First Week Night Check

It's Saturday June 22nd. My duty weekend- its like a work weekend, they are always very relaxing- save a lot of money on these weekends LOL! So night check has been going pretty well. Learning a lot, and meeting a lot of people. Its very relaxing, and the worst thing we do is like wash jets, which isnt even that bad. At least so far lol. We have a lot of down time, thus i can work on my qualifications to becoming a Plane Captain. When a person enters a squadron for the first time their life flows like this- trainees- learning everything getting 5 qualifications before they can start learning about becoming a Plane Captain- A person who launches the jet and make sure it is good to go before take off. Once they become a Plane Captain, and have all the quals for that, they hang out and train others for a little bit, work on getting their warfare pin "wings"- which is the wings that you see people wear on their shirts, giving them a lot of general knowledge about the navy. Once they get PC, and their wings, they can be transferred to "the shop"- which is doing what they came in the navy to do. My profession would be learning how to work on the engines, and fix them if need be. That is kind of the end all/ be all. Along the way a person would go to A school (already did that), then they have a C school- which i have yet to attend. C school goes in depth on the kind of jets i will be working on, and will help with my knowledge once i get to the shop. So out of the 5 qualifications, i have 2 so far. Just got a new qualification on thursday called break rider. It is the person who sits in the cock pit when moving a jet in case something happens and someone needs to apply the breaks. Got 100% on the test, and felt really good getting that qual. Next up is move director- which is the person who directs the aircraft around when the team is moving the jet to a different spot. Should be a pretty easy qual to get to. And im well on my way. It usually takes about 9-16 months to become a Plane Captain. but the quickest a person can do it is in 4 months. I hope to be a person who finishes sooner rather than later.
New news lol: Anderson got a car today, so that means we can finally do stuff rather than worrying about a taxi, or a non reliable person/ rent-a-car!!! woohoo!! it was 20 bucks to the movies each way in the cab we took the other night, way too much money. And now we have a ride to the campsite for the 4th of July. So things are looking very promising. I have also been having mixed feelings about my early promotion to an E4. It has been a struggle back and forth in my mind on what i should do, and i kind of had an epiphany this week. A little sad- but my reasoning for not taking it would be to get out a year earlier. And my mind at this point was thinking everything would be the same when i returned home. All my friends would still be there, everyone would be the same, and the partying would be the same as well. I then thought to myself that i am barely going to see any of my friends from home anymore, maybe a couple times a year for a week at a time, but things are going to be different. People are going to move away/ move in together/ not be partying hardcore anymore- whether it be 4 years from meow, or 5. Then i thought i was under estimating myself by not taking the promotion, cuz i worked hard for it in A school. And a lot of people take like 2 or 3 years to become an E4, and i could get it less than a year in the navy. I would start getting paid 200 bucks more a month starting in November. rather than waiting like 7-10 months to start getting paid, if i even got picked to get promoted. Once i become an E4, i only have to wait a year to become an E5 and take the test. And with E4 and E5 comes BAH, which is money for houseing. So i could move out and get a house/apartment, and the navy would pay for it. So for an extra year, knowing that things will in no way be the same when i go home again, the benefits seem to be outweighing the non-benefits. It was just really rough realizing that things wouldnt be the same in 4-5 years, and i didnt want to let that go, but the reality is that i need to do what is right for me, and that benefits me. Once i let that go, and start enjoying this new lifestyle that i have, anything can happen. And once i get my jeep down here, life is only going to get better. But i mean i still got couple of months to think about it.Honestly i think it would be stupid not to take it. More respect, more money, more leadership, and a chance at quicker advancement that most people can only dream of. I dont want to sell myself short here. Gotta adapt and move on. But heck- still gonna be awesome when i do come home and visit my friends :) And i always have Dave in LA out here.... always a great friend to get drunk with.
Just a quick little blurb about my fitness- still going really well. Been here a month so far, been to the gym everyday cept for thursdays, which is my day off. This is going great, i love it. Also watched a movie called Food Matters, which in turn made me think differently about vitemans and food in general. So what did i do? Went out to GNC and bought some Daily Mens Vitemans, which also included some Superfood vitemans that are really good for your health, and fitness/recovery/muscle building. Salesman sure did a good job on that. But it was just interesting to note that most medicine these days try to focus on one aspect of a disease, when really we need to start with ourselves. Our body has a natural defense system, which if used properly can fight off any disease. We toxify our bodies with terrible food, and get all these diseases, which can be cured by superfoods and simple vitemans. But no one wants to endorse this subject because there is no money making in giving people vitemans- its such a simple concept. A pill for every ill- its just a temporary patch to the diseases people get. Where as vitemans give the body antioxidents that help fix the problem, and cure disease rather than patching it over with certain doses a week, and then upping the dosage. It makes so much sense to start from within work on your own immune system, cuz your body has an amazing defense system, but i cant be used with all these toxins. These doctors and health companies are out for money, and we give them that money by getting prescriptions, and medications that may or may not work for a certain period of time. They discourage vitemans cuz they would lose money cuz it works better than anything they could prescribe. Watch the movie- it makes so much sense. Its on netflix lol.

Night Check/ Life thoughts

Alright so Monday night comes, already had a great day so far. Took a nap till about 2:30pm. Got ready for work, and was there by like 3:15pm. immediatly started launching jets, and recovering them per usual, but this time i was already learning a lot of new stuff. It was nice, cuz they were going in to detail, and since i was the newest there, everyone had something to say to teach me the ways. Kinda like my own lil private lessons. So then we got a jet ready to be washed, started washing it, recovered my jets. It started getting dark out, and the runways lit up, pretty dang cool. and when the jets take off, you can see there after burner, which turns out to be a flourescent blue. So cool to see all this stuff happening, and you dont have the heat of the midday sun as well. Then it was time to take some fuel samples from the jets, cept when i did it, it went horribly wrong. I stuck the pin in, got a sample, but the valve never closed. It was this little hole that was spraying fuel everywhere. I yelled to my friend to help and he tried to as well, but couldnt get it to shut, i ended up running in the shop and getting some more help. after about 4 people trying, we got it shut, with a lot of fuel on the ground lol. What a great way to start off my night shift experience! Then we had to fuel some jets, met a nice old guy there who was in the navy 20 years!! talked to him a lot, and kinda just hung out. Night check is a lot more laid back than days. Its so nice, but we know what needs to get done, and when, so it works out. Got back around 2am, took a shower and passed out. Woke up a like 830am. Got myself a coffee (iced of course), and bought some yogurt. Then i went to the gym. Cept today, one of the first days i did not feel up to par with running. My joints were a little sore, and running just wasnt my cup of tea. I still ran, but then i walked a little more but i raised the elevation, so it was like i was walking up a hill. Then out of no where, i see a rowing machine. Rowing machines and I used to go way back, in londonderry. I immediatly got super excited and went on to rowing for 10 minutes. Ive read this before, but I guess your body eventually gets used to the types of work outs youre doing, and you need to try new ones to trick your body. Well that is exactly what i did. I am super excited to start this new journey with rowing. Its a pretty good workout too!
Life thoughts: Okay so here are just some random thoughts that i would like to remember and jot down, in case i forget about upcoming events/ long term goals.
Ive been here a month so far, havent missed a gym day cept for my 1 day off a week, which is usually thursdays. May have quit juicing, but i feel like im in the best shape of my life, and getting there.
Bought new sunglasses for $5, and had a silver sharpie from bootcamp, gained like $150.

I dont know if you can see it, but in the upper left hand corner of the screen, i wrote rayban, makes me feel rich without spending the money LOL! cheap i know, but who has to know?

I am enjoying my time here in the Navy, meeting new people, and having new experiences. Working on myself and trying to be a better person.

Yes, the navy is not for everyone, but as of right now, i would like to get out after my 4 years. I know ive only been in 6 months, but theres a lot of things i would love to do on my own time.

I spoke with Tom Bever, asked him about the Appalachian trail, said i would need about 4-5k, to do the whole trip. And then he asked me if i wanted to do the pacific crest trail, same thing just on the west coast. I was extremely happy and said yes. Hopefully that can follow through, but that, again is 3 and a half years away. I asked him if he would wait for me, he said he needed to get a job to get more money to do his next trail. So yeah, that does sound like a pretty good plan.

Long term goals i would like to accomplish while in the navy- pay off my student loans, save money for that hike, save enough money for 6 months of rent for when i get out to fall back on while looking for a job. Use my GI bill for a private pilots license, all the way through to a commercial pilots license. Maybe become a pilot when i get out? Not too sure about anything at this point in time, but i still think that would be pretty cool. Work at an airport, or get a job as a police officer, endless oppertunities with the resume im building hopefully. I have thought about getting a lift kit on my jeep- only cuz every person here who owns a jeep has it lifted pretty high. Going cost would be around like 1200 total or more. I thought about it long and hard, and yeah it would be pretty nice, but i dont think i neeeeeeed that right meow. Could use that money on a lot of different things.

Cross country trip with Paps- Come home for a friday morning, party it up friday night and saturday night. Then get on the road by sunday. Some places that i would like to see would be niagra falls, even if we jsut swing by these places i would be happy, texas, colorado (maybe visit jared), Grand Canyon, Las vegas, and some redwood forests. There might be more that i think of later, but these seem on the way, and a great idea. Things i would need to bring are: skis, and boots, winter gear, def.

I found out yesterday that active duty persons get free skiing, lessons, gear at all national parks in california. So instead of getting a season pass somewhere, all we would have to pay is for lodging near the national park. Anderson thinks thats a great idea, and i think that would be awesome. Sweet POW.

But yeah, these are the long term goals of what i wanna do whilst in the navy, alls subject to change lol, but still wanna know what i was thinking when i read this in a couple months/ years from meow. Keep up the good work.

Six Flags/Weekend of the 15th

Vrooooooooooooooooooooooom! Fast forward a week i guess? I have barely had time to get on this thing, but i couldnt wait too long to do my next blog. So here we go. The rest of last week went well. Friday we had off- so Anderson and I, and another work friend went to six flags. Picked up the rental car that morning at 9am. Then we had about a 2.5 hour drive to the LA area. We were basically swerving in and out of mountains the whole time. Pretty neat. We get to six flags, and we start hitting up a bunch of coasters. Waiting in line stinks, but it was only like 20-30 minute waits. Then we came to the two rides i really wanted to go on. The sling shot, and a freefall one. They sling shot looked like this:

You just sit in a chair and they sling shot you like 200ft up in the air. That was a ton of fun!! When we were done with that, they couldnt get the shoulder harnesses off of us, so we got to go on again for free. This was 30 dollars for two people, so there was no line. It was such a rush. The other awesome one was the free fall, where you are attached to a cable, and you control when you drop, and you swing back and forth. Kinda like a huge swing, cept at 150ft in the air. Just the adrenaline rush i was looking for! We continued to own all the rides in the park, and eventually stopped for some ice cream from coldstone.

So around closing time we hit up our last ride called X2. Man was that such a great ride to end on. especially at night, and you literally had no idea what was going to happen next. Gave us a real boost for the ride home. So we got in the car around 10pm, and everything was going swimmingly until we hit some traffic. Probably got stuck in like 45 minutes worth of traffic. Found out it was an auto accident, but we ended up making it home by 2am.

Pass out and return the car in the morning. Went to the gym- which might i add i am making great gains at the gym. Been running super fast miles- im talking 6:15 miles, and 10:00 mile and a half, which is my all time best. Its been feeling really good lately, and my ability to resist more weight has increased as well. its awesome. So then i went to the pool. Brought a book, and got a lil sleepy. Ended up falling asleep for a good time. Meow im burnt to a crisp, but honestly look really really really really good. Itll fade to tanness, and my Portuguese will come out :) Then on sunday i had quite the relaxing day, didnt do much. Oh yeah! got a notice on my door that i needed to switch rooms ( down the hall ) cuz my roommate got promoted, and at that rate, you get to have your own room. So i moved most of my stuff out that night, and finished up in the morning. Got a lot done on monday morning, cuz, well night check started!

Sunday 6/9 -Tues. 6/11 pool/getoutofjailfree/watch

Sunday morning comes quick, wake up go to the gym, feeling great. And it is a beautiful day out, so i thought what better way to spend it then go to the water park on base. This thing was pretty cool. 3 dollars to get in, and guess who i saw there? Anderson! We really like the same things, its weird. So i jumped in the pool, tried jumping off one of the professional diving boards, but i almost ended up hurting myself. Then i went down the really fast slide, that kinda just went straight down. It was super fast, i yelled while going down without even knowing it. It was over in like 2 seconds. Then i went up again and went down the boring curvy slide. There was never a line for the steep slide cuz everyone was too scared to go on it. After that, i just laid out for a bit, went back home and watched some more office. Time to get ready for the week. Only gonna be a 4 day week, pretty pumped about it, but still didnt realllllly wanna go to work. Both monday and tuesday were very busy, like non stop work of fueling jets, bringing them in, moving them around, inspecting them, etc. Busy days kinda go by fast too, which is always a good thing.
Update: i have given up on juicing by this point. I am going to stick to eating healthy and "colorful" though. Its just a lot harder than what the movie put it out to be. Id like to see that guy clean out his juice every fricken time he uses it. It takes forever, and its annoying. Takes like a half hour of my time, and i just want to relax, and i barely have time for myself. So by cutting that time to make the juice, and clean it, it gives me an extra like 45 minutes to an hour of free time. More time at the gym, and more time to relax instead of stress out about stupid stuff.
Still trying to cut weight, but ive been going up quite a lot on how much i can lift during different exercises. Its exciting. So Anderson and i were talking on monday about our long weekend, and what we were going to do this weekend, if anything. She suggested a theme park, so i did some research, and theres like a 6 flags 2 hours away, so i asked her if she wanted to go, and she said she would love to. Just gotta rent a car, for that day (rentacar is on base) and the tickets only 40 bucks. So were gonna go friday, hopefully it wont be as crowded as a weekend, but were both very excited. something to look forward to.
Tuesday was a huge day over all. As you all know, i got into the accelerated advancement program through A school. Honor student in their class gets to get promoted to the next level after 6 months of probation. While everyone else has to take a test in septemeber or march, pass, and then be selected to get promoted. So the chances are against you for going the normal way, unless you score pretty high. I got the easy way "push button e4" But agreeing to this it adds another year to your contract. I signed that in A school, at the time thinking it was a very good idea, and kinda bragging to everyone that i would be an e4 alot earlier than most people and get paid more. The more i thought about it, the worse it got. Another year in the navy- something i didnt even know if i would like or not? Heck i didnt even know what i was doing when i joined the navy. I dno if this is made for me (right moew i sure dont). but im still loving it, making the best of it, and gaining so much experience and oppertunity. I love new stuff, and learning new things and meeting new people. But adding an extra year on to this what seems prison sentence- just doesnt seem worth it anymore. Thats when a buddy of mine told me that i can still deny the paperwork since i didnt get promoted yet. It opened my eyes, and made me the happiest kid in the shop. i went and spoke with admin to see if he was right, and they only made me happier, cuz they said i still have to apply for the approval of getting promoted. So as long as i dont do anything, the extra year wont be added on. Its like getting out of jail a year early (kinda). But i mean saying i only have 3 1/2 years left instead of 4 1/2 years sounds so much better, adn makes me a lot happier. I mean heck, there is still so much i want to do with my life, but im being held down by the navy cuz i cant just run away and do what i want. My resume will look fantastic when i get out of here, so im not worried about finding a job. Just trying to experience life. Anyway- also found out that i will be moving to nights next week. nights here are 330pm to around 130am. Which isnt bad at all, not like my old job at least. Im pretty excited about that, meet more people, and ill be able to get quals faster cuz there are less trainees on nights than days. They have sunday night off, and i have friday off, so i got kinda an extra long weekend :) Bought the rental car today, and my 6 flag ticket. Cant wait for that!
Also got put on watch for tonight (tuesday night) midnight till 6am. Which is not bad at all cuz then i get wednesday off, and only have to go in for thursday. ill take it! just gotta hang around the hangar bay and make sure no creepers come around the jets. Thats basically it. maybe do a little reading lol. But life is looking pretty good right meow. I knew it would start to look better. just had to give it some time :) but im happy

Saturday 6/8- Sequoia National Park

Woohoo! Went to the gym early in the morning, ran a 625 mile, all time new record, i was super excited to start off the day that way. and oh yeah, they shut off the air conditioning here in the barracks, ugh. 11am comes around, and Anderson picks me up outside, and were on our way to the park! Stop at starbucks real quick to get a mocha ice coffee. The way to the park is just a straight line east of where we were, so it was very easy to get to. All the crop land slowely started to turn into trees and forests. And right before we hit the park, there was a huge lake surrounded by mountains, it was beautiful.

Once we went past the lake, we started on our curvy adventure of going through the national park. very nice people there, and the first thing we saw was a huge boulder!! lolz

After that we were driving along the mountain sides, through loops and U turns, and it was getting quite nauseating going up. We were at like 6000 feet going up these mountains. We drive for like 20 minutes or a half hour, and get to the entrance of the sequoia forest.

   

Just four huge trees marking the entrance to the forest, it was amazing. Even got to hug one of them. These pictures do not do it justice. So we keep driving along Oooing and Aaaing at the trees we pass by. Then we get to the General Sherman tree. The largest living tree in the world? didnt seem THAT big, but what they meant was the volume of the base had the most wood in it, than any other. nice.

   

This was also at 7000 feet. I thought it was a little hard to breathe, but there were a lot of people hanging out there too. From there we decided to drive further and check out the visitor center/ gift shop area. Bought a t shirt, and some trail mix lol. also saw a bear!!

Anderson really wanted to see some waterfalls, and on the map there was a river near us, so we asked the help desk where the waterfalls would be, they said it was a 1.7 mile hike out to the nearest ones. We were so down to do that. We strapped on our camelbacks, and headed into the woods. We talked to people on the way there that were coming back, and they said they saw bears, i didnt want to get my hopes up, but from then on out, i kept my eyes out..

We turned a corner and what did i see?!?!

A deer!! i know its hard to see in that pic, but we were really close, and its standing in front of the tree. It was pretty cool to be that close to a deer. So it got my hopes up that maybe we could see a bear. We walk another like 10 minutes, and turn the corner to a bear and 2 cubs!!!

We were very scared to get too close, cuz there were cubs around, but we did make a little noise and the cubs ran up a tree, pretty dang fast too. So we just scurried along. After we saw the bears, our trip was complete, for the wild life section. We were close to the falls, we could hear it.

There they were, beautiful!! But the cool thing was, that there was a swimming hole right below the falls, and i already saw a guy down there, and i wasnt going to pass this up. aint nothing like a nice cold fresh water swimming hole at the bottom of a waterfall. I climbed down carefully, and luckily i wear basketball shorts under my regular shorts lol, used those as my bathing suit!! And i jumped on in!!

   

That was probably the most refreshing thing in the world. It felt so good to be in there, and it was pretty deep too. It was so reviatalizing, felt like i could run a marathon after being in it. Made me extremely happy, and i had to convince Anderson to jump in as well. It was such a fun time.

After we got out, we hiked on back to the parking lot, and started our journey home. We had such a fun time in the outdoors, and saw a lot of cools things. It was the most fun ive had in lemoore since i got out here. Glad to know there is another person that enjoys the outdoors as much as i do. Anderson even snowboards! So we're already making trips to go skiing some weekends in the winter. Gotta remember to bring my skis down during my road trip!! Starting to enjoy myself here. And we have next friday off so, its gonna be a good week.

Wed. 6/5- Friday 6/7

Thought I would start compacting the blogs since, mostly the same things happen everyday for the work week. This was a pretty good week. Ended up working really hard. It is a very labor intensive job, and since im new, i can find myself doing the most work outta alls the people there. Boy was it a hot week too! got up tot he 100s by the end of it, feeling real burnt. I have seemed to be straying from the juicing path, and just started yogurting, cuz juicing is a lot of hard work, i mean just cleaning the thing takes a long time too. Lot of upkeep. As long as im looking good and feeling good, i guess thats alls that matters. I took Thursday off from the gym as my off day, which was nice. Always need an off day every once and a while. But im still setting personal records at the gym for myself, so i dont feel bad. Been eating healthy too. Tons of veges, all mixed into a salad, a very colorful plate. Plus with all the labor intensiveness at work, i have been sweating a crap ton too, and it seems to be getting me into shape as well.
On friday, i started working on my break rider quals. Thats when we need to move a jet somewhere without the pilots being in the cockpit, and it has to be towed on a tractor. Well for safety precautions, a person sits in the cockpit, and is in charge of the breaks, and emergency breaks. So i was sitting up there, and it was a pretty cool experience.
Been meeting a lot of people lately too, so its nice to joke around with some kids while at work, or waiting for the planes to arrive, makes it not so tough of a job. Its amazing. All these kids that i work with can joke around all the time, but when it is time to work, boy do they work hard, and they do it right too. Work hard play hard. There has also been a rumor going around that sometime next week i will be changing to night shift. Cuz they have so many trainees on days, they need people going to nights. I heard this would be a good experience, because it is a lot slower at night, and i can personally work on all my quals without any other trainees getting in the way. The hours are 330 pm- to like around midnight. Not too bad, sunday through thursday night. Cant seem to get away from night shift jobs lol.
My friend Anderson from the shop, has a car for the weekend, she was asking anyone if they wanted to go to the sequoia national park on saturday. Surprisingly no one wanted to go, but when i got wind of it, i jumped right on it, and she was super excited. i couldnt wait!!

Tuesday 6/4- Juicing Day 10

Doing pretty well today! Woke up 1 minute before my alarm, ughh. Texted my father on the way to work to ask him about getting my jeep out here by doing a road trip. Id rather use the money that i would ship it across states to make something out of it and get experience, and see new things, and spend time with my father. What better way than to get my jeep here asap? Im surviving just great with out it, but it will be nice to have it. I can wait like another 2 and a half months. So i texted him, and he loved the idea! hes already getting very excited. The things that frighten me about it are that the navy can literally change their mind about anything at any time. But were suppose to go to another city for a week in the middle of july, so that wont interfere with anything, and were not suppose to get deployed till next year, so the only thing i have to worry about it C school, which will be like a month, but its whenever the navy can fit me in their schedule. So when they see that i request to take some leave time, they should honor that, because they are always trying to help people take leave. So i was excited. And if you leave after 4pm on a day, it doesnt count as a leave day- and if you come back before midnight on a day, it doesnt count as a leave day either. So its looking pretty good. Anyway, got in to work, and ended up getting my duct diver quals right away! they got approved and everything! Duct diving is basically making sure there is nothing in the fan blades before the engine takes off. Probably one of the easiest quals to get, but i got it!!! yayy. very good start to the day. Then we went to lunch- had more apple juice for breakfast- then only had a salad for lunch. did pretty well today. We get out at 2pm today cuz our command has PT together at 330, so that will help out if im in a time crunch. Cuz i love to PT :) But yeah, gotta run to the market, get some fresh apples and strawberries, then probs watch some more office, but thats pretty much it for the day.
Woke up feeling really good. Checked out myself in the mirror- and just smiled. Ill weigh myself today to get a 10 day count. Hopefully its a good number. Tomorrows hump day!! woohoo. Gotta research some stops for my road trip too. Maybe ill save that for the weekend though. hmmm

Oh- and some bungee jumping places have wieght limits- like 225 max. Which is even MORE inspiration for me to lose weight.

Monday 6/3- Juicing Day 9

Alright! Woke up on time this morning. Had some fresh apple juice with strawberrys, and i was off to work!! Excited to get to interact with people, and get some more qualifications done. Suppose to be like 96 today, gonna be like this all week!! ahhh. Whatevs, i found out we could take off our blouses, and just have our t shirts on = one heck of a farmers tan. But its still tan lol. So we sent off a couple jets early in the morning, looks like it was gonna be an easy day. I had one more big project to catch up on paperwork wise, so i walked over to the ID building to get my email address set up. The lady was so nice, and they had free lollipops, so i grabbed a tootsie roll one, it was really, really good. After about an hour and a half of taking care of that, it was time to go to eat. Went to eat, had some salad, and a little bit of fresh roast beef, just a lil bit. After that it was back to work for a little bit. I could really feel myself getting burnt.

Then work was finally winding down for the day, and it went by pretty fast. Exciting. As i got my ride home from my friend from work, i started to ponder about my jeep, and how it would be really nice to have it here. Then for kicks and giggles, i logged on to my account to see how many days of leace i had built up. it was at 5.5. I started thinking about how to get my jeep out here, and wondered if my father would want to drive it out here with me if i came home for a little bit. My mind started going crazy- and heres my perfect view of how it would go down. Go home in like mid august. leave thursday night, get back to londonderry around friday morning. Sleep alls day party by night, maybe pooplex?!?! lol, then party all night saturday as well. Wake up and get on the road heading to cali. I would have 8 days to get to fresno, in which my leave would be up. So we would journey maybe swing by scranton, PA for the office tour. The big places i really wanted to hit up would be there, Texas, the grand canyon, las vegas and the red wood forest in san fran. I want enough time to hang out at these places for at least a little bit, have a nice sit down meal around there. I researched some bungee jumping sites near the grand canyon, they even have some in las vegas. But i would def wanna do that, maybe get father to do it too lol. But brother said it took him 5 days, 4 nights to get to san diego, should give my like 3 days to play with, 2 max. that way we can take our time, and enjoy our sites. So ill ask my father and see if he approves. Then gotta get it approved by the navy too. ughghh such a process!

Sunday 6/2- Juicing Day 8

Decided to sleep in today. Well actually woke up round 9, watched two episodes of the office, then fell back asleep till 12, so i was having a lazy day. Went to lunch- had a salad. Pretty much decided i was going to only juice during the week, cuz i have less time to think during the week, its usually just go go go, and my mind is always thinking about something, so i figured id juice during the week, breakfast, salad with juice for lunch, and then a yogurt for dinner. I mean, i see this stuff is working so why not? Im down like 9 pounds, and ive been working my butt off for this, and it feels really really good. Heck, i havent had bread for the past 8 days, or anything fried, barely any meat- only fish- so dont judge, its working. So every night i will juice for the next days festivities. Went to the gym today. its like 100 degrees out, i swear i get tan walking everywhere i go. i have THE worst farmers tan ever. Whatevs, ill finish it off sometime. After i left the gym (pretty good work out), i heard that the out door pool is open for the summer. Thought id swing by, cuz i saw a slide over there.

Look at that bad boy, like a 2 minute walk from the gym or my humble abode. 25$ a month pass, or 3$ for which ever day you wanna go. I only had debit so i couldnt get a pass, but man those slides look fun!! Get a little excitement in my life! yeah! So i just came back and showered and meow im here. Juiced up for tomorrow, apple and strawberry, pretty excited for that. Pretty much did all my errands yesterday, hair cut, bought some binders, did some laundry. very productive. Even talked to molly for like an hour yesterday, nice catching up with friends!!

But yeah, work tomorrow, so i might be a little late with some blogs but uhh should be a regular week. The part for my jeep comes in friday- hopefully we can get it fixed by next friday, then shipped by 2 weeks after that? Within a month? hmmm- until then, just work on my juicing, working out, so that when i do get my vehicle, ill be in the best shape of my life. Oh future goals.

Saturday 6/1- Juicing Day 7/ Triathlon

Happy birthday marc!!! Saturday morning comes around. Feeling quite nervous about this triathlon. Even thought about skipping it lol, but i wanted to do this. It was at 10am, and i was already up at like 8am. went to bed at like 10pm last night, so i was feeling pretty good. I ate an apple for breakfast and got my stuff together. Headed over around 915, guess i was pretty early. Checked in, and just hung out for a lil bit until people got there. Chit chatted a lil bit with some people asking the usual questions of are you ready, have you done this before, etc. I talk to the instructor and he tells us that it will be 8 times down and back in the pool. It didnt seem that bad, but when you look at the pool youre like oh crap thats a long time.

Seemed like the longest pool in the world. So it was getting near the time to start. Had all my stuff ready for the transitioning to biking, then to running. It was 800m ( i think) swim, 6 mile bike, and 1.5 mile run. Easy day right? we have 5 minutes to transition to each station. They let us go in 5 minute intervals in the pool, that way we werent alls clustered. The clock started, i started to swim, within the first half of the lane, my arms were already feeling like jello. I know how to swim, i jsut cant coordinate my breathing with my swimming. So after 2 lanes, i was already doing the backstroke, but suprisingly i was doing pretty well, i didnt stop, like a lot of people did. there was a solid 20-25 people there. Came out of the pool in like 7th. I ran over to my towel, dried off and went in changed in the locker room. Took me like 1 minute to change. After that i grabbed my water bottle and ipod, and ran to the bike station and started peddling. This was pretty tough, arms were tired, happy i could use my legs at this point, but 6 miles is a lot. youre just looking at the clock, and how many .1 miles you travel, and its like youre not getting anywhere. But since the other people are next to you, they give you inspiration, etc. So i finished that in like 20 minutes. On to the run, 1.5 miles with an incline of 1.5%. the incline really hurt me here, even that little bit, i could feel it in my shins. The guy next to me was running at a solid 8, and i was trying to keep up with him even though he was already a half a mile ahead. Then a girl comes next to me, and lightly jogs, so i make her my new competition. She wasnt jogging that fast, but you could tell we were around the same age, and she wanted to finish strong, so i was determined to beat her. So i ran for a minute, then i just couldnt take it anymore, i briskly walked for another minute, and i alternated like that every minute, which kept me in a pretty good position of the girl next to me. I finished strong with a mile and a half of just over 14. Weak, but after swimming and biking, it really takes a toll on you.

I didnt know i was making such a weird face at the time, but that was me, fully exhausted. Just lounged on the beach chairs outside by the pool for like 20 minutes after. Went and showered, and had possibly the greatest lunch of all time. Big salad this time, and a cup of milk. figure i would reward myself (somewhat).\

The rest of the day i just lounged about, couldnt really move. OH forgot to mention - free water bottle for completing it. yayy!! he hasnt posted the results yet, but im eager to see how i did compared to everyone else. Then i just watched the office, and had a celebratory beer that night :) good day.

Friday 5/31- Juicing Day 6

Friday!!! everyones favorite day of the week. I wake up every morning, just feeling better, and feeling a little skinnier too. Couldnt wait to hit the gym today and see my weight. had my morning apple juice this time, pretty good- and the same ol thing happened- grabbed the bus and off to work!!

This is basically my work station. Checked my email on the bus, and found out we got paid today too!! $$$$ cha ching. what a great day it already started off to be. Get into work excited, finally remembering peoples names, saying goodmorning, happy friday. Everyone seemed to be in a cheery mood. We had some early flights taking off so we rushed everything a little bit, checked the tarmat for Foreign Object Damage (FOD) little pieces of like metal that could injure the plane. We do it every morning- takes like a half hour. Then we started getting these planes ready! Launch like 5 planes off- they usually dont come back for like an hour and a half, so we just went inside and hung out. No wash jobs today or anything. Got a lot of work done on the paper work end. Met the CMC (command master chief) In charge of our whole command, like 250 people. Got a free ball cap, and had the meeting postponed like 2 times, cuz its hard to have a meeting with him. After that, I went to my work area and no one really needed help with anything, so i just started asking people more questions. Printed out some study guides for future tests i will be taking. Got a lot done. Recovered the jets when they came back, and then refueled them again for another take off. Was interupted mid fuel to go to lunch, so a couple of us went to lunch, discussed what everyone was doing for the weekend, had a good time. Came back and launched another couple of jets, then when they came back we only had 1 more jet that had to take off for the day- seemed like an easy day. So were all just hanging out, recovered the 4 jets that left, put them to sleep for the weekend- just chained them down and put covers on them. Then round about 1, there was a MOD A jet that was going to take off. This jet just came back from being worked on in the shop, so they needed to test every little button out, so it would take longer than usual. Were out there for like an hour and a half before they found something was wrong with the engine. They shut it down and decided to just work on it monday, everyone was pretty excited with that outcome. We put that jet to sleep and waited a little bit before they let us go for the weekend.
They let us go, and i got a ride home with my buddy from work, hope he doesnt mind i ask him a ride home everyday cuz we live in the same barracks lol. couple of us go home with him actually. Got home, went straight to the gym, and decided i would have a good workout today. Ran a 6:42 mile, my personal best ever!! i was very excited. Then i lifted for a little bit, did some shopping, and i was absolutely wiped out. Wanted to stay in and get some rest for my triathalon tomorrow!!

So i took a shower, popped on the office, and went to bed around 10pm. mmm. had a very, extremely good day. down like a total of 8 pounds at this point to. Gets me excited. lol

Thursday 5/30- Juicing Day 5

I know, im getting a little behind, but its the freakin weekend, time to catch up. So Thursday. Wake up in the morning, have my orange fresh juice from the fridge. Pack alls my stuff and im out to the bus stop by 553, just in time to make it. Get on the bus and im off to work. My second day, i kinda know what to do in the morning, so i go out and get the jets ready for flight. Which is basically just take off the tie down chains, and the covers on the engines. Once that was done, we find out we have to wash a plane which is located like a quarter mile away and bring it down to our section. So we all walked down, like 8 of us. Someone drove one of those little cars that hook on to the jet to move it around. We got it alls set up and it took like an hour to get it back to our place. By that time it was time to get ready to launch some jets. So i think we launched like 4 of them, got them off the ground perfectly and everything was going smoothly. Went back over and had a while to wash down the jets. So we just washed it for the next hour or so. I had to do some paper work again, so i was in and out of the office alls day, while also working on the washing.

that was the plane we were washing. snapped that pic on my way to lunch lol. So we went to lunch, had a light salad, which was delish, and when we came back the plane was all done being washed. Then we had to recover some planes that were coming back, and send them right back out again after we refueled them. After we sent those guys out, a couple of the new guys and I went to try and get some more signatures, and order some flight line gear, like a jacket, boots, gloves, etc. After that it was a little bit of down time until the next planes came back. We just wait on planes alls day basically.They came back around 130, we recovered, then the next planes were going out at 3, once again refueled and hung around. At 300 we had a meeting for all the people who passed their test and got promoted. All hands mustered in the hangar bay, and we all congratulated them on getting promoted. After that, we went home. 

Today was a day i would not go to the gym, so i could have a day of rest before my triathlon on saturday, i was pretty excited about it cuz i was going hard everyday. OH, and i got 3 packages from mother today, which i brough back and teared open. mmm, i alot sweatshirts, shirts, tablet, it was a pretty good day. Cleaned up the room and it was time for the office!! I had a yogurt for dinner, and watched the office for a solid 2 hours straight, and went to bed at like 9pm. what a great night.

PS- i know it may not seem like im juicing much anymore but what i do is have a drink in the morning for breakfast, and then i have one in the mid afternoon for an energy boost, then usually a yogurt for dinner. Ive upgraded my diet.