Snowbirds...

What I hope you see is my kids playing in the snow last winter in Naeba, a wonderful little resort town with outstanding skiing and snowboarding...

What you're probably seeing is two typed lines with no picture...

Failure...

I said it before, I'll say it again, a successful blog is about the posts...

Or should I say, it's about posting...

Cause you have to post regularly in order to have a blog, otherwise it's just another failed endeavor in your life...

I refuse for this blog to be another one of my unfinished projects...

But what do I write about when I have nothing to write about?

I write about nothing...

This should suffice...

Happy Birthday!

Alright, so this isn't exactly a Happy Birthday to any one person in particular...

We all know that someone who has a brain that was designed to keep track of dates and names and special occasions and clothing sizes of other people and what someone's favorite fad is currently, etc... that ain't me.

Every New Year I tell myself I'm going to be better in tune with everyone and try to push back into people's lives. That's normal for me because I'm usually kicking myself in the ass after mailing out my Christmas cards 2 days before Christmas.

Shortly after the New Year it's my brother's birthday. The following month is mine. Come summer, Dad's birthday is in July, my daughter's in August, Grandpa's in September, Mom in October, and wrapping up the year is my wife and son in November.

So far this year I am 2-4. I remembered mine and my daughters.

With all that being said, Happy Birthday Jake! Happy Birthday Dad!

I hope I can up my percentage through the rest of the year....

Oh, The Drudgery!

I can sum up every day at sea the same way: same stuff, different day.

Repetition is the key to survival out here. Routine is the lifes blood of a Sailor. Every day you have the same tasks (with a few differences here and there, it doesn't change the routine), the same sleep times, the same eating times, the same watch times, the same daily work, etc...

My routine? I start my day around 8pm. I shower, shave, get dressed, come into the office. I check my e-mail, look for any extra taskers on top of my normal workload, check the message traffic for anything from other ships or units that may need something from me and, in general, let everyone know I'm up and around. I answer my e-mails, set up my priority list for my workload, and check the watch floor in case there's anything that did not come to my inbox. I eat chow around 11pm, give or take 30 or so minutes. I return from chow, start on my taskers, and then around 1:30am I start preparing for taking over the watch at 2:15am. I stand my watch until 7am, get relieved, take 30 minutes to myself to wind down and then hit breakfast. I'm normally back in the office by 8am and start back in on my taskers. I either finish them or I don't because they're not going anywhere and I'll get them taken care of eventually. I'm not overly tasked though and can get done around lunchtime, 11am-12am, at which time I take some more time for myself, either hitting the gym, surfing the internet, chilling in my room, or whatever has captured my attention on that particular day. On a rare day I can get together with the boys and play a bit of guitar. I hit the rack about 1pm and it starts all over again. Everyday I'm underway. Of course, the times may change depending on when I stand watch but it runs exactly the same way.

Why the routine? When I'm underway, I'm technically at the office 24 hours a day, 7 days a week because there's no where else to go. I have a routine to make the days go by faster. It's not about the hours in the day, it's about the actual days because the faster the deployment is over, the sooner I'm home with my loved ones.

And every Sailor will tell you it's all about getting home.

On a side note... whenever I re-read my posts, I realize I need to bone up on my writing skills...