10/18/08 47 Days left

Today was a pretty good day. I'm really tired- everyone is. We had our 5K road march this morning. We marched for about an hour and 10 minutes for 3.1 miles. It doesn't sound very difficult, but it was more like constantly uncomfortable and on the return trip my shoulders began to hurt.

We did a short practical course for NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) attacks after our brief. Then I was in the last group of people to do the gas chamber! Dun dun DUN! They tested our masks for proper seal and had us enter a room about 12 x 17 ft and stand along the walls- this was the "cool room". Then about 30ish people from there entered the "hot room" all in masks. They had us pull the bottom of our masks out and take 2 breaths and clear our masks. Wow, that was a shock. I took one small, cautious breath and couldn't breathe, so I tried to take a second, but hardly could and sealed/cleared my mask. To clear the mask means to cover the exit vent and breathe out hard, then cover the intake hole and breathe in to make sure the mask seals without any toxic air inside. In the room, they burn the gas over a propane like stove or open flame. They have you step up to the "ready line" about 8 at a time and tell you to remove your mask. Before I went, a couple of guys were talking, so the Sergeant in charge of the chamber make them take their masks off and recite the entire soldiers creed before the rest of the group unmasked. WOW, that sucks. So then it was my turn- I took a deep breath, then removed my mask. You're fine if you don't breathe- you're exposed skin burns slightly but that was negligible for me, not even a sunburn- around the neck mostly. Then I took a breath- slight delay, then BAM! Your body instinctively, reflexively, and uncontrollably tries to cough up what you breathed in and then gasp for a clean breath of air- but you can't breathe. For several seconds you just heave for air- it feels like dry heaving in your lungs- then you catch a few short breaths while coughing, really hard and uncontrollably- as if you had a cold with an awful sore throat and were trying to cough up phlegm. Then when you start taking more regular, short breaths between coughing fits, your chest begins to tighten and become painful from pressure and you begin to sort of cackle in your coughs- loudly. Then we left and instantly enjoyed the clear breath of air at the exit door although felt much the same for another 20-30 seconds aside from being able to breathe and gasp. After only 10 seconds out, while bent over spitting and still coughing, the DS shouted "What is the battery motto?". I started shouting it, but quickly used all of the little breath I had left and coughed and struggled for more air after only a line and a half of the motto. Then the DS said, "Ok, you don't want to sound off, back into the chamber." I sort of screamed and cackled the rest of it out as best i could, although I don't think he would have actually made us go back inside. After a minute or two, I was much better with just some coughing and phlegm and shallow breathing- I still don't feel like I can take a nice full breath though. When we got back, we got smoked for a while- pretty good since we were already so tired. It's cool though- I got a nice burst of energy after we did about 65 push ups and 40 sit ups to knock out the last 15 or so. It felt good to pull that extra energy from seemingly nowhere. Goodnight.