Cream Beef

For the second evening in a row I stayed back in the dormitory during dinner. I had no desire to get cheese for dinner as was stated on the menu on the “alternative entrée”. It certainly does appear American cheese has taken over as the vegetarian choice from peanut butter. Interesting that this has occurred in the New Year, maybe it has something to do with cost. I would be very interested to see the nutritional value of American cheese versus peanut butter. I do know peanut butter does not contain any cholesterol which is a positive over the American cheese. From my perspective it appears peanut butter would be a better alternative over the American cheese but hey what do I know. Also, my meals are decided for me so I have little choice. I am fortunate to be in a position to make my own food. Last night I did make my own food of rice and beans. The rice was whole grain rice and the beans were dried but didn’t taste half bad. The beans were spicy Refried Pinto Beans. I usually don’t like refried beans of any type but these beans did not have the refried taste which is a good thing. I did make enough of the rice and beans where I ate most of it out of my bowl and I was also able to make my own rice and bean burrito. I was indeed full after I ate my dinner.

I had a scheduled 7:45 pm telephone call last night but that was shot with the unannounced “flip-flop” of the yard. I did not go outside last night because my tier only had afternoon yard making my scheduled telephone call useless. After my “homemade” dinner I started yet another James Patterson novel, “Lifeguard.” I need to mention that this book also has a co-author Andrew Gross. Apparently, Mr. Patterson has published several other novels with a few co-authors. He has written other novels with Andrew Gross in the past such as 3rd Degree, 2nd Chance, Judge & Jury, and The Jester. Even though this novel (Lifeguard) was written with a co-author and is not an “Alex Cross” (James Patterson lead character) novel, it is just like many of the other Patterson novels because it is filled with action and extremely fast paced. I only read for a few hours but got through the novel. It was very difficult to put it down but I know I had to go to sleep. I did put it down as I went to sleep at 10:30 pm.

I woke up at 5:00 am but didn’t get out of my bunk until 30 minutes later. Today being Tuesday meant I had to get my sheets and laundry together. I stripped my bunk and kept my one good sheet and turned in the other two. I have discovered the more sheets I have on my bunk the more comfortable it is. I have not done what many of my dorm mates have done to their mattress which is secure four or five sheets permanently to it. My dorm mates tightly wrap the mattress with these sheets and tie them with a ripped sheet. It truly is a large production but I am happy with tying my sheets together and getting fresh ones each week. I was thinking about taking an open mattress which had five sheets permanently affixed to it but I hesitated too long and the bunk was filled the next day. (By the was I am still waiting for my new mattress which I requested 2 months ago but all is well ever since I received the 2nd mattress.) I am in the process of accumulating more sheets because this seems to work best for me. I completed this ritual and went to the television area in order to watch the morning news. I did watch 1 hour of the news and ever since “Heroes” went on hiatus a month ago this hour is the only time I watch television all day. Again, I was interested to see something on the alleged new sentencing guidelines but there wasn’t any information on it. There was something about prisons which wasn’t very good because there was a race riot in a prison located in Southern California (Chino). Apparently according to the report 50 inmates were injured in this riot which occurred last Saturday (December 30th). Also, it appears up to 800 inmates were involved and it took 2 hours for the prison guards to control the situation. Thank goodness I am not located at the prison because I certainly can do without that type of excitement.

It was onto breakfast where I had to request my vegetarian tray because the main entrée was creamed beef. I am not sure but sometimes it takes a few minutes for me to receive a tray without the creamed beef and nothing else added to it. Today was one of those days and by the time I arrived at the table my usual table mate was almost finished with his breakfast. I was surprised he was still eating. I guess he slowed down on my account! I did receive the requisite two tubes of peanut butter (I guess the American cheese wasn’t readily available!) with my breakfast tray. I mixed one tube of peanut butter into the grits and as I was eating them when I tasted something that didn’t taste like grits or peanut butter. Apparently, a stray morsel of cream beef slipped into my grits and I did not notice it until I placed it in my mouth. I actually did swallow this stray piece and I almost gagged. (Yes, I am a “psycho” when it comes to food!) I did my best to wash away this awful taste by drinking all of the skim milk and grape juice but I could still taste it. I examined very closely the remainder of the grits and found 3 other small pieces. After finding these I couldn’t eat anymore grits and I was done with the breakfast. I am sure it is in my head but I had that awful taste in my throat all morning. It truly did ruin my appetite most of the day. During the PFT Plus in the morning as I was performing the exercises I still couldn’t get this taste out. At one point during the class I really thought (yes, I know I have a problem) I was going to throw up and it had nothing to do with the exercises and all to do with that horrible taste. Somehow after running 8 miles and doing 2 PFT Plus classes this taste finally was exorcised from my system, thankfully.

When I returned to the dormitory I had prepared my bunk and locker area for inspection. Inspections have been postponed for all of December due to the Holidays and weather issues. Today the weekly inspection was back on which meant I had to take down all the clothes lines on my bunk and clean off the top of the locker. It appears to be a pointless exercise because once the inspection is complete back goes the clotheslines and the things on top of the locker only to be taken down next week. I guess this is an example of who really is in charge and it is certainly their rules. I do follow the rules because I don’t want any issues whatsoever. After preparing for the inspection I waited for the morning unlock in order to do the PFT Plus class. From some unknown reason the unlock came 30 minutes late but it did come. Interestingly enough the “Coach” was out in the yard prior to the unlock because he had returned from his vacation. There has been an on-going controversy since the PFT class ended last Friday as to whether or not the students had passed the class. There have been all kinds of rumors circulating since last Friday and me being an Instructor, received countless questions in the past 3 days. (Brief re-cap; a substitute “Coach” granted the students a semi-test last Friday, according to the substitute coach he was satisfied with all the students performance and would see if the Administration would accept the results.) Now with the regular coach back I was hoping those rumors would be put to rest.

The Coach did speak with all of the Instructors after the PFT Plus class and filled us in on the latest. According to the Coach all of the students in the PFT class failed and will return this Friday for a new 9 day class. This failure was at the request of the substitute Coach and a supervisor not the Administration. (There is a back story to all of this and to briefly discuss the substitute Coach and the regular Coach do not get along – enough said.) Apparently the substitute Coach took it upon himself to advise a supervisor that every student should fail because they did not complete a full test. This is very unfortunate because it was he who cut out a significant portion of the test. The students appear caught in the middle of something that is very wrong. The regular Coach is urging another supervisor that he should re-test the students prior to Friday and see who passes. This option makes the most sense and will at least give the students a chance at passing. Otherwise it will be another 2 plus weeks before the students test. This also has trickle down ramifications to all of the other inmates (like me) who are waiting to get into a PFT class. This would mean I would not get into a PFT class until at the earliest February. This is critical because I need to be officially in one class in order to move on to fire camp. The sooner I get to fire camp the sooner I get to be with my family. On the bright side with all these delays I am approaching my four month commitment so I can indeed select the fire camp I would prefer to attend. Another positive would be, if I do indeed pick the fire camp my wait time will be diminished significantly after I finish the Firefighter Training session. Whatever is the case I do firmly believe everything will work out for the best because it has so far.

The regular Coach had an air of disappointment in all his mannerisms as he spoke with us. Unfortunately the Coach has a bad reputation with the regular inmates because of his demanding nature. If they could have seen him speak during this meeting I know many of them would change their minds. The Coach was doing everything in his power to help the students and his number one priority is the students. The decision appears to be out of his hands and now it is just a wait and see what happens. I did find myself passing the information I learned in this meeting to many of my fellow inmates who were in the class. They were very disappointed for obvious reasons but as I explained I certainly have a bias for the regular Coach. I believe this information will change the perception of the coach but all in all it was a sad day for these students. I do hope common sense prevails and the right decisions are made.

When the meeting was concluded I needed to start my morning workout with my legs feeling good, I did run 7 miles. I didn’t concentrate on my stop watch for once and ran within myself for the first 5 miles. The last 2 miles I felt very strong and ran much faster. It was once again a good run and I did want to rid my body of that horrendous taste of cream beef. The last 2 miles I got a great sweat working which helped but the taste still lingered. I went back to the dormitory for lunch and could only muster eating a Nutri-Grain bar and nothing else. I read a few chapters of “Lifeguard” and went back outside for the afternoon session of PFT Plus class. Once again just like the morning I did all the exercises in the class. Strangely enough after a fairly strenuous morning workout I made it through the class without working up a sweat. I believe my body continues to build up a tolerance to sweat and when I have a “sweaty” session earlier I have a much more difficult time sweating later. I do sometimes feel a bit awkward because many of the inmates in the class are sweating profusively at the end of the class and I look like I haven’t done anything. Hopefully it doesn’t discourage anyone to continue trying their best. Once the class was finished I headed toward the pill call line in hopes of receiving the protein drink. I waited 35 minutes and when I reached the window I was told they were still out of the protein drinks. This is getting very discouraging and at some point I may just give up but I will continue to try. I would like to make an appointment with the doctor and inform him about the low supply of the drinks because I am sure he is unaware. However, there is so much red tape to cut through and I am sure I would ruffle some feathers by telling the doctor. I will sit tight and play it by ear and when it gets to the ridiculous stage I may do something.

I finished my workout session by doing 20 minutes worth of push-ups. I have noticed my upper body strength training so I did about 400 good push-ups in this 20 minute period. It is so easy to cheat while doing push-ups which is why I concentrate on perfect form. This makes a huge difference and although I only do sets of 10 it truly is a great exercise. While I was doing the push-ups an inmate came up to me and asked yet another question regarding the PFT class. As always I was cordial and answered the questions to the best of my ability. I don’t mind being asked these questions but sometimes the training is not so great especially when I am exercising so I must remind myself to be nice. I do try but sometimes my words may seem more abrupt than usual and I must be aware of this at all times. The push-up session had ended and I was just in time for the preferred 2:45 pm unlock. I did wait a few minutes for the unlock and as I waited one of my newer dorm mates asked me - rather told me I run flat footed. I was sort of setback by this comment because no one has ever said this to me and I have an extremely high arch which is the opposite of a flat foot. My response was, “Really I have never heard this before”. Then he went on to describe how I run. I may not have minded this so much if another Instructor had told me this but this new dorm mate is older than me, is slightly overweight and wears a bright yellow jacket with the letter “Mobility Impaired” printed on it. Normally I would have blown this off and thought nothing of it but I couldn’t. I then proceeded to explain to him the proper long distancing running form is having the heel strike the ground first followed by the toe and it may seem like flat foot running but it certainly is not. After I explained this he just said “Oh” and we went into the dormitory.

As I thought about this interaction I know I still have a long way to go with my character defects. I may have patience in some areas but other areas I need to get better. This is one of those areas especially when I feel “superior” which I am not. I need to be much nicer and exhibit more patience at all times. Each day is a learning experience and I do continue to learn. Now I need to apply these learning experiences to my daily affairs. Thank God for my recovery because without it I would be on the wrong path which I am not. All of this may seem simple and mundane but it is crucial in order for me to live life with a positive purpose. I try each day to live this way and I am thankful for each day.