Yes, it really is 2:55 in the morning. It's not a time change thing. Had a long watch today. Productive and educational, but long. Educational in a good way, this time though.
I never did make it down to the bikes last night. It just got too late and I didn't feel like working out right before bed. So instead I went to up 'rats and had a couple slices of overcooked pizza. Saturdays are great because they serve pizza for dinner and midrats. Usually the pizza is pretty good. Last night, though, it's like they just threw their timers away and pulled the pizza out of the oven when they could smell the carbon. What a shame. They did have some pretty good cookies, though.
I laid in bed after that and watched a movie on one of the ship's TV channels. The ship has a TV studio on board that manages several channels that are piped throughout the ship on standard coax cable. When we are close to CONUS, they provide network TV, and a pretty extensive list of DirecTV channels. In fact, last fall, they bought NFL Sunday Ticket for the ship, so we didn't miss a game! When we're away from the states, there is the "Armed Forces Network" which is piped over satellite around the word for US forces. AFN has a "Prime" channel that plays old reruns, a "sports" channel, and a "news" channel that shows Fox News (any surprise there?). In addition to the AFN channels, the ship has 5 "site" TV channels through which it shows a running slide show of ships information, sort of like watching a local public access channel with powerpoint slides on meetings, procedures, safety tips, announcements, etc. On 3 or 4 of these Site TV channels they also play movies around the clock. Some of the movies are fairly recent releases, some are cult classics, some are just bad. Site TV is also used for training videos and live briefings at times. Another channel on Site TV shows the PLAT/ILARTS. Yet another channel has a map showing the position of the ship. Not real useful when you're in the middle of the ocean, but can be interesting when there's land nearby. They change the scale depending on where we are.
I digress. So I was laying in bed, half watching the movie and half processing through the events of the day. I wrote to Janell tonight about how I can easily take things to personally and in my mind make them out to be a much bigger deal than they often are. To regain some perspective, I tried to consider what the impact would be tomorrow, in 10 days, and in 100 days. In the long run, it's a small thing. That helped.
Another thing that helped was that after church and brunch this morning, I got an email from one of the H-60 detachments on a cruiser out here with us. They are having some real tough maintenance problems and need us to send some expertise over to help them figure it out! That also put things in perspective. I have a great team here backing me up.
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4 comments:
You sound much better today than yesterday. What a difference a nights sleep brings. As you know, cruise (as well as life) is a big roller coaster. Not every day can be at the top of the hill. You hit it when you took a different perspective about looking at the bigger picture. It's hard to do, but it usually helps.
There are some movies that I will only watch on the boat. The ones that MIGHT be interesting, but I don't want to pay to see. I saw a couple like that while deployed last Oct. The base had a free movie theater that showed new releases, so I figured I would take advantage of it on my days off. I'm sure glad I didn't pay for a couple of them. I would have been very upset (I do not recommend "The Marine". Not even on the boat.)
Hey, Scott! Enjoying your blog. Thanks for taking the time.
kraig.smith@warren.af.mil
Same as Kraig - I'm a late stumbler onto your cruise blog, but am catching up fast. Like Rich said the other day - it's almost as addicting to read as you've said it is to write! I was trying to explain to Barb today about your 'bad day' experience. Something tells me I as a civilian can't quite appreciate what it's like to have a 'debrief' with my boss. When I make a mistake it's either not seen, or glossed over, or given the good ol' "do better next time" treatment. Just ain't the same, is it?!
Take care, and God bless.
PS - I got 'debriefed' by Owen tonight that I forgot to remember you in our prayers. The fact that he prayed for you, followed by Cameron, then by Barb ahead of me didn't let me off the hook. :)
Papa was talking about the bad days he has had in civilian jet land. Some, at the time, seemed to be overpowering. Perspective and time are good healers. Keep up the good work. We love you.
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