Simple Update

Chilling in DC, been having a pretty awesome time on leave so far, but I think tonight I'm going to just take it easy and plan out what I'm going to do tomorrow and go from there.

And I guess catch up on the blog front.

Where was I? the last couple of days, I was in New York City, like I was last year.

today, I drove through Philadelphia. I wanted to stop, but then I learned that Philadelphia, if you don't get there early, is outragiously expensive to park, and they don't have the public transit system of New York and Washington. Some places it cost twelve bucks to park for thirty minutes! I wanted to go to the Franklin Institute Science Museum last year and decided to check it out this year, but the parking arrangement kept me from exploring further. That, and Philadelphia drivers are rude as hell. But I had a Philly Cheese Steak from a street vender, because I was in Philadelphia so that was a given.

so now I'm in DC.

What now? I did DC last year, saw a lot then. Well, I didn't see the Museum of US history (it was closed for renovation last year) and the zoo is free too. I got a nice camera and a new lens to check out. And I want to see the Spruce Goose which I've been told is somewhere in DC, I've just got to find out where (hmm, just googled, it's at the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum, in the Smithsonian true, but I'm on the wrong coast, nevermind).

I guess check out a couple more museums I missed last year too? There is a lot to do here, I'll be here through tomorrow for sure.

New York was awesome, it's always more fun to explore these places with somebody rather then by yourself as well.

Recap on Vacation So Far

Still on the road. Been busy, enjoying stuff, and not blogging about it.

Hah!

Right now I'm doing laundry. I made it to the eastern most point of my destination. Portland Maine. I was going to go to Bangor and Acadia National Park but it ended up getting the ax when I discovered that there wasn't a whole lot to see in Bangor really, and Acadia sounds awesome but to make it worth my while, I need to spend more then an afternoon there. I did the Adirondacks instead, which showed me that though spontanious is good, some planning is necessary. So steadily, I'm fine tuning this trip out. I've got a plan going as of now, though events keep throwing a monkey wrench into it every now and then. Or I just screw everything up by changing my mind last minute.

I visited a few historic sites from a religious perspective, not sure how much detail I want to go into that with my very secular blog but it was cool and I really enjoyed myself. Monday was primarily that, spent just outside of Cleveland OH, in a little town called Kirtland, and driving to get to Niagara Falls, which I saw at night, as well as Tuesday, which was spent almost entirely at Niagara Falls. I got on the road and spent Wednesday in Palmyra NY, another historic point in my journey. Thursday was the Adirondacks, a spur of the moment detour, where I got around to Lake Placid and the general area surrounding it.

Today was Vermont (and some of New Hampshire) where I went searching for Covered Bridges. That was my task for today, the covered bridge. I found about fifteen or so, I'll have to recount them, but going on the side roads looking for covered bridges was quite fun itself.

I had more then a couple people comment that I was a long way from home. I guess my Washington License plates stand out.

Niagara Falls needs a post all by itself. I've been dumping pictures on Facebook, but haven't really gotten to editing them down yet.

Tomorrow its going along the coast of Maine and I'm going to have Lobster damn it! That's a given.

Three states off my 'too see list' (I've been to Maine before, but it didn't really count seeing as it was only at the airport.)

Next post I'll try to make it more interesting.

Exhaustive Roadtrip Much?

Machine Gun Shoot got rained out. Well, actually it didn't, but I delayed going there by a day. Instead, I spent the day getting things ready for the rest of my trip.

Which included getting my tickets for Orlando. I think I'll definitely be doing this trip, seeing as I've got Five Days at Disney World and Seven Days at Universal Studios. Plus I got a ticket to Kennedy Space Station.

For Free.

The hotel and food is what will cost me, and i'll likely spend the most money of my entire trip in Orlando (and nearby places) but whatever the case, looks like I'll be using all thirty days of my leave. I've got to be back by November 7.

So the trip is up into Ohio, through New York, Vermont and New Hampshire to Maine, go back down through Massachusetts into Rhode Island and Connecticut, through New York City, Philidelphia and DC, and then high tail it down to Florida from there.

I'm going to exhaust myself on this vacation, but damn am I not looking forward to it!

Leave Info

Yay for Leave! For those of you who don't know, Leave is basically paid vacation in militarese.

Every time I have had a bad experience on mobilizations, Leave has always been there right when I needed it most, to pull me out of the crapper and get me all rested and cheerful again. Or at least get my head straight.

Leave in 2005 led me to take a whirlwind trip across 5 countries in Europe, a trip I would love to repeat again if I ever get the chance (though granted, likely visiting different countries next time) and something I briefly considered this time around.

Last year, I did a Mid Antlantic State visit. I stopped updating after DC due to overwhelming number of pictures to edit, which meant I left out Philidelphia, NYC and Gettysburg, but I have pictures for my own record. In hindsight, I wish I blogged more on it. But hindsight is 20/20 and I was busy actually enjoying my leave instead of worrying about blogging about it.

And that is the point of Leave and all.

Actually, the trip home last year was interesting too, seeing as I did a detour in Illinois and down through Missouri and then there was that whole Prop8 thing in SLC.

Anywho, if you haven't gotten the news, I like to travel. A lot. I love to visit different parts of this beautiful world we live in and now I'm looking at different areas I have not been to yet.

Where haven't I been? Hmm, New England strikes me as some place I need to check out, so I'm heading up that way via Ohio and New York (brief stop at Niagara falls) and into Maine then go down through Rhode Island and Connecticutt through Massachussetts (Salem in October should be pretty cool) and back into New York and down into DC.

I have thirty days. I don't think I'll use the entire thirty days. Whether or not I continue from DC depends on how burnt out I am from being on the road though. I saw both NYC and DC last year, so I'll hit up some places at both I missed on the last trip (maybe Broadway this time?) and continue on. Depending on how much time I have left (my plan is not to stick to a rigid agenda of being at a specific location on a specific date and seeing museum such and such at this time and visiting historic location So and so at this date and time because then it ceases being a vacation) I'll head south from DC to Florida and go check out Disney World.

Why you might ask? Because for lack of any other reason, It's freakin' Free for me to go there. To bad I don't have any young children or significant others to go with, but if I play my hand nice, I can probably make a few friends on my trip and hang out with them there. Besides, I think everyone ought to visit Disney World at least once in their life.

My mother asked me why I don't go see disney world first. (Actually, my trip up north will probably take me about two weeks if I play it right). The reason, because I can get caught up in Florida for one thing. There is plenty to do there, and it will likely be pretty expensive to go to Disney World for free.

But who knows, I might reverse the itenerary and go see Florida first. I'm open. That's what I like about 1)traveling by my own set of wheels and 2)not having to worry about other people. As much as I love my family to death, we are quite large as families go (i've got five siblings, four of which are married, and at last count thirteen nieces and nephews) and trying to get us all in sync at family functions is akin to trying to catch a feral cat with nothing but a liquor license and a chain saw. If that analogy makes any sense whatsoever. Case in point, nothing ever goes as smoothly as planned when you try to get that many people on the same sheet of music.

Now, if my family would let me run things and put my current training into use, I would have any family function running like a well oiled machine except for infants are involved. But I digress, and I'm rambling off topic.

anyway, Leave should be interesting. I'll blog when I can. And at the very least, I'll TWEET it!

30 days of paid vacation. If you judge it by how many hours I have worked since February, its well deserved, seeing as I sometimes work 16+ hour days.

On Secret Projects, Leave and Lot's of Automatic Weapons

We're about ready to graduate this latest crop of misfits, and it looks like we will not be picking up another cycle, so once they are good and gone, I'll probably be updating a lot more blogwise. Seeing as I will have time to do so.

I recently got this idea for a project that I think will be ready to go sometime next spring. To be honest, if I had the resources, I could do it right now but logistically I'm missing a few key pieces. I think it will be pretty cool when its all sad and done and will require myself recruiting some help (which is truthfully the hardest thing for me to do, asking people for help) and getting prepared for it. What is this project you ask? Well, it's secret. But to keep from annoying my few sparse readers, from now on whenever I refer to my project, I will call it Operation Zombie Plan.

Operation Zombie Plan is still in the planning phases.

In other news, with graduations comes time off, and in my world, that is called Leave. I have some wheels (though I'm worrying more and more that I may have gotten myself a lemon) and I need to come up with a plan. Namely, what do I want to do with myself?

I'm either going North (New York?) or South (Orlando?). Or maybe even overseas, (anyone know of any good deals to, well, anywhere on the planet?) This is quite spontanious of me, I know, but me being me, somebody mentioned Amsterdam and I just lit up at the notion.

Of course, with my luck, I'll be in DC when there is another major terrorist attack like the one that apparently was diverted recently in New York.

But regardless, before hand, there is one thing that happens in Kentucky but Twice a Year, and I might as well give you the heads up now because I will blog it. Yes, the Machine Gun Shoot.

For some reason, I was thinking it was the 3, 4, and 5th until I just checked their website and discovered it was the following weekend. Damn, that puts a little dent in my plans.

I'm still attending though.

More on the HorseBack Riding

I found a new picture for my blog's sidebar.

I was on vacation last week in the little town of Seaside Oregon (this picture was taken just north of there on Del Ray beach). I had to arrive a little late because I was working on homework trying to get that done and all (will post the finished works in a minute)

So anyway, I got there Saturday night when everyone else had gotten there on Thursday and I was struck with a realization that I really really REALLY wanted to run a horse on a beach, in fact this is something I have always wanted to do. So I shopped around for a place that would let me lope a horse on the beach and found Small World Farm. They offered the best deal and they actually let me run the horse on the beach, while the owner took a lot of pictures for me. He was very kind and this was one of those opportunities I couldn't pass up.




The horse I'm on is named Thor, he was a great little Arab, he loved to run and I got the impression he could go all day. He didn't like to run in the water so much, which is a shame because I really wanted to run in the surf, but after riding on the sand I realized how difficult this would be for some horses as the sand along the surf is really soft and horses tend to shy a bit when they come across water.

There were people along the beach with us, but I went early so I could avoid to much crowding. I told the owner I would probably post these pictures on the web and that I would give him a shout out, so if you are going to find yourself in Seaside Oregon anytime in the near future and you want to take a horseback ride along the beach (it is a lot of fun!) I would recommend giving him a call.

I had so much fun on the beach that I took my nieces for a trail ride later. I didn't enjoy it as much, mainly because I spent a good portion of last summer walking horses on trail rides so that experience has lost the novelty of it. But the trail had some good views as well, and also some photo worthy moments.

The beach ride was worth every penny I paid.

If I make it down to Seaside in the future, I'm pretty sure I would go again.

Deutschland, cont. . .

So, like I said earlier, I'm currently in Germany, which honestly is not a bad place to be. In fact, being here is a huge difference from being in Hohenfels earlier this year. I'm sure Hohenfels isn't a bad place, but it kind of takes away from the novelty of being in Europe when you have to trudge about a block and a half through two feet of snow to use the bathroom, and the food literally tastes like cardboard.

Well, right now I'm in Kaiserslaughtern (er, I'll have to doublecheck the spelling on that) and I'm enjoying the pleasant drive from the inn at which I'm staying to Landstuhl. The drive is beautiful and I've actually quite fallen in love with the country as the leaves are starting to turn and the German villages tucked away within the valleys.

Sometimes when we're driving back, it almost feels like home again, driving through the cascade mountains to get to Seattle or even the scenic drive through Northern Idaho and Western Montana. And with the drivers driving a bit saner then those in the Balkans, as Kosovo looks nothing like the States. Though the German Autobahn often provides the opportunity to show us how well its known for having no real speed limit (well, technically it does, but it isn't really enforced.)

I kind of spent a few hours planning a bit more on the trip I'm taking for R&R, and I really can't wait to see my mom and explore more of Europe with her.

And being here is also making me wish to go Active Duty and find a way to get stationed here. I'm pretty envious of the people that are here currently. Maybe I don't agree with Germany politically, but it is really a beautiful country.

Deutschland

Yay, I'm in Germany.

The internet here is iffy. And expensive, by the minute type pricing.

So this week Updating will be sporadic, if it happens at all. Things might be cheaper via library or what not.

To keep you all entertained in the meantime, here is a picture, of me, in Bulgaria. At the shooting range.



If all else fails, see you next week!

September's Going to be Nuts!

Well, without giving away dates and timelines, September for me, well, it'll just be plain nutso!

I was supposed to go to Bulgaria at the end of July/beginning of August but since that got blown completely out of the water, I had to settle on going at a later date. Well, that later date has come when Nate (aka The Boy) came around asking me if I could go *enter date here*. I'm looking at that date and what else is supposed to happen this month and asked if he couldn't change his.

Nope, no can do. So I'm going to Bulgaria at the beginning of September *will be sure to post all about that adventure here, hopefully in a timely manner!*

So, what else was planned for this month? Well, this was something that we weren't entirely certain on, but there is a Preventive Medicine Refresher Course going on in Germany for one week (read = the training we should have gotten before we came here) which will undoubtedly help me as I am not the greatest 91S in the world nor do I pretend to be. Well, I just got my TDY orders confirming that indeed this train-up is a Go.

So I will be back in Kosovo, working like a dog when that is all said and done, and what do you know? I leave on Leave toward the end of September. Leave will once again be in glorious Germany, where I will meet up with my mom (who can't help but tell me every time I talk to her how excited she is about this, and I'm in the same boat with her!) and we will head south to Austria, Switzerland, Italy and *possibly* Hungary. I think we should also hit Liechtenstien too because nobody thinks about Liechtenstein, and we could go there on a day trip on our way to Switzerland!

So, anyway, my leave will indeed seep into October, where I'll come back here from my exhaustive vacation that I will undoubtedly need a vacation from, but anyway, September is going to be nuts and quite possibly slow on the Blogging Front due to lack of time to actually post about it.

Well, I'll let you know more as the month progresses.