he's off

On Monday after I got home from work, we did our usual episode of going to play tennis. After a few minutes a bunch of teenagers from the local high school came and played next to us. They believed they were a lot better than they really were. Such arrogance really bothers me big time. I tried to ignore them and pretend they were not there, but my youngest son was intimidated by them and sat down and watched us play. We had a good time once we go into a zone and ignored them and their stupid behavior.

The day before our oldest son re-hurt his hand when he drove on the tennis court for a ball. I had never seen do this before, so it was kind of odd. My next to oldest son was with us and was full of energy running all over the court. Maybe this motivated my oldest to expend too much energy and thus hurt himself. His first remark was he would not be able to go in the Army as his hand hurt so much and he could not do push ups! His recruiter was due to come to our house on Monday to check his physical fitness abilities. He was very discouraged and I was kind of shocked he wanted to play tennis on Monday with his hand tapped, but it is a stress reliever for him.

Yesterday we learned that his recruiter was coming to take him to an Army doctor to check his hand. Since he is over 18 and not full time in school, our medical insurance for him expired, so this was nice news to hear. We heard in the afternoon that his recruiter was taking him to the military hotel to wait for deployment to boot camp! That was interesting change of events. He went to get his hand checked so it must have been good enough as to not prevent him from going to boot camp. We got a phone call around 9pm last night that we would find out today if he was of to boot camp.

Today we heard from his recruiter that it would not be final until around 12:30pm as to whether he was off to boot camp or not. We never heard and he never came home to we assume he is in South Carolina at boot camp. We heard they pay them $250 to buy stuff they need as he really took stuff only for Tuesday appointment at the Army doctor, so that is good. He finally has started a new phase in his life. His recruiter told us we should get a phone call in a week. After nine weeks he will be done with boot camp and have a day off to see us. He will them go to Maryland to train as a tank and heavy machine mechanic. We hope this will be best for him!

soon to go

We received the final word today on where our oldest son will be going with the Army. He is joining next Wednesday and will doing his basic training in Fort Jackson, South Carolina. Because he scored well on the military tests today, he will receive $8000 bonus if he completes boot camp, so that is good news. After that he will be stationed in Maryland as a mechanic. He will go in one rank above the lowest rank if he completes 40 push-ups within 2 minutes and 50 sit-ups within 2 minutes and runs a mile under 8 1/2 minutes within the next week before leaving for boot camp. He also has to memorize a bunch of Army jargon. This is all wonderful news as this will keep him busy and has a real goal for the next couple of months!

almost in

We heard late Friday afternoon that our oldest son was leaving for Army boot camp this evening, well actually at 3:30am Monday morning. His recruiter came to pick him up around 4pm today, after a whole day of restless family members wondering what was going to happen. We had a bit of a scare when he called Saturday morning for me to come pick him up as he had cut his hand. In his drunken state he was showing off for his friends and jumped off the porch and landed on bike in the yard and cut his right hand. He thought he may need stitches. Immediately I thought it was not really an accident but a ploy to get out of joining the Army for another week or two. Turns out the cut was not that bad and on the way home we bought butterfly bandages to seal the wound. He messed with his cut most of yesterday and today. He woke up at the last minute and wanted to go to church with us and then the rest of the day laid on the couch watched the Beijing Olympics with me. Nothing much exciting on, just hanging out doing nothing waiting for his recruiter. At 6pm I received a call from his recruiter that he had dropped him off, but that he only had to choose his Army career tomorrow and that would determine his boot camp location and start date and completion date of boot camp and length of his service. If we can just keep him home for the week, then all will be well by next Sunday night when he really leaves for boot camp. Just another step closer to him getting out on his own. I think he really wants to go now and will do just fine.

no go

So we learned yesterday that our oldest son will not be joining the military after all. His three alcohol related traffic tickets were too overwhelming for the Navy and Air Force. This means a major change of plans are in order for him. He can no longer depend on the military to help pay for his future schooling nor give him something to do until he gets his license back as a Christmas present at the end of this year. Now he has to get a job locally somewhere and try to start all over with his life. Just when we thought a change was in order, it will be hard for him not to revert back to the same old life he led before. He was hoping the military would help point him on a new path, but now he has to take the hard way and do it himself.

Our next to oldest son is attempting to go to Expression College for Digital Arts in the beginning of August. He went for an orientation session in the beginning of July and really liked it. The amazing thing is that he arranged the whole thing, but of course I had to pay for the airplane ticket and the hotel stay! He is trying to get financial aid so he can actually attend, so he is motivated to do it quickly as August is almost here. He has been approved for housing, which is really subsidized furnished apartments near the school. He keeps mentioning that he wants to drive all of the way from North Carolina to San Francisco, California as a major road trip. We keep trying to suggest that is probably not a good idea; however, he keeps insisting. We will see how it all pans out shortly...

We are still playing tennis daily, which is a still a shock to me. It is fun as the oldest and youngest son are definitely improving slowly as they learn how to hit and server the ball. It has been such a long time since I played so much tennis. It is a fun sport to learn.

Our daughter has been away at grandma's house all week long. She is learning how to do cross stitch and crocheting. I taught her how to start cross stitch as my mother taught me when I was just a young thing. No one in the family believes I know how, as everyone thinks only women and girls know how to do such things, so I guess I am a victim of reverse prejudice. My wife's sister is an expert at crochet so the extended stay is a reason to learn yet another new thing. Hopefully when our daughter returns she will not suffer boredom and complain as she will have many projects to complete and to keep her busy. We are about half way through the summer school break, so we don't want boredom problems affecting the family this soon.