ammogirl

I’m sorry you guys, but every second of my day my thoughts are consumed only with how many days I have left until I go home, and I know my posts are suffering.  Bear with me!

One thing I hate more than anything is when people do not consider the wishes of others when dealing with a captive audience situation.  Like today, I had to attend a mandatory promotion ceremony, but it started 35 minutes late, and instead of getting through the ceremony and then getting all 600+ of us out of the hot and STINKING room, we had to sit through so many ridiculous presentations and "surprise announcements" and oh GOD SO MANY OTHER STUPID THINGS.  It was like, "Okay, thanks for coming, oh!  Wait, yet another announcement!" and I was so irritated it was like my mind would clench and I would involuntarily say out loud, "oh CMON!" and "This is FREAKING RIDICULOUS" but not REALLY LOUD, sort of under my breath loud, and then begin another round of half hearted clapping.  You know what I’m talking about, right?  When you clap without making any noise?  Because you are SO OVER CLAPPING?  Anyway, by the third "Oh wait!" I turned to my neighbor and said, "That’s it.  We’re going to have to sleep here, and when we wake up at 0800, he will STILL be talking, and it will be about somebody’s cousin’s daughter who just enlisted in the military so LET’S ALL CLAP AND HONOR HER!"  Because in truth, it had gotten that bad.  But we had NO CHOICE but to just sit there and listen respectfully, and I SWEAR TO GOD the only reason the whole thing happened like that: the running late, the ENDLESS announcements, was simply because the people in charge wanted to make a point that our time is not ours, but THEIRS, and they do not care one bit if it’s after 5pm on the Friday of a four day holiday weekend. 

Speaking of promotion ceremonies, my very own best husband in the world John is HIMSELF being promoted to the next rank on July 1st!  You guys, this is a big deal, because he has only been in eight years, and he’s already putting on E-6.  To compare, I have been in 14 years, and just put on E-6 two years ago.  So yeah, he caught up to me, and now I can’t boss him around, so that’s…very unfortunate, actually.  Huh.  No, I am very proud of him for making rank so quickly, for reals.  If you were wondering, in the Air Force, E-6 is Technical Sergeant, or Tech/TSgt for short.  And, now you know.  My husband is cool.

Anyhow, I’m on standby this weekend, so I sort of have to just hang out with the pager in my room, but tomorrow night I have town patrol (babysitting the drunks down in A-town) and on the 4th I am selling burgers and dogs for my squadron, so I might have a tale or two to tell.  If not, have a great holiday weekend and Happy July Fourth!!

Auf Wiedersehen!!!

You know, I consider myself a fairly fit person, cardio-wise.  I mean, I do at least 60 minutes of cardio six days a week, and I do different things: run, power walk, bike.  I also lift free weights, and have various other routines I do, because although I know y’all will think I’m looney for it, I LIKE working out, and enjoy finding new ways to challenge myself and my body. 

Now, because I have been getting up at the crack of freaking dawn, and it’s just wayyyy too dark for my wild imagination to even THINK about using my path, I’ve been working out at the gym almost exclusively lately.  So this morning I thought I’d switch up my routine with a round on the ol’ elliptical.  Of COURSE, it did not go smoothly.

My first problem with that damn machine occurred with my first "step": I could NOT, for the life of me, figure out how to get it to work.  I was pulling and pushing, and forcing and cussing, but…nothing.  One little ellip, then…dead in the water.  Finally, after a few starts and stops…success!  Ellip ellip ellip went my legs, but even though it SEEMED like I had it down, I still THOUGHT it felt a little…odd.  I couldn’t quite put my finger on why, until I glanced over at my reflection in the window and realized I was going backwards.  Okay, easy fix, right?  I mean, all you have to do is go forward, right?  Well, for crap’s sake, that’s what I thought too, but then I spent the next two minutes thinking, "Forward.  Move your leg…NO.  Move it…TREENA.  FORWARD…WTF!  FORWARD!"  Because once you are going on that thing, it’s so hard to break your momentum, BESIDES the fact that I am totally uncoordinated to begin with, and the whole arm/leg synchronized movement thing is almost beyond me.  To switch it up once I finally got going?  Nearly impossible.  Finally, at around the 5 minute mark, I finally settled into a steady, FORWARD moving pace.  I felt pretty cool, and at the very least, I’m sure I provided a good spot of entertainment for the other people in there. 

Anyway, before today, I have never used one, because I will admit: I get tired of hearing everyone RAVE about them and how great the workout is.  "Oh, PUHLEASE!" I think to myself, when somebody starts in, "THAT machine canNOT be that freaking tough!"  And….wrong.  Also: more wrong than you can imagine.  Ohhhh elliptical trainer, I hate you so.  You guys, I never went above LEVEL ONE.  Even if I COULD have loosened my death grip on the hand things (I thought I would fall off, LAUGH AND DIE), I STILL wouldn’t have gone above level one, because that thing kicked my ass SO HARD.  I was totally unprepared for this.  So, I stopped after 15 minutes.  WHAT?  Thursday is LIGHT cardio day, not nearly die from LEVEL ONE exhaustion day.  So I wiped that damn machine down, gave it a parting glare, and moved on to my old friend the treadmill.  TOMORROW though…ohhhh ho.  Tomorrow is heavy cardio day.  That stupid elliptical stupid trainer is going DOWN.  Oh yes.  I’m making it to level two. 

John is meeting with a realtor Thursday to talk about selling our house.  I’ll admit, it’s exciting, because of the reason behind selling (moving to Germany) but definitely sad.  We love that house so much, and so many memories were made in the short time we lived there.  I’m almost glad I have been here in Korea so long, because it won’t be as hard for me here, as it would if I were actually living there when we sold.  Anyway, wish us luck; the housing market in our area has cooled recently, but hopefully she’ll have a promising outlook…we aren’t so much concerned with how much it sells for as how quickly it goes, you know?  Awwww, bye, house!

Auf Wiedersehen!!

I found a solution to my Direct TV problem!  I forwarded the email to John, and now, it’s not MY problem, it’s his!  Viola!

I find it funny how whenever I start typing up a quick post to say I’m not posting, it ends up longer than real posts.  But, seriously, there’s so many other things I need to do right now, besides this…

I’m SUPPOSED to be getting ready to go watch a softball game.

I’m SUPPOSED to be cleaning the bathroom because my suite mate came home early and I swear I was going to do it this past Sunday but then Sunday was Monday and then all of a sudden Tuesday and I forgot. 

I’m SUPPOSED to be working out because although we aren’t as hardcore as the other services we do still have an annual fitness test that I like to stay on top of.  Oh, and then that bikini + boat thing.  Sighhh.

But all I really want to do is go to bed.  I have been sleeping like crap this week, and last night was the icing on the cake.  I seriously thought my suite mate was coming home SATURDAY, so when the shower woke me up at 3:30 this morning, I sleepily thought, "shower." then right after that panic-kily thought "!!!SHOWER???" and although I immediately realized it was indeed her (she? I suck at grammar) my heart was racing enough to ensure at least an hour of wakefulness.  I think I fell back asleep around 4:46, and my alarm went off at 4:50.  Shut up, alarm.  I think adding Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday together nets me roughly, ohhh…twelve hours of solid slumber. 

On top of that, the chow hall has theme nights, and today is "Soul Food Wednesday" and while I grew up almost as far from the South as you can get in the States (Oregon) I love me some ribs (saucy fat, yum!) And potato salad (lots.  and then more than that.)  And fine, chocolate cake, but I ONLY ate 3 bites, and they were not teeny, and not ginormous, but average.  Is any of that actually considered "Soul Food?"  I have no idea…but whatever it is the combination of cake + carbs + sleep deficit has me completely drained. 

Gah, it was soooo humiiid here today!  I had to give a briefing today, and I walked…by the way, I don’t know if you guys knew this but the reason I walk everywhere is because we are not allowed to drive here.  There IS a completely reliable bus system but it’s like 3/4 mile from my dorm to my work…I’m a bit lazy but not THAT lazy.  Anyway, so I walked to my briefing, and the guy wasn’t there, so we turned around and walked back. The whole adventure only took about 30 minutes, but when I got back to the office my shirt was soaked.  So GROSS.  It’s truly not hot here, either…it’s about 75-80, which is PERFECT, it’s just 1739% humidity, which is NOT perfect.  I find I am not a big fan of humidity, it’s too…complicated.  It’s not hot, but it’s certainly not cool, and I HATE feeling damp all the time.  My hands are constantly clammy, and: ew.  And it sucks, because the A/C in our building (the building I was JUST recently complaining about being sooo hotttt) is ALWAYS on, and it’s set to 60 degrees.  So, while it feels fabulous when you come in from outside, after about 10 minutes the sweat that has soaked through your clothing starts turning to ice, and then it just sucks, and you sit really still so your freezing sweat soaked shirt won’t unexpectedly touch you, but eventually it does, and it’s really, really gross.  Also, does anybody else’s knees sweat?  Mine do, and I find it odd, and slightly disgusting.  Not the back of the knee – the front.  It’s probably just me, isn’t it?  Sweaty knees indeed.  I find myself almost longing to be back in the bone dry desert heat at Edwards AFB, where once May hits, the thermometer instantly reaches 100+ degrees and yeah, it feels like you live on the surface of the sun but at least the sweat evaporates instantaneously, AND…my hair never, ever gets curly.

Auf Wiedersehen!!