Iron Gump

Spanky · Post by **Spanky** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 4:09 pm

In ALABAMA...ur joking right??

No....I saw it get a light layer of ice one winter....but the X-mas camp Rat is refering to we saw temps in the upper 80's at one point.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 4:09 pm

No - at least while I was there. There was a winter (1998) where the lake did have a lot of ice on the surface, but it never froze completely over. Most of the other winters when I was there, the lake never had any ice at all - but it was cold.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 4:16 pm

We did use the lake that Christmas Camp when it was in the 80s - only during the daytime and only for the zipline. The water was still very very cold and we had counselors in wetsuits in a raft to help the trainees out of the water.

SpaceCanada · Post by **SpaceCanada** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 4:36 pm

Yeah, I guess I have never been anywhere in winter where the lakes didn't freeze over or at least have 'thin ice' warnings. (Crazy Canadian...)

We went into the AC lake when it was 74 degrees in October 1999.

It's my own Gump moment... the fool who thought lakes freeze over in Alabama, a place where one can wear shorts in October!

Don't mind me... it has been a long (and cold) day... High of 45F today.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 4:39 pm

Shorts in October?

For the entire time I lived in Alabama, I wore shorts outside, all day, at least one day a month. No kidding.

Post by **Vincent** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 5:12 pm

SpaceCanada wrote:
Don't mind me... it has been a long (and cold) day... High of 45F today.

Ouch! And September's not even over yet!

...so do some Canadians move to, like, North Dakota to "retire down South?"

tennisrox014 · Post by **tennisrox014** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 7:09 pm

Going to christmas camp, for me at least, was like a vacation in the tropics.

Fargo reached a high of 50 degrees today, I just laughed, because I'm now in the wonderful south.

MAYTAG · Post by **MAYTAG** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 8:15 pm

one word

ALABAMA!

lol

Space Nerd · Post by **Space Nerd** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 2:35 am

I managed to get out of the cold by going to school in Arizona... Too bad the AC in my dorm broke...

Spanky · Post by **Spanky** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:05 am

Actually that was a Spanky/Rat tradition. We would wear shorts year round. When we had kids in camp....we would find away to wear shorts.

I remember X-mas camp in 1996. We started the week in freezing temps...the volleyball pit was frozen. When we walked across it, you would leave a lite boot print. By then end of the week.....we were in polos and shorts!!!

X-mas camp in 1999....Y2k baby.....I was driving a Corvette convertible and had the top down on New Years eve...it was in the mid 70's that day.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:12 am

Rat counselor uniform, year-round (unless too hot) AC sweatshirt and shorts.

Supplemental uniform of BDUs and tanker boots for E&E and survival events.

SpaceCanada · Post by **SpaceCanada** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:33 am

Must be nice!

A lot of people come to my town to retire, so we have lots of old rich people here... but some people move to Vancouver Island to retire, or somewhere 'warmer' in British Columbia. Can't say I have heard of anyone retiring to the USA though, not many Canadians want to live on the other side of the border.

Good to hear you can wear shorts all year in Alabama. I'll make a note of that for if I ever come down for camp in winter.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 11:35 am

Speaking of counselor uniforms....

When I went through Counselor training, our class of Spring counselor dwindled quickly through the then-rigorous training process. It was January / February and really one of the colder winters I experienced at AC.

And then came Land Survival, day two. The set-up:

Weather: Temperature about 50 degrees, cloudy with a little bit of wind. A counselor trainee, callsigned Shrimp (changed to protect the guilty), shows up for counselor training at the land survival area in some type of strappy sandal and nice khaki pants.

While I can't remember the exact exchange, I believe the SGM sent her home to change with something like "And don't come back 'til you've figured out how to dress to work outside. This ain't the (expletive) (expletive) (expletive) Mall! You ain't gonna make through training if you can't figure that out."

Funny thing, she didn't return to training that day, or ever.

One day I'll have to share the adventure of my counselor training class that dropped by 25 percent after the first day and continued to drop until only about a third of us graduated. And we still lost counselors after graduation (including one the day after graduation). Ah, those were the days!

SpaceCanada · Post by **SpaceCanada** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 1:55 pm

Some people never figure it out...

If I were SGM I would have made said counsellor do training as she came and took none of it if she bickered about how messy it was - make things tougher just because she showed up in fancy clothes. Then again, that's just me... lessons learnt the hard way.

I still laugh when parents complain when I send their kids home dirty from camps or wherever. Really... they invented a washing machine for these things... you should try it sometime!

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Wed Sep 20, 2006 2:21 pm

Speaking of washing machines....

Late Spring - 1996

A Counselor previously given the (guilty) callsign of Winky takes his Basic (Mach 2) team into the woods for the firecraft class. For the previous several days, there's been a lot of rain and the ground (especially in that area) is really muddy. But, we're hardcore counselors, right?

So, Winky and his kids head into firecraft with a stern warning from the SGM that they better not be muddy when they walk back in the gate.

Well, as a survival lead, I walk out to check on the activities and when I arrive I find fifteen trainees and their counselor involved in a knock down drag out mudfight. They are scooping up handfuls of mud and throwing them everywhere. This is bright red Alabama clay, and there isn't a stitch of clean clothes on any of them. Mud is caked on shoes, pants, shirts, jackets and all over any exposed skin.

Naturally, I decide to step in and get them back on track, only to have a trainee (again guilty callsigned Stretch) hit me square in the back with a mudball. This starts a pelt the lead counselor attack, from which I narrowly escape down the back trail to the shelter area and into the gate. I go to the bathroom under the bubble and proceed to try and clean myself off. I walk into the Intermediate (Mach3) sim room and Doolittle starts laughing at me. "What happened to you?"

My answer - Firecraft became Mud War I.

So I get to the B-52 trailer about the time that Winky and his mud-covered trainees are nearing the Wardroom and Volleyball Court. The SGM is standing there with a water hose. For several minutes, nothing happens - a true Mexican standoff. Finally, we hear the SGM speak softly to the trainees.

"People, you have two choices - either I hose you off right here and now, or you are all going in the lake and not coming out until your clothes are clean."

Naturally, the trainees resist and attempt to run away. They actually make it to the barn, muddy footprints following them. The are about to enter the barn and run to their bay when the coolest tech we ever had (we'll call him Mitch) opens the door from the inside and steps out then locks the front door.

Behind the trainees looms the Sergeant Major carrying a large bucket of water, grinning hysterically and yelling that he's going to get all of them.

The PM returns from a meeting and walks into the office. "Why are there trainees in the lake? It's not warm enough? And who tracked mud all up the road and down the sidewalk?"

I smiled. "Put two and two together, Flipper. The SGM is down there making sure the trainees are all clean before they are allowed inside."

ACluvR · Post by **ACluvR** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 1:12 pm

It snowed at my first X-Mas Camp... memories of the public pool and doing push-ups outside in the snow are coming back... I think it was X-Mas 00-01 I think... We had two Mach 3 teams of 6... it was weird.

Mud fight? Sounds interesting... Doolittle was the bestest... He and Grunt scared the living daylights outta me my first T-Ops... when T-Ops was still T-Ops... I love the AC stories keep them coming...

Space Nerd · Post by **Space Nerd** » Mon Sep 25, 2006 10:50 pm

The funny thing is that when i was done with E&E in June of 2002 our counselor told us to go and rinse off some of the mud in the lake and the SGM came out of the trailer yelling at us to get out of the lake.

Sandrat · Post by **Sandrat** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 9:24 am

The SGM has always had a peeve with getting in the lake after E&E - especially because it was always a tradition to throw counselors who were completing their last week in the lake after E&E. The hijinks got so bad one summer that the Program Manager was thrown in - and that basically stopped the activity for about three weeks!

I have no recollection, I swear, no recollection at ALL about who threw the Program Manager in the lake after E&E that Thursday evening. Well, who carried the PM into the lake...

It was me.

And boy did I get chewed out for it - but it was fun!

Spanky · Post by **Spanky** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 4:16 pm

Rat,

When was the SGM not pissed off????

Spanky · Post by **Spanky** » Tue Sep 26, 2006 4:18 pm

Well there was that one time we went by his house to tell him that someone he did not like working with had been cut loose. Why did he break out the head dress and warpaint.....