Army Post Road

We'll start today off with a quote from the Simpsons:
“Woohoo! Beer Beer Beer! Bed Bed Bed!” Eloquent words of the sage Homer. “This is my sandbox. I'm not allowed to go in the deep end.” Ralph

I've tried to think of interesting or pithy things to talk about or say all day. And that was it.

Just kidding. But really, nothing interesting has gone on today. Work went along without any fireworks (other than the last two hours did not go by as fast as they usually do and needed too) and when I was done I bought a dozen Krispy Kremes with the thinking that Dad was picking me up and we were going to pick my grandpa up and the three of us would share them. Rather, my mom picked me up and we ate some doughtnuts on the way home. I fell asleep shortly after I got home, missed watching Star Trek (the highlight of my morning before I sleep and I slept through it) and woke up at 1. The dog and I communed for a while after I woke up and I've just been watching the news and cartoons since.

“Smithers, there's a rocket in my pocket.” “You don't have to tell me sir.”

I'm surprised that none of the restaurants I applied at have called me yet. I'm not particularly worried, since neither of my parents really think I should change jobs before I know whether I'm going to Ft Riley in April (which I think I may just be deluding myself if I begin to think I'm not) and if things begin to consistently go like they did last night, the job itself will be alright. And really, what would I do with a job that had more conventional hours? I wouldn't see my family much more than I do. Mom would probably be gone to work before I woke up every day anyway and she's usually in bed before I leave for work now so I probably see her as much as I would in any circumstance. And I may or may not see my dad any more than I do. I'd like to but it's ok how it is. And if I did have more time to socialize, what would I do with it? Hang out with Kelli every other, every third night and just spend money on Perkins or beer? If I had more time to go to Iowa City, I would probably only spend too much money at the bars anyway. It all sounds like self-consoling, doesn't it?

Yeah, that's all for now. I'm sure I'll be back in a little bit with more.

Well the big news since yesterday is that MAJ Scherer sent out an e-mail to all of us yesterday informing the battalion that they were asking for volunteers for the April 4 mobilization before they start picking people involuntarily. That breathes new hope that I may not have to go until November (or earlier if I otherwise volunteer but that's another beast for another moment). That's happy news for now.

I realized I know a ton of hot chicks, some really hot. As sad as this next statement may make some of you, a lot of them are sorority girls, too. And they've all got really hot friends, the sorority girls in particular. It's incredible. I just thought I'd put that out there. I don't think there's anything to it. Haha just a healthy appreciation for the beauty of so many of my friends and their friends.

So I called in sick for the first time at QuikTrip last night. My shoulder has been bothering me some the past few days and it was bad last night. I couldn't really raise my right arm or bend my elbow so that would've made doing much of anything at work very insufferable.

My parents' dog is nuts. She came to get my attention by stomping all over my lap and of course stepped on my computer too. I think she has to go potty so when my show is over I think we'll be going outside to romp in the snow for a little bit. She's laying down being good again at the moment so I might actually wait until she comes and dances around again before I get ambitious and go outside. I'm still in my pajamas and am in no hurry to get dressed just to supervise the dog outside.

I'm going to think outloud now about getting deployed. Steve and I both think I should volunteer in the near future to go with a unit to Iraq. I want to; he made the very salient point that down the road people are going to wonder why so many of my fellow soldiers, plenty of the ones younger than me, have a chest full of awards for valor and so on from spending one or more tours in Iraq or Afghanistan and I spent the whole war in Iowa and Kansas and there was even a long period where I wasn't in school; and my goodness, I would make a ton of money. Combat pay, atleast one promotion, BAH, if I go with one of the Civil Affairs units I was looking at I'd get jump pay, and all of it would be tax free. One year alone of tax-free basic pay would be almost $25,000 and that's without all the extra pays or the promotion I'm coming up on. But the strongest point, and it was influencing me long before Steve said it, was the one about spending the whole war here stateside with my thumb up my ass. I already know kids with multiple Purple Hearts, kids I went to high school with have Bronze Stars. This summer I met a a 20-something kid who earned a Legion of Merit in Afghanistan. I'm not desperate for chest candy. I'd be happy with just my Army Service Ribbon (yes, it's the rainbow ribbon) but I don't want to have to admit to people that I sat through the whole war at a desk in Des Moines or Ft Riley.

Another funny thing is that when I talk to people and the fact that I have a deployment impending they say, “Oh, I'm sorry.” It's nothing to feel sorry about people! Please anyone in the future do not tell me you're sorry that I might get deployed. Go ahead and feel scared, that's fine. But I joined the Army. I'm not being picked on or oppressed by being picked for deployment. I joined the Army because it's the honorable service of our country (yes, I'm waxing patriotic poetic, live with it) and I'd rather sacrifice that way than 80 hours a week for money.

Ok, I've been working on this entry long enough. I'll add more later if it strikes me.

Ugh, work was no fun last night. My back started hurting way earlier than it needed to and the damn snow made the store frickin' filthy and it was impossible to combat. When my mom came and got me this morning, it hurt to sit down in the car. How lame is that? None the less.

I just looked down at my desk and discovered I already have a 2005 penny. Let's call that good luck.

So my search for a new job needs to move into high gear. I think maybe I'll make this a short post and see if I can't do something about that. I'll be back later with an update.

First things first, I came to the realization that I shouldn't use a number of people's names in here. Not because anyone has complained, but because if I start telling stories that some people don't know about, I don't want people wigging out. I'd rather have people curious about who I'm talking about than people flipping about certain personalities involved.

I had a dream last night about working at Cambus (yes I'm weird, but I so wish I could go back to working at Cambus) and when I woke up from it (at 4-something, of friggin' course) I got to thinking about someone who I've been thinking about a lot since November/December. I hadn't thought much about her for maybe 2 years but since a bar crawl I've thought about her lots. And it stinks a lot too, I don't get to see this person at all since I've 1)stopped working at Cambus and 2)don't live in Iowa City anymore. Plus, you don't wanna go out of your way to be real attentive to this person since they're in a pretty serious relationship. It's just one of those situations where you sit on it and don't reveal much of anything.

So I feel like I should put the whole story of my exit from Iowa City so I will:
It was the final day of my rhetoric class and a couple of the girls in there wanted me to go out that night, seeing as though it was a Thursday night and they were (and still are I would imagine) alcoholic freshmen. I didn't think I was going to (I didn't have the money to, I had to scrape some together. That should've been my first clue that I wasn't supposed to be going out that night) but when I got home and Mike actually wanted to go out without much of any coaxing, I decided why not. We went to a couple places, Brother's first, then Sports Column for most of the night, back and forth between Brother's and Spo Co a few times. Mike ditched me to go chase after a girl he spends a ton of time chasing after, I went back to Sports Column, drank a little more, got pissy about Mike ditching me and made the fateful decision to drive home. Everybody and there brother since has said, “why didn't you call me?” well A) I was drunk, B) I didn't really feel like I was that drunk, and C)I didn't think a quarter of these people were the ones whom I should call in that situation. Oh well, you live and learn. I had parked on Iowa Ave, right by Phillips and backed out of my spot and headed towards Clinton. I turned right on to Clinton and headed north and stopped at the light at Clinton and Jefferson. I noticed that behind the truck that was behind me there was a UIPD car and got an uneasy feeling. I pulled up to Market and turned left and went down the hill and noticed that the police car was following me. I had already at that point been using my turn signal and executing all my driving with legal perfection. I've since been told that this is a tell-tale sign to the police that you're drunk. Whatever. The cop eventually stopped me on the Iowa Ave Bridge and proceeded to give me all the rigmarole of touch your nose, watch my fingers, blah blah blah. It was really annoying. The cop was even asking me about being in the Army and how he'd been in for a long time and how he was in the 101st “Rendevous with Destiny” blah blah blah. I wanted to smack him and be like, “well if you wanna be my battle buddy, why the hell are arresting me?” We got back the UIPD cop shop and did paper work and he had me blow in their super-duper serious breathalyzer machine where I blew .156 (yes, almost double the legal limit). They wanted to know if I had anyone who could get my car or if I just needed to have it towed. I called Mike and afater about three tries to call him, he answered and said sorry, he was already asleep. We lived a 5 minute walk from where the cops had stopped me and he couldn't get out of bed! From there, he took me to the county jail where I spent the rest of the night until 10AM. It really stunk because from my cell, for lack of a better word, I could see the Cambus barn and the East Campus Shttle going by every 12 minutes. That really drove home quite hard what I had lost (my job and my license). I finally got released from the jail, walked over to the bus stop out in front of the Barn, got on it, rode up to McBride Hall and caught the pentacrest home. I had to go home that weekend for drill and I made myself sick worrying that people there were going to find out and my Army career was going to be over at that moment. I talked the issue over with CPT Thayer and he assured me that the whole situation wasn't as bad as it seemed (despite what my mother was trying to depict). That next week, I realized that the whole problem with owing that shit-ton of money to our landlords was about to come to a head on the following Tuesday and that something was going to have to get done. On Monday when I got back to IC from taking my car to Des Moines, I couldn't scrape together even a pittance of what we owed so the next day, Tuesday, I was going to try and beg the landlords to drop the eviction action and that we'd promise to be good boys. Well, they wouldn't have any of that, we'd had enough time and it was over at that point. And they were right, we'd doddled long enough before trying to do anything. So the eviction order was handed down. My dad was coming the next day to pick me up for Christmas stuff and so we decided to just take a lot of my stuff back then. And that Tuesday night would be the last night I spent in Iowa City in my own apartment. I got all of my stuff out on Monday, December 27 and didn't have anything left in Iowa City. I've been back to Iowa City three times since then, once to drop off the cable box since we didn't get it taken back to Mediacom before we left Iowa City, once to go out with Kelli, and once for my court-ordered substance abuse evaluation.

I just got off the phone with Steve. I haven't talked to him since early January and he didn't know that I was living in Des Moines at that point. Once again, I desperately want to move back to Iowa City.

So this is my first entry. I've decided to take a leap and start doing this online journal. I guess I've been enough of a voyeur reading everyone elses and should start ponying up some information myself.

It's been one of those afternoons where I've tried twice to lie down and take a nap and almost got there but my mind got going (about stupid shit no less, not even anything really coherent) and no nap for me. So that gave me the impetus to get up and atleast do something I'd been planning to do and that was to get on here and start this. I spent some time earlier this afternoon looking at job listings online, in addition to looking at them in the paper this morning at 6-something when I was up.

I woke up this morning at about 5-something because of a combination of having fallen asleep somewhere between Adam Viniateri kicking his only fieldgoal of this Super Bowl (which I think was in the 4th quarter but may have been the 3rd, I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention) and 10PM last night and the sounds of the snow plow right outside my window. I don't really have a sleep schedule so much as I sleep when caffiene, the dog, and the noise my family makes permits me. That usually turns out to be between 11AM and 8-9PM on the days that I work, 8PM-6AM on Sunday nights and absolutely no discernable pattern on Monday nights (last week I didn't sleep between 4:30AM Monday and 7AM Tuesday). And it's all because of my job working overnights at QuikTrip. Such is the life of a 2nd ASSistant Manager (Nights). 46 hours per week with Sunday nights and Monday nights off. Yipee.

Kelli and Patti are the only friends I've seen since moving back to Des Moines and we're getting to be two weeks shy of having been here 2 months. Kelli and I have hung out a few times (mostly just going to Perkins) and went to Iowa City once and I saw Patti when Kelli and I went to Iowa City and when she came here. Other than that, it's just been my parents and what little I see of my coworkers at work (I'm alone at work from midnight until 6AM, every shift. That alone is one of the huge things to drive me nuts). Socializing and making new friends isn't really too much of an option when I work the diametric opposite of everyone else and want to spend the majority of my two days off sleeping. Plus, who wants to hang out on a Sunday or Monday night anyway? I really wish I could go back to Iowa City for a Thursday, Friday , or Saturday just once. That would blow my mind it would be so awesome. I didn't get to say good-bye to anyone and have hardly had a chance to tell anybody what happened to me at all. I think Patti's the only person at Cambus who knows where I am and I very much doubt she's brought me up to anyone there.

I want to move back to Iowa City more than anything. It seriously feels like I'm a freshman in high school all over again. I can't drive, at all. So maybe that makes it feel like I've gone back to being in 7th grade again. I can't really have people come over (all though I was shocked really at how little my mother did to try and chaperone). They can come over but no being noisy, nobody stays overnight, and people who are over 21 can't even consume alcohol (unless you're drinking wine with my parents). My dad even recognizes it all sucks. He and I would probably drink beer together if I were ever freaking around but that doesn't happen. I'm in this mess because I fucked up hardcore in two serious ways. If one or the other hadn't happend I guarantee I would still be in Iowa City for sure. But I had to be stupid and not learn my lesson and drive home on that Thursday night and I had to let us get so fucked up paying rent that we got evicted. How on earth could I let that happen?