Aaron update

So I'm not the best at keeping this current...So here are some excitements:

June 27: "so today we stated combative training and in one day we did all the training that I did in one weekend except we had less chance of practicing. So when I heard combatatives I was like, oh no! I don't want to do this...but then we started to train and it was a good review for me and the first time we got to roll with someone for practice I took on 2 heavy weights and on one that was talking trash earlier I actually made him tap out So my confidence started to grow then the story started to grow and everyone started to hear that Marshall is good...later we did a platoon on platoon rumble. Everyone in my platoon was not doing so well. Then it was my turn (3rd or 4th person) and everyone started cheering for me, "Marshall! you got this, come on!" etc!!! So to make a short story shorter, I won my match impressively and my platoon was screaming. They were shocked that my little band teacher bdy could do so well. Unfortunately, it makes my confidence grow, and everyone now knows that I am good at basic combatitives---thanks RSP!"

June 29: "today I shot a M203-a grenade launcher! of course the rounds they gave us were training rounds, so instead of blowing this up I was chalking things up...it was still really fun though and yep, that's all we did today besides get yelled at a lot."

July 1: " shooting was the highlight of my day, the second highlight of my day was a PVT (who has a bad reputation) challenged the DS in re-assembling 3 different rifles whose pieces were mixed up and the deal was if the PVT wins, we can go buy a Gatorade, if the PVT looses, we do 1/2 hour of PT. So after our PT session (DS reassembled 4 out of 6-one of the PVT rifles- in 5 min.) DS said since PVT Long had the guts to challenge me, go downstairs and buy a Gatorade, I never knew that 1.25 would taste so good."

He is doing well on his M16 shooting. He completes his daily qualifying quickly, and then gets other duties like coaching or targets. He will actually do his final qualifying test on Saturday, July 11.

He is getting to teach discussions on Sunday. Last Sunday it was the 'final' discussion with a challenge of baptism, this week he taught the first discussion. He said it was a lot harder because it was all of the basics and the worst part was translating all the important parts from Spanish into English so he could teach it.

On July 4 they celebrated by watching a movie...Band of Brothers, had steak and corn on the cob for lunch, and then a few were chosen to attend a baseball game in Columbus...He was chosen because he answered a question right. He was anticipating ice cream, but there wasn't any, he settled for "grossly overpriced" domino's pizza, and passed up an opportunity of catching a fly ball with the logic that he didn't get to keep it anyway. "That was the first real B-Ball game I've been to and now I know why: B-Ball games are kind of boring, although I followed the action somewhat closely--as lose as I could for pitch-hit-catch-throw...We had to form up at 2130 in the parking lot and I was almost late. The city of Columbus had their fireworks show in the distance and I was enjoying that...When the lights in the stadium went out and the stadium had their own fireworks show that went with music (I couldn't hear the music, but I know it was there) and it was going off right on top of us (we were standing right underneath of it, that was cool) The baseball games crowd was like 1000-2000 soldiers and we were all under the fireworks. When the first one went off, everyone started to shout, "Mortar rounds 12 o'clock, 100 meters" everything a good infantry man shouts when under fire!"

July 4 was the letter I received today. He really is doing so well and is enjoying it as long as he isn't getting yelled at :).

Hope all is well. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.