SOLO

Army flight school has been the most stressful thing I've ever encountered. It's a great diet, however. You get to wake up at 0330, after dreaming all night about autorotational descents and hover power settings, with a fresh case of anxiety induced nausea. I can never manage to eat in the mornings so I keep a Cliff Bar in my cargo pocket and rush to the flight line bus stop. While waiting for the bus, Soldiers are walking around mumbling to themselves, desperately trying to memorize an entire book of emergency procedures and operational limits, that they will shortly be told to stand and spit out in front of their colleagues.
On the bus you look for someone to say something encouraging to help settle your nerves and motivate you, but usually you just wallow with them in your huge vat of self pity and worry. This does not help the nausea. It grows the closer you get to the the flight line. Walking into class is okay because you're finally there and you can't turn back now. The urge to flee and never return is fairly constant.
Really the worst part of the day is the mission brief when you are quizzed on your verbal knowledge. Looking from the outside in, it's not that big of a deal. Getting your name called (in my case it's always Mr. O'....I mean Ms. O'Connor (seriously, I'm the only female in the class, just say it right once!)) feels like you just got picked for the Hunger Games. When that is finally over, we are released to our Instructor Pilots and then we start to have fun.
My IP is great and we have a good time up there. I also fly with my "stick buddy" so the 3 of us are always together. I have learned an incredible amount of information in the last 3 weeks and apparently it was enough to pass my first check ride and then solo! I flew a helicopter without my IP and I LOVED it! His job is to belittle my piloting skills and yell at me the entire flight, so it was extremely enjoyable to fly without the harassment.

Me, my IP & 76 Foxtrot

All alone in the clouds :)

I Ate a Snake

The Army sent me to a 3 week survival course in the Alabama jungle. Things happened out there that have made me a different person...I caught and ate a wild snake. Unfortunately most of the training is classified but if you're curious, google SERE and you can pretty much figure out what kind of stuff went on.
I have been hyping this course up in my mind for the last 4 years and now that's it's over, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I'm not saying that I want to do it again, but I did learn some seriously badass stuff that makes it all worthwhile. You also get the chance to learn more about yourself. People always think they're going to act like a hero when danger comes along, but until you've experienced it, you don't really know how you'll react. It's exciting to be tested and see what you really choose to do.
Let me just recap what I can from my experience: Spiders everywhere and especially on my face as I walked through their webs in the pure darkness, snakes everywhere (one guy got bit by 2 rattlesnakes in the throws of passion and went to the hospital for 3 weeks), a degree of body odor I didn't know I could achieve, sandy drinking water, losing 8 pounds, immersion foot, entire body covered in either bug bites or other various rashes, and urine.
Fortunately that was the last big obstacle between me and flying. I start flight school on Tuesday and am so excited to be stressed out for the next 4 months. It's a little overwhelming right now, but like all challenges that I face in life, I remind myself of all the idiots that have done it before me. I need to find new coping techniques.

HOST/Dunker

This week I got to participate in one of the best trainings the military has ever offered me. Helicopter Overwater Survival Training and Dunker. Don't get me wrong, I was terrified, but this training is legit! There are several courses covered but the main goal is to egress from an upside down, underwater helicopter. It starts out slow and gets progressively more advanced. I did not enjoy holding my breath while being strapped in to a 4-point harness. Even though you get out pretty quick, I felt anxious each time.
Once you have mastered the breath hold ditching, they train you up on how to use compressed air. I've never SCUBA dived but I loved having the air. You still get strapped in, turned upside down and dunked but before trying to egress, you put your mouth piece in and clear it. Once you have taken a couple of calm breaths, then you can begin the methodical egress process.
Let's be honest, I did not achieve even one calm breath upside down and underwater. Each time I cleared my mouth piece, I inhaled like a fat kid eating a piece of double fudge chocolate cake. Thank every god that man has created, that there was never any water in my mouth piece or I might not be here today. I don't think I could have made it out if that were the case. Egressing the death trap didn't come naturally to me. This was evident once the multitude of bruises I acquired, started appearing. I was not as graceful as I thought. You really can't tell that you're hitting and kicking everything around you on the way out because ALL that you are thinking about is getting air into your depleted lungs.
After it was all over, I loved it and had a great time. I'm hoping that this day of torture helped prepare me for my next training, SERE. I leave on Sunday and will be gone for 3 weeks. I'm thinking of taking before and after pictures. People come back different. It's weird.

Each door on this fuselage is a replica of a different Army helicopter. You sit at each station and practice egressing from the different doors. 

The SWET chairs on the left are practice before the bigger trainer

Shallow Water Egress Training (I freaked out a little on this one and tried to kick the instructor)

There are several instructors each time it goes down to make sure everyone gets out safely. Right before it goes underwater they yell, "Ditching, ditching, ditching". I now hear that in my nightmares.

The Apache trainer

Airborne

Corey was at Ft. Benning for 3 weeks for Airborne training. It is located about 100 miles from me so I have been busy driving up to see my war hero on the weekends. He absolutely hated the training and the jumping, but it's over and he only has to jump once a quarter. His last jump was rough. He hit the plane, spun around, didn't get his parachute open until 400 ft and then had a hard landing. No broken bones or serious injuries though. I would LOVE to attend this training but they typically don't send pilots...challenge accepted :)

Training field

The Silverwings dive team jumped in for the graduation

The grass was slippery

This was one of the best graduations I've attended

4 platoons double timing in

Corey was in the back row. I had to find him when it was time to pin him.

We spent a day at the National Infantry Museum. It is beautiful!

Waiting to do their 3rd jump

In the Company area after the ceremony

A new frame for his office :) 

NOLA!

I was lucky enough to be squired around New Orleans by a native, over Memorial Day weekend. It was as amazing as I've always imagined! Of course I loved it and want to live in one of the cool neighborhoods and never leave, but it turns out that I have a job (yob) and can't really do whatever I want to. I learned a lot of great things about the area and was able to visit the WWII museum so it was the perfect minication.

The French Quarter

I loved it there

St. Louis Cathedral

Jackson Square and the St. Louis Cathedral

Southern trees

Field of wild flowers

WWII Museum

Go Army!

The Battle of New Orleans

Chalmette Battlefield

Malus-Beauregard House 

Chalmette National Cemetery

St. Roch's Cemetery

Cemetery

Second lining a New Orleans wedding...incredible

Week of Funtivities

All I want in life is to play everyday. I just want to do something fun every single day and it has to include a variety of activities. Last week I kayaked 3 times, ran through the woods with an organized group of crazy people, went to the shooting range, had girl's night at a Brazilian restaurant and did Land Nav twice. I failed my Land Nav test which is why we had girl's night at a Brazilian rodizio. I needed to drown my sorrows with filet mignon.

Hash House Harriers run

Lake Tholocco

PMS Thursdays at Lock-N-Load

Land Nav gone wrong...ugh

Dressing up and overeating to soothe the pain

Econfina Reserve in Florida

The world's most gorgeous water!

Such a fun group of kayakers!

Living Your Dream

I have wanted to be a pilot since I was 12, when my aunt took me to Catalina Island via chopper flown by cool pilot woman. It was always some sort of elusive fantasy because of the reality of becoming a freaking helicopter pilot. It's expensive, it's not economical, it's a HUGE commitment, not necessarily family friendly, blah, blah, blah. In my mind I knew I wanted to do it, but I avoided thinking about it because it was difficult to accomplish, I didn't want to fail and I'm pretty lazy.
Now I'm finally in the Army and will start flight school soon. There are still a few obstacles in the way (which will be their own posts) but what I wanted to share was how it feels to be living my dream. Everyone has something that is their ultimate fantasy, career or life goal and that nothing can top. To me, being an Army helicopter pilot is it. I think it's cooler than being an astronaut, a surgeon, a anything.
Living your dream is the best feeling and I have tried to think of ways to eloquently describe it, but I can't. I really can't even fashion it into an organized thought. Here are little descriptions: When I'm sitting in a never-ending Power Point training about the Army's most boring topics, I still love it. When I wake up after only 4 hours of sleep and know that I'm going to the range to sweat like a race horse and be miserable in the hot Alabama sun, I love it. When I'm driving and start to zone out, I think about the fact that I'm in flight school, and I love it. When I can't travel or hang out with friends because I'm busy with homework, I still love it.
There are definite sacrifices and it's certainly not easy, however, I feel like everyone should experience the absolute bliss of living your dream of dreams.

UH-60 Blackhawk

AH-64 Apache