Class pics

Class 2-09

almost Ensign Knauss

Alfa 3 (Dan's platoon)

Report Date

We don't have the actual orders yet, but do have a report date. June 8th...or maybe June 9th. Dan was told Tuesday June 8th, but the 8th is a Monday and usually for flight school report dates are on Tuesdays. Once we get the orders then we can schedule the movers and deal with the housing situation.

Dan's great week!

As most of you probably know by now (and everyone who heard me scream in Target), we are headed to Pensacola for flight school! No idea when the report date will be. Official orders probably won't be out for a while yet. We are more than thrilled and ready to have our family back together. Landon is also excited to know that he will be seeing Riley again soon.

Thursday I flew up here to try to clear out the clutter in the house and also spend some time with Dan as long as liberty was granted. We got to spend yesterday afternoon and most of today together before I had to give him back. For the first time in a long time we went to a nice dinner last night (went to a fine dining place at the Mohegan Sun casino) and this afternoon we saw a movie. Very odd for us to be without the boys, but nice at the same time.

This morning just as we checked out of the hotel Dan received a phone call from a weird number. It was someone from USAA calling to tell him he won an iPod Touch in a drawing! USAA was on campus yesterday giving the OC's information about a special loan they offer to newly commissioned Officers and had several prizes you could enter a drawing for.

So all in all the past few days have gone very well for Dan, and our family. I am so proud of him for continuing to not give up as he strived towards his dream. It will be a great lesson to teach our boys as they get older that if you really want something and continue to persevere it will happen.

I did take a few pictures, not as many as I would have liked due to the nasty weather. Hopefully tomorrow after our pre-move inspection is complete I'll be able to post a few!

Eagle Update

22 Mar 2009

Sailing to the southeast under lower topsails, the foretopmast staysail, the main topmast staysail, and the mizzen topmast staysail. Weather: Winds southwesterly at 20 knots, seas 3-5 feet.

Thanks to the miracle of the internal combustion engine, we were able to make significant progress to the north (and directly into the teeth of a 25 knot wind) on Saturday and Saturday night. This will allow us to sail a bit more before mooring the ship at the end of our OCS training cruise. This afternoon, EAGLE conducted a progressive wear, which means the ship turned onto the opposite tack (similar to a jibe in a small sailboat). The catch was that it was accomplished with only 25 people, while everyone else enjoyed some time below decks on their "day off."
The progressive wear is a sailing maneuver which uses just the "watch on deck" or the personnel normally assigned during a given watch to trim sail. It takes about 2 hours, but the watch on deck will progressively turn the ship around by bracing yards, dousing and re-setting sail, and giving slow rudder commands. It is an impressive maneuver, and something that today's watch on deck can be proud of.
The wind is blowing a near-gale, the sun is shining, and EAGLE's lower sails are filling beautifully as we knock off miles under the keel at a fairly rapid rate.

Eagle tracking

Here's a site that shows where the Eagle is.

http://www.sailwx.info/shiptrack/shipposition.phtml?call=NRCB

Eagle updates

These are from a site the Eagle has where they periodically do updates. It's actually through Facebook and you can't access it unless you have a FB account. Don't worry, it's not OPSEC violations to be posting!

Saturday March 14th:

Tonight we welcomed aboard the current Officer Candidate School class to EAGLE for their afloat training cruise. We will be getting underway within the next few days for a short sail off the east coast of the US, introducing these future officers to life at sea. It is an exciting time for the EAGLE crew because this is the first training cruise of 2009: time to get in gear for the sailing season!

with that update there were a few pictures, but none that included Dan.

Tuesday March 17th:

Underway from Little Creek, bound for points east and eventually New London. Weather: Northeasterly winds 20 knots and seas of 5-7ft. We were able to get underway from Little Creek today with OCS class 02-09 onboard and everyone is excited to get sailing.
After a bit of rain and wind, we cleared the sea buoy and set 5 sails: the inner jib, the fore topmast staysail, the main topmast staysail, the mizzen topmast staysail and the lower mizzen sail. Does that confuse you? If so, you can get a taste of what our OCS class is dealing with.
Learning the "language of the job" is something that all Coasties must deal with, whether they will eventually work in Aviation, Afloat Operations, Response, Incident Management, or Support jobs. By stressing our future leaders' brains and cramming in as much lingo as possible, we accomplish two goals:
1) We breed better tall ship sailors. By the end of their week aboard, OCS class 02-09 will be able to virtually sail the EAGLE by themselves. As cool as that is, it's not the main reason...
2) We prepare these young men and women (who will be ensigns in a matter of weeks) to learn and adapt by the "fire hose" method. When they report to their first unit as a commissioned officer, they are going to have a very short amount of time to "get up to speed" on their job and their role in the organization. By experiencing a bit of that aboard EAGLE, we hopefully set them up for success upon graduation.
In the near future, we'll continue to operate east of the mid-Atlantic states and conduct training. The sunset tonight was beautiful...it's great to be a sailor!

Wednesday March 18th:

Underway east of Virginia motoring in search of wind. Weather: Southerly winds at 3-5 knots and clear skies. We braced our yards on a starboard tack in the hopes that the wind will fill in from the south this afternoon. Unfortunately, we are only seeing puffs of wind occasionally, but we do believe it will blow a bit stronger overnight so we can put up some canvas.
Our training program is progressing well; today some OC's learned a bit about Celestial Navigation and charting fundamentals, while others donned Fire Fighting Ensembles to learn about shipboard damage control. Everyone also takes a turn in the galley or the scullery washing dishes, because it takes a lot of work to feed 180 people!
Hopefully the wind cooperates....

Friday the 13th=GREAT day!

Today was base camp day (you can see part of last class' on that video)
Here is a blurb from Dan's e-mail tonight:

Base camp day was pretty cool. Instead of a recording of reveille played on a bugle, we were instead awoken to Guns N Roses "Welcome to the Jungle" and brought out into the passageway indoc week style, except a whole lot less serious and stressful. They beat us lightly, and joked around a little bit. We teased some of the other platoons too. My favorite part was when they had us do jumping jacks while sounding off "Mr. Tanksley is compensating # sir!" (He is the alfa 2 platoon officer and we are in alfa 3). All the while, there is other music playing in the background, like highway to the danger zone, the theme from caddyshack, everybody wants to rule the world, message in a bottle, etc. It was pretty funny. Then we got ready and went and took our prog. Everyone passed. I got an 86. Not great, but right around where everyone else did. It was a hard test. Then we had drill competition. Since I wasn't competing, I went ahead and just took pictures, since the majority of the company spent the entire thing in parade rest. It was nice to be able to move freely and all. Then we had base camp day. Made fun of the staff officers, played some games, ate some food, etc. Then the privileges. We were granted senior status. There are a few perks associated with that, I don't remember them all. We were granted the freedom to take our eyes out of the boat, not square corners, and swing our arms in the passageway of chase hall. AND WE GOT CELL PHONES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But we can't use them until tomorrow.

I didn't write about it, but earlier in the week (Tuesday I believe) they were playing capture the flag. Dan got run over by another OC and caught his face and throat were hit pretty hard by the OC's shoulder and elbow. They sent Dan to medical where he was given meds, told he has some nerve damage, and was told not to sound off or talk much. He called last night and sounded pretty bad, but he said it was a big improvement from how it was. Because he wasn't able to sound off he couldn't compete in the drill competition today. It was the top 3 people from each company and he had been selected to be one from his company.

Tomorrow they will be bused down to Virginia to meet up with the Eagle. Then Monday they will set sail back to New London and arrive the following Monday, the 23rd. Dan has earned individual liberty for Sunday as long as he doesn't have duty, which they won't know until later. It seems like he's looking forward to getting off campus and doing something new.

They will not have e-mails or anything while on the Eagle, but when they get back and he lets me know how it went I'll update then.

Video from Class 1-09

Here are some videos from the last class, thought I'd pass them along if anyone else is interested!


Coast Guard OCS Class 1-09 from Zachary Wiest on Vimeo.

Week 8 HPR Test

Dan had the first half of his HPR (Health & Physical Readiness) test today. He improved a bit over week 1's test. Here is what he said about it:

I just got back from the PT test. I improved a decent bit in every area. I got 10:39 in the run, an improvement of 45 seconds. That was 56 points. I got 37 push ups, an improvement of 8, for 71 points, and I got somewhere between 83 and 87 sit-ups (I honestly can't remember exactly) but they are good for a point apiece. In any case, I am already well over the minimum standard of 240, even if I do the absolute minimum on the swim. I think I will pick up some extra time there as well though, but we will see tomorrow. I am feeling pretty good about it right now though.

So right now he has 210-214 points and 240 is passing.

Pictures!

Dan mailed me a DVD full of pictures and also a few video clips. There are 963 pics (I cut out about 400 of them, just duplicates, too blurry, dark, etc) so I'm not about to put them all on here. You can check them out here: http://picasaweb.google.com/jan2009ocspics/ They are in 2 albums because each one can only hold 500. I'll get the video clips up shortly!

2.23.09

Dan called tonight so this is a compilation of things he told me tonight and e-mails over the past few days.
The OCs had a big test yesterday. It was one of the 4 must pass tests in order to graduate. If they want to go afloat they had to score a 90+ or passing was 70. Dan got an 84. So while we can't say we're disappointed he won't be going on a boat, he was hoping for a little better for his academic average. Today he passed his survival swim test with 100/100. He told me over the weekend what all it involved, but it was a lot and I can't remember. 12 minutes worth of swimming, diving, picking up bricks, etc. He also had his flight school interview today. It went well and they seemed to like that he is interested in fixed wings (there is a shortage for fixed wing pilots in the CG right now). We're still a month out from billet night so keep your fingers crossed! Dan said he put a package in the mail to me yesterday that contains all of the pictures and videos taken so far as well as a calendar of their tests, etc for the rest of the time there. Hopefully I'll get that sometime this week and will post what I can.

2.18.09

Dan sent an e-mail tonight along with a few more pictures.

He is re-thinking the original plan we had for his dream sheet. As of now, this is how it stands...

1-Flight School
2-Gulf Strike Team (Mobile)
3-Sector Prevention St Pete
4-Sec Prev Mobile
5-Sec Prev Jax

So basically GST jumped from towards the bottom to the top. He says it would be a great resume builder and he's going to talk to his advisor and see what she thinks. Lists aren't due for a while yet, so there's time for more changes. He told me to do some research and let him know what I think, so that's what I've already started doing.

Dan says...

I de-briefed my OOD duty day finally yesterday, and Chief said I did a god job, and I got pretty decent marks for it so I am happy.

--pics deleted--

Pictures from Dan

Today when Dan called I asked if he could send some more pictures. Apparently even though the camera he is using is USCG issued for security reasons they do not allow the pics to be transferred to the computers with a USB cord. Thankfully one of the guys (who I'm friends with his wife) has a laptop. So they transfer the pics to the laptop then burn CDs to upload to the USCG computers.

--pics deleted--

Shopping List

The shopping list came out today! But it was released pretty late in the day. Dan called for just a few minutes to give me his top choices. They should have an electronic copy soon which he'll send on my way.

First choice is obviously flight school, but if those fall through here's what we're looking at (in no particular order)

Sector prevention (The Prevention Department consists of three divisions. Inspections Division manages and oversees the regulatory and inspection aspects of the Coast Guard’s safety, security, and environmental protection responsibilities for vessels and facilities. Waterways Management Division controls aids to navigation; safety and security zones; Regulated Navigation Areas; ice breaking; and VTS and AIS. Investigations Division initiates inquiries into marine casualties, pollution, boating violations, and assessment of civil penalties.)
-St Petersburg
-Jacksonville
-Mobile
-Miami

District Miami and Command center duty

Sector response (The Response Department addresses SAR, pollution, and all hazards via its Incident Management Division. Enforcement Division enforces all laws and treaties and carries out PWCS enforcement activities, such as armed boardings, vessel escorts and security zone enforcement. This division works closely with federal, state, and local law enforcement and sister agencies within the DHS to respond to and mitigate the impact of maritime threats.)
-Jacksonville
-Miami
-Key West

Gulf Strike Team in Mobile (The GST is one of 3 Special Teams that make up the National Strike Force. It is a vital national asset comprised of a unique, highly trained cadre of Coast Guard professionals who maintain and rapidly deploy with specialized equipment and incident management skills any time to any place or hazard.)

Pics and e-mail news

Just received an e-mail from Dan. Here's a blurb from it...

Today was career day. A whole day in the class, but nothing was testable. They invited in a bunch of officers from a bunch of different career fields to talk. Two cape cod falcon pilots were among the speakers. Then we had a very relaxed evening reception where they and our instructors answered questions and were nice and helpful. It was almost surreal in a way. And there was a cash bar too. I had a beer, I won't lie. Anyway, it was a nice, but surreal day.

--pics deleted--

Small update

Monday Dan had OOD duty. Late that night he sent me a brief e-mail saying his day was very long and so far hadn't received any demerits. Then Tues morning he sent me another quick one, about 5:30am just saying he was in the watch office waiting for everyone to come back from morning work out and had gotten about 3hrs of sleep.

Last night he called, just for about 5 minutes. He had a ton of paperwork stuff to do because of OOD but got it submitted and today he was scheduled to meet with the guy who was in charge while he was OOD to go over his performance. Hopefully not get any demerits along the way!

Not much to report on but thought I'd pass that little bit along.

Phone call 02.08.09

Dan made his weekly Sunday morning call today. I got a short e-mail from him last night saying he would be calling.

Friday they had a test and he scored an 88, so he has an 89 average. He said he's in the upper part of the class.

The camera he was assigned to take photos with is missing the cord to upload them to the computers. He thinks the one he has in his car will work so later today he's going to try to get it and upload some pics. If he has a chance he'll send them on and I can put some up.

This coming Friday the shopping list comes out. It's basically a list of all available jobs for his class to pick from. But Billet Night isn't until March 26th so we'll have plenty of time to research and come up with our 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc choices (1st obviously being flight school). He had his flight physical this past week. The Officer flt phys is different than the Enlisted one. He passed it just fine though. Tomorrow is the deadlines for the memos to be turned in requesting flight school, but he already turned his in. He feels pretty good about his qualifications compared to many of the others who are interested but there are about 20-25 who do want flight school.

The class put in a request to be granted 1 cell phone call next Friday to go over the shopping list with their spouses instead of 90 people trying to use 4 pay phones. He said they could possibly keep the privilege but usually it's not granted until later.

Mail runs don't get made every day. It's based on the duty officer and what they say so sometimes it'll be several days inbetween receiving any mail even if it's there they just can't have it.

He hasn't had much time for e-mails or anything, but said after tomorrow should have more time available. (Steve, he said he got one from you this morning and would try to reply but still had stuff to do first). Tomorrow he will be standing OOD Duty (Officer of the Day). Basially means he'll be the top OC in the barracks. While their everyday uniform is the usual ODU, he will be wearing the Bravos because he's OOD.

This coming week's class schedule looks like it is mostly geard to a career week type of thing. They will be learning different Officer career paths so they know more about them when the shopping list comes out on Friday.

I think I mentioned before how Dan said he was drinking coffee in the mornings. He said they're also allowed sodas but it usually isn't available in the mornings.

His cold is mostly gone and he's feeling better. He sounded good also. Landon and Logan both spoke briefly with him too in the beginning of the call. That's about all from today!

E-MAIL!!!!!!

Dan just sent me an e-mail! They earned them this week, yahoo!!!

He says to feel free to flood his inbox! OC.OCSNEW41@uscg.mil is the e-mail address.

He said he would try to send some pictures this weekend once he gets the right cords to upload the pics. Also on Tues when he called he mentioned he hadn't gotten to write a letter this past week to anyone (even me). But hopefully with e-mail communication will be more frequent and with everyone!

Phone call!!! 02.03.09

I got an unexpected call from Dan tonight!!! Apparently he had a 2nd phone card there so used even though he used the other one on Sunday he could call again. I wasn't expecting a call at all since I just put a new card in the mail yesterday (for some reason the old one wasn't letting me recharge it).

It was a somewhat brief call. He said since I asked him to call more when he had 15min until taps he decided to give it a try. We basically discussed the boys and how they were doing. I told him tonight we did our pizza and movie night that we used to do once a week for the first time since coming down here. Talked briefly about graduation plans. He got a lot of mail yesterday. It seems to go in spurts even though I mail them out usually every other day. He didn't get a chance to write on Sunday, but I reminded him to write others besides just me so maybe soon he'll get a chance. He's hoping they'll earn e-mail this Friday but only time will tell.

That's about all for tonight!

Phone Call 02.01.09!

Dan called this morning! We talked for a good 20 minutes again like last Sunday. We ended the call because there was 1 minute left on the phone card. I got him a new one last night though (for some reason I couldn't recharge his, he may have given me the wrong info from it).

I took a few notes this time, so hopefully I can do a better job remembering what all was discussed.

There are now 87 people in the class and 91 people began. 1 went home due to family emergency but will be attending the next class. 2 were sent home because of weight issues. The 1st person gone was the female from Cape Cod that got picked up. No one could really believe she was accepted in the first place though so it didn't come as a huge shock.

Dan is 1 of 3 photographers for the class. He was issued a camera and has to have it with him all the time to take pictures of what is going on. Once he gets email he will be able to send pictures. I will be certain to post any that he sends my way! There is also a videographer for the class, I talk with his wife quite a bit.

He gave me a breakdown of their typical schedule.
5am-wake up
Workout
6am-back to shower, get dressed
6:40-formation and breakfast
7-back from breakfast (so only 20 min to get everyone in formation, food, and once everyone is seated they can eat)
7:15-inspection
7:30-11:30-class
lunch
12:30-4:30-class
dinner
30 minutes to cleanup
study phase 1-silent desk work or computer lab
Drill for 1 hour. If it is sunny they will go outside for it.
9-9:30-Study Phase 2-Where they can iron, shine boots, write letters, make phone calls, etc
9:30-10-Taps 2-Continute tasks from Study Phase 2 but may also shower
10-Taps

He said he has right at 100 demerits which is about the average. They hand them out in chunks like 15 or 25 at a time, so he hasn't gotten in trouble 100 times. Yesterday he received 15 because some of the members of his group were late for something so even though he was on time it's a teamwork thing.

There are 3 platoons in the company and he is the 3rd guy in his company. He holds the flag and is also incharge of sorting mail. His is in the lead academically and they've also won 2/3 drill competitions. On Monday they had their first test and he got a 90 and said he thinks that is right about par with everyone else but can't say for sure.

This past week they did a type of corporate teamwork training. He said they all had to use each other's first names which threw everyone off but it was a nice change up in what they had been doing.

Next week his memo requesting flight school is due and he is planning on working on it today. A pilot from ASCC had given Dan a copy of his memo that he wrote before Dan left to give him a guideline of what to do and what worked for him.

Billet night will be the night they return from the Eagle cruise. It is in mid-March but Dan couldn't remember off the top of his head the exact date.

Soon they will be buying their swords and dress whites. Today he's going to the BX to buy some new pants, his current ones have gotten too big. He knows the 1st week he lost 3 pounds but isn't sure since then but it's obviously been a bit if he's needing smaller pants already.

Landon didn't want to talk to Daddy but Logan was very eager too. He heard Dan's voice on the phone and started saying "Dada Dada Dada" and reaching for the phone. He misses everyone but is happy it's already February. Can hardly count May as him being gone since I'll be up there and seeing him a few days before grad anyways.

I think that's about all! He won't be able to call again until he gets the new phone card so if he gets a chance it won't be until the end of the week or weekend.



Adding a few hours later...Oh yeah, almost forgot, he said they earned caffeine on Friday! So in the mornings he has been having a cup of coffee with breakfast. Neither one of us have ever been coffee drinkers. We have a coffee pot only for when we have company lol. I told him not to go changing too much on me :)

Letter from Dan

As much as I want to start singing the Blue's Clues song about getting a letter, I'll refrain :)

The mailman (lady?) was nice today. Finally brought a package Dan sent me back on Jan 7th and a letter from him!

The letter was written Sunday night after I had talked to him earlier in the day. So not really much to report, but there are a few things worth mentioning.

I had mentioned on the phone to Dan that we have a countdown going. He said on the portals with all the class information is a countdown until the exact hour of graduation. There are computers in their room, but at the time not working, so he was looking forward to having them available to get more work done. He does have an e-mail address there, but is not yet allowed to use it for personal use. If anyone gets anything from OCSnew41@uscg.mil that is his e-mail there. But do NOT write to him unless you get something from him first or hear the a-ok from me. Their e-mail is monitored and would hate for anything to happen which would push back the date they'll be allowed to use it for personal reasons. There is a good chance that on Friday (tomorrow) they will be given this privilege.

He said their first big test was Monday and he was expecting it to be pretty easy. Things that the prior enlisted people should know in their sleep like rates, ranks, shipboard nomenclature, vessels, and aircraft.

Dan seems a little down about missing Logan's birthday and mentions how much he has changed over the past few months and how much more he will change by the time he seems us again. I've been trying to send him pictures to keep him up to speed on some of those things and write everyday with anything new that's happened.

Last Sunday when we talked he said he would try to call tomorrow (Fri) on Logan's birthday and if he was unable to then he was going to try to call during the party on Saturday. So hopefully if he calls on Sat he has a little bit of time and we can pass the phone around some.

Phone Call 1.25.09

I received a letter from Dan on Friday, but it was just a recap of the first 4 days and had talked to him twice since then. So there wasn't anything new to report.

Dan called this morning though! We got to talk for 20 minutes, so I'll do my best to remember what all was said. It's one of those things where you have a lot to say, then you forget when the time comes and you get off the phone and your mind sorta blanks out again.

Dan said that so far things are going well. The classwork is easy and pretty basic. He has 2 new roommates, they change every 2 weeks. They are both snorers so Dan's had some trouble getting sleep. They get woken up at 5am, workout, eat, class work, lunch, class, etc until taps at 10pm. He said once they get e-mail to the outside world (right now they have it just within the company) he'll send me his schedule and some other info. He's a little worried what is going to happen this week because apparently some of the other OCs are having trouble remembering not to talk in the Wardroom and other little things like that. They usually take away/grant privileges on Fridays so hopefully it's not too bad since they were able to keep phone priviliges. A lot of other OCs have been calling home frequently which I asked him about. He said when other shipmates need help with something he's been stepping up to help and be a team player. That's good to hear. I told him from day 1 I'd rather him take care of stuff there then worry about trying to call me for a few minutes. This class will be sailing on the Eagle (sometimes they take other ships this time of year). It looks like the beginning of March they will be flying to Norfolk to meet up with the Eagle then go from there. The cruise is usually about 2 weeks long.

Landon talked briefly to Daddy, we were just sitting down to breakfast when he called. Logan was in the background jabbering.

Dan said he'll try to call on Friday during the day since it's Logan's birthday. If he is unable to then he'll try again on Saturday during the party. Hopefully it will be like today where we had a bit of time because no one else was in line waiting to use a phone and maybe we can pass him around a little.

Next time I'll have to have a list of things to talk about and a notebook to record what he says so I can remember it all! But I think I got the big stuff this time.

Phone call 1.18.09

Dan called several time this morning, but unfortunately I missed them all. We were down in Tampa for Marshall's wedding and my cell phone was on silent (eek!). He also tried the house phone to no avail. I heard from other wives that their husband's said they should be able to call more often now and perhaps again today, so I was holding on to some home he would call again.

He just did! Yippie!

He sounded well. Tired, but but hanging in there. Indoc week is over now so they're allowed to look at their food again, have pictures up, and hopefully their room won't get tossed anymore. They haven't really been getting any mail yet. He said it's basically sitting on a desk waiting for it to be someone's duty to hand it out. Same with outgoing mail. Dan said he put a letter in the mail last Sunday and today when he put one in he saw the letter he wrote last week still sitting there. Apparently they are both assigned duties and those don't begin until tomorrow. So hopefully after tomorrow things on the mail scene will pick up and get going smoother/quicker. He said he's really homesick but hanging in there. Hopefully the pics he has up there and the ones I put in the mail can help out with that some.

It was a brief call, as I'm assuming they all will be until cell phones are earned, but was great to hear from him regardless!

1st phone call

Dan got to call home tonight! Originally I wasn't expecting a call for 5 weeks or so, but I've met a few other wives and 2 of them got calls last night. So I was holding out hope for tonight and just as I was putting the boys down to bed he called!

He said he is doing well. The days have been long and it's hard to believe he's only been there for 2 nights. The PT test was mostly done yesterday with the swim portion today. He missed the run by about a minute (1.5mi in 10:19), got 3 over the pull-ups, the exact number of sit-ups, and killed the swim part. So even though he missed the run since he did so well in the swimming portion it put his total score up to passing. But, because he missed the run he will have remedial PT 1 morning a week. He has 2 roommates. 1 is a civilian and 1 has been in the CG for just a short time. He has been put in charge of his room. I'm not sure what all that entails, just what he said. He said he has been very busy. Not only with gathering all the stuff he needs there, but also with reading all sorts of books they are given. Like how to fold everything in their drawers. I told him I hoped he didn't get in trouble for folding since it's not his best area! He's been writing a letter a little each day just has not had a chance to mail anything out yet. Landon talked to him briefly. I was worried he wouldn't, but he ran down the stairs when I told him Daddy was on the phone. Afterwards he was asking when Daddy was coming back to Florida. Dan said it would probably be about a month before they were allowed to call again but basically were given this chance just to let everyone know they made it ok. I told him how the boys had been and updated him on football scores. He sounded tired and a little congested but in good spirits. It was hard to tell exactly though, the connection wasn't the greatest...it sounded very far off and quiet. Dan said he's tired of standing at attention but it's only going to get worse as the real stuff should start on Monday.

That's really about all I can remember for now. It was a quick call, he'd waited in line for at least 30 min to be able to call and there was quite a few others behind him waiting.

Dan's address

If you'd like to write Dan, this will be his address while at OCS:

OC Daniel Knauss
US Coast Guard Academy
Officer Candidate School
43 Mohegan Ave
New London, CT 06320

Eventually he will be able to receive packages and goodies, I'll post when that time comes if you'd like to send him anything.



Yesterday was tough, it was time for us to say good bye. The boys and I dropped Dan off at the Tampa airport. After fighting traffic, a long check in line, and a dealyed flight things got even more interesting when the cops had to pull some people off the flight before it finally got on the way to Providence.

Today he will leave the Cape and travel over to New London. Tonight he's sharing a room with another OC from the Cape. Many of the other OC's will be meeting up for one last dinner tonight before reporting bright and early in the morning.

118 days until graduation!