OBLC- Week 4

What a great week!!! Monday morning bright and early we started FTX-1 (first week of Field Training Exercise). We drew M16 rifles from the armory during the early morning hours, then loaded buses and headed towards our home for the week- Fort Bullis. The FOB (Field Operating Base) at Fort Bullis is a training replica of a typical FOB (Forward Operating Base) found in the Army. In the FOB, we lived in 30 man/woman tents and learned basic Army skills. No showers, but we had porta-pots and a small personal hygiene area where the guys could shave and everyone could brush their teeth.

The weather was amazing for the first day and a half- low to mid-70s and clear skies. With such a strong aversion to cold weather, I was thankful for the happy weather! My luck ran out in the middle of day 2 however as a cold front rolled in and the sky started spitting icy raindrops on us as we stood around outside and learned how to assemble & disassemble M16 rifles and 9mm handguns. With a windchill in the 20s, I was amazed at my ability to remain positive and focused on the tasks at hand. Could it be a sign of maturity?! Nah, I think it's just that I like guns!

The sky finally cleared and we were left with cold, but dry days for the remainder of our time in the field. The first pic is of me at the top of a ridge after successfully finding my third point with only a compass, map & protractor during the land nav (navigation) test. As most of you know, I usually am unable to find my way out of even a parking lot, so I was a little concerned about my ability to pass land navigation. After a couple of hours of quality instruction though, I felt like I finally understood land nav and was absolutely giddy at my ability to "find myself" three times in the allotted time! I was starting to feel less apprehensive about the night land navigation test coming up at the end of the week.

Although I haven't been able to do it much since high school, I love to shoot and was excited about getting to fire the M16 and 9mm handgun during the week. Since I shot small bore .22 rifles on a team in high school, I always considered myself more of a rifle than handgun girl. My qualification time at both ranges proved me wrong however as I managed to qualify with the 9mm and not the M16. With so little hands on time before actually shooting though, I feel like a quality day at the range practicing would boost my rifle score significantly. No worries, it was fun to get to shoot and the experience served its purpose as weapon familiarization. I was disappointed that we couldn't spend more time shooting though.

It's no secret that I'm a chow hound! I love to eat! Hell, food is my chosen profession!!! While out in the field, we were served hot breakfast and dinner and only had to eat MREs (Meals Ready to Eat) once a day for lunch. If this is the Army's idea of roughing it, I'm in the right place!!! And man, have MREs come a long way since my time in the desert in the early 90s! They now have dozens of options and actually have heating packs in them so you can have a hot meal. These meals-in-a-bag are actually pretty tasty!

We learned lots of stuff during the week that I won't go into here. No need to tell the world what we're learning here other than the basics! Thursday night culminated into the night land navigation test. This group pic is of our platoon getting fired up before the night nav brief- you can see all the dust in the air from so many boots on the ground in the FOB! We were paired up and sent out into the dark, cold night to find 3 out of 4 points in the allotted time. I was nervous, but feeling pretty confident after my success during the day portion of land nav. After plotting our points and coming up with a game plan, my assigned partner and I headed into the dark, moonless night. An hour later, we found ourselves circling what we were confident were the coordinates we were supposed to be at looking for the marker. Another 20 Soldiers converged on our spot looking for the same marker to no avail. I was confident that we were within 10 meters of the location but was frustratingly unable to prove our location. With time clicking away, we replotted a course to our next location (the course is self-correcting so we were able to verify our current location) and moved on to our next destination. As I was on the ground working my map and protractor, I heard a familiar Cajun accent from over my shoulder. One of the other teams looking for the same point as us just happened to be from Louisiana! It's amazing how the only 3 Cajuns in the whole Company ended up stumbling upon each other in the middle of Texas woodlands! We joined forces and moved out towards our next common point.

As the night progressed, we ran into other teams who confirmed our suspicions- there was a disconnect between our score cards and the destination markers. I was disappointed that I wouldn't be able to verify my navigation skills, but the clear night and camaraderie seemed to dampen my frustration and made me appreciate the moment. Although I was freezing, it was a clear, beautiful night out in mother nature with a bunch of like-minded folks. The sky was chock full of stars and the certainty that all of humanity was under the same sky this night. For some reason, I was on point and shooting our azimuths to the next destinations for the rest of the night. At one point during the night, one of my fellow Cajuns shouted out to his partner in the dark "Can you believe we're being led through the woods by a Dietitian from Houma?!" Our evening wasn't a success on paper, but I was immensely satisfied with the knowledge that I always knew where we were. Even though the markers weren't where they were supposed to be, I was able to verify that we were always withing 10-20 meters of our destination. At no time did I not know where we were on the map or in which direction to head to get us back to the the FOB- it was a great, new feeling for me! Unfortunately, the evening didn't turn out so well for everyone. One Soldier had to be medevaced off the course with a broken leg and there were several twisted ankles during the night.

Overall, life in the FOB was pretty cushy. My battle-buddy, Goguen is in the picture with me. She too is former enlisted (Army though) and shares my upbeat attitude about the whole experience. Although we went without showers for 4 days, baby wipes are pretty efficient at keeping a 25-30 woman tent from reeking! I was grateful for my short hair as I watched other women struggling to manage their longer tresses. Between rolling around on the ground during combatives (hand to hand combat) and tromping through the woods, it was hard to keep dirt and critters from making a home on our scalps! Although a good taste of field life, 4 days in the field was in no way a hardship!

Our last day in the field ended with a fun day! We went out to the obstacle course and learned how to low & high crawl and did some 3-4 second rushes. Although we only did a short round of rushes, it was good for us to get a small taste of what the infantry guys are subjected to. This drill starts off in a prone shooting position wearing an LBE (Load Bearing Equipment). The LBE is basically a web belt with suspenders upon which you can attach a couple of canteens of water, a couple of pouches for ammo, a first aid kit and miscellaneous other equipment. Between the LBE, Kevlar helmet and our weapon, we weighed an extra 20 pounds or so. Upon a whistle blow by one of the instructors, you jump up from the prone firing position and run to gain as much ground as you can ("I'm up!") until the next whistle blow ("He sees me, I'm down") at which time you throw yourself onto the ground back into a prone firing position. I say "throw", but obviously you don't want to trash your knees, so you break the fall with the butt of your weapon. It looks so easy, but it gets harder and harder to pop up with any quickness after only a few down-and-ups!

Although pretty bruised up from our day of drills and obstacle course (AKA in the PC world as a Confidence Course), I had a BLAST!!!! I struggled with the obstacles that involved rope climbs (I haven't figured out the technique of using my feet for leverage with the rope yet), I was able to successfully navigate the other obstacles. This obstacle in the picture is a "reverse ladder." You climb up the back side of it, flip yourself over the top rung, then go down face first using your arm & shoulder muscles to work your way down the rungs. As you can see from the smile on my face, this was great fun!

Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and this course was a great way to expose ourselves to both. If you click on the picture of the obstacle course to see it up close, you can see that some of the obstacles are quite high. We had a few folks who weren't so comfortable with heights. Also, many of them required a fair amount of upper body strength which obviously, not everyone had. The whole experience was a great team-builder as we all pulled together to help each Soldier face his/her weaknesses, including our own.

With a great week behind us, we have the weekend off (I'm embarrassed to say that actually) before going back out to the field on Monday. After hot showers and meals, everyone is plowing through mounds of dirty laundry and required reading in this down-time. I hope that this post helps everyone to envision what the training is like. Although a challenge for the folks who have never been exposed to camping or the great outdoors, to say that this is arduous would be a stretch! More than once during the week, one of the instructors would catch me grinning from ear to ear and want to know what my problem was. Unable to conceal my happiness over this career choice I would simply respond with one of my favorite Navy sayings. . . "I'm just full of joy, Sir, full of joy!"

If you're interested in seeing more pictures of FTX-1, go to these links:

http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2013407&l=07b76&id=1454935642

http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2013408&l=b01ac&id=1454935642

OBLC- Week 3

Time is flying by here in San Antonio! I can't believe the 3rd week of training is already over!! Week 3 was more didactic training in the classrooms. We learned about a variety of topics that we will put into practical application out in the field. Basic Army skills mixed in with issues relevant to the current world situation rounded out the questions included on our mid-term exam on Saturday.

Also on Saturday, another 100+ reserve soldiers were integrated into our company to take part in the field exercises. Just like the folks that have been here for 3 weeks now, this group of reservists represent all of the medical corps you see depicted in this picture of the wall from one of our lecture auditoriums. The emblem with the "S" superimposed over the caduceus (medical emblem) represents the Medical Specialist Corp, the Corp under which I fall as a Dietitian.

A lot has changed in the military since my first go round. The integration of reservists into the active duty component's training is a huge one. Having all the paperwork online is another one. Seeing all-civilian staff at the galley, oops I mean DFAC (Dining Facility) is another strange sight to me. Funny, the food hasn't changed much though! Thankfully, a lot is still the same though and feels quite familiar. The black & white regulations and always having a resource to reference for information suits my personality well.

With the mid-term behind us and lots of new knowledge in our brains to turn into practical application, most of us are pretty excited to trade in the classroom environment for the "field" tomorrow. My roommate Alex is packing up her gear in this picture so that we can do the bag-drag tonight. We'll be out at Camp Bullis for the next three weeks learning to shoot, land navigation and other fun stuff. I'm hoping that my map & compass skills have miraculously improved from the miserable attempts of my past!

Although I'm thrilled to finally get to do some of the field stuff that I felt like I missed out on during my previous service stints, I'm a little disappointed that training stops during the weekends! With so many people stressing out about not being able to shower for 5 days (actually only 4 since we can shower before we leave on Monday and when we get back on Friday), I have to wonder if anyone in America actually goes camping anymore. . .

Until next weekend, send me a good sense of direction for those of you who have it and some of your good sense of humor for those of you who don't!!!

OBLC- Week 2

Week 2 of OBLC wasn't much different from the first, we're still sitting through numerous Power Point presentations and doing administrative things. I find the information interesting though, so the hours of presentations haven't been bad really. I continue to be amused yet taken aback by some of my classmates' lack of punctuality. I'm not sure what they thought the Army would be like, but some of the new officers don't seem to understand that not being in the designated place at the designated time is not an option! So far there hasn't been much consequence for the tardiness, but we'll see what week 3 brings.

In the midst of all these presentations, one of the assignments was for us to present to our classmates and instructors. I haven't always been so comfortable in front of an audience, but I'm thankful for all the experience I gained at the USOC getting up in front of groups of people to present information. It's gotten easier and easier over the years to the point that I actually enjoy presenting now. Of course, it helps to have an audience that wants the information you're putting out!

PT has picked up a little bit, but still manageable. The company was split into ability groups based on 2-mile run times. I'm at the slower end of the range for my ability group, so I'm expecting my run time to get better over the next few weeks!

Every year my birthday falls on a 3-day weekend (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day). While here at OBLC, it's a 4-day weekend!! Unbelievable! I had originally submitted a request to go all the way to Louisiana for the weekend, but after a little more consideration, I decided I had too much reading to do and errands to run to make the 8-hour drive each way. Since it's on the way of my originally planned trip and only 3 hours away, I met my brother Dwayne and his girlfriend Jada in Houston. After hearing about her great beach house in Galveston for the last couple of years, I finally got to see it for myself! It's a great retreat in a city that is making a steady recovery from the devastation of the last Gulf Coast hurricane. We celebrated my birthday at a wonderful seafood restaurant called Willie G's. A Blood Mary cocktail left a bit to be desired, but the mixed grill entree of crab cake, broiled shrimp over a creamy risotto and grilled Mahi Mahi that followed made up for the lackluster predinner drink. We laughed and visited our way through the delicious dinner- a great way to spend my birthday!

Dwayne & Jada took off early this morning for a vacation in Mexico and left me in charge of the beach house! My roommate and I get along great, but at 41 years old and having lived alone for many years, I'm enjoying having a house to myself and a little space. I enjoyed a leisurely run along the beach and the gorgeous sunny day afterwards. I've been able to do a little studying and projects and even fit a nap in this afternoon!

I head back to San Antonio tomorrow morning and prepare for my last week of classroom instruction before our training takes us out to the field. I'm still immensely happy with my decision to return to active duty. Although I'm only taking it a day at a time, I'm finding myself more positive about life in general than I have been in a long time. So far, so good. . .

OBLC- Week 1

Yes, I'm still alive and made it through week 1!! The phrase to sum up this first week is "death by Power Point"! There are about 160 folks in OBLC Class 902. It's a mixed bag of backgrounds, but most students can be broken into one (or multiple) of a few categories. The first are "direct commissions". These are folks either right out of college or who have been practicing in their professional field for various numbers of years and who have no previous military experience. These folks literally went from a college setting or from going to an office everyday in the civilian world to putting on a uniform with a rank that requires them to be leaders in the U.S. Army. Quite the culture shock to most. Another group is people who are either in the Army Reserves, Army National Guard or who are already on active duty but just didn't have this course yet or were in ROTC in school. These folks are already familiar with Army uniforms, protocols and customs. The last group are prior service. These soldiers were previously enlisted or commissioned officers from any of the Armed Services. Some went straight from being an enlisted soldier to an officer or had left the military for the civilian work force for varying lengths of time. There are several people like me who fall into two categories- prior service and direct commission.

Ages and ranks vary greatly. The rank at which an individual is commissioned into the Army Medical Dept is based upon education, years of experience in their field and specialties. Folks right out of school or without much professional experience are brought in at the rank of 2LT (Second Lieutenant/O-1 grade) or 1LT (First Lieutenant/O-2). Advanced degrees and/or several years experience will earn you CPT bars (Captain/O-3), which is what I was brought in as. Many years experience and specialists in their professions are brought in as MAJ (Major/O-4) or LTC (Lieutenant Colonel/O-5). There's a dentist in our class brought in as a LTC. From what I've heard since getting here, the Medical Dept. is the only section of the Army who will commission civilians straight into higher ranks. Obviously, rank comes with responsibilities as well privileges so there are pitfalls to commissioning a non-militarily experienced individual into a rank that demands advanced management and leadership skills. The fact that the program continues this way and brings into the Army some of the brightest professionals in their fields however, indicate that the acquisition of specialized skills must outweigh the downside of inexperienced military officers.

AMEDD (Army Medical Department) is comprised of 6 different branches. OBLC Class 902 is made up of professionals (now officers) from each of the branches.
1) Medical Corp (Physicians)
2) Dental Corp (Dentists)
3) Veterinary Corp (Veterinarians)
4) Nurse Corp (Nurses)
5) Medical Specialist Corp (Dietitians, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists & Physician Assistants)
6) Medical Service Corp (Healthcare Administrators, Entomologists, Environmental Scientists, Microbiologists, Biochemists, Social Workers, Clinical & Research Psychologists, Pharmacists, Optometrists, Podiatrists, etc.)

As you can see, we've got quite a mixed-bag of professions covering the full spectrum of medical specialties!

One of the major concerns of the first week are uniforms. We were all sent an email with a list of minimal uniform items with which we were expected to report. Easier said than done! Now, I'm a person with approximately 11 years of experience wearing military uniforms (Navy & Air National Guard). I'm pretty confident looking up uniform regulations and making it happen, but being a direct commission certainly made it hard to comply with requirements. Coming from San Diego where there are a ton of Navy & Marine Corp bases, I was able to find many non-Army specific items, but only with the help of a military ID holder to get me on base (thanks Ed!). Those which I could not find I ordered through civilian retail websites online. Sounds like a good plan, right? It was until one of the most crucial items needed was not in stock and had to be back ordered- BOOTS! At this point you might be thinking to yourself "but Marines wear desert uniforms, why couldn't you just get them at one of the Marine bases in San Diego?" Well, although not obvious to the non-service-specific eye there are subtle differences in uniform items, specifically boots, between each service. All the tan boots that fit my feet in uniform stores throughout bases in San Diego where stamped with the USMC emblem on the side. Not so appropriate for wear in an Army uniform! Luckily, the military clothing store here at Ft Sam Houston was open last Sunday and had boots in my size, so I was able to show up Monday morning in the appropriate uniform. Anyone who has ever worn a new pair of boots can appreciate how suboptimal it is to purchase new boots the day before they are to be worn everyday! A handful of folks were not so lucky though and showed up in various degrees of uniform faux-pas or civilian clothes.

With specialty patches, rank and name tapes all velcroed into the proper positions on the ACUs, my final challenge was the beret. The Navy had gone to berets as I was getting out, so I never had to deal with them. I don't understand the military's desire to put everyone into berets since tradition had dictated that this head gear be reserved for a select group of warriors. Nonetheless, I purchased my perfectly flat, thick felt disc and struggled to make it droop over my right eye and ear like the crusty SGTs I saw around base. I'm not exaggerating when I tell you a whole course could be taught on how to shape a beret! Nothing screams "newbie" more than walking around with a pizza-man-making looking beret. In order to achieve proper fit, you have to shave (yep, with razors) as much of the felt fuzz off as possible, drench it in hot water and wear it on your head multiple times (wet). I repeated this process several times during the week but still could not achieve the proper fit and appearance. Finally, I was informed of a place off base that sold them already shaved and shaped and succumbed to this shortcut in order to get squared-away!

Our week of paperwork, classroom instruction and uniform experiences ended with an APFT (Army Physical Fitness Test) early Friday morning. The tests of push-ups, sit-ups and 2-mile run are scored and recorded in your service record. Successful completion of OBLC is contingent upon passing height-weight/body fat standards and scoring a minimum score on the APFT. Click here to see the standards. A maximum score is 300 with a possible 100 points in each event (push-ups, sit-ups, 2 mile-run) and are age & gender specific. A score of 60 in each event is considered minimal scores required to pass. As you can imagine with a group of people coming right out of the civilian world, there were quite a few new officers who did not meet the minimum standard and will be participating in "special populations" physical training 5 days per week at 5:30 am. Although I didn't achieve the 300 I was shooting for, I was pleased with my score for the most part and will try to improve it on the exit APFT in Feb.

Words of wisdom for future OBLC participants:

• push your recruiter to sponsor you for an AKO account BEFORE you get here
• have name tapes made BEFORE you get here. You can obtain most uniform items once you get here, but name tapes must be custom made and take time (order online).
• have a full PT uniform BEFORE you get here. The military clothing store here on base was out of most sizes and many folks had to PT in random civilian workout attire (a definite no-go)
• have every piece (and MULTIPLE COPIES of) ALL the paperwork you were told to bring (orders, oath of office, birth certificates, marriage licenses, adoption papers, DD-214 discharge papers, direct deposit authorization, etc.) Did I mention to have MULTIPLE COPIES???!!!! Do not show up to any session with only one copy (especially not just the original).
• if you are fortunate enough to live near an Army base or university with an ROTC program, get someone to help you put an ACU uniform together and show you how to wear it. There's something to be said for putting on the uniform and being looked over by an experienced eye in order to get familiar with proper wear and feel comfortable in it. You should look proud to be wearing it, not intimidated or unsure.
• show up in shape! The instructors can appreciate the fact that you are coming straight from civilianhood, but you WILL NOT pass OBLC and move on to your first duty station until you are able to meet minimum body fat and physical fitness standards. Don't just assume you can meet the standards. Many people were caught off guard because their home bathroom scale told them they were a certain bodyfat or because they could do so many push-ups or sit-ups the "normal way". There is a specific way the push-ups and sit-ups must be performed or else they do not count so look up the proper procedures on the internet and make sure you can do them (e.g. fingers interlocked behind head and all the way up in 2 minutes for sit ups, NO "girl" push-ups on knees, elbows much break horizontal plane in 2 minutes, the run was on a 1/2 mile track and not a 1/4 mile track, etc.)
• bring a positive attitude! The military will not do things the way you might have done them in the civilian world. There's a lot of "hurry up and wait" that will happen. Get used to it, this will continue throughout your military career. Complaining doesn't help anyone and only spreads negativity. Remember that you VOLUNTEERED to come here for whatever reason, so stay positive and don't become the cancer of bad attitude in the group. Sage advice my dad gave me before I left for Navy boot camp 20 years ago still applies- the military has been doing this for a couple of hundred years before you got here, so don't automatically assume you could do it all better!
  

That's all I have for now. I'm laying low for my day off (can you believe there's a day off in any military "basic" training?!!!) and catching up on things that fell by the wayside during my relocation and job transition. As hectic & chaotic as this whole process has been, I know I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing with my life. As I was making my way to formation one morning this week, I was overcome with an absolute sense of joy and the thought that I was exactly where I wanted to be at that moment- in a uniform and preparing to make a contribution to something so much bigger than myself. HOOAH!

OBLC

I don't really have time for a full-blown post, but to appease everyone's requests to see me in ACUs (Army Combat Uniform) I'm posting the only pic so far! My room mate Alex took this pic of me at the end of Day 1. And yes, I chopped my hair back down to the way I wore it in the days of when I had to accommodate flight-line cranials and flight helmets!

The first couple of days have pretty much been paperwork, orientation and a little drill & ceremony (formations & marching). We got tested for height & weight standards this morning and will take the APFT (Army Physical Fitness Test) on Friday morning.

I'll keep ya'll in suspense a little until I'm able to post more this weekend. Have a great week as my blood takes on a green tint (don't worry Navy buddies, I'll always be blue at heart!)!!!

20 years and 20 pounds later!

Sorry that I don't have any pics yet, but just wanted to let everyone know that I made it to San Antonio and am checked in for OBLC. That's "Officer Basic Leadership Course" for the non-Army types! I say that tongue in cheek because all the Army's acronyms are completely different from the Navy's, so I'm pretty illiterate when it comes to this new language myself! But pay attention, because I'll explain an acronym once and then you'll be on your own for future posts!!!

I arrived and checked into the base and was assigned a room. Here's the first difference between enlisted basic training (AKA boot camp) and officer training: I have only 1 roommate in a small suite with a kitchenette and it's own bathroom! Compared to the 74 women in bunk beds in one large room and another large room with a bunch of shower heads sticking out of the wall, this is a massive improvement! I couldn't help but marvel at the strange twists and turns in my life as I realized that this year marks the 20th anniversary of me going into Navy boot camp in Orlando, Florida (Company K131, 1989)! It was so long ago that the base hasn't existed in over a decade and that all my shipmates are now retired or retiring! It's also worth noting that on August 21, 1989 when I arrived for boot camp, I weighed about 120 pounds (versus 142 today), smoked like a dragon (1 pack of Winston or Marlboro reds per day) and drank & cursed like a sailor even before I was one!!! I don't think any of my family or friends thought that I'd actually make it through training back then.

Fast forward to today, I meet my new roommate at check-in and we help each other with the bag-drag up to our room. She's a freshly graduated nurse, early 20s and is super-excited about being here. Although she is much more responsible and level-headed than I was when I joined the military, she still reminds me a lot of myself- somewhat spontaneous, adventurous and has a positive, can-do outlook. We seem to be a good match so far; we'll see how long she can put up with being roommates with a relatively old lady though!

That's it for tonight. Training doesn't start until Monday, so I probably won't have much to post about until later in the week, but stay tuned. . .

Transitions

A lot has happened since I've gotten back to California from Christmas vacation! I landed in San Diego, rented a car, rushed to my apartment to get my bike to the Harley shop before they closed, then spent the rest of the night preparing my personal property for the movers. The movers showed up on time and packed out my stuff but were "unaware" that I had a bike that needed to be shipped. After some negotiating, the movers followed me to the Harley shop where they had prepared my bike for shipping. I just didn't have enough time or the facilities to prep the bike myself. Me and some of the mechanics stood out in the parking lot in shocked amusement as we watched the movers try to figure out how to get my bike into the truck and strapped down. As attached as I am to my bike, I finally had to remind myself that it's just an object that can be replaced and let them do with it what they will. I'm anxious to see what condition it shows up in North Carolina in. Even with the help of the guys at the Harley shop, the whole operation was dishearteningly incompetent.

With all my stuff en route and the apartment turned over, I once again showed up on Whit & Kathie's doorstep homeless! You know you have good friends when they allow you to show up twice in the same year needing room & board!! Their twins (Naomi & Cal) are still in NICU and their progress has been an emotional roller coaster ride for these first-time parents. I've done my best to be a help and not a burden during this time of crisis for them and can only hope that I'm pulling it off to some small degree. Me doing the grocery shopping and cooking dinner last night helped to score a few good-house-guest points!

The process of going into the Army has been an extremely frustrating one. I resigned from my job, shipped my household goods and booked a plane ticket to get me to training that starts on Monday without officially being in the Army. As of yesterday, I still had not raised my right hand or signed one single piece of paper stating that I was in the Army. Finally, yesterday Whit was able to commission me at a recruiter's office here in San Diego so I now have a piece of paper saying that I am in the Army. Another testament to the bonds of friendship- Whit & Kathie did my commissioning while their son Cal was having brain surgery (notice the hospital bracelets on Whit's wrist). I didn't want them to leave the hospital to do it and had the recruiter lined up to do it instead, but they insisted that they needed the distraction to keep their mind off the surgery. I'm continually amazed at how well they are handling having two babies in NICU.

Our New Year's Eve was spent here at Whit & Kathie's house with a home cooked meal and a nice bottle of wine. We kicked off the New Year with visiting Naomi at the hospital this morning and running errands for the rest of the day. I hope everyone has a Happy New Year and that you set goals for the New Years that are achievable and have a positive impact on the rest of your life. After all, today is the first day of the rest of your life so make it count!!!