Happy late Valentine’s Day! I can’t believe February is already halfway over! School and various activities have been keeping me pretty busy, so when I looked at the calendar and saw that we only have nine weeks of school left I was shocked. I do have great news to share—I am going to get to fly an airplane! Through AFROTC, I was able to secure a spot on a flight to get flight time for free! I have never taken over the controls and actually flown an airplane, so I am pretty excited! I will let you all know how it goes in my next journal entry and I will be sure to take pictures.
On February 5th, Joe Galloway came and gave his talk. I mentioned him in my last journal entry and how I was very excited to hear him come and talk. Well, I wasn’t let down because he was a great speaker and by far my favorite one. He talked about his experiences in the Vietnam War, current politics and veterans, and the process of writing his book We Were Soldiers Once – and Young. At times during his speech, I got goose bumps on my arms because he was so passionate about his job and what he was doing that you could almost feel like you were there.
Air Force ROTC is going really well! We have several big events happening soon including the Physical Fitness Assessment and Mid-Terms. I have started running outside twice a week in the early morning in preparation for the fitness test and I hope that I can take a minute off my run time. Mid-Terms consist of an inspection and a knowledge test, so I need to spend some time shining my shoes. Also, in order to get a scholarship and commission you must have and pass a DoDMERB physical. Some people come to school with them already done, but I didn’t and I am now going through the process. You have to have your eyes examined and then a physical. I had my eyes examined last week and received good news: I don’t need glasses. My physical is this coming week and hopefully that will go just as smoothly.
As I am sure all of you already know, the Daytona 500 was this Sunday and I got to work at the racetrack for AFROTC. My job this time was to check people’s bags to make sure they weren’t bringing in anything they weren’t supposed to. You are not allowed to take a regular backpack into the racetrack, it must be clear. I had several people get upset by this rule, but most people were cooperative. Unfortunately, I got sunburned on my face and neck because we were standing out in the sun for so long. I did get to go inside the racetrack and WOW! We were able to get real close to the cars and the noise and speed is amazing. I think I could definitely become a NASCAR fan! The traffic around Daytona Beach has been horrible because of all the people in the area. I heard the announcer at the Speedway say there was enough people in the racetrack to triple the size of Daytona Beach! The Thunderbirds flew right over top at the beginning of the race and I love watching them because it’s amazing how they stay together! Also, I got to hear Trisha Yearwood (a country star) sing the national anthem! I am excited for next year’s race, but I can wait another year before it happens again. As a part of Silver Wings, I helped sell Papa John’s Pizza outside of the racetrack. All the people pouring out at once sure were a sight to see! We sold out of pizza and I think we could have sold more because when we left there was still a ton of people waiting in line to get on buses to take them to their parking lots. I believe we made quite a bit of money so that’s a good thing.
My classes are going alright but this semester my math class, Business Statistics, is a little harder. I needed some help on my homework and the teacher’s office hours were when I had class, so I decided to get help from the peer tutor. He was really helpfully and was able to give me some pointers on the class in general. Lesson learned was take advantage of the tutors because they can help. In my last entry, I mentioned how I was trying to work on my Microeconomics paper so that I wouldn’t have to work on it over Spring Break…I finished it and turned it in already! I am really proud of myself because I usually procrastinate a lot when it comes to writing papers.
Check out my pictures because I posted some of the race! If you have any questions you can e-mail me!
Until next time,
Kaleigh
e-mail: sidesk@erau.edu
