I don't always have fun in the Army, but when I do, it's Mandatory!

My MEDEVAC company planned a nice outing for the majority of the unit today. We had a two hour flight down to Santa Fe, NM from the Springs, ate some weird tasting pizza (I think the mozarella they used was really strange...), and took a tour of the Glorietta Pass Civil War historical site in some beautiful Mesa country. Our tour guide was very animated and you could tell he loved what he does, so I very much enjoyed myself. I didn't get any pictures at the historical site, unforunately. The flight played havoc with my reception on my new phone, which unfortunately has a battery life not unlike a 2 year old has bladder capacity... So, I only managed to get a few shots from the flight out. Once I perform some charger CPR on the piece of jun... I mean phone, I'll try and post the pics of the flight out. One of our LTs is supposed to be sending me a video he took of our take off from Santa Fe, I'll post a link when/if he does. It was quite a site to see a chalk of 6 birds taking off in staggered formation

Anybody else have a memorable Mandatory Fun Day?

Yeah, but it's not family friendly!

Oh and I was MUCH younger.

Much MUCH younger!!!

That's what I said. I can't hardly believe it was abut 40 years ago!

When I was in the Army, every Friday was a fun day. We would do our normal 1 hour of PT (Physical Training) followed by a five mile run. Then we would hit the Recondo Pit.

The Recondo pit consisted of a 20 foot diameter circle of sandbags, stacked about waist high. Inside the pit, was a mixture of sand and wood chips. This was at Fort Lewis in Washington State, where it rains all the time. So you can imagine the state of decay of the wood chips in the pit.

The company commander would then pick a squad (11 guys) to go against the squad that won last weeks contest. My squad was the reigning champs for as long as I can remember. At 5-10, 220lbs, I was the smallest guy in the squad.

The rules where simple for us grunts, you got 2 teams consisting of 11 men per team, and five minutes in the pit. The team with the most people in the pit after the five minutes, wins. That's it. Puching, biting, kicking, eye gouging, ear pulling, atomic wedgies, averything and anything was allowed. A great way to blow off steam.

In the old Straight Leg Infantry, that was a fun day.

Oh My Ya big Brutes!

In the Air Force we used imported down filled fur pillows.

Haaahaha, Mastiff, that actually sounds like a lot of fun!

I was going to try and talk my Commander into authorizing us a day for the whole unit to go paintballing. I figured I might leave a few welts for them to remember me by

I heard that the CHAIR Force wouldn't allow their guys to work up a sweat!

Wouldn't allow us to work up a sweat! You try swinging one of those pillow for 2 minutes in 70 degree weather!

Haha, seriously our "Basic" wasn't all that bad. The hardest thing was having to run a mile and a half in X amount of minutes. We (for what ever reason) didn't have the Obstacle course. And after basic training our "Yearly" testing only consisted of running a mile and a half or walking 3 miles in X amount of minutes (varied by age).

Mile and a half huh? what a breeze