1st Weekend Off!

After my last post on Thursday I applied for a seasonal ranger position in Cape Cod because the opening closed on Friday.  I then spent the rest of the night in bed feeling like I was fighting for air at some points…just lying in bed.  I don’t know if it’s because I’m sick, not acclimated, or just psyching myself out but I downed another huge glass of water and took off my shirt which apparently helped because I fell right to sleep after that haha. 

PT “Fun”

I woke up this morning with a dull pain in my groin muscle, everyday it’s a different body part hahaha.  I stepped out of bed and let out a jokingly “OOOWWWWWWW” which I adopted back in high school that mocks Private Pyle from Full Metal Jacket after the Blanket Party Scene.

I guess the pivoting during the shuttle run was a bit too much. To make matters worse, since the practice PEB was out of the way we were supposedly going to be having more “fun” in PT from now on.  I’m sure most of you picked up on my sarcasm the same way I did when Mike told us that. Nick & I left 10 minutes earlier than we usually do, got into the building and I just sat there.  I still felt these bad cold symptoms and my groin was killing me.  At some points I’d just be staring off in the distance due to the hurricane I felt ripping through my face & head to which some of my classmates noted, “you look so focused.”

We moved on to the warm-ups and I actually made it through them easier than I’ve been but they still got my heart and breathing rates moving.  After the warm-ups we had to run, not jog, two laps around the two tennis courts we were on; I gunned it for the second lap…there’s the breathing problem.  Again, it corrected itself in a couple of seconds.  Apparently “fun” wasn’t happening today…at least it wasn’t as bad as I expected it to be.  Mike showed us posed running techniques that apparently helps your running form…basically you run on your toes and your heels don’t hit the ground which saves your knees; you’re supposed to look like you’re leaning forward and you kick yourself in the butt or something.  We took turns with our lifting partners holding each other up.  The spotter puts his hands on the runner’s chest and the runner leans hard into him.  The spotter counts down and moves out of the way and the runner’s supposed to fall into the running form and run to the tennis net.

 After that we practiced our agility run some more which we apparently did wrong the day before.  In our practice PEB we ran straight up and straight back down along the cones, Mike said that’s not the way.  We had to run almost at V along the cones, starting 5 meters out to the side.  I was dreading doing this because of my groin but I was game.  Wouldn’t ya know it, I knocked nearly a second off of my time already. When I was sprinting back into the cone weave portion I could hear Mike say “He’s big but he’s quick!”.  If I could make a smoother turn at the pivot points I’m sure I’d make my 15 second goal.  Going back to that goal, I said I think NFL RBs and WRs can do this in 15seconds…they’ve gotta do it much faster because some of my classmates are already at that mark.  After the agility run we had more time for lifting.  Stan and I worked on chest and triceps.  As has been the case all week we couldn’t get on a flat bench so we opted to start off with the incline bench, I never do that.  I went heavier on the incline than I normally do so when we finally did get on the flat bench I was putting up weak sauce. 

Class ended and got held up at some lights once again during our little transition between PT and classroom.  “I can’t wait for 5 o’clock,” I hollered when we got stuck at another light.  Our first 2 days off after 11 straight on.  We got home and I made some turkey sandwiches and moved some laundry.  I’m not sure what happened but I got snagged up while getting ready and we left 4 minutes late and the journey back made us feel like the whole world was against us.  Catching lights, not getting the green turn arrows EVER instead of letting the oncoming traffic go first, and being stuck behind slow moving trucks…what the crap?  We did get a break once we made it to the parking lot; almost the entire place was empty so we got a “rockstar” parking spot and had less than 10 minutes to get to class.  We made it.

Today’s lesson was on courtroom evidence and I just have to say that applying this stuff once we’re out in the field is going to be super tricky.  During our first break I stopped by Kathy’s office to have her look over my resume while we were in class and she returned to me during our second break.  Good thing I had her look it over because I made a couple verb tense mistakes.  That probably won’t look good to the 4 parks I’ve applied to so far…whoops.  After this break it seemed like the entire class shut down.  Two more hours and then we had two days off!  The slide show presentation ended at 4:30 and you could see how eager everybody was to leave, then our instructor read us some scenarios and we had to pick the type of evidence he was describing.  Some students toughed it out and participated but almost all of us shut our brains off for the day. 

When we got home I didn’t know what to do with myself.  I tried taking a nap but couldn’t fall asleep so I read my Maxim magazine the re-watched the last episode of Spartacus since that show is very confusing at times and I think I was typing my last post when I watched it the first time and had no idea what happened.  Good thing I did because that show is so freaking AWESOME!  I might not be able to keep the character’s names straight but this is like the ultimate dude’s show.  I won’t get into detail but watch for yourself and you’ll see what I mean. (WARNING: Graphic Violence and Nudity)  Nick went out for the night so I did a little exploring on my own.  There are 3 Chinese food places near our house but NONE of them do take-out, they are actual restaurants!  There are two take out places by campus and a 3^rd exists somewhere but I never heard of the street it’s on.  We were out of paper towels so I volunteered to pick some up.  The convenient stores here aren’t very convenient…just saying.  No Chinese food in sight, Sonic grilled chicken on wheat it is.

I spent the rest of the night resting and recuperating. I watched some episodes of Lockdown on Netflix; one of the prisons was a tent city in Phoenix.  That was pretty cool.  I’d been talking with Laura about her coming out here for her birthday/my spring break in mid-March with the possibility of flying her into Vegas and crashing a night out there.  Thanks to my time spent at the Harrah’s owned Casinos in AC I’ve earned some free/discounted rooms that I could use up in AC or Vegas.  Laura and I have been out to Vegas twice before, the last time was around this same time of year and everybody else was on Spring Break and Vegas knows this…so no free rooms for us; but I do have a deal for $30! Sweet.  So I spent some of the night looking up flight information and these hotel deals.  I have a big day planned at The Plex tomorrow so I looked up different hamstring stretches online. 

I checked my bank account and started getting nervous, what if I don’t get a job after this?,  so I’m trying to figure out things to do that don’t involve a lot of money. Thanks to a former co-worker I won’t have to worry about going out to the movies anymore haha.  I watched Paranormal Activity 2 and was totally let down.  Considering my house back home is haunted I was absolutely in love with the first 1 because I could relate to a lot of the weird things happening, nothing really happened in the 2^nd one…which was a prequel…so slow. Of course the ending was cool and there was one other cool happening and I loved the German Shepherd, Abbey,  in it but other than that it sucked.

I finally fell asleep sometime around 3am.

NO SCHOOL TOMORROW!

Me-Day Saturday

I woke up around 10:30 feeling relieved, no school aaaaaahhhhhh.  When I awoke, nobody was home but me.  I farted around on the computer for a little bit then started thawing some chicken for lunch…not breakfast haha.  I plugged my sweet ass iPod Touch in to charge it up for my workout and then took my sweet ass time in the bathroom and started up the shower.  When I was in the shower I started doing some of the hamstring stretches I researched the night before, felt pretty awesome in the hot shower. 

I started getting dressed and packing my stuff for the gym. 

Dear Brian & Elena,

               

                Thanks for the gym bag, it rules!

Love,

J~DuB

When packing I had to remember my agenda for the day: calisthenics workout that Instructor Bryan gave us, sprints, bball, hot tub, shower.  I packed up my bathing suit, towel, and sandals for the hot tub, my new bball sneaks to break-in on the court, jump rope, change of clothes for afterwards, workout towel and I made some copies of the workout outline to take along with me.  I unplugged my iPod and realized…I need some new songs to add to my 140 song gym playlist entitled “Flagstaff Prep” and I needed to delete some crappy ones that always come on when I’m near the end of my run and they totally screw up my flow because they aren’t best suited for running so I gotta skip them.  That’s where my FB status came from, What’s your favorite pump up song?  I got a couple responses but I wish I got a lot more…many of the suggestions are already enlisted on FP.  My buddy from high school, Gabe, pointed out a good one that I had in my library but wasn’t on my list…Victory by P. Diddy & Notorious B.I.G.. That song was on one of the CDs we used to listen to before basketball games in the locker room and it plays once a game at Giants games when you’re at the stadium.

I brought my laptop out to the kitchen and began making my grilled chicken and wheat egg noodles.  Whenever somebody suggested a song I previewed it on I-tunes and either downloaded it or ignored it.  I just didn’t see some of the songs getting me going.  I also downloaded a free watch and a stopwatch apps to use later today. While all of this was going on Laura reached out to me.  We talked for a bit then I started looking at all of my Indy pictures on my computer, at which point Nick came home and I gushed over her to him about some of the priceless pics.  I texted Laura “Puppy Indy pics bring happy tears to my eyes...I just showed a bunch to Nick and you couldn’t scrape the smile off my face or wipe the tears out of my eyes.”  That made Laura sad but she then suggested I adopt a dog out here.  I can’t do that and Indy’s the only dog I want, but Jane’s been talking about doing something similar even before I got here so I tried urging her along….

Food was done and it was delicious.  I began eating when my first of from home reaching outs of the day came through…it was my sister Katie.  She got the postcard I sent out on Tuesday.  I sent one to everybody in my family, Laura’s parents, and Rath & LK since Rath is too cool for Facebook so they better be there!  We chatted for awhile about stuff going on, my god son AJ’s 9^th birthday is tomorrow, the health of a good friend of hers, and the crazy sale at Old Navy (through today, 90% off clearance items…30% off everything else but jeans).  

When the phone rang for our call, Fiona jumped up into my lap on the stool and hung out for a long petting session and I thought she was going to fall asleep there…that was until Mama Jane came home.

Jane saw my note and actually called somebody about adopting a black lab (Bella) that survived Hurricane Katrina, was adopted by somebody in Arizona who then passed away….WE GOTTA SAVE HER!

Looking at the website, they also had a 10 week old German Shepherd puppy to rescue and despite my pleas, it was ruled that we couldn’t get a puppy because nobody’s home with it.  Fair enough.

I sat on that kitchen stool for 3 hours today, totally delaying my gym appointment.  I was there for the duration of load of dishes to be completed so I put them away while Jane read me a children’s book and then I was off to The Plex.  As expected families overran the place with their kids wanting to frolic around in the pool but the locker room was so bad when I got there that I felt like I was in a night club.  The pool was closed temporarily for maintenance so the kids were running all over the place. Up to the weight room…practically nobody there.  I recognized a young girl who was running on that silly track the entire time I was there…same story the last time I saw her.  If 15 laps equals a mile than this girl must’ve done 4 miles hahaha.  I made my way over to the little stretching out cove and tried getting my hamstrings and my groin ready to rock.

For the calisthenics portion of the workout, the outline calls for doing 4 exercises, 20 seconds on..10 seconds off…move to the next exercise, 20 seconds on..10 seconds off…etc.  There were 4 exercises listed and a bunch of alternatives.  I did 5 exercises, pushups, flutter kicks, scissor kicks, squat jumps, and mountain climbers.  I was in no mood for burpees hahaha.  It was suggested to repeat the exercises for 16 minutes…I think I made it for 10.  Sweating my ass off and breathing heavy, I switched it over to the abdominal routine.  Not timed, 50 crunches, 30 flutter kicks, 30 scissor kicks, 20 side touches, 20 bicycles, and then you’re supposed to do a 2 minute plank…that’s 1 set.  You’re supposed to do 3 sets; I did one plus an extra plank.  I was able to hold each plank for 45 seconds before collapsing on my face.  I then made my way over to the more desolate side of the track to practice some sprints. Starting with my chest on the floor and pushing up I exploded down the straight away which made a loud echoing sound and the people working out looked at me startled.  I didn’t stop to catch my breath, got right back on my chest and sprinted down the other way, trying to remember the posed running Mike talked about. I needed to catch my breath after the second time around.  At some point during my sprint I felt some pain in my right quadriceps…it was only a matter of time, everything else hurt.  I was going to duck out but I decided to do one more set of down and backs…shit hurt. So I decided I’d make it up playing basketball. 

I made my way to the locker room, changed shoes and grabbed my jump rope and headed to the court.  The little office that loans out basketballs was closed so I had to go to the front desk to get one and usually you’re supposed to give them some sort of collateral…they didn’t ask for anything. Got to the bball court and the middle hoop was open, on the side hoop a little boy was chucking the ball over his head backwards to see if it’d go in and the other side had a boy and a girl (I think) playing 1 on 1 that just resulted in punting the ball a lot.   My first shot, 3pter…swish…hardly even touched the net.  I started shooting from some of signature spots…both elbows, the baseline, turnaround jumpers from the post…I either bricked horribly or swished beautifully…there was no middle ground.  I ran to few spots for pull-up jumpers and tried different layups but my quad hurt so badly that I decided it was time to see if the pool was open so I could jump in the hot tub. 

When I brought the ball back to the desk I saw something I’ve never seen before in my life, these two young Mexican children were eating Ramen noodles straight out of the packet like they were potato chips…what the hell? I got changed into my board shorts, threw on my Under Armour shirt, slipped on my sandals and headed out to the hot tub.  The place was a zoo but at least the hot tub was somewhat empty.  I think the dad who had his too young to be in the tub daughters with him got a creepy vibe from me because as soon as he saw I was heading in, he gathered them together and left.  They weren’t in there that long because there was only one person in there when I checked to see if the pool was open before I got changed.  Weirdo.  Soon I was the only person in the hot tub and I looked around at all the families doing their thing and I couldn’t help but wonder what that’s like.  What if I did some things differently? Would I be where they are?  I wish I had the whole house, wife, kids, dog, 4Runner thing down but I obviously don’t.  They say the grass is always greener but I can’t help but be curious…I’ve known what it’s like without those things long enough. I’m not sure what steps I could’ve taken to see these things through but I’m sure somewhere along the line it involved being more assertive. 

At any rate, I spent about 20 minutes in the hot tub then showered and thought to myself…I could do this all the time.  I would need more than pair of board shorts to do so since I can’t exactly hang mine out to dry in the winter and I can’t do laundry every day so I decided to check out Old Navy’s crazy deals Katie told me about.  Wouldn’t you know it…I got 2 bathing suits for less than 4 dollars!!!!  That store is awesome!  Before heading home I drove through the Toyota dealership…they got 5 more 4Runners in!  Freehold Toyota sucks…they don’t ever have any. When I got home I piled a bunch of peanut butter and added some jelly onto a wheat bun and gobbled it up.  Mmmmmm.  Nick wanted to go get something to eat, I said save money dog. He felt he didn’t have enough of his groceries left for a meal and I remembered that I picked up some stuff the other day.  I want to learn how to cook so I wanted to start out with something simple…like hamburgers.  Knowing that Laura doesn’t eat ground beef, I picked up a package of ground turkey for turkey burgers when I was shopping the other day.  What better time to practice?  Nick guided me through it but I was able to produce some pretty fine turkey burgers and he threw in our newest craze, Bird’s Eye Steamfresh veggies and the meal was quite good.  I got a phone call and an e-mail from Travis saying the class got a room to practice our D-Tac tomorrow…SWEET! Arkansas stopped by and she had a bag from Cheesecake Factory.  “Where the hell is there a Cheesecake Factory?” I demanded.  “Phoenix”, she responded. She took the 2-hour trip by herself.  That’s when I found out the Three Amigos separated and did their own things today; “Me-Day Saturday”.  Nick shopped, got his oil changed, and napped hahaha.

I was wrapping up my meal when my brother Brian called.  He was out to eat with my dad, Elena, and my neighbors “Cousin Lisa & Cousin Alex”.  They went out to eat at his friend’s new restaurant.  During the call I found out that Cousin Alex, who I’ve known since he was born, got accepted into Farleigh Dickinson University and would be playing football.  He’s soooo grown upL.  I couldn’t be prouder though.  Good Luck Alex.  I retired to my room and I got a text from my brother-in-law, Matt, with a picture of his Matt Cave.  I wrote about the Matt Cave in their postcard so I assumed they got it just as Katie did, he said he didn’t…that’s weird.  Then he remembered that he didn’t check the mail so when he did he discovered that it arrived.  Maureen then wanted to try out her Skype on her phone so I could see the dog, Keaira, but we were greatly disappointed when we discovered that the video option doesn’t work on cell phones…yet.  After I got off the “phone” with her I got a text from Rath…he was at his company’s after Christmas party.  I talked with Laura briefly as she was continuing her celebratory weekend with her new housemate Stephanie…it’s like they’re back in college again.  Good for her, she needs a break from all the madness.

Hearing from everybody was great but it made me miss home a whole lot.  As of tomorrow, I’ll be out here in Flagstaff for a month…easily the longest I’ve ever been away from home.  I feel like a turd not working and I miss everybody back east.  I’m still doing my thing out here but it’s just a long strange transition.  The not working thing is probably the biggest adjustment.  I over think a lot of things way too much and it just might drive me crazy.  I watched standup comedy specials on Netflix until I fell asleep.  John Capaurola (sp?) was funny as hell, so was that Gabriel Iglesias or whatever but why the hell is Jamie Kennedy famous?  He sucks at everything and he’s dating Jennifer Love Hewitt…I don’t get it.  

Some weekend off ey?  I know…I’m a party animal.

First thing I'm gonna do tomorrow is write this blog.

Good Night

Mount Up!!!

Pleasant Surprise

Sleep In Time

Tuesday was officially our latest start to a day ever since I’ve came out here.  Tuesdays & Thursdays we don’t have PT in the morning which means we got class 1-5 and that’s it.  Last week, Tuesday was our orientation so we were in at 12 and Thursday we had our application seminar so we were in at 10.  Being able to sleep late was great!  I didn’t do much before class with the exception of applying to another seasonal ranger job out here in Flagstaff that would start in mid-May and be done sometime before the end of summer.  Today was the first day that job opened.  Ironically, the Chief Ranger from the parks (it’s like a trio of parks in an certain area) was my instructor yesterday.  Weird.

Not doing anything in the morning, short of taking my uniform pants to the cleaners, was pretty lame; it just kept me tired.  It was a counterproductive change in routine and I hope I don’t do that anymore.  I was dreading going to class today because we were covering Constitutional Law and all I could think about was when we covered that section in the Academy for the MCPS.  It was our 1^st classroom session and throughout all of our training we were let out early when applicable…not this day.  We were usually out an hour before the police recruits, well that day we got out an hour AFTER them!  The building was already closed!  Yikes! 

I ran into our instructor while exiting the bathroom, not literally & I didn’t know he was our instructor, but we’re supposed to move out of the way whenever other people are in motion…only thing was we were in the doorway and neither of us wanted to move.  Awkward!  I returned to class and then he walked into the room…he looked stone faced and he looked very much like a no crap taking cop.  Then class started.  This dude was awesome!  I’ve never had so much fun learning constitutional law.  I wish he was one of my college professors, he was great.  He’s currently a United States Attorney but before that he was a cop…PEGGED THAT!  SMALL WORLD AFTERALL FACT, he was a patrolman and a detective in Nick’s hometown!  I’ve never even heard of Urbana, Illinois and now there are 2 people from there in the same room! I think I might like to take his approach…maybe get my 20 years in as a full time ranger and then go to law school.  Law school’s tough but it could be doable.

We decided we were going to stay after class today and nominate our Class President with the possibility of voting him or her in later in the week. No vote necessary.  Our acting President Travis was the only one nominated so he won by default.  I guess a lot of people are either afraid of speeches or felt weird nominating themselves.  Congrats T-Mac!  He was 1 of the 3 I figured would be “holding office”.

Tuesday was basically a blah day, I wasn’t looking forward to the next 3 days and I tried getting some sleep in early.  I did watch Kevin Hart’s standup special…he’s funny haha. 

WFR Shirt Wednesday

It's Spreading

Today was bit more action packed than the previous day, but I was still fairly tired.  I woke up with a massive pain in my hamstring and I totally didn’t want to go to PT.  I couldn’t remember the last time I drank any H2O so I refilled some of my plastic bottles but hadn’t drank any yet as I was rushing around in the AM getting ready.  It felt like I had a boulder on the inside of hamstring and it was greatly affecting my mood.  My great roommate even tried squeezing the knot or whatever it was…nothing was happening. Jane left us another motivational chalkboard message, “Unstoppable!” It’s spreading.  I did notice the MCPS sent me my tax information…woo hoo!!! I put that sucker away and we were out the door. I stopped in the NAU Outdoors office and talked with WFR Matt and I was able to get my “Outdoor Medicine” t-shirt…it rules! 

The class started up with our warm-ups and Travis had his first official responsibility as El Presidente…leading us in warm-up exercises and stretches.  Heading over to class I told Laura & Nick that if we had to run today I was probably going to have to puss out because of my hamstring.  I could hardly get through the warm-ups because it hurt so bad AND because I didn’t hydrate, I couldn’t breathe after our very first exercise.  Ladies & gentlemen…it is VERY scary when doing something so easy causes you to freak out and gasp for air….somehow I managed but it was a sad sight.   Our practice PEB was tomorrow so Mike wasn’t going to “gas” us.  Remember when I said Mike (our PT instructor) didn’t look like he was much older than a student?  Well it turns out that he IS a student.  I’m good at these things.  So not gassing us meant we weren’t going for a run outside…phew.  Instead we did some jump training (plyometrics) and I already got my squatting form improved since the first day of class.  We had to get down in a squat position, hold it for 3 seconds, and then leap up in the air landing softly and immediately return to the squat position…15 times.

Since we weren’t running outside we had to do something to elevate our heart rates prior to lifting.  That something was (some name of the sets we were doing that I forget) burpees; 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off for 2 minutes.  I started out on fire; I think I did 10 in the 20 seconds.  Your lowest score counts…mine was 4.  When I dropped down for the pushup portion of the burpee I contemplated staying there but it hurt my lungs too much.  I really hope I get this breathing thing down.

We had just about an hour to lift 2 body parts today; FINALLY some real weight lifting time!  In between sets I talked to Mike about my breathing problems to see what he suggested.  Just like everybody else he said it was the altitude and to hydrate and that he used to have the same exact problems I was having.  Stan & I did legs and back but I couldn’t do the leg curls because of my hamstring…I tried doing on set with just 20lbs on it but failed miserably.  Normally my tree trunks can curl well into the 100s but it wasn’t happening.  The weight training session wrapped up and Mike had a little pow-wow with us, informing us that once we get the practice PEB out of the way that we’d start “having some fun” in PT from here on out.  Oh Great!  Something tells me this is about to suck.

Nick & I got home, showered and ate relatively fast.  We headed back to school at or earlier than our goal time of 1230, traffic sucked once again and we were nearly late.  I had a sneaky suspicion that we’d be having a uniform inspection today…YAHTZEE!  Kathy was our instructor for the day and the very first thing we did was lineup for our inspection.  I passed, but some students received the first demerits of the semester.  During one of our breaks I received an E-Mail saying Jerry Reese plans to talk to Plaxico about coming back to the Giants when he’s released from prison…that makes me VERY happy!  PLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAXXXXXXXXXIIIIIIIIIIIIICCCCCCCCCCCCCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Bring Back Plax

Sure he’s old but if the G-Men had him and Nicks on the outside and Smith in the slot with Manningham floating around?  Would there be a better receiving corp in the NFL?  The only 1 that could contest them has the other Manning behind center.  Much like the G-Men, their receivers can’t stay healthy either.

Back to class.  It was fun having our program director as our instructor, we mostly went over the NPS’s rules that we enforce.  I thought the MCPS had a lot of stuff to remember. Their list of rules fit on a tri-fold brochure, maybe 40 rules & regulations in total.  For the NPS, we have two big text books full to digest.  The cool thing about this class was that we got a look at how we would cite certain offenses as if we were writing out tickets. During another one of our breaks I asked Kathy about a couple of pointers for applying to jobs and I told her I had my sights set on working in Philadelphia…mostly because its one of the few full time gigs available and because it’s close to home. She referred to that park as a “revolving door” park, I’ve heard similar descriptions before, because they get into the full time academy in Georgia relatively fast and then people like to transfer out of there because it’s an urban setting and most people get into park ranging so that they can actually work out in the wilderness.  I don’t know much about it now, but I wouldn’t mind working there a long time.  She went on to direct me to other parks that are close to home or at least on the east coast so I got some more work to do.

After class Nick and some other ranger trainees were going to check out a gym in town so I was left to explore Flagstaff a little bit by myself.  I picked up my pants from the cleaners and I was huuuuuungry.  Remembering all of this talk about nutrition and everything, I bypassed my craving for a Big Mac & Chinese food (since I haven’t had it out here yet) and went to the grocery store.  Picked up a roasted chicken (like the 4^th one I’ve had out here hahaha), a salad, and some veggies and headed home.  Nick beat me home and he began cooking his meal as well.  We basically combined powers and just had a feast.  When we were eating, Mama Jane came home to a greeting usually reserved for parents who are up waiting to all hours of the night for their kids to get home.  “Where were you? We were worried sick! You could’ve at least called!”  She’s great.

After dinner I wanted to get my resume printed out to see if Kathy would look over it but I’ve been having problems with my printer for weeks now.  I figured out the issue and began printing. OUT OF INK! CRAP!  Mama Jane said she’d print it out for me and I spent a couple of hours reading one of our required text books, Blood Lessons.  The stories in this book really make you think twice about pursuing a career in such a field.  One story that really bothered me involved a cult hanging and slitting the throats of German Shepherds.  When the cop began investigating the cult by asking around town, he started coming home to dead cats nailed to his door or thrown on the windshield of his wife’s car.  He started receiving threatening phone calls and once he answered the door and 3 people asked if they could use his phone because their car broke down, he told them to wait, flicked on the porch light and they ran to their car and sped off….they were trying to get into his house!  I’ve always had a fear of the backlash of choices you make as a law enforcement officer and I’d never want to put anybody in my family at risk.  I obviously thought of Laura and Indy, Maureen & Matt, and basically everybody I know or I’m linked to.  You don’t hear about these threats too often and it sounds like something out of a movie but you never know. 

Right before going to sleep I looked up some tips for running at high altitudes and clicked on the PS3 Netflix and saw that they already had the 1^st episode of the new season of Spartacus on it!  WHAT!?!?!  I love that show and this episode just aired not too long ago…usually Netflix is behind the 8 ball with getting newer stuff up for streaming at home.  I mean c’mon, one of their new release movies is Blue Crush.  I think that came out when I was in high school.  At PT I noticed my Zigs had a nice rip in the side of them so I wanted to check out some new pairs online…I can’t believe how expensive they are!  Same thing with Oakley sunglasses.  DAMN IT!

At any rate, it’s time for sleep…Practice PEB is tomorrow.  I put a bunch of Icy Hot on my hamstring and crashed for the night.

You Down With PEB? Yeah You Know Me!

Okay so some of you might be asking yourself, What is PEB?  Well my friends the PEB (Physical Exercise Battery) is one of the key factors in not only a ranger’s graduation from a seasonal academy, it is also a pre-qualifier for employment in just about every law enforcement agency.  In most cases it consists of a distance run, agility run, bench press, flexibility test, and body fat percentage and the qualifications are broken up by age and gender.  Today was our “dry run” and we’ll conduct another one a couple days before graduation.  For our graduation purposes we need to qualify in the distance & agility runs and the bench press…but we get tested in everything because in order to get into the full timer academy you need to qualify in just about everything.  Before getting hired as a seasonal you have to do another PEB for EVERY job you go for. 

I woke up and hydrated like a mad man.  I drank two 32oz glasses of water, refilled two plastic bottles and stuffed them in my gym bag with a Gatorade.  I showered and shaved and got into my PT uniform.  Mike told us that it’s good to ingest as many green vegetables as we can pre-run so I heated up some roasted chicken and green beans and had ANOTHER glass of water.  After lunch and chatting with Laura for a little bit, I broke out the foam roller and went to work on my quads and hamis, popped some Ibupro and headed out the door.  My car’s thermometer said it was 48 degrees outside so I drove to campus with the windows open, making any efforts I could to speed up this acclimation process.  I blasted my Kush CD & drank another bottle of water on the way.  When I got to campus, I thought my thermometer was broken because with the wind blowing the way it was, it felt like it was in the low 20s. I had to run to our PT building because nature was SCREAMING and then I plugged in my iPod Touch and began my walk to the track with one of my classmates, Alex.  The gates were locked so some of us began stretching outside while I showed that I was “feeling the flow” of the music in my ears…good show for everybody around. 

When we got inside the track I booked it for the port-o-john and relieved myself once again…hydration is a funny thing.  We continued stretching up until Kathy broke out the scale.  We lined up for the weigh-in prior to the body fat composition test.  It got to be my turn to step on the scale and I was expecting something around 280 to the high 270s since I weighed 285 when I got here.  I looked down and saw 267 and almost pooped a baby right there on the scale!  I guess all of these meals of chicken, vegetables, wheat pasta, water and snacks of cookies and Reese’s peanut butter cups (thanks again Hoop!) combined with PT 3 days a week, a weekend of defensive tactics, and a couple days at the gym paid off a little bit. I dropped 18lbs in just under a month! At the beginning of the program we had to submit fitness goals, included in mine was my goal weight for the end of the program (250) and the weight I want to obtain and maintain the rest of my life (240). I’m only 17lbs from my program goal and we still got 3 months left! Imagine what I’d weigh if I laid off the sweets!  I don’t feel like the weight loss shows but I did mention in a previous post how much easier it was to do dips the other day! I felt weird taking off my shirt with my back to my classmates but as my boy Owen put it, we’re all family.  THAT’S SOMETHING I SAY!  Regardless, no shirt, wearing only bball shorts on a wind rippenly chilly January day in the 7,000ft high mountains of Flagstaff was certainly an experience.  I don’t know how the measurements translate to your fat % but I obviously need to lose more in the belly area, my chest was good, and my thighs could use work. It’s all good, I lost this much already…its only just the beginning!  One thing that kind of got me down was the instructor who was carrying out the body composition portion is the same Chief Ranger instructor from the park I just applied to. 

So you bet your ass I was going all out when it came time for the 1.5 mile run, which I naturally didn’t start without making another run for the potty.  He had us circle up and we did a group warm up then it was time for the run.  I lined up toward the back of the group but as soon as we started I jetted toward the front of the pack.  I kept a good pace with most of the stronger runners in the group for 3 laps and then I couldn’t control my breathing once again.  I slowed my pace and tried breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth but I couldn’t inhale through my nose.  Constant breathing in and out of your nose is a bad deal.  My goal for this practice was to not walk at all but when failing to control my breathing started messing with my mind and I lost track of how many laps I had done, I had to walk to get it under control.  With the timer right next to our starting line I thought I ran a 6 minute mile…YEAH RIGHT.  I ran a 6 minute ¾ miles.  Every so often I’d make a conscious effort to try to breathe in my nose and out my mouth and when I couldn’t I’d slow up and get it figured out and then start back up again.  It was down to the last lap and Jake & I were pretty much keeping pace with each other until I had to walk a few more seconds.  Some of the faster runners were done already and they doubled back to get us slower dudes through.  Eric ran with Jake and tried urging me to catch up to them…I slowly closed the gap and by the time we were on the home stretch I kicked it into another gear I didn’t even know I had and dusted anybody in my way.  I always start strong and finish strong, I just need to get that middle area up to par.  14:34!  I missed my qualifying time by 37 seconds, damn all that walking!  But I knocked 2 minutes off of my time from last week.  Already improving baby! 

I felt myself getting like cold type sick.  I was spitting a lot, had to blow my nose a lot, and once in awhile I’d cough.  I can’t get sick!  We walked back to the gym and then a bunch of my classmates got introduced to my bizarre sneezing pattern.  It never fails to hear something along the lines of “is that real?” after I perform my famous machine gun sneezes.  Now we’re inside and it’s time for the agility run and sit and reach. The agility run is 10 yards long and involves sprinting down & back, weaving in & out of cones down & back and then sprinting down & back and you start in a pushup position with your body resting on the ground.  I flew out of the gate and I thought I ran really fast.  The instructor said I ran so fast that I went further than I had to on the turn arounds and that cost me some time.  I caught my breath and went again but I was much slower out of the gates but felt I had a good enough speed going…I ran the exact same time both times; 17.72.  I think I need to beat 19 seconds so I’m good for now but I want to be in the 15 second range…I think NFL RBs & WRs do it in 15seconds lol.  

Going back to my fitness goals for the class, I pointed out that my weaknesses were my endurance and my flexibility.  They already saw my endurance, now it was time to demonstrate my poor flexibility.  Now even when I was in “sprint around my neighborhood for hours and then come home and have 1 man slam dunk contests” shape, I could never bend down and touch my toes.  Rath used to do the whole straighten my leg, hold my foot and knee cap stretch before bball practice and my leg used to shake him like a new paint can at Home Depot.  I don’t know what it was and the days of my superior physical shape have long since passed, so I don’t think it’s a surprise to any of you readers that my sit and reach numbers were complete crap. I sat down at the box and put the bottom of my feet up against it and I ALREADY felt the pull.  Surprisingly, I think I almost made it to my toes.  In order to get into the full time program…I need to go 6 inches past my toes!   Just as I did in the agility run, my 2 measurements for the sit and reach were identical.  Now we bench.

In my fitness goals, I stated my strength was decent…in that I can take some bodily abuse and left 240lb crowd surfers up over my head with the crowd’s support. As far as lifting weights, that remains to be scene.  One of my goals was to be able to bench my body weight but with how easily today went, I’m shooting for 300lbs.  I was nervous about bench pressing for the PEB.  I’d been asking my brother-in-law Shrek for tips for weeks if not months prior to heading out here.  When I’d go to the gym, I’d do mostly cardio & abs but if I lifted I was benching.  The thing is, I never lifted with a spotter so I never gained anything.  We only had to move the barbell up once and it lays down just at your chest on an adjustable rack and you have 5 attempts to increase your weight.  I don’t know the whole math of the plates and everything else but I was beasting more weight off of my chest than I’d ever lifted before.  I’d never benched 200lbs before and I threw 205lbs up as if I was benching a pencil.  Prior to my sudden weight loss I knew I needed put up 220lbs to qualify, so I decided to go for it but my chest was fairly sore from the previous 4 attempts.  I exploded the weight off my chest, halfway up and all motion just stopped.  My classmates were cheering me on. I was struggling to get it up but there was no way I was bringing it down.  After fighting for a few seconds I called for a rack and my spotters took the bar up the rest of the way.  Had that been my first set I would’ve made it.  So tomorrow in PT, Stan and I are working on our chest. 

This practice PEB was pretty cool.  I was accurate in indentifying both my weaknesses and strengths and the number on that scale was huge pleasant surprise! The camaraderie I noticed toward the end of the WFR course was booming amongst us rangers today, everybody had each other’s backs and we cheered everybody on like we were at a pep rally.  Nicknames came flying out like crazy but I’m not sure you can yell “Hell Yeah” while in uniform so I gotta watch that.  Curtis, Turiya, Travis, & I stayed after class for a little bit to brainstorm about how we’d be able to work out a way to get in some extra D-Tac training since we have a test on it next weekend and then we bounced.  I had to run some errands that included hitting up the school bookstore (man I would buy so much swag there if I could) and then some other places in search of one of these water bottles/jugs everybody else in the class has except for me and to Walmart for some new printer ink and then I hit up the Plex for my first ever hot tub while staring out at the mountains experience.  Hot tub felt nice, I even jumped in the lazy river.  I felt like I was on vacation or something.  Then I saw a bunch of women getting ready for some class in the lazy river and that’s when I bailed.  I’m not sure what the class was but 56 laps around the river equals 1 mile! Just damn.  I actually showered at the gym and of course when I was getting changed some riffraff had to pull that whole getting naked in the locker room crap.  C’mon Man!

I got home; nobody was home.  I heated up more roasted chicken while I threw my wet clothes and some other dirty items in the laundry and ate my salad. We have a counter that we eat at sometimes but the stools are kind of high so taller people like me have to lean over to eat.  Well when I did tonight, Fiona jumped up and wedged herself between my back and the back of the stool.  Silly cat.  Right as this happened, my sister texted me and told me that one her adopted cats peed in the toilet today!  My cat Fred used to do that, that’s great news! 

Today wrapped up with a La Stone phone conversation and now it’s off to bed. 

Only 1 more day of school then two days off!!! (and then 12 straight on…woof)

Good Night

MOUNT UP!!!

Flagstaff Observations

1.)    The first rule of being unstoppable…you must be hydrated.

2.)     

3.)    Arizona is an open carry state (firearms) yet nobody out in Flagstaff carries.  Damn hippies.

4.)    Pardon my saying so but Flagstaff girls have got NOTHING on Jersey Girls…especially my Jersey Girl….and ladies back home that’s something you should celebrate or something.

5.)    I watched Precious last night….just damn.

6.)    I thought I had weird dreams at home…I have at least one messed up dream a night out here.  I don’t remember everything about this one last night but it involved me meeting a girl who had a daughter that was 2 years OLDER than her.  That same girl tried kicking in a bathroom stall door while I was taking a peepee.  I don’t know what’s going in there but it sure is weird.

Let's Get Physical

2^nd Day of D-Tac

Today I woke up and I felt that pounding that I didn’t feel at all yesterday…being held up in the prone cuffing position for a couple hours will do that to you.  The extra half hour of sleep was glorious but I still felt very sleepy all day. When I was getting dressed I opted for a different type of socks, which actually helped a little bit.  Who says cotton is rotten? We both actually packed our lunch today and made our way back for defensive tactics. We parked in the closer lot today which gave Nick the opportunity to perform his first Law Enforcement Officer duty, issuing a fake parking ticket to one of our classmates.

When we got into the classroom I discovered that some more of my classmates started reading this blog.  That’s pretty frigg’n sweet. I’m not saying I influenced this with my last post but everybody was on the ball with their duty belts today…not one person left them around when they weren’t supposed to. We had a brief review of yesterday’s techniques and then it was on to the new stuff.  We were introduced to searches and let’s just say we were very thorough; the student that searched me certainly found my concealed crack…and he showed it to part of the class haha.  Our # of mistakes dropped drastically, the only way we got tick marks was from missing items in our searches…to make it life like we had a bunch of drug paraphernalia and fake drugs & weapons to plant in our pockets, socks, shoes, etc. The instructors informed us that they were thinking of ways to torture us last night and luckily we didn’t give them many opportunities to because when we did…it hurt…in a good way.  That basically took us to lunch.

Be Unstoppable

After lunch we were able to take a couple of class pictures.  The consensus of the class was to take the picture under a feminine product banner in the classroom.  At first I was against it, I even chatted with one of the instructors about it being unprofessional, but it quite possibly brought about our class motto. “Be Unstoppable.”   We got our baton & weapon retention drills on. Travis certainly made sure I “honored” his strikes when the top of his dome bashed into my mouth and his knee knocked into mine...neither blow phased me…until the next day when it felt like I had a rock on my knee cap haha.  I unintentionally planted Arkansas on the ground just by grabbing her shoulder…there was supposed to be more of a fight but whatever…I got my gun back.  We laughed about what happened, apparently a lot of people were laughing about the use of fake violence within our pairs, and our instructors DID NOT like that…we paid for that in pushups.  Once again, all of the instructors paid with us but they were trying to hammer home the seriousness of these scenarios.  “Train to Work”

The day ended with a famous “Red Man” scenario…you and a partner respond to a verbal, now physical dispute (between a “blue man” &  “red man” ) at a campsite…grab your foam “baton” and regulate the scenario.  Before we entered the scenario we had to get our heart rates up…we did that by doing “bear crawls” followed by 5 burpees.  I’ve never bear crawled in my life…if you don’t know it’s crawling on your hands and feet instead of your knees & feet…yeah I was very slow at it.  My partner, Pat, was a pro at it…he was almost at the finish line by the time I got about 5 feet down the lane.  They were calling him Golem after that haha.  We separated the dispute and red man seemed to fade away while blue man attacked my partner…keeping my eye on red man, I started swinging my baton to help my partner…that’s when red man “joined the party.”  I immediately turned toward him and delivered a “straight strike” and sent him straight down to the ground where I stood over him until Pat got blue man down and the scene ended.  Naturally, I feel there were better ways I could’ve handled the situation but it was just a dry run for all of us on many accounts.

Golem or Pat? Hmmmm

At the end of class, we formed an assembly line to get the judo mats away and I informed those who cared that the Packers made it to the Super Bowl.  I couldn’t wait to get out of there to catch the Steelers game but one of the instructors was nice enough to give us a copy of a workout routine..which is one of the things I was really looking forward to going home with…and he demonstrated some of the techniques for us. Some of our classmates said they would meet up with us for some food and the game.  I quickly changed my shirts into a black t-shirt and a black & yellow fleece (that I got for $2 at Old Navy…damn that place is great) and I headed to meet Nick at the car and that’s when I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me.  I saw a body ON the stone wall side of one of the school buildings and I thought it was a really well done 3-D painting…that was until it moved.  There’s apparently hand and footholds on the side of this building and this student was climbing across the wall…definitely not in Jersey anymore!

He's hard to see but he got down right after I took this 1

We’ve passed this place called Granny’s Closet everyday we’ve driven to campus, I’ve heard great things about it and they advertise the hell out of it outside the building; Sunday’s message was “Watch Championship Sunday Here.” Sold!  This place instantly became my favorite restaurant out here. The food was phenomenal and I think they have better wings than just about everywhere in NJ…maybe not the Picili (SP?) Inn in AC…but nowhere else comes close. There were TVs everywhere!  Every table in the place had a TV at it, in the dining room, in the bar…it didn’t matter.  What’s better? Every table had their own TV remote so they could watch whatever they wanted.  Who watches Spongebob or the news during Championship Sunday?!!?  There were Steelers jersey & sweatshirts everywhere…people even waved their “Terrible Towels” like they were actually at the game.  As I’m sure was the case all over the world…the Jets fans were quiet until the second half but I think they were more Steelers Haters than Jets fans…considering the Steel Curtain denied AZ their Super Bowl victory 2 years ago. 

You guys can hate on me for having 2 favorite teams all you want.  I’m True (Big) Blue through & through…that’s the way I was raised.  But when I started getting into the NFL in college I adopted the Steelers too thanks to Cousin Hines and the Black & Yellow that resembled my high school’s colors.  Ok it’s corny to like a team just because of their colors but I know a bunch of people that pick their favorite teams based only on their colors and they can’t name 4 players on the team…and I’m not just talking girls here.  Hell, if girls didn’t pick their favorite teams by their colors then Starter would never have sold any Hornets or Panthers Starter Jackets back in the 90s (don’t forget the drawstring clips!!!)  Giants are number 1, Steelers are number 2.  I know a bunch about both squads but I get nowhere near as fired up watching the Steelers as I do for the Giants; I’ve had plenty of experience in Super Bowl games these past few years to illustrate that point.  The only other team I care remotely about is the Dallas Mavericks…but I don’t follow the NBA at all.  That comes from my Dirk nickname in college cuz I was usually the only white boy balling at Stockton and I made it rain 3s….other than that, sports don’t exist…that’s just my thing.  Can’t get into baseball unless I’m at the stadium…all they do is stand around…and hockey…welllll….the one Rangers game I went to with J. Kush was mad cool but I’m mad at that sport for fighting being allowed but James Harrison (Steelers) gets fined for devastating but clean hits on his opponents…so screw hockey.

After the game it was shower, read, and hit the sack time.

Three of these physically tough 4 days down, 1 to go.

Three weeks down, three months til I’m back in NJ! (but for how long???)

Be Unstoppable

I woke up after nearly 10 glorious hours of sleep and my knee felt like it needed to be cracked quite a bit.  Silly Travis and his “fake” knee strikes…the WWE won’t be calling him anytime soon.  My knee didn’t hurt too bad but I could definitely tell something wasn’t right.  Got out of bed, got ready for PT, got some Ibuprofen in me and we were out the door.

We got into the PT building and I passed  by the NAU Outdoors office and there was Matt, my instructor from WFR, so I stopped in and chatted with him for a little bit and met up with the rest of the class.

We all shared stories of soreness, showed our battled wounds, and reminisced about our first of 2 weekends of D-Tac while we stretched and bellyached about how we didn’t know how we’d be able to run today.  We were sharing our instructor with the general fitness class again today so we warmed up on our own…and that’s when “Be Unstoppable” was unleashed.  Not everybody got it at first but soon just about everybody was on board.  We’d be doing our jogging warm-ups and in almost like a cadence fashion I’d ask whoever was near me if they were/felt unstoppable…if they responded lowly…I belted out “I can’t hear you” and then they yelled their response.  Hahahaha.  I was getting so carried away with it that I was trying to get the class to huddle up and put their hands in the middle for a 1-2-3 Be Unstoppable!  But it wasn’t flying.  I even borrowed the famous 300/ Drew Brees “This is NAU PRTP Class 21…aaooooo aaooooo aaoooo” or however you spell it.  I even went GHETTO for a little bit and tried doing a “role call” song & dance deal that you see some basketball teams do.  “Hey yo Carter!(Yeah)  You unstoppable? (Yeah) I can’t hear you (YEAH!) Role Call!” and then Carter’s supposed to call somebody else out…it didn’t happen though…everybody just laughed at the big dumb idiot.  Some people were into it.  Nick brought up the idea of getting class t-shirts made with somehow working Be Unstoppable on the front and our class ID #s on the back…I’m #24 just like my main man Rath in our SJV Days. I’d totally do that.  I’m trying to get us unified and keep this morale up.

As much as I tried loosening everybody up with the Unstoppable business, the reality was we still had to run and whether they laughed or not I still announced that I’d be the guy coming in last in the run today.  We took a different approach today.  We essentially “raced” each other in a sprint on the tennis courts in the gym; Nick cheated when we went but I was right on Forrest’s heels when we went.  “You’re a fast (something I don't remember) ain’t ya?” one of my classmates noted.  “I can run fast I just can’t run long”, I responded.  Somebody else chimed in, “you’re like a bear”.  That’s the 2^nd time in 3 weeks that I heard that out here hahaha. We had 25 minutes to lift, which sucked, but I already see my strength improving because back home I was lucky if I got 1 “dip” off on the dip stand; I got 3 sets of 3 in today. Today’s distance run was shorter but more challenging than Friday.  We ran a mile around a road on the outside of campus, which included some serious hills, and then back through campus.  I felt slightly better on this trek but I was pissed because I still walked about 20 steps.  It was pretty cool seeing cars stop for us and students watch as we wheezed by them…some of them were very encouraging.  I still have a hard time breathing while running but I catch my breath almost instantly when I’m done.  I wasn’t last but most of the class was at the finish line cheering me on to finish…I passed them and bellowed out a booming UNSTOPPABLE!  The student body, which at this point and location looked like Times Square around Christmas, looked around to see what was going on as if I startled them.  Some of my new chums got amped up by my war cry and started pumping me back up talking about representing Jersey…then CJ asked how I could be from Jersey if I wasn’t a guido; it took 3 weeks but I finally got the much anticipated Jersey Shore reference hahaha.  Thank you CJ, the seal has been broken. 

The ride home for the transition from PT to class was quicker today but I felt like I moved a little slower once we got home.  I showered and texted La Stone a bunch.  Her new furniture made it to the warehouse and is set for delivery to Stephanie’s….sweet! I ate a protein packed lunch and then we made our way back to campus. We left almost 10 minutes later than we wanted to but not only did we make it with plenty of time to spare, I got a parking spot in the front row too.  We began our section on legal stuff and our first of 2 instructors today was a US attorney that talked like the Micromachines guy, despite being a woman.  Not a lot of her info registered in my brain but she forewarned us that it wouldn’t as this was just an introduction.  The next instructor was a Chief Ranger at a local park and covered authority & jurisdiction…very informative and he seemed to really have fun talking to us about that and our fitness levels.  In the middle of his lecture I got a bad case of the coughs, it felt like a needle was piercing my throat.  I couldn’t wait for break so I was the first student so far to the leave the class in the middle of a lecture…unless you count Brad’s asking for permission to go to the bathroom last week. Hahaha.  The lecture ended early and then “always looking to do the right/common sensical thing Jeff” made an appearance into my brain.  The instructor essentially dismissed us but, as I was saying to Nick on our drive over to class, we never get let out early.  I didn’t say anything to hold up the class but Kathy came in as more than half the class was gone and she told Travis that if we’re ever done early that he should get her to see if she has any announcements…low and behold she did.  I wonder when I’ll start opening my mouth for the right reasons. HA!

 It's the Micromachines Guy

Believing that part of my breathing problems when running comes from the dryness in the air, Nick and I headed to Target to get me a humidifier for my room as well as a bunch of other stuff.  Thank you for the birthday gift card Katie & James! Our fitness and diet plans have been pounded into our heads this entire first week of the program so we decided we were going to grab a rotisserie chicken and cook up some of our vegetables for dinner tonight.  We stopped at Fry’s (grocery store) on the way home to get our chicken and I deposited my final fantasy football championship check at the Wells Fargo branch they have…IN THE STORE.  When doing that, my sweetness called with some great news.  The job that she’d been hoping to land for years was finally hers and she got it on her own terms!  If you know her, make sure to send Laura some form of congratulations because this is almost like her Will Smith at the end of Pursuit of Happyness moment.  She’s busted her ass for years to get this and all the years of tears, frustration, and sleepless nights have paid off.  Congrats Babe! Big Things Popping!

When Nick & I got home, Jane was cooking herself a nice dinner…if you consider tofu nice…and she handed Nick his FIRST PACKAGE!!!! YAY!!!!!!  Put him on the board.  We got changed, I threw in some laundry, and we got cracking on making dinner…that was already half made when we bought it.  The three of us sat down for a nice “family” dinner and we discussed things like the Pangaea, Jane’s childhood friend that she reunited with recently through some of the crazy “It’s a Small World After All” happenings, and some stories from class.  I retired to my room for some “maintenance” and I watched some episodes of Undercover Boss on Netflix which brought me to another observation…

Flagstaff Observations

1.)    Unless I’m completely oblivious…there’s NO 7/11s OUT HERE EITHER.  One of the bosses on the show was the CEO of 7/11 and that’s when this dawned on me. Could you Jerseyians imagine no Dunkin’ Donuts AND no 7/11s?  Following up on the other day’s no Dunkin Donuts observation…Jane informed me today that there are no donut shops of any kind out here.  What do all the cops eat?

2.)    This was just something cool I saw today.  When stopped at a red light, my window was right next to the head of a gorgeous Siberian Husky  that was just chilling with his head between the little triangle between the glass of the rear window and the window pane (I guess that’s what you call it).  He was just staring right at me then the driver and front passenger caught wind of it and turned around and started laughing at the site.  The dog was just staring…not moving…not even panting.  Dog was beautiful!

3.)    Speaking of dogs.  I got some potentially bad news about my Golden Retriever, Casey, aka…probably the best dog that’s ever lived.  She’s had a hemorrhoid –esque bump on her butt for awhile now and 3 different vets said it was nothing.  Well reports from my sisters say that the new vet my dad takes her to took a piece of the lump for a biopsy as they think it could be cancerous.  So please keep her health in your thoughts.

4.)    It’s so weird being out here and meeting new people and making new friends because I keep thinking I’m going to run into somebody I know.  In Freehold, if I went out ANYWHERE I bumped into somebody I knew to some capacity.  I don’t know if its home sickness or what but I swear some people I see out here remind of people I know from home.  As far as running into people I know out here goes…Brad is that guy.  We ran into him out at the Grand Canyon then today when Nick and I were at Target…we bumped into Brad and Lauren C from class.  It’s pretty freaky that I’m essentially establishing these kinds of roots out here in AZ.

5.)    It’s been just over week that we went to the Grand Canyon, it feels like it was 2 years ago already.

6.)    Although some of my habits & tendencies remain the same, I haven’t played videogames in over a month…and I have my PS3 with me…weird.

7.)    This is the longest I’ve gone without working in over 10 years and it’s freaking me out a little bit.  I really hope I pick up a good gig after all of this is said and done.

Alrighty then.  We have our first late start day on Tuesday, nothing organized to do until 1pm. Wow already 1 week of the program down, 12 more to go.  WOO HOOO!

Have a good day everybody.

MOUNT UP!!!