You missed a spot

Every time I think that I have seen the full extent of the pure evil nature of my DIs, they prove me wrong.  All my life I've heard that if you don't like the weather in New England, wait a minute.  That principle can be applied here.  Sgt Smith is a hard man.  I don't think that he knows what sympathy is and I know for a fact he doesn't know what empathy is.  Our platoon scribe is a kid named Throck, that is short for Throckmorton.  Yes that is quite a mouthful.  Throck bears a striking resemblance to Drew Carey.  He is about 5'8, has a belly, wicked thick glasses and a seriously high pitched voice.  Throck has been on PI for two months because he broke his leg and got rolled back in training.  Throck can be whiny and seems to operate on his own program.  More than just about any other recruit, he seems to inspire the ire of Sgt Smith.  We were waiting in the chute at the chow hall at lunch time.  Throck was standing in the line closest to where Sgt Smith was cussing out the platoon.  All of a sudden Throck reaches up and with his left hand and smacks his right forearm and quickly tries to put his hand back to his side.  Of course, it made a loud smacking sound and Sgt Smith saw this.  He yells at Throck to get out of line and explain himself.  The exchange went like this:

Smith:  What in the HELL are you doing Throckmorton?

Throck:  (High pitched voice) Sir, killing a mosquito Sir!

Smith: (Smacks Throck in the face with his right hand and then uses that hand to guide him toward the back of the platoon) Come with me Throckmorton!

(Now at the rear of the platoon)

Smith: Don't unpack your bags son, you won't be staying here very long!

Throck is an extremely nervous young man.  This has completely freaked him out.  He's terrified of Sgt Smith.  During Senior Square Away time, Throck asks the Senior if he should be nervous about what Smith said to him.  The Senior who is not the most even tempered man quickly and emphatically says "Throck you don't have to worry about how long you're staying till I tell you that you're in trouble.  Now sit down and shut up!"  Throck seemed more at ease after this which makes me seriously doubt his intelligence because there was nothing reassuring about that statement.  

Now you might be saying to yourself right now that wasn't so bad.  Maybe you're right.  A drill instructor slapping a recruit in the face (not supposed to happen, but it does) isn't that bad.  But maybe you'll feel differently about this.  We had an inspection today.  So last night we had to shave, scrub our hands and fingernails and get a pre-inspection inspection (yes that apparently is a real thing)  We had to come out and stand in front of Sgt Smith with our hands presented at waste level and then turn our heads to the right, left and sky.  If we were clean enough we got to our foot lockers, if not we had to go back and try again.  Now shaving is really rough for the black recruits because some of them get really bad razor bumps.  It goes so bad for some of them that Medical will issue No-Shave Chits.  Guys would be coming out of the head bleeding because they had cut off a razor bump and then Smith would cuss them out.  Now that's pretty bad, getting forced to painfully shave, cutting yourself and then getting an ass chewing for it.  But that's not the focus of my story.  One recruit, Hockenberry (I am not making these names up!!!) is a 5'7 white kid from Pennsylvania.   He is a little slow and not really athletic.  The most distinguishing feature he has is severe acne and pits on his face.  It actually looks like mountains and valleys on his cheeks.  Hockenberry is also terrified of Sgt Smith.  Hockenberry shaved his face as close as he could.  Let's just say he shaved too close.  He came out of the head with a beard of blood from all the acne he cut off. (This is not an exaggeration!!!)  He stood in front of Sgt Smith for inspection and at first Smith's eyes bulged out of his face in shock.  Here's what happened next:

Smith:  What in the HELL were you doing in there Hockenberry?!?!

Hockenberry:  Sir shaving Sir!

Smith:  (Stares at him menacingly then inspects him, then he points at one side) You missed a spot. Go do it again.

So Hockenberry went back into the head and shaved again!  When he came out the second time looking just as jacked up as he did the first time, Sgt Smith inspected him and then sprayed him in the face with after shave!  I don't even want to imagine how much that must have stung.