(If you remember from Part 1, Cadet Symonds quickly got himself in trouble at the MAWG encampment. Let's follow along, kids and see if he can keep up the momentum! - Ed)

5:15 *AIRHORN* "GET OUT OF BED DELTA IN THE BAY MOVE IT!!! *AIRHORN STEEL CAN* "DELTA IN THE BAY"!!!!

Waking up is, by far, the best part of encampment. You're woken up at 5:15, which is actually about 15 minutes later than I get up on a typical school day. You know how sometimes your alarm doesn't go off or isn't loud enough? Not an issue at Mass Wing encampment! Airhorns in a bare, cement block hallway. After two days of this, I tried my good buddy Silva's suggestion: Tell yourself to wake up at 5 before going to bed. That way, according to his logic, you wake up five minutes before they pull the airhorn and can get ready to move. Total bull, right? This worked out for me very well, actually. Yeah.

You stretch yourself jumping up and getting out in the hall. And you're already dressed. And your shoes are already on. Then you have your morning stretches and pushups and running, essentially all the pushups you would have to do for the day if they could make you do pushups. Actually, even though I was out of shape and had run only once since outdoor track, the PT was the least of my worries.

The first two days are the hardest to remember, mostly because we didn't do anything but march. And be inspected. And read our OIs. And have the SET ('Standards Evaluation Team' - Ed) team getting in our faces, asking us who the Chief of Staff was from our OI's and such. My favorite incident?

1. SET member asks Cadet a question
2. Cadet answers correctly
3. Cadet Officer yells at Cadet for answering incorrectly
4. Cadet staff informs Cadet officer of mistake
5. Cadet officer walks away in a huff

On the first day, Sgt Benton had us all "introduce ourselves". It wasn't until the end of the second day that I actually knew everyone in my flight or even the higher ups in my squadron.

I mentioned that they made me the Guide. That meant I had to stand outside every meal, holding a stupid flag, all the while looking stupid myself. My meals were always more than half-ed: when I was the starter, my relief would come late. When I was the relief, I'd hurry up and get out there too early. One time, some kid randomly fell down, nearly unconscious. He’d locked his legs. Another time, an unmarked police car drove up, followed by an ambulance, followed by a military fire-truck, and followed by multiple vehicles of the same type. While we stood there, they carried off a cadet. A senior member would come and ask us what we saw, and then tell us us not to say anything or he’d know. When Charlie flight stole Delta Bear, our mascot, I had to stand there when they held him up taped to the their guidon for all to see, while the staff took pictures and mocked me. Not exactly the greatest job, and no special honor. Just that when you screw up, everyone knows because the guidon highlighted you like a bright green t-shirt.

First Sergeant Johanson had a good command voice. Some people have trouble with being loud and clear at the same time. Not 192d's First Sergeant. "Your uniforms are DISGUSTING!" "Be QUIET!" "I see SNAKES!" and other first sergeantish remarks were the backdrop to encampment '05. The day at the virtual rifle range, some Cadets were talking loudly and she yelled at them. The sergeant who maintained the range, an older airborne ranger that had to be the coolest guy I've ever met (Favorite true quote: "You're lucky I don't have my campaign cap, or else you'd be doing more pushups than Truman has heart pills!") came out and said, "We need you to be quiet, the sound goes straight through the walls. Otherwise the Angel of Death here will keep yelling." She blushed at that one.

On the third day, we started our activities. After breakfast, we loaded up the van with Delta flight and drove to the obstacle course. Gura, Provost, a girl staffer, and I were a group; the medic and the Senior Member who ran the kitchen came with us. That was a ton of fun. After everyone tried an obstacle, they were set up individually, we'd have a ball racing. My first time crawling through the sand, I "Died like 800 times," were Johanson's words to describe it. The second time I went through, but had sand coming out of my pants for the remainder of the week.

After lunch, our second activity was the LRC, Leadership Reaction Course. Have you ever played the original Donkey Kong? The one where you have to get a key up to a door using the objects around you. That pretty much defines the LRC.

My group's first challenge was one most screwed up things I've ever seen.

From our starting point, there was a cement wall with two pipes about a meter wide sticking out of it. After the five other guys in my group crawled through to take a look, I couldn't believe what was on the other side. Two cement square pillars coming out of waist deep, algae-filled water were between us and where we needed to be. The square pillars were about one foot long and wide, 10-12 feet high. Across from us, apparently finding this funny, were the staff members. I wished them all an early grave, because I thought what was coming was sure to suck.

Our objective? Get an ammo container (about four times the size of a normal ammo can) across to the other side along with the six guys in our group. Our tools? Two boards, one larger and one smaller. Both were nice and strong.

After wasting about ten of our 15 minutes trying to figure it out, and two or three failed attempts at crossing, I made our closest attempt and it nearly sent me to medical. Having my group put the bigger board through the hole to me, I lifted it with my arms and, after much huffing and puffing, reached one of the square pillars. Setting it down on our edge and making sure it was secure, the other board was sent through the pipe to me. I crossed to the pillar, set the smaller board down and over to the other pillar. My group joined me on the small board, with the ammo tin, and then passed the board to me, who was at the front. Standing there, with the staff yelling that I had no time left, I tried holding the board and gently touching the other side. Sgt Saucier got right next to it, making sure it didn't touch the red part. Honestly sick of this and willing to try anything, I leaned forward, seeing if I could hit it down and reach it.

I missed, falling with the board and somehow hitting my chest on the concrete on the other side. I wasn't hurt, but the medic made me show her my chest to make sure I hadn't broken a rib or anything. I was wet. After retrieving the tools ("Guess the next group will have wet boards," someone commented) and the ammo box, we moved on to the next task.

This was over water, too. But instead of pillars we had long poles stretching from one end to the other. Using six boards that got progressively smaller, passing them back and forth, we managed to get across with 30 seconds to spare. Then they made us jump in the water because we didn't have two minutes left. That time was more celebratory, for we were the only group that made it.

We left the LRC about an hour later. Some staff members got a group together and tried our first challenge. They didn't get as close to the end as I did, mainly because they didn't take one for the team. I still wonder what the hell I was thinking, but I was glad that I could take charge like that and not have to rely on Silva all the time. It wasn't a bad experience overall.