"The Ready Position, Hiyeah."  The first whistle blows.  02 padded, adrenaline-filled recruits charge each other with Pugil Sticks in hand.  The crowd of awaiting recruits cheer and enjoy the chance to let loose around the Pugil Cage.  We spent an afternoon, Saturday, learning basic rules, proper stances  and approved offensive and defensive movements.  The purpose of Pugil Stick training claims to be an outlet to channel controlled stress, but I think it's also so our Company Commanders can watch us beat each other with giant Q-tips.  Not too many of us have ever been in a genuine fight, so now most of us have a better idea as to what we're capable of.  The matches are so fast and such a blur of padding and slobber (due to the required mouth piece) that most recruits don't even know who won by the end of their own fight.  It's defiantly a new way of interacting with the people we rely on so heavily in our everyday life. 

The taste of graduation became a little more palpable when we were sent to Uniform Distribution center Tuesday to pick up our dress uniforms.  We got our first quick glance at a new batch of Guardians in the mirror.  Of course, the real highlight of our week was when we received our first Coast Guard Assignment Thursday.  Miraculously, as much as 90 percent of the recruits got their first pick or, at least, their first choice in districts.  Most got land-based units, whether they asked for them or not.  For those stationed on Cutters, the process for going out of country begins: passports, more inoculations and, of course, more paperwork.  As the reality sets in, our minds can now focus on the rest of our training, maybe.  We're still practicing for our Manual of Arms and Close Order Drill test coming up this week.  We had just passed our Uniform Inspection Friday with a score of 55 out of 60.  Chief Hampton went as far as to say we looked "Outstanding."  And when you look sharp, you feel sharp.

A few other highlights this week: we learned how to communicate over the radio (which as non-rates, we will be doing a lot of), learned how to put PFD's on ourselves and others and the basics on housing on and off our assigned units/bases.  We spent Sunday afternoon doing an off-base company run where we ran in formation and sang various cadences.  All in all, everyone really enjoyed the group exercise.

Our task of nightly watches in Sexton Hall (where the newly arrived recruits, now the new Oscar Company) was a genuine responsibility.  If anything is going to go wrong, it's going to be in Sexton Hall.  We had to walk our post as though we were looking after our own, because in reality--we are.  We are taking baby steps towards gaining more responsibility.  Some of use still have a hard time understanding that we're no longer the same person that we were when we arrived, but we still have a couple of weeks to go.  Coming up on week 06, our company still needs to step it up and fine tune pretty much everything we do.  Nerves are getting stepped on, but as they say: don't take things personal, especially from our  own shipmates mouths. If you leave here with anything, it's certainly going to be thicker skin. 

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