As I sit, waiting for this xmodem transfer to complete, I realize 2 things:
1) When following along with whatever training resource you're using, it's important to enter the command as shown, rather than trying to guess.
2) These kind of things teach you a LOT!
In my situation, the computer I'm watching cbtnuggets on does not have a serial port, so after Jeremy goes through how to wipe out the configs, I move to another system that does, and rather than erase startup-config, I erase flash: and reload.

(hilarity ensues).