My Project!

Well, here I am at my project! North Central Arizona National Monuments in Flagstaff, AZ. I don't even know where to start with this, because I don't have much time. My team got 3-week free passes to the YMCA, and we go pretty much every day. No joke. We get home from work, eat dinner, then go to the Y till it closes at 9:00. I felt like alone time tonight, so I just dropped them off and came to a coffee shop. So much to talk about but so little time! I'll do my best to do a quick summary.

First of all, my team is absolutely wonderful. They work really hard and when I ask them to do something, they just go do it. They're also silly and ridiculous a lot of the time. I got super lucky there. I have 10 people, five male and five female. I think I have the best shuffled team too. Most of the other teams have like four people from one regular team and none from another or something, but I have three pairs of people from the same team, then one from each of the other four teams. It doesn't get any more shuffled than that. I think that's a plus, since it avoids having people only hang out with the people from their regular team who they're really comfortable with.

Second, we live in tents. We have two porta-potties at our campsite and get all our water from a tap on the side on the maintenance yard garage at the nearby Walnut Canyon. You know those Jeff Foxworthy "You might be a redneck if" jokes? We make a lot of "You know you're homeless when" jokes because we wait to brush our teeth and put in contacts if we know we're going to be in a public restroom soon. Also, a few times when it's been super cold at night, we've brought our sleeping pads and sleeping bags into that same maintenance garage to sleep. Yep, we take shelter in a garage when it's too cold to sleep where we normally do.

My project is...interesting. Or something. The scenery is beautiful. We've only worked at Walnut Canyon and Wupatki National Monuments so far, but we'll probably be at a few others before we leave. You should go Google those right now since I don't have any pictures yet. There have been a few frustrations so far though, including:

Job #1 We've Had to Redo: At Walnut, in the parking lot by the visitor center, there was a HUGE dirt pile. Our first task with that was to pull out the pieces of asphalt, concrete, and rock from the dirt and make separate piles. That's right, we sorted rocks. Then we brought out wheelbarrows to bring dirt out to the Rim Trail and spread it out to be like a shoulder off the newly-paved trail. (That's what all the random pieces of asphalt came from.) We thought we were done, then our supervisor walked the trail with me and pointed out all the places that could use more dirt, so we did it again. Then after I had not been on the trail for a while, my team told me they were done again, so I told the supervisor. He then walked the trail with me again and pointed out MORE spots. Bleurgh.

Job #2 We've Had to Redo: At Walnut, we dug up a bunch of signs and moved them to other places along the Rim Trail, which turned out to be much more of an ordeal than it sounds. The ones we had to dig up all had big pieces of concrete on the bottom. Then we were told we could put the in the ground in the new place with the concrete still on, but it turns out there's really no way to make them sturdy that way, so we had to go back and break the concrete off and pour new concrete. I can't really complain because I was off the work site doing paperwork and getting some van maintenance done when they had to do the new concrete, but my team wasn't happy about it.

Job #3 We've Had to Redo: We then moved on to Wupatki. We were met by an archaeologist who explained that there was a historic stone walkway that led up to an employees-only area. The stones all had to be removed last fall because they had to put in a gas line that ran the entire length of the walkway. The archaeologist had taken 40 pictures of the walkway and the stones all got placed on numbered palates, so we would at least have a general idea of what area each stone should go in. The archaeologist didn't have any tools for us and had no idea of the technique for doing this. The project was literally "Here are some pictures of how it used to look. The stones are over there. Make it look like this again." So it began with a massive puzzle, laying the stones out to match the pictures (most of which were super distorted due to the archaeologist being pretty short, so the pictures were taken at a fairly sharp angle). We then spread ourselves out along the walkway to start digging them in once we had tools, but we had a few different opinions of how to go about doing such a thing. We were visited by another archaeologist one day, who went along looking at everyone's work and basically told us we were all doing a good job. The next day, our regular supervisor (who hadn't been with us for several days) informed us that that second archaeologist told him which group he thought was doing it right, and that everyone else would have to redo their work. That walkway was only supposed to take us one of our four-day weeks, but tomorrow will be day # 7 on it because no one told us how to do it at first.

So yeah. My team is generally pretty happy, so even though they get frustrated at having to redo things, everyone's attitude is still pretty good.

If you want to try a fun game, keep an eye on the weather in Flagstaff, then think of my team living in tents/a maintenance garage. There have been some pretty cold nights. I've started amusing myself with counting how many articles of clothing I wear. I frequently get up to 13 at night. That's ridiculous!

Upcoming Project and My Vacationing Suitcase

So. As you may or may not know, part of being an STL (Team Leader working in the office) for the Denver campus of NCCC is that you trade places with a field TL and go out with a team for the third project round, which we call shuffle round because all the teams shuffle up as well. I finally found out my project last week! It was my first choice, even though I was the 11th person to get to choose a project. It's an environmental project at multiple national monuments in and around Flagstaff, AZ. I Googled the ones listed in the project description that we will be working at and they look AWESOME. I was wanting a project in either Arizona or New Mexico all during last year, and now I have one! The only thing is that on the project description sheet, which provided the only information we had before choosing projects, under housing all it says is "Camping." Some other projects said things like "Camping with support trailer" or "Primitive camping," but mine just says "Camping." I'm fine with camping. Big Bend was absolutely my favorite project last year, and I camped for two months for that. I just want a few more details since there are lots of different kinds of camping. Really I just want to know how close we'll be to a bathroom and shower. Is that so much to ask?

The day after I found out my project, I left for Vermont for a long weekend (Thursday to Sunday of last week) visiting my brother, who is in grad school there. I had been wanting to visit and it kind of had to be before I leave for my project (which will be like March 14 I think) because once I leave for that, I won't be back until the middle of May. Obviously, the middle of May is a really bad time for anyone in any kind of school, so I had to go before.

Anyway. So I was flying Southwest, which lets you check bags for free. I don't have a suitcase here in Denver and I haven't checked a bag in like my last 5 flights, but I was able to borrow a nice small rolling suitcase from a friend and thought why not, it's free. I don't like checking bags because I'm a little too paranoid, and especially when you're flying by yourself, it's obnoxious to have to lug all your stuff around to go to the bathroom or get a snack when you don't have someone to watch it for you. So I packed up the little suitcase and dropped it off at the Denver airport. On my first flight, I got a window seat right where they put the conveyor belt to load bags onto the plane. I was staring out the window watching. I was pretty sure I saw my bag go on (it had a bright pink TRANSFER tag, which I saw the bag check lady put on, and said BDL, the Hartford airport), but it was a little black rolling suitcase that looked like every other little black rolling suitcase. The guy next to me said something about how he's had that window seat before, and it's always reassuring when you see your bag go on. I told him I think I saw mine, but I borrowed from a friend so I wasn't sure. Later, we talked about where we were going, and he said he was also going on to Hartford and said we'd have to book it to our connecting flight. I said I'm sure we'll be fine.

So I landed in Chicago, got off the plane, and looked at the monitors to find the gate for m next flight. It said Boarding, but luckily it was only two gates over. A lot of people were already on, but I still managed to get a window seat! (Southwest doesn't assign seats.) As usual, I chatted with the lady next to me a bit. I told her about how I got off the plane and this flight was already boarding, and jokingly said "I hope my bag made onto the plane." She seemed a little worried for me, but I said I'm sure it'll be fine, it was only two gates over.

I land in Hartford, turn my phone on, and see that I have a voicemail. It's someone with Southwest IN SEATTLE telling me that they think they have my bag there, but it has someone else's name on it. They also asked if I see a bag that's not mine with my name on it, to please turn it in. So I went straight down to the Southwest baggage claim office and the very nice lady there said that yes, the computer is saying my bag is in Seattle, but I could go ahead and look on the carousel if I want. I had already talked to Carl and he was running a little late picking me up, so why not. Most bags were already off the carousel by that time and it stopped not long after I got to it, but I did indeed find a little black rolling suitcase with my name on it that I had never seen before. When I went back to the office, the lady said that they could get my bag on the first plane to Hartford and it would get here tomorrow. I said Awesome!, but then remembered that Carl lives two hours away from the airport and I didn't want him or me to have to make that trip again. So she said they could Fedex it and it would get to Vermont on Saturday. I called Carl to get his address, and he reminded me that he lives on campus and they don't do mail on Saturdays. We hung up and he very kindly found a friend that lives off campus and could get mail on Saturdays, and he gave me her address to tell the Southwest people. Before I left, I asked if since I wouldn't get my bag till Saturday, did they give vouchers or anything for like toothpaste or underwear. She gave me a toiletry kit and said that if I bring receipts for buying stuff to replace what would have been in my bag, they would reimburse me up to $50. (Brief tangent: I absolutely do not understand why people get rude and angry in situations like this. This person works in the office. She had nothing to do with it. She seemed very happy that I was still smiling and thanking her even though I was going to be without my bag for like a day and a half.)

We didn't get to Vermont until like 11 that night. Carl had class from 8:30 to 12:30 on Friday morning. He had me drive him to class so that I could keep his car in case I wanted to venture out around town. It was like painfully cold that morning, so I knew that if I went back inside to his room, I wouldn't want to go back out in the cold, so I'd better just do my exploring now. I don't know how, but I found the little downtown area. The roads kept forcing me to turn, so I got confused and had given up and was trying to get turned around to go back to campus, when I saw a building I recognized from driving through downtown last night. Amazing! I had some pretty good breakfast and a cup of tea from a cute little cafe, and by that time it was still cold, but not painful anymore. I found an outdoor store that was having a pretty big sale, and bought some nice wool hiking socks and silk glove liners (which I had kind of been wanting since last year). Those decisions might have been influenced by the cold and my lack of warm clothes. (I had a sweater and my parka, but warm socks, gloves, hat, and a scarf were all in my cross-country suitcase.) Then I walked around a bookstore and decided to go back. While I was getting turned around I saw a used bookstore, which I love, so I had to stop again. I found the three books after "A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" (which I read in Big Bend last year) for a total of like $10! I got back to campus with perfect timing to check my email and stuff then go to lunch with Carl after his class. After that, he needed a nap due to insomnia the night before, and I went out again to the always hated but sometimes necessary Walmart.

That night, it was one of Carl's best friend's birthday, so we went with like 10 other people to an Indian restaurant. I had never had Indian food before, but with a little help from his friends, managed to order something not too spicy (which I CANNOT handle) and really pretty good. We all went back to campus for cake that a couple other friends had baked, then played a pretty intense game of Oh Hell. Oh Hell is a card game that Carl and I had grown up playing with our dad's side of the family. He had already taught several of his Vermont friends the game, and they love it. It was crazy. I think I did better than I ever had before, and it usually would have been good enough to win, but Carl and a friend who usually loses did better. Carl had a nearly perfect game, until everyone set out to take him down, and they succeeded on the last hand. It was pretty fun.

Saturday was pretty relaxed. Someone we sat with at lunch that day told us she and some other friends were going to a jazz concert that night, so we decided to go too. Jazz isn't my favorite thing ever, but this band was really good. And it was in a big building that used to be a cotton mill, but ad gotten turned into a bunch of artists' studios and performance spaces. We all went out to a pub downtown after the concert.

So I forgot to mention that after dinner on Friday, someone from Southwest in the Hartford airport called me and said that my bag had just gotten there so it was too late to Fedex that night, but they could do it tomorrow and it would get to me on Monday. I said no thank you, I'm leaving on Sunday. They said I could come pick it up, but again, it was two hours away. So I said no thank you, please just hold on to it until Sunday when I come to the airport to leave. And then they gave me a $100 Southwest voucher. So I didn't have my bag all weekend. Between the toiletries in that kit and what Carl had, the stuff I got reimbursed for from Walmart, and Carl's T-shirts, I was pretty much fine. It was kind of weird to be meeting all these new people and going out and everything wearing my brother's shirts, but it wasn't that bad. His friends are all wonderful, and most of them had heard the story of my bag going on vacation to Seattle. It was a really good trip and I'm glad I was able to go.

Aahhhhh....

Hello dear readers. I write to you this fine evening (well, night by this point) in a rather contented mood. All is as it should be again. In what way, you ask? I'd love to tell you.

**Actually, first I'm going to go on a tangent. I recently (or maybe 3 months ago) found out that the title of Unit Development Assistant, or UDA as we affectionately say, was completely made up by the Denver campus of NCCC. This position exists on all campuses (campi?), but it is called Unit Support Team Leader. You see, the entire group of green-shirted Team Leaders can be divided into two categories: Field TLs (the ones who go out and lead teams on projects) and Support TLs (it's the government, so we say STL). STLs are all the TLs working in the office. There's an STL with the Community Relations department, one with the Operations department, and one with the Programs department. There is also one for each unit, which is me for the Sun Unit. Despite several staff members telling us clearly that the job of UDA doesn't really exist, the entire staff still calls us UDAs. Go figure. But from here on out, if I say something about "the STLs," that will mean the four UDAs and the one STL from each of those departments I mentioned.**

So. Here's the first thing that is as it should be. When the entire Corps is in Denver on campus, everyone eats all meals in the cafeteria. That's just how it is. When teams go on spike, they receive a budget and go grocery shopping and fix all their own food. The STLs and whichever teams happen to be local are given access to kitchens and also receive a budget and go grocery shopping. However, the city forced us to renovate the kitchens back in like early November. This was supposed to be done by the time teams left for spike and the STLs and local teams would have started using them, but it so totally wasn't. Thus, local teams and STLs were forced to eat in the cafeteria for another month. People complain about the cafeteria all the time, but let me tell you, the quality went way down when everyone left and they were only cooking for 50 of us instead of 300. It was really rather sad, as you could imagine. That was nearly four months I had to eat in that place.

Our Christmas break started almost immediately after everyone got back from their first projects. After break was what we call "Transition Week," which is the week you always spend back in Denver between projects. Last week was transition week, so everyone was eating in the cafeteria as expected. Then we got the wonderful news: THE KITCHENS WERE DONE! Kind of. There's still an inspection that needs to be done by the fire department, which means that a security person has to be around while we cook until the inspection happens to make sure we don't set the stove on fire, but we can use the kitchen! Jourdan (the Ops STL) and I went grocery shopping for the STLs on Sunday and we've been eating real food ever since! No one's made anything too exciting yet, mostly because we seem to have forgotten how. Even after these three days, we all walk into the kitchen and have to take a moment to stand in the middle of the floor and look around confusedly, wondering what to do. But I'm sure that will wear off.

The other thing contributing to my Happy Courtneyness right now is that I finally got to go back to my yoga class at the YMCA. During the first project round when everyone was gone, I got in to a pretty nice routine at the Y. Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday I went to Body Pump (an hour-long weight-lifting class), and Tuesday and Thursday I went to yoga. I've been to yoga classes before here and there, and they're always kind of ok, but I've never really felt much of a desire to stick with it. Emily, the yoga teacher at the Y, is absolutely WONDERFUL in every way. She explains things very clearly, so I'm not always having to look around to see what I should be doing. She walks around to check our postures most of the time, but she'll go back up to the front to demonstrate when she's about to have us do something more complex. This class is specifically Flow Yoga, so she even includes when to inhale and exhale as you're flowing between postures, but not in a way that's annoying or cumbersome. If she's walking around and sees that you maybe don't quite get it, she quietly corrects you in a way that doesn't make you feel like a clumsy awkward oaf.

I would probably have wanted to keep going back just because Emily is so wonderful, but this is also the first yoga class I've taken where I've felt better for days afterward, not just for an hour or so like other classes. For the purposes of this post, "feeling better" mostly means "feeling not so lopsided." You may or may not know that I've had scoliosis my whole life. It's not severe or anything, but there's definitely an S curve and also a twist going on in my spine. Studying the Alexander Technique (you should probably click that link - I find it so fascinating) with the brilliant and magical K-Spang for my last year and a half of college did wonders for my lopsidedness, but that was well over a year ago now. It pains me greatly to say it, but my body has forgotten a fair amount of what she helped me accomplish. You know what also helps me not feel quite so lopsided? Flow Yoga with Emily at the Y. It's been three weeks now since I've been to that class, so even though tonight's class was a little rough for me, it was still wonderful to be back.

And now I'm going to read a little David Sedaris and go to bed. Life is good.

My Actual Job Has Finally Begun!

Oh goodness. I didn't realize it had been TWO MONTHS since I last posted here. Sorry about that. Team Leader Training (TLT) ended just a couple weeks after that last post and the Corps Members got here to begin their month of training (Corps Training Institute, or CTI). That's when my real job as UDA began. I guess now I'm kind of at a loss for how to go about blogging. I used to do a day-by-day kind of format, but that's when I was doing things everyday that would (theoretically) be interesting for other people to read about. Now that my job is much more administrative, I'll have to figure something else out.

But I'll do my best to give you a general idea of UDA tasks.

Task #1: Every week, every team submits a Weekly Progress Report, or WPR. Obviously, this report just tell what they did that week. There are categories for quantitative tasks done on the work site, service learning, Physical Training (PT), Media coverage, team morale, things like that. UDAs are in charge of sending these out to the entire staff every Monday. Sun Unit's WPRs have mostly been getting better every week, but they still need quite a bit of proofreading before the whole staff can see them. The main problem is that they're supposed to be written in third person, and some people just can't quite remember that.

Task #2: Along with submitting WPRs every week, Team Leaders (TLs) also send me how many hours each of their Corps Members (CMs) got that week. I then enter the numbers into a giant spreadsheet that keeps a running total of everyone's hours. Everyone needs 1700 hours of service by the end of July in order to graduate from the program.

Task #3: UDAs are in charge of sending each team a package or large envelope of the team's mail that has been sent to campus. We've only done this once in the three weeks that the teams have been gone on their first projects just because there hasn't been much. No one wants to waste money to send a package that only has like 3 pieces of mail in it. Most of the UDAs also include their own things in the mail. I sent various puzzles and a quote ("It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life, that no man can sincerely try to help another without also helping himself" - Ralph Waldo Emerson) to each team, which I think I'll probably continue every time I send mail. I wish I could say it was my idea, but that's what last year's Sun UDA did, and I know my team always loved the puzzles (crosswords, logic puzzles, Sudoku, etc.). Sometimes teams also have something specific they need sent. One of my teams is in Houston, and there's going to be some kind of ceremony for the city of Houston to honor AmeriCorps. Obviously, they need to wear their formal uniform (steel toes, black pants, and white polo) for that, but one of the CMs didn't bring the black pants or polo. So I had to go into his room and find them in his closet to include in that team's mail.

Task #4: Every project round, one team from each unit lives on campus and has a project in the Denver area. I'm not really sure why, but the CMs on those teams have to have room inspections done every week. CMs who don't have local projects get their rooms inspected before they leave, but I don't know why local teams need room inspections every week. Anyway, guess who's in charge of the weekly inspections? Yep, the UDAs.

Task #5: Lots and lots of emails, phone calls, and texts. I'm sure this goes for other units and UDAs as well, but Sun TLs frequently call or email me with questions and requests. I also send lots of mass texts and emails. I TRY to just send one big email with all the reminders and announcements they need per week, but that hasn't actually happened yet. Other things just keep coming up after I've already sent the big email. I'm sure the TLs are all getting pretty tired of seeing my name in their email and text inboxes, but they just need to learn to love it.

So those are all the things I can think of that all four UDAs do every week. The rest of our time is spent with a lot of random things that come up. Also, all of our jobs seem to be slightly different because each of our Unit Leaders ask different things of us. Vaughn seems to be the most laid back and doesn't ask much of me, which just means it's more up to me to find things to keep myself busy. (And when I fail at that, I've gotten addicted to logic puzzles, specifically these .)

So yeah. That's how I spend my working hours. Next up will be my non-working hours, but I'll save that post for another day. Which most likely will be less than two months from now.

Oh, but before I end this one, here's where my unit is for their first projects:

Sun 1 (TL - Cody): Cal-Wood Education Center! My first project last year!

Sun 2 (TL - Brandon): Denver Mountain Parks

Sun 3 (TL - Matt): St. Louis Parks and Recreation

Sun 4 (TL - TK): Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks

Sun 5 (TL - Lupita): Boys and Girls Club in Denver (They're the team living on campus whose rooms I'm inspecting this round.)

Sun 6 (TL - GG): Project Homecoming (kind of like Habitat for Humanity, in New Orleans)

Sun 7 (TL - Meg): Houston Parks and Recreation

Until next time!

We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Blog Post to Bring You...

A TALE OF HORRIBLE PAIN!

So AmeriCorps took us (all the TLs) out to dinner tonight at a Chinese buffet. I wandered around for a while and filled my plate with food that looked promising. Part of my plate was from a salad bar thing. I had red onions, green and red peppers, broccoli, carrots, and maybe some other stuff I don't remember. All delicious, right? I sat down with my food and the first thing I ate was a piece of green pepper. OH MY GOODNESS THAT WASN'T A GREEN PEPPER. In case you weren't aware, I canNOT handle spiciness AT ALL. I popped the piece in my mouth and chewed approximately 1.5 times before my mouth was on fire. I am very proud of myself that I didn't yell or cry or spit it out, I actually managed to chew it the rest of the way and swallow, but then the pain got worse. My thinking was somehow clear enough through the pain panic that I remembered that you're not supposed to drink water, you're supposed to drink milk (which of course was not present) or eat bread, but I didn't have any. I took a bite of egg role, but that didn't help. I took a bite of chicken, but that didn't help. Though I managed not to yell through this ordeal, a couple people around me noticed the (probable) pain on my face and asked if I was ok. I said yeah, that was just really spicy. They asked what, and I pointed to the pepper. They informed me that it was a jalapeno pepper. A JALAPENO PEPPER! I think it's the way it was cut that totally made it look to me like a regular old harmless green pepper. Meg went and got me a piece of bread, and Lupita had French fries (why there were fries at a Chinese buffet, I have no idea) that she shared, so that took some of the edge off. I was pretty traumatized though. All I ate after that were fries, green beans, and chicken. Why do people willingly eat jalapeno peppers? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?! Also, the stupid thing was covered in seeds, as peppers in restaurants frequently are. I'm pretty sure I have a jalapeno tree growing in my stomach right now, just lurking there waiting to destroy me. (Do jalapenos grow on trees? Or does the devil just keep them in potted plants in his backyard?)

Whew. Now that that's out of the way, I can tell you the latest TLT news. On Monday of last week, we had some boring meetings that aren't even really worth writing about, and then Habitat training all afternoon. Each unit did it at different times, so I was only with Sun people. We went to the local Habitat for Humanity warehouse for a guy named Bruce to teach us how to use tools that I've been using for the past six or so years. He taught us about miter saws, circular saws, chalk lines, drills, and hammers. We then had to pair up and go around to different stations to actually use each of the tools. We had to make cuts with the various saws to specific measurements and practice drilling and hammering. We practiced with all the things for a while, then he made us take a "test" with all the tools. Really the only part worth mentioning was that he wouldn't let us leave until we had put a 16-penny nail (those are the big ones) in a piece of wood in three hits. There were framing hammers there for us to practice with (huge heavy hammers that are pretty much made to sink 16-penny nails), which I have never used before. They're kind of nice when you get the hang of them. I got a nail in three hits a couple times during the practice, but it didn't count unless Bruce was watching during the test part. It took me a while to do it with an audience, but I did it a couple more times!

The rest of the week was pretty chaotic. We had a little mini-spike Wednesday through Friday, so Tuesday was all just getting ready for that. A spike is a project where the team lives somewhere other than on campus, remember. The mini-spike was just to show new people what a spike is like and prepare them for what's to come a bit better. Here's the silly part: So we're already split into four units, right? Well for this we were split into three groups, A, B, and C. We would be working and traveling with our group, but buying food, cooking, and checking out tools and dishes with our unit. Does that make sense? No. It does not. So Tuesday was spent with our units, checking out equipment and making a grocery list and shopping. The problem here is that there was no clear leader. This is a big group of leaders. My unit gets along really well, but there were a few differences of opinion in how to go about organizing the day.

Wednesday, we left for our spike. The plan was that each group would work with Habitat here in Denver for one of the three days, then spend the other two days working at the campsite where we would be living. Group A at Habitat Wednesday, B on Thursday, and C on Friday. Also, everyone had another day of service thing on Saturday, and group C would be working at Red Rocks Park that day. So Wednesday, A went to Habitat, B (my group) went to the campsite, and C went to Red Rocks for an orientation thing for their project on Saturday. They were supposed to meet us at the campsite after lunch. Well B got to the campsite, and Matt, the supervisor, told us that there was a change of plans and he was going to take us to Red Rocks to do the orientation with C. Even though it was an orientation for something we wouldn't be at. Ok, whatever, we do what we're told here. So we were all bored for about an hour and a half during this orientation, and then they unexpectedly put both B and C to work moving rocks. There were big piles of rocks along the road that needed to be spread along the trail because one of the projects for the Saturday thing was to build a couple rock walls. It was fine for a while, because most of the rocks weren't too big, we didn't have far to take them, and a few times we formed a line and passed them down while singing Disney songs. Then, we got to the fourth pile. This pile was made mostly of BIG rocks, and they had to be taken first down a really steep hill, then a LONG way away. We tried carrying individual rocks all the way from the pile to the destination (way too exhausting!) and also passing them down a line and throwing them down the steep part to people waiting at the bottom, but those didn't really work. We ended up throwing/rolling them down the hill right from the pile, and then people carried them together the rest of the way. Also, Red Rocks park is called Red Rocks for a reason. The rocks are all covered in red dust, which got all over us. Even though we have to tuck our shirts in with the uniform, everyone's stomach was red by the end of the day. It was ridiculous.

My group was supposed to go to Habitat on Thursday. However, we were told at that orientation that someone would need to be there to set up the Saturday thing (there would be like 200 volunteers there on Saturday that they needed to get ready for), but C was supposed to be at Habitat. B and C just ended up switching Habitat days so C could set up their own thing at Red Rocks on Friday. So on Thursday, we finished that pile of rocks. Then we were sent to help get rid of a bunch of Russian Olive trees, which are an invasive species. Two Red Rocks employees chainsawed them down and cut them into manageable pieces, and groups A and B (25 people) carried them into piles. Does that sound like a productive use of time? If it does, I described it wrong. There were about 20 of us just standing and waiting at all times. It was a little silly.

After that, Matt took us to see the amphitheater, since a lot of people had never been there. Then he took us to go climb around in a cave. Then he took us to an old CCC camp. (Tangent: The CCC is the Civilian Conservation Corps, which existed for several years after the depression. Men 18-25 years old could work for room, board, a uniform, and I think $25 a month. $5 would go to them and $20 would go home to their families. The CCC built the amphitheater at Red Rocks. They were nicknamed the tree army, because they also planted a ridiculous number of trees and build a ridiculous amount of trails in national parks. National parks pretty much wouldn't be the same without the CCC. My specific AmeriCorps program is called NCCC, pronounced N triple C, which stands for National Civilian Community Corps. NCCC is kind of modeled after the CCC. Oh look, a link if you want to know more. I think it's pretty cool. Also, my maternal grandfather was in the CCC back in the day, which I didn't know until after I already decided to join NCCC. End tangent.) The CCC camp had also served as a chapter of CCC alumni. We didn't get to meet anyone, but we did get to look around and see lots of pictures and read stories and stuff. It was really pretty cool.

Finally Friday was B's day at Habitat. The house was mostly done, there was just little indoor finishing work to do. I spackled and caulked all day. It's tedious and boring work, but I don't mind it that much. I alternated between working with other people and getting to talk and working by myself and getting to zone out and turn my brain off. Not a terrible day.

On Saturday, while group C was at the Red Rocks thing, A and B went to a different volunteer day, the Platte River Sweep. It was pretty cool. There was a bunch of free swag, which is always nice. Most of the volunteers were just picking up trash, but our group got to do some landscaping and painting railings and stuff. At the end, they raffled off like 30 things. I think like 10 of us won something. I won an umbrella. Someone else won a mini-grill/cooler combo. A couple of us won backpacks. A couple won lottery tickets (they didn't win). And we only had to work a half day.

That night was Oktoberfest in Denver. Your guess is as good as mine why it was in September, but whatever. It was fun.

Sunday was spent doing absolutely nothing productive except thinking about writing a blog post. Obviously, that didn't work out.

Which brings us to today. We had to check in all the equipment we checked out for the spike then do a debrief for the staff. Also, all the office team leaders had to sign in to their desktop computers for the first time and watch the boring video that tells us how to be secure with computers that are on a government network (like our desktops are). It was super complicated to get into, but then the video was boring.

In the afternoon, we had the first four of our twelve hours of Supervisory Skills. 1-5pm today, then all day tomorrow. Not much to say about that. It was fairly boring, but the guy leading it probably did as well as was possible.

And now it's almost bedtime. Good night!

Week 2 of TLT

The week started off with everyone's favorite thing: van safety! Oh, the joys of sitting in a room for three hours being told multiple times that the vans are heavier and more top heavy than cars and that you need to use a ground guide when you back up. Then, like last year, the rest of the day was spent in a van with the rest of my unit driving around. TK, Matt, and I were drivers last year, so Vaughn didn't make us drive that day, but the other six Sun people did.

Tuesday was learning about AmeriCorps expectations of TLs, and also learning (again) how to change a van tire, check the oil, put on the snow chains, and all that other fun stuff. Is it sad that I can sum up an entire day in just one sentence?

Wednesday was yet more safety training. I don't even remember what exactly we talked about, but I'm pretty sure most of it was common sense. We also had a little session to learn about how to motivate our teams to do PT (ooh! Another acronym!) and think of different activities to do with them.

After lunch, we got our technology packages! For office TLs like myself, that only meant our government-issued cell phones. But still, that's kind of exciting I think. They're even brand new this year. The TLs phones last year were pretty beaten up. Field TLs also got a laptop and a GPS, which I will also have for the round when I go into the field and have a project.

That night, a friend of one of the staff who is a yoga teacher came to do a class for the Sun and Water units (Earth and Fire had their class the night before. There's too many of us for one class like that.). The first third or half of the 1.5 hour session was really pretty hard. There were a lot of really difficult moves that not many people could actually do. After that, she slowed down and it got a lot more relaxation and stretching oriented. I didn't enjoy that intense part at the time, but I sure felt good when it was over.

The next morning, with half of us sore from yoga the night before and the other half STILL a bit sore from yoga two days ago, we had PT at 6am with two of the staff people. I remember that before I left for my last AmeriCorps year, I read somewhere that you do PT five days a week during CTI. I'm pretty sure I did official group PT like twice during that whole month. Apparently, they're a lot more serious about making TLs do it. Every Tuesday and Thursday we'll be doing PT. This first session was at 6am and lead by staff members, but every other one will be lead by fellow TLs (and I also heard we can decide as a group to do it after work instead of 6am if we want). The way-too-perky-for-6am staff members led us through some stretches and cardio stuff in the freezing cold of still-dark 6am-ness, then brought out the Fit Deck. The Fit Deck is something that was just been purchased, and they said every team will have one when they leave for projects. It's just a deck of cards each with a different exercise on them. They were split into four groups based on what part of the body it worked, and we rotated through them with our units. Some of them were hard, some were funny, and overall it wasn't too bad. It's nice when there are other people around for that sort of thing sometimes.

After 6am PT when the day actually started, we had an entire day with the Program Directors. These are the people who go over organizations' applications to have an AmeriCorps team and decide what projects we do. The three people were very nice and not bad speakers, but the room was the exact too-warm temperature that makes everyone sleepy. And we had to be in there all day, with the exception of our lunch break. Whew. That was a really long day.

Friday, we had a lesson in cultural competency. It started off where we were all at different tables in groups of five with a deck of cards and rules for a card game. We practiced the game for a few minutes, then started a tournament. The tables were numbered and the object was to get to table number one. (The two winners of each round move up a table and the two losers move down a table after each round.) When the tournament started, we were no longer allowed to talk. As could probably be expected from this situation, each original group had received a different set of rules. It was kind of interesting. We also had a session with the Resource Manager, who taught us how to document our use of our budget while on spike. Since the budget can be as much as like $6,000 of government money on a debit card (it is used for food and hotels during travel, groceries, laundry, etc.), it all has to be carefully documented on a complicated-looking Excel spreadsheet. We also had an activity where he gave us a huge packet of receipt photocopies and had us put them into the spreadsheet to make the budget balance out, and also find the charges with missing receipts on the bank activity printout. It was difficult and we didn't even have enough time to finish, but we all agreed that it will probably be much easier when it's our own stuff not a jumble of someone else's, and when we can update our form every few days or so and not do all the receipts all at once.

Also, as some of you may know, yesterday was my birthday. In the middle of lunch on Friday, everyone started singing happy birthday to be and also brought out a cake (that was from the local Super Target and was way more delicious than you'd expect a Target cake to be) and a card that everyone had signed. It was really nice.

We went out that night, first to hang out in a park in Denver and then go to a couple bars. They sang happy birthday again at the bar when it tuned midnight.

I had a nice relaxing day on my actual birthday also. After lunch, I went to a mall that was a bit farther away than I was expecting, but it was a pretty nice one. I haven't been shopping in a really long time. Then we went out again that night. It was a pretty nice birthday weekend.

I feel like there was something else that was kind of random that I wanted to talk about here, but I don't remember. Hmm. Maybe it'll come to me.

Team Leader Training!

Hello readers! I hope all 3.5 of you have been doing well since my last post. As you may or may not know, I'm back in Denver for a second year of AmeriCorps, but this time as a team leader! (More specifically, as a Unit Development Assistant [or because the government loves acronyms, a UDA], but more about that at a later date. You know, when I actually know what that job entails.) Even though I am an office team leader, right now ALL of the team leaders are in the same training, to learn how to lead a team. I'll have specific UDA training in a few weeks I think, but right now I'm with everyone else.

I feel it is important to note that I now get to wear a color! TLs wear the exact same uniform as Corps Members, except that TL shirts are green instead of gray. Have you seen gray and khaki together? It's not attractive. Getting to wear a color in general is exciting, but green also happens to be one of my favorite colors to wear.

So how's TLT (Team Leader Training, of course) going? Well, the other TLs are wonderful so far. I have of course met them all, but haven't had a chance to talk much with some of them still. I'm in the Sun Unit again, and the other Sun TLs are great. I am with TK (who you may remember was on my team last year) again, as well as Ashley (who will be in the office with me as a Support Team Leader, but more on that later as well) and Matt, who were both Sun Corps Members last year on different teams. We also have Brandon, Meg, Cody, Lupita, and Stephanie, all of whom have never been in AmeriCorps before. It is my understanding that most of the Sun TLs from last year didn't like each other very much, so I'm happy to report that I think this year will be MUCH better in that regard.

So what have I been doing? I arrived in Denver last Monday night and was able to stay with Amy, my fabulous tentmate from my shuffle team in Big Bend last year. She lives in Denver with her sister. The next morning I picked TK up from the airport and we went to campus, where we were apparently early and no one knew what to do with us. Meg arrived right after we did, so it was nice to meet another from our unit so soon. That day, we didn't do much besides check into our rooms and unpack. AmeriCorps also took us all to dinner at Old Country Buffet, because we're classy like that.

Unfortunately, there's not a whole lot to talk about right now. It's all been fairly boring meetings so far. There's been learning about the rules of living in the dorm, learning how to use government-issued laptops that are full of people's personal information safely, registering personal vehicles that people (like me!) may have driven to campus, learning the role and responsibilities of TLs, and of course the always enjoyable TB and drug tests. I'm TB free! (Also drug free, but that doesn't rhyme.)

The only interesting "official" activity so far was yesterday, when we went to a ropes course in Genesee Park. It's at a higher elevation than Denver, so obviously it was gorgeous. After a silly version of freeze tag in the morning, we had a pretty interesting activity. There were ropes laid out on the ground in like a plus sign, but then we found out it was really an x and y axis with a whole spectrum in between. Remember math class? First, we put ourselves along the x axis. One end of the spectrum was for people who go with the flow, are happy to do what everyone else wants to do, don't usually state their needs, that sort of thing. The other end was for people who are really opinionated, state their needs, make decisions quickly, etc. After we had plotted ourselves along that line based on where we think we are in the spectrum, we moved on to the y axis. One end of that spectrum was for people who tend to think logically and gather as much information as possible before making decisions, while the other end was more emotionally charged and made decisions based on feelings. Staying where we were along the x axis, we moved along the y to where we thought we should be for that second spectrum. So now all the TLs were plotted into four different quadrants. Interestingly, most of the Sun Unit was in the same quadrant. We were called Architects and Analysts, people who go with the flow and also make decisions logically.

We then split off into our units and did some group problem-solving activities. In one, three people were blindfolded. Four other people could talk but could not see the blindfolded people, and four others could see the blindfolded people but not talk. That last group had to communicate to the group who could talk what the blindfolded people had to do, and the talkers had to instruct the blindfolded people. I think all of the tasks were just walking around and picking up objects scattered around on the ground, but it was fairly challenging.

After that, we moved to where there were like eight rows of five large flat-ish rocks laid into the ground. We had to get the entire team from one side to the other on top of the rocks, but they had to be in the right order. We went one at a time. If someone guessed a wrong rock, they had to go to the end of the line and the next person had to start from the beginning. It wasn't that hard. It was just trail and error until we figured out the pattern, and then we had so many people that it wasn't hard to remember it.

After that, we went to where the ground was lava, and we had to get all of us from one spot to another using tree stumps and six boards. If we dropped a board or if someone fell into the lava, "something strange or wonderful would happen." We dropped several, causing us to go down to three boards and losing the use of a few arms, but then we got a board back later. That one was cool. We worked pretty well together, and our facilitator told us we took a path she hadn't seen before. Also, I don't think anyone in AmeriCorps has much of a personal space bubble, but we broke through those bubbles pretty quickly with people squished together on stumps and whatnot.

After lunch was the high ropes part of the day. I unfortunately didn't actually go up on any of the three activities due to a couple not-so-good knees and a history of stress fractures in my right foot. I have no desire to have my knees or foot hurt anytime soon. But I was still able to be a spotter, help belay, and cheer people on.

At the end of the day, we got back in our units with that x and y axis. Ali, our facilitator, told us to go back to the quadrant where we were in the morning. She then had the group decide if they thought anyone should move to a different position. Most people stayed about where they were, but they said I should move closer to the middle, where the two axes meet. I think I'll take that as a compliment, that I am pretty balanced.

Tomorrow we get to do the wonderful day of driving tests. I think I heard we might be driving to Rocky Mountain National Park or somewhere cool like that, but it's still several hours in a van.

I still haven't put any pictures from Big Bend or Saguache on this thing, have I? I'll try to do that sometime soon. Apologies for laziness.

Oh! But look on the side! I figured out how to make a nifty little text box on the left side that I will fill with those beloved-by-the-government acronyms as I think of them.

Also, I just noticed that this is blog post number 101. I posted on this thing 100 times in the past year. Crazy.