Magellan 2013: Rolla, MO to Amarillo, TX

Currently listening to: You're The Reason-Eyeshine
Current location: Amarillo, TX
Miles Traveled: 1,547.9

Day two=complete!

I left Rolla this morning around eight and started towards Oklahoma City.  I passed Ft. Leonard Wood and there was smoke everywhere.  I thought it was just fog at first, but i could actually see it billowing up, and it was a dark gray color.  I tried to find out from my friends at LW if Missouri was having forest fires, but no luck. 

 When I got close to the border of Kansas and Missouri, I got off the interstate and onto Historic Route 66 in Joplin.  I followed it for a few miles before coming to a life-size Mater tow truck from the movie Cars.  I had read that the movie was based on Route 66, so I was very excited.  I stopped, took a few pictures, and talked to the lady that had given a lot of information to the makers of the movie.  The street had a lot of buildings that had been featured in the movie.

I drove into Kansas on route 160, and I made a discovery.  Kansas is weird.  I stopped along the road in an wooded area on a road that was barely a road in order to use my phone.   Then, three white limos drove down the road filled with elderly people, all who stared and pointed at me.  I kept driving and came to a bridge with a very descriptive sign.  It read, "Bridge floods.  Turn around.  Don't drown."  I should've taken a picture... 

Anyway, I eventually turned south into Oklahoma.  A year ago to the day I was in Oklahoma at boot camp.  I can't say that I miss those days... I don't understand Oklahoma turnpikes.  I payed literally five times on one road.  When I got on, they gave me a ticket.  It told me that in 27 miles, I would need to pay $3.15.  I drove twenty-seven miles, and sure enough, I came to a toll booth.  I paid, and kept driving...on the same road.   In seven miles, I came to another one.  This time, I had to pay $1.35.  I drive three more miles, and had to pay .35 cents. This was all on the same road... I exited, paid another toll, got food, got back on the road... And paid again.  I don't think I like Oklahoma.  I'm going broke.  Haha.

When I saw the sign for Texas, I was pretty happy.  Amarillo is my last stop before Santa Fe.  Everything was extremely flat, with gorges cut into the earth.  It started to rain, and it was beautiful because I could see the rain miles before I drove into it.  It was just like the clouds had touched the ground.  Amarillo is a nice place, and I'm going to take some time tomorrow to explore the area.  

I keep thinking that I'm missing cool things, but my favorite part of the trip so far is just driving.  I think I'll need a separate trip to just stop and see everything.  :D

Magellan 2013: McAlisterville, PA to St. James, MO

Currently listening to: Closer - Better Than Ezra
Current location: St. James, MO
Miles Traveled: 869.6

Top ten reasons my new car > my old car:

10.) Air conditioning
9.) Heat
8.) Power locks/windows
7.) Auxiliary input for my iPhone
6.) Dashboard display with how many miles left for tank of gas/direction of travel
5.) Working CD player
4.) I hit the breaks...and the car slows down...every...time
3.) More space to shove more stuff
2.) I don't have the need to drown out suspicious engine noises with the radio
1.)  The old owner left a month's subscription to Sirius XM Radio


I'm going to start this blog off right by remember to write a post... I left McAlisterville yesterday after a good week of hanging out with my parents.  After about five days, I was getting antsy from doing nothing, and I started getting ready for the road trip.  Right before I left for LDAC, I had sold Tank the Cavalier, so I needed to buy a new car.  Enter into the picture Optimus, my 2007 Dodge Caliber.  I've named him Optimus for obvious reasons.  See list above.  I drove out to Washpa yesterday afternoon to meet up with people to have a campfire.  I crashed on campus, and then left around 8:45 the next morning to start the trip.

In Ohio, my dad called me to tell me he just passed me on I-70 W going the opposite direction.  He drives through Washington all the time, so I knew he was heading home.  I kept driving until I hit St. Louis.  I saw the arch, got stuck in traffic, and grabbed some food.  A while later, I found myself driving towards Rolla, MO, with an empty gas tank and no idea where the next gas station was... First lesson.  Watching the freakin' gas gauge.  Luckily, I made it to the station in St. James and filled up.  I have a 13 gallon tank, and I put 12.994 gallons in.  Never again.

Altogether, I didn't do much other than drive and look at things.  I drove farther than I planned to, and I definitely felt a need to put as much distance between myself and Pennsylvania as I could.  Now that I got a bit of that out of my system, I'll spend more time tomorrow checking things out.  My dad is texting me with places I should visit and things I should see, so I am making sure to look out for them.  I'm enjoying being by myself after a month of being around 50 people literally 24-7, and I can't wait to start driving again tomorrow.

Until then...

LDACistan, Warrior Forge 2K13

LI figured I should write something about this past month for the one person that has the link to this blog (hey mom).  Thanks for being such a diligent follower.  :)

A few hours ago, I returned from my deployment to Atropia, the make-believe nation located in the rainforest that is Joint Base Lewis-McChord, WA.  After a month of infiltration operations, 3rd Regiment, A Company, 1st Platoon vanquished the aggressive South Atropian People's Army (SAPA) and brought peace to Atropians everywhere...

LDAC is set up like a deployment, including peace talks, cultural immersion briefs, and training.  During the final two weeks of the camp, we staged attacks and raids against Atropian towns and resupply points.  There were parts of it that were actually pretty awesome, and then there were times were I considered going AWOL or joining the SAPA.  Upon arrival, we went through medical in-processing, took the physical fitness test, and started our road to war briefs.  The first two weeks, we completed a confidence course, Primary Marksman Instruction for our M16s, Land Navigation, Basic Rifle Marksmanship and IED training.

The next two weeks consisted of actual missions against the SAPA.  We camoed up, and moved out.  We did STX lanes as a squad.  We rotated through commanding a group of 11-12 soldiers.  During platoon ops, we commanded a 50 soldier element, all the while being assessed for our leadership skills.  

Upon returning from our "deployment", we finished out LDAC with CBRN and a water confidence course.  For those of you that aren't familiar with CBRN...Be glad.  CBRN stands for Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear, and refers to the point in training when all cadets must enter a chamber filled with 2-Chlorobenzalmalononitrile, otherwise known as tear gas.  You enter with a gas mask, take off the gas masks, and try not to die.  Cadre ask you a series of questions that you must answer if you ever want to get out of the chamber.  This builds confidence in equipment, as well as gives you first hand experience with the effects of riot control gases.  

As horrible as this sounds, it wasn't the worst part of the day.  Water confidence course.  The course consisted of three "obstacles."  The first was a boat race with kodiac boats, which involved flipping the boat upside down and then back over while in the water.  This was a lot of fun, and we beat the squad we were racing.  After this came the single-handed worst part of LDAC.  The obstacle consisted of a ladder attached to a horizontal beam with a block to step over, attached to another ladder, attached to horizontal rope.  The entire obstacle was placed in a lake, so that if you fell off, you fell into the water.  You would climb the rope onto the beam, which was twenty feet up.  The beam was around six inches across, and you made your way across to the other ladder.  From here, you climbed another fifteen feet until you reached a rope.  You would grab the rope and crawl out across the lake until you reached the middle.  At this point, you were hanging off a rope, 35 feet above the water.  The final part of the obstacle was to let go of the rope, drop into the water, and make it back to shore.  I think I hung onto that rope for a solid minute.  I cried like a little baby.  I'm not afraid of heights, and I'm not afraid of water, but I decided I was just going to hang there forever.  Finally, I did let go and thought I was going to die.  Obviously, I didn't.  I even lived to do the next obstacle.

The third obstacle was a zipline across the lake.  The start was approximately seventy feet above the water, and you zipped for a full ten seconds before dropping a few feet into the lake.  For some reason, I was completely okay with this, and ended up having a blast.  

The final week was spent in the barracks, getting ready to go home.  Overall, it wasn't too bad.  I made some good friends, and learned a lot.  Washington state is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to, and I didn't want to leave.  

That's about it.  I reserved a spot with a Military Police battalion in Pittsburgh as an S6 officer.  It's pretty much the army version of an IT Manager.  As long as I don't get pregnant, fail a drug/PT test, I will commission in 10 months.