Moving Up / Moving Out

Last night, the correction officer did not post the “transpack list” which informs the inmates who are moving on to their next destination in the coming weeks. And, we did not receive our razors. I have been in this dorm for three weeks and in those three weeks – every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 2:00 pm, we received razors like clockwork. However, yesterday, this part of the program was interrupted. I don’t know the reasoning behind it, but I suspect all of the double shifts the CO’s have been pulling are starting to take their toll. The razor program was cancelled along with the posting of the transport list. Today, one of the CO’s was fast asleep while sitting in plain sight behind the podium, and it was only noontime. I guess they can only take so many 16 hour shifts regardless of how good the overtime may be. The human body can only take so much sleep deprivation before giving out. Maybe these programs were cancelled for other reasons, but the CO’s have become noticeably irritable.

Because the transport list was not posted last evening, another one of the perks of being in the kitchen had surfaced. The CO’s who are assigned to the kitchen have the master transpack list. As soon as the kitchen workers, entered they went right to the office to look at the list. I was not interested because I have yet to see my counselor and in order to get on the list one must be seen. More on this facet later~ back to the transport list in the kitchen~ many of the kitchen workers were on this list. In fact, four of the six on the ovens are moving on to their next destination in a few days. This means I will have the most seniority (a whole 2 weeks) on the ovens next week, and my “oven man” status has become official. The CO in the kitchen who decides on the position list wrote “ovens” in my ID card so I guess I won’t be jumping back and forth between the front line and the back kitchen. I sure hope it doesn’t mean I have to work the grills and possibly fry eggs because I may have a problem with this. I will know definitely next Sunday because that is “fried egg” day and by this time everyone who has prepared these eggs in the past will be gone.

This morning’s menu was very simple. It consisted of cornmeal mush, cinnamon rolls, banana, toast, and milk. Another good thing (this may depend on your point of view, but I consider it a good thing) about working in the back kitchen is that I get to see the ingredients of the prepackaged menu items. I was able to inspect the cinnamon rolls because I was curious how this could be part of a good breakfast. Much to my surprise, these cinnamon rolls were identical to the kind I used to purchase in the health food store. It is made from whole grains and has very little fat in it. I guess this is a far cry form Cinnabon, but it made me happy to see this because it meant I could eat something different. It was very tasty not only by my standards, but by the way all the other inmates devoured their portions. It was very filling and I have no idea how these guys can eat more than one, yet some ate four and five! I was also impressed that the prison system slipped in some whole grains without sacrificing on taste. I was also impressed to see the inmates adding their peanut butter packet to the cinnamon roll. I was not adventurous enough to try this and the roll was filling enough without the peanut butter. Oh, the things I learn in prison~ I had no idea that peanut butter could compliment a cinnamon roll, but apparently it does.

After finishing up in the kitchen ahead of schedule, a few other inmates and myself went to the main kitchen to help load one of the trucks. The supervisors were taking loaves of bread, cartons of milk, and cases of apples to another area of the prison and they needed help loading. It appears that my “hand-truck-jack skills” were a little rusty from my days of working in the grocery store some 25 years ago. I had to maneuver the jack in a confined space and it took awhile to get the steering correct. I was able to maneuver it and load the apples onto the truck without incident. Unfortunately, as the four of us were helping out in the main kitchen, the CO was giving the rest of the crew new sneakers. By the time we were done, they had run out of my size and believe me I could use a new pair. Oh, well, maybe there will be more next week.

We did finish up and it was time to go back to the dorm. The weekends are much easier getting through the “checkpoint” because the regular CO is off duty. His replacement is much more lenient when it comes to bringing across food items. The regular CO does not allow anything to come across and confiscates all food items. He throws out the individual packets of coffee, peanut butter, jelly, and syrup. Today I was able to bring across two packets of peanut butter which will add to my peanut butter “stash” especially when lunch offers those horrible lunch meat packets.

When I arrived back at the dorm, I was interested to see if there would be any counselors visiting today. Much to my chagrin, they did not come in today and hopefully they will be here on Monday. I was hoping to see my counselor because as I reported earlier this week, I hit the one month mark. Most or rather the majority of the inmates do see their counselor around the one month mark and are moved 2 to 3 weeks later. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule and some inmates have gone 3 months without seeing one. I was certainly hoping not to be an exception, but based on my past history with so many delays on my case, nothing would surprise me. Of course, it will be disappointing, but at this stage it certainly would be par for the course. I am not in panic mode as of yet. I still have until next Friday before I become concerned. Next Friday will be the sixth week that I am here. If I don’t see the counselor by then, I will put in a request as to the status and hopefully there will be a response. The last time I put in a request was at the county jail asking when I will be transferred and low and behold, I was transferred within the day. I am still not sure whether it had anything to do with the transfer or whether it was purely coincidental. With any luck, I won’t have to fill out a request because it appears the counselors want inmates transferred as soon as possible.

I looked at the transpack list and counted 22 names plus the 19 names from last week. This is almost a 30% turnover in the overall dorm inmate population. This tells me that the prison officials certainly need the bed space for the incoming inmates. It must be a nightmare scheduling the moves in and out of this place because there are so many variables in the equation. These all boil down to one variable – availability. If there is any on the next level beyond the reception center, the inmates move, otherwise they stay here. I do hope I don’t have to wait too long because I really want to hear my wife’s voice very soon.

Seeing that there were no counselors, I started my morning workout. With the weather decidedly cooler, it took much longer to get a sweat going. When I finished the workout, the sweat seemed to dissipate quite quickly. This made taking the cold shower intolerable. The hot water is still not turned on and with the cooler weather, the shower is downright freezing! I tried to grin and bear it, but I just couldn’t do it. I decided to improvise again and get the bucket from the utility closet so I could take a “bird bath”.

First off, I was very surprised no one else had thought of this because the other inmates in the shower were complaining quite vociferously about the cold water. Second, the the faucet in the utility closet offers hot water so I filled the bucket and brought it to the shower area for my “bird bath”. The water felt great and I was able to wash my hair and entire body without freezing. I’ll continue these baths until the hot water is turned on which is supposed to be this week. Apparently more than one person formally complained and the prison has 72 hours to remedy the situation or they will be in serious trouble. This should mean it will be turned on by Tuesday. When I was taking a shower yesterday before the “bird bath” idea came to me, there were a few other inmates in there commenting on how the shower situation can be construed as “cruel and unusual punishment”. They went on further to say the terrorists who are incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba have hot water in their showers.