Back on track

Awesome, awesome, awesome weekend back home.  Of course it flew by and I was back in Bama before I knew it, but well worth my first day off.  Nothing like sleeping in your own bed and getting some home cooking for a weekend.  After being a bum all weekend seeing friends and watching football, I ran today and dropped my 1.5 mile time down to 10:50 again, Kaboom!! One more week until our official timed run in the military park takes place and I'm on pace to drop 3.5 minutes off my first time (first run was pretty pathetic).

Tomorrow is the last workday I will have with Habitat for Humanity in Mobile County.  Still can't believe how quickly this first Spike went by...  Did some flooring today which I'm getting pretty good at, I am now proficient with a skill saw, jigsaw, table saw, chop saw,  and just about any other type of saw out there. We had a volunteer come by and work with us today; an older woman named Joyce who was impressively knowledgeable about flooring. Hopefully, she will be working with us tomorrow as well, we got a significant amount of flooring done today.

Also, I've been reading a post grad "how to get a job" book which i've been taking pretty seriously until it told me to save my resume in Windows 6 or 95 mode and realized the book was beyond outdated.  Alright team meeting time, this should be good. 

Yet another Weekend Getaway

After a fun filled week of flooring, upside down hammering vinyl soffiting, metal bending, and sawing the weekend has arrived early for me. Utilizing my first (of two) personal days off, I have been approved to take Saturday off enabling me to fly home to Long Island tonight. Looking forward to seeing my parents and friends for the first time in months (yes Ma even our weekly phone calls don't do justice). Also getting to experience a little of what REAL fall is like, maybe even get to see some leaves falling off tree's who knows.

It seems just as I'm finally getting to know the town of Mobile, we are getting ready to depart onto our next Spike.  Last night Cain and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch the Nebraska/ Kansas State game which was quite the massacre; Nebraska which is not often known for their offense really ripped apart Kansas State defense winning by a boatload.  No worries I did go running before and got my time down to 11:02.

As a media representative for my team (Along with Jacquie King, she's pretty awesome) I have been in contact with the local fox 10 news assistant manager trying to get River 7 some press coverage in the community.  Furthermore, I have written an updated Press Release to attract other forms of Media, however have had no such luck in obtaining interest.

Time to get back to some flooring, only a few more hours until I'm en route to NY!

Incoming last full week of work

My how time has flown, I cannot believe how fast this Spike has gone by.  Working with habitat has been awesome, and the staff is filled with amazing people.  I will be sad to leave them, however looking forward to my next adventure in New Orleans.  The project information for the Spike in Nawlins can be seen HERE (pdf format).  My work week will go back to the standard Monday - Friday grind, and we have a week of training included before we begin working (although most of the stuff we should already know at this point).

Our team photo specialist posted pics from the past few weeks which I will share to give you a better understanding of some of the things I have been doing. Pretty random pics captured during working, relaxing, and ISP's. 

Ran again yesterday and cut the 1.5 mile time down to 11:15 (slowly working my way back towards the 10's).  Mac has been inspired by the epic ABabama shirt and wanted to do an ab routine yesterday so we did that as well after the run, will probably be increasing the ab routine up to twice a week, once with the team, and once with Mac.

Another beautiful day here in Alabama - sunny, low humidity, and lower 70's... will probably have to go for a run this weather is perfect for it.

Edit: 1.5 mile run for the day time = 11:06

Another week bites the dust

After getting to "sleep in" until 6:45, River 7 embarked on yet another day of serving the community in Mobile, Alabama.  Our new construction site was packed out with all 60 volunteers who promptly showed up at 8am.  Although they left at lunch, we accomplished a lot and witnessed some people overcome their fear of going up on a roof which is always rewarding.  Today we finished putting up the roof and began shingling.  The trusses were backwards so half the volunteers dismantled the trusses (they will be recycled, reconstructed, and brought back to us) and the other half helped with the roofing.  The work day went extra long as we did not leave until all the roofing was completed (Habitat is on a pretty tight schedule) and everything was cleaned up and ready for next weeks shenanigans.

In more exciting news, I am officially allowed to announce I will be going to New Orleans for my next Spike! My team, along with River 1,2,3, and 6 will be heading out in late October (and just in time for Halloween) to good ol' Nawlins which we are all pretty excited about (Each River team has a separate project).  I don't have the project information yet however I should be able to post it tomorrow (Don't worry Ma it's another 20 pager that should answer all your questions). Right now all I know is we are working with The Phoenix Project and doing more construction, as well as surveying low income communities finding out... well I have no idea yet.  

I guess I should address this dungeons and dragons issue as all four of my followers seem to have made a comment towards it!  Dungeons and Dragons is not a video game however a tactical strategy role playing board game that is bonding us together as a team!! Well... the guys anyways... The running may be dipping however I am still teaching my ABsolutely ABliterating AB routine weekly for PT as well as maintaining a strict diet.  Hopefully next Spike I will have access to a gym.... only time will tell.

Hello again.  I know it's been a whopping 3 days since i've updated the old blog however I have been captivated by a game known as "Dungeons and Dragons" that has been taking up a substantial amount of my free time.

The last 3 work days have been filled with bending metal, putting up siding, painting, measuring and cutting wood, and other fun work related activities.  Today (Friday) we went to our first house dedication where Habitat finished a house and dedicated it to Sudanese refugees (Kaitlin you'll appreciate this - they spoke Zwahili).  It was pretty cool, and they barbecued some shiskabobs for us and after a prayer the keys were given to them and we were on our merry way.

Tomorrow our new construction site will have 60 volunteers which is quite a substantial amount.  Only 2 weeks left until the first Spike is completed and back to campus for transition and training for the next Spike... Time for some dinner and then potentially more Dungeons and Dragons...

Edit: Ran for the first time in a week and a half... wow that was painful! 11:25 1.5 mile... meh. Also southern people seem to love heckling runners for some unknown reason. And forgot to add this awesome pic of me with Nelson our coast guard friend

Awesome weekend, as you can probably tell from the pictures.  Sunday my team was invited to attend a Baptist Church shindig so we did that around 10am.  We were the only white people in the entire church it was pretty interesting to say the least.  I have only been to a Roman Catholic church which is pretty stringent about their ways... boy was I in for something else.  Not only did this church have a DJ booth in the back, it had 3 video cameras filming at all times, and a computer lab/media center to the right that was operating the 3 projection screens throughout the church. There was lots of singing and clapping and people randomly calling out "Praise the lord!" and "Amen."  Factoring all these variables together I nicknamed this church "Club God"  and was tempted to throw a fist pump up here and there but restrained myself.  After the service ended they were kind enough to feed us a home cooked southern meal which was amazing.  Southern cooking is something else. 

Today (Monday), my team volunteered at a mens shelter to catch up on some ISP hours where we did some closet demolition.  We also rearranged some items and did busy work until about 3pm.  Now comes the fun stuff...

Mac, our teams Service Learning Initiator (SLI) became buddy buddy with Nelson, one of the volunteers who works with us every Saturday at our Habitat for Humanity new construction site, and who just happens to be an active Coast Guard member.  So for a service learning project we were approved to spend the afternoon at the local Coast Guard Facility and get a tour around.  We were fortunate enough to go in all the helicopters and planes and try some flight simulators which was AWESOME.  We may also setup another ISP working with the Coast Guard because all their planes/choppers need to be washed daily and they would "love for us to do that for them."  I am so down to wash equipment ranging from 18-80 million dollars for volunteering hours haha.

It's always sunny somewhere in Alabama

Week 4 = completed, and my weekend officially begins right now. So what's on the weekend agenda you ask? You didn't? Well I will tell you anyways.  One of the church groups that volunteered with us last Saturday invited us to their Baptist church service and a lunch in afterward so we'll be checking that out tomorrow morning/afternoon.  Monday we'll be knocking out some Independent Service Hours (ISP's) at a local shelter for men @ 9:30am.

Today was cut short due to a massive thunderstorm that erupted after lunch, so we left the new construction site around 1:45 and got a few extra hours added to the weekend.  It's sunny and 85 now which is nice; storms usually don't last too long around here and the weather is very temperamental.  Alright weekend time, adios muchachos!

Lastly, couldn't get any new progress pics of the new construction due to the rain... just imagine there's a house with half a roof on it with windows now.