Promotion

Well, it's been awhile since I've written up here. The past couple of days our internet has been wonky and wouldn't let me access our blog...oh well. Anyway, things are going well. We've got some interesting developments. I'm now back on full duty and doing missions again. Mike and I are going on leave at the end of this month. We'll be sending out emails in the next few days to let all of you know what are plans are with our road trip across the states. Hopefully we'll be able to see everyone, and it doesn't conflict with any plans. We're pretty excited about it.

Some cool news for this month...I'm getting promoted to Specialist! I'm rather excited about it, and of course that means more $$, but it's also just nice not being a Private anymore. It means I'm one step closer to being an NCO. Right now I'm planning on getting my nursing degree sometime when we get back. I'd like to do it at University of Washington as they have one of the best programs in the country.

I finished my math class, and I got an A. I'm very excited about it. Now I just need to finish my Psychology class, and then possibly take a break for a little bit. Especially since we're going on leave in November. I can have my fourth class start up at the end of November, and leave Iraq with four completed college classes. That would be quite nice. I know with going to college again within the next year, I need to retake my SAT test. That should be interesting. I'm probably going to take a refresher course on it since the test has changed in the last few years. There are now a couple of additional sections to it. This all depends on the unit I get into back at Lewis.

My goal is to get into Madigan. I'd love to work at the ER there. I'm going to be contacting the career manager for medics about that, and see if there are any openings for a Specialist returning from Iraq, who has a modest amount of training in trauma from one of the local CSHs (Combat Support Hospital). So hopefully that'll work out, and they'll give me the time frame for when I can apply to the nursing program. OR they'll just sponsor me going. It just depends on what happens. In the mean time, working on more online classes, and maybe knock out a few of the basic science courses along with their labs at the education center back at Lewis.

I'm very ready to move forward with all of this. Michael and I are planning on getting a house on post for now. This could change, but for now that's what we're aiming for. I'm so excited to get home soon. We're at the home stretch. It's hard to believe that I'm almost finished with my first deployment. Only about four more months, and one of those months is leave. So that's pretty cool.

Michael and I are doing well. We're sassy and delightful as ever. I've put myself on a running program. My goal is to get to 30 miles a week...hopefully before we leave for the states. Tonight is sprint intervals. Yesterday was two miles. Tomorrow is three miles. Maybe after next week I'll start doing four miles at least once a week. My goal is about every two weeks to add another mile to the program. I'd like to do at least three miles a day except for sprint days. But we can still increase how many of those we do, or the length. I'm enjoying my running shoes. It's cool to start feeling the progress you're making. Like when you first start running, it REALLY hurts. But after a few weeks you get used to your heart rate speeding up and can breathe easier. As you practice more your stride gets better, and you're able to push off harder for longer distances. Once I get into the groove of running, I enjoy it. I just hate running after a break of not running. It really sucks trying to get it back. Especially after about a week of not running.

Michael's told me I'm not going to want to run while we're on leave...we'll see. I never want to run, but I do it anyway, and I really don't want to go through three weeks of no running and trying to get my groove back when we return. Not cool at all. I'd like to run a marathon in about a year. I'd also like to break 20 minutes for a 5K, and possibly do my PT test two mile run in under 12 minutes. Wouldn't that be cool? Anyway, I think that's it for now. Other than classes and being back on full duty, I'm pretty much boring at the moment. Michael would disagree, but he's a bit biased.

Anyway, I'm going to take a nap, finish my chapter summaries for my Psychology class, study for the test I'm going to take a little bit later today, go to a re-enlistment ceremony, and then come back and take my test. Results will be posted.

TTFN
~R.