Hey Y'all,
Can you believe I've been out here almost two months now! The time sure flies by! Only two months and already five port visits...I think that is a new record!
Unfortunately this week, we're taking a break from giving you a snapshot of a new country that I've visited... This week we spent some time at sea doing Electronic Warfare with other ship in our group. While in Poland, we embarked the Standing NATO Maritime Group (SNMG) Staff, to include a Rear Admiral, who is in charge of the entire group of NATO ships. It's really neat to interact with Sailors from other countries and see how they work. Since we have several international Officers onboard right now, we get more interaction than we did during the first three weeks we were underway with the Neptune Warrior group. Our mission with this Staff and group is to help train other Navies with some of our tactics and electronic capabilities. We even have two Norwegian Midshipmen embarked who are doing their summer training with us. One is a female living in my stateroom (so we're a little more crowded than normal) and she is pretty cool. She is standing watch with us and learning all kinds of great information to take back to the Norwegian Naval Academy to teach her counterparts. It's also pretty neat to get some new faces around here, and to add another personality to our little liberty group! Beate will be with us for our next two port visits...it was especially nice to have her along in Norway so she could translate for us!
Anyway, this week was a little difficult to start, standing watches again and getting into an at-sea routine, but we're getting there. It's always pretty tiring the first couple of days out until you get a rhythm going. The seas have been calm though, so I've been able to get a good work-out in in the evenings, or whenever my watch allows. So far so good! I'm quite sore because I've been pushing pretty hard since I missed a little time while we were in and out of port so often, but it feels good to get those running shoes on again...and my new iPod nano works great...it's a big help since there is nothing but a white wall to stare at when I'm running in the cardio rooms onboard...helps to have some upbeat music to get you going! :-)
About halfway through the week, XO (the #2 guy on the ship) came up to me and said, "Congratulations on your new assignment!" Naturally, I thought he meant my orders to DESRON 22, where I'll be headed after deployment; however, he actually meant that I'd been chosen by the Admiral to be his Intelligence Officer. Apparently the Admiral's staff can't quite take care of everything, so several department heads were chosen to comprise this new "Intel Cell"...they didn't have enough people who were qualified to do the job, and since I have a Top Secret clearance, I was chosen to work with the Department Heads for the role. We will be really busy gathering information and putting together a brief that this Admiral will give to HIS boss later on in the deployment. It's a pretty big job, but quite an honor to be chosen, and a change of pace from what I am used to doing up on the bridge and as Strike Officer! Unfortunately for me, my role as Intel Officer is in addition to my role as Strike Officer, so for the next couple of months, I will be getting even less sleep both underway and in port! Oh well...it's a great experience and I am looking forward to the road ahead!
I also received word that I will be coming home a bit early! Due to when my school starts for my next job, I have to leave deployment early and get back to Virginia! It appears that I'll be home close to a month and a half earlier than expected, which is really good news! And depending on where they "stash" me until my school starts, I won't have to eat up too much leave with all that time off....should be a pretty good deal for me!
Whelp, that's it for this week...next week I'll have a bunch of new things to tell you about: Blue Nose Ceremony, another port visit, my divisional inspection, and probably more!
Keep in touch!
Kate
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