Sometimes, getting the minimum is juuuust fine

As I alluded to in my previous post, today was our last day of Army Training here at Fort Jackson. To celebrate, we drew M16-A2 rifles early this morning, and headed to the range for a little Basic Rifle Marksmanship, or BRM.

Now to those of you who knew me during my huahh-huahh Army 1.0 days, you probably recall that BRM was something that I was never really that good at. Sure, I had my good days...but I never qualified expert (36 out of 40 hits) and once or twice I put up some real stinkers.

In fact, in a 4 year Army career otherwise unmarred by mediocrity, my rifle skills were never more than average.

Furthermore, I found rifle ranges so stressful--I was never 100% positive I would qualify--that the last time I fired an M16 back in April of 2005 was, at the time at least, one of the 2 or 3 happiest moments of my life. It meant that I never had to fire an M16 again, and I was more grateful for that than you can imagine.

All of that brings us to today, and my triumphant return to the M16. And by triumphant, I mean that I managed to put up a 23/40...the minimum score needed to pass. Of course, had I failed to pass they would have simply made note of it, and sent me on my way. What else could they do, really? Send me to Iraq?

All in all, though, I was relieved to pass after my two year hiatus from shooting. And to be honest, I'm proud of my 23. It was a nasty-hot day, my glasses fogged up on me, and I didn't have time to properly zero my weapon before the qualification range--I basically had to aim low and left on all of the targets to get the rounds to hit where I wanted them too. At the end of the day, I passed, and that's good enough for now.