| That's Petty Officer to you. |
[Sep. 28th, 2007|10:51 am] |
It's official, I am now a Machinist Mate Third Class. An E-4, a third class petty officer. OK, ok, technically I am a frocked MM3, which means that I am allowed all the privliges of title and insignea, but I don't get the pay till Oct 17th. But that's just a technicality.
Just so you know, my profile picture is a picture of the sleeve of my dress blue uniform.
And one of the best parts to this, is that I am now officially on leave till October 14th. |
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| it's been sureal |
[Sep. 26th, 2007|09:47 pm] |
Every so often I see something that reminds me that I have joined the military. This is what I saw as I left the on base Mickydee's.
Yep, those are tanks. And that sign says; "now leaving naval weapons station, please drive safely."
Like I said, every once and a while I remember that I am in the military.
more pics of this at http://www.flickr.com/photos/twiggelf/
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| Fortune Cookie |
[Sep. 26th, 2007|09:29 pm] |
Life found me at a chinese food restaurant tonight. I almost forgot my fortune cookie, but I am glad that I grabbed it, the fortune read;
"Your hard work is about to pay off."
This is one of the most true fortune cookies I have recieved in a long time. |
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| It only takes one person to screw it up for everyone |
[Sep. 24th, 2007|09:28 pm] |
It only takes one person to screw it up for everyone. And I happen to be part of everyone this time around.
In case you hadn't noticed, I have not been able to blog (able being the key word there) for a couple of days now (yes, I know, gross understatement).
Up until now I have been using the resources provided to me by my military MWR (moral, welfare and recreation.) They, just before I arived here at NNPTC updated a recreation room with some pool tables, a couple of big TV's, two dozen internet ready laptops, and half a dozen of both Xbox 360's and PS3's. A good place to get on the net, and do things like email, and maybe even a little bloging. And the games were a nice escape from school, and something to do on base on the weekends, especially for those people still in a bit of shock getting out of boot camp. I spent many hours in there, doing everything from killing aliens, to tonning my guitar hero skills, to my all popular blog here.
But one day I walked over after school to enjoy myself to find the room dark, with a sign outsid saying "Recreation room secured". Secured is one of the Navy's all purpose words, we secure everything from machines for maintenance, to soda fountains, to permition to talk freely. It is a very funny word, but... obviously, it has started to grow on me. This place can be very funny at times. Enough of that tangent, back to our feature presentation.
The story gets around to me, much like any story gets around a high school (and the rumor mill here is worse than most high schools could ever dream of,) Someone broke into the rec room, and stole all the video game consoles (and maybe the games, I never got that confirmed though.) Because of this, they kept the entire room closed. Just like that, some A-hole ruined the rec room for everyone at the base.
They finally caught the guy, aparently he tried to sell the consoles to Gamestop... with the MWR barcodes still on them... This man was already in prototype, had finished 2/3rds of his naval training, one of the hardest training progarms in the nation, and he steals from the navy and tries to sell labeled consolses. there are some very stupid people in the world, and we all have to pay for what they do.
The rec room is open again now, at least, the ping pong tables, pool tables, and tv's are open. The most appealing parts of the rec room on the other hand, are still not back. (and they already had copies of Halo 3 preordered...)
Now, my observant readers may realize that, well, that you are reading this.
With the generous aid of a college bonus, I finally have my own computer. And, to brag a bit, a really good computer. A desktop, with all the power I could ask for to play any of my video games, and several to come in the future (I'm a nuke, i'm allowed my own little bit of being a nerd.) A 22" widescreen, high resolution moniter, and a bose 2.1 computer sound system (the navy exchange has some amazing amazing prices on things like speakers I got them for 2/3 the normal price.) At the moment I am watching dvd's of darkwing duck as I am typing this up. Big widescreen moniters are nice, this moniter is bigger than my girlfriend's regular tv, and has a resolution that almost matches most big screen HDTV's.
The only downside to this computer is that I will not be able to bring it with me, when I come home... this weekend. |
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| Moo |
[Aug. 5th, 2007|08:06 pm] |
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Moo |
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| The importance of symbols. |
[Jul. 23rd, 2007|08:34 pm] |
One of the great goals of boot camp is the chance to earn your NAVY ball cap, just like the one the real sailors wear. Today I replaced that ball cap, putting it away only to be brought out for inspections (when our class must be uniform.)
Why, you might ask, would i discard the cap which i "worked so hard for". The carrot dangled above every recruit in RTC. The symbol of a goal achieved.
Because I now have something better. I have what is known as a command ball cap. A cap which does not symbolise what I have done, but instead, what i am, and what I am doing. It names my command, and even has their spiffy little atom.
I have discarded what i have achieved, and replaced it with what i am, and what I am to become. A month ago I would not have believed that I would not want ot wear my great NAVY ballcap. But now I am proud to have the choice to wear my Comand Ballcap. |
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| (Personal) Freedom |
[Jul. 20th, 2007|09:08 pm] |
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Today I earned what is called phase two here at NNPTC. it means that my first set of restrictions here at school has been removed. I could go out and drink if I were old enough (any guesses how most of my class is spending their evenings...). I get a bit of freedoms involving the school it's self (don't have to march in every morning, we can were navy altered uniforms, etc...) And I get to were my own civilian clothes when I leave the base. The first day that I don't have to wear this uniform can you guess what i did? I stayed at school, in uniform. I put in a bit of study hours, and then went to the game room. I'm an exciting person. |
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| A bit of a statistic |
[Jul. 20th, 2007|09:00 pm] |
A tried and true statistic,
when a nuke is given a 50:50 choice they will chose the wrong answer 90% of the time.
They just can't accept that the answer is that easy. |
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| one year... |
[Jul. 18th, 2007|10:12 pm] |
If you had told me that this is where I would be a year ago, I would never have believed you.
I can remember this date one year ago pretty vividly. It was an important day, among many mundane days.
It was my day off (yes, my weekend was on a tuesday and wendsday) And I had just finished a work week of over fifty hours. I spent the morning being lazy, and the afternoon working on bodywork on my car. And then, in the early evening I left for a "movie with a friend", to return home many hours later, just to spend three additional hours on the phone with this same "friend". That was the definition of a big day in my life.
Jump forward one year... This is the definition of a typical day...
I got up at 0530 to run a mock pfa. Walked to the school house, had a pop quiz at 0720 in the morning (I previously hated my 8am class) and then had school all day. I took about two hours off, and then went in for another over two hours of schoolwork. My school plus study time totals around 70 hours a week. Well more than the 50 or so that i complained about a year ago. And today was also the day that I celebrated my one year anniversary with the "friend" that I went to the movie with.
A lot has changed in this one year...
And a lot promises to change in the next few... |
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| So this is what a zombie feels like... |
[Jul. 17th, 2007|10:56 pm] |
I just got back from a little bit of studying at school, to the tune of about 4 1/2 hours...
And It was supposed to be an "easy assignment" I think chief will be supprised by the demeanor of the class when he comes in tommorow.
I walked to my room on auto pilot.
I hate studying at times.
bleeeehhhhh.... :-P |
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twiggelf's journal
