Pizza Luce!

I'm having a hard time remembering everything I did today.

I got up, walked the dog...oh yeah!  I created a calendar of moving activities for myself since I recently learned of the likely air ticket date and realized that I still needed to ship the car to Baltimore as soon as possible.  I feel a lot more clear on what I need to do next and in what order.  Thus far, the major items on the list are as follows: finish moving out of the house, transport vehicle to Baltimore, meet up with my wife in Indiana, take care of the Seven Oaks farm while C and R enjoy a much awaited trip to Cancun, help out C and R with their garden in the spring, bring all remaining belongings and dog to Baltimore and fly to Germany to meet up with my wife there.  This all spans about one month's time.

I took and completed my first military training...anti-terrorism level 1 training.  It was mostly very obvious things, but I did not get 100% on the quiz questions.  The only question I had issue with was "You get off the train with your children just outside the museum you plan to visit.  There is a political protest nearby, but it is not violent.  What do you do?"  Of the three options offered, I chose, "You check to see if police are present.  If they are, you decide to proceed to the museum."  The correct answer was, "Turn right around, get back on the train, and leave."  I'm guessing I didn't have the environmental context right.  In America, if there is a non-violent political protest, you can pretty much safely ignore it, especially if cops are around.  Apparently, anywhere else in the world it is closest thing to an all-out riot.  Experientially, I have a problem with the answer because I feel it pre-supposes that the underlying intent of political protests is violence, of which I would disagree.  However, I CAN agree with the concept that proximity to an event by extension makes you a participant.  The same idea is applied to rioting at college campuses...if you are spectating a riot in progress, you are assumed to be participating because you only add to the body count to be controlled.  You could argue that one is a riot and the other is not so different rules should apply.  I would agree, but the military is very concerned about image and is very clear about avoiding even implied involvement in instigating unrest.  The US Army is a very public entity.  Now as a representative of that, albeit indirectly, I need to be aware of these things.

The house also got "inspected" today by my mortgage company...a routine check of the property for short-selling procedure.  I put "inspected" in quotes because the inspector literally took five or six pictures and left...all within 5 minutes.  I don't call that a house inspection, but maybe he was told to just go because it was a formality.  I could be very positive thinking and assume that the bank will take what the buyer is offering because this sale involves military movement.  Time will tell.

I co-sang with my sister at church.  It was a transition mass: my transition out and her transition in.  She did pretty well for her first time.  She's going to try it solo tomorrow.  Afterward, I received a lot of hearfelt goodbyes, one especially from an unexpected member...C, the guitarist I used to sing with in the contemporary choir.  He wished me luck, said he would miss me, and we hugged.  He's always been such an upbeat, down to earth, and genuinely caring guy.  While his relationships with his children seem very healthy, and he seems to love his wife, his wife seems to really hold something against him.  My understanding is that he's a recovering alcoholic, so it's very possible that she's a recovering alcoholic's wife.  My late grandmother was one of those, and that seemed a far more difficult recovery process than grandpa's recovery from alcoholism.

I ran anoher errand after church and then went to Pizza Luce for dinner.  They have the BEST artichoke dip anywhere PERIOD!  Today, I realized that they might use fresh garlic in that dip.  It had that characteristic fresh garlic zing without the dried garlic carryover.

I then ordered a Maximus pizza in the smallest size they had available, ironically.

I finally had some of their carrot cake.  It was a lot lighter than I anticipated.

I had more than half of everything there, but the rest I took home which will serve as another meal at home.

I'm dedicating almost all of tomorrow working on a gift for K-borg that I have put off for a while now.  I'm hoping to finish this gift that's been waiting for over two years.  I anticipate it will take the whole day, but this may be my last chance to get it done before I leave.  We've been good friends for most of our lives.  I want to get him something...especially something he wanted me to give him.

On the Georgia Front, today was spent on R & R.  She slept extremely well off base, went through a mall with hopes completely dashed of finding one decent store, and had a nice long bath.  She got to spend 5 hours behind a desk today.  It's little more than monitoring who comes and goes through the barracks.  Everyone in their class gets to do this, but get to choose if it's a solid 5 hours or if it's 1 hour increments broken up over the six week training.  She admitted to being crabby today.  She looks forward to another 8 mile ruck march this week along with roughing it out under the stars.  Her final week is one solid week of outprocessing paperwork with a PT test thrown in there somewhere.  I was surprised to hear that she has one entire week dedicated to out-processing.  I guess there will never be a shortage of paperwork.

I get to see her again in less than 2 weeks!  Yay!