Happy Birthday Mom! I love you :)

Today feels like a Thursday.

The most recent Joe Bear episode is now online.

This evening when I went outside to call Heidi it was a bit chilly, so I went back to my room to find a sweatshirt. All my cooler weather clothes are in a box in my closet since I haven't had much use for them. While I was digging through the box I came across my crew sweats, so I decided to out them on. I'd forgotten how comfertable they are. I hope that the evenings stay on the cooler side because cooler weather clothes are so comfy.

Last night I made brownies for my class at the Munsey's house. The brownies turned out pretty well, and only lasted a very short time in class. My teacher walked in and ate one and then asked who made them. When I raised my hand he told me that they were "evil" and then went back for a second brownie. If only he would like my squad's briefings as much as he likes the brownies.

I am actually only a moderate fan of the brownies. They are extremely rich and I'm not usually a brownie person to start with. They are growing on me, but I still think that Chris's mom can make them much better than I can. What I enjoy is the chance to bake and brighten people's day even a tiny bit with whatever I make.

Kate and Jordan are out in the field till Saturday night. Even though I don't usually see them during the week except for at OCF I still miss them.

I started making a Joe Bear OBC episode this afternoon with Rachels help. Nobody was in the classroom when we started taking pictures, but then an NCO stuck his head in to see if anyone was still in there. Luckly the white boards blocked his view of the stuffed animals. Awhile later I was posing the stuffed animals when I heard the other door open. I thought it was the NCO again and this time he would've had a clear view of me holding a teddy bear, so I jumped and threw the teddy bear (which happened to be Joe Bear) under the table. It turns out the person was just one of my classmates who came back to look for his cell phone. The rest of the afternoon Rachel laughed at me for jumping and throwing Joe Bear under the table. I almost did it a second time when my classmate once again entered the room.

It's monday, but my group is already losing it mentally. I volunteered to go a on a work detail to clean the grill outside because I wanted to get out of the classroom. Most people didn't want to go on the work detail, but those of us who did go on it were all really happy to be outside and not in the TOC. When I got back in the room 1.5 hours later (we sat around a lot while waiting for supplies, but didn't mind that at all), Rachel spelled the word friendly with the e before the i not just once, but twice, so John put a cartoon of her up on the white board and we all laughed about it (including her). John and I then started to play paper football because we had no clue how to do the rest of the COA analysis, and neither did anyone else. It was a real productive morning to say the least.

This past weekend was pretty fun, and more relaxing than most other weekends. On Friday Rachel and I got to leave class an hour early in order to go to the VFW post and help serve at the Women's Auxillary dinner. All we did was take food out to people and stand around in the kitchen for 2.5 hours. We finished around 7:30 in the evening. I was so tired that I went to bed at 8:30 that night. I woke up once during the night when Chris IM'd me from France around 3am. I need to remember to turn down my computer volume at night so if people IM me it won't wake me up. I thought about responding to the IM, but then decided to go back to sleep instead. I finally decided to get up around 7:30. It was great sleeping for 11 hours.

On Saturday I spent the morning watching the first part of the UM vs Notre Dame game, but was getting mad at Michigan, so I decided to go run some errands. I picked up some arch supports for my running shoes, but I'm not sure if it feels better or worse using them. I think I spent the rest of the day reading and watched TV until 5pm and then headed over to Barnes to go work at the BN boxing match. My class all worked at it because it was our class volunteer project. Originally I was supposed to help with the hot dogs, but ended up being tasked to video tape the whole thing. Some of the bouts were fairly interesting to watch because the people were either really good, or they were not good at all. I also spent a lot of time just day dreaming and people watching, because I wasn't allowed to leave the camera. Occasionally I'd call a friend on my cell phone and ask them to bring me a soda or a hot dog. We finished up there around 11:30pm.

Sunday morning I got up and went to St. Andrews to check out their service. I enjoyed the service, especially the homily. Then, at 11, I went with Kate and Jordan to the Crossroads service on post. It was more of a worship service than a Church service. In the afternoon Kate and I headed out to the MIOBC soccer game. There are two teams from MIOBC in the league, and Sunday was the first game for both of them, and it was against each other. One team is almost completely composed of my class, while the other team has people from multiple classes. Since I know people on both teams I tried to support both teams, but ended up being called a traitor by Rachel and Natalie because I was sitting with Kate on the other team's side. Eventually I gave up and moved over to my team's side. In the evening I went over to Todd's house and he cooked dinner while I made him and his housemates brownies. I had a good time over there, and dinner was delicious, but the brownies didn't finish baking until around 10:20, so I ended up getting to bed a bit later than usual, which has left me feeling rather tired today. I hope the brownies turned out okay. I was headed out the door as soon as they were out of the oven because I was getting really tired.

One of my plebe year squad leaders, Derek H, just died died on 1 September. He was on patrol with his FA unit as part of an Infantry regiment in Afghanistan. My prayers are with his family and unit.

I've been rather tired recently. I especially noticed it this past weekend, although it was pretty prevelant before then. All I wanted to do was sleep all the time, which wasn't exactly what everybody else wanted to do. This week I've felt ready to go to bed around 7 or 8 each evening, and a few times I have laid down to take a nap, but usually my mind is still in overdrive and so I don't actually sleep. At night I drift off to sleep fairly quickly, but wake up anywhere between 2am to 4am and basically just doze the rest of the night, which isn't great. Perhaps tonight will be better.

Yesterday my squad got torn to pieces during our briefing. I think I heard our brief taker say maybe 1.5 positive things during the whole hour and forty minutes he ripped into us. It was supposed to only be a 45 min brief. His comments were very good, but it was really depressing to have the presentation torn apart from the very first slide. The rest of the class heard about our experience and offered their sympathy. Rachel, who is in my squad, attributes it in part to the fact that we have been doing the same thing for the past month to month-and-a-half and are getting burnt out from it. I can't wait to move on to something else.

Midway through the presentation my throat started to get really scratchy, and since I'd finished off my bottle of water before the briefing started I assumed I was just thirsty. Turns out I was catching a cold right in the middle of our briefing. I felt rather crummy the whole evening, but a really strong motrin and a cup of tea helped a bit. I definetly have at least a slight cold, but at least I'm feeling better today than I was yesterday.

I have to give yet another big briefing in about an hour. At least this one is a squad briefing instead of individual.

I can see again! My contacts finally came in the mail today and I no longer have to wear my glasses. Now I just have to remmeber that I have an appt on Nov 21st at 1015.

I said that I was interested in the soccer game on Sunday because I had a few friends who would be playing, but that's only 75% of the truth. I said I was interested in a home cooked meal, but that's only 75% of the truth. I said that I baked brownies for my class, but that's only 75% of the truth. It's that other 25% that I try to cover up because it would leave me feeling very vulnerable if even hinted at being the reason behind these things. At times I feel like it's so obvious, and other times I feel like I do too good of a job of covering it up.

"Guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life." Proverbs 4:23

I'm back, and in one piece, from Arkansas. The wedding was nice, and it was great seeing Charlie, Jordan, Jasmin, and Jason again.