Hemingway

I'm reading A Moveable Feast and found an interesting quote. I'll update this post with more quotes because I would like to remember them, and I do not have a piece of paper with me at the moment.

"When the cold rains kept on and killed the spring, it was as though a young person had died for no reason."

"They say the seeds of what we will do are in all of us, but it always seemed to me that in those who make jokes in life the seeds are covered with better soil and with a higher grade of manure."

"In the end everyone, or not quite everyone, made friends again in order not to be stuffy or righteous. I did too. But I could never make friends again truly, neither in my heart nor in my head. When you cannot make friends any more in your is the worst. But it was more complicated than that."

Compulsory military service in 09?

It looks like we'll have another draft here in the United States. Emmanuel Rahm, the future Chief of Staff, discussed a compulsory draft so that Americans would really know what it feels like to be an American. A circle of love, as they say.

I have signed my name on paper to serve the U.S. so I obviously have no real pickle against the military. I do see a problem for the rest of the freedom-loving Americans that chose not to.

Why give up one's life for something so distant? The war on terror is something we see on the television. We cannot truly grasp what is going on, because we choose to change the channel and ignore our problems with shows like The Hills, House, Lost, Sunday night football, etc.

The lazy American way of life we have all grown comfortable with is going to come to an end as soon as Obama gets sworn in. I'm not anti-Obama or anything; I knew that we'd be screwed either way by this democracy.

Link to the Rahm article.

Wave 103

My friend made this awesome mix of 80s music.

President elect

I found the speech quite compelling, and it did not even have a hint of arrogance like he usually does. I am willing to see where he goes in four years, but I am a little worried about congress and the power democrats have now.

Also, another thing I found surprising is how California voted no on proposition 8. I studied San Francisco politics before, and I thought that the people's voice really worked. When the people want something done, they'd do it. And, I thought giving marital rights was just one of those things people there thought was fair.

Bed Bugs

I've been living in dorms for about 4 years now, and I've never had a real problem with it till now.

I moved in back in August, and found that the room previously had an infestation of bedbugs. My roommate had stayed in the same room before, and he laughed about it. He didn't seem to mind too much. I thought this was outrageous.

I've had some days where the exterminator came to spray the room, but I've done it five times now, and I sitll have the problem. The supervisor for the work request office said that it's my fault if the problem persists. I thought that was ludacris, because I never had bedbugs in my house, and I have been following all the instructions she gave me. and it still fails.

This is a video about bedbugs to get a better understanding of my worst enemy of 2008.

LTC memory: DS Rhine-Russell

We had four drill sergeants (DS) assigned to each platoon during LTC, and one in particular stood out today when I decided to write. DS Rhine-Russell was the only female DS in our platoon. I think that is why she was also the toughest DS we had. She would come in with an apathetic attitude in the morning, chewing gum, and looking like she woke up on the wrong side of the bed. She wasn't that tall either, so that physical appearance would fool someone into thinking she wasn't going to be hard.

I remember she was always there for a smoking session. A smoking session is when the privates/cadets messed up something and is decided that physical punishment is needed. It varies from the smoker to smoker: it could be pushups, mountain climbers, overhead arm claps, flutter kicks, side straddle hops, etc.
Her favorite lines to say during the smoking sessions was, "Wah wah wah, want to go home; want my milk and cookies."

A fellow cadet of mine said Rhine-Russell instead of DS Rhine-Russell in one of his conversations and she was actually walking by. She overheard it, and as punishment she made him write a five page essay on some random Army value. That was a horrible punishment considering we only had five hours of sleep a night.

It's always funny when you look back on it, but at that time it sucked a lot.

DS Rhine-Russell was in charge of the female barracks, and she was extremely picky on how neat it had to be. She told them later that she was hard on them because they are a minority in the army. Women have it a lot tougher, so they have to set their own standards higher than the rest. I thought that was a pretty good philosophy to teach by.

Just when we all thought she hated us, DS Rhine-Russell actually told the girls that she was proud of them. I don't know if it was part of her job to tell them that, but I would like to believe she meant it. I'm sure they'd like to believe it too.

During our FTX, the DS were very laid-back and had fun with the cadets. Even DS Rhine-Russell had some fun. Of course, by fun, it was at some cadets' expense.

Clinical Experience

So I started my first semester of clinical experience. It's only an education psychology clinicals, so there's nothing too difficult about it. My professor is really nice about the whole thing, and my elementary school teacher isn't so bad either. I'm pretty lucky to have good instructors.

My student that I'm observing and working with is Brian Bacon. Of course, I changed the name to protect his privacy. He's a really smart and funny kid, but he has a mental disability, so it is harder for him to concentrate on the tasks given. It hasn't hindered our work greatly, but it has become quite time consuming.

His problem solving and logic is progressing at a normal pace, but his literacy and language development is a little slow. His teacher told me that it's probably not going to improve, and I was a little sad about that pessimistic view. It's not set in stone; the kid can change if everyone tries a little harder.