Morning routine

Our previous first sergeant liked the gym, and set up us on a pretty good schedule.  Whenever we're not doing something useful, we all head over at 0800 and do gymish things for about an hour.

I hate PT, and all things gym-related, but I really couldn't start out the Abby Regime by announcing that henceforth we'd start work at 0700 in order to be at the bar by 1430.  Wouldn't be seemly.  So I stuck with the previous schedule.

I didn't mind the gym when it was cold.  And when the weather's nice, I just stick my head in, count my wayward sheep, and head outside for a long, slow job (and occasionally a nap under a tree).

But in case y'all didn't notice, it's hotter than the seventh hub of Hell here right now.  Yesterday I ran a little over three miles and seriously thought about flopping over and dying.  So today I had 40 quality minutes on the treadmill.

Treadmills are, for the record, really designed for people with better balance and coordination than your author.  Injuries narrowly avoided by timely use of the handrails?  Two.

I wanted an eyepatch

But since I'm spending the Fourth in the People's Republic of New Jersey, where I'm fairly certain anything more dangerous than a sparkler is illegal, I don't think there's a whole lot of fireworks-oriented tomfoolery in the offing.

The downside of spending so much time in such a male-dominated environment (I am one of three chicks in the battalion, and the only one in my company) is that one ends up engaging in a lot of dude activities. Long story short, it seems there's some sort of Ultimate Fighting thing on TV tonight, and much effort and many phone calls have gone into the best place to watch said Ultimate Fighting.

At least there will be beer.

It's been a while

But you know what?  It's been kinda nice to disappear on an undeclared hiatus because life has been good and I've been busy rather than because things are dark.

I'm still training troops at the place that sounds like Court Licks.  Actually, I'm not doing much training - circumstances demanded our real first sergeant go take over another company, and so I'm flailing around trying to fill his shoes.  Challenging, but in a good way. 

Writing here is something I'm going to try to get back in the habit of doing.  For a while I just didn't have anything to say, or nothing worth putting into words.  Recently, though, the writing impulse has come back.

So we'll see.  I'm going to try to share some thoughts - and maybe a little griping.  I find I miss the interaction with the Bad Dog Faithful.

Y'all have a great 4th of July.  We've actually got a holiday with no units in our pipeline, so I think I may go try to find something dangerous and irresponsible to do with fireworks.