Relaxing Saturday

Saturday was another lazy Saturday, which is exactly what I needed after the past couple of weeks. At 2pm I was still in my PJs. I woke up around 9:30am, but after getting up and eating breakfast I went back to bed for about two hours. The only activity that I did all day was going on a little over a 9.8 mile run with Jordan in the afternoon.

Last week was a three-day work week due to Monday and Friday being training holidays, but I was scheduled for Brigade Staff Duty (SDO) on Wednesday. Another officer ended up wanting to trade days with me because she had it Friday and I reluctantly agreed to switch with her. It ended up working out perfectly because I was able to have dinner with my dad on Wednesday evening. Thursday was the BN hail and farewell, after which I went to a pre-St. Patty’s day party at Christy’s house. I arrived a couple hours late and only stayed for an hour due to having staff duty the next day. Friday, of course, I had staff duty which lasted from 8am Friday morning to 8am Saturday morning (no sleep). After my shift was complete on Saturday I went home and got about four hours of sleep before some of my friends and I headed down to Austin for the Star of Texas Fair and Rodeo. It was my first time seeing a rodeo and I rather enjoyed the whole thing, though Jordan thinks they are rather cruel. Jordan, Zack, and Andrea all left before the rodeo, but Amy, Willy, Heather, and I all stayed.

This past week was my first full five-day week as a platoon leader. I am really enjoying the job and my soldiers. The issues that arise are completely different than anything I ever had to deal with as an S2, but working with soldiers is so much more enjoyable. Closeout formation is usually mid-afternoon, but most days this week I ended up staying till 6pm or 7pm for different reasons. On Thursday I was at work until 7pm, then rushed home, quickly changed my clothes, went out for a 5 mile run, came back showered, ate dinner, and went to bed. Today is the first day where I have a little time to relax and unwind.

The week wore me out because I am trying to learn my new job which involves trying to process a ton of information that is completely new to me, as well as trying to sort out my emotions on a personal matter. If only I didn’t think so deeply about things.

Yet Another Very Vauge Post

My emotions and thoughts are all over the board right now. Thursday afternoon I recieved a call from one of my friends giving me some news that normally would've been out of the blue, save for the fact that I had a dream about the exact thing a couple days or more before hand. My dream had seemed so real that a couple of times, including when I was driving to Waco to have dinner with my Dad on Wednesday, I started wondering how the people involved in the dream were handeling the situation and hoped they were doing okay because it had to be very hard on both of them. Then, I would remember that it was just a dream. Needless to say, when I learned the news that it shocked me and all I could say was, "wow," over and over again. My friend who told me the news made me promise to not mention it to anyone, so my usual method/outlet of sorting through my emotions and thoughts aloud to my friends is not avaliable. On Friday I had BDE staff duty, which left me far too much time to think and ponder the situation. The whole day I felt like I was in emotional shock and also wanted to curl up in a ball and cry, but of course that was not an option. Instead I spent a lot of time staring off into space and probably looked very tired and worn-out.

I have no idea why I am reacting the way I am to the news. I guess when people you really care about are hurting you hurt too. It's also bringing back a lot of memories from the past year and I feel like I'm going through the same struggle that I went through at the end of October and not knowing the outcome of it all, wondering what God has planned in all of this, wondering if there is any hope for me in the future, yet feeling bad for wondering that at a time like this.

Running for Peace of Mind

If I didn't think so much I would have a lot less drama and frustration in my life. Yesterday I planned to go for a 5 mile run, but after I reached the turn around point I stopped and watched the sun setting for a bit and then walked back to the apartment. It was while I was walking back that I realized that when I run I don't think very much. In fact, usually what happens is one line of the most recent song that I've listened to repeats itself over and over again in my head the entire run. Instead of being annoying I find it helps me concentrate on running. I find it nearly impossible to think deeply while running. I say all this because the other 99% of my life I spend contemplating things that more often than not are things that I do not need to spend hours upon hours over-analyzing. I wish I could turn off my mind and not think so much sometimes.

I'd write more, but it's getting late. Guten nacht.

Above 300

This morning my company had a diagnostic PT test and I maxed the PT test for the first time in my life :)

 

Push-ups: 54 (108 pts)

Sit-ups: 81 (101 pts)

Run: 14:54 (107 pts)

Total = 316 points on the extended scale (which technically does not exist). 

 

After the PT test I went out and ran another 2 miles with a 9:30/mile pace and felt fine, which means that I did not push myself hard enough during the PT test. 

Randomness...

I only had to work four days this past week due to Monday being Presidents Day, but it still felt like a long week. In order to unwind and relax a bit this evening I baked peanut-butter chewies and chocolate-caramel brownies. Tomorrow I am planning on making some caramel corn as well as some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and put the baked goods in bags to give to Phil and Ben on Sunday. They both are deploying to Afghanistan in a few days and Sunday will most likely be the last time I see them for a while. I will miss those guys.

Last Sunday after Church Mike invited me to fly to a Todd Agnew concert that evening with him, Ben, and Phil, but sadly it ended up not working out for me to go. I'm trying my best to keep myself grounded in reality and not get my hopes up about anything, but some stuff Phil said and asked me this evening on the phone is making it really hard, like when out of the blue he and Ben wanted to know why Mike and I aren't dating yet. "Strength arises, wait upon the Lord..." Good song.

One morning earlier this week I got a call from a fellow S2 asking if I knew where my roommate was because she hadn't shown up to PT or to work that day. I'd seen Andrea when I got up for PT, but left before her assuming that she would be following shortly. Therefore, when I got the phone call it concerned me that she hadn't been seen by anyone else. I almost called Jordan to ask if she had seen Andrea, but then remembered that they are in the same BN and so of course Jordan wouldn't know anything more than I did. It turns out Andrea had a briefing and had informed the proper person that she would be gone, but it had slipped their mind. I am writing about this in here because it reminded me of an incident that occurred while in Iraq. One day a report came over the systems about an IED strike that resulted in a soldier killed in Tarmiyah. I remembered Jordan mentioning the night before that she was going to Tarmiyah the next day and the KIA was from her BN and in the vicinity of where she was supposed to go, so I became worried that it might be her because the battle roster number of the soldier hadn’t come through yet. I was too scared to call Jordan’s work phone because I didn’t want to hear from them that she was actually in Tarmiyah, so instead I called Andrea and asked her if she knew if Jordan was on the patrol that got hit. Andrea informed that it was a different platoon and Jordan was still safe and sound back at Taji. That evening Jordan stopped by my room to make fun of me for calling Andrea instead of her, and still hasn’t let me forget the whole thing, but I don’t care because I’m glad she is alive and safe. I guess I connected the two incidents because I found it amusing that this time I was ready to call Jordan due to worrying about Andrea.

Are the paragraph breaks working? They don't appear to be at the moment.

Ripe Pineapple

While in Iraq I ate pineapple almost every morning for breakfast. The man at the fruit stand got to know know me so well that he would see me walking up and start chopping up the pineapple before I even reached the stand. Now that I am home I occasionally buy a pineapple at the grocery store, but I've run into the problem of not knowing how to tell if a pineapple is ripe and sweet. This evening I was at the store and once again standing in front of the pineapples trying to come up with my own method of determining what characteristics meant a pineapple was sweet. I suddenly remembered that one of my friends is from Hawaii, so I gave him a call in hopes that he might know more about the subject. He and I had planned to hang out last night because we hadn't really seen each other since august or September, but for some reason that didn't happen. Sad :(

I digress.... Anyway he didn't answer the phone this evening and so I was left clueless about pineapples. Eventually I decided upon a particular pineapple due to it's pinkish hue. Now that I am home I looked up the question on Google and found the site http://www.ehow.com/how_1679_choose-slice-pineapple.html that gives advice on choosing a pineapple. I wish I had know the advice when I was at the store.

Weekend Synopsis

There are so many things I could write and have thought about writing over this past week, but right now I I do not particularly feel like writing about any of them.

 

I was hoping to spend the weekend lounging around the apartment, but I was at work until 8 pm on Friday working on a slideshow and waiting for keys.  Then, on Saturday I went down to Austin with Andrea and Jordan to go dress shopping for a dress for Jordan for valentine's day.  Andrea had a mall in mind that she wanted to go to, but after driving for three hours and stopping twice at gas stations for directions, she gave up finding the mall and we headed back to the outlet mall in Round Rock.  I was hopping to buy a skirt for myself, but quickly gave up on that idea.  We did not manage to find a dress for Jordan, but each of us bought a few things.  I came away with two new tops.  Going shopping with Jordan and Andrea made me feel better about my own clothes shopping woes because we all have trouble finding clothes that fit properly, especially when it comes to pants, skirts, and dresses.  Recently I've managed to find a style of top that works well for my body type, but as far as the other half of my outfit, if I find an article of clothing that fits one area of my body it likely will not fit another portion properly.  What women out there, besides young teenage girls, have the same size waist and hips/thighs????  I am not a guy!   Okay, enough of my ranting and raving on that subject. 

 

This afternoon I decided to take a break from working on the slide show for my BN ball and go for a run.  Since I wasn't very motivated to go out and run, but yet still wanted to get the exercise I gave Jordan a call to see if she wanted to go running.  She happened to be at the mall doing some more dress shopping.  I made her promise that if I went there to help her shop she would then go running with me.  Unfortunately, we were not any more successful today with dresses, but thankfully she has a few back home already that could work if need be.  After shopping we went for about a 4.25 mile run near her neighborhood.  She invited Andrea and I to eat dinner with her and Zack, so when we got back from our run she taught me how to make stewed tomatoes while she made tacos.  Zack learned the stewed tomatoes recipe in Iraq from some local nationals.  I actually liked the stewed tomatoes and the recipe is very healthy, so Andrea and I may add it to our repertoire. 

 

The hardest thing for me this weekend was giving up going to Grace Bible Church.  I got an email from Betsy on Friday that pretty much summed up what I was experiencing.  Andrea and I have been talking recently about obedience to God and how He has used peoples obedience to bless them.  Abraham's obedience to God in being willing to sacrifice Isaac kept coming to mind, as well as the phrase "and He was obedient, even unto death on the cross..." referring to Jesus.  I felt like this was something God was calling me to do in obedience to Him.  Giving up going to GBC is hardly the same as either of those two things, but it has been really hard because I really liked the people there and I was making some new friends.  Phil and I ended up talking this afternoon and he asked where I had gone to Church today because he goes to GBC.  I told him the whole thing, as well as my frustration with not feeling at home or a sense of peace at the church I ended up going to this morning (Holy Family).  He said obedience isn't always easy, which is very true.  I'm glad he talked to me about that instead of trying to convince me to go back to GBC. 

 

Lindsay called me on Saturday night and she told me that if I sign up for the San Diego Marathon on June 3rd that she'll run it with me.  I am seriously considering it because I want to run a marathon and I also want to see her again.  She's an '04 USNA grad who is in the marines.  We became friends while attending the Anti-terrorism/Force Protection course together back in July in Baghdad.  We mostly talk about running and guys, though other topics are occasionally discussed. 

Jitters

I am extremely jittery and I don't know why.  Perhaps this is what happens now when I don't do much physical activity for two days.  It started during the Bible Study before the church service when we were discussing the Church as a whole.  I find I get very excited about studying/discussing theology and, though our discussion was quite basic, it got the wheels in my mind turning at an extremely fast rate because I wanted to dig deeper but couldn't.  I think I am currently so hungry for any type of spiritual discussion in person that even the hint of it gets me going, though I do not know why I actually ended up with the jitters.  During the service I have to admit that I barely paid attention to the sermon because I was thinking about the Bible study, searching through the Bible, and jotting thoughts down on paper.  A few times I ended up putting my head down and praying for peace so that I could concentrate.  After the service I went home and found that I could not stand still, so I went for a 6.4 mile run to calm me down.  I'm hoping to break the 9 min/mile mark on my longer runs soon, but today I averaged a 9.07 min/mile.  The run worked for about an hour, but now the jitters are returning.  When I was walking out after church today Mike invited me to a Super Bowl party at his house.  I hope that I manage to be a bit more calm by the time I go over there. 

 

On a random side note, the word dichotomy  has been running through my head since this morning.  I don't recall hearing it used anytime recently, so I do not know why I keep thinking about it. 

Talking About Talking

Some people love talking and have trouble listening.  I have the opposite trouble, especially in groups.  It is extremely common for me to be in a group of people who are talking and listen intently to the ongoing conversation and be perfectly content without even realizing that I haven't said a word throughout the whole thing.  Of course, the rare times that I do feel the urge to add my two cents to a conversation I find that I am so focused on trying to get a word in that I stop listening as intently and then get annoyed if I can not find the opportunity to speak.  I am usually much more talkative one-on-one, although I am also probably worse at listening one-on-one. It is usually dependent on the other person and their talkativeness.  If they like to talk a lot, I'll let them talk and just listen.  If they don't talk at all then I probably will not talk very much either.  I probably sound like goldilocks right now, but I'm comparing talking instead of porridge or beds.  Goodness.  Perhaps I enjoy writing on here because I have the ability to talk as much or as little as I want without interruptions and also spend most of the time doing my most common activity: over-analyzing myself.

 

In Iraq I discovered that when I try and multi-task my ability to hear decreases.  I didn't realize that until the potty-mouth contest started the last month of the deployment and someone would be shouting a swear word in the TOC, but I would be so wrapped up in what I was doing that I wouldn't hear a word.  MAJ P was actually the one to point it out because he had thought I had really good hearing until I started the contest.  The truth is that I didn't hear 75% of the things said or discussed by the guys, but I would read their body language as well as the obvious fact that they were whispering to each other and pick up that they were making some sort of less than wholesome comment. 

 

This post is truly pointless and I have no idea why I stayed up writing it. 

 

Best moment of the week:  Finding out I am going to be the UAV platoon leader.

Worst moment of the week:  unlike last week, one single moment doesn't stand out. 

Battle With A Cold

Just the other day I was congratulating myself on staying healthy for almost a year without even a cold. Now it is up in the air whether or not my healthy streak will last any longer.

 

Last night I went to bed with great plans to ride my bike and go running today, but this morning I woke up and realized that I was in the beginning stages of fighting a cold.  Around noon I went to go pick up my uniform and then headed to the store to by some supplies to make Heidi's chicken soup recipe.  The errands wore me out and I spent the rest of the afternoon on the couch watching TV after having made the soup.  Currently I'm debating how to spend this evening because I was planning on going to church and then Maj P's promotion party, but I don't think I have enough energy to do both of those things.  I don't actually feel that sick, but I can tell I am not completely well because I have absolutely no desire to go out and ride my bike or run, and it is a beautiful day outside for doing both of those things.  All I want to do is curl up in my bed.  Hopefully the chicken soup, lack of activity, and medicine that Andrea gave me will strangle this cold before it gets past this beginning stage and I'll be completely healthy tomorrow. 

PL Time!!!

I'm getting a platoon in a few weeks :) WAHOO!!!!!!!

New PR

Today was the first time in my life that I swam a mile. I started swimming when I got back from block leave, but didn't have a set swim workout until last week when I came across the site Zero to 1650 in Six Weeks. Swimming a mile has always sounded like an incredibly far distance to me, especially since I was averaging a little under 1000 yds with plenty of (long) breaks and variations in strokes. I looked at the Zero to 1650 plan and it seemed almost possible, so last Wednesday I decided to start it.

Since I'd already been swimming for a couple weeks I advanced myself to week three of the program, but unfortunately failed to realize that the repeat is in addition to the first swim, so instead of 1350 yds I only swam 1150 yds, but swam more consecutive laps than I had in many years. Then, on Friday I was a bit tired and decided to skip my noon swim. On Monday I moved on to week four of the program and this time counted the repeats correctly, thus completing 1500 yds with a few breathing breaks. The program has you repeat the same workout three times before moving on to the next week, so my plan today was to repeat Monday's workout.

I started swimming the first 600 yds and after 100 yds I realized I felt pretty decent, most likely because I had a dentist appointment this morning and so did not participate in PT. After a few more laps I had talked myself in to skipping ahead to the very last day of the program and going for the full mile without stopping and utilizing only the freestyle swimming stroke. I was more focused on completing the mile then on speed so I found a slow and steady breathing rhythm that I was able to keep up the entire time. I ended up completing 1650 yds in around 47 minutes, but then swam an extra 100 yds for good measure and finished in 50 minutes. The whole time I using the same motivation techniques by counting down the yards like I used to do with the meters while on the erg or during a race. In fact, in my mind I even saw the computer screen on the erg but instead of having the distance of a 2k or a 6k, it was my swimming distance.

After work today I was driving home and saw that the sun had not yet set, so I decided that I'd try pushing myself a bit more today, and also try and relieve some stress and frustration, by going for a run and timing myself on a 3.86 mile loop. Since I had already swam further than ever before in my life I was not sure if my time would be as good as I'd like, but I ended up with a PR of 33:28, or 8:41 min/mile. Of course, it was only the second time I've done that specific loop, but my first time I averaged 8:53.9 min/mile. That probably sounds fairly slow to most people, but for me with that distance it is a decent pace. One thing I do have to learn how to do is pace myself. I start out fairly fast for the first mile, then slow down to a slower pace that I maintain for most of the run, but pick it up again at the very end. I'd probably do a lot better if I started out slower and picked up the pace later on.

Confused Doesn't Even Begin to Describe Me

I am a Lutheran who is lead to attend a non-denominational Church yet also called to become Catholic.  Something has to be wrong here.  Argh!

WWW.HowToDiceAnOnion

The internet is great.  I am quite cooking illiterate even though I love baking.  Andrea is making a sauerkraut casserole for dinner tonight, but neither of us were sure how to dice an onion, so I looked it up online and found a nifty instructional video at http://www.chow.com/stories/10134. 

 

Last night Derrick and Cara hosted a Mexican fiesta reunion of the Tigris River Chapel praise team and chaplains.  I really enjoyed seeing everyone again after almost three months, and it was neat meeting their spouses and families.  I was truly blessed to be able to spend time with such an amazing group of people in Iraq.  I don't think I stopped smiling the entire evening. 

The Week Tastes Like Vegetables

This week has been akin to me eating vegetables when I was little.  I was told the vegetables were good for me, but I sure didn't like the taste of them. (Sometimes I spit them into my napkin, although I usually reserved the napkin trick to get rid of my glass of milk.  Shh...don't tell my Mom).  The week has been full of things that are probably good for me and will help me grow and mature in the long run, but they are very uncomfortable to deal with right now.  More specifically, yesterday I had two extremely embarrassing moments, one of which was so embarrassing that I was tempted to never show my face in public again.  However, my Dad has always said that a sign of maturity is the ability to laugh at yourself, so I did my best to laugh at myself and also gave a few other people something to laugh about.  Some of the other things this week relate to hopes being deferred and, in the process, working on patience.  I sure hope I am doing the right thing by not acting and being patient in one of the circumstances, because otherwise I will probably look pretty funny as I try and kick myself if I find out that inaction was the wrong action.  Vague, yes.  Why?  Because elephants have flat feet. 

One More Has Fallen

My prayers are with the family and friends of 1st Lt. Jacob N. Fritz, West Point  class of 2005.

http://www.west-point.org/users/usma2005/61584/

 

Random Email

    Today I received an email stating, "You have been identified as a potential instructor for the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the United States Military Academy, West Point.  If selected, you would be given two years of fully-funded (and full time) graduate school with a follow on three-year assignment to West Point in the Department of Mathematical Sciences."  I am wondering how my name ended up on the email list since it wasn't a mass email to all of my class, though I have no clue how many other people received it.  Probably a fair number received it as well.  I can't even remember how I did in my math classes.  Strange.

Does Anyone Love Their Job?

This morning I was planning and looking forward to going for a faster, longer run with one of my fellow LT's during PT.  My plan fell through due to a new policy and I ended up not being able to go for a run at all.  Since I went swimming yesterday I didn't due any PT during lunch, but decided I still wanted to go for a run after work at 5pm.  I was really looking forward to the run, but then a meeting with the officers in my section took a while and the sun had already set by the time I got home.  My attitude became worse and worse during the meeting because I realized that I wouldn't be able to go for a run, and though I was not verbally saying anything it still showed on my face.  I was both angry about not being able to go for a run, and also angry at myself for having a bad attitude about having to stay a little later. 

 

I got home in a bad mood and after Andrea came home we had a little venting session.  My mood was still not very good when a few friends showed up later on for the first meeting of a Bible study that Andrea is leading.  This evening we only looked over the Bible study for a bit to familiarize ourselves with it and then talked about work for about an hour, but my attitude is a lot better now after the Bible study.  I do have one question though.  Can anyone name someone in the Army who actually loves their job?  I asked this to Andrea and to the other people who came tonight and sadly no one could name a single person.  A few did say that they really enjoyed PL time, but none of them are PL's anymore.  I'd like to meet someone who whole-heartedly loves their job and looks forward to going in to work everyday.  Perhaps that person could inspire me to love my job instead of bear it in the hopes of something better coming along soon. 

A Wonderful Day

I wish I could press the stop button on today and rewind it so that I could relive it over again and again. I am probably making far too much out of this day and I will realize that sometime in the near future, but for now while the emotion and excitement is still fresh and full of possibility it seems like a completely wonderful day. I will now proceed to rehash the day down to the minute details.

To start off with, the day was beautiful and in the low 60's which, after a week of rain and freezing temperatures, was a welcome change. Earlier this week Phil invited me to go to Church with him and I agreed because the Church was on my list of Churches that I wanted to check out. I wasn't able to make it to the Bible study portion before the service due to having SDO duty yesterday, but I made it in time for the 10:30 service. At the church I ran into my friend Willy who I know from OCF at West Point, and his wife Amy who I met when Willy was in processing into Fort Hood last December. I chatted with them until Phil came in from the Bible study. With him was his friend Mike. Phil had mentioned Mike a couple times over the week, but I hadn't realized that Mike would be at church, which is probably a good thing for me to not have known ahead of time. We all sat down together and a few minutes later Ben, Mikes roommate and Phil's friend, and Ben's girlfriend, Danica, joined us. I was sitting in-between Mike and Phil and during the greeting portion of the service Mike told me that I had a very beautiful voice.

After the service Phil, Mike and I were talking together and Mike mentioned that he was going flying today and asked if either of us would like to go. It sounded very cool and I had never been in a small plane before so I wanted to go, but Phil had other activities he wanted to do. All of us, Ben and Danica included, ended up going out to lunch at a nearby deli that is a very popular after-church gathering place to eat. Mike choose to sit on the end of the table next to me even though there were two or three other open seats on the other side of the table. I wasn't sure if I was still invited flying since Phil didn't want to go and Mike and only just met me, but Ben and Danica were also going flying and Phil's not going didn't seem to even be an issue to Mike about whether or not I was invited.

When we all arrived at the local airport Danica asked me if I had met Mike before today, and I suddenly realized that there I was spending an afternoon with three people who were close friends with each other, but I who I had never met before in my life. The really strange thing was that I didn't feel as extremely shy as I normally would under those circumstances. Most likely because they were all very friendly...and we had all gone to West Point and so had something in common.

Due to the airplane being fully fueled it could only carry three people at first, so Ben opted to stay on the ground while Mike took Danica and I up. It was awesome flying around and Danica and I had a wonderful time. At one point he asked me if, when I got up this morning, I had imagined I would be flying around in plane this afternoon. The thought had never even remotely crossed my mind. After about 30 minutes we landed to see if Ben wanted to come along because enough fuel had been burnt off. Before we took off Ben had said that he and Danica weren't going to stay very long and Mike offered that after that they left he could take me up in the plane again. Ben opted not to go up in the plane at all and so he and Danica left after the flight. Mike repeated his offer to take me up again and I readily agreed. He also asked me if I'd like to learn how to fly the plane this time since it was just the two of us. Shortly after we took off he gave me a few instructions on what to do and then let me take control of the plane. I ended up flying the plane for about an hour, though a couple of times he stepped in to help. Twice he referenced us going flying together again sometime in the future. One reference was to us going flying at night so that he could show me how beautiful the lights are. The other reference was that next time he'll have a specific destination in mind, most likely because I had asked if there was anything really interesting to see where we were flying and he couldn't think of anything.

After we landed and Mike was tying up the plane I happened to see Derrick, so I yelled to him and he came over to say hi. I introduced them to each other and we exchanged pleasantries.

As Mike and I were saying goodbye he told me that I could call and ask him to go flying with him anytime and he would always say yes:) When I got back to the apartment Andrea was about to take off on a bike ride, so I quickly changed my clothes and joined her. My original plan for the afternoon had been to go for a run followed by a bike ride, but the invitation from Mike to go flying had changed everything. Being able to still get in a 14 mile bike ride was quite nice. The weather was perfect for both flying and bike riding.

I called Phil later in the evening because he had mentioned wanting Mike and I to meet and I wanted to tell him how great the day had been. Who knows if Mike and I will actually ever go flying again, but today sure was amazing. The wonderful day ended with Andrea and I having a fire in our fireplace and making s'mores :)

Good Service Is A Bad Thing?

 Phil and I have gone out to eat twice this week and both times the service was exceptionally fast and good.  In fact, the service has been so good that after this last time we were trying to think of places that would be more crowded so that our service would be slower.  We both knew the idea of it all was quite backwards, but both times we went out to eat we had to turn our waitresses away multiple times before we were ready to order.  Had we sat down and decided what to order before starting to talk there wouldn't be an issue, but our problem is that we start talking before we are ready to order.  Our waiter/waitress, seeing us in deep conversation and no longer looking at the menu, comes by because he/she thinks we are ready to order.  We then have to send him/her away and get back to looking over the menu.  That only lasts a minute or two before the menu is forgotten and we get caught up in another topic of conversation.  I think the the process repeated itself about four times both times we went out to eat.   What's more, even at Starbucks the coffees were made exceptionally fast, although Phil already knew what he was getting and I ended up getting the drink that the guy behind the counter recommended, so we didn't run into the ordering problem there.  That is not to imply that the service is usually slow at Starbucks. Starbucks happened to be the location of the place where we were discussing our good service problem and so it is lumped in with the other two instances.