is (uniform). This is the last minute to be called for this formation. Do not forget your lights. 2 minutes remaining.

No pain (unless you mess up), not too much stress (unless you are in charge and people are too lazy to do it). Just one more thing to put up with. . .38 days left.

long days

At the end of another long West Point day, I find myself reflecting back on the events of the day. This is not because I have tons of time to spend on such things (I really shouldn't be spending time on this either) but rather because I am too tired to think straight and my mind is racing too much to go to bed.

The day started out like any other, woke up at 0610, learned my plebe knowledge for the day (the day's meals and 2 news articles), shaved, etc. and got things set up for calling minutes (a process I'll have to describe later) which I am in charge of this week. Head out to formation and a SGT that lives next door asks if I am aware that no minutes have been called in our section of the building at all this week.

"No, Sergeant, I will take care of that, thank you for telling me."

So far so good. . .now just a test and my day should be mostly over. . .

I had the first 2 periods off today, and being the tired cadet that I am I slept 2 hours before going to my first class (one of the few good things of the day). Classes are dull, Fundamentals of Personal Fitness and History of Eastern Asia. Come back from class and lunch minutes are supposed to be getting called. Instead of minutes I hear my First Sergeant (1SG) yelling about how crappy the (lack of) minutes are and all of the upper-classmen confused as to what the uniform is.

"Crap, this could get ugly" I think as I head up to my room to ditch my stuff. Minutes are being called in my section of the barracks, so it must not be that bad, right? Announcements for lunch say something different. 1SG (in a rather ticked off tone):
"I need to see Bishop and his entire chain-of-command in the back immediately after formation"

I turn to my squad leader standing right behind me (who was, until today, impressed with me and giving me an 'A' for my military grade today, who knows what it is now) and he is looking at me like "WHAT DID YOU DO!" I knew what it was, and it was completely out of my control, not fair.

We all go to the back of formation, and my TAC (the officer in charge of our company) is standing there. Great, now I'm not only gonna get chewed out, but its going to happen in front of the TAC, this just keeps getting better. . .

Never before, and hopefully never again, have my face and 1SG's face been so close, or his voice so loud.

"What's the deal with minutes. . ." and he proceeds to rip on me for there not being minutes in his section of the building. Then he moves on to the lack of minutes in my own section for breakfasts. All I want to do is scream "I DIDN'T KNOW, I HAVEN'T HAD A CHANCE TO FIX IT, GET OFF MY BACK" but rather, I said "Yes 1SG" when he demanded that I turn over the names of those who had been messing up minutes.

After lunch I go take the huge test i spoke of earlier. Math. I discovered early on that EVERYTHING I studied the night before was left out of this test. Admittedly I still feel I did well-ish, but only time will tell. Come back from the test and take a nap? No, I was up so late the previously studying for the test (which helped none at all) that neglected to write a poem for english and shower. I did both of those and headed to class where I learned of 2 huge assignments for that class in the next week. Crap.

After school nap? Nope! Swim meet! We won 54 to 19, and I beat my coach in the butterfly and managed to finish the IM, so those were good, but I desperately needed sleep (and to throw up).

Go back to the barracks and sleep? Still no! Go back and meet with 1SG, shower, and sleep, that's the plan. After my shower, I checked Facebook really quick. Hey! a message! Mom is the only one that sends me messages on Facebook very often, so I figured I should read it then. Turns out that an old friend and neighbor died at 2 AM. Wow, can this day get better? Yes, it can, and does (thank you Murphy, the Army hates you). I got no sleep (still) and had to go call minutes for dinner.

After dinner (minutes went smoothly, Murphy can't mess with everything) I return to my room and try to work on stuff. No dice. Too tired. Can't keep my eyes open. A 20 minute nap!! Yay!! 20 minutes later I wake up to my Team Leader cracking the door open and TADA! time for us to chat. It was a good chat though. I finally finished (I hope) taking care of the minutes stuff. My homework that absolutely has to be done for tomorrow is done, and I'm hoping that after this my mind will have cleared enough to go to bed, we'll see.

Things get better, SAMI (Saturday morning inspection) and In-Ranks Inspection (uniform and rifle inspection) means NO SLEEP THIS WEEKEND!!! YAY!!! JUST WHAT I NEED!!!! What's more, while everyone is sleeping off the effects of being up until 3 or 4 in the morning scrubbing floors, I will have to be in the library trying to work on one of my millions of papers and projects coming up. But hey, spring is here, the grey period is gone, I get to see the sun almost every day now, so it could be worse!

Boston

I finally got out of here this weekend for the All-New England Winter Extravaganza (a huge young single adult activity with all the stakes in the New England region- hence the name). It wasn't really in Boston, but only about 20 minutes out so still not bad, and I did get to go into the city on Saturday for a couple of hours.

We stayed in members' houses. The only reason I bother to mention that is because of what happened at the member's house. The house I stayed at had 5 bedrooms upstairs and the living areas downstairs. 1 1/2 bath, which meant you had to shower upstairs. So Friday night, everyone is tired and goes to bed. I'm slower to get ready because I was on the phone all night, so everyone else is in bed and the lights are off. Unfortunately, the bathroom is directly at the top of the stairs. . .not a good combination. I came out of the bathroom and couldn't see a thing and went right down the stairs. Luckily I caught myself on the railing, unluckily my knee went through one of the stick supporting it, crashing loudly and putting a huge dent in my shin (I somewhat suspect a stress fracture too, but since all the doctor can do for me is tell me to take it easy and limit what I can do I refuse to go see her).

The next day was infinitely better. We woke up and got ready, drove to the church worried about missing breakfast because we were late. Oh wait, we forgot to figure in Mormon Standard Time. . .we were there before most other people. After breakfast there was a keynote speaker, Jane Clayson Johnson, who was an anchor on The Early Show, Good Morning America, and several others before she became a stay at home mom. Her talk was wonderful, but us poor cadets had a hard time not chuckling at times because the main story she used was about one of her reporting tasks which required that she attend a mini-boot camp at the amazing West Point, NY. She didn't know there were cadets in the audience.

After that we broke off into workshops. There was only time for three and they all looked great, so I just kinda wandered from class to class. The first two, I was planning on going somewhere else and felt like I should go to them instead and they were wonderful. The last one I went to the one I had planned rather than the one I felt like I should go to, not as good. Still a good workshop, don't get me wrong, but not what I was looking for. Moral of the story, go with the spirit, he knows what'll work out best.

That afternoon most of us cadets went to Boston for a couple of hours to just chill. We finally found a place to park (who knew a fifteen seater van could could be parallel parked with less than 2-3 inches of room in front and back?) and walked aimlessly down a street, soon getting lost. The good thing about a city is that there are maps all over for the subway systems, so you just look for one of those and BOOM! you're not lost anymore. Nobody could have guess that we were tourists with 8 clean-shaven, short haired, straight young men in downtown Boston all huddled around a subway map, but who cares? we're cadets, we don't need to fit in. Ben Westman, one of the guys, just got off his mission to Hong Kong and desperately wanted to go to Chinatown, so we went. Chinatown is always fun, but with him it was a blast. I tried a new kind of bread that was amazing, some tea (he assured me it was Word of Wisdom approved and that he drank it all the time on his mission) that he convinced me to buy because it was "the best drink ever" (tasted like liquid cardboard), and some Japanese gum (yes, in Chinatown, who'da thunk?). Then we found a little shop where Ben went insane with the Chinese suits (see pictures), but they were insanely expensive. He bargained the best he could, but when the lady said $35 and he said $5, didn't go so well (all happened in Chinese, he had to explain it later).

We headed back to the Church where we had dinner and a dance. Meals were interesting there. West Point cadets don't get out much and as a result, we are the most socially awkward people you'll ever meet. Luckily, we don't care if people like us anymore, we're pretty secure. That meant that everyone could pick out the West Point cadets at a glance, we were the only large group of guys with no girls mixed in. The whole weekend we said we were going to branch out, not sit by each other, never really worked out though. . .

Since I am happily taken, I played wingman at the dance. The problem is all the guys I was helping were 18. While that is ok at a YSA dance in Utah, these people push the 30 year-old age limit so there was pretty slim pickins for us. I was gettin my buddy to dance with all the best looking girls there, but one was a junior in college, the other already had a degree. He pretty much gave up after that. . .

The next morning we got up and went to church. The night before, the CIC (Cadet In Charge) for the trip told us to be there 10 minutes early. We got there almost 10 minutes late, but the other van wasn't there yet so we were still good :) Turns out they pulled in about the same time on the other side of the building. We walked in 10 minutes late from both sides of the chapel. Perfect timing. 13 cadets, walking into the meeting from opposite sides of the back of the room and meeting half way across a pew in the front of the congregation. We made quite an impact, so much so that they stopped the meeting to welcome us. It was perfect.

The plan was to leave after sacrament and make it back to West Point before a storm hit. Turns out that there was an old grad in the congregation though. . .one that knew our OIC (Officer In Charge) nonetheless. He asked for a few cadets to come bear their testimonies in his Sunday School class, so we waited for them to finish, then waited for him to talk to Bro./MAJ Cook. We climbed in the vans and headed to gas up. Before we pulled out, Bro. Cook talked with all of us. We had to make it as far as we could before the storm hit, so our orders were at or above the speed limit (beautiful thing about driving vehicles with government plates, tickets are much less common) until weather made us slow down. Everyone but the drivers fell asleep, when we woke up nobody knew where we were. MAJ Cook had dissappeared long ago, the driver of the lead van had decided to follow a different route. Ended up working out well though, we made it to Highland Falls where we stopped to get some food (its always better to get food outside West Point than inside the gates). Orders were to get it to go and get back to the barraks, until one of the drivers locked the keys in the car. The department we got the vans from was closed, the MP's didn't have a lockpicking kit. . .fine, call the local police. He couldn't crack it, had to hand his gear over to a cadet to break in.

Several hours of math project later, I'm sitting in my little gray cell, putting off the rest of my homework by writing a long blog entry. . .

Some pics from the trip:



I'm not a picture taker so there aren't very many, but in the future there will hopefully be more.