the downward slide

Time is flying now.  It feels like I've been here for several months and
not several weeks, but it also is starting to go by incredibly fast.  I
had my final 'test' on Friday with the leadership reaction course, and
it went really well.  I somehow inherited the best genes from both my
mom and dad and can apparently get 's1' aka dominant and directive when
I need to be.  These challenges are really fun but really hard to
complete..there's one person who's the leader and they have to get every
one of their team members across these obstacles..poles, pillars...etc
over water with things like bombs, enemy attackers...in a matter of 20
minutes.  The leader is judged on a plethora of things but basically how
well they direct, explain and coordinate their team.  It was a ton of
fun, and at the end the commander that evaluated me said that I was the
best example of a leader he'd seen..  J  nothing like tooting my own
horn right!  Regardless...I was just glad to get it done. The o club
orientation was equally as interesting because I managed to have actual
conversations with the commanders that were screaming at us for the past
4-5 weeks!  Very weird..but nice to see that most of them are really
decent people.  I also had the opportunity to go painting at a school in
a poor neighborhood, and had a ton of fun doing that.  WE all went out
to dinner with Capt. Taylor and his wife after and he gave me some great
info about the D.C. area and where to live.  He was by far one of the
most avoided commanders the first couple weeks, but he's probably one of
the nicest and most down to earth when you actually talk to him.  The
irony amazes me. J

I can't  believe I'm going to be in Florida already this weekend.  I
think I just have to keep going with the flow at times, because when I
stop to think about it all..it's a little surreal at how different my
life has become.  It was nice talking to Karl for a few minutes, and we
could laugh about how weird it feels to be in civilian clothes at times.
I know that I've changed in a lot of ways..but most of them are subtle
and only I would probably notice.  Well...I'm going to go to write my
final 'morale' letter and go to church with a few of my flightmates so
I'll update later...love y'all

p.s.  the funniest thing is how programmed I am.  I call EVERYBODY ma'am
and sir!  I guess there are worst habits to have!