Day 8
Things are well, I'm kept busy with school and other duties. It's been quite warm since I got here, except New Year's Day itself. It's rained almost every day (which I'm told is quite normal for St. John's, but not at this time of the year). Most of my classmates/co-workers seem like nice, friendly folk. Half of the class has to live in singles quarters on base and the rest of us are in civilian owned buildings, rented by the Navy. We're staying in apartments in Hillview Terrace, which is on the corner of MacDonald Dr and Torbay Rd. There's a Shoppers right across the street and a Sobey's and Dominion (Newfoundland Superstore) within 10 minute's walk. It's a decent area and very central to many things. There's a transit hub at the Shoppers where I can get buses to CFS St. John's, the Avalon Mall, Stavanger Dr (where the big retail outlets like Zellars and Walmart are) and the Marine Institute. We all have to be at the base gym four mornings a week for drill at 06h30, that usually runs about 45 minutes to an hour (I have to learn to take shorter strides), then class starts at 09h00 every morning and runs till either 16h00 or 17h00 every day. Classes are interesting so far, but we haven't gotten very deep into course materials yet. Still no firm dates for basic training, but it looks like we'll be doing three terms of school and going to basic next January while the half of the school that has done basic already is on work term (i.e. Still assigned to CFNES St. John's, but working on a ship getting practical experience).
Those of use who arrived late to the school got our NCDs late last week. We were also fitted for CFs and DEUs, but my dress shirt and jacket will both have to be lengthened when they come in (for anyone who was every curious, my arms measure 37 1/2" which is longer than my inseam and I just squeeze into the widest standard boots available for the length of my feet). We never got the chance to wear them till Monday because Friday is casual day ($2.00 per person and it all goes to some local charity, some women's shelter I think). I spent all weekend polishing my boots and I've nearly got a good solid base coat on them and can start to put a high gloss on them. It takes a lot of work every evening right now because they're still new and stiff so the polish keeps cracking off where the leather flexes as I walk.
I had my first Electrotech lab today, just the basics of how to identify, use and clean our tools, mostly our soldering irons because we each use our own (or one specific to the work station) whereas the rest of the tools and supplies (wire, solder, cutters, wire strippers, etc) are kept in common lockers. We also have classes in digital theory and logic dealing with building and analyzing circuits, schematics, etc. (I spend a couple hours a week right now, tutoring people in how to count and perform mathematical operations in non-decimal and English (basically teaching us how to write in a manner appropriate for technical work as opposed to a literature class). We actually have two Electrotech classes, we're taking the first term class and the second term class at the same time. The first term class deals with the basics of working with electronics from an assembly and repair end (learning to solder and splice wire, removing, placing and replacing components on a circuit boards, etc) and the second term class actually delves into the details of the components: what they do and how they work, etc
Those of use who arrived late to the school got our NCDs late last week. We were also fitted for CFs and DEUs, but my dress shirt and jacket will both have to be lengthened when they come in (for anyone who was every curious, my arms measure 37 1/2" which is longer than my inseam and I just squeeze into the widest standard boots available for the length of my feet). We never got the chance to wear them till Monday because Friday is casual day ($2.00 per person and it all goes to some local charity, some women's shelter I think). I spent all weekend polishing my boots and I've nearly got a good solid base coat on them and can start to put a high gloss on them. It takes a lot of work every evening right now because they're still new and stiff so the polish keeps cracking off where the leather flexes as I walk.
I had my first Electrotech lab today, just the basics of how to identify, use and clean our tools, mostly our soldering irons because we each use our own (or one specific to the work station) whereas the rest of the tools and supplies (wire, solder, cutters, wire strippers, etc) are kept in common lockers. We also have classes in digital theory and logic dealing with building and analyzing circuits, schematics, etc. (I spend a couple hours a week right now, tutoring people in how to count and perform mathematical operations in non-decimal and English (basically teaching us how to write in a manner appropriate for technical work as opposed to a literature class). We actually have two Electrotech classes, we're taking the first term class and the second term class at the same time. The first term class deals with the basics of working with electronics from an assembly and repair end (learning to solder and splice wire, removing, placing and replacing components on a circuit boards, etc) and the second term class actually delves into the details of the components: what they do and how they work, etc