THE SAILOR'S LOG II

Where in the world is Tsim Sha Tsui?

2006-04-10T05:39:00.001-07:00

Currently Watching:

American Me on DVD

We pulled out of Hong Kong today. I had a great time there, once again. While there this time, I visited a couple good shopping spots I hadn't been to before (I had focused solely on Stanley Market before).

I spent the day yesterday traipsing around the Kowloon peninsula, visiting spots I had been informed as good shopping spots. I visited the Golden Computer Arcade and the Ladies' Market. The Golden Computer Arcade was a huge collection of booths/stores selling computer/electronic goods at unbelievably cheap prices. I stocked up there on an external hard drive, wireless mouse, and a pack of 100 DVD-R discs. At the Ladies' Market, they had everything that Stanley Market had and may have even been bigger. I bought t-shirts, a hat, and another shirt there. I capped the day off by getting some bubble tea. If anyone's had bubble tea before, you know there's usually tapioca eggs/balls (whatever the term may be) in them. Here however, I was enlightened to find them with jelly and fruit pieces in them. I got one that was mango, with manjo jelly in it instead of the tapioca.

As the days go by....

2006-03-23T16:42:00.000-08:00

Currently Watching:

Four Brothers DVD

Days left of deployment: 137
Days left on the ship: 204

As I write, the ship is still underway for a month long period, turning circles around the Western Pacific...awaiting our first international port visit in a couple of weeks.

I have still been watching movies constantly to occupy my free time. However, our mail service resumed yesterday, after being kept for a week and a half, and I received books!!! These included the books I ordered to read more about Che Guevara (three different books), and also a box of books from home that my dad sent out.

I started something today to occupy my time in a more constructive way (maybe!), but less enjoyable. I am now enrolled in the ship's ESWS program to earn a warfare pin. This is an exhaustive study of all the ship's systems and departments. After finishing the qualifications books (going through and being instructed on everything), one is required to take a test, take a practice board with questions being asked on every department, and then a final board with the same information. It can take a lot of time, but can be done as quickly as one desires (and as large as one's commitment is to the study). For me, personally, I hope to complete all of it within a two month span of time.

That's it from the far seas. I shall try to write again sooner rather than later!

2006-03-08T22:25:00.001-08:00

Current News of interest:
Shell Oil doing corporate good in moving their employees back to New Orleans (done by way of buying 120 houses and condos for them!!).

We've been underway on deployment for a week and a half now, and so far so good. It was busy for the first several days, but now it's calm and relaxed for the most part. I've been spending my time watching movies and studying for my upcoming advancement exam. My exam is early in the day tomorrow, and I feel I am about 75% prepared for it. Either way it goes, is not too important to me. On these exams I regularly do well based on my studying and my head knowledge (that one covers the bulk of the answers on exams, or good guessing). I say that it isn't too important because if I do get advanced, it'll only be for 1, 2 or 3 months, till the time I separate from the Navy.

In packing for this deployment, I didn't have the time to pack up any of my books...so I have none along. However, now in the last week, I have found 3 different sources that are going to be sending boxes of books out. So, I should get those at the beginning of April.

That's it for now. Hope all is well with everyone. Feel free to e-mail back and forth with me to give me some hometown company or messages from where ever you are!

Time, why you punish me?

2006-02-23T00:29:00.000-08:00

I am currently engaged in a losing battle to have all the fun I can, accomplish all the menial tasks of life, and get all the work done that I possibly can in the next four days.

What this means is that I work hard, play hard, hang out with as many friends as possible, and fritter time online as much as possible, whilst ignoring the sleep. I slept 1 1/2 hours last night, and glad that still 18+ hours after, I'm not feeling that.

I want to be here, doing this, wondering if I should go curl up with my book that's been neglected for the last week or two....rather than jump into another Sorry game online.

I wish that I wasn't about to leave the country for five months. I wish that I had made another trip to Canada in the last year. I wish I didn't have a car that I don't want anymore. However, I'm not griping....just missing some enrichment of my life.
That's it for now.

Conundrum

2006-02-19T22:32:00.000-08:00

Today, I spent a lot of time browsing cars online. I decided (tentatively) that within the next year I'm going to buy myself a lightly used Hyundai Elantra...due to great fuel economy, cheap price, and the fact that it would be an almost new car - something I've gotten close to with the Crown Vic, but not close enough (?).

So here is the conundrum....what to sell, what to keep, when to buy in regards to the below pictured automobiles. These vehicles are posted in the order of the aforementioned category they fall into at the present time.

2006-02-10T18:14:00.000-08:00

Currently Working On:

Today was a lovely day off. I stayed up till 5ish this morning. I played Sorry online, and then talked to a New Zealand girl, who I had played against, for a couple hours.

Then, I slept till 10ish....woke up and did nothing (picking up around the house and flitting around online) till 3. Then, I went around and did errands. David, if you read this...the Hawaii picture was copied and sent off today, for Cadie and you to each have a copy.

Tonight, I'm going to go over to Frankie Shanks's apartment and play Monopoly (maybe). Then, if I meet up with James, I may be playing Texas Hold 'Em tonight.

That's it for now. I just had to charge the vacuum up, so now I have to go get busy. Have a great weekend!

Meme of Four

2006-02-10T01:24:00.000-08:00

FOUR JOBS YOU'VE HAD IN YOUR LIFE:

Personnelman - US NAVY
Sandwich Artist - Subway
Usher/Concession Stand/Box Office Attendant - Cineplex Odeon/Loews
Beverage Stocker, in a college cafeteria

FOUR MOVIES YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER:

Serendipity
High Fidelity
Say Anything
The Shawshank Redemption

FOUR CITIES YOU’VE LIVED IN:

Everett, WA
Mountlake Terrace, WA
Wheaton, IL
West Chicago, IL

TV SHOWS YOU LOVE TO WATCH:

The O.C.
Desperate Housewives
Grey's Anatomy
Fresh Prince of Bel Air

FOUR FAVORITE PLACES YOU’VE BEEN ON VACATION:

San Francisco/Oakland/Monterey, CA
Panama City Beach, FL
Hong Kong
Perth/Fremantle, Australia

FOUR WEBSITES YOU VISIT DAILY:

Myspace
Google
Tv.yahoo.com
Craigslist

FOUR OF YOUR ALL TIME FAVORITE RESTAURANTS:

Olive Garden
Jack in the Box
Any Mongolian BBQ
Pineapple Willy's

FOUR SCHOOLS YOU’VE ATTENDED:

Wheaton Christian Grammar School
Wheaton Academy
Wheaton North High School
Olympic College

FOUR OF YOUR FAVORITE FOODS:

Chocolate-chip or oatmeal raisin cookies
Hamburgers
Fettucine Alfredo
Pad Thai

FOUR THINGS YOU WANT RIGHT NOW:

More time on land
No more Navy
A road atlas
Ice cream

FOUR NICKNAMES YOU’VE HAD:

Joe-Joe
Big
Josey Wales
Joey

The Great 5000 Mile Road Trip

2006-02-05T00:49:00.000-08:00

Currently Reading:

Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America With Einstein's Brain
By Michaqel Paterniti

I'm sitting here thinking, researching and dreaming....and I shall share with the public at large.
When I am let go from the Navy in the last month of my contract, I have made plans and ambitions to drive cross country. I have spent several other nights brainstorming this large trip, and did so again tonight.

I went online and figured out again what places I would go, how long I would drive each day, and where I would stay....as well as how much it would cost.

Below you'll find the summary of all of the above. Before I began all this, I started off with the idea of having bought a truck camper. I browsed these online before I started research, when I saw that I could get a used truck camper, to put on the back of my truck, for somewhere between $500 and $1000. What is listed below is a combination of hostel stay, RV campground stays, and other friend's houses en route.

Trip plans....

Oct 14/15 - Seattle to LA, picking up Zach along the way
Miles: 1166
Time: 18 hours
Stay: Hostel California - Venice Beach $15.50 for the night

Oct 16 - LA to Santa Fe
Miles: 848
Time: 12 hours
Stay: Santa Fe KOA campground $28

Oct 17 - Santa Fe to Houston
Miles: 874
Time: 13 hours
Stay: Frankie’s house

Oct 18 - Houston to Chattanooga
Miles: 815
Time: 12 hours
Stay: Chattanooga South/Lookout Mountain KOA $29

Oct 19 - Chattanooga to Alexandria, VA
Miles: 601
Time: 9 ½ hours
Stay: One of the Davids’ apartments

Oct 20 - Alexandria, VA/Washington DC to HOME
Miles: 730 miles
Time: 12 hours
Stay: HOME

TOTAL MILES: 5034
TOTAL DRIVING TIME: 76 ½ hours
TOTAL LODGING COST: $72.50
ESTIMATED FUEL COST (BASED ON ESTIMATED 10 MPG AND $2/GALLON GAS): $1006

So, what do you all think of that planning? Is there anyone out there who wants to join in? If I do buy a truck camper, it would have sleeping room for four. However, the truck would only allow two other travelers (and only one if Zach does join this road trip).

Heaven's Very Special Child

2006-01-30T21:20:00.000-08:00

The following poem was read at church yesterday, and I really liked it. It's online on one or more sites about Tourette's syndrome.

A meeting was held qute far from Earth,

It's time again for another birth

said the Angels to the Lord above,

"this special child will need much love."

His progress may seem very slow,

accomplishments he may not show

and he'll require extra care

from the folks he meets down there.

He may not run or laugh or play

his thoughts may seem quite far away...

In many ways he won't adapt

and he'll be known as handicapped...

So let's be careful where he's sent.

We want his life to be content.

Please, Lord, find the parents

who would do a special job for you.

They will not realize right away

the leading role they're asked to play

but with this child sent from above,

comes stronger faith and richer love..

And soon they'll know the privilege given,

in caring for this gift from Heaven,

now precious charge so meek and mild.

"He's Heaven's very special child."

Letter to Bethany (paraphased for the general public)

2006-01-20T23:30:00.000-08:00

___________,
Hello, dear reader! I’m writing this late at night while I’m hanging out in the office. The inter-net just went down, so my fun surfing for the night is done with. I’m out of books to read, so I decided a little while ago that I would write you a letter tonight (that was even before I got on the Internet).

I am getting so excited these days on my trip to Europe, and doing all my web surfing on that topic. I have decided (based on input from Ryan Schaap – who I e-mailed the other day) that I am going to combine a rail pass with a rental car (however many weeks on this, I haven’t decided yet). I found a website/company where I can do a short-term lease on a car (with insurance included) for about $28 bucks a day. The car would be a little stick shift Euro economy car. I’ve been reading how expensive (like 4 bucks a gallon!) gas is in Europe, but on the flip side of the coin – how fuel-efficient the cars are. On the negative side, I’ve looked back on fares, and they’ve gone up 150-200 bucks since I last researched the price. I’m going to submit my passport application the week after we get back to Everett!!! So, hopefully that’ll come in the mail at home right about the time I leave on deployment. That’s going to be my first preparation item this year…then throughout the year, I’ll buy the plane tickets and rail pass, etc.

Other news from me is that I just bought a laptop on Ebay. It's a Dell with all the specs I wanted and it was a good price, compared to new. It's currently at my parents house, and should hopefully be waiting for me in Washington next week.

We’ve got one more week of this underway, and then back in Washington for a month before our 5 month deployment. I have got just less than 9 months left in the Navy. Can you believe I’ve been in over 4 years now? Way too long, I shall add! The just less than 9 months translates to 266 days left.

Things I love, and things I don't...

2006-01-12T22:41:00.000-08:00

Currently Reading:

Mary, Mary
A novel by James Patterson

(Random) Things I Love

-A sister who is fun enough to go to Costa Rica
-Clean laundry
-Democratic party ideas that focus on social issues for the good of the country (this thought brought to mind due to "Living History")
-Carne asada burritos from a "roach coach"
-20 oz bottles of Coca-Cola
-People who share books (with me!!)
-Writing letters

(Random) Things I DON'T Love

-Not being able to visit aforementioned sister, due to my own (Navy-ordered) globetrotting
-The beginnings of sick feelings when coming off a night with minimal sleep
-Sour cream
-Cold temperatures

Quick news that matters:
The ship is currently in San Diego and pulling out again tomorrow for a week and a half. One more stop in San Diego at that point, and then headed back to Everett (we'll get home two weeks from now).

My Big, Bad GMC truck!

2006-01-06T23:26:00.000-08:00

Currently Rockin' out to:

Now 16

Just before I went home for Christmas, I bought myself an old truck. This had been building for a long while, since I had been wanting a 70s-80s Chevy or GMC full-size pick-up for the last four or five years. I decided a month ago that I would sell my car come August and buy an old truck. I then decided 3 weeks ago, that I would do it that week and have two vehicles until whatever point I sold my car.

What are the details of my truck you may ask?

This truck is a 1973 GMC Sierra Grande Camper Special (sans camper). It runs well and is in good shape mechanically. The one negative point of it is that it has a LOT of rust on the hood and other parts of the body. This is okay with me, since it runs well. The rust deal is going to give me a project with it, to see how much I can sand off. Then, I'll explore my bondo options and touch-up paint! As well, all this year, I will be looking forward to driving all my stuff home in the bed come October.

Since I've been back in Everett (at least before we got underway), I spent as much of my free time rockin' out in the truck (since it has a radio that works, so much unlike my car). I drove to and from work in the Crown Vic, and then used the truck for my play toy in the afternoon/evenings.

I will make some attempt to post pictures up here of the truck after I get back off this underway.

Stay tuned for future entries....I have a new position in the office to talk about!

Dreading

2006-01-04T20:17:00.000-08:00

Currently Rockin' out to:

From Under The Cork Tree
Fall Out Boy

I am on duty tonight, and about to go underway tomorrow. This is another short underway before our regular deployment. Although, the above is true, I'm still dreading this underway. I'm just not prepared for it. I didn't really pack until this morning at 5 am, and I had to leave for the ship shortly after that. So, everything was done in a rush, and I forgot a few crucial tasks before I got here. With a little help from my friends, these are getting all accomplished tonight. My friends/co-workers here helping me out tonight truly deserve my appreciation and love. I shall endeavor to make them all dinner upon our return!?!

That's it for now. I have to hit my rack soon to get up early. I'm responsible to do the muster report tomorrow morning, starting at 4 am.

I shall write next on my big, bad truck....which I bought just before going home for Christmas.

Composites

2006-01-03T20:07:00.000-08:00

Untitled (and unfinished)

Let's walk together
Through the park
All through the city
Talking and laughing
Growing closer

Luna And Soy

Do you know
You're special to me?
Even when we don't talk
I wonder how you are
Here I sit now -
Sorting through four years of memories
I find so many memories of you
From soy nuts to German phrases
Drawings and doodles, to quotes
Here you are
When you didn't know me angry or upset
When you left, what your reflections of me were
When I left, what would become of me
You shall remain deeply entrenched in my memory
Here's to the future
May we shortly meet again in Chicago?
If such shall be, we shall continue to share deep friendship
And share in the changing patterns of our lives.

VACATION!

2005-12-25T01:42:00.000-08:00

Currently Reading:

Living History
By Hillary Rodham Clinton

I have been away from this blog for quite some time now. I have worked a crazy/busy schedule of hours at work the last month preparing for an inspection of all our processes. Expected date for that inspection was 1-2 weeks ago. Actual date that inspection will be...some time in February! Ugh....all my (prematurely) wasted hours!

In happy news, I have been home for the last week/week and a half. I have seen an endless stream of people around home...both those expected and unexpected. I have seen the family near and far (Michigan relatives at least) in various Christmas celebration (a week ahead of time!! Seriously, for my immediate family, we've felt that Christmas was a week ago, cause that's when our major Christmas was. Now, we've just done our traditional Christmas Eve dinner with the grandparents. Tomorrow, will be church in the morning, and Christmas with my Mom's side in the afternoon/evening.

I dread going back to work. This week (after the busyness died down) of vacation has been so great. The last three nights, I've stayed up till 5, 6, 7ish in the morning, slept a few hours and hit vacation hard again...driving all over creation, seeing people, hitting up Chicago and various suburbs a time or two. In that staying up all night long, I've found Sorry and Scrabble available for online play. To me right now, this is the greatest thing in the world. I've consistently played with a wide mix of people, mostly Australian though!! Cool? I think so!

That's it for now. I may update more later to fill in gaps or such..

Merry Christmas to all, and good night (for you...I'll still be up for 4 hrs?)! :)

Where I fall on the political spectrum...

2005-12-11T09:35:00.000-08:00

You are a
Social Conservative
(33% permissive)

and an...
Economic Liberal
(18% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Totalitarian

Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid
Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

You exhibit a very well-developed sense of right and wrong and believe in economic fairness.

Currents

2005-11-13T03:51:00.000-08:00

Currently Rockin' Out to:

New Found Glory -- Sticks And Stones

Currently completed - driving around Pleasanton, San Leandro,
Oakland, San Francisco
- visiting Wal-Mart to pick up the bare necessities of life
- trying a new wine at a uber-classy San Francisco bar
- making a special trip to that California (and various
southern states) favorite, In-N-Out burger

Currently thinking of - my future adventure of riding the rails in Europe
(based on conversation with Zach's roommate, and Zach this previous afternoon)

Currently looking forward to - getting my passport application submitted

Currently reading - The SF Weekly

Currently hungry because... - I only ate one In-N-Out Burger, instead of two

Currently up at nearly 4 am... - because I slept all morning (yesterday) until 1 pm

2005-11-10T22:52:00.000-08:00

Currently Reading:

Cargo magazine -- Nov 2005

Our underway is almost over, our underway is almost over! We pull into port in a nice spot this weekend, where I'll see a friend from home (a guy that moved out west). Then, it's fast steaming back to Everett.

Things have been indescribably busy and I'm so very much looking forward to being back in Washington. I currently am in the process of apartment-hunting, and will move into a place with a co-worker within 3 days (hopefully) of being back. As well, I will be renting a Scion XB for several days or a week. Yeah, splurge! If you all don't like them little boxes....you are entitled to your own opinion......however, I love 'em and may buy one used in the next 24 months.

That's it for now. I've been through all the books I brought with me on this underway, so now I'm left to read the magazines that I brought along with me. I'll be reading "Nickel 'N' Dimed in America" next, after we get home.

Scion XB!!

A Year In Numbers

2005-10-25T16:30:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Travels With Charley
By John Steinbeck

In direct relation to how much is happening for me this next year, and how close some of it is....I decided I wanted to sit down today and figure out the countdown for all the events upcoming that matter to me. So below you'll find it, the highlight work of my day!

COUNTDOWN.... (drum roll please, Maestro!)
UPDATED NOVEMBER 13TH....
End of current underway (November 16th) -- 3 days
Go home for Christmas (December 17th) -- 33 days
Christmas -- 42 days
Second to last underway begins (January 6th) -- 54 days
TAPS class, teaching me how to transition effectively from the Navy to a civilian again (February 6th) -- 85 days
My 23rd birthday (February 7th) -- 86 days
Deployment begins -- 106 days
Return from LAST NAVAL DEPLOYMENT (late summer '06) -- around 260 days
Depart the ship (October 14) -- 335 days
Fly my bum ass to Europe -- 345 days

2005-10-16T13:51:00.000-07:00

Currently Watching:

A Song's Best Friend -- John Denver Remembered

I'm currently on duty on the ship, trying to take it as light and easy as possible.

Last night, I went to a few bars with a group of guys off the ship. We went to one bar in Lynnwood that I had just heard about and wanted to check out, and then a place that had karaoke, and then down to Seattle! We went to Cowgirls, Inc...which is modeled after/inspired by Coyote Ugly. The karaoke place was a superbly good time. They have private rooms you go in, sit on nice leather couches...and punch what songs you want to sing into a big ass remote. We spent 1 1/2 to 2 hours there. I sang several songs, such as Brown Eyed Girl, Sweet Home Alabama, Bed of Roses, and more. Then, down in Seattle, we were just there for about an hour and then came home. We had gone in two cars, and the cops started towing cars that were parked legally. So, one of the guys got nervous and thought we should go.

Changes

2005-10-01T14:37:00.000-07:00

Currently Rockin' Out to:

Weezer -- Blue Album

This week/weekend there have been lots of changes afoot. A lot of people have left the ship, most of whom have been here the whole time I have.

It's going to be quite different at work, since this is just about the last of the batch that was there when I arrived here in Washington. If you don't understand the change think about this...These are the guys that I have been with at work for the last 3 1/2 years. While underway, these are the guys I spent day in and day out with. At one occurence (leading up to the start of the war in Iraq), that was 9 1/2 months straight, without seeing family, friends outside the Navy, or any of the normal world. You are forced to become "family" in these cases. As much as you have differences with some guys, it has to be dealt with.

The person I will miss the most, left on Thursday night, and drove home to LA. From there he will go to Houston visiting more family, before finally arriving in D.C. (his next duty station). Although, he is going to go home with me to celebrate Christmas with me and the fam....so that's something to look forward to.

2005-09-18T14:59:00.000-07:00

I know it's a tad late in the game, but I encourage everyone to donate to the Red Cross. I did donate online today myself. I know if any of us were in the same position as those in New Orleans et al, we'd want all the help we could get...and would want the relief to get to us as soon as possible.

You can donate as little as $5 online with your credit card, or as much as your wallet can handle.

Click here to donate specifically for Hurricane Katrina relief.

Hotdogs With Honey

2005-09-17T20:33:00.000-07:00

Currently Rockin' Out to:

Blessid Union Of Souls - Self-titled

I am currently underway on the glorious vessel. Quite frequently, they have been serving burgers and hotdogs (and in the shortest of the four lines, I might add), and that gave me inspiration for a random title and idea. Some point in the near future, I am going to try an interesting mix of hot dogs and honey, and see if that's a good mating or not. When the time comes, I'll put that out for the world to know my opinion on such.

The underway time has been quite productive so far, and emotion-wise pretty good as well. We're approximately 9 days into this business, and have about 9 more days till Everett. I've been successfully accomplishing all the projects that have been put in front of me and my section of the office. I use me, and my in that sentence because I am now largely responsible for these successes.

Since being advanced, and the onset of this underway, I've stepped into a leadership role. In my opinion, I am doing quite well with the change. I've worked out a good mix of showing the junior folks under me that I'm willing to do half the work and organizing, so they'll step up to finish the other half...and will respond when I ask them to do something. I haven't worked out all the kinks yet....I still have one person to figure out. Often, if I ask him to do something, it'll take him six hours, and further reminder, to actually do what he was asked. I still have good hope for it though. In latest days, he's actually surprised me with some smart ideas, thinking, and exploring ways to do things better. If only I could see him doing the general request tasks well, everything would be going super-smooth. We still have a week and a half, so I'll see how things work out.

I'm off to relax now. I hope the weekend is going well for all landlocked folks.

It's an exciting day in the neighborhood, exciting day in the neighborhood....Won't you be my neighbor?

2005-08-31T03:40:00.000-07:00

Currently Re-Reading:

Love In The Time of Cholera
By Gabriel Garcia Marquez

It's late, and I don't have too much energy to update. I will tell you all three major news items that have happened to me in the last week.

The first one is that I was CAPped last week Thursday. This means I was promoted/advanced in the Navy in a matter other than the normal promotion business. Normally, one must take an exam and be advanced off that, if they achieve a certain score. I, however, was nominated for the Command Advancement Program....where departments can submit the names of those stellar performers that deserve to be specially advanced. All of these are then reviewed by the Commanding Officer of the ship, and he makes the final choices of who he'll advance. So, effective immediately (with a time delay on the pay stuff, however), I am one rank higher and make plenty more a paycheck!

The second item of news is that I have moved into another house. This is the one with the guy w/guns....and so far it's working beautifully. He told me today that the landlord is raising the rent $50, though. Not so hot....however it will still be cheap.

The third item of news is that I am seeing someone now. This is especially exciting for me because I really have NO experience dating. However, up to this point, things are going well and I believe we are clicking quite well. This girl is a church-going gal, and that is definitely a good thing. We actually met on-line, and e-mailed and called for about a week before meeting up. Then, when we did first see each other, we went to her church on Sunday night, and then out to Applebee's with church friends. Tonight, we had a first real date and things continue to go well. :) Yea!!!

Movies for Guys

2005-08-17T02:23:00.000-07:00

Currently Watching:

The Dukes Of Hazzard

Tonight was a night centered around me-time. I tried unsuccessfully to enlist friends to join whatever adventure....but the ones I talked to were TIRED and not going out.

Any which way, I drove around Lynnwood (just south of Everett), trying to decide what to do. I discovered a Borders I didn't know existed, and sat reading magazines in there for an hour. Then, I drove back up to Everett and saw Dukes of Hazzard. Before the movie came out, I wanted to see it, solely because of Jessica Simpson's involvement. Then, after the reviews came out, and it was said she was the only worthwhile part of the movie, it put me off to watching it. However, tonight, since I wanted to relax, all that was fine with me.

After seeing the movie, which I did thoroughly enjoy, I wanted to write about car chases. I love movies with car chase scenes. I have yet to see Bullitt, however, which is said to be the greatest (and really first) car chase movie.

In doing web-surfing on these related topics, I once again perused the free Wikipedia encyclopedia.

Is there anyone else (besides my friend/co-worker David), who has found this site to be really, really cool? Just looking at it tonight, with car chases, I found links to the entries on police cars (where I learned that Crown Vics account for 98% of U.S. cop cars -- yea for my car!), individual car chase movies, and more. The internet shall never cease to have fun surprises!

That's it for now. It's too late for me to be up, so it's off to bed!

A Real Texas Outlaw

2005-08-15T23:00:00.000-07:00

Currently Watching:

Two and a Half Men, Friends, and Summerland

I talked to a prospective roommate today on a couple occasions. He is a co-worker of one of my close friends on the ship. It seems like a definite possiblity, when I am ready to move into my next place.

There are however a few things to consider.

This guy I talked to today is the one who's been in the place from the beginning, and is the primary guy on the lease, as far as I can surmise. However, he is leaving ultimate approval to another guy that's living there now with his woman. I don't really understand, because the first guy was their first and he's the man in charge. Why is it up to this other guy and his woman?

The other thing left to ponder is who this guy is, and what that means. He's one of them Texas boys that has guns and will shoot anyone who breaks into the house.

If I live there, will it be like this?

Where should one draw the line when evaluating roommates? Would one choose not to live with someone who has guns? Someone who has a LOT of guns (self-professed amount to provide for a small army)?

These are things to think about, given my slight fear of the unknown in reference to guns.

Under, over, climbing the mountain

2005-08-14T14:10:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

A Short History of Nearly Everything
By Bill Bryson

See more about Bill Bryson here

I am currently getting my slightly out of whack situation straight. I have several bills I've had to pay down....as well as figuring out what to do with a towed/impounded car bill of $700 paid. I'm still working out that last one -- to try to find the guy and ask for money. Any which way, I'm going to pay that on Monday. AUGH! From this point forward, I do declare, upon selling a car, that I will march whoever it is into the required office to register the car in their name. Due to my laziness, this is the second time this has happened to me! I have lived and learned!

That's about it for me now. Come September 1st, I should be far less debt-ridden and be able to go out and have more fun. I'm hoping to go that weekend to hike Mt. Rainier or camp, or some such Pacific Northwest fun. We will go out to sea again the following week, so as much fun as I can happen is indeed required.

2005-07-29T15:42:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

The Last Season
By Phil Jackson

I'm currently in Michigan, visiting my older sister and husband. I'll be here through Sunday, and go home Sunday afternoon.

My trip home was unique and different last weekend. I flew to Denver, caught a ride to Nathrop, CO (where my younger sister is working at a ranch). I didn't have a lot of time to spend with my sister, but it was still worth the stopover there. We did a little hiking/getting lost in mountains (driving on the way out of that area), shopping, and more. It was great, and if I hadn't done it, I wouldn't have seen her until Christmastime.

One more week at home, and then it's back to Navy-world. Stay tuned to this later...I may try to elaborate on things.

Whooo....so much going on!

2005-07-20T20:29:00.000-07:00

Currently Watching:

A Very Long Engagement
Starring Audrey Tautou

Life has been so busy this last week. I got into a fight on Friday with my roommate of three weeks. The issue that caused us to fight brought to light all the things I really don't like about him and can't stand. So, in the end, I ended up moving out at the first opportunity (Sunday). I was disappointed that it didn't work out, but it is DEFINITELY for the best, so I can champion the move. I am currently semi-homeless in Washington state this week, though. As I was moving on Sunday, I rented storage space, and moved about 1/2 to 3/4 of my belongings there. Other than that, I moved them upstairs in the apartment building...to where another co-worker lives. I'm currently staying there this week too, sleeping in the living room on my mattress and box spring, until I go on leave. After that, when I return the second week of August, I'll find a new living situation.

To review, I couldn't go to Snoqualmie Falls on Saturday to due some inconsiderate and selfish behavior on the part of my roommate. AUGH!

Two days till I go on leave, and spend time with (in this order): my little sister in Colorado, my older sister and hubby in Michigan, and my parents/friends in Illinois. I'm so excited (I just can't hide it)!

C'est la vie!

Woe, I'm a Travelin' Man

2005-07-15T11:31:00.000-07:00

Today is Friday....which I'm very excited about! I'm excited for the weekend -- both to go out and about, and to stay home and watch movies. This weekend, I'm going to head out a little ways and take a short hike here:

Snoqualmie Falls

It seems quite cool, don't ya think? I've had it on my list of spots to see since I saw info/pictures of it online a couple months ago.

The remaining majority of my time this weekend will be spent watching new movies from Netflix, movies I have out from the library (which are all due tomorrow!), and the fine movies that cable offers me.

Life is ________!!

2005-07-12T17:52:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Mudhouse Sabbath
By Lauren F. Winner

To prepare for this current write-up, I browsed on-line for life is _______ quotes. Among some good ones I found, are these:

"Life is chunky"
"Life is a soft adventure"
"Life is hard"
Life is confusing for two-headed snakes"

All I really seek to say is that my life is good in large degree. I am currently eating well, living comfortably, and sleeping plenty.

I have had a couple instances of having folks over to the new place this last week to eat. We had a barbecue over the weekend, and had co-workers/friends, and their wives over. This last week, one co-worker/friend stayed at the apartment with his wife and child (baby 11 months old!!) who were out here visiting for a couple weeks. Then during the barbecue, we had them around, and one more little family added to the mix who had two kids of their own....one a baby and one a couple years older.

I'm gearing up for more travel as I write. In approximately 10 days, I'll be hitting up Denver, CO for the weekend, and out southwest of there, where my little sister is slaving away this summer. The logistical details still have to be worked out, but I think I've come up with something that works. Due to the high population of bed and breakfasts as the only method of lodging in the area, I didn't know what I was going to do at first. Now, I believe I've found a campground close by....but I still have to see how close it is. I'll be down around there for two days, and then be hopping on Greyhound for a 20 hour ride home.

2005-07-05T12:09:00.000-07:00

I added on picture captions, and more below. Check it out!

Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind.

2005-07-04T23:49:00.000-07:00

I began my departure from New Mexico this morning at 9...with leaving Gallup. My flight out was from Albuquerque again, at 12:10 pm. I went through the same steps getting home as I took going out there. I rushed it back to Everett, and got here to watch the fireworks from the flight deck onboard the ship.

That's all I'll report now, since I don't have the time or energy to get into depth. Tomorrow, I'll be working, so I shall take some time to describe the second half of the trip (Sunday and Monday), and describe these pictures below. Hope everyone had a great Fourth of July!

This is the typical landscape around Gallup, NM

This is that as well, close-up

Topographical map of Gallup

Regular/political map of Gallup

Hotel where wedding reception was held, and where one cousin and family stayed

And also....take a look at the Earthship, owned by Noah's dad!

It grows as it goes

2005-07-02T21:52:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Friday Night Lights: A Town, A Team, and a Dream
By H.G. Bissinger

I am currently in Gallup, New Mexico. In the last twenty-four hours I have made a big hop, a big skip, and big jump to get here. I drove down to Vancouver, WA/Portland, OR last night to visit with an old teacher of mine and her family. This ended up not to be (at least for that day), due to holiday weekend traffic and losing the directions and more. After that not working out, I went to the airport, parked, and camped out in a lounge I found there. I was surprised to find no USO in the Portland Airport. I stayed up till the wee hours reading the newspaper and my book. Then, I fell into sleep for just a couple hours and woke up at about 6 to catch my flight.

My cousin André and family picked me up from the airport today, after my parents missed their flight on account of a missing wallet. They got a later flight tonight, and are due to arrive here at the house at 12:30 in the morning. After arriving with André and company, we went out to eat with the grandparents.

That's it for now. I'm happy to be traveling, despite the headaches. I'll post on the events of the reception et al tomorrow.

Fun quiz for the day

2005-06-26T14:46:00.000-07:00

Which American Cities Best Fit You?

American Cities That Best Fit You:

75% Chicago

60% New York City

60% Philadelphia

55% Atlanta

50% Washington, DC

Yea...I love Chicago! I can't wait to live there in some frame of time! I'll be living there before I live back in Wheaton, again.

Moving Forward, Moving On

2005-06-26T11:46:00.001-07:00

Currently Watching:

In America DVD

Ah...the life! I have made 90% concrete plans to move out of my current living situation and into a new one on Thursday night. July 1st is the effective date, however I'll be taking off then for the whole weekend...so I want it set-up before I'm gone. I'll be moving into a 2 bedroom apartment which is currently occupied by two friends off the ship. One is moving out, and so I'm moving in, along with another guy. So, it's going to be three people in a 2 bedroom apartment. I'm going to alternate months of having the bedroom and having the couch, if the guy I'm moving into the place with is as set on the living situation as I am. Anyways, check out the place I'm moving into --> here.

I'm really looking forward to the travel plans this coming weekend. I'm meeting up with a friend or two Friday night, whom I haven't seen for a couple years, and then meeting up with the family. They are going to bring books I want from home, my suits, and THEMSELVES! Yea!

I'm going to finish watching In America today. I watched 3/4 of it last night, and it is great! I highly recommend it to anyone!!

Thank you, Al Gore!!!

2005-06-22T11:55:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Surfing the Himalayas: A Spiritual Adventure
By Frederick Lenz

I really love the internet. I could seriously not get tired of seeking out random or interesting information, or looking through and finding people that I know. Today, through random blog meandering, I found a couple blogs of someone I know from high school. This girl has gotten married in the last year, worked a couple different jobs all at the same time, and is currently recording an album (she's a Christian singer/songwriter). Her album is going to be released some point this year, and I will look forward to it.

We've been extended about a day or so on our underway here, yet will still get back this week before the weekend starts. I'm looking ahead at spending about a week evaluating new apartments/places to live in Everett...so I can move out of my current place on or before July 1st. However, I also now have another option if I don't find anything that works. Two other folks I work with are sharing an apartment, and one of the two wants to move out July 1st. If I don't find a place, I'll jump into that one. It's a few bucks more for rent et al, but it's the same proximity to work...which is exactly what I need--a 5 minute drive to work.

That's about it for now. To give a heads-up on my travel plans, they are as follows: Drive to Portland on July 1st, fly out on the 2nd to New Mexico to hang out with family and attend Megan's wedding celebration there on the 3rd, and then back to Portland/Seattle early-evening on the 4th and attempt to catch the fireworks in Seattle.

Later, folks!

Lollygagging

2005-06-18T18:15:00.000-07:00

The ship is in-port San Diego now. We'll be heading home next week. While here, it's been nice to relax and recuperate. I've been sick the last several days with cough/cold ailments and am about over it now. I am on duty today, which has offered me a lot of time to web-browse and do nothing else.

Things I've learned today...

-Gas prices have dropped in the last several weeks (down about twenty cents) since we left on our underway period. Research courtesy of Gasbuddy.com.

-Craigslist has some weird ass people that put stuff on there. On New York's Craigslist, there was a guy that admitted he wore diapers and was in search of a woman that was okay with that, and would change him. In trying to put the link in here for that, I find that the post was now removed. Research there courtesy of Cupcake

-The distance around the globe from Chicago to Jakarta, Indonesia is 9807 miles. Research there courtesy of one USDA page (odd source, eh?). The site is really cool, though, and easy to use. In addition to the distances (in three formats), you can find out the latitude and longitude of any listed city.

-My older sister, Megan, has a blog. Check out the Meg_O_Tron! It was surprising to find that today, and interesting to read the little nuggets of what's happening in her life.

Stay tuned this next week for news. I may be moving, I may not have a home anymore, and I definitely will be traveling. I hope everyone is having fun in the sun!

Woes of Shipboard Life

2005-06-10T16:44:00.000-07:00

Apple's America: The Discriminating Traveler's Guide to 40 Great Cities in the United States and Canada
By R.W. Apple Jr.

I finished reading my Living Abroad in Costa Rica book last night, and decided to change subjects. All the books I selected to bring with me on this underway, are on travel in some form. Looking over the various books today, I chose a different subject than Costa Rica (because I have several on the country). So, for the next few days I will immerse myself in the U.S. and Canada to read critically on cities far and wide -- both those I've been to and those I haven't yet visited.
The biggest pain/annoyance of shipboard life is sporadic internet availability (as I have so imparted before). The internet has been a greater constant today, and I'm enjoying it. In the morning today, I paid bills and looked at the status of my investments. This afternoon, I have read up on the news, caught up on other blogs, and caught up on my own.

Due to the internet issue, I'm going to put out the list of top things I like of being out underway, and that which I don't.

WHY JOSEPH LIKES GOING UNDERWAY:

1. Group camaraderie among those I live and work with 24 hours a day

2. Saving money due to far less daily expenditures

3. Visiting interesting places (though on these short underway periods...it's just San Diego, San Diego, San Diego--yet San Diego is a nice place)

4. Time after work solely to reading and/or watching movies.

5. Karaoke on the mess decks twice a week (I watch, but don't sing)

6. Getting hook-ups from time to time from the cooks/supply folks, giving me or those in my department cookies and other good foods.

7. Getting hook-ups from the Public Affairs folk that air the movies on the ship channels.

THINGS I DON'T LIKE ABOUT GOING UNDERWAY:

1. The food! It's often not anything I want to eat

2. Working 13.5 hours a day, 6 days a week...plus a little bit on Sunday.

3. Confrontations that occur with being around the same people 24/7. It is most often cordial relations, but sometimes flare-ups occur.

4. Still working, when there's not a lot to do.

5. No days completely off until we pull into port.

My Shampoo is Hazardous to My Health

2005-06-07T21:22:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Living Abroad In Costa Rica
By Erin Van Rheenen

I was in the shower the other day, and took a good look at my shampoo bottle. My shampoo is a Target generic product made to be similar to Head and Shoulders. I was carefully reading everything on the label as I was in the shower, out of some odd curiousity to do so. I noticed that this shampoo included zinc. I thought, "Hmm...that's interesting. I wonder if that is good for me to have in my shampoo." Then, the next thing I read made me believe that it may undoubtedly not be good for me. The next thing I read on the label was in fact, don't let shampoo get in contact with eyes (or the like of that).
"If shampoo gets in contact with eyes, rinse immediately". I really have to hand it to these Target folks...they know how to screw up shampoo. Do normal people not let shampoo get in their eyes? My shampoo runs down my face every time I rinse it off. Ugh! What is the deal?

Do other people wash their hair different than me? Are there some people in this world that could use this very shampoo, and keep it completely out of their eyes? Please let me know who are, and how you do it!!

Aside from that, does any one know if Head 'n' Shoulders has zinc in it?

Dream A Little Dream With Me...Vol 1

2005-06-02T17:55:00.000-07:00

Currently reading:

Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel
By Rolf Potts

Dream a little dream with me....Volume 1
This is the first of a ??-part series detailing my dream jobs.

TAXI DRIVER

Generalities--Provides car transport services to clients in/to varying destinations. Must be licensed to drive a taxi and have a "satisfactory" driving record. Relies on instructions and pre-established guidelines to perform the functions of the job.

Salary range (Chicago, IL)--$25,248-37,098

Why I want to be a taxi driver:
I want to be a taxi driver for many reasons. The first is that I can think of nothing else I would rather be doing than driving. I love to drive....and this would be a job where I'd spend the whole workday/week driving! Second of all, I like to meet people, and this would be a varied clientele day in and day out. Third, I could do this and constantly be in and around the city that I love. I would see areas I haven't seen before and learn more of the ins and outs of the city.
Overall, the occupational outlook for taxi drivers is good. They are always needed, and provide a necessary service for the travel and tourism industry.

I just need to work on my driving record :) So, this one may have to wait several years.

Update from the road

2005-05-28T16:10:00.000-07:00

Currently Reading:

Nothing Is Impossible
By Christopher Reeve

I successfully arrived in Pleasanton, CA at 2 am this morning, after driving all day yesterday. I drove down with a couple guys from Seattle, who I dropped off in Eureka. Due to that fact, more than 1/2 the drive was taken on US 101. That route took a while longer than going straight down I-5, but it was very picturesque and beautiful at various spots along the way. There are many ocean views along the highway, with some small, medium, and large rock islands to see, which are very cool.

My friend Zach did have to work today, so I'm hanging out at his place until he's off (another hour and a half now). The plan for the night is to go through Berkley for some errands, and and an ESL lesson he's teaching. Then, it's onward to a hookah bar for some fun, then there or somewhere else, Zach and I are going to discuss life and our current pursuit of it.

Stay tuned for another update in the next few days. There is little agenda but hiking tomorrow morning. Then my drive back up north will be on Monday. I'll fill you in on whatever else comes about.

It's Victoria Day today in Canada!

2005-05-23T12:54:00.000-07:00

I successfully sold my old car to someone last Wednesday night. I had two people call on it between Tuesday and Wednesday night. The first guy that came out and saw it in person was the one that bought it.

Starting today (later this afternoon) and (hopefully) continuing every day this week, I will be writing up a series of "My Dream Jobs, and why." Although, It may be a little differently titled. I'm going to do a little web-browsing, and use something like dreamweaver...or some other catchy dream phrase I maybe able to find.

Four days until my thousand mile road trip to Oakland, CA! I'm excited...as it will be a little last minute fun before going underway for a few weeks.

In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning

2005-05-18T04:07:00.000-07:00

I just got off a wee small hours of the morning watch (11:30 to 3:30), due to having duty again last night. I tried to nap before my watch but it didn't happen...so now I'm about to go off and get oh...2.5 hours of sleep :(

I posted my old broken car on Craigslist last night, and got several responses. I realized about 5 hours later, I hadn't said what body style it was, however. This could possibly narrow down the number of potential buyers, since the Dodge Dart Custom (sedan) is not as highly sought after as is a Dodge Dart Swinger or the like.

That is all for now. MUST SLEEP NOW!

Looking Back

2005-05-14T19:23:00.000-07:00

I neglected to take the time to do the write-up on my Oregon weekend. It was indeed fun to go down there, but turned out to be less than I hoped. This wasn't however, due to the spot, as much as other factors. I was going to go down with a couple people, and they ended up concerned with other things. Then, when I got down there, the hostel I wanted to stay at didn't work out. In the end, I just ended up staying down there for Friday night (staying at a motel for $40/night), and driving back Saturday night.

While I was there, I did enjoy a couple activities. I spent the morning walking around town and walking down by the beach. In the afternoon, I rented a kayak for an hour and paddled up and down a river. In the linked picture there, you'll see the river, and the spot I rented the kayak from. After this, I spent the afternoon at the library reading. Then, about 5 pm, I took off back for Washington. During my walking, I noticed a spot that had bingo Saturday night, and that almost persuaded me to stay, since I think it'd be fun to play bingo somewhere again. However, in the end, it didn't persuade me.

Looking forward, two weeks from today, I'll be in the midst of a grand road trip down to Oakland, CA. For this, I'm quite excited!

Here below you'll find the lyrics to Don't Ask Me How I Know, from Bobby Pinson. This is a country song, which I heard for the first time last week. I wanted to remember the name of the song, to pull the lyrics up later, but it didn't happen. I heard it again today, though, and was able to follow-through.

Don’t ride your bike off a ramp that’s more than three bricks high
Don’t take that candy from the store if you ain’t got the dime
Don’t pick a fight with a little guy that doesn’t talk that much
Don’t pick up a cherrybomb thinkin’ it’s a dud
And don’t sneak out of a 2 story house usin’ bed sheets as a rope
Don’t ask me how I know

Sell your truck while it’s still runnin’, save the Jesus off the dash
Say a prayer when you feel like cussin’,
save your money pay with cash
Forget your pride, buy the roses, if you’re sorry tell her so
Don’t drink the water in Mexico
Don’t ask me how I know

Don’t quit your high school football team halfway through the season
Don’t bust your buddy in the nose when you know he didn’t mean it
Don’t lose a girl you love at home for a night in Panama City
Don’t rush off the phone when your Mama calls you ain’t that busy
Ya oughta make that drive to say goodbye to your grampa ‘fore he goes
Don’t ask me how I know

Forget your pride buy the roses, if you love her tell her so,
Don’t go to Vegas with your heart broke,
Don’t bum your cousin for that first smoke
I'm tellin' ya, don't drink the water in Mexico
Don't ask me how I know
Don't ask me how I know I just know
sell your truck while it's still runnin',
say a prayer when you feel like cussin'
I know,

La Musica!!

2005-05-13T12:00:00.000-07:00

Both yesterday and today, I have decided to fulfill the desires of my musical psyche.
I started yesterday, by buying the albums of the three artists/bands I mentioned last week. Then today, I bought the following:

Cold Play - A Rush Of Blood to the Head
Tom Cochrane -- Mad Mad World
Phantom Planet -- The Guest
Clearlake - Cedars

I bought these four CDs for about $28, price + shipping. I love it. You see, when I buy CDs on Amazon, I go for the used & new from ____ . If you pull up the music you want, you'll see that under the Amazon new price. Sellers put their items up as well, and you can buy like new CDs for less!

That's all for now. I'll update again this afternoon.

Life Is A Highway

2005-05-06T12:10:00.000-07:00

Sunset in Everett, WA

I don't have too much of interest that's happened to me recently. However, I will now reflect on this past weekend's highlights and lowlights. As well, I will share my road plans for this month. I am done with weekend duty for a while, and I'm so excited to be taking off a couple times.

LAST WEEKEND
Highlights:

-Talking to Highwaygirl on the phone Friday afternoon

-Seeing The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy with a friend on Friday night.

-Helping someone in Seattle move from downtown to the U-District on Saturday

Lowlights:

- Having duty on Sunday

This weekend I will be visiting Seaside, Oregon. I'm going on a road trip! I'll probably be going with 1 or 2 friends, and then I'm picking a couple people up in Portland as well. I found them online through Craigslist

Click on the link to check out what's cool in Seaside!

I still haven't loaded up the pictures of my car to post. However, I have one to show that's just like it. I found this for Ben's blog yesterday, and now I wanted to put it up for mine.

In other news:

In the last week I have started to dig a few bands/individual artists.

These include:
-Bowling For Soup
- The Killers
-Anna Nalick

Stay tuned Monday or Tuesday for account of the trip! Have a great weekend!

It was a beautiful day!

2005-04-26T14:51:00.000-07:00

Last night was my long awaited U2 concert experience. I went to the second of two Seattle shows, at the Key Arena. I got down to Seattle on the bus, early -- more than an hour before the concert began. I walked over to the Key Arena from where I had gotten off (probably about a mile or more), and hung out on a concrete sitting area overlooking a large grassy area, and the entrance to the arena.
The opening band was a Southern rock group called the Kings of Leon. I liked them well enough and listened to a few songs. On one of theirs, they called out a special surprise guest who was a friend of theirs. It turned out to be Eddie Vedder, and he sang one song with them.
I did listen to a few of their songs, as I said. However, during their set, I spent a lot of time (30 minutes?) in line to buy a concert t-shirt . It's a gray color with a cool print of the foursome on the front, and the tour dates on the back. I liked it better than the uber-official Vertigo one with a big red V on it.
The concert itself was superb. It was everything I was expecting and more. They had the regular stage, and then a circular portion that went around the closest people, and came out around to near where I was (the rest of the floor area). They had 4 video monitors showing close-ups of the stage, and big sections of lights that went around the back of the stage. They went from the stage to the ceiling and were really cool. Throughout the concert, they were every color imaginable. As well, the showed formed the guys in light, scrolled flags, some other dude walking (during Sometimes You Can't Make it on Your Own), and more. They played every song that I wanted to hear except Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of and I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For.
Overall, I had a great night, and it lived up to my hype of being the best concert I've ever gone to.

DUTES....(I have duty today)

2005-04-23T19:33:00.000-07:00

I have duty today, and it has been quite a busy day. I started off my day getting up in the nick of time (6:45), to be on base at 7, and on the ship at 7:15. You see I went out last night, and was out till about midnight. I got to the ship and started off the day doing a little painting of "lagging" (a fiberous material covering pipes) around the office. I continued on in the morning with doing the muster report. That was quite frustrating, because 4 department duty folks needed me to e-mail them THEIR department's muster report, in order for them to do it today. I was so frustrated, pissed off, and more. I am going to put out a serious e-mail or contact with the regular departmental muster report folk on Monday to remedy this frustrating situation. AUGH! After the muster report was done, I had to quickly and vigorously clean paint off my hands, iron my dress uniform, and change for watch. My watch was largely unexciting, though one of the other personnelman that I was on duty with had a situation. Every so often, the Security division runs drills switching people's ID cards to see if the watchstander catches it. My fellow personnelman was the victim of one of these, and failed today. It was an unfortunate situation...but she caught what was going on before the second person went through. So, her punishment wasn't so harsh as it could have been.
As for now, I am not doing anything but surfing online and writing. I read a little bit this afternoon, and will soon go back to that. I may come back to the office later this evening and work a bit, though I don't know yet. I definitely should work some on my duty days, but I have had a really busy day, and no one really notices if the work sitting around here gets done or not (there's always work around, so no one is really the wiser).

Hope everyone has a great weekend. Tomorrow afternoon I will be rather free...so if anyone wants to call please do so! Wink, wink...you know who you are!

The longest day of my week

2005-04-15T13:45:00.000-07:00

Currently playing:

The Wonder Years soundtrack

I am on duty today, and soon have a four hour watch. I haven't done a lot of work today. So, this means that after I get off watch, I have to at least make a concerted effort to get a few things done. That's alright if I work for awhile tonight, though. I have virtually nothing planned for all daylong tomorrow. I plan to lay around as much as necessary.
I am quite happy to report that I am probably buying a "new" car this next week. My 1974 Dodge Dart is now in the shop, and may cost a small fortune to fix its problems. So, I decided I would buy me a new car that costs more than $1000. I applied for and was approved for a $4000 loan. Upon hearing that, I went to check out a 1996 Ford Crown Victoria w/the police interceptor package. For those that don't know, that means the car has added power, reliability and more, and was an ex-cop car!! The car has low miles, light blue color, back doors that don't open from the inside, two spotlights, and a BULLET HOLE! That's all I'll say on it for now. I'll talk more about it after I pick-up the car this next week.
Besides the car deal, everything else is going along swimmingly. I'm ready to kick back and relax this weekend!

2005-04-12T12:00:00.000-07:00

Currently reading:

Chronicles, Vol. 1
By Bob Dylan

I have been, uncharacteristically, sleeping a lot the last 4-5 days. It's annoying to me, also, because I have been trying to watch a movie or read a book and have fell asleep at various times. I have one movie, where it happened twice. However, the movie isn't that good anyway, so I don't mind too much that I haven't watched the whole thing.

Over the weekend, I went to Seattle both Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday, I went down to Pike Place Market with a group of friends. One guy who's been onboard the ship about 6 months had not been there before, as well as a girl that is just about to get out of the Navy. So, we went down and met up with Ben. It was fun and we did that most of the morning and into early afternoon.

Later on in the afternoon, I went back to my house with my friend Jeremie. Upon arrival there, I received my new toy, a Dell Axim pocket PC, in the mail. I bought it on Ebay for a good price, and it's a great toy. It gives me wi-fi internet access in any free hotspots. Since I got it, I've made a couple walks over to the public library's cafe, and I used it on base today.

My other trip to Seattle, was a quick there-and-back to go to church down there. I got there early and walked around trying to pick up wi-fi-ness...but my battery was low, so it wouldn't cooperate.

This weekend, I did plenty of house work. On Sunday, I did dishes, vacuumed, and cleaned up my room. Upon going through the junk I had piled up, I found Chronicles underneath the pile of papers, where it had sat hidden away for a week.

That's all to report for now.

Experimentation

2005-04-07T17:00:00.000-07:00

Currently reading:

At Home In Mitford

By Jan Karon

In mid-March, as my leave time at home wound to an end, I pulled up Craigslist to find some apartments to check out upon returning to Washington. I found a few promising ones, and sent out some e-mails. As soon as I returned to Washington, as I was riding the bus back from the airport, I got a phone call reply. It was a duplex apartment I had found that was close to the base, was in my price range, and seemed real suiting. I went that night to check it out, and I liked it and liked the guy alright from the beginning. I told him the next day that I would take it, and arranged to move in the day after that (Thursday).

As I write this now, I have been in the place for exactly three weeks. It has been everything I wanted and more. My roommate's name is Jim, and I'll tell you (and expound) on him and his activities.

He is/has:

-42 years old

-Retired Navy (now works on base doing the same job, but now as a civilian)

-A cat named Cocoa

-A smoker...but not in the house

-A girlfriend in Portland who he visits almost every weekend

-BAAADDD at doing dishes

-A dealer of used furniture

He is 42 years old, divorced, and has a kid and ex-wife on the east coast. He drives a newer Ford Ranger, and has driven me to work several times (both when I didn't need it, as a carpool...and when I did as my car has been broken down).

His cat really doesn't like me, and runs every time it sees me. Now, I have tried to be nice and gain some bond with it, but to no avail. When he is gone for the night or the weekend, I leave food out, and Cocoa eats it after I'm gone. The one worst experience I had with the cat was when I let her out, and she wouldn't come in for 3 hours (till 12:30 at night).

Jim has no skill at doing dishes. Most of what he has washed I find bits of whatever left on. If I take a dish out and blatantly see that he was the one that washed it, I have to rinse it off to use it. For that reason alone, I try to do the dishes left in the sink as soon as I possible can. I should talk to him about it, but I haven't yet. My other option...which is also a good one, is just to wash the dishes that I use!

When Jim goes to Portland for the weekend to see his girlfriend and stay at his house (he owns a house down there), it's really the nicest thing about the living arrangement. I get the whole house to myself for the weekend, and can be as carefree as I want until Sunday night. At that point, I wash all the dishes from the weekend, and pick up after myself. It's just nice to leave all that, and not worry about it for two straight days.

As for how Jim is a dealer of used furniture -- he collects and buys what he can cheaply from Everett, Seattle, and other places around the area to keep and sell later. Every so often, he'll have a yard sale or sell/rent the stuff to friends.

That is the large bit of Jim. Now, onto my living quarters.

Both bedrooms in the duplex are upstairs, with the kitchen, bathroom, and living room downstairs. I have the bigger bedroom, and have it well equipped. Within two days of moving in, I had it fully furnished. The night I moved in, I bought a twin bed, box spring, and bed frame from a used mattress outlet. Then, I went out that Saturday to shop garage sales and thrift stores. I found a bookshelf and tv/vcr combo at the first and only garage sale I went to. Then, I went shopping at two different thrift stores, and picked up a small table, small four drawer dresser/chest, and stereo, for a small chunk of change. I also went out to Target to buy new linens, towels, washcloths, and the like. That was a considerably larger chunk of change, but necessary. As well, as the purchased items, I had my portable DVD player as well. That is able to hook up to the tv as well, and thus providing several entertainment choices mere feet from my bed.

I am happy, comfortable, and take pride in the fact that I have a physical home in Washington now!

Envisioning Change

2005-04-07T13:00:00.000-07:00

I am currently thinking, evaluating, and messing around to change my blog up a little. I want to clearly display what I'm reading, listening to, etc., as countless other people do online. I hope to have that up and running this afternoon, as well as putting out a new, long entry. I know I'll be bored and not have much interesting work to do this afternoon....so I'm hoping this will entertain me.

April Showers

2005-04-03T14:41:00.000-07:00

I have had a lot of great things happen to me in March, upon our return to Washington, and some not so good.
I started out the day we pulled back in, by going and retrieving my car back from where I had it in storage. After filling the tires a little, washing her, and topping the fluids....I was on my way. I then proceeded to go pick up a friend from the base, and take him around on his errands. I drove all around three different towns, for the afternoon, and then ran out of gas. You see, the car was low on gas when I picked it up, and I neglected to get gas before it was all gone. :( So, a cop came along and pushed my car into the nearby parking lot, and I went to a nearby gas station. They let me borrow a gas can, and then I filled it and went back to my car. The whole ordeal taught me a few important things. (1) I (and anyone else) should not be neglectful enough to run out of gas -- it's just really ridiculous. (2) You should know some gas station attendants are bad people, and won't let you borrow a gas can. Some sad people make you buy the gas can. (3) I think there was something else I was thinking of, but it slipped my mind.
After the homecoming day, I made my way HOME HOME. I went to the airport that night, and stayed at the USO there. Then, I flew out at 7 am the next morning. I was going home to be home again, as well as to be there for my sister's wedding. The wedding business was in full-swing when I got home. Since the boys of the family were invited to the end of my sister's wedding shower that day, we went there straight from the airport. That was fun to immediately get home and run into all these people -- my grandparents, other relatives, and family friends from church.
The rest of that weekend, my sister, now husband, and his sister stayed at the house. We went shopping for wedding items both Saturday and Sunday. We got belts, ties, and socks on Saturday. Then on Sunday, we went to get my suit. I was not able to wear the suit that I bought, so I had to buy one in their chosen color scheme. The wedding suit was/is an olive green color, and I like it a lot.
Mos of the next week was pretty tame. I spent some good time with my little sister (not the one that got married), and then took a road trip mid-week. I went down to southern IL...Champaign and Carbondale to see friends that I haven't seen in a year or so. That was good fun, yet done quick. From there, I drove home Thursday morning/afternoon, stopped home for an hour, and then rushed to Michigan for the batchelor party. Over the course of the trip in IL, I ran into snow, rain, and hail. Then, as I made my way to Michigan, I ran into even more snow.
I was so excited to do/be a part of the whole wedding. It was a great and fun time. All the involved siblings on both sides of the marriage stood up in the wedding. My little sister is the same age as Noah's (the new husband) little brother, and that's the same for me and Noah's little sister. So we processed in, in those pairs, and also sat up at the table during the reception. The wedding was simple and ceremonial...nothing really noteworthy, just a nice, sweet ceremony. It was 45-50 minutes long, I think.
The reception was held at the Meijer Gardens in Grand Rapids. This was a nice place, with a nice banquet room. The room was large, and in the front center, had a moderately sized dance floor. I enjoyed dancing, even though I don't do it well, with both my sisters and my mom. In place of a cake, there were two chocolate fountains -- one milk chocolate (I believe), and one white chocolate. That was a really neat idea...you would take sticks of cookies, strawberries, and more, and let the chocolate run down over it to coat it. In the midst of the reception, guests could go walk through a butterfly garden, which was really interesting. Some pictures were also taken in there.
Over the course of that weekend, I enjoyed meeting friends of my older sister, that I hadn't met before. I talked to one about experiences in Europe. She gave me some good ideas and recommendations based on where she had been before, and what she had done.
After the wedding, I had just a couple more days at home. I flew back to Washington the Tuesday after the wedding. However, I ran into some trouble with the law before I was gone. On Sunday night, I drove out to see a friend of mine. He had just moved out to a new house out in the country while I was home. I went there and hung out with him, had a pizza, and then came back. As I was driving back however, I took the highway in the wrong direction. As I was doing so, I was also speeding (63 in a 45 mph zone), and was pulled over for such. I got a speeding ticket and proof of insurance ticket. The proof of insurance ticket was due to my dad having the wrong car's insurance card in his car. :( I would have had to go to court for all that, if I didn't do what I did. The next day, I drove back out to the country, to go to the county's courthouse. I brought the insurance card, to have that dropped, and paid off the ticket ($75). However the one problem was that the cop took my driver's license (in place of bond...for the insurance deal). So, I got everything taken care of, but had to have my license mailed to me in Washington. I was able to drive, however, if I kept the ticket with me. Then, my license arrived about a week or week and a half ago.

That's it for now folks. I will post again as soon as I possible can, about my new place!!

I am alive and well!

2005-03-28T14:12:00.000-08:00

I have tried a couple times to sit down and write-up the account of my activities for the last few weeks. However, I have now failed 2-3 times. The first time, I wrote half an entry and saved it. The second time, I didn't have time to do it. And the third time (today), I saved half an entry again, and it didn't save. Augh... Sorry to disappoint all ten (?) of you that are eagerly awaiting news of the normal life now. You shall be fulfilled in your quest for the random and interesting very soon (as in tomorrow).
To give you a preview of what's to come...here are a few things that have happened: went home on leave, saw my sister get married, ran out of gas twice, found and moved into a comfortable duplex apartment, dealt with a non-starting car, went to a punk concert with RandomBen, and more.

One more day...

2005-03-03T11:48:00.000-08:00

It has now been nearly a week now since I have had enough time or gumption to write up an account of my world. Things have been busy and swirling, as we wrap up this deployment. One more day and we’ll be through!
Yesterday, I started on a project to go through verifying one list against another for those who should get a certain pay. It was incorrectly paid out to everyone listed as assigned to us, when some people have been on the beach detachment, and shouldn’t have received it. So, I’m going through and making the necessary corrections to the list, so that another person can go through and correct the payments. It is a long process, proved by the fact that one list (the one with the smaller type) is approximately 100 pages long. As well, at the end of the day, we stripped and waxed in the office. The folks on day shift stripped the floor and put two coats of wax down. Then, when the night shift came in, they put down another coat or two. The floor looks good…just streaky in one or two spots.
During the day today we are supposed to have a Driving Safety brief from the Washington State Patrol. They come onboard at the end of any major deployment, going over how to adjust to driving again, and any driving laws that have changed in the time that we’ve been gone. Also, today, we will be moving our luggage out of the office storage room and back down to the berthing. I don’t recall if I wrote anything about the berthing storage room flooding, but it did some time back, and we had to move everything out of there. That’s it for now. If I don’t write tomorrow, I’ll be sending something out in the next week or two about my new non-deployed journal. The new journal will be posted online only, no e-mail version available. You’ll also be able to find out everything on http://thesailorslog2.blogspot.com, upon my release of the information.

Home is where one starts from

2005-02-26T22:13:00.000-08:00

It is now late evening on Saturday. I was just sitting in the berthing watching a movie, and the (oh-so-happy) thought came to me that exactly one week from today, I will be doing the same thing at home! :)
I was walking around the ship today, and had the great yearning to be in wide, open, natural space and stretch. I want to move, and be off the ship. It caused me to make a mental note/commitment to spend a lot of time outside after we get back. Whether it will be walking often, going to parks frequently, or camping a few times…it doesn’t matter. I want to do all those things.
This last week I have sent a couple boxes of my stuff home in the mail. I wanted to do this in order to clear out some of my belongings (an ever present need), and ensure that some of the things I want at home with me can be there before I am. I sent enough clothes that I will just have to carry a bare amount with me, and have more room for bigger physical objects. I have acquired a few toys while I’ve been deployed (I have become an even bigger fan of Internet shopping, as a side note), as well as new books and movies, and will be bringing them home to show off and share.
I am headed off to bed now, soon to awaken to the last Sunday of this deployment!

Crazy, Busy Days

2005-02-25T12:59:00.000-08:00

Today we pulled out of Hawaii, after one day and one night in port. However, I did not get off the ship at all, except to take out trash. I took someone else’s duty, as I described a few days ago. It was BUSY day. I went from muster report to working party to watch, to sleep. Then, this morning started off really busy to. It took me 4+ hours to do the muster report this morning, while getting muster reports with a lot of changes, initial copies, then corrected copies. Ugh! While we were in port, we took Tigers onboard for a Tiger Cruise to San Diego. I have also described this before, I believe. There are around 280 Tigers onboard, and they must all be mustered.
Every day is one big step closer to getting home…we are closer than yesterday, with a small number of days left. I am trying not to write about this subject, every time I write, but that’s hard to do!
Not too much to report on the literary front. I finished The Kite Runner the other day, and started a new book. The new book I’m reading is the story of investment guru, Jim Rogers, in his travels on a motorcycle across several continents, over a few years. It is very interesting and informational to read about the social, political, and economic situation in various countries. That is all in spite of the book being over 10 years old. If the situation has changed dramatically in these countries, and I looked into all this more, I will know how a certain country became the way it is.
This entry has been posted/published/sent on the 25th, because the ship’s servers (e-mail off-ship/internet) were down at the end of the night on the 24th.

2005-02-20T10:21:00.000-08:00

Written the first Sunday of the two, posted the next morning (second Sunday)

Today is our first Sunday out of the two. At midnight, we will begin the 20th all over again. Now, I must tell you, contrary to what I wrote the other day, the powers that be decided we would not have two relaxed days. So, we had to work throughout the day today, and will have a relaxing day tomorrow. This is the Navy way -- we can’t have too much fun or be too relaxed, now!
I started reading The Kite Runner, and I’m enjoying it. The chapters are short, so I’ve found if I’ve got approximately ten minutes during a chow break during the day, I have enough time to read a chapter. That’s a nice change from My Life, where they chapters are something like 20+ pages.
The events celebrating the 60th anniversary of WW II, which I mentioned a few days ago have now begun. Without even thinking about it, as I was looking through the news, I found an article with stories and memories of Iwo Jima. I have it pasted in below if you’d like to read through it.
It’s hard to accurately say that I have less two weeks until I get to my house, because of the date line crossing. However, that is basically true…because I’ll be home 2 weeks from yesterday. But counting calendar days, it’s still 14 days from now. However, tomorrow will be 13 days. I wish I could stop counting for at least a few days, but there’s always some point/event during the day when I think about it!

Stories of and memories of Iwo Jima:
http://www.jsonline.com/news/metro/feb05/303276.asp

2005-02-18T20:18:00.000-08:00

I have about 50 pages left to read in My Life. I have really enjoyed reading this book, even though it’s taken me a month plus to finish it. I decided to go ahead and read The Kite Runner next. It looks like a really interesting book, and the other book that was in the running is quite short. So, I’ll save that for reading during my time at home.
Here below is an editorial summary of The Kite Runner (compliments of Amazon.com):

The Kite Runner follows the story of Amir, the privileged son of a wealthy businessman in Kabul, and Hassan, the son of Amir's father's servant. As children in the relatively stable Afghanistan of the early 1970s, the boys are inseparable. They spend pleasant days running kites and telling stories of mystical places and powerful warriors until an unspeakable event changes the nature of their relationship forever, and eventually cements their bond in ways neither boy could have ever predicted. Even after Amir and his father flee to America, Amir remains haunted by his cowardly actions and disloyalty.

Other than the reading, I don’t have too much else to detail. We will soon be in-port Hawaii for one day. I will be taking someone’s duty day, and staying on the ship. That’s a good thing, and pretty much what I wanted to do, anyway. I need to go through and effectively pack my stuff together how I want it. As far as I know, I have a lot I want to take home with me for different things that’ll happen at home. I have wedding gifts, my suit, and other things that I bought in Hong Kong, that I want/need at home with me. As well, I will go through my books/movies, and decide the best ones I have yet to peruse, and the ones I want to bring home to share with others. In other news, we will soon be close to the regular U.S. clock, as we cross the date line this weekend. We will have Sunday twice this weekend. Since it is our most relaxed day on the ship, it should be a really great weekend! That is all for now.

2005-02-16T22:06:00.000-08:00

I watched Good Morning Vietnam last night in my rack, courtesy of a couple different friends loaning both the movie and a portable DVD player for my use. I then read for a little closer to the end in My Life, and tried to fall asleep. I couldn’t sleep however, due to thoughts running through my head. It was one of those nights, in which I had thoughts of anything and everything with no feasible way of stopping them or drifting to sleep for a long while. I managed a few hours of sleep, and took a nap during lunch.
I just took a sample of the news that’s posted on the ship’s network, due to the Internet not being up at the moment. I found a really good article from the Washington Times I wanted to share some thoughts from. Through the article, I was reminded that this year is the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II. The Department of Defense is planning half a dozen events across the country in the next six months, beginning this week, to commemorate the people involved as well as the ideals of the war. It seems especially moving to me, because these veterans won’t be around much longer.
I should finish reading My Life in the next day or so, as I have approximately hundred pages left in it. I will have to take a day or two afterwards, to pick out my next read. In the couple months, I have received some great, interesting sounding books, which may make it difficult to pick out the next one. One of those in consideration is The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini. I did want to tell you about it today, but I’ll write the summary/plot of that out tomorrow.

COMPLETE SINGAPORE WRAP-UP

2005-02-13T20:55:00.000-08:00

FEBRUARY 5, 2005

Today was the first day in Singapore. We pulled in around 11:30 in the morning, and I was on the flight deck "manning the rails". I got dressed in my summer white uniform, mustered at 9:30, and we were in our place around the edge of the flight deck at 9:45. We were there until we were moored, which at 11:30. It was hot out, yet still a nice day.
It took a couple hours for liberty called, and for the folks that I was with to be set to go. I went out with three buddies of mine that work in other departments on the ship. We started on our way, before we knew really what we wanted to do. The general consensus was to go out for dinner and then some beers, with no specific place in mind. We headed out on the bus that took us to the MRT station. Due to the number of people from the Navy following the same route, there were lines out the door for the closest ATM. I started to wait, but we decided to skip that, and skip the MRT due to it. We took a cab, which would take US dollar, and headed to Hooters. I ate a great ham ‘n’ cheese sandwich w/bacon, alongside grabbing some wings of the plates of the others. We had the local specialty, Tiger Beer, along with our meal. As soon as we sat down, I got up and headed outside to try to find an ATM and get Singapore money, even though they would also take US dollar at Hooters. It proved to be fruitless, with people I asked sending me on a half a goose chase. I asked a couple guys working in the area, and they sent me to a nearby hotel. Upon asking people inside the hotel, I was sent from one side to the other, with no ATM present. Then, they told me somewhere close to the other side of the river, that I had come from. So, I gave up and decided I would get Singapore money later on in the night. After that, we just walked around Clark Quay (the area we were in). There was a bungee activity that the other guys went for. I however chose not to, and was the designated photographer for said activity. The bungee cords were attached to a 3-person capsule, which upon release sent the folks up 60 meters in less than 2 seconds, held them there, then went up and down a couple times.

FEBRUARY 6, 2005

I write today from Singapore, where the sun is warm, the breeze is cool, and the water is gorgeous.
Today is my duty day, and I had watch this morning from 7:30-11:30. I was posted at the main gate of the Singapore naval station, where we are moored. One of my main tasks was to escort vendors/suppliers of various items, onto the base and to the ship. Some of these folks drove trucks, and some just were walking onto the base. One of them that I walked with was a moneychanger. With him, I had one of the best, most interesting conversations that I’ve had in a long time. We talked about how long I’ve been in the Navy, whether or not I like it, where the ship has been before, and the war in Iraq. We had somewhat differing viewpoints on the war in Iraq, but both of us were right in our thinking. My comment on the war was that I didn’t think we should have gone in there unilaterally, and he thought it was okay. He thought that the multi-national (UN) approach hadn’t worked, and hadn’t been working in that specific situation for a long time. He believes that it was right for the U.S. to invade to keep Saddam from oppressing the people (a point I brought up, and he agreed with), it kept (or stopped?) Iraq from being a country open to or breeding terrorists, and it left Saddam without the possibility of wreaking any havoc on the world. While engaged in, and after the fact of, I am left with one of those thoughts of "Who would have thought that I would in Singapore, walking and talking about global events with a local?"

FEBRUARY 7, 2005

Today is my birthday! I’m 22 now! I had a good birthday, even though it didn't turn out like I thought it would. I started out my day early (about 7 am) in order to do a community service project for the Singapore Children's Society. We all met up as a group at 7, picked up our box lunches, and several boxes of clothes for the kids...and waited till 8 to get on the bus to go to the site. We got there, and did general yard work and picking up trash, etc on the grounds. We raked leaves, picked up logs, and more, to make the backyard a better place for the kids to play. It was fun, though we didn't have as much time with the kids as was originally planned. We worked there basically from 9-12...and then I went out and about with a buddy.
The rest of the day was spent shopping, riding the bus and the train around town, and more shopping before my birthday events at night. I bought a couple things from a Columbia store that we found in one of the malls. I got a cool polyester blue/gray shirt there, as well as new sandals. My buddy bought the shirt for me, and the sandals were my birthday present to myself. My birthday events were dinner at 5:30 at a ribs/steaks/burgers restaurant, and then drinks at another spot at 7:30. I invited about twenty people, and no one showed up! They were all too busy doing other things in port. I did have fun though, doing those things with my buddy, and then other people we ran into from the ship. I got to the drinks spot an hour and a half late...and found out later that a couple people had come on time, and missed me. The drinks spot was cool. They had 100s of drinks on their menu, and all alphabetized. One guy we were with and I both stole the drink menu to have as a souvenir!!

Addendum to yesterday

2005-02-01T18:48:00.000-08:00

After writing my entry up yesterday, I realized there were other items of interest that I forgot to include. I’ll include other things that happened today as well.
Yesterday afternoon, I got the results and my qualification sheet back for becoming an RPPO (repair parts petty officer). I did indeed pass the test, and my qualification sheet is now en route up the chain of command for everyone that needs to sign off on that. I still will spend some time sitting down with the person I’ll take over from, to completely know what I’ll be doing. All that will have to do with the ordering process, picking up the supplies, and balancing the department’s checkbook.
Also, yesterday was the last day that we sent volunteers to the beach. We sent a group of 45 people to the beach today, to turn over with the USS Essex, who will continue the work. Throughout the month of January, we transported 2.2 million pounds of food and supplies, with more than a thousand volunteers going ashore. The U.S. military in total has delivered 5.1 million pounds of food and supplies, and had an approximate total of twenty-two hundred volunteers.
I sent up my leave chit today for signature, and it looks like I won’t have any problems taking leave then. So far, there are only one or two other people requesting it for that time. I got my leave chit in as soon as I could, so I was a step ahead of the game.

2005-01-31T21:17:00.000-08:00

One of my friends onboard reenlisted today, for three more years. He has orders to Naples, Italy, and will transfer there in about 2 months. I went to his reenlistment ceremony today after dinner. Then, after we got off work, a couple of guys (including the friend that reenlisted) and I went up to the smoke deck and each smoked a cigar in celebration.
There is some other news to report. We got the definitive schedule passed down to us tonight, as well as what the leave time frames will be. There will be leave out of Hawaii, and three different periods out of Everett. I will plan on taking leave from March 4-16th, having plenty of time at home around the wedding. I am happy about that, and also happy we’re getting back earlier (up till a week or two ago, we were going to be home on or about March 12).
I finished Duty last night, and I had some thoughts about it. I am struck with even greater respect for World War II veterans and those of my grandparent’s generation. One interesting thought in the book was about how people went from growing up in the Depression times, into becoming men in the war times. The main point was that kids growing up poor saw these places on a globe, and they were so unknown. They never thought they would ever see such places. Then, they were pulled into war, and saw Europe, Africa, Japan, etc.
That’s it for now. I don’t have any other news or stories to tell.

Quote of the day: “When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.” --Eleanor Roosevelt

2005-01-29T12:30:00.000-08:00

“Never, ever let the job finish you.” That quote come from a Toyota ad I found this morning, on the back of a Navy Times newspaper. It is exactly the same kind of thought that I use to keep me going in my job, and ultimately in the military. I often face situations, that in word and behavior, are almost utter stupidity or ludicrous. That’s the way the military is often. If you’re not doing something at a certain time, you’re wrong, and have to start doing something – ridiculous as it may be. All along the way, there have been many things to irk me about the military experience, but that is the latest and greatest at the moment.
I received my sister’s wedding invitation in the mail the other day. Alongside that, however, I received both good news and bad news with the schedule around that time. We should be back a few days earlier than I’ve been planning, allowing me to leave from San Diego or Everett, and be there in time for the wedding. However, I have also been told that they don’t want to let people take leave until our change of command ceremony a couple weeks after we get back. However, my supervisor recognizes my different circumstances, and will support me on asking for leave. So, it’s good and bad, but should work out swimmingly.
We got some update on the schedule last night from the CO. Early yesterday evening, he gave his daily update on the relief work. Then, a couple hours later, he came on again and relayed what is 90% certain for our return voyage. We will be stopping for a couple days (including my birthday) in an in Asian city, which I’ve seen before on the last West Pac. Then, we will continue on home – stopping in Hawaii and San Diego again.

2005-01-28T15:57:00.000-08:00

Today, I switched back to working the day shift. I worked half the night last night, ate and relaxed for a little while, and then slept for just a few hours. I think I’ll need to fit in a nap this afternoon so I can fully adjust back to this schedule.
We are in our final days here aiding in the relief effort. However, the date that we’ll leave, and our exact date of return, is up in the air yet. The schedule hasn’t been finalized; we just know that the end is coming soon.
I am concurrently reading My Life and Duty right now. Duty is a book written by Bob Greene, about his dad, him, and Paul Tibbets. It’s a great book of history and military combined, and one I will highly recommend to anyone, both now and when I’m done with it. I’ve read both books in little parts the last week or so, but think I will finish Duty now (I’m halfway through) before finishing My Life. I started compiling a scrapbook today, covering all my time on the ship. I have a vast accumulation of articles from the start of the war in Iraq, coming home from our last West Pac, and now this. I am also adding bits of memorabilia and souvenirs from events and adventures along the way. I also have some war comics I’m putting in. It’s a rather simple thing, but I’m excited about it—something to hang on to for the years to come.

2005-01-24T04:00:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, I went to the beach for the relief effort. I started my day by mustering at the ATO (air transport office) at 5:55 in the morning. We checked in, and were told to return at 6:15. When we did, we had to wait for a while, and then we were given cranials and rubber duckies (life-saving float device). As well as getting our equipment, we took advantage of the waiting time, and put on our sunscreen and DEET, as recommended. As we were on our way out, one girl threw up in the passageway where we were standing. She went to medical, and did not get to go. We rode in a helicopter to get there, which was a little frightening to me. There were about 10 people to a helicopter, and we were all sitting in the back, on the floor. Both going up and coming down are a little choppy as the helicopter maneuvers around.
We arrived on the field, where we would be working, around 7 am. We got started working almost as soon as we got there, and didn’t get a sizeable break until about 10:30. We did however eat little bits and drink lots of water, which was provided for us there under a tent. It was real hot and sunny even before 9:30 a.m. Just before 10:30, one of the folks in charge, asked for 6 people to volunteer to go get wood from the nearby Indonesian air force base. I volunteered, and after some figuring out, we were given a ride by some Indonesian guys in the area. They had a big truck, which was open in back (yet covered high overhead with a tarp). There was one of their guys in front, as well as one of our officers that would lead us to the wood. Then, we had about 6 Indonesian guys and 6 of our guys in the back. We got to the Air Force base (which was just a few blocks away), and had to stand by, by the gate, till we were allowed to enter. They only wanted one truck at a time in there, so we had to wait for another truck to leave. Upon stopping, and getting out of the truck, we loaded 40 long planks of wood (2 X4s?). The project intended with all this wood, was to make new pallets for the relief supplies to sit upon.
The main purpose of the day was to move boxes of the relief supplies. We unloaded them from trucks, with supplies provided by the U.S., USAID (a UNICEF organization), The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and more. We moved boxes of chocolate milk, water, sunflower oil, rice, biscuits, and more. After unloading them from the trucks, we set them up in piles based on what they were. Everything was separated by what it was, and set into nice square areas, on the pallets we had, as well as large metal squares placed on the ground (those were compliments of the US Air Force). When helicopters landed we would initially bring up boxes to the helicopters and give them to the crew onboard (2-3 guys usually loading the helicopter), and then with the people bringing up the rear forming a chain to pass more boxes up to the helicopter. It was hot, tiring, and well worth the effort. I had only slept a couple hours the night before leaving, but I did the job. As well, I managed to squeeze in a couple naps in the afternoon, between helicopter landings. At some times we did have 2-3 helicopters down on the field at a time, so we had to make a couple chains to load 2 helicopters at a time.
As far as seeing people needing medical assistance, there weren’t that many that I saw. They did have some, but no one on a stretcher. The one guy that I saw, and actually looked to see what was wrong with him, had his head bandaged up.
There was a great international mix around the field that we worked. From the Navy, we had regular enlisted folks, officers, and hospital corpsmen. There was an Air Force detachment out of Travis AFB in California. There were Indonesians that came from the area directly around the airfield to watch what was going on. There were several different journalists from around the world…the Boston Globe, two French reporters, an Associated Press guy, and a few others that I didn’t talk to. The Associated Press guy took my picture, and within an hour of getting back to the ship, it was online for the world to see. I figured that out a little while after I looked at the picture, after someone else was talking about the time it was posted. Again, I go back to what I was saying in relation to the inauguration, with the speed of information these days. I’ll put the link at the end here if you all want to check it out.
During and after the work, I did feel hot, sweaty, and exhausted…but I knew that it was all worth it. Every box I moved was going to be received by some one who needed it, and had hardly any food. We finished the day between 4-5 in the afternoon, so it was just over eight hours of work, with plenty of “catch your breath” breaks in between.
We were well stocked with food for ourselves. Food from the ship had been brought for lunches, snacks and drinks. We had sandwiches, fruit, Pringles, cake, Pepsi (I had one, because it’s not really what you should be drinking on a hot day), bottled water (as well as a water tank for re-fills), and more.
When we headed back to the ship, I rode in a helicopter with a few less people. They were sending people back in groups of 4-10, rather than them all being groups of 10. The crewman that was sitting in the back with us left the door open for the whole flight. This scared me a lot more than the helicopter flight itself.
That was my day. As soon as I got back to the ship, I stopped for a minute to drop an email. Then, I crashed from the depletion of energy. I slept till almost 4 am and then got up. My body is just starting to return to normal now, after changing around my sleep pattern like that.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/050122/481/rjv10701221142

2005-01-20T23:59:00.000-08:00

I have been quite busy the last couple of days, and haven’t adequately shared my news. About two days ago, I got an e-mail telling me I had a medical screening that morning (for going to help with the relief efforts). Later on in the morning, half hour before the medical screening, they cancelled it however. I had it at the same time this morning. All of those in a select group went to one meeting place on the ship, and were given a lecture and information from one of the hospital corpsman onboard. We filled out paperwork to be put in our medical records, and received a month’s supply of anti-malaria pills. For those that know medicine at all, the pills are Doxycycline. I have one to take every day with a meal until I go, and then for twenty-eight days thereafter. Stay tuned on all this news, as I should go to the beach within a week and a half. I have to wait on a brief with the chaplain, before I’m sent off to help.
I’m quite excited about everything in the above paragraph, as I’ll be able to physically do something rather than just being here. Right now, I am watching the presidential inauguration. Because I don’t want to put out too much politically inspired thought in my journal, I won’t say much about this. However, I did have one interesting thought/question to put out to all of you. It’s rare for people to have to watch television or check the inter-net for news from the head of the company they work for. Yet, that is how it is for me, thinking of the President as the head honcho.
One other interesting and grateful thought I had in the last hour was also due in part to the inauguration. I am watching/listening to Bush’s speech, and will probably hear all of it, yet I was just thinking of how I will easily be able to find it online. Due to the speed of information in our day and age, within an hour, I know I will be able to find the complete text online. Within minutes of a newspaper going to press, one can pull up the stories online. I am continually amazed and pleased, with the access to information I want to gather.

2005-01-18T04:42:00.000-08:00

Yesterday (since it's after midnight here), was the celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr. I went to the ceremony held onboard the ship, and was particularly moved by the message and reverence of it. They had one of the Catholic church choir onboard sing a few songs, a slide show of pictures was shown, a poem read, the national anthem and a solo sang, and a message highlighting several of MLK Jr's speeches and ideals. I particularly noted how it was put out that this holiday is for all people, not just African Americans, and how MLK Jr gave a lifetime of service for what he believed in. I took this to heart, to fight for freedom and always look to how you can serve fellow man. This strikes with me so well, because I do have similar ideas continually stirring in me. When I'm ready, I want to answer a call of service in whatever way I can and am led. That service I'm talking about is beyond the military, if I need to elaborate. Now, of course, that will be in addition to service I can and will do along the way.
Since I am writing this so late, you may infer that my schedule tonight is a little different. That is correct! Tonight is the first night I've switched over to working nights again. However, this is only for a week, as we complete a special project. On days like this before a switch, we come into work in the morning and are let off after a couple hours to get our sleep schedule somewhat acclimated.
This journal entry has sat on my computer now for almost four hours now. We have a large quantity of record entries for this project, and it's kept me busy all night. I'm on my breakfast break now, but I am going to leave this where it's at and put it out to all of you.

2005-01-13T19:13:00.000-08:00

Today has been busy, both with my normal tasks and other things. I had a spot check this week, which was scheduled yesterday morning, again this morning, and finally done late this afternoon. The Chief I was doing it ended up being during both of those morning times we set up. As well, today I took a test for RPPO, which is a qualification I’m working on. The letters stand for Repair Parts Petty Officer. This person is the one who orders all supplies and maintenance parts for a department. I took the test last week, too, and missed too many (five) questions.
My library, which I think I detailed on here before is now operational. It is also largely mobile. I brought together about ½ of my books, and have them in one box I can carry around and take to people. In terms of record keeping for this, I created an Excel spreadsheet with all the books listed, and who currently has them (if anyone). There are about 50 of my books in this lending library so far, and it’s yet to be seen if I will add the others (another whole box worth of books). So, I think this is working, and it’s fun for me, and enriching to other people.
In other news, I’ll be back on night shift for one week, next week. I’m going to night shift along with another person. Alongside the existing night shift person, we will be working on entering the most recent Sea Service Deployment Ribbon, which most of the crew earned this week.
That’s all of what is noteworthy. Our schedule is still completely up in the air…but it sounds like we’ll be home sometime in March.

2005-01-11T14:30:00.000-08:00

Today is my Dad’s 51st birthday. In a way, I would have celebrated with him if he had been able to come on the Tiger cruise. Instead, I’ll send off his birthday present this afternoon.
The last day or so has gone over well. In the wee hours of the morning yesterday (Sunday going into Monday), we received a LOT of mail. I personally got 5 or 6 boxes yesterday from different people at church, from Amazon.com/Ebay orders, and my Christmas presents from my Mom and Dad. Through all this mail, I received many additions to both my library, and my DVD collection. I moved all of my DVDs down to the berthing last night, which were approximately 30 movies (old + the new ones). So, all that was a great thing. As I said, this was in the wee hours of the morning, so I decided to stay up for the mail, knowing that my Christmas presents would arrive. I didn’t mind one bit – thinking of it like staying up for Christmas. The original plan was “to wake up early on Christmas morning,” but the mail call was before I had even gone to sleep.
About five months ago, I was seriously looking at the stock market due to Google’s IPO. At that time, I started playing an online stock market game. I bought stocks of Google , and 3 or 4 other companies. Google is the only one of the bunch that has been a profitable investment. As I write now, Google is currently trading at $195/share. This is up from opening at around $100/share. I really wish I would have had the capital at the time to invest…I would have been sitting pretty!
In one of my boxes yesterday, I received a journal. I decided that I would make use of it solely for my compositions, etc. I want to make a strong effort to write in it everyday, with whatever writings I can draw from my feelings of the moment. I started on that last night, and wrote one page with two compositions. One I finished, and the other I left incomplete to finish tonight.

"Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life."
--Jack Kerouac

2005-01-08T19:46:00.000-08:00

I don’t know what’s going on, or what will happen in the near future. Today, the CO came on and said that the Tiger Cruise is officially cancelled. For those that don’t know, the Tiger Cruise is one way the Navy lets families/friends into our world, to have a glimpse of what being underway is like. They had planned to have people come onboard as the ship transits from Hawaii to San Diego, or San Diego to Everett…or both (both combined would have been about ten days). I am accordingly extremely disappointed and somewhat frustrated. We were supposed to be home on my birthday! Now, I don’t know if we will be home then or even how much later, if that’s the case. I want be home for my sister’s wedding, and though I think that still won’t be a problem, it could be a question of how long I could be home at that time.
Life and God’s plans can be strange, odd, and mysterious. I know this should be good, but still I have the prospect of the same thing happening to me twice while in the Navy, on this ship (getting extended on a deployment). Ughhh! I really don’t think this should be so, and yet it is.
This is a huge drain on any ship’s crew morale, and to have it happen to the same crew twice?
That’s all I’ve got for tonight. I really am frustrated and want to go home and be driving again.

2005-01-06T19:55:00.000-08:00

As can be expected, there’s a lot going on around the ship. We have been here in the tsunami-affected countries for nearly a week now. The CO comes on every day and gives an update on how much stuff we have flown around, delivered, and more during the day…as well as what’s going on. We have moved hundreds of thousands of pounds of food and water, as well as the helicopters moving people from remote areas to where they can be taken care of.
As of yet, I have had no active part in this. I am still hoping to go, but doubt that it’s likely.
Dan Rather and maybe Diane Sawyer were onboard the ship the other day. I didn’t hear about either one until after the fact, so I missed seeing them.
There is a supposed date that we will leave this region, as another group of military will take on the mission of aid. If this goes as said, we should still be home according to schedule.
In spite of everything else going on, I have continued to read. I finished reading a book about a map thief, started and finished reading “The Last Juror”, which is one of Grisham’s latest. Right now, I’m reading a couple books. I started reading a book by Hunter S. Thompson that I had bought a couple months back. As well, yesterday, I found someone that was selling Bill Clinton’s book, My Life. So, I bought that, due to my curiousity and slight interest in his story, since the book came out over the summer. I started reading it last night, and think it may be my primary reading instead of the other book.

2004-12-29T15:35:00.000-08:00

I'm doing well. We just pulled out of Hong Kong yesterday, and that was great. I bought so much stuff there! I bought a couple wedding presents for my sister, a three-piece black cashmere suit for me (tailor made), a new silk robe, a long sleeve Von Dutch t-shirt, and more. I also ate some good meals...an eight course seafood dinner on Christmas, and a breakfast of dim sum the next day. As well, I had a couple American meals for good measure. These were a meat lovers’ pizza from Pizza Hut on Sunday afternoon, and a late lunch Monday at TGI Fridays.
The ship's mission has changed due to the current events. I'm putting in an article below what I write for you to read about it. It is all due to the natural disaster(s) involving the tsunamis/earthquakes in south and east Asia
I have not received any Christmas presents from my immediate family, yet, but I did get a couple of DVDs from my cousin. I got the 60s miniseries that was on ABC about 5 years ago, and a new Spanish movie that I saw on Amazon and was interested in. As well, I got a few other DVDs this last week. I bought Garden State over the weekend and watched that yesterday. I thought it was quite good. Soon, I will begin to watch The Three Colors Trilogy that came this week, after ordering it online. This is a trilogy of French films that come highly recommended, and I have been waiting to see for a while now. So, I’m excited!
On the literary front, I am about to conclude reading Snow Falling on Cedars. It’s been quite an interesting read, and it’s been cool to read a story set close by Everett…with familiar town names mentioned (Seattle, Anacortes, and Bellingham).

http://www.heraldnet.com/stories/04/12/28/100loc_navyorders.cfm

2004-12-23T21:30:00.000-08:00

After seeing that our upcoming port visit is news online, I’m now safe to report where we’re pulling into. We will pull into Hong Kong this weekend for several days. Although I have been here before, now I can add it to my list of exotic (or semi-exotic) locales where I’ve been over the holidays. These spots include Perth/Fremantle (Christmas 2002), Hawaii (Thanksgiving this year), and now this. It is indeed a downer to be so far away, but all that at least makes it bearable J
Work has been going along well, yet busy. Yesterday we had a few hours of ID card issue for those folks that absolutely needed a new military ID card now. These were the old ID cards that we’re not allowed to make any more (because we changed over to a new kind of ID card). We made approximately 30 of them yesterday afternoon. This is whole encompassing the afternoon, considering it takes more than 5 minutes to make each one (maybe 7-8 minutes?).
Merry Christmas everyone! I pray that you stay safe in traveling, and festive activities!!!

2004-12-20T19:42:00.000-08:00

Besides, the mail that I mentioned yesterday, I also have received a couple boxes of books this last week. I received one from one of my high school youth pastors from church. I was especially surprised about that box, because I didn’t know it was coming, and it was full of books –all wrapped up individually in Christmas paper!! It was great to get, and there are a lot of classic books and other good ones included.
Today has been a good day. Yesterday, I failed to mention that I was stuck doing the muster report yet, because the duty section personnel were busy with a working party. My part in all that is not meant to be (because it was a Sunday, and everyone but duty section should have the day off). My supervisor noticed that I was doing it, however, and he compensated me three hours today after the muster report was done. This encompassed the 2 hrs of lunch, so it was really only one free hour…but still nice! I watched a movie that I had been looking forward to all morning, and then read further in my book (The Wedding, of which I have now finished).
That’s almost all there is to report. I’m writing this as I wind down my night. I have eighteen minutes left of work for the night, and then I’ll be free to go confirm my choice of the next book.

2004-12-19T19:30:00.000-08:00

It’s been a long and busy week and I haven’t had too much time to write. I have been busy everything from work to reading to power-outages, and most everything else you could imagine from me. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings, we had dual-down drills going on. This is where the power is shut down, as well as the a/c ventilation system, for several hours. They have done these a couple times in the past since I’ve been here, yet I don’t really remember the purpose (if I knew it). I imagine its purpose is just to see how well the ship can sustain itself if such events were to occur.
As well, as busyness and work, I’ve gotten a lot of mail this week. I have gotten a couple boxes from folks at church back home, sending books and Christmas cards…as well as Christmas cards solely. I have received a couple boxes from military support organizations that I gave my name and address to. From those organizations I have received a package full of “Prayer Bears” and also a huge box of Christmas cards. In turn, I have dispersed those to all around who were interested. The prayer bears are made up in various fabrics, with a story of the start of them enclosed, as well as a flag/cross pin. I’ll go into the other mail tomorrow. Yes, I do plan to get back on track, and write again tomorrow!!

2004-12-14T19:00:00.000-08:00

While far from home, I would imagine that anyone, anywhere, would be surprised to hear the name of a well-known person from (until recently) a stranger. I had this experience yesterday, and once before this last month, from the same man. The air-wing chaplain onboard personally knows my pastor and also a family friend (that’s the one that was revealed yesterday). In all of these kind of situations, the old montage, “It’s a small world after all”, pops its pleasant head up.

2004-12-09T20:00:00.000-08:00

Did you ever know anyone who could say, “I ate lunch in the refrigerator today.”? Today, I can say that! This morning, beginning at 0630, I was involved in a 200-man working party. This is was during an underway replenishment that we had. After mustering at the aforementioned time, we were positioned in the spot we were to work, and waited, and waited, and waited some more for boxes to come down. This was during happy hour, so it was nice to have a change, and not have to do that. After a little bit of time waiting, however, I knew I would get bored. So, I decided to discreetly sneak down to the berthing and get my book. I accomplished this determined maneuver without a word from anybody. This was a rather remarkably accomplishment, since we’re not supposed to move around the ship during happy hour, and the officers and chiefs walk around to make sure everyone is working.
The task of my group (numbering twenty folks) in the working party was to “hump” boxes of fruit, vegetables, and other food to the freezer and refrigerator store rooms below decks. These are on the fourth deck and fifth deck, respectively. It was hard work, often heavy, and in the case of the freezer time – quite cold. In the refrigerator, it was easy to feel like it was normal temperature, due to the workload. After approximately 4 straight hours, we had a break for a box lunch. We ate in shifts, with approximately 3-4 eating at a time. After lunch, there was a little work left and we finished about 12:45. IN the end, we had moved endless boxes of potatoes, kiwis, apples, oranges, grapefruits, celery, cucumbers, broccoli, red and yellow peppers, tomatoes, bread and more. Seven hours after this said endeavor, I’m still a little sore and ready to go to bed!
There is a conveyer system designed to carry boxes down to the level they need to go, but it was working very intermittently. So, after a while of it bringing down one load, and stopping, those in charge decided to make it more efficient. Hence, the humping began from that point.
There’s not too much else notable from the rest of today, except a couple of mail calls. I received several Christmas cards today, cookies, and a letter or two. So, it was good, yet not so much the mail I’m waiting for.

2004-12-06T20:00:00.000-08:00

The last two days we’ve been experiencing a lot of rough sea. The boat has been consistently rocking all day long. Today hasn’t been as bad for me personally as yesterday was. I don’t get fully seasick when all this goes on, but I do get constant headaches.
After a little bit of marathon reading yesterday afternoon and night, I finished reading The Life Of Pi. It was an absolute great, enjoyable read! I would highly recommend it to anyone who would ask. I have now moved on to read the prequel to The DaVinci Code, which I have borrowed from one of my co-workers. I read it just a little bit during lunch today, and a little bit during dinner, and have begun to be engrossed in the story. The first few chapters have hooked me right away.

2004-12-03T18:39:00.000-08:00

DECEMBER 2, 2004

I ate really well today. For lunch, they were serving veal parmesan, spaghetti, and pizza on focaccia bread. The pizza was surprisingly unique and a pleasure to eat. Then, for dinner, I skipped it and read further into The Life of Pi. I started this book last night and I’m ¼ of the way into it. It is really interesting and unique…descriptions of things relating to zoo animals, religion, and India. It’s quite uncharacteristic in comparison to other things I’ve read lately.

DECEMBER 3, 2004

Today has been a little less normal. I did my regular work this morning...and ate lunch (which wasn’t as good as yesterday’s. Then, we had the command frocking ceremony (where the people who are advanced/promoted first get to put on their new rank). I watched that for about half of it -- the people that I work with were at the very beginning (because it was alphabetical by department, and admin is the first one). Then, I spent the last hour and a half cleaning out one of the vent systems around our office. We are required to do maintenance on various things...and what was assigned to me and another guy this week was the vent system. In order to accomplish this, we had to undo three different vent covers, look up in there, and vacuum/wipe out all the dust and dirt in there. It was a messy job let me tell you! I got dirt and dust all over my clothes and face. I'm writing this after I cleaned up and put a new uniform on, so I feel like a new man!
I want to start loaning out books that I have (my own library!) for other people to read, so I'm doing a bit of a project with that. Yesterday, I started making a list on Excel of all the books I have, and then doing a Word document to have little summaries of the books on there. Some of those summaries I wrote, and most I pulled off the Internet (allreaders.com is a great site I found).
That is the summary of my super fun life at the moment. What do you think! Oh, and tonight we cross the dateline, so we're going to skip forward to Saturday...which is good because Sunday (becomes tomorrow!) is our sleep-in day!

2004-11-29T20:36:00.000-08:00

The ship is once again out to sea for another while till our next port visit. We pulled out this morning, and I didn’t have to do the muster report. Someone who was in the office early, was doing this already when I got in, this morning.
My Thanksgiving celebration was really spectacular. It was indeed, as I imagined, a way I will probably not have the opportunity to do again on Thanksgiving. We started off the night by meeting up at 3:30 in the afternoon, but not being able to get on the buses to Paradise Cove for an hour after that. Once on the bus, it was a 30-40 minute trip to the spot. The locale itself was very tropical, with straw/tiki-like booths set up all over the place, and right alongside a beach. We walked through various lanes/gates, and were greeted by getting lei’d. Also upon arrival, we had nearly 2 hour before dinner was served. During this time, we were able to walk the grounds, browse the little shopping booths they had, and enjoy various games/activities. I went ahead and tried throwing a spear. However, I missed the bulls-eye. Everyone who tried it received a shell lei…so then I had two!
Just before dinner was served, there was a small ceremony in the amphitheater involving digging the pig out of the ground, and poi samples being given out. Upon my mother’s suggestion, I wanted to try poi at the luau, if they had it. I didn’t come upon the ceremony/ritual until the end though, when the women serving the poi (to folks who wanted a taste of it) were packing up. We then moved on to dinner. This consisted of the pig in shredded portions, chicken, fish, and rice. Dessert was a kind of coconut cake, with pineapple and a small gelatin-like cube on the side. I skimmed the coconut off mine, and then just ate the cake and the pineapple. Along with the food, there was a great consumption of tropical beverages consumed by those attending. This was due in large part to being able to get unlimited mai tai’s, included with the more expensive of the two tickets. Now, before you get worried, I had a few and didn’t over do myself (as those few were well-spaced out over the whole evening). Along side those, I drank guava juice, passion orange, and pop.
The show itself, after dinner, included many things. There was a large Samoan guy that was the emcee for the night. He led the audience through some history, and then various performances began. Among things that were displayed were: hula girls, guys/girls dancing all across the stage in whatever kind of dance it was (maybe Polynesian), a fire-dancing fellow who had 1-2 sticks of fire at various times, and then as well they brought quite a few audience members on-stage to show off their limited skills as hula dancers (after a short lesson).
One of my other major events in the last few days in Hawaii was shopping. On the day after Thanksgiving, I went out with a group of guys I work with and hung out at the mall most of the day, after going to a flea market that was near the base. I walked through the mall and looked at a few stores, bought remaining Christmas gifts, and then hit up clothes sales for myself. Without intending to initially, I spent more money on myself than on the aforementioned Christmas gifts. However, I think that I did complete my Christmas shopping, and thought I would present myself with gifts. I bought all the clothes at Sears, and most for 30-50% off their normal price. These purchases were: new Hawaii t-shirt, three button short-sleeve Henley, button-down striped Oxford shirt, jeans, and a pair of striped lounge pants. Other times in/around the described activities were spent on base, and largely at the liberty center(s). They have a couple liberty centers that have restaurants in them, inter-net access, movies shown, comfortable furniture, pool tables, juke box, and more. Oh, and I did l laundry too!

2004-11-25T11:56:00.000-08:00

The last few days have been in-port Hawaii. The first day was a liberty day (but I had duty), then the next two days we were scheduled to run force protection drills. We were not scheduled to be able to leave the ship until the end of the work day on that second day of the drills (Wednesday). However, they suspended the drills Tuesday to give us liberty that night, and then on Wednesday the drills were complete before noon. So, it all worked out good.
On Tuesday night, I stayed on base and went to one of the liberty centers on base. I played rummy with someone, got something to eat, watched a couple movies, and played around on the Internet. Yesterday afternoon and evening, I cooperatively rented a car with a few other people, and we drove halfway up around the island. Hawaii is beautiful! That was one of my first times devoting a long time to exploring it and traipsing about the island. My friend has a digital camera with all the bells and whistles…and he was willing to have anyone take pictures with it, to their heart’s content. I took several, but had one that turned out to be an absolute perfect shot. It was house along the river, nestled in the midst of trees, with a beautiful and rich blue sky in the background. I am going to get a copy of all the pictures we took, copied to CD.
Happy Thanksgiving! I am going to go to a luau today with 300 of my closest friends (a.k.a. other people of the ship). I am going personally with a group of five or six people that I work with, and I’m really looking forward to the experience.
That’s all the news fit to print for today!

2004-11-20T21:15:00.000-08:00

Both yesterday and today, I have been busy filing evaluation reports that we had piled up. There were at least two to three hundred that needed to be filed. I started yesterday, and was doing it largely by myself. Today, I had help from two co-workers, and we just about finished. There’s just one small pile to tackle tomorrow.
I finished reading another book yesterday. The book I finished was the one I described in my last entry. The books by the Kellermans, being the psychologically entrenched books that they are, really do an effective job of hooking me in. I can hardly put something like that down. When, so interested in a book, I have no problem spending an hour reading…even when it is late, late at night. I’m about to leave work now, and I plan to go in search of a new book to read in my collection. If I find Democracy in America, I am going to evaluate it, and determine if it could hold my interest.
The ship is about to pull into port again. I’m excited about it, too. I am going to do more touristy/native things then I did before, which I’m happy about it. I will be spending Thanksgiving in a way I never imagined I would ever before. Per operational safety I can go further into detail, but will after the fact.
I hope that everyone is well, and all the upcoming holidays are blessed for you, in time with family and friends.

2004-11-16T20:30:00.000-08:00

NOVEMBER 15, 2004
The last couple days I have been reading "O, Pioneers!" by Willa Cather. I have been pleasantly surprised, both with this book and others that I have read, on people’s reaction. I seem to be in an environment where quality (classics) literature is not perused. Every time that I sit in the office reading some quality literature, I am asked, "Is that for a class?" It is just kind of surprising to get that reaction.

NOVEMBER 16, 2004
I finished reading "O, Pioneers," last night. Today, I started one of Jonathan Kellerman’s books that I had around.
I had a spot check today, which I spent a chunk of the day worrying about, and preparing for. It went swimmingly, however. The Chief that I did it with wanted to get it done with as soon as possible, so I just went over/through all the things he had to mark off on the sheet.
When we’re out here on deployment, I am probably going to get some qualifications done for various things, and do little extras I may not need to do. However, I decided in the last twenty-four hours that my main objective will be to take a list of good books to read, and collect all those. I would like to be able to say that I’ve read a lot of classics, which I can’t attest to right now. There’s a list that I found in the back of my book yesterday, with the top 25 or so classics put out by that specific publishing company.

2004-11-12T20:45:00.000-08:00

I have been fully occupied the last few days with starting a new facet of my job, reading, and more. I finished (in large part) a book on real estate investing that I had been reading, and read “Nights In Rodanthe” by Nicholas Sparks. “Nights in Rodanthe” was a good romantic novel, and I could hardly put it down. I started it yesterday afternoon while doing laundry, stayed up late last night reading it, and finished it during the day today. After reading it, I look forward even more so to reading more Nicholas Sparks novels. I had only previously read The Notebook, before reading this one. In the last few days, I have also found out that he wrote “A Walk To Remember”, which is a movie I thoroughly enjoyed.
To expound more on my new position per se, I am now doing the command muster report in the morning. This is a multi-hour project in the morning, which involves taking in muster reports from every department on the ship and compiling the numerical data. There are many reasons why it takes so long. The person responsible for it has to compare all the departmental numbers to those of yesterday, note down all personnel coming and going, all personnel on unauthorized absence (commonly recognized as AWOL), and more. As well, if there are any discrepancies, the department point-of-contact must be called, and clear up the situation.
To those that are curious, the e-mail only version of this journal will continue. For those that solely wish to view it on the internet, please send me a message to let me know. I don’t recommend this highly, as posting will be sporadic due to shipboard internet conditions a large majority of the time. However, to each his own.
I hope that I can keep writing this frequently. However, at times (which you have seen so far), it may just be every 3rd or 4th day.

2004-11-09T21:25:00.000-08:00

It has been a few days since I put this out. The web log format that I mentioned in one my last entry has actually received a web-only entry! I wrote this while out in town in Honolulu, HI on Friday, I believe it was. You can visit my log on-line at http://www.thesailorslog2.blogspot.com/. It has not yet had all the “cracks” filled in…yet I believe all will still enjoy seeing it. Again, as time allows this week, I will fill the cracks in and have every past entry uploaded on there.
Ah…so to hear about the days in port. Hawaii was great! Among the things I did were going out walking around town, shopping for me, shopping in order to outfit another guy I work with, going out to eat (Red Lobster, Hard Rock Café, and a hotel restaurant), climbing a crater (Diamond Head), taking a nap and more. The hike up the crater wasn’t too high or too long, but it was work. Yet it was worth it, for the views of the ocean and the city. I purchased a great, new Hawaiian shirt that has a blue background and pink/white flowers all over it. I also bought a boys t-shirt, that has that little but not too little look to it on my figure. Then, I envisioned buying a necklace for myself, but had to decide what kind. In the end I picked out one that has white beads throughout, and a small group every so often of blue and white alternating. I’ve never been too much of the hemp or bead necklace wearing kind of guy, but I’d like to try it for a while.
The last two days in port, I didn’t too much. On Sunday, I stayed on the ship in the morning, and walked around on base for a couple hours in the afternoon. I went to a liberty center that they had, to use the internet and sit reading my book for awhile. Then, I stopped at a mini-mart to buy a couple things, pick-up Subway, and returned to the ship. On Monday, I had stand-by duty. This means that I stayed on the ship for the duration of the work day, helping out the normal duty section with anything they needed. I was busy all day! I had to lug a jug of water up and down the pier for the watch standers, and then later go down for a couple hours to clean up around the trash dumpsters and throw a lot of the trash in. After I was done for the day, I was hot, sweaty, and tired. I did not want to do anything more in Hawaii this time around. I spent the afternoon and evening hours relaxing, reading, and watching TV.
This morning, I manned the rails again, as we left Pearl Harbor. As we do Manning the Rails in and out of Pearl Harbor, whichever respective side of the ship is closest to the Arizona memorial, renders honors (salutes). This time it was port side, while I was on starboard. It was hot out, but then after we passed the memorial, and started getting out of the bay towards the ocean, the cool breeze started moving.
Other than that, the only other news of significance is that I have now been switched to day shift. While I don’t prefer this shift to the other, I will live and trudge on.

2004-11-05T19:45:00.000-08:00

Today we pulled into port in Hawaii. The day has been nothing of what I expected. It started out with me working through the night, when I thought I would decide to cut out a little early and sleep a few hours. Then, just before happy hour, on my way to the berthing, I slipped and skidded down the ladderwell. I came out largely unscathed, however sore and bruised most likely. I hit my right backside on a number of steps, as well as running one shoulder blade or back bone into something. I also spilled water on a lot of the stuff I was carrying with me. Then, I thought I might take a nap after happy hour. I didn't have much of an opportunity to do this however, as I knew that we would have to be close by the office for briefs and taking out trash before liberty was called away.
Then the other thing is that the weather is not paradise weather at all! It has been drizzling rain all day! I will have to check the forecast tonight and see what it looks like for the rest of our time.
I have enjoyed my day after I got away from the ship. I have gone out around town today with my friend Jeremie, and another guy from my office. This other guy only has one outfit of civilian clothes onboard. He discussed wanting to go out and buy some shorts. So, I suggested he should go for more than that, enabling him to have more than one complete outfit. He was very much for it, so that has been a large part of the shopping we've done today. From head to toe, we have added to his wardrobe. It was a lot of fun, because Jeremie and I picked things out, and if we liked them, and fit for him, he bought them...no matter the price! We got a nice hat, which I would have trouble describing, a green Hawaiian shirt with ukeleles and lei's, then khaki pants and a pair of green and black Converse All-Stars. After we finished with the wardrobe, we walked around in search of an internet cafe...from where I am now writing this.
That's it for now. I wouldn't doubt that I will update again during this in-port period.

2004-10-28T03:00:00.000-07:00

Every day at approximately 2:30 am, the local area network on the ship goes down. This means that the e-mail server is not available, and the Internet is down as well. It’s not a huge travesty, since I should be diligently working during that time. However, it is a large down time, since we rarely have customers during our 1-3 am customer service hours. So, around that time, I am characteristically either busy working or sitting at the computer sorting through e-mail and surfing online.
A lot of the time in the Navy, I feel stagnated. With my train of thought, I’m thinking that after my time in the Navy is done, I’m going to restart life again. To explain it in other terms, I feel like I’m a tape/CD/videotape that has been paused, and I’m waiting for what I was born to do to resume. Now, granted, I didn’t know what this was before I joined the Navy, and I may not be right in what I think it is now, but I am planning to explore further of what I think it is at the present time. Right now, I am thinking that it would do me good to explore writing as a career, job, or what have you (thing that I’m gifted at, to make money?). The idea of a writer at home during the day, holed up in a room just to write, has some appeal to me. And if I do what I’m thinking of doing, I will have a lot of substance to begin the process. If I stay going at the pace I am now, I may just be left to devote time to combining, editing, and smoothing out my writing. What I am planning to do is make an attempt at a book. I mentioned this in my last entry and have been thinking of it almost constantly since then. I think that by the time I leave the Navy, I will have a working prototype of this made up. In humoring myself, I wrote an "about the author" block the other day, which could go on the back cover of said book. I know indeed that this is like picking out the color of a new car, when you don’t even have a driver’s license…but hey, it was fun! If anyone is interested, I’ll send it to you in hopes it will make you smile or laugh.
The word of the day today is guarana. This is one of the ingredients of a Monster energy drink that is sold onboard the ship. GUARANA - a dried paste made from the seeds of a Brazilian climbing shrub containing tannin and caffeine and used in making an astringent drink, and also used in the cure of headache.

2004-10-25T23:59:00.000-07:00

It has definitely been busy the last couple of days. On Sunday morning, I had a long nap due to going down for an hour and not being woken up (as I arranged with someone to do). So, based on that, I was asleep most of the morning, and missed going to church. Right after I woke up, I went up to the flight deck for the picnic. It was an extremely hot day out too, with little to no breeze blowing. They served chicken, hamburgers, hot dogs, and steak. I went out there for just long enough to stand in line for food, and eat it. I don’t think I could have taken much longer, and I wanted to try to go to sleep. I tried and had fitful sleep - basically two 2 hour blocks of sleep. Then, I got up and had 3 hours before I was required to go into work. You see, on Sundays, we have our most relaxed day and come into work later.
Monday was another busy day. I wrapped up my night at work by painting in the berthing’s fan room during happy hour. Then, after that, when I should have been getting ready for bed, we had a GQ (general quarters) drill. This kept me up for another couple of hours. After it was done, I went down to the berthing and crashed on the couch. Awaking from that at 1300, I went to my rack for regular sleep. I got 5 more hours of sleep from that point.
I woke up at about 1800, and went into work, only to be greeted by another time change. I stayed in the office, and when 1900 rolled around again, I had to go up to the flight deck to be a phone talker. We had an underway replenishment this evening to get more weapons (bombs/ammunition) onboard. I went up to relieve someone and was up there for 2 and a half hours. It is uncharacteristic for me to be up there at night, but I enjoyed the serenity and silence of it. I looked up and saw the moon with clouds moving across and around it. However, all that in itself wore off quickly, and I had to endure just standing for 2+ hours.
The last couple days I have been thinking, planning, envisioning and writing. I have wholly and completely decided I will try my utmost to combine my journals into a book down the road. I imagined how this would come together with my last log, and begun to write "The Void". "The Void" will be my journal of all the events and tribulations that occurred for me between returning to Washington in May 2003, and leaving on this deployment in October 2004. Then, as well, today I decided I will go back and fill in details from Jan-May 2003, missing from the last journal. This includes thoughts/feelings, events surrounding us turning back to the Gulf, our activities in the war, and homecoming.

2004-10-23T18:15:00.000-07:00

Last night, we went through daylight savings time and set the clocks back an hour. This, and all the time zone changes we are going through are effective at exactly the same time that I come into work (7 at night). So, I come into work, and am working an extra hour! I forgot to change my clock, after I got off work, and was going to bed today. So, I woke up at 6:30, and while still having 30 minutes to get ready for work, I realized after a few minutes that my clock was an hour off. It was good that I discovered this quickly, as I was about to wake up my night shift co-workers. I know that they wouldn't have been too happy with this! I discovered it just before turning on all the lights in the berthing, to wake everyone up. So, then I got ready, and organized my clothes in my rack a bit. You see, II did my laundry about a week ago, and had yet to put my clean clothes in my rack. I re-folded all my clothes neater, and then organized the two compartments in my rack where I was putting them.
After finishing that, I went into work, where I discovered that we were going through a time zone change and it was now 1800 (6 pm) and not 1900 anymore. So, it is now 1900 and the start of my day. We've gotten to about the end of the aforementioned project, so I'll have the time to work on my regular work and my own work projects tonight.
One of the things that is totally unique to my job and life on the ship is walking around planes during the course of the day. When I walk through the hangar bay, there are more planes stored there then one can imagine. One has to devise a method of where to walk in/around planes, while steering clear of low parts that a tall person could run into, and walking under wings.
I'm about halfway through another Kerouac book, Lonesome Traveler. I don't remember if I mentioned that I was reading this before now. I received it in the last week, after ordering it off Amazon.com. I have the little news to mention that I also found Dharma Bums today while I was going through my rack. I don't know if I will go back to reading it this week, however, as it did have interesting words...but otherwise didn't hold my interest too well. We shall see on that front, eh?
That is it for now. Tomorrow is a steel beach picnic on the flight deck. I'll go into further explanation on that later, if I decide to go. It is taking place during my sleep hours, so that idea is still up in the air.

2004-10-21T02:19:00.000-07:00

I have not written any entries in the last couple days due to being busy and having a one day port visit into San Diego. I am so looking fondly forward to my rack. I have worked hard tonight, with no breaks. Now, of course, that is of my own design in order to get productive work done. However, it doesn't change the fact that all the work has made me tired. Through the course of the night, I have gotten about half done with the project that was started tonight. I am working with my night shift supervisor on it, but I have worked a lot harder than he has. The project has been to go through a list of records, and check in the records to see the status of the Page 2 (record of a member's spouse, parents, next of kin with addreesses). We are noting the status on a list, and then doing data entry into that list on Excel. Ughh....3100 records to do that for. So far tonight, I have gone through a list to make the notes on, and have then entered approximately 1200 similar notes on this spreadsheet. My back needs a rest! Enough of this, and of my varied ramblings on the subject.
We pulled into San Diego the other day for a one day visit. I had fun shopping for a few items, and going out walking around downtown San Diego with a few people from the ship's Legal office, and another guy from the Precinct (a Master-At-Arms--similar to a cop out in the regular world).
I wish that I could write longer and of more interesting topic, but I'm beat and pressed for time. I must nourish my body soon, and finish my tasks off. Good day to all!

2004-10-17T20:30:00.000-07:00

If you don't know my personal habits/organizational skills, you don't know that I'm a hoarder. However, I am. I stay relatively up-to-date with articles in the Chicago Sun-Times through internet/e-mail, and they had an article this last week on hoarding. I read it, and was constantly saying "Yep, that's me", upon various hoarding examples. One such example is keeping around free newspapers that you can pick up from places all over town. I do that with both free newspapers, and the ones I buy. For a related real life example, I have bought a Sunday paper in port San Diego before, thrown out the ads, and kept all the other sections unnecessarily. I'm finally getting around to combat this problem by running out of space completely and realizing I can't keep all this junk/paper around forever.
Another example of my hoarding is in my e-mail inbox. Up to yesterday, I had 350 messages in my inbox and had been getting "your mailbox is oversize" e-mails every single day. I now am happy to report that I moved my e-mails into their respective folders (for who they are from), deleted a lot, and am down to 28 e-mails in my inbox currently. If it is at all interesting to you, my folders are: Business, Family, Friends (with 2 sub-folders--Church and Penpals), and Navy.
I started reading Dharma Bums (another Kerouac book) yesterday. I am enjoying it so far, but also wonder what I hope to find in reading it. It's a book about two young men searching for meaning by was of Zen/Buddhism. It does give me plenty to think about however, and words to look up (Bodhisattva for example!!)
So, on that note I'm going to make that the word of the day! Now, in this spot I was going to give props to dictionary.com. However, my internet is down right now. I am left with consulting the old, hardback, physical dictionary. According to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, a bodhisattva is: (1) one whose essence is enlightenment; (2) a being that compassionately refrains from entering nirvana in order to save others and is worshiped as a deity in Mahayana Buddhism. The internet did just come back up, and dictionary.com adds: One who has reached the highest degree of saintship, so that in his next incarnation he will be a Buddha, or savior of the world. That's all folks!

2004-10-16T02:01:00.000-07:00

As I write this now it’s the early am hours of the 16th. Over the course of the night tonight, it dawned on me that I should figure out whether or not I should write this in terms of the night going into the next day or write on the last half of my previous work day and the first half of the current work day. Any suggestions on style and approach in this regard would be appreciated, from you my readers.
We just got underway, and yet one of my foremost thoughts is being home again. I’m looking forward to heading home a couple weeks of we pull back in, by taking another great cross-country road trip. I’m thinking about places to stop before I get home (to visit people I haven’t seen in a while) to spend a day or so, and then driving perhaps 12 hrs from that place (wherever it may be) to HOME HOME. I do want to drive straight through on both fronts, with accompanying driver(s) on the first leg (that’s looking at 36-41 hours for crossing the country, based on where I choose to go).
I finished reading On The Road (Kerouac) yesterday afternoon (during the several hours where I couldn’t sleep). Now, after I get off work, I must decide what book out of the library (my stock) to read next.
I think that I’m putting too much stuff in parentheses. I hope to be able to stop that in the near future. Hopefully, I won’t have to put so much footnote/background info alongside my words as I get deeper into this endeavor.
Reverting back over the course of the night, I haven’t done too much work, but I was productive from the get go and did get enough work done to satisfy me. As well, I still have several hours to achieve more tasks. During my lunch break, I took a nice half hour nap…because of my aforementioned lack of sleep.
I’m quite surprised that more words of mine have tumbled out of the course of the evening, and basically provided two journal entries in the course of one evening. However, I must remember that the mind is always churning and I usually have enough interesting things to say. Wham, bam, here comes another. Always remember, correspondence is great and feedback is welcome.

2004-10-15T23:50:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the Sailor's Log II! If you didn't receive The Sailor's Log two years ago, you most likely have no idea what this is! The story is, that on my first Western Pacific (WEST PAC) deployment, I was bored. I wanted some little project or entertainment to keep me busy aside from (and during) work. Thus, that journal being concocted. It was widely read and enjoyed, as well as me enjoying writing it. From that experiment, comes the sequel...a veteran sailor's second time on deployment! Enjoy!
Last night, I took care of all my errands, and last minute shopping needs necessary before I left town. Then, I went to a co-worker/friend's house for dinner to celebrate his separation from the Navy. It was a lot of fun, and we also enjoyed the company of another fellow who got out of the Navy a couple years ago. He was also in our department, and moved back home to New York post-Navy. Due to having friends in the area, and job possibilities, he decided to return this summer to the Seattle/Everett area. I was glad to see him last night, since it was the first chance I had to meet up with him since he's been back around. After dinner, I met up with a local guy that I connected with through friends back home, and followed him to his parents’ house to park my car for the length of the deployment.
Today was our first day underway, after pulling out of Everett. I started the day off by not getting a lot of sleep. I woke up quite early just because it happened, and got out of bed at about 6:20. I got my dress uniform out of its perch and proceeded to iron it and dress. I was a participant in the "Manning The Rails" ceremony this morning as we pulled out. This entails putting on our dress uniform, going up to the flight deck, and standing around the edge of the flight deck as we pull out of port. It lasts for about 1-1.5 hrs in normal circumstances. This morning, it was so very COLD and hard to take. After that, I was required to participate in Happy Hour. For you novice readers, happy hour is an hour set aside in our day solely for cleaning the ship.
As is my preference, I was designated to be on the night crew for this deployment. This means that I work from 7 at night until 8:30 the following morning. So, after returning to the office after happy hour, I just had to have a little pow-wow with my co-workers and then I was free to go. I, however, had an agenda. I received my absentee ballot (for my first time voting!!) a week or so ago, and I decided that I need to send it out this weekend. I wanted to look online at the presidential candidates websites, and decide today who I wished to vote for. The other (local) offices, I will decide on over the weekend, and mail in my ballot on Sunday or Monday. After this browsing, thinking, etc...I went to bed to wake up about 6 hrs later to get ready for work again. That's all for now. Stay tuned for my next entry tomorrow. Have a good weekend all!