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.