Awaiting the President’s speech in Crabtown last week:
Thanks to alert reader K for sending the link along.
Well do I remember how tired one could be, and the often regrettable institutional predisposition to whip the masses into a semblance of order before chaining them to their oars a good hour or so before someone Really Important came aboard.
And yet, something there is that comes to mind about the price of liberty being eternal vigilance.
Heh.
Changing gears a bit: Navy’s win over Army this weekend (42-23, if you’d missed the game) was the fourth in a row for the midshipmen. When I was a mid, we had strong teams all four years and had beat Army for my first three. Going into the the game senior year, the rumor spread through the yard “win four, go to war.” Apparently each class in the 20the century that had won four Army-Navy games during its time at the Academy had ended up going to war. I never did the research on it myself, so I can’t say if there’s any background to this bit of apocrypha. Although my best friend from high school went to West Point, and told me after the game that the reverse theory had swept Bedlam on the Hudson: Lose four and go to war.
My senior year? We were heavily favored going into the game, and obviously wanted to win it: War or no war, it was the Army-Navy game, after all. Somehow an underdog Army team managed to eke out a tie, at the end. We were disappointed but philosophical – seemed the least worst option, at least insofar as the curse was concerned.
All of that seems terribly quaint these days.
Reminds me of a picture I’ve seen of Marine recruits after their first night in training. Guys who had just met that day were sitting in chairs and half-laying all over each other, sound asleep.
It seems to me that these Midshipmen are being excellent managers of resources.
If you’ve got nothing else to do, sleep. That was certainly MY mantra in college when I was working 30 from M-F while still taking a full load.
Old grunt philosophy…
“Sleep when you can, because you never know when your next chance might be…”
I know two of those guys, I met them at Pax River this summer during physiology training.
And I agree with the others… maximize your sleep time because you never know when someone is going to be throwing a keg party.
Well maybe not at the boat school… but some of us chose NROTC.
Having a son at USNA. I Salute those able to sleep in Alumie Hall prior to a sleep prior to a speech by the pres…
The first group of Midshipmen stepped off from Tecumseh court at 0630 for a 0930 speech.
I would have been asleep too.
Dave
I agree they were managing resources well… you can’t blame them in that environment. Good for them.
In keeping with the finest naval tradition, there seem to be a couple or three lookouts on duty in the first row…just in case.
I always had it down as “Never stand when you can sit, never sit when you can lie down and never stay awake when you can get some sleep”
I can neither confirm nor deny that in Nuke school and prototype training, we learned to sleep anywhere (like in a bilge), in any position (say squatting), in any noise (oh, next to a feed pump) for any minimal amount of time. I see USNA was similar.
Boy, those people look young– and sharp!
Winning Streaks of Four or More, Army-Navy Game
Army 1901-04
Army 1913-16
Army 1927, 1930-33 (no game played 1928-29)
Navy 1939-43
Army 1944-47
Navy 1959-63
Navy 1973-76
Army 1992-96
Navy 2002-05
So it’s apocryphal, I’m afraid, although I’m hard-pressed to think of any USNA class which hasn’t gone to war at one time or another.
Those people look young- and sharp. I am heartened by that.
during my time at South Hudson.. the motto was “if you sleep 8 hours a day, you really only spend two and two thirds years here…”
(of course i had to ask my whizzo roommate to confirm the math)
My God, they DO look oh-so-young! But then again, I always think that when I’m hanging out with my sons and their peers. As a matter of fact, having to salute kids was a prime mover in my decision to retire when I did. Just sayin’!
As for sleep: Every GI learns to grab it when and where you can. Desk tops, three swivel chairs lined up in a row with a field jacket for a pillow, the ground…whatever. I did more than a few “death marches” (an IT industry term for killer projects that culminate in quite a few all-nighters) during my civilian career and my non-military friends always expressed amazement at my ability to grab a few winks in the most unlikely places.