For the past 3 weeks, I have been at SERE school. It sucked in some ways, and was awesome in others. I killed a rabbit and it tasted amazing. I hate the cold. Getting hit in the face sucks ass. That's about all I have to say :P
As a reward to myself for finishing SERE, I got my hair cut, my legs and eyebrows waxed, and a pedicure today. On Friday I'll be getting my hair highlighted and my nails done. Sometime this week I should be getting a back massage, but I have to talk to my friend and see if she's scheduling us appointments or not.
I also bought Final Fantasy XIII today. The graphics are amazing, but I'm still waiting for the story to make some sense (I just started it though, so I'll hold off on getting too critical until I've played for a while longer). I also blew through $700 on home theater speakers :p I bought a Bose center, and two Polk Audio fronts (a couple of tall floorstanding speakers). The sound difference between these speakers and my TV without any is incredible. Eventually I'd like to complete the set with two rear speakers, but I'm going to have to upgrade my receiver in order to have anough power, and adding more is out of my budget right now anyway. I have to keep some money in the bank to finish paying off my credit card bill, heh (plus I apparently fudged up my taxes a little bit, so I have to make sure I have a few hundred spare in case I owe a little bit back after making the adjustments).
I'm on hold now until sometime in May - my estimated flight start date is between April 21 and May 29 :P I have leave set up for a week in mid-April; otherwise I'm just hanging out here. I'm on SERE detail, which is pretty much the best detail to get stuck on. All I have to do is sit at a desk one day a week during normal work hours, during which time I can read, study, or pretty much whatever I feel like. In return, I don't have to go to formation at all while I'm on hold. I still have to do PT, obviously, but we just started a new PT incentives program, which means that I only have to show up MWF (which is awesome, because MW are run days, which I need to improve anyway, and F is sports day, which means I get to either sham at Ultimate Frisbee or go run if I feel like it). Basically, life is awesome right now. Hopefully my brother will be able to make a trip up here soon, and I can get my ferret, which will just make things even cooler. I'm even buying a dining table, finally! (6 by 3.5 ft, solid oak :) ).
Aaanyway. I'll have to take a snapshot of my hair once it's done :) Other than that, not much happening. Sham city!
Showing posts with label apartment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label apartment. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
It's Been a While...
I have a post that I really want to make right now, but since I haven't updated since before Thanksgiving, I'll give an update on life first.
First off, my Thanksgiving pass reappeared. Apparently our Company (or our Battalion) is disorganized enough that it assigns people to extra details without bothering to finish going through pass and leave forms for upcoming holidays, and it doesn't really track where those forms are at during the approval process. This leads to passes disappearing (as fa as the Company is concerned) while they're being approved at Battalion, which in turn leads to a lot of distress on the part of the unfortunate brand new lieutenants who don't know any better. A.k.a. me. Hopefully, when the time comes to write an end-of-course memorandum next week discussing the various shortcomings (and good things) about life in DCo, I'll remember to make some sort of fuss about better leave and pass tracking.
That aside, Thanksgiving was okay, as was Christmas. I'm used to living by myself now though, so shared living arrangements really bother me. I also love my family a great deal, and enjoy visiting my extended family in Michigan, but I think I've (finally?) grown up and grown past the need to be with my parents and my family on a regular basis. That's not to say that i don't ever want to visit them all, but I'm happy having my own life now, and truth be told, I can only really handle being around the rest of the family for a limited time. I've read and heard that that's how most adults feel when returning home; whatever, that's the way it feels for me. I don't know that I speak with my dad any more often now that I'm off living my own life (and college did not count), but I talked to him on a fairly regular basis in college anyway. Granted, he generally has to call me, but I've always been that way with everyone in my family (which is a large part of what I'll discuss in my next post). I do talk to my mom a lot more often, and I frequently call her instead of the other way aound, which is a change for me. I also talk to my older brother on a somewhat regular basis, but i'll talk more about that in the next post too.
Christmas itself: my mom flew to Michigan this year, so I got to stay there for the entire break instead of flying out to Colorado on Christmas day; that also meant that I got to visit with my mom's side of the family for a little over a week, which I don't ever get to do (I typically only see them for a day or for lunch if at all). I did not, however, get to see my mom's stepmother, who has always been "my grandmother" in the same way that all of my other grandparents have been "mine." I'm actually a bit upset still over the reasons we didn't see her, since it was an unpleasant bit of drama and I truly would have liked to have seen her, even if she didn't seem particularly interested in seeing any of us (but she felt snubbed for reasons that I won't go into, so I don't think it's entirely her fault - which is why I've pretty much held my tongue to the rest of my family about it, since I know I'll probably get a little bitchy about it if I say anything, and nobody really deserves that).
Anyway, I'm back at Fort Rucker (obviously I suppose), and only have a week and a couple of (extremely easy and short) days away from being finished with BOLC III/JOPD/A Bunch of Stuff That I'll Probably Forget by the Time I Finish with Flight School. Then I start SERE school on 15FEB, and then I'm probably looking at a 1-3 month hold before starting "actual" flight school (which is good, since it gives me time to memorize the parts of the flight manual that I kave to know).
On a more personal note, I'm not sure I still have a boyfriend (if I ever really had one), and if I'm bothered by that fact, it's only because I don't know for sure, and would like "closure" if that's the case. The story of my dating experience:
-He asked me out to dinner after a strange conversation on Halloween. Due to the nature of the situation, I was pretty sure he was not my boyfriend.
-We go out again, at which point I supposed he probably was my boyfriend.
-We went out to eat a handful of other times and made out from time to time.
-We didn't "technically" have sex... depending on your definition of sex, I suppose. But we went far enough along for me to decide that i'm not comfortable with it, in hindsight. I never said anything after the fact, because I was fine with it during the fact (what hormone-induced idiot wouldn't be?), and it hasn;t really come up again since then.
-Although our mutual friends may have known something was going on, we never actually did any "couple-y" things in front of them... and I don't know if that was because he didn't want people knowing he was "with" me or because he thought I didn't want people to know or because it just never really came up. It still bugs me a little, but I didn't say anything so it's my own fault if I've got a problem with it. Especially since I don't know if I do want everyone knowing.
-Then we left for Winter Exodus, and he went to SERE school immediately on return. Cue 3 weeks of no contact, which didn't bother me in the slightest.
He's back now, and I haven't received the texts and calls and unannounced visits (which actually really piss me off...) that I was expecting. He also didn't kiss me or anything when we drove back from Montgomery together after Exodus, or when I drove him home this past Sunday after a mutual friend's son's first birthday party. Maybe he's just waiting until the weekend, or maybe I've given off some kind of signal that we're done, or maybe the three weeks (well, 3 weeks plus Exodus) apart did what I'm too chicken to do (because dating, even if it's not-dating, a friend is pretty damned awkward when you're debating breaking up and you have all the same mutual friends and have to work together for quite a while before being sent into the "real Army"... at which point we'll see each other again frequently anyway, because Aviation is a very small community).
Long story short, I'm a little confused about the whole thing, probably not helped by the fact that I've never dated anyone before (and never really kissed anyone before, or made out with anyone before, or did anything else remotely sexual with before), and I rather wish that I hadn't bothered "dating" (or not-dating, whichever...) the guy after all. Blah.
Apart from that, not much going on personally. I'm getting myself a ferret after I return from SERE, and my older brother is going to drive up from Florida to help me move the ferret in and in general just hang out (and bring me a lot of smoked pulled pork). I'm really looking forward to having a pet :) I want a dog, but I know I won't have the time for one during flight school, and moving with one will be really difficult once I finish. Ferrets aren't as low-maintenance as a fish or something, but they sleep a lot during the day, and don't need the same amount of space that a dog would. I'm also not allergic to them like I am to cats, so they're pretty much the ideal pet for me right now. I know emotion doesn't translate well through digital means, but I am SOOOOO excited to be getting a pet!!
Aaanyway. That's it I guess. Time to post this and then start on the next (somewhat disturning) post :p
OH! My car is FUCKING UP. I almost forgot that! My speedometer swings back and forth - not constantly, but nearly every time I drive now, worse in the cold it seems, and enough that I have no idea how fast I'm going when it happens, unless I have my GPS on. The dealership basically told me "tough shit", since they'll have to take apart the electronics to go through all of the wiring to try and fix it, which I don't have the time (or really the money) for. Especially since the mechanic on post says it's probably an instrument cluster problem, and I should try finding one at a junk yard and replacing it before going through the wiring. I have absolutely no idea where a junkyard is here in Alabama, but maybe I can get my brother to find one in Florida and bring it up after SERE, since he's way more car-savvy than me anyway. Blah again.
The end for real this time.
First off, my Thanksgiving pass reappeared. Apparently our Company (or our Battalion) is disorganized enough that it assigns people to extra details without bothering to finish going through pass and leave forms for upcoming holidays, and it doesn't really track where those forms are at during the approval process. This leads to passes disappearing (as fa as the Company is concerned) while they're being approved at Battalion, which in turn leads to a lot of distress on the part of the unfortunate brand new lieutenants who don't know any better. A.k.a. me. Hopefully, when the time comes to write an end-of-course memorandum next week discussing the various shortcomings (and good things) about life in DCo, I'll remember to make some sort of fuss about better leave and pass tracking.
That aside, Thanksgiving was okay, as was Christmas. I'm used to living by myself now though, so shared living arrangements really bother me. I also love my family a great deal, and enjoy visiting my extended family in Michigan, but I think I've (finally?) grown up and grown past the need to be with my parents and my family on a regular basis. That's not to say that i don't ever want to visit them all, but I'm happy having my own life now, and truth be told, I can only really handle being around the rest of the family for a limited time. I've read and heard that that's how most adults feel when returning home; whatever, that's the way it feels for me. I don't know that I speak with my dad any more often now that I'm off living my own life (and college did not count), but I talked to him on a fairly regular basis in college anyway. Granted, he generally has to call me, but I've always been that way with everyone in my family (which is a large part of what I'll discuss in my next post). I do talk to my mom a lot more often, and I frequently call her instead of the other way aound, which is a change for me. I also talk to my older brother on a somewhat regular basis, but i'll talk more about that in the next post too.
Christmas itself: my mom flew to Michigan this year, so I got to stay there for the entire break instead of flying out to Colorado on Christmas day; that also meant that I got to visit with my mom's side of the family for a little over a week, which I don't ever get to do (I typically only see them for a day or for lunch if at all). I did not, however, get to see my mom's stepmother, who has always been "my grandmother" in the same way that all of my other grandparents have been "mine." I'm actually a bit upset still over the reasons we didn't see her, since it was an unpleasant bit of drama and I truly would have liked to have seen her, even if she didn't seem particularly interested in seeing any of us (but she felt snubbed for reasons that I won't go into, so I don't think it's entirely her fault - which is why I've pretty much held my tongue to the rest of my family about it, since I know I'll probably get a little bitchy about it if I say anything, and nobody really deserves that).
Anyway, I'm back at Fort Rucker (obviously I suppose), and only have a week and a couple of (extremely easy and short) days away from being finished with BOLC III/JOPD/A Bunch of Stuff That I'll Probably Forget by the Time I Finish with Flight School. Then I start SERE school on 15FEB, and then I'm probably looking at a 1-3 month hold before starting "actual" flight school (which is good, since it gives me time to memorize the parts of the flight manual that I kave to know).
On a more personal note, I'm not sure I still have a boyfriend (if I ever really had one), and if I'm bothered by that fact, it's only because I don't know for sure, and would like "closure" if that's the case. The story of my dating experience:
-He asked me out to dinner after a strange conversation on Halloween. Due to the nature of the situation, I was pretty sure he was not my boyfriend.
-We go out again, at which point I supposed he probably was my boyfriend.
-We went out to eat a handful of other times and made out from time to time.
-We didn't "technically" have sex... depending on your definition of sex, I suppose. But we went far enough along for me to decide that i'm not comfortable with it, in hindsight. I never said anything after the fact, because I was fine with it during the fact (what hormone-induced idiot wouldn't be?), and it hasn;t really come up again since then.
-Although our mutual friends may have known something was going on, we never actually did any "couple-y" things in front of them... and I don't know if that was because he didn't want people knowing he was "with" me or because he thought I didn't want people to know or because it just never really came up. It still bugs me a little, but I didn't say anything so it's my own fault if I've got a problem with it. Especially since I don't know if I do want everyone knowing.
-Then we left for Winter Exodus, and he went to SERE school immediately on return. Cue 3 weeks of no contact, which didn't bother me in the slightest.
He's back now, and I haven't received the texts and calls and unannounced visits (which actually really piss me off...) that I was expecting. He also didn't kiss me or anything when we drove back from Montgomery together after Exodus, or when I drove him home this past Sunday after a mutual friend's son's first birthday party. Maybe he's just waiting until the weekend, or maybe I've given off some kind of signal that we're done, or maybe the three weeks (well, 3 weeks plus Exodus) apart did what I'm too chicken to do (because dating, even if it's not-dating, a friend is pretty damned awkward when you're debating breaking up and you have all the same mutual friends and have to work together for quite a while before being sent into the "real Army"... at which point we'll see each other again frequently anyway, because Aviation is a very small community).
Long story short, I'm a little confused about the whole thing, probably not helped by the fact that I've never dated anyone before (and never really kissed anyone before, or made out with anyone before, or did anything else remotely sexual with before), and I rather wish that I hadn't bothered "dating" (or not-dating, whichever...) the guy after all. Blah.
Apart from that, not much going on personally. I'm getting myself a ferret after I return from SERE, and my older brother is going to drive up from Florida to help me move the ferret in and in general just hang out (and bring me a lot of smoked pulled pork). I'm really looking forward to having a pet :) I want a dog, but I know I won't have the time for one during flight school, and moving with one will be really difficult once I finish. Ferrets aren't as low-maintenance as a fish or something, but they sleep a lot during the day, and don't need the same amount of space that a dog would. I'm also not allergic to them like I am to cats, so they're pretty much the ideal pet for me right now. I know emotion doesn't translate well through digital means, but I am SOOOOO excited to be getting a pet!!
Aaanyway. That's it I guess. Time to post this and then start on the next (somewhat disturning) post :p
OH! My car is FUCKING UP. I almost forgot that! My speedometer swings back and forth - not constantly, but nearly every time I drive now, worse in the cold it seems, and enough that I have no idea how fast I'm going when it happens, unless I have my GPS on. The dealership basically told me "tough shit", since they'll have to take apart the electronics to go through all of the wiring to try and fix it, which I don't have the time (or really the money) for. Especially since the mechanic on post says it's probably an instrument cluster problem, and I should try finding one at a junk yard and replacing it before going through the wiring. I have absolutely no idea where a junkyard is here in Alabama, but maybe I can get my brother to find one in Florida and bring it up after SERE, since he's way more car-savvy than me anyway. Blah again.
The end for real this time.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Mother Rucker
So, yeah, I obviously didn't post about my weekend in Naperville. Not because it was a bad weekend or anything, but because I simply got too lazy to bother posting.
So, we'll start with Naperville. It was an ok weekend. Got to see my mom and two of my brothers (yeah, I have four of them :p). My older brother adopted a new puppy (who was sick and skin and bones then but is healthy and apparently doubled in size as of her vet visit a day ago :p), and she is absolutely adorable. Her photo is the one up at the top. The next two are Charlie (my brother's first dog, and a complete daddy's boy) and Kit (one of my mom's two dogs, and a complete momma's boy :p). I do wish that the weekend had been longer, or that it hadn't been a competition weekend (aka a "work" weekend for my mom). Didn't get to hang out and have some quality mother-daughter time like I was hoping :-/
Anyway... the last couple weeks of Fort Sham passed by pretty much the same way as the rest of the time there - easy and boring, for the most part. I'm still not active duty according to the Army database, and apparently that was a big enough fuckup that it had to be sent to the DA to be fixed *sigh*
So, we'll start with Naperville. It was an ok weekend. Got to see my mom and two of my brothers (yeah, I have four of them :p). My older brother adopted a new puppy (who was sick and skin and bones then but is healthy and apparently doubled in size as of her vet visit a day ago :p), and she is absolutely adorable. Her photo is the one up at the top. The next two are Charlie (my brother's first dog, and a complete daddy's boy) and Kit (one of my mom's two dogs, and a complete momma's boy :p). I do wish that the weekend had been longer, or that it hadn't been a competition weekend (aka a "work" weekend for my mom). Didn't get to hang out and have some quality mother-daughter time like I was hoping :-/
Anyway... the last couple weeks of Fort Sham passed by pretty much the same way as the rest of the time there - easy and boring, for the most part. I'm still not active duty according to the Army database, and apparently that was a big enough fuckup that it had to be sent to the DA to be fixed *sigh*
Oh well, at least BOLC III is over... now on to my real BOLC III! That's right folks, I have (finally) arrived at Fort Rucker. I have my own apartment here (2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, all to myself), which is nice except now I actually have to grow up and pay bills :( And buy furniture, which is a hell of a lot more expensive than I'd expected... Thus far my life has consisted of PT in the morning (which lasts from the 0615 formation until around 0700... what a joke...) and inprocessing. Now I have Permissive TDY (PTDY) starting after PT Monday, which means 10 days of not having to do anything and still getting paid! So I'm going to stay here long enough for my internet to be hooked up Monday (I'm hijacking a neighbor's right now) and for my furniture to be set up Tuesday, and then I'm headed home until the 6th.
In other exciting news, apparently I'm entitled to BAH (housing pay) for part of the time I was at Fort Sam, which means my paycheck next Weds. will have an extra $700 tacked onto it... plus the $719 for this next month's housing that I haven't been drawing yet. In short, the paycheck will be double what I usually make :) Additionally, my travel voucher will wind up being approximately $2000, which I should be getting deposited to my bank account towards the end of this upcoming week. Hallelujah for paying off the credit card (which I pretty much maxed out to buy furniture) and restocking my checking account (which I wiped out paying rent and buying groceries and curtains). Yes, I bought curtains. I bought blackout curtains, which I fully expect to lower the cost of my electricity bills, so no need for "housewife" jokes, thanks :p
And while I'm speaking about decorating my house, check out the paintings I bought in New Orleans to hang on my walls!
I was going to paint the walls too, but then I discovered how expensive paint is, and I decided that it wasn't worth it for a year-and-a-half-long stay. Instead of painting, I'm probably just going to invest in some comfy throw rugs that match the curtains (which match the paintings). Yes, I picked different rooms for the paintings so that I could color-coordinate curtains and such. I like art and like things matching, so sue me :p
OH, and in case anyone is curious about the oils, the lady's website is here: http://raganarts.com/RaganArts/Ragan_Arts.html
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