I made it out of bootcamp...

...And honestly, it was a joke. We were our Chief's last division, and he totally babied us. Even other divisions were like... wtf, you go to the phone center once a week and get candy and red bulls?

What's to congratulate? The ability to run a mile and a half in 14 minutes? Gaining military bearing? Not bursting into tears when I was yelled at (which was often, because I have a hard time keeping my mouth physically closed)? I mean, the worst thing that happened was one of the chiefs yelled at me a few times for having hair in my eyes, got frustrated with my inability to do so, took a pair of scissors and cut the offending lock off. Though I won't forget the expression on her face, the first time she told me to get my hair out of my face, and I tucked that stupid lock behind my ear, and it promptly fell back in front of my face.

I really wanted to get beaten every day, get stronger, that sort of thing. Instead, bootcamp was a classroom-intensive, sleep-deprived (I averaged 4 hours a night, for various reasons) struggle to get things right and pay attention to detail. The physical aspect was almost an afterthought. And for the most part, I had fun. My division did well, earned all our honors (so maybe there was a reason for the phone calls and the red bulls.) But I still wonder if I would've had the same perspective if I had been in my brother division.

Here at Nuke school, though, PT is not an afterthought. And the chaplain leads it. we usually do ten of an exercise, uhh, kinda goes like this:
Chaplain: One!
Nukes: Navy!
Chaplain:Two!
Nukes: Navy!
...
Chaplain: Ten!
Nukes: Nuke Powah!
Chaplain: Hooyah Nuke Powah!
Nukes: Hooyah Nuke Powah!
Chaplain: Hooyah Chaplain Corps!
Nukes: Hooyah Chaplain Corps!
Chaplain: It seems some of you can't count/like your R's too much/whatever he didn't like.

(yeah, he made us do the exercise again because someone said "nuke power" with a hard r. )

And the classes are pretty intense. I like it here. I'm happy. It's crazy.

that wedding -- that asshole

So, my friend had her wedding recently. She had decided to have a fairly small wedding on a boat on a lake. Unfortunately, the waves were pretty choppy for marching down the aisle. I was the last to go before them, and I heard her father tell her that if she started to fall, he was just going to let go.

Granted, he is an old man -- older than 3/4 of my grandparents -- and he isn't in the best health. But just letting go of your only daughter if she happens to loose her balance on her wedding day seems awfully assholish.

Fortunately, no one fell, and the biggest catastrophe was that someone had misplaced the forks for the wedding cake.

But now I can see why she's waiting for him to kick the bucket.

Six years

Today, I'm certain that there's somebody at Ground Zero in NYC exercising their right to freedom of speech by proclaiming that 9/11 is a massive government conspiracy. More than likely, there's a group of them, and they're handing their propaganda out. Lots of people aren't going to like what they have to say, and will probably tell that to them too. It might come to shouting, but if no one throws a punch, no one is going to get arrested. This is the US, that's the way we roll.

Today, there's someone out there who's proclaiming that we should probably just "nuke em all," without the depth of insight that our country would again be guilty of genocide. Wouldn't it be foolish to wipe out a whole region of the world, poison it with radiation, just to satisfy a lust for blood and revenge?

Today, there's someone protesting the War in Iraq. Perhaps they'll say that we're killing Iraqis there... and they wouldn't be entirely wrong. Something like 225 Iraqi civilians have died in 2006 as a result of US actions. Some 16,791 Iraqis have been killed by terrorist actions in the same year. I'm reminded of a line from Reading Lolita in Tehran, where the author passing by posters, and one of them says, "The more we die, the stronger we become." What the hell kind of logic is that?

Today, there is a large, quiet gathering at Arlington National Cemetery. Maybe someone's brought a picnic to spend the day there in memory of their loved one. Maybe someone else will yell at them for irreverence. Or not.

But I imagine that almost everyone today sits and thinks about what they were doing, where they were six years ago, at least for a few minutes. I know that I can't forget, though I was hardly the person who I am now then.


I suppose the same could be said, of the whole world.

The Last DEP Meeting, or Today I Blame Myself

I had my last Delayed Entry Program meeting today. It was surprisingly academic; the recruiters mostly asked us questions about things you should know before you go to boot camp. That part was easy, since everything is in my mind pretty firmly. Then we went outside and had a little fun, running relay on a soccer field. One of the recruiters challenged us to complete it in under 20:00 -- giving us each about a 1:30 to complete our leg.

Physically, I'll say that I'm average to above average. I can push out the required push-ups easily, the sit-ups are a breeze. But running? I'm not so sure if I can make the required 15:00 mark for a mile and a half.

So my turn comes up, and I ran at an easy loose pace until the last 100 yards or so. I dug deep and sprinted as hard as I can, and my muscles felt like jelly. And about 12 feet from the tag-off line, my jelly-muscles say, "nope, we're not going to support you!" and I fall on my ass. The recruiter that I was running with asked if I was okei, (yes) and offered a hand to help me up. I jogged back, tagged off, and walked around with my hands on my head, stomach revolting and feeling as though I might pass out.

We missed the 20:00 mark, by five seconds -- about how long I was on the ground. No one else fell, no one else pushed themselves so hard that they hated themselves after it was done. No. If I hadn't literally pushed myself to the limit, we probably would've made the mark. my team failed because I didn't acknowledge this.

For this, I completely blame myself.

Religion of peace?

Catchphrase for V -- and coundown time

I dunno if you're allowed to "win" more than once, but what the hell.

Your pain does not make you special.


I've started counting the days until I leave, literally. 32. I ship out Oct 2nd. (and my b-day is a week later, that's going to be "fun.")

I'm not worried anymore. Maybe writing had a cathartic effect. Yeah, I'll blame it on that. And I gave my notice at the mcjob. I've changed subtly -- I roll out of bed and I want to go for a run, I want to do 50 push-ups in a minute, I want to recite my 11 general orders in phonetic alphabet.

Sweet zombie jesus, I'm crazy...

Dream a dream

There is a certain doubt, internally, when I consider my fitness for the Navy. I've had three brothers go to boot camp, but none have graduated. This, by itself, gives me more pause than mother's passive-aggressive campaign to convince me to believe I will fail. Granted, this was a different time -- these brothers are all 30+ now, and they enlisted in the late 80s. Still, I wonder what was so irreconcilable with who they are and military life. I'm more anxious about this than anything else.

Family lore has it that they couldn't shoot. I... don't believe this. All of them have better eyesight than I do, and in arcade games, I usually hit what I'm aiming at 50% of the time. Not exactly the best indicator of my shooting ability, but I've never shot a real gun before. Although one of my brothers has admitted to doing "something" to an Army captain that made his separation more expedient.

I'll probably be fine. I try not to think about this too often, still it's kinda worrying.

wedding

A friend of mine has asked me to be maid of honor for her wedding, and I accepted. We had a nice, long chat and I asked her what color dress she's wearing.

She's always been a dark sort of person. She wrote a book where no one has more than one redeeming quality. Once, a group of our friends dressed up in dark robes, went to a cemetery and had pizza delivered, and after eating the pizza, we picked up the garbage until the police came to scare us off. She's decided that rather than having a proper "wedding night," she's going to invite the whole wedding party back to the suite, hang a "do not disturb" sign outside, and likely jump on the beds and play with the jacuzzi and make a lot of noise. (her fiancé has the same sort of personality. This is going to be a fun wedding) And she hates white.

So I fully expected her dress to be blood red or even black. So I was surprised when she said it was white. Apparently, her mom threw a fit when she said she wanted a black wedding dress. So they had a trade-off, she gets a themed wedding in a white dress for her mother's... non-bickeringness?

Whatever makes her happy, I guess.

Intelligent design

About once a day when I work in drive-thru, I get someone who almost drives pass my window, and probably would if I didn't holler "hello!" at them. Often then, they'll comment on the poor design of the drive-thru. I mean... heh, looks like I'm going to have to do some exposition.

There are three ways to enter the parking lot at my McDonald's. Two of them can get you to drive-thru easily, but one other makes you circle the building so you can order. Also, you can't see the window that I work at from very far down the line, because it's around a corner. Besides the window I often work at and the window where the food is handed out, there's another window. We have it covered by a curtain, but sometimes people still stop there and I'll have to hang out the window to wave them down.

The poor design of this McDonald's is not merely relegated to the exterior; it also has quite a bit of wasted space, not much storage, a grill that is too small of the volume of business we do, and my personal favorite, only one stall in the women's bathroom. In fairness, there's only one in the men's too, but they also have a urinal. It was built on a crawl space rather than a foundation, and there are cracks in the floor if you look closely. And, the dining room is too small. I say, jokingly, that this McDonald's is evidence that there is no such thing as intelligent design. And the owner agrees with me. He's having it torn down and rebuilt like a "normal" McDonald's.

Hey, Mr. Owner, be sure not to give the contract for designing this place to the same company that give you this shitty design in the first place, mmmkay?

Chances are, it'll still be closed when I graduate from boot camp. It'll make things nice and complicated when the Navy guys show up to interview my superiors and coworkers for my security clearance and find a building site. Heh. I might spend a month or two doing more shit jobs because they can't easily find people to interview.

Letter to mother

Dear mother,
So, you went through my stuff and found my birth control. I almost want to congratulate you, since this is the most you've found out about me since I was seven. Which, judging by your reaction, is about your age.

I'm not really angry. I'm too lazy to be angry. I expected you to break your promise sooner or later, because you've broken similar promises in the past. I had hoped that you wouldn't, but like Dr. Phil says, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.

I guess I'm sad. I had hoped that you would actually talk to me. No, listen to me. I've done a lot of listening for you. It feels as though I've been your emotional garbage can, that you talk to me in order to get it off of you, rather than dealing with it. What's more, I want you to care about what I think and how I feel, since I've come to the conclusion that caring about thoughts and feelings is the hallmark of real love. I know you won't find that in your bible, so perhaps that doesn't mean anything to you.

I can remember times that you've shrieked at me to "grow up." Now that I am an adult, I find a sort of irony in it. I mean, you're throwing a fit because I'm not behaving like you think I should behave. I wonder what Grandma would think if she saw you like that. I think that you got to point in life where you decided that you didn't need to grow anymore, so you just stopped. Oh, certainly you have grown older, but you have consistently chosen not to learn from what happens.

I know, I know, you've been hurt. I have heard you tell the tale many times, relishing the hurt, the details, the pain. Mother, your pain does not make you special. Pain happens to everyone, and I could point out numerous examples of people who have been through the same traumas that you have, some even worse, and have come out of it to live successful lives, with a better sense of perspective. I imagine many more have taken your route, to blame the world, everyone around them, shove off the responsibility of growth on other people. It is the easy way. The coward's way.

Yes, I think you are an emotional coward. Accepting the past, then letting it go was the hardest thing I've done. But, it's given me an incredible freedom... a detachment from my pain. I can look at what has happened, and see oh, perhaps that's why it happened, and gain understanding. Yes someone did a horrible thing to you. Someone did a horrible thing to you 45 years ago. It's as though you are stuck at that age. Maybe you are, emotionally.

Then, you had kids. You had a responsibility to be supportive and caring and nurturing. But, you weren't; you aren't, just listen to yourself and the disparaging way you talk about most subjects that my siblings and I bring up. Anything uncomfortable gets a one-sentence treatment. The talk about sex went: "Sex is for marriage." The talk about birth control: "Some women just can't say no." There's no information in those statements, no caring, no love.

So, you've found my birth control. Rather than behaving like you care about me, you try to rip me to pieces. I can't tell you how sad it makes me feel when you behave like this. I wish you had some self-awareness, to listen to what you're saying and imagine how you'd feel if you were called a whore by your mother. I will obey you and your rules, in letter if not in spirit.

I think I've cried enough tears over this.

your daughter,
Tactical Grace

[i] do something to [/i] support the troops

You know, I dislike the yellow ribbon magnets people have on their cars that say, "support our troops." I wonder what people [i]do[/i] to support our troops. Hey, I work in drive-thru! Let's ask people!

Most people say they have them on to support a relative who's in the military. Okei. What do you do to support this relative? The answer usually end up in the "uhhh..." department. Some of them do write and send care packages on a regular basis, but most, don't. To me, it seems that the magnet amounts to telling people if you happen to meet a service member, you won't spit on them. I imagine that it might be comforting to Vietnam vets, but on the whole, I think it's a wimpy position.

And it's not as if it's difficult to adopt a service member. You could head over to anysoldier.com, pick the last person who updated, and just write letters, tell jokes, that sort of thing. No obligation to send care packages or meet them at the airport. The cushiest job in Iraq doesn't compare with being home, and generally speaking, a letter that comes off as "It's rough out there, and maybe I can cheer you up a bit" is as good as a box full of hooah bars. Maybe better.

So if you have a bumpersticker on your car, spend the $0.37 and the time to actually support our troops. It's much more appreciated.

maturity

I've recently been obsessing over a single sentence VA wrote : Children are the only people on this planet who can seriously claim 100% victim status.

It's got me thinking, is claiming to be a victim a kind of immaturity? I mean, shit happens to everyone. I doubt that there's a single person that has had a life free from emotional pain, but you don't learn from the experience by wallowing in it. I think part of maturity is being able to handle and control your emotions. The question is, then, when are you going to stop letting the past control you?

Let's apply this at a large scale. I imagine that many of the problems in Palestine arise from a communal victim status. (Caution: broad and sweeping generalizations ahead) Jews feel victimized because of the Holocaust, and Palestinians feel victimized because their fathers' land was taken from them.

Firstly, I'm not saying we should forget the Holocaust or The UN Partition Plan.

I'm saying that no one's life should be controlled by what's happened in the past.

I wonder, and suspect that I'm right, that blowing up yourself is an incredibly immature way of proving your point. The abbreviated scenario goes like this: "You're not listening to me! I'm not getting my way! WAHH I'm going to blow myself up and take take some of you along with me! BOOM!" Again, I know I'm massively generalizing, and I know that generally isn't not [i]that[/i] impulsive, but sheesh, that's what it amounts to. Riots are also generally massive orgies of immaturity. You know, I really wonder when the Middle East is going to grow up...

Drive-through ettiquette

I think that there are quite a few people that are inadvertently rude while giving their orders in drive-through. Some suggestions seem to be common sense, others are less so.

1. Diction. Seriously, there are times when I can barely understand customers for lack of diction. Ive changed "Hi-C" into "Iced Tea," and on one occasion, a small sprite became a small fry. And speak slowly! Over the intercom, speaking too quickly is one of the best things you can do to damage your understandability. Slow down, and make your consonants crisp, please.

2. Have an idea of what you want before your start ordering. Even if it's vague, I can list the choices we have in that category. Say, you want a salad though you're not sure what kinds the store offers or what's in them; a good drive-through order-taker should be able to describe the different kinds of salad fairly quickly. Don't get me wrong, I know that sometimes you need to look at the menu board to see the prices or narrow your decision, but please, don't sit in drive through looking at the menu board for more than a minute or so.

3. Turn your windshield wipers down if it's raining. This isn't obvious, but when your windshield wipers are on high, often they'll throw the water off of your windshield and onto whoever happens to be next to you. It sucks working in drive-through when it's raining just because of this.

4. Please don't yell. Try to speak in a calm, low tone. Even though the volume is up on the speaker outside, you don't need to match its volume for me to hear you. Speaking voice is good, if you know command voice, that is better. Screaming and shouting aren't good.

5. If it takes you more than thirty seconds to find exact change, don't bother. Exact change is nice, but celerity is better. If you have pennies to make it to the next quarter, dime, or nickel, that's more than adequate. Also, if you want to pay exclusively in change, please don't come at lunchtime or around 8 in the morning, because chances are, there will be a line at least three cars long behind you. Ideally, we're supposed to go from order to handing the food to you in less than 90 seconds, and giving me five dollars in mixed change at lunch is more than just annoying. It's going to take you and those other people that much longer to get to the food.

6. This is a personal preference, but if you're going to thank your order taker while at the speaker, say "thanks" rather than "thank you." Over the speaker, "thank you" sounds like "fuck you."

I may think of more later. I just want to put this out there, for contemplation's sake.

Reflections on "The Sailor's Creed"

I am a United States Sailor.
I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America and I will obey the orders of those apponted over me.
I represent the fighting spirit of the Navy and those who have gone before me to defend freedom and democracy around the world.
I proudly serve my country's Navy combat team with Honor, Courage, and Commitment.
I am commited to excellence and the fair treatment of all.

At the beginning of every school day at Great Lakes, I and my fellow recruits will recite this creed, like schoolchildren recite the Pledge of Allegiance. I'm fairly certain that there will be some in my division who would protest this, but I think repetition is the best way to learn something, and once it's fairly solid in your mind, then that's the best time to analyze it.

It hasn't been around very long. I suppose there is a kind of tradition around it, but how can something be "traditional" when it's only 15 years old? It's a shallow sort of criticism, I'll admit. Those who have gone before me didn't recite this. I think that's it's deepest flaw, giving it tradition when it's new.

I wonder why it's the singular "Sailor's Creed," rather than the "Sailors' Creed." There are about 342,000 active duty personnel in the US Navy, and we're in it together, not as disparate personalities. There is no such thing as a "Navy of one," no matter what the Army may try to tell you. Every branch of the Armed Forces needs that solidarity for it to function. Perhaps, as we recite it, we should say, "We are United States Sailors... We protect and defend... We represent the fighting spirit... We proudly serve... We are committed..." I suppose the problem there in lies that I can't depend on anyone else to prove that I have Honor, Courage, or Commitment. Funny how the Armed Forces are like that, eh?

"I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States..." You know, I think you have to read the Constitution in order to really support it and I think that it's necessary to know its contents to defend it well. I don't know how well the average American knows the Constitution and its amendments, But I'll hazard a guess and say not well. But I think below its surface, its fancy language, its specifics, it say that each person has a right to choose how they want to live. I will support and defend each person's right to choose how to live their lives as they see fit.

"...and I will obey the orders of those appointed over me." I knew this point would get sticky with me. I am a skeptic, I ask questions, I want to hear what the authorities have said. I realize that there will be times when I will need to do what has been ordered without understanding its context or its meaning. But, I also trust that I will ask questions if an order seems very wrong or harmful. I may not be able to have the point of view that my superiors have, and I trust that in time I will trust their judgment when I cannot see what they see. That's actually just a little scary for me. I've grown accustomed to feeling like I can only trust my own judgment. But that is another blog entry, eh?

"I represent the fighting spirit of the Navy..." Now there's a phrase that's special -- fighting spirit. I don't think they mean a bellicose spirit, the spirit of bullies, but "fight" is such a vague word. Only two of the Navy's ships have sunk enemy ships, and one of them is the USS Constitution, the oldest commissioned ship afloat. So obviously, we're not out there sinking every ship of every country that disagrees with us. Or at least not openly, if the Navy is doing that, but there's a giant cover up (there's one for conspiracy theorists) so... well, I can't see the point of there being a cover up. More than anything, the Navy is like a Sentinel of the Seas, always armed but rarely firing. It seems that way at least.

"...and those who have gone before me to defend freedom and democracy around the world." When I think of the people who have given their lives to defend freedom and democracy, I think of the men who raised the flag on Iwo Jima, or the heroes of the Revolutionary War, more than the kids out in the Sandbox. Don't get me wrong, I think that they're doing what they believe in, but also we, as a nation, are instituting democracy on them. They're not really defending democracy, but it's more like they're on the offensive for democracy, if that makes any sense.

"I proudly serve my county's Navy combat team with Honor, Courage, and Commitment. " Honor, Courage, and Commitment are the Navy core values. Commitment and Courage I have good concepts of, but Honor is rather squicky with me. If they mean "honor" as a personal obligation to acknowledge what's right and what's true, then I can get on with that. Some other definitions would leave me rather speechless.

"I am committed to excellence and the fair treatment of all." This one is the most forthright of all. I like that.

It's nto such a bad, thing, th "Sailor's Creed." I'll probably have different ideas about it when I graduate bootcamp than I do now, but that's okei. I'm never really the same person twice.

confessions

A few weeks before Christmas, a friend of mine asked me what I'd like to get. This is the sort of question that gets to me, because most of what I want is immaterial. I want peace, warmth, a soft place to fall. I got very quiet. I paced around him in the mall, and he waited without vocal complain. Who could understand that what I want can't be handed to anyone?

As a child on Christmas, I'd look around at all these presents while my parents were screaming at each other, usually over nothing. As much as the presents comforted me, I still wanted more. I feel badly that at such a young age, I began equating love with stuff. Not good, I think. I began to ask for more and more outrageous presents, and I'd get one of a few reactions. Being told I'm a spoiled brat. Being told that it's not affordable. Being told that it's not possible.

I have a vivid memory of my first boyfriend and his father talking to each other, disagreeing, but they still said what they needed to say in a normal tone. Although the issue wasn't resolved, they mutually decided to talk about it later. Before he left, his father hugged him and told him he loved him. And it was as natural as you could think. I sat on the bed, and stared at the ceiling above me, trying to keep my eyes from watering up.

"What's the matter?" he asked as he put his arm around me. I don't remember what I said, or whether or not I said anything. What was I supposed to do? You know, he's never wanted for anything he's needed, which is both a gift and... well, not a curse. It's just that he would never be able to understand how much it hurt watching a normal, healthy relationship, because I wanted -- I still want it -- so badly. Ironically, he's now grown into an asshole. Is that because he's never been rejected by someone he's loved, or are there deeper roots? Man, that's a whole topic by itself.


After pacing around him for a while, I got to the point where I could say something that wasn't "a hug" or "loving surroundings" or something like that. I succumbed, and told him I'd like guitar hero.

DEP, again

So, like a good little depper, I've been memorizing things like the Sailor's Creed, Rank and recognition, 11 general orders.
The problem is that, I didn't memorize the order of my 11 general orders. I could tell you all of them, but not nessisarily in the order that they're in. oops. Everybody drop, and give me 15!

Also, I found out that Donald Rumsfeld is no longer Secretary of Defense. Fortunately, they didn't make us drop for that, he only laughed at me and told me I was out of date. yay, not paying attention tot he news.

But all in all, it was a good dep meeting.

heh.

I came across a site named, "Fundies say the darndest things" and I've been browsing it, and already I have some favorites. There's this one:

I believe it can be more or less proved, or at least there is better evidence for the truth of the Bible than the Gita. First off let me state that the philosophy of the Gita makes more sense to me on a rational level than that of the Bible, and yet I believe in the message of Jesus. Just because something is rational or seems sensible or can be explained convincingly, doesn't mean it is necessarily true!

That last sentence is priceless. Is it mean of me to laugh at that?

Intuition

I've been reading Res Ipsa Loquitor, a blog by an atheist law student, from its beginning. I had been searching for something, and had hit upon his blog. The first entry I had read was about the aborted Easter showing of a naked chocolate jesus, I had though, ah, here is a person that thinks in a different way than I do, but we've come to similar conclusions.

I think logic and hard evidence is very valuable, but I'm naturally more intuitive than logical. I think that the writer of that blog is drawn to law because it requires a combination of intellect and incisiveness to be a good lawyer, but I can't point to anything he's written that implicitly or explicitly states that. I end up reading blogs and thinking, what does this say about his character? what are his motivations? And I end up forming opinions and conclusions based, mostly, on what's not being said.

woo.

If the bible is inerrant, then Joseph had two daddies.

You know, when someone says the bible is inerrant, I usually send them to read Matthew 1:16 and Luke 3:23.

Matthew 1:16 reads:

and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.

and Luke 3:23 reads:

Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph, the son of Heli

Both passages refer to both Jacob and Heli as sons, so we can reasonably assume that they're both male. If you say the bible is inerrant, then Joseph had two fathers. If you believe that the bible isn't inerrant, then you can pass this off for a mistake. Although I would personally find it somewhat alarming that a mistake like this was made in the highest book of my religion.

Or, as I took it, that the bible isn't inerrant, and that this is just one of the more glaring examples of lack of self-consistency.

I value self-consistency; I look for it in movies and fiction and in people. I find it more often in movies and fiction than people. That used to bother me, but now, not so much. I'm not entirely self-consistent, and I doubt that anyone is. But I think a system of philosophy -- which is what most religion seems to be, at least to me -- should be self-consistent.

I wonder where I got this peculiar fetish...

Suicide is not painless

At work the day before yesterday, I dropped a glass coffee pot and it shattered on the edge of a shelf, causing an impressive amount of glass shrapnel. I'm lucky, I guess; I stepped back and put my arms up, so rather than getting a face full of glass, I only have a series of mostly minor cuts on my arms. Most of them are shallow, a few are deeper, and a couple of them are longer than the others.

There's a cut on my left wrist that didn't even go all the way through my skin, but it's fairly long, so that gets three stitches. One on my right elbow, although not as long, was quite a bit deeper; it even had some arterial spurt action going on before the bleeding stopped. It got one stitch.

Of all the cuts, I find these two to be the most interesting and oppositional. The one on my wrist looks like a lame suicide attempt. It hardly bled at all, and I don't know why they felt it needed some help getting back together. And why'd they use stitches? It's shallow enough to use superglue. However, because of its location, and not so much its severity, it gets the most attention from my superiors and crewmates. Great. I'll have a scar on my wrist the rest of my life.

The one on my elbow, though, was bloodier and messier than the one on my wrist, but it got less attention because, I suppose, people don't normally try to kill themselves by cutting their elbows. Maybe this'll start a new trend.

Anyway, I'm in a bit of pain. I think I'll leave it at that.

Oh, I want to copy this and make the shift leaders read it aloud...

So, I got a copy of The Bluejacket's Manual from Amazon. It's pretty much the handbook on how to do stuff the Navy way. And it's frequently abbreviated BJM. BJ, he he.

So I've been reading it, and I've gotten to the part about leadership. Here's a bit:

Know your job. Few things are more uninspiring for subordinates than to recognize that their leader does not know her or his job. As a leader, you will earn confidence and respect of those who work for you if you know everything you can possibly know about your job. You should also strive to learn as much as you reasonably can about the jobs of your subordinates, but use this knowledge to improve your communications with subordinates, to instruct when necessary, and to monitor what they are doing. Do not use this knowledge to intrude on their work.

Oh, I want to copy the whole section and give it to the managers at McDonald's.

I hope it just keeps getting better.

A few things I'll never tell my Recruit Division Commander

Recruit Division Commanders (RDC) = Drill instructors. But you don't call them Drill instructors, if you want to keep your life.

1) That I love my rack (bed) . Most of my life, I haven't had a bed to sleep on, so when I do have one, I practically revere it. I don't care how many times he makes me strip it only to make it up again (and I imagine that will be many, many times) it's still my place to sleep.

2) I've had 5,000 hours of drill (thank you, band camp). It's one thing to say you know all the fundamentals, it's another duck entirely when you can do all the fundamentals while double timing backwards. No, I think I'll keep that to myself.

3) I'm a little scared of guns. No, I'm really scared of guns. This doesn't mean I'm going to get out of qualifying on 9 mm pistol and M16 rifle. It's a case of Suck it up, bitch.

4) Whenever I take out the trash, it makes me feel nauseated. Fine, I'll toss my cookies into this bag, and then tie it up and throw it out. Suck it up... err, no. Carry some breath mints?

But most of all

5) He can't make me unhappy. Although it's absolutely true, if I say that, I think the RDC will take it as a challege to make my life as hellish as possible.

neither here nor there

I wrote this at a forum I frequent, on a thread dealing with the Virginia Tech shooting.

I find it ironic that the WBC is going to be protesting. I think that they believe that if everyone in the US believed as they believe, then bad things would stop happening -- that is, it's the stuff that other people are doing that's making them unhappy, disappointed, or angry, rather than having a degree of control over their feelings and doing something to make the world better.

I'm not sure about the shooter's (s'?) situation, but I can't imagine (though that might just be failure of the imagination) someone gunning down 33+ people not being angry or desperate about something. Rather than dealing with it or talking about it, he hurts other people. It's other peoples' fault that he's hurt of course, and not his own. If they changed, then he wouldn't think these things or feel these things, rather than take a degree of responsibility for his own feelings.

someone replied to me:
Wait so are you saying that it's not the shooters fault that he gunned down so many, but it's societies fault, or are you just explain a position that some people might take to this event?

So I responded
I keep forgetting, sarcasm doesn't read well over the internet.

I think that people who blame others for their actions and situations are most at fault. It'd be unreasonable to blame just one thing, idea, or influence on what happened, and no, I can't blame society for what one person did. Certainly there was a confluence of outside influences, but for me, it boils down to one point:

If he had taken responsibility for how he felt, rather than blaming other people, this tragedy probably wouldn't've happened.

You could say this about Columbine, or heck, you can say that about 9/11. What do the terrorists say to us, in essence? If you change to become like us, we'll stop attacking.

And that's bullshit.

You made me do this, one report has him writing?

Whoever that's directed at (on the off chance that this person is alive,) they didn't go and buy a couple of pistols. They didn't buy the ammo. They didn't make a plan, they didn't pull the trigger. Most likely, this person hurt him, maybe even humiliated him. And that happens to almost everyone. And since most people don't go and become school shooters, this too is bullshit.

I can imagine that he idolized his pain. His pain makes him special, his pain marks him, or something. Gah. I don't know if you can reach out to a person like that, so you can't say, oh, if someone did this for him or that for him... he had people "reaching out" to him all the time in little ways, and he rejected it. I don't know at what point some intervening person could've stopped this, but it could've been stopped, all the way up until the first shot was fired, by him.

Taxes, McDonald's, comments, and DEP meetings

Dear libertytax.com, I appreciate being able to use your site to prepare my taxes. However, I don't like finding out three days before my taxes are due, that my electronic taxes were rejected. Fuck you in the fucking neck.

on to more pleasant things.

Final Embrace said...

The only part of this story that's hard to swallow is that you work for McDonald's.
I mean, really. In your post about abortion (today's post) you use a semicolon correctly. Do you expect me to believe that you labor daily at a fast food restaurant?
Otherwise, keep up the great writing.

Well, I don't suppose it really matters whether or not you believe that I work at a fast food place. Given my situation, I could either work there, at a gas station, Subway, or the local Chinese restaurant. Menial labor. I have to say that it's good for me to work in this in-between time, otherwise I'd likely get depressed and lazy and bitter. I could start a small business doing something like writing resumés, but I personally don't like the idea of opening a business that at the onset has a close date. Well.

I had my first DEP meeting (that would be a meeting of all the kids that are in the Delayed Entry Program in the area in the Navy); it went both better and worse than I expected. Better, because I had confirmation that I have indeed memorized my Eleven General Orders for a Sentry, Sailor's Creed, and Rank and Recognition. Worse, because I've found out how out of shape I'm in. Well, that's fixable and I do have time to fix it. I am going to be strong and fit by the time I visit my friend who's already graduated boot camp.

Abortion, drugs, and the meaning of life.

For a long time my position of abortion was that of a pro-lifer. I've changed a bit from that now, I suppose I've become less rigid in judging others. I consider myself personally pro-life; I doubt I'll ever have an abortion. But, I've come to realize that if we make abortions illegal, that doesn't do away with the demand. There will be women who want abortions, and doctors (and if it becomes illegal, pseudo-doctors, I'm sure) who are willing to perform them. What happens is that there's no legal recourse if a woman's abortion is botched. Medical tourism to countries who do allow abortion would almost certainly rise. On the flip side, if you don't like abortion and it's legal (as it is now), no one is forcing you to have one. You have a perfect right to call it immoral, protest it, and write negatively about it, but no matter how much you protest or write, there will never be a consensus.

For a long time, my stance about drugs was simple: they were bad. I've changed a bit from that now. For instance, marijuana isn't toxic enough for someone to smoke weed to death, unlike the possibility of smoking cigarettes to death or drinking oneself to death. The substances in it have proven to ease pain and increase appetite, and have been used in painkillers, some specifically prescribed to chemotherapy patients. Is smoking weed directly worse? I'd think not.

I've never smoked, I've never gotten drunk, and I've rarely been in the mere presence of weed. This does not mean I'm somehow morally superior to those that do choose to do so, and I think that if someone wants to go get stoned, they should be able to do so safely and legally. (Well, as long as they're not in the armed forces, but that's covered by an additional code of laws). I think that we should legalize all illegal drugs, regulate the hell out of them, then tax them like we do for cigarettes. We'll give the money to the armed forces. Build an aircraft carrier from that tax money and call it the "Mary Jane." People can have bumper stickers that say "Support our troops, smoke a joint." (I'm easily amused, heh.)

No, we'd never be so outright with where the tax money would be going. I'm sure some people would go out of their way to grow their own in order to not support the troops. And those that would get the really illegal weed, because their moral qualms over wars and the industrial-military complex (whatever the hell that is) would prompt them to specifically not buy the legal and regulated kind, and then we'd have the problem of discerning legal weed from illegal weed.

And the meaning of life? I used to think that if everyone thought and talked like me, only then we could have world peace. I now think that we'd loose so much diversity, it'd be a pretty boring place. I think part of the meaning of life is allowing room for other's opinions, and diversity.

Incompentence

I'm going to be blatant. The store manager at the McDonald's I work for is ultimately incompetent.
I don't mean she's a bad person. Personally, I rather like her. Nor do I mean that she is mentally impaired in some way. She just doesn't have the skills to run the store well, and if left to her own devices (that is, some of the shift managers stopped supporting her and telling her what to do), it would be a likely disaster. And sometimes it is a disaster, even if she is supported.

One of the Point-of-Sale computers (POS, sometimes we call them pieces of shit) had been malfunctioning. Instead of calling in the problem directly, she stuck a note on it, "don't use this." I wonder, did she think it was going to go away? Anyway, I was pushing a bit for her to call it in right now, so if we needed to do a system reset, it would be at 5 in the morning. She was unsure, and so she waited for a more competent manager to come in and weigh the situation.

Unfortunately, the next manager didn't come in until 8am. They agreed that yes, they needed to call this in, and as it turned out, they did need to do a system reset.

Oh, that sucked. System resets take at least 45 minutes, and according to the franchise rules, we weren't allowed to close for this. So for about an hour, we were taking orders by hand, figuring out the seven percent tax, keeping a log of what was ordered. During what's usually a busy breakfast hour.

It wasn't as bad as it could've been. I was given the task of taking orders and figuring the prices for drive thru. I've paid enough attention that I know most of the menu items' prices including tax, but there were a couple times where I had to compute the 7%. I'm sure I got something wrong during that hour, but generally things (at least from my perspective) went about as smoothly as you could hope for.

Judging by my coworkers, though, it could've been a disaster. One girl insisted on having a calculator for finding the change. Another gave out free things, and later got in trouble for it. One was amazed by the arithmetic that decorated my orders. To me, it's just simple math that I've had a lot of practice doing.

A manager is in a position of power and authority; however, without input from the people who are in their authority, it would be hard to have a grasp on what's really going on. It's a reciprocal kind of relationship, since a manager can't manage without talking to and considering the opinions of their "followers," and the "f0llowers" need an authority in order to function as a unit.

I learned all this at band camp. I have a feeling it will be reinforced at boot camp.

Let There be Peace on Earth, or My Idealism is Showing

One of my favorite hymns from going to church was "Let there be Peace on Earth:"

Let there be peace on Earth,
And let it begin with me.
Let there be peace on Earth,
The peace that was meant to be.
To take each moment
And live each moment
In perfect harmony!
Let there be peace on Earth,
And let it begin with me!

To me, it seems to advocate a personal responsibility in world peace. It sounds like an oxymoron, but it'll only be when everyone on Earth chooses personal peace that we'll have world peace. I still believe it's possible (perhaps because I'm young?), though entirely unlikely, at least in my lifetime. Excuse me, is my idealism showing? But if you believe that world peace is only possible if everyone thinks the same, or shares the same faith, then you're never, ever going to get it.

on a tangential note...

I can recall having a conversation with my mother about Marlyn Manson. She was in total disapproval of his choices, going on for a solid fifteen minutes about why he's bad. My end of the conversation can be summed up as:

You can't control what he does to his body.
He does what he does for shock value.
When you talk about what he's done, particularly in an indignant or offended way, you're actually reinforcing his shocking behavior.
Moreover, you're teaching people that if they want attention, they should do something wild and crazy.

I used the example of a flasher, that he does what he does for people's shocked reactions. If the people he flashed were to, say, comment on the lining of his coat, behaving in an un-shocked way, they'd be taking his reinforcement away. If the media decided not to cover the craziest segments of society, except perhaps in conjunction with a larger story (and then, very carefully), then I imagine that as a whole, we'd see less of the crazies. And with the extremists not getting any real coverage, then perhaps we can see some real depth to serious stories. Oh shit, my idealism is showing again.

I think largely ignoring people who want others to be annoyed, offended, or angry is a good step towards peace on a larger scale.

Though, I do wonder how well this attitude will serve me at Boot Camp...

There are no girls on the internet

If you're reading this, chances are it's because someone linked to me, since I'm not really out to promote myself. And I'm mildly amused that she referred to me as a male.

Eh. It's not as if I chose a particularly feminine name. Or as if I'm not doing something as typically masculine as, say, joining the military. Or like there are pictures of me. Or I'm all like, "The crimson ichor of my wymenhood cycle is leaking from my puffy, raw vagina." (thank you, encyclopedia dramatica).

But, I bet it's because there really aren't any females on the internet. They're too busy cooking, cleaning, and shaving their legs to go on teh interweb, and all females on the internet are really males, unless they show proof of their femalian qualities, and even then, that's subject to review. "You're a girl?" they say, followed promptly by"pix plz." I suppose in print I'm not particularly girly. I can live with that. And why should I get my panties in a twist when someone who I only know through what she chooses to publish on her blog calls me a guy, based on what I've chosen to publish on my blog? We must have very narrow views of each other, lol.

If this is the worst thing that happens today, then it's a pretty good day.

Why I don't like the 700 club

I can remember thinking, while mom was in one of her jesus-highs and watching the 700 club, "Why does God heal in time with the music?" Admittedly, I didn't think about post-production, but it felt weird to me. It was the first time I applied a little critical thinking to my faith. I started to watch with a more neutral and less incredulous point of view.

On the 700 club, they often have a segment where they heal people. Not just pray for sick people but heal them, and (creepy) watch them be healed. There is something much like this in New Age religions; it's called Astral Projection. Now if I were to say to my mother (if I had the chance) that this is like Astral Projection, and define it, she'd probably defend it on the grounds that it's Christians doing it. I imagine we'd get stuck in a good ol' circular argument.

Sigh.

Don't let it go

There are some childlike attributes to my personality. I still see the world with a sense of wonder, and I'm openly curious about what I don't know. I still ask "why?" quite a bit... why do you hold that position? why does this work? That sort of thing. I love easily and I love for a long time; I don't know if that's a childlike trait, but I think it is. I can still get lost in watching the clouds, or examining a bug. I just can't forget how beautiful the world really is.

Sometimes, when I hear someone tell another person to "grow up" they're usually telling them to loose these traits... Going through school, the older I got, the less wonder there was.

I'm not sure why I wouldn't let it go, but I'm glad I never did...

jesus addict

I sometimes refer to my mother as a jesus addict. To me, I see her clinging to religion to try to convince herself that this gives her some measure of control over her life. It saddens me.

I don't know what goes on in her mind, nor can I really find out, but I think her actions are representative of who she is. She does not like being questioned, even on the smallest issues, about her position. Sometimes her argument is "Isn't it obvious?" If it's so obvious, it should be easy to defend.

It's gotten in the way of her job. It has disrupted our family life. She's been disrespectful towards others because of their faith or lack thereof. She's used money earmarked for bills, clothes, food, among other things, for tithing. She's ignored her children in favor of praying. (I have a vivid memory of tugging on her sleeve, bleeding rather profusely from a cut finger, and her swatting me away, saying she was praying.) She's gotten into a couple car accidents while praying; at least once because she didn't have control of the car because she had one hand in praise position (I can only vouch for this one, because I was in the car, although she has mentioned being distracted while driving because she's praying for the others).

But mostly, and most importantly, it hasn't made her any happier. If anything, it seems like it's made her more unhappy. She overeats and procrastinates. There isn't any lightness in her being. And there's always a frown on her face.

I'm not saying that everyone who's Christian is an addict, although that is often my first thought. In this case, though, it seems like it to me. Though it's not like I could take her to a rehab program to detox her, since her drug is inside her head.

Writing this has made me feel sad. I don't think I'll speak of this anymore.

catchphases?

So Violent Acres is having a catchphrase contest. Let's see if I can make the top ten, or something...

It's not as if I'm going to look into my angry-bag and see I've run out of angry.
And they say forthrightness isn't sexy...
More useful than tits on a nun.

Yeah, that's perhaps adequate. Maybe I'll think of something better later.

Edit: I hate it when people take logic and ram it up god's ass

a fetish for obeidiance.

I have a little brother. He's 15, and he has Downs syndrome, Trisomy 21. In his way, he's observant and intelligent. I know to some that will make no sense, but he can manipulate and play my parents like a virtuoso pianist, better than I ever could. I bewilder him, apparently, because I'm much harder to manipulate -- I won't say I can't be manipulated, though.

Anyway, he's realized that being bad gets him attention. Good for him, I want to say, I never had the guts to be bad, only delinquent. So he's being openly disobeidiant, running away from mother at church, not doing as she says when she says it, that sort of thing. Things like getting ready for bed become a contest of wills. She argues from authority, and he just wants control of himself.

Mother gets frustrated with him easily and often, and sometimes shouts at him, "Just obey!"

I find that mildly disturbing.

I mean, you'd think by now she'd learn some behavior management skills and put them into use. I understand that he's not a robot, and I respect that he has his own thoughts and feelings, and I genuinely value him and his contributions. When I talk to him about getting ready for bed, he's more open to it than if I just tell him to get ready for bed. It doesn't always work, and I don't expect it to. Sometimes I have to find a different tact, sometimes two or three, to undo the damage that's left over from mother and father being "authoritative."

This damage, though, is now crossing over into his school life.

I don't know how patient his teachers are. I don't know if they're as observant or respectful of my little brother as I am. I doubt it. So when he feels like he's had one order too many, he acts out. Or he feels ignored, and acts out. I look for his behavioral tics, and I usually stem off some of this. Like, if he feels ignored, he'll start giggling. I'll suggest to everyone that we take a couple deep breaths, and he usually does. It calms him enough to start participating in the conversation. But one of the best "behavior management" techniques is just talking with him and paying attention to him.

I've noticed, if I spend fifteen or twenty minutes talking with him about school while playing a game, or reading a book and asking him what he thinks of it, his behavior is generally much better for the rest of the day, and in part of the next.

Mother is too busy praying, usually, to do this.

She wants to medicate him. This angers me; she wants to drug him so he's more manageable? What's the fun in being manageable, in just doing what you're told without questioning it?

I want him to make good choices, which means I want him to retain his ability to make bad ones, and hopefully learn from the consequences.

Because, if you can't make a bad choice, then there's really no choice at all...

heh, technorati.

Technorati Profile
So I caved and joined technorati. I'm just a dirty lil attention whore, aren't I?

Screwed up people tend to be screwed up.

Well, at least people who wallow in it.

My mother, who I generally don't get along with, was molested when she was 13-14. She has control issues, probably because of that. If it is because of that, then that's her problem.

I know, sounds cold. But when you get past a certain age, the crap that happened in your childhood starts to be under your control. That is, you can let it control you, or you can accept it for what it was, how it changed you, and you know, move on. If you're going to be all, mommy didn't care, daddy didn't love me, blah blah blah, thirty years after the fact, then you haven't moved on. You're still stuck there.

I have some crap. Occasionally, it sneaks up on me and then practically hits me on the head with a frying pan. It can be annoying. Usually, I see it, and it's like, oh, that's what that was... and I move on. I don't think mom does that.

I could list the things mother does that leads me to that conclusion, but it's more than sufficient to say that they're controlling and manipulative behaviors. And whenever I say something to that point, she gets angry. Without fail. It's frustrating from my point of view, because she's so stuck in this past drama that she can't -- maybe won't -- grow.

I'm certainly not perfect, but I do think my point of view is relevant.

Something that bewilders me.

There are people who come through drive-thru and just order drinks, usually diet. Now, I have no problem with people drinking diet; it could be that they like the taste better than regular soda, or are diabetic, or trying to loose some weight. Those are all pretty good reasons to drink diet.

But what bewilders me is two pronged... why are you going through drive-thru to buy soda, and why don't you go next door to the convenience store to buy it?


Soda at my McDonald's currently costs $1.07 for 12 and 16 oz, $1.59 for 21 oz, and $2.02 for 32 oz. Next door, the prices usually run around $1.30 for a 20 oz and about $1.50 for a liter (it depends on what you get). However, those are just for the bottles; they've had a sale going for their fountain drinks -- any size, 69¢.

So really, go there. You can even park your car in the parking lot if it's not terribly busy. The *cough* fresh air and exercise will do you good.

Why I knit

I knit. I admit it. And I enjoy doing it. Terrible, really.

I started knitting after mother called me lazy. Just to be perverse. Because it's hard to call someone lazy when they have knitting on their lap.

I made some potholders, then I decided to stop dicking around and get to it. My first real project was an entrelac shawl made with noro silk garden. (entrelac is a method of knitting that makes the fabric look like woven strips; noro silk garden cost me $85) Not the lady Eleanor shawl, but close to it; it's called "kaleidoscope" and it's from Donna Kooler's Encyclopedia of Knitting, my first knitting book. I taught myself how to knit backwards working on it.

It wasn't hard, per se, just difficult. I had to constantly remind myself of basic stuff, like how to purl. I survived it, and it's still survived. I gave it to my sister, and it looks a lot better on her than me. I've done cables, socks, intarsia, and my personal favorite, cabled intarsia in the round. What was I thinking? That project is now sitting on my lap, waiting to be finished up and then sent off to its recipient. Nothing's been as difficult as teaching myself Trig. And damnit, if I can teach myself trig, I can so do anything.

Regardless of what mother says.

it doesn't feel good to be an asshole, or why I'm "nice."

I think most people think that they're nice. I don't know why. Working in drive-thru, I can say that most people don't put forth the effort to be nice -- most people are either neutral or assholes, with only one or two being nice before I'm nice to them.

A lot of people seem simply reciprocal, following lex talionis to treat others as they treat you, or worse. I think this is the norm, even for people who proclaim to be religious. I personally, treat others how I'd like to be treated not because some old book tells me to, but because it makes me feel good. That's all. No other reason; any other would be bullshit. Is some "niceness" wasted on people? YES. I imagine Violent Acres would say, "Absofuckinglutely." Perhaps without the fucking? It doesn't bother me, it's not as if one day I'm going to look into my nice-sack and realize that I've run out of nice.

One day, I decided to be an asshole. Just for experiment's sake, because I think you can't really say your position is best without at least trying to see it from the other point of view. It wasn't huge; I stopped smiling, I refused to make eye contact, I bitched about customers. It just didn't feel good to me. So I don't do it.

It's hard to be nice to asshole customers, but it feels worse to be an asshole back at them. If I can, I'll ignore what mildly annoys me; I mean, who are they, who are in my life for maybe whole 90 seconds to get under my skin?

This doesn't mean that I won't make fun of someone. I sometimes post on yahoo! answers, if someone asks a stupid question, one that should've been googled to solve, or is appealing to ridicule, then I'll make fun of them.

"Do Marines wear panties?" asks an apparently overproud soldier. "Sure! They also skip rope, put their hair in pigtails, play with pretty ponies, and have pillow fights. And they do all that better than anyone in the Army."

"Do you think pearl harbor was an inside job?"
"George W. Bush stole a time-traveling DeLorean, went back to 1941, and used his godly powers to confuse innocent Japanese civilians into innocent Japanese planes and drop his evil bombs of evilness on evil american battleships of oppression and also evilness.
The purpose was to get Japan's oil. When he got back to the future, he was ashamed to learn japan never had oil. he would've changed it, but the DeLorean was hit by a train at that moment."

Stuff like that. It doesn't make me popular; people take themselves way too seriously. Or maybe dripping sarcasm doesn't transmit well over the internet? But it's fun for me.

In the meantime...

I've joined the Navy. For a lot of reasons, I'm not shipping out until October 2. In the meantime, I'm working at McDonald's, living with my parents, and hoping not to go crazy, somehow.

I've taken to calling this in-between time my "meantime." I see other people with them, in a period of doing something that isn't what they're "meant" to be doing -- whatever THAT means -- but doing it anyway. I'd probably be either bored or depressed if I wasn't working. Or both.