Chris' Updates

My family came into town on Friday, ready for the Tour de Force of Colorado relatives. They decided to try and see if all of us could sleep in Alcott, and after some shuffling and a couple of air mattresses, we managed it. On Saturday we saw Grandma Bobbie, along with aunt Rhonda, aunt Teresa and her grandson. After breakfast and a short visit, we were off to Great Grandma Keller's and Grandpa Doug's, and saw Teresa's boyfriend Ed, aunt Gwen and her two girls. Grandma Keller is not looking well these days; cancer is taking its toll. It's very sad to see her whither away like this. As the evening set in, we headed over to see uncle John and Maryann at their isolated little foothills house. They're doing well, as are all of their dogs. Sunday, Zach decided to leave to visit his friend Josh. The rest of us did a bit of clothes shopping, and in the afternoon we visited Grandma Doris and aunt Nancy. They seem to be doing pretty well these days. After that, Mom and Dad dr...

Well, I spent the first part of my break at my parent's place in New Mexico. I had a very relaxing time. Looking back at the whole trip, I only left the house a few times. I got to meet my sister Jeannie's boyfriend, who was recovering from a bout of some sort of colitis. He's a nice enough guy, but he has a long and colorful history in Los Alamos. The family opened packages on Christmas eve. I made out with a bunch of new tools, which I can certainly use. I've also got a gift card to Best Buy, which is always handy. On Christmas day, my brother Zach and I went for a run around the neighborhood, and I really didn't keep up very well. Dinner was very good: lasagna, sides, and pecan pie. My parents had saved the frozen pie from Thanksgiving. I planned on staying a bit longer, but my family is also planning on coming up to Colorado, so I drove back today. This should give me a day or two to clean the house.

I'm done, it's over, fin . My exams all went pretty well. Arabic was a little bit iffy, but I was impressed that I did know a few things. I hope my grades are good enough for Engineering, but it's out of my hands now. It's a strange feeling. I'm relieved that I've done my part and I don't have to work anymore, but still nerve-wracking. It shouldn't take more than a week to get my grades back, but I have no idea how long the dean's office will take in its decision. I've decided that if Engineering turns me down, I'll still stay at CU for another semester, to try for appeals, and so I don't have to switch schools in a matter of days, potentially. That could be a nightmare. Besides school, driving is also winding down, at least for me. I haven't volunteered my services over the break, although I might want to do a little work. At this point, I want a break from the bus. The internship is still going well. At this point, it's pretty s...

School is drawing to a close. I finished up my classes this week, and tomorrow is my first exam. It's really been a good semester, even if it's been stressful and difficult. If I can just pull my GPA up, I could be admitted to the College of Engineering and Applied Science. If I can't, I'll be barred from the college and the Computer Science major, at which point I'll probably transfer to another school. My predicted grades put me right on the line, and I'm not yet sure how to feel. On the other hand, my exams count for a lot of points, so they could really help or really hurt me, either way. In other news, the internship is starting well. I've decided to work on the same project as Holly and Marlin. Some of the ideas are covered by non-disclosure agreements, but basically we're going to be working with Natural Language Processing ideas, trying to expand the field in new ways, and possibly make a profitable application. Let me say this; if we can pull o...

Hey, just a quick update. There's not much to report for school, since I'm just looking ahead to the end of the semester and the fateful decision. But the exciting news is that I just interviewed at a small corporation called Rational Data. Holly has been working with them for a few months on a new project, and recommended me to her boss, the CEO, Marlin. The interview went well, and I've already been invited to start next week, although we're not sure which project I'll be involved with just yet. I'm just excited that I'm looking at real-world experience!

This week, I took my last midterm, for calculus. I felt pretty good about it, but I only earned a 67. I'm not fretting though, I only have to hit the average. My monthly Army drill was this weekend. First thing on Saturday morning, we had a random UA screening. Funny thing about the random people chosen, though; most of the E-4's and below were "randomly" chosen. Just funny is all. While people were waiting for the urge, our Major put in The Muppet Chrismas Carol . I'd never seen it before, and it was cute. After that, we got some work done on service calls. I ended working mostly on phone lines again. Sunday afternoon, there was a Christmas gift drawing, and I got a mug and some candy out of the deal. I have to say, I really like this unit, and I'm proud to serve with such a great group of people.

Well, I was planning on leaving for Colorado on Wednesday, but the weather ruined that plan. Instead, I spent the day doing homework and getting some quality "me" time. Thursday, I went with Ashley to the Campbell's Thanksgiving celebration in Greely. There were quite a few relatives that even Ashley didn't know, but the food was great. I got a chance to talk with her grandfather, Bob, and he gave me a bit more of his vast knowledge on guns. It was fun. After the Campbell's, Ashley and I drove back and visted my grandma and aunt. They seem to be doing well. We also visited Ashley's grandmother, and she was thrilled to see me. I really need to visit people more often. Saturday, Ashley needed to catch up with her work, and it was a gorgeous day, so I decided to get really ambitious and clean our garage and make room for a huge bucket freezer. It wasn't too bad, and just when I started to run out of steam, Ashley's mom and uncle showed up to help put ever...

Yesterday was Chris and Holly's wedding, and it was absolutely wonderful! Ashley and Jackie left the house early, about 10 AM, so they could go have their hair done. I lounged around a bit longer. Finally, at about 2:30, I drove to the event center. I met up with the girls. Most of them were already dressed and ready. I changed into my tux and helped Chris with his. Pictures started at about 4. At first we were missing the best man, Ed, but he arrived with impeccable timing. We took many pictures with just about every configuration of family members and bridal party members possible. During much of the process, Ashley took pictures with her new camera, and she got some excellent shots. After the bridal party was released so the photographer could continue family shots, we mostly sat around, complaining about the lack of a lunch meal. As the evening waned and the photos wrapped up, guests started to arrive. After what seemed like an eternity, the ceremony began at about 7. Holly loo...

Well, last weekend was a bit crazy. Friday morning, Kristen was induced into labor with her baby. Ashley decided it was her job to get Kristen through, so she was at the hospital most of Friday and into Saturday. All that time, I was hastily cleaning the house. Saturday morning, my mother arrived, and I spent most of the day with her. In the afternoon, I received the call that Devin had given his mother some trouble coming out, but after an emergency C-section, mother and baby were both wonderful! Sunday I spent more time with Mom, and she came with me on my bus run to Boulder Reservoir. It was a great time, and she found several opportunities to use her new camera. Sunday evening, I went and saw Devin for the first time. Babies are just so tiny when they're first born! This week I've been a working fool, but at least this time I'm choosing my hours. I need to get some money together for the holidays. I had a physics midterm on Tuesday night that went very well. This weeken...

Well, I think I've taken my wardriving to the next level. Currently, I'm in the middle of a bus run to DU , and I'm parked in the bus, nowhere close to anything on campus. (Actually right about here .) However, as I type, I'm connected to the infamous "linksys" wireless access point. Someone in one of the nearby houses did the typical home user thing, and just plugged in their router without setting up any security settings. So now, I'm not stuck trying to walk around south Denver trying to entertain myself. Thank you, linksys. How many people can say they've gone wardriving in a 20-ton bus? In other news, the online music store that I've been using, URGE, has officially shut down, so now I'm stuck finding a new store. It's like PC Club all over again. So for the past couple of days, I've been trying out Rhapsody. My MP3 player, a Sansa e260, is designed to integrate with Rhapsody, and so far I'm impressed. Instead of the way I...

Or this post's alternate title, "Since When Am I an 88M ?" This weekend was my unit's drill, and this time we were slated for weapons qualification at Ft. Carson. Now that I'm the only licensed bus driver in the company, my superiors asked me if I could head down with the advance party on Thursday, one day ahead of the bulk of the company. So, Thursday, I woke up bright and early, and headed over to Fitzsimons to meet up with the rest of the advance party. After a bit of confusion initially, we lined up our three HMMWV 's and our LMTV , loaded our personal gear and my radio gear, and set out for Ft. Carson. The rest of Thursday was rather dull for me, since it was just the other members of the advance party, all senior NCO's (and most nearing retirement) getting ammo, ranges, and the like lined up for Friday. Friday morning, we acquired our bus, and everyone headed out to the range to start setting up. The company showed up earlier than we expected, so we ...

Alright, so it's Halloween night, and tomorrow I'm going in early for drill. I managed to get to Sights and Sounds of the Islamic World last Thursday, and Ashley and I had a good time. The food was quite good, the songs and poetry were great (besides the extremely rude crowd), the comedian was a ball, and the wedding was intensely interesting. On Saturday, Sean and I mostly finished the calculus lab, so that's one academic need complete. Saturday night Ashley and I went to the CU Theatre's production of "The London Merchant," which was in the Loft Theater, a very small venue with seating for maybe 100 people, on four benches surrounding a square stage. Very unique production, and a great play. Monday, Ashley and I got to our last beginning ballroom dance class. We're thinking about more advanced classes, but we'll see. Last night we both went to Golden with my Arabic class to enjoy a meal at the Ali Baba Grill. The food, company and coversation were al...

Well, here I am again, driving the bus on the late night. Oh well. Earlier tonight was the second calculus exam. It felt significantly better than the first, but there were a couple of parts that were out of my grasp. The TA's were very good about grading last time, and we had the exams back the next day. That kind of turnaround is unheard of! Hopefully they will do the same tonight. I've got plenty happening in the next week; tomorrow night is the Sights and Sound of the Islamic World event, which I'd like to experience. They're holding an actual wedding, plus who can turn down free food, even falafel? Saturday night, Ashley and I are going to see the CU theater production of The London Merchant by George Lillo, which promises to be entertaining. Monday night is the last of the dance classes that Ashley and I have been taking, Tuesday is the Arabic class "field trip" to the Ali Baba Grill in Golden, and Thursday will be the start of this month's Army dril...

It's been another busy week for me. Work has peaked again because of another home football game and Parent's Weekend, so I've been driving a lot. Tuesday I took my exams, and did fairly well on both of them, so I'm pleased there. Academics from Wednesday forward felt rushed. I'm still keeping up with calculus homework, but only just. We have a calc exam next week, and I've had little time to study for that until now. For driving, I've taken a lot of different runs, ranging from early morning College Inn loops to late night WillVill loops, and even a few charters. In particular, Thursday afternoon I had a charter from the School of Engineering going to several tech companies in north Boulder, and that run was disastrous. I had 3 separate drops and pickups, and conflicting information on where they were and in what order to arrive. I did what I could to salvage the trip, but it was still a royal cluster-f***. We got back to the school 35 minutes late, and seve...

Nothing huge to report this week. School is continuing at a steady pace. Work has slowed down, and I'm quite happy about that. We have several new drivers coming into the company, so the workload should cut down a bit. Ashley and I have started ballroom dance classes on Monday nights, through October. I had fun, more than I expected. I don't dread the classes like many males do, but I have to admit, I wouldn't just take them on my own. This weekend was the first Army drill of the new fiscal year. We have another addition to the commo section, MSG Mora, who is a great guy and a knowledgeable NCO. I spent most of the weekend moving phone extensions, since the unit decided to rotate offices for a bunch of people. However, a couple of highlights included a change of command for the company commander from CPT Robinson to CPT Sherard, followed by a patch-changing ceremony. Our higher headquarters have changed from the 96th RSC in Utah to the 103rd ESC in Iowa. Our new patch is a ...

Tonight was the 5 years of dating anniversary for Ashley and myself, and about a month ago I bought tickets to the Loreena McKennitt concert! This was Ashley's first ever concert, and the first one I've been to on my own, and it's been years since I've been to one at all. It was held at The Paramount in downtown Denver, which I had never been to. The concert was amazing, and the woman sitting beside us was friendly and had an extended conversation with us before the concert and on the intermission. The concert was just absolutely great. Ashley and I thought the three encores were a bit much, but oh well. I was extremely intrigued by the hurdy gurdy and its player. I'd heard the sound in some of Loreena's songs, but I could never identify the instrument, so that was a treat. Ashley bought two CDs from the vendors, and we headed home. As if it wasn't a great evening to begin with, I still had a surprise for Ashley. When we got home, I gave her a little crimso...

Wednesday was the Calculus midterm, and I didn't do all that well, but I'm not alone. Temper my 49% with the fact that the average was 51%, standard deviation 16%. I feel like school is going pretty well, but I'm staying incredibly busy with special events. Like Friday night's Buff Bus driver's party. Dine, the girl I trained with, worked very hard and was actually able to reserve one of the 22-passenger mini buses for a "team-building event." She invited all the drivers to be picked up at their residences, to be taken to a park off of Broadway and Table Mesa for a barbecue. We had a great time, and I got to meet a couple of drivers formally instead of just passing them on the time sheets. I spent a good amount of time talking to Stuart, an Army ROTC cadet and generally good guy, and we arranged to switch our schedules a bit to make both our lives a bit easier. Great time. Saturday was another football game, this one against #3 Oklahoma. I had the distinct...

This weekend was our family trip to Ruidoso, and we had a great time! Ashley and I spend Thursday night trying to pack and plan for the airport. Friday after class, I headed strait home to get the last few things ready. Ashley and I got out of the house on perfect time, parked on the off-site lot, went through a quick computer kiosk for check-in, and buzzed through security without a hitch. We had a little bit of time, so I introduced Ashley to the USO at Denver International Airport. The flight was very short, and in no time, we met my mom at the baggage claim in Albuquerque. We spent about 3 hours driving southeast, some of it through twisty mountain roads, and found the condo without too much trouble. We met Dad and Jeannie there, and went to bed promptly thereafter. Saturday, we picked up some groceries, then mostly just lounged around. Zach showed up mid-afternoon, and everyone took some time to enjoy each other's company. It's not often that we can get the whole family in...

Well, Tuesday night was my first midterm exam of the semester. It was in my General Physics 2 class, and I already have the score back, a B. I'm pretty happy with that, although I haven't seen what questions I missed. I have an exam in Calculus next week, we'll see how that goes. This weekend is the family trip to Ruidoso, NM, so I'll have to study on vacation. What a gyp.

The week was normal for the status quo. I'm still working a bunch, and not incredibly happy, but at least I'm keeping up with schoolwork. Saturday, I first had a trip up to CU's Mountain Research Station, a very beautiful, scenic drive. Saturday evening was the football game against Florida State, and I was driving WillVille. Not only was it the first game of the year at Folsom Field, but it was also Florida State's first ever trip to CU, so the student body was hyped up and there were a lot of Floridians in attendance. For some reason, Events Services had not redirected our normal route, so we were expected to keep going through the middle of campus along Colorado Ave. As game time approached, it seemed obvious that it wasn't going to work for long. Colorado Ave. was a sea of people, with vendors and radio stations lined up on the sidewalks and people meandering everywhere. I found that I could inch through the crowd safely, but my horn was only semi-functional. Ju...

Hey all, just a quick update. This weekend, my dad came up from New Mexico, and my dad's uncle and a couple of his cousins came from California to Colorado for a visit. I followed them all around Saturday and we met with quite a few relatives. However, the person of honor was my great grandma Jean. She's 86 years young and battling cancer, so she's usually quite tired. This time, with my dad and his cousins, and a couple of my aunts and their children and grandchildren, grandma perked up and held out for quite a few hours as everyone talked on her front porch. She still seemed frail and tired, but she was also excited to have so many of her generations in attendance. School has been going well, but it's certainly picking up pace. A rhythm is slowly starting to form, and I just need to adapt my schedule to it. I'm working quite a bit again this week, but nothing like the first week, thank god. Don't worry, my studies still come first.

Well, Saturday I looked forward to my last bus run for the week, the CU vs CSU football game. It's traditionally one of the rowdiest games of the year, seeing as CSU is our rival school. Well, sure enough, even at 8:30 in the morning, we had several hundred people lined up on the sidewalk, all vying for a seat on the Buff Bus. We packed all of our buses as full as we could allow, then set off for Mile High Stadium. The entire way, the crowd would start up singing the school song, and a variation on a CSU chant, "It sucks, to be, a CSU Ram!" Once we hit the traffic, the crowd would often see a car loaded with black and gold, and cheer. Or they might see an SUV loaded with green and yellow, and start jeering. We made it to the stadium in one piece, but after much more traffic on the side streets, we were turned away from the usual bus parking lot. This upset me quite a bit, as I was forced to drive around (at a crawl) and try and find a place to let off the now-rioting mob ...

Transportation plans on working me like a dog this week. We're down several staff drivers and lost many student drivers to graduation, and I feel like I've been picking up more than my share of slack. From Tuesday to Saturday alone, I'm working 33 hours. I'll admit, that's not even quite full time, but I'm a freaking full time student! I've sworn off full time job and full time school ever since EchoStar. Three nights this week, I'll have gotten less than 5 hours of sleep. If this bullshit doesn't clear up right quick, I'll have an earful for my boss.

Well, yesterday was the first day of classes at CU. So far so good. I think this semester will be good, as long as I don't get bogged down with work. So far, I've got about 20 hours this week, and thats really more than I want to handle. I've got about 9 hours bus driving on a permanent basis, but a bunch of people are still figuring out their schedules, so I've pick up some of the slack. Oh yeah, and I'm working the CU vs CSU football game this Saturday. Wish me luck. I'm thinking about taking a flak vest or my Kevlar helmet, because it's going to be absolutely nuts. As long as work settles down to about 12 hours a week, I should have plenty of time to get with study groups and office hours and the Arabic Speaking Club, and use so many more resources that I never thought I needed. This semester, it's time to figure out how to be a good student again.

I've been mulling it over for weeks, and I decided that a new laptop really would help my endeavors this semester. My old laptop is a bit slow at this point, but I could live with the dated technology. What really prompted me were the bulk and weight of the machine, and the fact that it has a 2 minute battery life. It's impractical to try and use that laptop very often, since I'm forced to sit near an outlet and take a few extra minutes for setup and tear-down. So today I finally took the plunge. Armed with some leftover student loan money, I headed to Best Buy. I had already shopped around and picked out the machine, so the transaction was fairly quick. I am the proud new owner of an HP Pavilion dv2415nr . It's fairly small and light, and looks great with their Wave pinstripe design. It's got Windows Vista, an AMD Turion dual-core processor, comes with 1GB of RAM (I'll probably upgrade that posthaste), and built-in NVIDIA GeForce graphics! Not to mention the in...

Well, just got back from my first major bus break-down. Several other drivers and I were taking a group down to the Denver Museum of Natural History and the Denver Zoo. The drop-off was uneventful, and the other drivers and I wondered around the museum for a bit, taking in the dinosaurs exhibit. When I went to start the bus back up, however, I noticed a large puddle on the ground, near the engine compartment in back. Upon further investigation, there was oil leaking all over the transmission block, and it had been the entire time I had been dropping students off. It was a severe leak by this time, but my only conclusion is that a hose was severed while I was coming off of the highway. Luckily, there was enough room to take all of the students back on the other buses, with a few standing. I waited for a while for the enormous tow truck to get through rush hour traffic, then had a pleasant ride with Brent, the tow truck guy, back to Boulder. I'm just thankful that this wasn't wor...

With summer break coming quickly to an end, I decided to head down to New Mexico last Saturday. It was optimal timing, as I was in attendance for Jeannie's birthday dinner and the big day, her first day back to LAHS, and Zach's last few days before he heads off to his first year of college at New Mexico State . My dad and I also got to go hiking and geocaching, but we didn't find our chosen cache before the weather forced us to move along. I also saw The Simpsons Movie with Dad, and Rush Hour 3 with Zach. Decent, funny movies in both cases, but I think the company was better than the movies themselves. And for Mom, we found Photoshop Elements 5 to help her compile her many family photos digitally. It was just the break I needed before I get back into school mode. Oh, and on the drive back today, I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on audiobook. Great read (or listen, in this case), I highly recommend the entire Harry Potter series now that they're all done...

The past week hasn't been the mad cleaning fest I had planned. After Jackie moved out, I had planned on doing my best to get myself and Ashley better organized, and find everything that was left behind. Instead, Sunday I developed a nasty pain in my abdomen, and it just got worse. I went to the doctor on Tuesday, and based on the location of the pain he suspects some form of colitis. The pain peaked Wednesday, and I spent most of Thursday asleep or in agony. But after many antibiotic pills, the pain finally let up Friday. I didn't feel well enough to get to my Army drill, so I'll have to make that up soon. By today, I'm feeling mostly normal, and thank god for that.

Well, starting where I left off, last Sunday I went down to the Renaissance Festival. We weren't sure ahead of time who all would go, but we ended up with just Jackie, Holly and myself. Ashley was down with a tummy ache, and didn't feel up to going. But the two girls and I saw the sights and got our fill of the merchandise, the shows, and most of all, the atmosphere. I can't vouch for the Faire's authenticity, but it truly is another world apart from the modern. The week has been usual, excepting a fairly embarrassing incident while driving a bus through Denver International Airport. No injuries or damage, just embarrassment. Jackie has been packing like a crazy woman all through the week, and it culminated today. After picking up her father and their U-Haul, we packed the small truck, said our goodbyes and took our pictures, and she's on her way. It should only take 3 or 4 days to get to Georgia, the faster the better I'm sure. Best of luck on your trip and in...

A few exciting points this week. Last Friday, Ashley and I attended her cousin Robin's wedding. It was a very simple ceremony by a Justice of the Peace in their beautifully decorated back yard, and a nice family party afterward. Robin looked great, and it was a great time overall. Saturday and Sunday were devoted to the monthly Army drill. It consisted mostly of unpacking from AT, and the commo section received a new addition. SPC Flauta is a former active-duty infantryman, and self-admitted World of Warcraft addict. He seems like a great guy, and it's great to have him in the section. Besides that, I've been driving buses. Yesterday I took my first bus trip up to Rocky Mountain National Park, and it was just a terribly pretty drive. I've forgotten how nice it is up in the mountains at this time of year. Jackie has been making more preparations to move out next week, and the house has half-full boxes everywhere. But tomorrow we're taking a day off...

Well, not a bunch to report on since coming home. I've been working a lot, including more than a few "rain runs." They work like this: I come in and pre-trip the bus as usual, but I don't actually go anywhere until the coordinator of the cheer camp calls us. We're only needed if the camp needs to be moved indoors due to rain, and it's too early in the summer for many afternoon showers. Consequentially, I end up doing busywork, like cleaning out the classroom, inventorying bus equipment, or even just washing buses. Its not like it's hard work, and I still get paid my full rate, but still. But the real news today is that I declared a major! I've been vying to transfer into the College of Engineering and Applied Science to become a Computer Science major since high school, but this spring I got caught. I earned more than 60 credit hours and was forced to declare a major, but I couldn't get into Engineering because of my GPA. A guy in the Department of...

That's right, I'm back home now. Last Sunday night was the end of the exercise. 1SG Bernal got a paranoid in the last hour, assuming that the opposing force (OPFOR) would mount a massive assault, so we broke out the MILES AT4 so that we'd be ready to do some real damage! We loaded them and ran them out to the entry control point (ECP), but the MP's there were already packing up for the exercise. What a let down. Over the next two days, we packed up the tents and all of our gear, and loaded them in our CONEX (Container Express, aka. a steel shipping container). On Wednesday, everything was packed and shipped, so there was nothing to do except enjoy ourselves! LTC Carter was able to get control of the rappelling tower, so several of us went and had a blast with that! In addition to the wall that everyone rappels down in Basic, they opened up the open side that simulates a helicopter rope decent! I only went down the wall, but the open side looked like a blast! After that...

Annual training at PacWar has been going well. SPC Dupio and MAJ Friberg have already gone home, so it's just SFC Zimmerman, SGT Lant and myself. About once a night, at 3 or 4 in the morning, Sgt. Z and I hear blank fire and are forced into a defensive posture, but other than that I've been updating work order paperwork, watching movies, and trying to stay warm. Yeah, no kidding, this place gets frickin' cold at night! It's 110°F in the heat of the day, and 45°F at night. And while 45° may not seem that bad, it gets to you after a few hours of sitting around typing. But I have some very exciting news! This morning after shift, Sgt. Z and I were told to be at the morning formation. That was a little strange because we haven't had to attend formation while on night shift. But at the formation, the two of us and several people from our sister unit (the 5025th GSU) were awarded the Army Achievement Medal ! It's a fairly low-ranking award, and most people with some y...

Well, it's been a heck of a time so far here at Operation Pacific Warrior. Last week, I joined up with about half of the company to fly out to California. The NCOs introduced me to the USO for the first time, and the USO in Denver is exceptional! The flight to San Jose was uneventful, and we had a short wait until we caught a bus down to Camp Roberts. In the grand scheme of the exercise, Camp Roberts is "Kuwait," the in-processing station, and Fort Hunter Liggett is "Iraq," the operational area. Camp Roberts itself is not much to look at. Yes, it was a huge training base during WWII, but I'm sure it hasn't been updated since 1945. Half of the camp is in complete shambles, unsafe and unfit for habitation. The other half has plastic siding installed. (Detect any sarcasm?) It's an enormous dust bowl, and miserably hot. I'm thankful we only stayed three days. On Friday the 8th, we bussed back up to Fort Hunter Liggett. Immediately I could see that it...

Since coming back to Colorado from Zach's graduation, I've gotten back into the routine of preparing for AT and trying to wind down. Saturday I had a quick one-day drill, which I took to fill out my military license, take a HMMWV road test, and grab all of my gear. Sunday I spent with my Mom, and we visited family up north. I've just about prepared everything for AT. Everything's packed into two standard duffel bags, compartmentalized using plastic zipper bags. I'm taking a camera, my GPS, and a few other amenities. I've decided to skip the laptop this time. It's just too heavy and bulky, and it's likely I won't have any internet access anyway. I'll be setting up an internet cafe at Fort Hunter Liggett, but for military computers only. I'll have to wait to see what sort of access I have down there. Potential internet deprivation aside, I'm pretty excited about this AT. It will be the first time our unit has done it all together in a long ...

Oh gosh, it's been a while. Really sorry to ignore this for so long, but you can beleive I've been busy. School ended smoothly with the presentation of our project in Components, and the very next day I was on the road to New Mexico. I drove to Albuquerque to see Zach's track final, and I was rewarded to see him get 2nd place in both shotput and discus, both directly behind his good friend and team mate. I was also there for Mother's Day, so Mom, Dad, and I went geocaching and found a great little path. While I was gone, Ashley had surgery on a cyst, and I came back to Colorado to find her very much in pain still. The weeks that followed were pretty quiet. I started thinking about Annual Training coming up in June, but mostly I was catching up on some good old computer gaming. One day, Marcy and I installed a new bedroom window, so hopefully it will be more energy efficent and more bearable in the heat. I also had a few bus runs, shuttling a conference from their hotel ...

My pride, my Army promotion, and my grades are all being decided this week, and so far I'm not doing well. The drill this weekend was fairly normal, nothing too bad except for the company PT test. I started on the push-up event, something I thought I had locked up. But about 10 push-ups in, I started lowering my head and looking at the ground. Almost instantaneously I had 3 NCO's standing around me and telling me to keep my head up and go down lower. With all of the commotion around me, I did a pitiful job, probably one of my worst performances on the push-ups. I didn't even come close to passing there. Disheartened, I wouldn't have even bothered going on, but SGT Murray encouraged me to at least finish all three events. I barely eked out enough sit-ups, and really took it easy on the run. All that preparation on the run with Pritchett, and I ignored my push-ups and failed before the run even started. This morning was the Arabic written final. I don't think I did a ...

Last night I had a fairly bad bus run. I was moving a conference from their hotel to Folsom Field for a relaxing evening of fun, gambling and socializing. I was driving an articulated bus, which forced me to park awkwardly for picking up the group. I had several ladies in high heels trying to walk down a short, grassy slope to board. However, no harm done, we continued on our way. I dropped the group off, then went back to base and post-tripped the bus and ate dinner. I came back to the bus and drove back to the pick-up point, where I was slated to shuttle for a couple of hours. Very few people came out during the shuttle period. When 10:30 rolled around and I had still only shuttled a fraction of the group back, I began to get a little nervous. However, my trip ticket said I ended at 10:30. Maybe the party went later? They were probably still partying and would find alternate transportation back to the hotel. So a few minutes afterward, I drove out, fueled up, and went back to base. A...

My time has been battling on four fronts for the past week; school, work, family, and PT. School has been busy as ever, and more so because finals are fast approaching. It's been a struggle to keep up, even after cutting slack and quitting calculus. I'm not doing as well as I thought in Components; my partner and I have done solid A's on our homework and projects, but I had forgotten how much weight the midterms carried. I always count on computer-related classes to be an easy A, but this class and its tests have really challenged me. Work has been keeping me busy. A lot of the other drivers have effectively started to refuse runs because they need time to study, and so I've been asked to take on more and more. I'm such a nice guy that I'll take almost anything from Ava, and I certainly don't mind the money. It just keeps me a lot more busy than I like. If that weren't enough, there's a PT test at the next drill. When they mentioned it at drill last ...

Friday morning was a bright, early start for me. I drove down to Fitzsimons, ready to rock the firing range! The morning was the usual drawing of weapons and gear, then the bus ride down. We had a little bit of a hold once we were set up in the billets, since the ranges were behind schedule to go hot. The first sergeant offered to take several people to the Military Clothing Store, and I decided to go with him and buy more boot laces. (Al has developed a fascination with mine.) When we got back, we were late for the move to the range, so SPC Faith and I rode down in the back of a HMMWV with CPT Robinson. Once at the zero range, I tried to quickly verify my M16's zero was still good, then headed back. Friday evening, SFC Zimmerman cooked up some commo training for SPC Dupio and myself, and we refreshed ourselves on SINCGARS radios and learned how to operate a field telephone switchboard. I really needed the radio refresher, and the switchboard training was completely new. We are goi...

Not a lot of interesting developments here. I've been plugging away at schoolwork, and taking more bus trips. I've had more WillVille of course, plus two charters to Chautauqua and one to the Boulder Reservoir. I'm really enjoying this work so far, it's probably one of the better student jobs I could think of. Last Sunday we cleaned the garage, in preparation for the Broomfield City Spring Cleanup. On one day out of the year they'll take just about anything that people need to get rid of, so I'm going to get my computer junkyard cleared out. I probably have 15 or so computer towers that are basically useless, and I need to be able to get them out the door. With Ashley's and Jackie's help, we cleaned out all of the cardboard boxes and the strewn-about recycled bottles, and we were rewarded with a walkable path through the garage. We still have the old corner couch and a few other things to deal with, but Ashley and Jackie are planning a garage sale soon f...

Well, the first week back from break wasn't too bad. I started driving more bus runs, and I've done several WillVille shifts plus a geology run to Chautauqua. Hanging out under the flatirons was very relaxing, so I think I'll be taking more of those runs! Wednesday evening Ashley gave me a couple more gray hairs by calling me and telling me she had backed her car into a ditch. I didn't ask questions, I just grabbed Jackie and started driving over. It turns out she was trying to get to a house in east Boulder for her poop-scooping job and missed a turn, so she attempted to turn around in a rural area, and backed one wheel into a small drainage ditch. She had called a tow truck and was towed out by the time I arrived. I wasn't very happy about it, but I knew that she just needed me to help at that moment. She got the grumpy treatment for the rest of the night. I wasn't angry, just grumpy my relaxing evening was upset. But Saturday night was a real treat. It was th...

A few readers may know that the Pentagon publishes US military casualty data on a web page , and that every death from Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom is cataloged and available for download on an Excel spreadsheet. (It's debatable whether every death is cataloged, but speculation is not the purpose of this post.) I have been attempting to mine data  on this Excel sheet for some time, but it's not nearly as convenient as having it in a real database. So after some thought and a little tinkering, I've developed a rough solution that will automatically download the latest spreadsheet, do some conversion, and import the data into a MySQL database. It's accomplished through a Linux shell script and a Perl script, so if you're on a Windows machine, you'll have to search for a different solution. This is the shell script, I call it oifdata.sh: #!/bin/sh filename=casdata printf "Grabbing xls from DoD..." wget -qNr http://siadapp.dior.w...

Ah, glorious spring break! A break from the norm. The first couple of days I spent relaxing, mostly computer gaming. Tuesday I set off for New Mexico to see the family. On the way down I listened to Ashley's Eragon book-on-CD, and quickly got hooked into that. I had just seen the movie on rental, and Ashley was right, the book was much better. Incidentally, I do agree with the sentiment that it's really a Harry Potter / Lord of the Rings ripoff, but it's entertaining and compelling all the same. I spent the next few days relaxing and hanging out with my family. They weren't on spring break, so I was alone for the midday most of the time. Wednesday I got down to Santa Fe with my mom, and we shopped around and visited Blue Corn , one of my favorites. We also started experimenting with her new scanner and scanning photos and negatives. She was interested in a program for organizing photos by tagging, so I did a little bit of research there. I found a wonderful little fre...

Here I am, Thursday night, and still wishing I was a little closer to spring break. As of this morning I've finished this round of midterms, including a fairly bad Calculus test, and oral and written tests in Arabic. Yesterday afternoon I got a crack at daytime WillVill, and it wasn't half bad. I'm really starting to get the hang of this job, I think. The new buses are nice, and it's nice to get the trainer out of the bus. I don't have to make 8 mirror checks on turns when I'm out on my own. Tonight I have another late night from 10pm to 4am, and I'm fully expecting to go home and crash into bed and sleep through Arabic. I think oustad will understand that it's the day before spring break.

Friday was of course the day before St. Patrick's day, and I had a little surprise in store. I was still getting some initial runs ironed out for the bus, and my boss asked if I could be a bus buddy for Saturday night. I said that was fine. Later on in the day, though, she asked me if I could actually drive one of the two buses. I was taken aback at first. I hadn't been trained up on any of the buses except our one conventional. All of the rest are transit-style with the engine in the back and the front wheels behind the driver, so they're quite a bit different. I reminded her of my lack of training, and she suggested I could take the conventional. I agreed, but I was still apprehensive. My first run ever is going to be late night WillVill on St. Patrick's day? For those who don't know, WillVill is our regular route that shuttles students between campus and the William's Village apartment complex, about a mile from the main area of campus. During the day it can ...

W00t! Passed my Commercial Driver's License test this afternoon, with flying colors! The pre-trip portion was fine, I aced maneuvers, and there were no major problems on the drive test. I guess Jordan and Dine had some problems on their first tries, but Jordan's already re-taken and passed. And I have faith in Dine, she's a pro! In no time at all, we'll be driving the Buff Bus baby! In other news, our good friend Kristen is... pregnant! She hasn't had a doctor confirm it yet, but apparently the home tests are more prone to false negatives than false positives. Meaning, it's very likely. As a consequence, Jackie and I have temporarily adopted Alastor the cat. There's some specific bacterial infection that feral or previously feral cats carry, and the infection can cause birth defects and miscarriages. Kristen would very much like to avoid all of that. Also, my confidence is renewed in my chances of actually getting into the Computer Science major instead of h...

Yesterday was quite the long day for me. It started out just fine; I got out of the house at a decent time and made it to Arabic early. I stayed for my two early classes, then headed home in eager anticipation. I sent my MP3 player in to Best Buy recently for a warranty replacement, since the left audio channel had stopped working. I though perhaps the replacement voucher would be in the mail, so I came home and immediately check the mail. Nothing important, just the usual junk. To make it even better, Jackie was in a huff about something. I learned that she and Ashley had had a tiff about cleaning Alcott. Long story short, everyone was in a bad mood. I defused the situation somewhat, but there's no way to fix it entirely at this point. No one will talk about the 800 pound gorilla in the living room and kitchen, that being Cameron's mess. Now, calling it Cameron's mess is a bit of a misnomer, because everyone has contributed to it by now. I still think of it as Cameron'...

The week was fairly quiet. Tuesday between classes I decided to do a little geocaching around home, and went for a walk around Tom Frost Reservoir, which is near my house. Wednesday it decided to snow, and while it wasn't torrential, it was very slushy and made the roads very slick, so after my first class I drove back home and curled up with a book on C# (C-Sharp), a fairly new programming language. This weekend consisted of more bus training. Saturday we had Dine, Jordan and myself back with Dien the trainer. He took us around some very tight roundabouts to start off, and those were fun. Just as we were about to start some WillVill loops, we were called off of training to cover for a driver that had not shown up for her run. We drove down to Aurora, almost to the airport, to pick up a busload of middle schoolers for the basketball game at the Coors Event Center. The run is called Ralphie's Roundup, in which we pick up grade school kids from the Denver area and take them to se...

Just a little busy this weekend. Saturday morning started with more bus training. We mostly drove around the north end of Boulder with Dien, visiting the Boulder Reservoir, through Lyons, and halfway up to Estes Park. We had to make a U-turn at a pulloff because we can't go all the way to Estes without mountain training, which requires at least 40 hours of route time after getting one's CDL. Saturday afternoon was spent with Ashley at her uncle's house. This was Ashley's grandmother's 90th birthday! I couldn't miss that for training. We went and mingled with her cousins, and aunts and uncles. We met the 6 point buck that her cousin Michael recently bagged on a hunting trip. It's really a monster. We got to play with Ashley's little 2nd cousins. They're pretty cute when they're that little, I have to admit. We stayed for most of the party, and then Ashely and I left for our own adventures. Saturday night I headed over to Mike's house for a lo...

This past week I stumbled upon a relatively new sport called Geocaching . Basically, people have gone out into remote parks and forests and left caches (most are tupperware containers) filled with at least a log book, and have posted the latitude and longitude coordinates. The object is to use your own GPS receiver and go and find these caches. Sounds simple and boring, right? What if the cache is halfway up a sheer rock face, requiring climbing equipment? Or hidden underwater for a scuba diving adventure? OK, most caches are not quite this exciting. If nothing else, it's a fun way to get a family together for an activity. In Ashley's (slightly cynical) words, it gives hiking a point, a goal. Well, Thursday evening I came home to find my brand new GPS receiver waiting for me in a shipping box. I bought a Garmin eTrex (for a good bit less than the MSRP), a fairly low-end receiver. It doesn't have a lot of fancy features, but still good enough for hiking around the woods. Fr...

This weekend was my first full weekend of bus training. Saturday I joined Dine, a girl in biochemistry. Our trainer was Dien, one of the staff drivers. We also had Adam, a staff driver training to be a trainer. After a long, methodical pretrip, we drove out to the Boulder Valley School District bus lot and practiced maneuvers. Let me tell you, it's not easy to parallel park a 40-foot bus. After lunch we went out driving around Boulder. One of the things we practiced was the Williams Village route, or WillVill. It's the major route that TS runs, so just about everyone has driven WillVill, and will drive it again. Sunday was more of the same with trainer Brian plus another trainee, Jordan, a dance major in the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity. We started out with maneuvers and then just drove around every part of Boulder we need to get around. Have I mentioned yet that those buses are huge? You're freakin' half way into an intersection before you even start turning! Gigantic....