AmeriTeam!

This morning, we had Mass Care training by the Red Cross. It wasn't really that interesting. They just gave us a few scenarios and we had to figure out how we would handle it.

This afternoon, we had Motor Stables. Every week or so we have to do a full check on the AmeriVans, so we had to learn to check tire pressure, fluids, electrical stuff, change a tire, and put on snow chains. Not much stuff I didn't already know, but it didn't take too long.

And after that was the part everyone was waiting for. Teams! Sun unit all met out on the soccer fields. The leaders taped cards to our backs, and were told that what was written on our cards were groups of objects that went together. Without talking or looking at our own card, we were supposed to find our group. I saw three that probably went together (Chuck Norris, Mike Tyson, and Bruce Lee or something), but every single other one I saw was completely random. Teddy bear, the year 1933, rocketship, toilet paper, "Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica." (that's a quote from The Office), blueberry, etc. Mine was band aid. While we were in the middle of this, with no one but the three fighters finding a group, Vaughn the unit leader came into the middle of the group and said, in all seriousness, that he knew we were all excited for our teams, but there was a situation and we all need to go back to our rooms. As we were walking away, I looked back and saw him standing with the team leaders and laughing. Obviously, this was part of the game. Sarah, a team leader, was in the lobby of the dorm telling people that they found "something" in someone's room and needed to check all the rooms. She was very convincing. When we got back to our rooms, there were cards on our door with our name and a clue. My clue said to find a guy in my unit named Rob and put our clues together. When I found him, our clue said to go to the cafeteria. There, we found an envelope with our names on it. It sent us to the auditorium. The envelope there sent us to the third floor lounge of our dorm. Which sent us back to the first floor. Our envelope there had three other names on it (Lindsey, Tomm, and Jessica). It said to go to the parking lot outside of the NCCC office and get in the van. Which van? No one knows. We figured we should wait for the other three, but they kept not showing up. I even tried calling Lindsey, but she didn't answer. Finally, we wrote a note on the clue that we had already been there, left the clue where it was, and went to the parking lot. When Rob and I got there, team leader Sarah told us we couldn't do the van thing till they got there. There were four vans with TLs in the driver's seat. When the others joined us, Sarah told us to get in any van with a driver. We piled in, buckled our seat belts, and were told just to go back to Sarah. Sarah gave us an envelope that said to go to the laundry room in the basement of our dorm, but we had to wait for 6 other people. The 5 of us waited and waited and waited. Finally, we got one of their numbers and called them. They were at the soccer field. They finally joined us, and we all had clues that sent us to the laundry room. Right after we left, team leader Sarah called one of us and told us to come back. She took the 11 of us into the office and gave us a song lyric. She said taped on one of the doors was another lyric from the same song. We had to stand outside the door and sing the song, then we were allowed to open it. It was the women's restroom, and our song was Thriller. So we sang it a little, then opened it, and there was Christina our team leader! We found our team!

Christina took us to Chipotle for dinner, where she had another little game to reveal our first round project. We all got envelopes with our name and a number, 1-11. Going in order by the numbers, we had to act out the clue inside the envelope. The first two were DVDs and books, but then we had snow, mountains, wilderness, sleeping bags, steel toed boots, coats, etc. The last clue said that we would be in Colorado. I was disappointed for a second because I was hoping to travel somewhere, but then I heard about the project. We'll be up in the mountains at about 8,000 feet above sea level, half an hour outside of Boulder. We'll be building trails, digging ditches, cutting down trees, etc. Christina said we would pretty much be lumberjacks. I guess I'll be pretty strong after a month of being a lumberjack, so that'll be nice. And we won't be camping in tents, like the clues suggested. We'll be in a lodge for the first half, then cabins the second. Since we'll be in the remote wilderness, we won't have any cell phone signal, but we'll have some super slow wireless internet. That's why we had clues of DVDs and books, because we'll need to entertain ourselves out in the middle of nowhere.

Another team, led by Jordan who is hilarious, has a project IN Boulder. I asked someone on that team where they were staying, and she said the AmeriMansion. Apparently, NCCC has done this project before, and they stay in some super nice 5 bedroom, 3 bathroom house that's right on the edge of downtown Boulder. Three miles from Pearl Street, but they have trails in their backyard. They'll find out what their project is on Saturday. Christina told us that we'll probably go into Boulder like once a week or so, so it'll be nice to have another team there that we can visit. Also, Thanksgiving is coming up, and I don't think anyone is going anywhere for it. My friend said that Jordan was telling his team about another team being nearby (that's us), and we can all have Thanksgiving together at the mansion. Two other Sun teams are doing Habitat for Humanity in New Orleans, and the 5th Sun team is doing something at a children's hospital in Arkansas. Christina and Jordan both said that since we're local-ish for our first project, we'll probably get to go to the gulf for our next projects.

And here's one of the best parts: My two-week winter break starts Dec. 19. My brother Carl's graduation in Louisiana is Dec. 19. The first flights out of Denver that day are at 6am. Even leaving at 6am, I wouldn't land there until about noon, so that probably wouldn't work. The last flights to Louisiana on the 18th leave at 8:30pm-ish, but when I didn't know where I would be, I didn't know if I'd be back in time to make a flight at 8:30. Since we're so close to campus, we're coming back on the 17th. Apparently we're doing stuff on the 18th, so we can't leave until after the workday, but I am 99% sure I'd be able to make it to the airport for one of those 8:30ish flights. So I think I get to go to his graduation! I would have been SO disappointed if I couldn't go.

So that's what happened today. Tomorrow, we have to go to various trainings for various team roles we're interested in. I'm going to training for Media Representative and Yearbook Representative. All next week is training for our specific projects, then I leave for the wilderness on Nov. 16!