The Guide to How to Simulate Australian Army Life
Want to be a soldier, but really don't want to commit precious years of your life?
Here are some easy ways to simulate exactly what it's like to be an Australian soldier.
FIELD LIFE (life on exercise in the bush simulating war)
Surround yourself with people who smoke like chimneys, drink like fish, bitch / whine
/ complain about EVERYTHING, and use foul language that would make a shearer blush.
Pack three days worth of clothes and toiletries. Live in your back-yard for two weeks.
Go into the house only once in those two weeks to shower. Dig a hole in your back yard and
live in it. Allow no direct contact with your family. Your only means of communication
should be with letters that your neighbours have held for at least three weeks, discarding
two of five.
Every two days, fill in the hole, move to another part of the yard and dig another
hole. Every time you are approximately half-way through digging the hole, have somebody come
by, compliment you on the fine hole you've dug and tell you to fill it in and dig it
somewhere else.
Always dig a hole next to the hole you're living in. This is your toilet. Re-dig the
hole every time your move your living hole. Fill in the old hole and mark it with a "Foul
Ground" sign. Have somebody remove the sign while you're not looking. Dig in that exact
space in 1 month's time.
Collect a jar-full of ants, dirt, various bugs and mosquito's. Pour them down the back
of your shirt.
Have week old fruit and vegetables delivered to your back yard and have your neighbour
give you one per day until they all go rotten and have to be thrown out. Watch your
neighbour eat as many as he wants, because he's on a "non-tactical" exercise.
If it doesn't rain, turn on the sprinklers.
If you're incredibly tired and fed-up one night, stand guard duty in your hole from 3
a.m. to 6 a.m. Don't sleep at all that day, even though there's nothing to do.
Sleep for only twenty minutes at a time; No matter how tired you are and even though
there's nothing to do.
Cook your meals in your shaving mug. Eat everything cold. Buy food with instructions
in Yiddish, so it never turns out how it should.
Eat everything in three minutes. After eating, sit around for two hours, glad you ate
everything in 3 minutes.
Buy two rolls of toilet paper. Ensure one of these two rolls is wet all the time.
Run around your yard, periodically throwing yourself to the ground and crawling for at
least 20 meters or smack your shins, knees and elbows with a hammer to gain the same
effect.
For two days in a row, walk 10 kilometres without stopping. Wear a poorly fitting back
pack with fifty-five kg of weight in it. Bitch and whine the whole way.
When making sandwiches, leave the bread out for six days, or until it is hard and
stale. Alternatively, put grated carrot, pineapple and tomato on everything so your bread
runs down your arm like a liquid.
Have one meal a week served to you floating in its own grease in a large cooler or
similar insulated container. Serve coffee, juice and other beverages the same way.
GARRISON LIFE (life in the Barracks)
Surround yourself with people who smoke like chimneys, drink like fish, bitch / whine
/ complain about EVERYTHING, and use foul language that would make a shearer blush.
Wear only military uniforms. Even though nobody cares, clean and press one ceremonial
uniform and wear it for 20 minutes on the whim of some crusty old guy who yells at you.
Ask for equipment or articles of clothing you really need, have somebody tell you that
you're not entitled to it. Walk away without recourse.
Whenever you're bored, get drunk. (BE BORED OFTEN)
Study the owner's manual for all household appliances. Routinely take an appliance
apart, clean it and put it back together, even though it hasn't been used.
Start a project, any project. Have somebody continually stop by and make stupid
suggestions to make the job "easier". Say "yes sir" and do it the way they told you to do
it. After they leave, go back to doing it the RIGHT way.
Repaint your vehicle every month, whether it needs it or not.
Move every two years. Whether you want to or not. When you get to a place you really
hate, stay there for fifteen years. When you get to a place you really love, pack up and
move again within 6 months.
Replace all your appliances and furniture with those which are outdated, in need of
constant repair or dangerous to use. Do more with them than you would if they were new.
If you have nothing to do, clean something that doesn't need cleaning.
TRAINING ENVIRONMENT (learning establishments like recruit training and promotion
courses)
Surround yourself with people who smoke like chimneys, drink like fish, bitch / whine
/ complain about EVERYTHING, and use foul language that would make a shearer blush.
Run. Run a lot. Run once in the morning, once at noon and once before supper.
Run at least five kilometres each time, pretending you really want to do this because
you want to appear 'hard'.
Stand to attention in a parking lot in the hot sun for five hours, or until you pass
out and fall face first into the asphalt. Have somebody yell at you the entire time. Have
this same person nitpick at you incessantly and then fine you $650.00 and confine you to
your room for a week, coming out only to go to the bathroom, shower, eat and march with a
pack on in your free time.
Have somebody yell at you every time you're stupid enough go outside without a hat on,
slouch, or put your hands in your pockets.
Cut your hair weekly, making it shorter each time, until you look bald or look like
you lost a fight with a demented sheep shearer.
Give yourself twenty minutes less than you need for lunch. Eat so fast you don't taste
the food.
Clean and shine everything to perfection. Have somebody yell at you and call you a
filthy pig. Pretend to clean and shine everything to perfection again (CHANGING NOTHING),
Have the same person inspect it and say "good turnout".
INTERACTION WITH CIVILIANS (pretty self explanatory)
LEAVE THE PEOPLE BEHIND who smoke like chimneys, drink like fish, bitch / whine /
complain about EVERYTHING, and use foul language that would make a shearer blush.
Whenever civilians say or do anything stupid (IT HAPPENS A LOT) shake your head and
mutter in your most contemptuous / condescending voice; "b.. civvies".
Use copious amounts of acronyms, NEVER explain them. When asked to explain shake your
head and mutter in your most contemptuous / condescending voice; "b.. civvies".
Have other people say ridiculously stupid things to you like: "you don't pay taxes, do
you?", "you get free housing", "man, you must get paid a lot". Shake your head and mutter in
your most contemptuous / condescending voice; "b... civvies".