Did I mention that AWS09 was continuing on it's second part?

We departed Seattle July 6, stopped quickly in Seward, AK for nearly two days and are now currently picking up our guests in Dutch. Again. My sixth time here and it's really not getting any better.

Seward was a real nice change of scene for Alaska. A group of us went hiking up the mountain the last day there and nearly died. The town has a marathon which takes place up the mountain every July 4. This marathon is fairly dangerous and many participants end up hurting themselves. So we decided to hike up this path and successfully did not hurt ourselves. The trail was steep for the most part but didn't become dangerous until we reached the shale/rock portion near the top. After a few close calls with some rock slides, we decided not to try to get all the way to the top and headed back to the ship. In total, the hike took 5 hours.

Healy heads back to the Arctic July 19. I'll be bumped up to the JOOD rotation since the red cadets we have are qualified now. I don't know if that means the other non-rates will have off and not have to stand any watch or not. It bothers me a little but it can't be helped since I qualified up. All I have left to be as fully qualified as possible on Healy is crane operator and boat crewman. The crane stuff is nearly done and the boat crew will take a bit longer.

After that, I can concentrate on my EPMEs (advancement stuff) and also possibly relearning Japanese. The new A-school list came out and I moved up another 4 spots to #18! It's been 8-9 months so far since I put my name on and I've already moved up almost half the list. I think that's pretty good progress so hopefully I'll get my orders before I hit the 2 year wait.

Well, it's getting a little late and I'm slightly hungry so I'm gonna wrap this up and go grab some food and drinks for the those on duty. Hope everyone's doing well!

I`m sitting in a parking lot waiting for a dry cleaner to open because i told Brittney I`d take her uniforms in since she has duty. Why oh why didn`t i push for us to do this yesterday afternoon? I could be sleeping now, or just getting up for work instead of having to rush around doing errands. Maybe I should see if they can take this early so i can possibly get some breakfast.

And this does mean I`m posting from my phone. Awesome, isn`t it? So sorry for inconsistencies with my typing.

Other than today`s fun, life hasn`tv been too bad. Work is going well even if we are getting underway in a week. A few work related dramas but nothing directly involving me. I`m gonna go see about turning in this dry cleaning now.

I'm standing watch again on a Sunday which is quite enjoyable. While standing watch on the weekends isn't all that fun because I lose a day off, it's not that bad because there's nothing to do during the day so I can just relax when I'm off watch. I'm standing the mids again but unlike last week, I'll actually get to sleep in tomorrow.

The past few weeks have gone by in a blur. We finished TACT, did I mention that?, but I have no idea how we actually did. I missed quarters last week due to watch and will miss it again tomorrow, if it's in the morning, due to sleeping in from watch. I should be receiving my first year of sea service award but I think I can wait on that a little bit more. Other than that, life is fairly ordinary right now.

I did get myself a new phone though! Have my own contract and everything and have even more bills to pay. It's all money management, though. I just have to stop buying books and games and stuff and I should be fine. Find better things to do with my time. I also bought a longboard the other day to get around Seattle a little better. My friend Brittney talked me in to it when I was taking her to the doctor. She had ridden Marshall's the other night and was going to get her own so I said why not? At least when I want to go to the park downtown it won't take me an hour to walk there.

We have another two weeks in port till starting the second part of AWS09. Next trip is going to be really hard, I think. Almost 63% of the crew is changing out this in port and that includes my best friend, Mark. He's staying in Seattle and will be starting school in the fall. I'll miss having him around but at least I won't be completely alone.

Anyway, I'm going to enjoy making some ringtones for my phone. Hope everyone is doing well!

Finally got around to changing my layout and icons :D!

We started TACT today so it's been a long, busy day. I really don't enjoy having to dress out in full fire fighting gear twice in a day to do drills. At least I'm not partaking in the inport drills for the next two days.

Guess what favorite ship is back State side?! Yep! Mine! That means three weeks of land and (some) sun and just overall happiness as we try to decompress before heading out for another mission.

It was a busy and pretty difficult three months. I can't explain why but this trip actually turned out to be harder and worse off in many ways than the last deployment. I wasn't the only one who thought so either. But I'll talk about the trip later, if I can work up the energy.

Some amazing things did happen this time. I was deployed on the ice for the first time and nearly fell in thanks to pressure and ice cracking. Exciting story to be retold later. I completed more work on my boatcrew member packet and should be getting helicopter tiedown qualified soon. We did some training exercises for the HH-65 pilots in Kodiak and I got to go under the blades once more. It was really exciting as this time, I was a low tiedown and was fairly close to the tail rotor as it was spinning.

The port calls sucked but we managed to make the most of them. My brother got to ride with us from Juneau to Seattle and I think he had a great time. He got bored really quickly and I wanted to boot him because I was happy to have a little down time and a chance to rest and rejuvenate.

Starting next week, we go into an evaluation called TACT which checks to see how well our DCTT (Damage Control Training Team) is training the ship to respond to casualties. It won't be fun and I'm not looking forward to it at all.

Anyway, it's still great weather outside so I'm going to go enjoy it while I have the chance.

I'm heading out to the freezing lands again. I've got nothing more to say other than I really don't want to go.

I'll try to keep in touch through email or have some pictures and such once I get back.

Really not dead though sometimes it feels like it.

I don't know how long it's been since I posted last but I'm guessing it was well before shakedown because I don't think I've been online in the past month. Unfortunately, I'm going to make this quick because I am le tired and have a headache or some kind of behind the eye ache that isn't going away. Actually, I think I'll just leave it here for now, letting you know I'm still alive and working like a fiend because I am ready to crash.

Life has been incredibly busy lately.

With the start of the new year, and month, I went in to two weeks of mess cooking. I was lucky and ended up being paired with my favorite fireman. The mess cooking deal is never bad, in my opinion, but long days get longer when you have to work nearly the entire day, from 0630 to 1830. Plus, during the last week we had to go to firefighting school for three days. It was an amazing experience and really, really fun but incredibly tiring.

For the past week or so, I've also been house sitting for our FS1 since she has two dogs and has been out of town. I really enjoy being able to get off the ship but with mess cooking and the 40 minute drive it takes to get there (that's without traffic), I'm beat by the end of the day. Yesterday, I went to bed around 1930 and woke up at 0600.

Unfortunately, because I've been so busy, I've had to put off working out. I feel like I've gained a lot of weight and I really don't want to weigh myself right now. I'm hoping this is just my body adjusting to a new weight level and such, but with my uniforms feeling uncomfortably tight, I'm wondering if I am putting on more weight or just really suck at drying my clothes. (The dryers we have are crazy hot and shrink clothes if you don't pay very careful attention to how long they're in there at what temperature)

On the brighter side, I'm on the verge of starting a relationship...I think. I'm really not sure what's going on or where we stand since we haven't spent any time together for the past two weeks. We've both been busy and he's going through a really stressful time right now. I want to spend time with him before we get underway and I'm worried about starting something before we head out for almost 8 months. I suppose it's just something to think about and such.

I had to run some errands today and ended up not being able to do my interval training because I got back so late. I hate Seattle traffic; I hate traffic in general but Seattle is just worse because no one drives the speed limit! Seriously. They all drive 5-10 under.

Yesterday, after buying Space Invaders for my DS, I discovered upon arriving home that I did not get my game. So I had to return to the store to get it which they were able to find. After that, I drove across the city to get acquainted with my FS1's dogs since I'll be house sitting for her while she's on leave. She's got a really nice house and two sweet pups. I have no idea what they are; they're both medium size with white hair, the girl has light brown spots and the boy had black. I'm looking forward to being off the ship for a bit, though I'm not looking forward to getting up early or having to drive in to work. I've become very spoiled.

Also, I may have a date tomorrow? Not sure if it counts as a date as we're going to the movies with some other people but who knows. Maybe I should ask him if it's a date...

I started a new exercise plan found in Women's Health Magazine. It's only been a week and a half into it, but I already feel a lot better; stronger, fitter, maybe not thinner yet but getting there. I'm not worrying so much about how much I eat right now or what I eat though I do still stay away from processed food and most sugars. Our galley has opened back up so eating regular meals is going to be a lot easier now. Well, regular and balanced meals.

Even though I'm working out regularly and still being fairly active, I'm excessively tired lately. This morning, I woke up to do the breakfast mess cooking and once I was done, came back to the room and zonked out till it was time for lunch. Granted, it was only an hour nap but I still felt tired during lunch and was incredibly tempted to sleep after.

This may also be a result from going rock climbing for the first time in two years yesterday. Wow but was it a lot more difficult than I remembered it being. Maybe the trails are just that different or something but jeez! I thought I had done well when I was in VA and doing it here, I felt like I sucked horribly.

Other than that, life has been as plain as usual. I tried to make it up to Leaventown for a day vacation but ended up spinning out on the road due to unseen ice. There wasn't any damage to the vehicle other than a bent bumper so I'm really lucky. And I learned a good lesson about driving in snowy areas.

Now I think I'm going to play Chrono Trigger for a bit. I really need to finish FFIII and Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, but I've nearly lost interest in Zelda and with FFIII, I really want to start again and level up my jobs correctly.

I'm shopping for anime. How great and dorky is that?

They had a buy one boxset, get the second free sale at FYE a week or so back and I ended up with Angelic Layer and Get Backers which I have burned my way through so I now need more entertainment! I figure by the time I get this stuff from online, it'll be about time to head north so I'll have something to keep me happy for the first three months of the trip. I'll order more at port calls so I have something during the second half of the trip!

Also, Amazon is having a sale on DVDs and I am so, so tempted to get Seasons 1 and 2 of Weeds because I've heard it's awesomely hilarious.

Stocking up for trips is so fun!

I need to start making a list...

Happy Christmas everyone!

I hope the day is beautiful for everyone. Currently, we in Seattle are experiencing slush and mush of massive proportions with a lot of snow left over and more to come! Yep, we've been socked in for about a week now and the roads are just now getting clear enough to travel far distances on. I managed to grab a few DVDs at the mall before the worst hit so I have some stuff to watch while I'm stuck on the ship.

But the holidays haven't been all bad. Last night, we went over to a friend's house for dinner with a bunch of people from the ship. It was nice and fun and loud and boisterous. Yes, boisterous. There was a lot of beer pong being played but seeing as how I didn't want to drink the kind of beer they had, I stuck with my wine and stayed fairly sober.

The dinner was the second best since I've been here, Thanksgiving probably beating it. We had a turkey, ham, green bean casserole, stuffing, rolls, mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, and cranberry sauce which I don't think was eaten. For today, I don't know what's going on but I'm sure I'll end up going to a friend's house again at least at some point in the day. I may be a bit of a bum and sit around a little longer before getting motivated to leave.

Hope everyone is having a great holiday!

For the first time in possibly five years or more, Seattle got a major snowstorm and ISC Seattle closed for the day. On Thursday. Guess who happened to be scheduled for duty that day? And had to stay on the ship the entire day off? During a VADM (Vice Admiral) visit? And a boiler testing that caused a backflow of water in the AMRs?

This girl!

Luckily, after my watch, the day went fairly smoothly. The roads cleared up enough Friday for a two hour delay into the base and a fully operational ship. Our department was nice and let us off early, though. Which worked out great for me because I got a nice nap in (I've been extremely tired lately and don't know why; I actually wake up exhausted from my naps instead of refreshed), a quick work out, and had enough time to buy a cake from Costco for our party that night and watch Brian Regan and Jeff Dunham on Comedy Central.

I meant to get in finishing my Christmas cards but yeah...didn't. I'm so behind on those that I'll probably get them out after Christmas this year :/ I fail but it's just difficult to work on them when you don't have a good area to sit down and write.

But the party last night was a lot of fun. Two of the girls from my room got their orders for A school and left, or are leaving, this weekend. Emily, one of the girls leaving, won a party for 100 people and this great piano bar called 88 Keys. It's like a dueling pianos deal with two pianos set up back to back on stage. You can request songs for them to play (for a nominal fee, of course) and they'll play it in various styles but always fun. If they don't know the song, they'll either make up lyrics or play another song in place of that one.

Since we brought cake last night, we gave a piece to the entertainers and during one song, they started eating it and kept going back to the cake and wanting to eat it. It took them a few minutes to finish the song but it was amusing. So the night was a success.

Today, I meant to get some work done and see a movie at night with some shipmates but got pulled out to the movie in the afternoon. We saw Yes Man which was surprisingly good. I thought it was going to be one of those awkward funny movies with stupid situations and such but it was fairly realistic and had a good view about missing out on life.

It also began snowing again today. I'm beginning to think that I'll be stuck on the ship for the entire stand down. But what can you do? One thing I do need to find out is if I'm going to be working on my duty days or if I just have to stand my watch and do whatever I want in my free time. Cause it would kind of suck to have duty and work one day and then have to come in the next day to day work. I'd be doing two days of work every three days or so instead of one day every three days. But I guess I'll find out come Monday.

I love Christmas and the holiday season because of the feeling that's supposed to be invoked by it. I say supposed because it doesn't always happen. You're away from your family, busy with work, have a million other things going on and you find that Christmas has snuck up on you and left without so much as a good cheer.

What I miss most about this time of year is finding a good place to curl up and people watch or read while enjoying a cup of coffee or hot chocolate or listening to music and just tuning out. The JC at George Mason probably provided one of the best places to curl up and just forget for a little bit. Nice comfortable chairs, a wall of windows to look out of, a few levels so you're off the ground and not staring people in the face as they pass by. I miss that.

Also, very oddly, I miss the retail side. Putting out those decorations, being part of the holiday experience and being busy. As much as I try, I just can't get into the Christmas spirit this year. I'm stuck on a ship in the middle of a city; not exactly enjoyable for me. I don't get the Christmas decorations people put up around their house; there's rarely Christmas music unless I head to the mall or another store. I was thinking of decorating my rack but really, what would I do with everything once the holiday was over? I don't have much room and what little I do have needs to be prioritized.

But, there are the little things that make life better. My favorite holiday CD to listen to is Vince Guaraldi's A Charlie Brown Christmas. One day, I'll actually buy it and have it for my very own. I love the music so much I listened to it when we were in the ice this past summer. It's very calming and being alone on the bridge, watching the Healy cut through the ice is surreal.

I've been tempted to buy some Christmas DVDs as well but, you know how money is. The Nightmare Before Christmas was re-released and costs $30! I don't need anything fancy; I just want to see my movie. I'll check Amazon or something before leaving for AWS 09. I'd like to have a few more movies on hand. I'd also like to have a TV in my rack so I also need to look into some sort of shelving unit. Maybe hit up Ikea though I doubt that'll help.

I don't mean to complain or be a downer; I just miss feeling good during the holidays.

I'm incredibly tired and fatigued right now. Maybe not so much one as the other but I can't figure out which is more right at the moment. I went out with my roommates last night and didn't get back to the room till almost 3:00AM. I slept till 10, which isn't as bad as it might seem since when I pull mids I don't go to bed till 3:30 and then get up around 10 or a little earlier. It was nice to go out, but now I feel a little rushed to complete some projects and things this afternoon.

With potable water being down till 7:00PM, I don't have to worry about working out till well after dinner. I was planning on doing it this morning, but thought I'd be going to the holiday party which started at 12:00. Instead, I went to the mall to get Christmas cards, a gift or two, and a CD organizer for myself. I was fine most of the day, but now I'm just exhausted and must have been really hungry because I had three (small) slices of pizza, a molasses cookie (because they are so good), and a can of tuna. Blah. Definitely a small dinner tonight.

I haven't knocked out most of what I want to do, yet, though. I need to organize my locker better so everything fits and has a space of its own. I figure getting through some of the cans of soup and tuna I have will help since it'll free up the bottom area. My checkbook is nearly up to date; I have to add in the latest purchases and my paycheck. I need to make a few calls which may or may not be done till Monday.

Overall, it's not so bad. I tend to feel rushed about things because of the way things are just laid out. If I need to head into downtown, I need to do that after lunch because everything will close if I wait much longer. This is because it takes me at least 30 mins to get anywhere in the city since I refuse to drive in the downtown area. So if I have errands in downtown and errands in some other part of town, I'm a bit screwed on time and get to feeling flustered about arranging my day.

I suppose I shouldn't be complaining too much, but I'd really just like to feel as if I have time to get everything done and not rushed to complete everything in 2-3 hours.

And now, I have to run to the BEQ because potable water is down. Guess what else is down other than drinking water? :D

It's been a few weeks since my last update. Life has mainly stayed the same since that update what with in port still in full swing. Our department is working on changing and becoming more rules oriented or something. I'm not sure what's going on with the new style of management and why they're doing it, but maybe it'll be an improvement upon how we've been working. There's been such a problem with miscommunication and non-communication that anything should be better.

Our BMs are going to work harder at making sure everyone's doing the work they've been given and doing it properly. People will be held responsible for their workmanship and work ethic. I don't think I'll be in any trouble with the new "system", but you still never know how something will play out in practice instead of theory.

I finally made it through all of American Gods. It was about a five month process, but I did it! And it was an amazing book. Probably not an easy read if you're highly religious and believe strongly in one God, but a great look at belief and the power of it through the ages. It also helped that the story had a lot of similar traits to Supernatural, my favorite TV show. I loved the use of mythology and America as a mixing pot for these different beliefs; that they're unable to thrive as they do in the old country, but impossible to die because the idea of them, the belief in these stories still exists. I can't believe I put off reading that book for so long. Now I'm incredibly tempted to get more Neil Gaiman books.

Last Tuesday was the release date for Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories which I bought and am currently playing :D It's frustrating to learn a new fighting system, especially one as invested as the card system they use, but it's worth it in the end. Learning curves and all that. I'll probably hook my PS2 up again tonight to get in a few hours.

I'm considering restarting FF3 because I'm not leveling my characters up properly in their jobs. Instead of having one or two be proficient at one job, I'm trying to make them all proficient at all jobs. It just doesn't work because they're leveling faster than their jobs are; so the characters are at level 30 and their jobs only around 26 max. I want to start again and level the jobs up properly; having one character proficient in certain jobs and not everything.

The weight standards have changed for us again. Instead of my max weight being 154, it's now 145. So from my last weigh-in of 152, I have at least 7lbs to lose. I'm going to aim for 10 total and see what I can reach. I've begun working out more, working it into my schedule right after work or in the morning. It's like getting in to boot camp all over again; losing a lot of weight all at once. Maybe this time I can keep it off and not shoot back up again :/

Other than that, life is boring. Not much going on but I suppose that's better than everything happening at once. We head out for shake-down near the end of January and then have half a month back in Seattle before heading out for AWS '09. I don't know if I'm looking forward to it or not. In port is certainly boring and trying, but being underway is...being underway. Stuck on a ship with nowhere to hide and nowhere to turn. I'll probably fall back into my routine of talking with Mark during midrats, but I also want to start studying Japanese and dusting off my editing skills as well.


BTW. New icons and layout :D Aren't they cute?

I haven't died; haven't gotten deployed either. For some reason, I just don't spend a lot of time on the internet anymore. Most of my time is spent walking around Seattle and just trying to get off the ship for a bit or trying to meet up with people and hang out. Even though we've been back in port for almost two months now, I still feel like I haven't had a chance to settle down any. I'm seriously going to try getting back into some sort of schedule or routine. I need to work out more, go out less. I need to remember to catch up with people though I have been able to talk to some of my friends on the phone this past week so it's not all bad.

I wish I had a ton of interesting stories to tell and make it sound like I've been doing exciting things. Unfortunately, I've mainly been going down to Pike Place Market each day, buying coffee and either sweetened dried strawberries or muffins.

It's been frustrating at work for a variety of reasons. Some days we have some good projects to work on, something that keeps up busy for the entire day and requires all that time to complete it and it actually feels like we're accomplishing something. Other days, it's a struggle to care about doing the work we're assigned or the clean ups we're told to do. Coming from jobs where there's always something to do, when I know the day in advance what sort of work I can expect, this is highly frustrating. I just want to have a clear idea of what needs to be done and how long it can be expected to last.

I bought a DS-lite a few weeks ago along with two games, Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass and Final Fantasy III. Naturally, I'm gravitating towards FFIII. It's not that I don't love Zelda, but for some reason, playing it on the smaller systems just isn't as fun or epic. I'm searching for some more fun games to play; I've been recommended MarioKart twice and I've already been tempted by the old NES/SNES and Atari games that are available for the DS so time will tell what I choose to buy. I'm also severely tempted by the Nintendogs/animals games because I miss my pets.

Speaking of, starting Friday, I will begin volunteering for a no-kill animal shelter for cats. Because of my schedule, I can really only be a socializer for the cats which doesn't bother me too much. I'll go tot the animal shelter once a month because it's so far away and I want to do more. I've also volunteered for a community theater group and have heard back but nothing's been confirmed yet.

Yesterday, my car broke down in the middle of the street, in traffic. After a good 5-10 minutes of freaking out and not knowing what to do, I left my car in the street with the hazards on and ran into a store and asked if they could help. When she mentioned calling a roadside assistance, I remembered my USAA account and called the number they had and they set me up with a tow-truck and even called the police to get me some assistance moving my car out of the street.

Turns out, the battery was completely dead and wasn't able to rely a charge from the alternator. It cost me around $200 to get the battery replaced and have my 70K checkup so all in all, not a bad deal. Frustrating and stressful and embarrassing at times, but not bad. A good learning experience.

My name is now on the list for Public Affairs A School. That means I probably have another two years here on the ship before I get to leave. I'm going to have to push to get all my application stuff done before we head out for our spring deployment. I don't know how much of what's required is to be done by me or my chain of command so I'll have to bug some people and find out.

Woohoo! It's nearly time for a Christmas theme on here. Let's see if I remember to do that >D

Hell of the frozen variety, of course.

We pulled back in to port around 9:00 today and I've got two weeks of vacation. Sort of. We're on stand down for 96 hours. That means every four days, we have to check back in with the unit. For me being part of the deck department, I have to do 6 hours of work every four days or so. It's rather complicated :/

But, I have the entire weekend to myself to go shopping, surf the net, get drunk and hang out with people. Not necessarily in that order or completely by myself but whatever :P

Please let me know what I've missed because I don't think there's any way I can catch up with people on my own within the next few days. Talk to ya'll later!

Zipping 75 miles an hour down a mountain is rather fun. I love how Montana's speed limit is 75 and then, as you enter Idaho, they're like "What are you doing, you idiot? You're going 60!" Maybe not as enjoyable as 75, but there's definitely something to be said about not keeping both hands on the steering wheel with an iron tight grip.

I was actually reminded of some of my traveling in Japan. Like when I took an 8 hour bus ride to Osaka and spent at least half of it praying the driver wasn't going to tip over the side of the mountain. The driving really wasn't that bad, but when you're on the top deck of a double decker bus, you feel those curves a bit stronger than those below you. This entire cross-country trip has made me incredibly nostalgic for Japan for some reason. Maybe it's the idea that I'll be heading to strange places again.

Speaking of, I reported in today. My ship...is enormous. And it really doesn't feel any smaller inside. I already see myself getting lost in the next few days; in fact, I'm planning on getting lost when I return tonight. I have a lot of information to look over and some packets to complete and I want to get as much done before we get underway as possible. I also need to do some stocking of items but I'm thinking that can wait until the weekend when I'm free and hopefully Murray is here. I'd feel a lot more comfortable venturing out into Seattle with someone I know.

I'm looking forward to getting started with qualifying and starting my duties. It feels awkward right now, but I don't think it'll last long. The people I've met so far have been really nice and as long as I think before I act, I should be fine.

I'll try to post some pictures before I leave but no promises.

I'm just under 600 miles away from Seattle; settled down in Butte, Montana which is gorgeous. Actually, I've decided that most of South Dakota and Montana are ideal places to live sans the slight winter chill. Now I understand why people would want to live in the Midwest and not in Virginia. Not that I'm saying Virginia is less than the Midwest, just that I can now appreciate the allure.

Plus, driving through the Rockies (maybe not so much the up part but definitely the down) was way too fun and reminded me so much of Initial D. If I were a more daring individual, I might actually consider drag racing. As it is, I will simply appreciate my slightly cautious turns down the mountain as I avoid Mac trucks.

I also believe I set a record for spotting number of deer dead on the side of the highway. I must have seen no less than 50 on Montana 59 itself. There were a number of prairie dogs that were tempting fate by trying to cross the road in front of my car. Lucky for them, I hate damaging my car by hitting anything (see the geese story written many, many months ago). That being said, I have an atrocious number of bug carcasses splattered all over the front of my car. It makes me cry thinking about how much cleaning Shiva needs right now.
For those of you just joining this journal, I named my car Shiva. Get over it; if my brother can name his cars, I can name mine

While I have no amusing roadtrip stories, I do have an amusing anecdote about how I tried to detour through possibly five ranches in Montana and lost about an hour and a half of travel time because of it. Well, maybe it's not amusing but it's certainly telling of my thinking patterns, I believe. But that would be for another day because I want some real food. Enough of this snack type stuff I've been suffering through for the past four days.