Awaited

Sorry It's been so long since the last post! I just can't be a very good blogger. I feel like a nerd-y when I blog.. Ha ha ..

But I want to be able to keep the Fam' up to date on everything, since I'm so horrible at calling.. 0.0 hah.

Well..

I've been in Norfolk, VA for about a month and 7 days. Still loving it.

Just got a car last Saturday!

His names Ducky! Hah. Its manual, and I bought it without the knowledge of and skill of stick shift driving, so I've been learning. He's a little upset most of the time at how I drive him.. ha ha.. But I'm getting better!

Im currently waiting for a E-mail back, of an application to do volunteer work at the Norfolk Zoo! I hope I get accepted! That would be super awesome! :] I'll just have to see how difficult its gonna be to drive over there.. ha ha

Hmmm.. What else, what else.. Its not snowing here in VA, which Im actually a little bummed about.. But it has been pouring a ton! Everyone keeps telling me to wait for Winter, then it'll start being soooo cold!.. Uhh.. Its the 7th of DECEMBER! When does winter on the East Coast begin? Im sure the mountain back home is covered in snow!! hah.

I love work so far! You can actually see my command from the second picture from the top. Its near the right side, with all the helicopters. hah :D

Let me just remind you of how HUGE they are!

Its so very exhilerating when you're climbing around on your Helicopter Jungle Gym after its been soaked in leaking oils, and greases and rain all night long. Plus... These boots.. Have NO traction! I get butterflies a couple times a day from my slip sliding around on top of them. My Favorite so far is climbing out onto the tail while is folding, and jumping to the other side with the blades on it, and greasing the inside of it. Its so exciting! hah

Virginia

So I arrived to Virginia yesterday. Checked into my squadron, saw my helos... <3...
Got my room, and etc.
Now I just wait... hah

Orders Orders

I got my orders! Woot. Woot.

Norfolk Virginia, Helicopter Mine Countermeasures.

This is my squadron.. :]

http://www.hm14.navy.mil./

YAY! No more Florida!

Grad-gee-ation

The birds were an inside joke of our teacher and our class..

Long story.. But ignore those.. ha ha

Jitter Bug

I received some EXCELLENT news on Wednesday at PT! Apparently the PT we've been having was not the "normal" ATO PT. I guess its usually been harder, but the instructor that usually does it was too busy doing orders to get around to coming to PT. But luckily for all of the "O" strand (ATO's) he's back! Wooo!! I was wondering when PT was going to get harder.... . . . . . ... . . . hah.

But I also checked my calendar and we should only have, TOPS, four PT sessions left with our class because of the two were missing from Labor Day weekend, and we get to "buy out" of tomorrows PT as a fundraiser for the NAVY Christmas party... But I think.. Yes.. I AM crazy.. I think I'm going to keep PTing with the "O" strand until I leave Florida. I actually like this working out in the Military thing.. Very odd I know.

It raining again.. WOO! :]

And I guess this weekend were going to a super cool restaurant, that's apparently on a race track.. And they have races you can watch while you dine. Sweet!

I don't have any exciting news yet. But I'll keep you posted if you keep coming by and checking..

Only 9 more days of school!!!! Woo!

And just a little humor for your day...

Red Light, Green Light

PT

ATO physical training is the training I thought I would receive in boot camp. Uh.. No. Boot camp PT was easy peasy compared to this.... Well it was easy peasy compared to anything really..

This was Fridays workout.

The start was the little black X on the left. The red X's were stops to do pull ups. The blue X was hosing point. The black X at the bottom was our stop for beach workouts. Er. And then once again the left X was ending point. And more workouts. :] quite a run. 3 miles. Which wouldn't be too bad, but we did three miles wednesday, three miles thursday and three miles friday. Oh.. My body is sooo tired.

School is pretty fun. Our teacher is a very good teacher. Our first test is tomorrow. Wish me Luck!!

Graduation is September 14th.. Woo!

Sailors and Marines

I officially started my first day of A School today. It was pretty fun. :)

The most obnoxious thing about the NAVY is that you always have to second guess everything that anyone tells you, unless its "official news".

I was told last week that I got classed up and to be at room 2111 at 0800 on the 4th. That was plain and simply all..

So my first thought was... 8? Usually the important people are already heading to bed by then. haha. Were usually told to be somewhere new for something new at 5 or even 430, so 8 was just wack!

Secondly, "be at room 2111". This would also be the first time we weren't marched out in a big clan of smirfs.

The Navy is slowly being moved into a new working uniform.. Called.. Yes.. The New Working Uniform. (NWS) ha ha. My new teacher, who is a Marine, told us that maybe one day, just maybe, if it came down to it, The Navy would be able to beat the Marines.... If it took place in a blue berry patch.. Or Smirf land. ha ha (Its also a good thing for man overboard.. We'll be so easy to find...... . . . . . . ha ha) --->

But they still TOTALLY rock.. I can't wait until I get mine!

Anyways.. I got to room 2111 at 0800 on the 4th, and we all lined up in the Peeway, and walked to the classroom we'll be in for the next 6 weeks. (The course is 29 days)

Its pretty small, but our teacher is a lot of fun. Maybe the planets are re-aligning or something.. (I guess the chinese had predicted that all the badluck that everyones been going through was/is because the planets have been out of alignment and are supposed to re-align tomorrow). Ha. Or maybe the ironing board is starting to feel bad.. ha ha

I start PT tomorrow morning at 0430.. Ha. Thats an hour and a half before I usually get out of bed. Gee. I can't wait. And then thursday we run the Marines three mile prt. And PT on Friday as well.. Awesome. I cannot wait!!!! :]

Well its off to the NEX (If they let me, I guess were in a tornado warning right now) to get my school supplies.... and to find somewhere to break my foot before tomorrow... ha ha :]

Wish me luck. Oy.

See ya later.. Alligator

June 4th I moved out to Pensacola for my A School, (Which is like the basic schooling for my soon to be job) Aviation Electronics Technician.

Great Lakes felt like ghetto ville compared to NATTC, that's right, its pronounced "Nazi".. Oh boy it cracks me up. This base is HUGE. I definitely still miss Illinois, this place is just waaaaay too hot and humid, there are three trees on base, and no wildlife.... Other than those crazy Marines.. hah.

I live in Delta barracks, which is almost an all female barracks. It also houses the AC's. (Air Control man). That would be a pretty scary job, they direct coming aircraft in for landing.

These are the barracks, galley, and the Mega building... which I'm sure you have already assumed is that MEGA building. It is where all the magic happens. If you don't know where something is, you can just assume its in The Mega Building. ha

The white building you see in the bottom right hand corner is Portside, where I've been working while in holding. But I start school tomorrow... So..

Pensacola is a very unlucky place. But my girls and I have decided to blame it on an inanimate object. Ever since my roommate, Steinbacher, broke this ironing board.. We have had nothing but bad luck. But we keep it around simply because how silly would it be to have to carry an open ironing board across the Quarter Deck. Trust me.. It would be Silly. hah.

Take for example my horribly unlucky Monday of last week. First of all, I had to wake up and go to school. Pretty unlucky already. It was an internet course and to sign into the computers we have to use our "CAC" card, which I just realized stands for Common Access Card Card. ha ha. Well anyways.. mine wasn't working, so another guy and I had to go to the AWAT (which was the class we were taking) office to get a walking chit to go to PSD to get a our cards fixed. If you were here, and new how horrible this office was, you would understand the horrible luck behind it.

There are a couple simple rules to follow when entering this office:

Stand behind the tape in the hallway until the office is clear.

Pound on the door three times and return to your spot behind the tape, in parade rest.

Wait until you hear "Enter".

Open and pound on the door yelling "Student on deck!".

Walk in a military manner up to the foot marks they have in front of the desk.

Stand at attention, "Airman apprentice Webster, Classroom 2243, reporting as ordered".

They tell you to stand at ease, and then critizice everything wrong with your uniform. (They will start making stuff up before they let your uniform slide through)

You state your buisness.

When you get dismissed, they say "dismissed".

"Dismissed Aye".

Take a step back with your left foot.

"Good Morning/Good Afternoon."

About face.

Walk out.

Pound on the door "Student off deck!"

But beware of all the important people in this room watching your everymove. It was my first time into that office that morning, and I had to repeat some steps over and over again. Talk about "Soup Nazi!".

So after I left that lovely office, the other guy and I made our way to get our ID's fixed. The Petty Officer at the desk told us to go have a seat down the hall, which is apparently where they send people to die. We waited for a good hour. And then a woman came to file the line of people that had formed down some hallways into an office. I sat down with another woman, who then decided I would need a brand new ID. (Be known that I had JUST gotten a new ID 13 days earlier). So I went back to the Petty Officer at the desk who gave me a #, and I sat back down to wait. When they finally called my number I was given to another lady, and we began to make a new ID. (I was very depressed when they said I'd need a brand new one, because of ALL of my ID's in ALL of my life, it was the best picture I've ever taken. ha) So we waited and waited for it to print, and.. it didnt work. She had to make THREE ID's before she got one to work. "I've never had this problem before, I don't know what could possibly be wrong", she stated...

Mam... May I suggest the Broken Ironing Board. ha ha

(Oh, and the day before, my roommate and I had gone camping and one of our friends did the whole "I wish I knew karate thing and I'm going to pretend to hit you in the face, but I actually am going to hit you in the face with my crazy nails and put a huge scratch between your eyes, so when you go take a new ID picture you have a lovely dark spot between your eyes") Very sweet of him.

So after being at this office for almost 2 1/2 hours, it was back to the AWAT office. I did better this time though. :]

Lunch came, and lunch time during school is impossible. The lines are so incredibly backed up out the doors. I decided I would go back to my barracks, get something out of the vending machine and go chill in my room. Well... Not one, but TWO vending machines took my money. After spending much more money than necessary I got up to my room only to find the door shut! Errr.

You see, my roommate and I were assigned to a room with a broken lock. You cannot shut the door unless you want to be locked out, and you definitely don't want to be locked out if you're headmates (Your neighbors that share your bathroom with you) are gone as well.. Because then you have to go to the MTI's (Military Training Instructors) and tell them how stupid they are that everytime they go into our room for inspection they shut our door, KNOWING we can't get back in. Oy.

Then it was back to school I went.

There were a couple more things wrong with that day, but I cannot remember them all right now. I try to block it out. hah. It was such a crazy day that I couldn't help but laugh at every sign of badluck. <3

Hoo Yah Pensacola!

Doing my time in the Great Mistakes

I love the cute little nicknames Sailors make for their stations.

Great Lakes - Great Mistakes

Though I loved Great Lakes.

I miss it all the time.

Started off in the Franklin, which as you can see in the picture below, is near the top.

It was in BOONDOCK ville. To get anywhere we had to walk and walk and walk. (See the big plus sign looking building, in the middle.. It's the Galley.) The delicious Great Lakes galley. We had 5 lines, Italian, American, Deli, Boot camp, and Chinese. Delish. Bobby was very jealous. hah.

After several weeks on "hold", not doing much of anything but cleaning. I finally got classed up for ATT (Apprentice Technical Training), which was a fun class learning about circuitry. I had the coolest teacher, and I loved learning about the circuits. It was like a constant science experiment... which didn't deal with chemicals or test tubes.. Just electronics.

(Look in the bottom right of this picture.. The Big white builing with the courtyard, that was the ATT building. Which I was in from 430 to 1230AM.... It was a night class) Boo.

After I started ATT I was moved into the Enterprise, which is near the galley. WOO!! ha ha

It was a huge building, and an incredibly old one at that. The oldest barracks on the base, which was apparently already being used in World War 2...

I tried to make this very clear.. In order to get to my room... I had to walk ALLLLLLL the way around the building.. Boy oh Boy.. Forgetting something was like a small burst of hatred into the world. ha ha.

I miss the trees!

The squirrels.. Ha. We had TONS of squirrels. And at every liberty breifing it was always made very clear "Do not touch the squirrels! Do not FEED the squirrels!". They would actually come straight up to you, as tame as they had been made, which was always frightening for me.. I did not want their crazy little squirrel diseases. Right before I left, a squirrel had decided to jump from our roof onto the tree in our courtyard.. Only to realize he couldnt get back out. He was our pet.. He grew very fond of a McDonalds diet.

:]

Number 1

So I'm officially starting a blog for a couple reasons.

One: I am incredibly bored out of my mind right now, and I figured it would be a nice way to keep the family informed on how my world is working.

Two: I've always wondered why such nerds (Kevin... cough cough) ha ha.. had blogs, so we'll see how exciting this can become.

Three: .... .. To keep the family informed.. hah

Four: I never got the letters and pictures out to the family that I wrote 4 months ago, so maybe this will make up for it. :]

I guess Ill go ahead and start from the beginning - Basic training.

(This may be an incredibly lonnnggggg first posting)

I left January 14th, arrived 10 PM (or 22 as we call it now. haha) and the fun began. The first thing I thought was... Wow.. Sailors REALLY do have bad mouths. Sometimes I'm still not used to all the cursing. The next thing I thought was "what in the heck did I just get myself into?" but at the same time, I was already proud that I had finally chosen my path. :]

The first 24 hours were the most ridiculous hours I've ever lived in my life. The first thing we did was line up for clothing and other things, now let me tell you IT WAS A LOT OF STUFF! We got bags and bags of things. Which all ended nicely with a 630$ bill. haha

We then changed, into our navy sweats, yellow NAVY shirt, NAVY sweat pants, our sweater tied around our waist, a nice white sock with our valuables in it hanging from our pants, and our dog tags with a pen hanging from them. Outside of our shirt of course, which was, of course, developed a bad habit, and definitely a no-no from that night on.

We were then sent in for our drug and pregnancy test, which started with walking laps and laps around a huge group of chairs, taking a drink from the drinking fountain every time you made a lap. After our group "squat" we got to stand in a long line holding the pee level with our shoulders..

We did A LOT of sitting, trying not to fall asleep in the middle of night. OH! And don't you DARE touch your face! That was the No-No of all No-Nos. It was very sweet of them to try to keep us from getting sick, or maybe they just needed some ridiculous rule for us to practice. ha ha. I can't remember everything we did that night anymore. But I do remember the "Moment of Truth". It was every ones final chance to mess up their future lives by telling the NAVY about the mistakes in their pasts. But most people, before they left, had been told by their recruiter to NEVER tell them anything in this moment of time. So... I didn't.. Not that I had anything to tell them. But they really do scare you! They make you feel like a man framed for murder, who over time starts to think he actually committed the crime. ha ha. I kept my cool. :]

So anyways at about 6 in the morning, after a nice 8 hours of nonsense we got to our compartment and joined the rest of the people that had arrived the day before us.... The ones waking from their first nights slumber.. We placed our nice 630$ bag full of goodies behind our new bunk and lined up for chow... The worst chow of my life.

Over time things got better in boot camp (now officially called Basic Training), less strict. You get an awesome notebook when you first arrive, and every time you go to chow you have to bring it with you, and while you wait in the ridiculously long line you have to "pretend" to read this thing. It has the Sailors creed, Seven General Orders, Chain of command, and a couple more things, but I learned all of that before I left for "Basic Training". So I just had to look into these blank pages, turned towards the wall, wishing that the next 8 weeks of my life would go a little faster! But, it still wasn't nearly as bad as I had thought...

If I keep going at this rate.. this blog will take me hours and hours to write and a pretty long time for you to read as well.. So I'll skip all of the little details for now.

Anyways, every morning we would wake up to a horrible woman yelling. Get dressed as fast as possible, but beware, you couldn't wear your sweats into the bathroom. The first couple weeks were spent putting stamps (our names, division number, and last four of social security number) on all of our gear, and learning how to correctly fold and stow all of this so called mentioned gear into our bunks. Learning our Sailors Creed, Seven General Orders, Ranks and Recognition, Chain of Command (which was soon to change.. :[ ) etc... Still no working out....

After two weeks, and the end of Processing day hold our "RDCS" (recruit divisions commanders) were finally allowed to IT us (Intense training).... which wasn't so intense.. Not for me at least, there were many girls whimpering and whining, which just made our consequences that much worse.. ha. We all quickly learned what was wrong and what was right.

We also moved into another building, The USS Arizona.. Crazy.. I go all the way across the country... and still end up in Arizona. haha

It was the "show ship", the ship that all the important people came to visit while in lovely Recruit Training Command.

Of course, there were three Physical Fitness Accessments (PFA). I never had any trouble with them.

We did a lot of computer based classes, some incredibly boring, and some incredibly long.

(we still do these... still incredibly boring, still incredibly long. ha ha)

We had a book with many miscellaneous topics in it that we were tested on.

We shot 9mms and shotguns. (Both, soooo much fun... didn't do very well though. ha)

We did some hands on deckwork. Working with lines, bollards, chocks, etc..

Firefighting... Gas Chamber.. Ooops sorry.. "Confidence Chamber".

Which I was so worried about, ended up not being so bad for me. I didnt have many reactions. Barely any when compared to my other "Shipmates".

I even had a job.. Woo. I was in "Ship Staff", which basically meant I mustered once a day, in the afternoon to clean the building.. We also stood watches for the entire building, rather than our divisional compartment.

Almost everything we did gave us the chance to get a flag. Which we would march with, and graduate with. There were several flags. There was an academic flag, inspections flag, marching flag, fitness flag. (You can see them in the above picture.)

There was also the divisional flag, division number, CNO flag, Ship flag and Cheerios flag (which you had to win captains cup to get... we didn't win Captains cup.. It was a fun fitness tournament)

Battle Stations... Ohhhh ho ho Battle stations.

Were not technically supposed to talk about it. We signed a page 13. Which is basically a "Don't you dare do it page".

It was 9 or so hours of working on a replica ship that Universal Studios built. Putting out fires, escaping smoke filled rooms, practicing pulling into port, pulling injured victims from devastated areas (the "victims" weighed like 200 pounds. It took five people to lift them, the more you shook them or moved them in the wrong way, they would actually moan and groan at you. It was pretty creepy actually.

And after Battle Stations was the time that we had all worked so hard for over the past 8 weeks.

The capping ceremony.

Our "recruit ball caps" were replaced by "NAVY ball caps". We were officially sailors. Its a very emotional ceremony. Everyone cries... Yes.. Even the so called "Men". ha ha.

Our RDC's treat us like human beings for the first time, and tell us how proud they are, and yes.. they shake our hands..

And then... We got to march back to our "ship" and stay awake for another 16 hours, once again.. not human beings.. ha ha

Boot Camp, I still like to think of it as a joke, compared to everything you've heard and everything you've seen in the movies and tv shows.. But I loved it. I don't know how to explain it, nor do I think I ever will. But I felt like something. An incredible something in the making.

I met a lot of cool people, and I will never forget our cranky old RDC's.

Graduation was pretty neat. A TON of people were there.

People were fainting left and right, dropping like flies.

Mom, Bob, Sarah and Oli came.

The best thing after two months!! :]

It was a very short weekend with them.

But I got to see Chicago for the first time.

Millennium park.

The bean.

Aquarium.

Green St. Patty's day river.

Boy... do I miss Chicago. :[