The 22-Hour Class - Part VII

Considering the potential for danger and misadventure, Sunday's hose and ladder class went off without a hitch, even in the constant rain and wind. We actually learned a lot and walked away a great deal more effective than when we showed up. Great news for the volunteer fire community - it's shite for trying to come up with interesting things to say in a journal (is it just me or is the word 'blog' just plain fucking annoying?) entry.

So, that being the case, I'm going to spend less time on what we did, and more time on the people that were doing it.

Only 6 of the 8 members of the recruit class (this class is no longer called the 22-hour class - probably because it lasts 59 hours) attended; plastic surgeon girl and one other dude didn't make it. Which left me with a class demographic leaning 2-1 in favor of non-douches; 4 non-douches, and 2 douches. The instructors broke down in a similar ratio with two being cool and competent and one leaning uncomfortably into douche territory.

Douche 1 - Awkward boy.
Douche 2 - [Coldplay].

Non-Douche 1 - [Trent]
Non-Douche 2 - [Ernie]
Non-Douche 3 - [Bob]
Non-Douche 4 - Me

They broke up the group into teams of 2 and 4. Why not 3 & 3? I don't know. My group started with ladders, with douche-leaning instructor giving us very little guidance, but plenty of reprimands. It was an effective strategy. I think we all learned, by way of chastisement, how to put up several types of ladders. We also got to climb the tower, which was the 75 foot truck ladder. Tough to beat the view from that vantage point.

The hose component was way more fun. There are lots of hoses on a truck, but unless they are specialized, they boil down to 3 types: 1.75 in, 2.5 in, and supply hose (generally 4 inch I think). Supply hose is just that, hose that gets water from hydrant (or other source) to truck. The other two hoses are attack hoses. 2.5 is primarily for external dousing (defensive), 1.75 for going into the structure (offensive) and mixing it up with the fire mano y mano, or mano y fiero.

Offensive is more fun, more dangerous, and way more exhausting. It took the 1.75 all of 60 seconds to wreck me. I'm told that will get easier with practice - and oftentimes I'll even have a 2nd man behind me - but that shit was grueling when going it alone. I would say advancing a 1.75 hose solo at 110 psi wide open is roughly equivalent to pushing a medium-ish car on a flat or slight incline - not impossible by any stretch, but there's no way a person can do it without looking like they are expending some real effort.

Defensive is definitely less exciting, but the 2.5 is to the 1.75 what a steamroller is to a tamping iron (I know, weak analogy, I'm off today). It took 4 of us to move the 2.5 forward (well, three of us, Awkward boy was bringing up the rear, which, in forward motion terms, netted us right around nothing). The amount of power in 2.5 inches was astounding, more water was displaced in a millisecond than Rush Limbaugh getting into a bathtub. So, to the Canadians out there, 2.5 inches might not impress the ladies, but it certainly kicks ass in other disciplines.

On to the participants.

Coldplay got his name today (and his 'douche' classification) because instead of wearing the uniform, he had a shirt with the faces of four guys on it. If that wasn't bad enough, when I asked him if it was N'Sync, he guffawed condescendingly and replied "Dude, sorry, this is Coldplay". To which I replied with nothing, because stone silence is my only response to somebody who parries an N'Sync jibe with the legitimacy of Coldplay.

This unfortunately resulted the most uncomfortable and mind-numbing conversation on music I've ever had the misfortune to be party to.

Awkward Boy - "Yeah, Coldplay is cool, but Nickleback and Creed rule."
Me - "I honestly can't respond to that with anything but a look of horror and revulsion. " (I then contorted my face in a hideous way and threw up on my shoes).
Awkward Boy - "You've got a problem with that?"

Let me stop here for a second. It's been brought to my attention that my zeroing in on Awkward Boy as the primary target of my disdain is generally not in keeping with my nature. Typically, I hate people for attributes that are under their own control - those primarily being personality shortcomings. I generally don't deride somebody for a physical flaw because those are mostly not of their doing. My original description of Awkward Boy, however, mentioned only shortcomings of a physical nature. I need to say here that, if his personality were anything other than grating, with an overwhelming dose of unearned credibility (established by his proximity to credible people, I would imagine), he never would have made my radar. But I fucking hate anybody who thinks that they can talk smack to me without a foundation of either friendship, respect, or fear. Awkward Boy has none of these, and he seems to think his validity is set in stone, which is presumptuous, which is something I also loathe.

Onward...

Me - "Nickleback is formulaic and their lead singer sounds like he's dropping a deuce. Oh, and Creed is a punchline, not a band."

The ensuing dialogue was painful and unfunny and I won't continue with it. Suffice it to say that, while I'm not a music snob, I refuse to discuss the merits of bands that only reside on the pop charts. Much like bubble-gum - the product used in many circles to define pop music - even if I consume it from time to time, I'm not going to spend time discussing it.

We ended the day washing the truck. Coldplay escaped early, as did Ernie. That kind of pissed me off, since I don't want to lose another classmate to the douche category. Coldplay was a big enough loss without Ernie going that way as well. I don't think he will, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed nonetheless.