Another letter from Ray80

[Earthpig]

Here's another letter from Ray80 that I received today. He wrote a quick sentimental T-Day paragraph and then got on with more useful Info for our DEP's. Thanks, Ray! Keep up the excellent work! Cross your fingers, DEPs...you might really luck out and have this guy as a TL some day. If you do, you'll be in good hands!
RLTW
EP
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Ranger EarthPig,

It's Thanksgiving today. The platoon got a special lunch and dinner. The Company Commander and the XO served chicken, turkey, ham, and ribs. A DS and the Company Chaplain served the gravy, potatoes, corn, beans, and stuffing. The D-FAC workers served dinner. If anyone can write L & S Services and thank them for feeding us so well, I'd appreciate it. It's a tough job to feed a brigade of privates.

To share Thanksgiving with the others in my Company was pretty cool. You could turn to the guy next to you or across from you and say, "Happy Thanksgiving," like you'd say to someone in your own family, and really mean it.

Enough of that crap. The DEPs want to hear about training events!
Week 6 & 7- Bayonet Training: 2 periods of instruction and a timed course. Google search: rifle with bayonet. My squad f'd up. The man next to me lost his bayonet, while executing a parry right + thrust. Otherwise, we'd have won. The course smoked my balls.
M-136 (AT-4): 2 periods of instruction and live fire (tracers). Google search: SMCT 071-054-0001, SMCT 071-054-0003, and SMCT 071-054-0002. This weapon is simple to use. You'll like it.
ITT PD 1-3: Individual Movement Techniques: SMCT 071-326-0502, 071-326-0511. Spot reports: SMCT 301-348-1050. S-A-L-U-T-E format. More high-crawling, low-crawling, commando crawling, 3-5 second rushes. We first marched to the training location, then did all that all day. We also found ourselves exhauted by this training.
Pugil Stick Fighting: Don't worry about technique. Aggressiveness works better.
Squad/Fire Team Formations: Nothing to this, at first glance. I studied this pretty carefully. As a TL/SL, I would like to do this correctly. There seems to be more to it than we were taught.

We have a 7 hour pass this Sunday, the only pass we've gotten so far, so I'll try and get on a computer. We have a PT test next week. No sweat. The Opt. 40 contracts are dropping already.

Bivouac @ Range/ Night Fire: More practice with PVS-14's (NODs) and PAK 4 lasers. It was also ass cold! We once again had people pussing out of Guard Duty to stand by the fire. Many of these were PT stud Option 40 Hooahs. A few refused to leave their sleeping bags!

Well, I'll write more later. I hope this gives the DEPs some good info. I have little time to write, but I'll try to keep the info coming, when I have more to report. I looked for GravityMan, but ended up getting my ass smoked by his Company 1SG, for being out of my Company's area. So, I'll crawl back into the hole I came out of.

Ray