alt.callahans Posts

Subject: From the Story Corner - Boot Camp Memories
From:Sailor Jim Johnston
Date: 1998/11/06
Newsgroups: alt.callahans

Sailor Jim wanders over to the story corner and settles into the nice comfy
chair. His boots go up on one salt lick and his drink is placed within easy
reach on another.

"Shipmates, it was twenty-four years ago, to this very day, that I entered
the United States Coast Guard and arrived at the dreaded Coast Guard Training
Center Alameda, CA.

"Oooooooooh, the stories I could (and, eventually, will) tell you of that
place!! But, today, I just wanted to share a little funny story … one I like
to refer to as 'Weed Whackers of the Water.'

"It was a normal boot camp morning. Which is to say, a very large and
terrifying man had screamed me awake and I was, seconds later, fully dressed
(and half asleep) and standing on The Grinder. The Grinder, if it had
parking spaces painted on it (like now), would have been a very large parking
lot. As it was, it was a very large whack of asphalt and the bane of all
boots. It is where we started each day, locked in mortal combat with a
sadistic training officer who ran us through what he called 'morning
calisthenics,' and we called 'sweat, stumble and puke.'

"This morning, however, was to be entirely different.

"You see, just the week before, the Oakland Police Department had seized a
large U-Haul truck, packed full of marijuana! Today, early in the morning
for the good photo op, they were going to burn all the tons of weed they'd
captured … right off of the docks … a few hundred yards away from boot camp.

"Yeah, exactly.

"They touched it off and the smoke from the burn mixed in with the morning fog
and drifted in great quantities over to our boot camp, where close to two
hundred boots were gasping for air as they were being forced to do yet another
lap around The Grinder. When we finished the laps, jumping jacks were called
for and we all started hopping and waving our arms in perfect union, counting
off the repetitions at the top of our lungs.

"'Sir, one, sir; sir, two, sir; sir, three, sir; sir, four, sir … '

"By the end of the mandated one hundred repetitions, however, we were all
pretty much doing our own thing. Morning calisthenics had totally broken
down and everyone, including the D.I.s, just wandering away, enjoying the
moment and being.

"All this is hearsay, though, in that I really don't remember anything until
somebody found me in the sand pit of the obstacle course. I was naked,
watching the clouds and wondering various wonders … The day was written off
and a nasty letter addressed to the mayor's office.

"It was the single best day I remember of boot camp."

SJ