Smoke Pit

I have been spending an incredible amount of time at the smoke pit this week. It's only a short distance away from my building (pretty much just on the other side of the parking lot. ) And it's obviously a prime place for people to hang out - especially if there is extra time after chow before the next muster time. (If we're lucky and eat fast, we can get as much as 45 minutes to an hour of 'free time' before we have to muster. Then again, sometimes we barely even have time to eat. )

So, anyway. I've never really understood why people smoke. Obviously once you get started it's hard to stop, but what the hell is so appealing about smoking that makes you decided to start in the first place? I can't really answer that question in words, but I feel as if I understand now. What once to me looked like a bunch of people sitting/standing around doing nothing, I can now totally relate to. Really, smoking is not that much different than knitting, (although I'm guessing knitting is probably less deadly.) both are habits that are addictive, attractive to bored and ADD prone personalities, and extremely relaxing. Even though I don't smoke, sitting at the smoke pit and chatting with the people there has definitely been a relaxing and enjoyable experience.

I do get restless, however, and today - because I desperately needed something to do with my hands - I pulled out my deck of cards and started shuffling them. It's a nervous habit that I used to do at AACC; I'd shuffle cards while waiting for class to start, or while sitting in the parking lot waiting to be driven home somewhere. I haven't really needed it recently with all my knitting stuff, but I pulled the cards out today without even thinking about it. As if I'd never stopped doing it. My smoke-pit buddy, Lyon, immediately recognized the entertainment opportunity and promptly taught me how to do the bridge thingy with the cards. I've never been able to do that before but it took me all of ten minutes to learn. Yay!

You'll probably be surprised to learn that it's 6PM on a Saturday and not only am I JUST NOW getting ready to start my first episode on netflix, but that I also haven't been in my room ALL DAY. Instead, I've been wandering around town with the guys - mostly near the fisherman's warf/Cannery row area climbing around on the rocky 'beach' there.

Shopping

Hello!

Today was a good day - Work was light, and I ended up being on watch with some awesome people (always makes the day go faster.)

A friend mentioned the idea of going to the farmers market after duty-hours, so once I got off watch I took a shower and put on my red dress.

One of the purchase I made on Sunday's shopping spree. I would have blogged about it, but I'm still roiling in guilt over my complete lack of self control when it comes to shopping >.<

The farmers market is every Tuseday, and I've been wanting to go. There are SO MANY good food venders - I only bought the kettle corn, because who can resist kettle corn? But lots of the other venders looked or tasted good. I'll have to go back, especially to the ravioli vender! Those sauces were amazing ^^;;

There was a T-shirt vender selling this epic T-shirt. I bought it even though the smallest size they had was a medium. It's like a tent on me, but whatever, it's still the awesomest thing ever.

I also fell totally in love with this necklace. I had to buy it. I knew the moment I saw it that I desperately needed it. Then I talked to the Lady selling it. She's nice. I instantly liked her, she told me what kind of stone it was made out of and where it was from. She even had a huge chunk of the rock in it's raw form. She mentioned something about the process involved in cutting the stones down to size, and that's when I found out that she shapes, polishes, and makes the pendents herself. I have a very large weak spot for artist, but I resisted. I'm not the type of person who spends that kind of money on Jewelry. I couldn't stay away, however, and on my 2nd visit I commented on how lovely the polish was. How do you do that? I wondered out loud. Let me tell you, she said. And then she whipped out a little photo album with pictures of her workshop and all of her equipment. My heart skipped a beat. I knew I would die if I didn't have this necklace. But I was strong. I walked away. I went and looked at all of the other stalls. But in the back of my mind there was a little green stone watching me with soulful eyes, I and I knew I was doomed.

IAFTSGH Part 2

Today I went to Captain's Mast. Actually, I should clarify; Today I had the opportunity to observe Captain's Mast. Rest assured, I didn't actually get into any trouble myself!

There were 5 people masted, and each one was seen separately. They were all tried under the same article of the UCMJ: Article 92, failure to follow a lawful order. They all broke the same rule too, they all were caught with alcohol in their rooms. That is sooooo against the rules it's not even funny. Now, I have to say that while witnessing Captains Mast did reinforce my desire to follow all rules to the letter exactly, it did also allow me to feel a little more relaxed about my chances of being masted.

I'm always slightly nervous that I might get masted under article 92 for something dumb -like forgetting that I have watch, or putting my name tag on the wrong way. But keeping alcohol in your room? Is it even possible to do that on accident or to 'not know' it was wrong? Especially if you've been here for a whole year already...

Anyway. It was a good experience, but also a pretty scary once. Obviously everyone takes it very seriously, and there are all these officers in the room passing down judgement - and there's always the threat of the worst punishment ever; separation from the navy, or WORSE, loss of the right to study at DLI. If they were to kick me out of DLI and send me to some other job on the fleet, that would be like a fate worse than death practically. I love it here, I've dreamed about studying here for years, and I'm totally dedicated to this job. The idea that it could all be taken away because of one simple mistake or lapse of judgement is a frightening one.

It's all fun till someone gets hurt

Hello,

Today had a perfect ending that more or less nullified all of the bad stuff that happened; First, we had PT, and for PT we played football. I've never played foot ball, and I think the last time I watched it on TV I was like, nine. But it was FUN, and I caught the ball almost every time it was thrown at me ^^:; At one point I was trying to defend our goal (?) and attempting to catch and 'tackle' (two hand touch) the person with the football - And I totally missed him and dove straight into the ground. I thought I'd have bruises, but all the lovely marks I got seem to have faded already. All in all, So much more enjoyable than running laps!

Everytime someone missed a catch, the two people involved in the pass (?) had to do ten pushups. Whenever a team scored a touch down, the entire opposing team had to do twenty pushups. Like I said, it was fun.

After that I had evening colors. I dread evening colors because I'm short, and the shortest person has to 'call'. ( Attention, parade rest, hand salute, all at the appropriate times in the correct order. ) I'm not stupid, but I do have my week areas, and anything involving directionality or sequence is not my strong point. I'm always doing things out of order or saying left when I mean right. However, comma, today I did colors and called it almost perfectly. I think the days of me dreading colors are numbered, possibly even over. Yata!

This all means that the ickiness of the rest of the day has been nicely balanced. There were a lot of angry words, uniform inspections, dental appointments, and Captains' Mast. I'm gonnna write about Captain's Mast in a separate blog post though ^-^

Chill

Hello,

Life is starting to fall into a predictable routine. Means I make less mistakes and am rarely late to muster, but it also means the monotony is starting to show. It's beautiful here and sunny, but at 50 or 60 degrees, not quite warm enough for my taste. I'm always a little cold - seriously need to buy a nice jacket, but haven't found one I like yet.

I've settled into my new room and cycled through all of my new cloths ^^;; enjoying going shopping on the weekends. This week I went to the mall, and then spent the rest of my weekend in my room, pretty much. I'm knitting this lace shawl and the yarn is sooooo soft. My previous shawls have been done in knitpicks yarn, and it's great for what it is, but never again. I'm knitting with malabrigo lace right now, and I think my new mission in life is to sample a wider variety of brand name lace, because this shit is *soft*

Oh, saw Burlesque. Epic. I'm totally in love <3

Laptop

Hello,

My box came in the mail last week ( yay. ) It contained all of my very favorite worldly possessions including a sampling of my knitting, my kindle, DS, Journal, ipod, and of course, Axiom, my laptop.

The Kindle and DS have seen extensive use. I read This Book which is the second book in the series. I love it so much that I think I may explode while waiting for the third book to come out. If you like fantasy novels and you haven't read this book yet, why are you still reading my blog? Go read it now!

I also bought Pokemon heart gold because... It's pokemon. Do I seriously need to say anything more?

But poor Axiom, he was neglected. I had this insane idea that I would refrain from paying for internet. I thought, I could save money *and* guarantee that I get a good work out, because it's a decent uphill walk to the place where free internet lives. But no, I've realized that that was an insanely misguided idea. I now have internet. Yay. On a sadder note, poor Axiom's battery is completely busted, and he wont run without being plugged in now :(

This past weekend was my first liberty weekend off base, and I was authorized to wear civilian cloths. The box contained 1 pair of jeans, my favorite pair of shoes, and several t-shirts. (My Disney baseball cap however, was not included.)

I just do not know how to explain how wonderful it felt to wear jeans for the first time in 2 months. I feel human again, and *almost* like myself.

I went all sorts of crazy shopping, bought *more* cloths, ate out at a fancy Japanese restaurant, walked up and down cannery row, and even went into a little wine store that was doing a wine tasting. (There are many of them around here ) I think wine tasting is going to become one of my favorite weekend activities. I'll probably even by a notebook dedicated specifically to taking notes on which wines I like ^^;;

Oh, and I saw Tangled, which is a perfectly adorable movie. Loved it!

Ok, well. I'm going to go crazy and surf the internet until bed time.

Cheers

Theo