The Week In Review

For the first three days of the work week, I was able to enjoy half days at work. I got out of work on Monday through Wednesday at noon. During those days, I attended several holiday safety briefings, a absentee voting briefing, a change of command ceremony, and several other things. The change of command ceremony was to honor a new Command Sergeant Major who is taking charge of the 3rd Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard) in Washington, DC.

As a result of the early release, I was able to spend some extra time at church on Monday afternoon. We have been working at the church to build a new Sunday School building. We are now at the final stages of the project and we hope to be moved into the building by the first of the year...or thereabouts.

On Thursday and Friday, however, I was back in Arlington National Cemetery participating in Funerals for soldiers. We conducted three ceremonies yesterday and one today. Today, my nose started running right at the beginning of the mission. That is one of the worst feelings because I am completely frozen in place. I'm not allowed to move a muscle and I know that it is going to be that way for about the next thirty minutes or more. It was torture! Oh well.

I heard a great Christmas story the other day. A grandfather comes home to see his granddaughter playing with her new toys. "Do you think the neighbor girl got toys as nice as you this Christmas?" He asks her.

"Oh, grandpa. She's not Christmas. She's Hanukkah...and she's not easter, either. She's passover." And then she paused for a few seconds. All of a sudden her eyes lit up and a huge smile swept over her face. "...but we're both fourth of July!"

I am looking forward to Christmas. I will not be headed home like I would wish, but I will be spending a lot of time with my wife with the four day weekend that I will be enjoying this week and next. I am definitely looking forward to gorging myself and taking a few days off work! I hope you all have an awesome Christmas! Merry Christmas!