Erin's Blog

More boring stuff about my life....

Today was slow. I didn't go anywhere. Stayed home all day. C wasn't here all day, either. I showered, made some lunch. Got online. Watched TV. That is pretty much it, LOL. Another lazy day.

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today was relatively calm. I woke up pretty late. It felt good to sleep in. C wasn't home. I took a shower. Made some lunch. Got online.

I had to wash my regular wig, so I wore one of my other ones. I kind of like it, though I'd like it more if it were a bit longer.



C came home and yelled at me for not doing the dishes. Whatever, I cleaned up the whole apt. the other day, the least she could do was the dishes.

I have been trying to call a friend of ours all day to pick up a bed from her house. I finally got through to her around 6pm. We agreed that I could come over to pick it up ASAP.

On the way out to my car, a lady stopped me on the street and asked if I was a smoker. I said no, assuming she wanted a match or a light. She continued to talk to me, striking up a little conversation. She asked where I was going, and said I looked nice. It made me smile. I went on to our friend's place.

I went over in my car, but the bed was too big to fit into my car. We came back and got C's Forester. The bed fit perfectly in the rear width-wise, but we had to use bungie cords to secure the rear hatch.

We got the bed home, then I brought it in and put some sheets and pillows on.

C made some mac and cheese for dinner.

After dinner, she left so she could spend the night with her friend, K. K has been having some issues, and C was nice enough to volunteer to be with her in K's time of trouble.

I got back online, and chatted with some friends from the car website. I am getting tired, so I'm off to bed.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Geesh! See, this work stuff is interfering with my blogging. Getting up at the buttcrack of dawn kinda forces me to go to sleep early.

In any case, here's what's happened in the past few days....

THURSDAY:

Today I got my license in the mail! Woohoo!



I worked with Marchelle again. Today she was nicer, and we actually had a decent shift and good conversation as well. Drove the route 43 and 20. Yesterday I didn't do the afternoon portion due to my doctor's appointment. It wasn't bad, I did the 20 before with Ken and also previously in training.

WEDNESDAY:

Today I worked with the first female instructor I've had, Marchelle. She was a bit abrupt and rude pretty much all day. "Do this. Do that!" -- all morning long. Argh. At least I had a doctor's appointment in the afternoon so I didn't have to work with her then.

After the morning "piece of work" (that's what they call a shift at RTD) I came home, and ate some breakfast. Watched some TV and took a nap. Went to the Clinic for my appointment. I talked with a psychiatrist, Beth Cookson. She was pleasant and helped me talk through some of my more recent issues. She decided I should try taking 300mg of Wellbutrin daily instead of the 150mg/day I've been taking since the beginning of March. She gave me a prescription so now I have enough Wellbutrin to last me until my next appointment at the end of June. While there, she briefly touched on the lab results. Cholesterol was 171. Diabetes A1C test showed a 5.9. The "normal" range she said was 2.5 to 6.0, so I was just barely under the wire. She said that the medication will help keep that number down for the long run, so I should continue to take it. I go back on June 8th to talk to an M.D. about the results and get tested again.

I cleaned the apartment while I had the rest of the day off. C came home and made some of her yummy spaghetti sauce. After dinner, I fell asleep while C was watching TV.

TUESDAY:

I worked with Paul again today. Did the 35 and the 2X again. It was pretty uneventful. Work is work, LOL.

In between shifts, I went back up to Thornton to sign some more papers that Mel and I had to get notarized. I had to use my passport as ID since I had already changed my license and gotten the "paper" license. The notary guy gave me a few strange looks, but whatever. I don't care.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Geesh, I can't even remember what I did on Saturday. I seem to remember sleeping in, and calling the picture place in Boulder to see what their hours were.... Obviously I was online as well, because I wrote the previous blog entry on Saturday. Geesh, my short-term memory is going to shit....

SUNDAY:

Sunday I went up to Boulder. I took a bunch of pictures. I walked all around downtown, drove out to the mountains. I also sunburned the crap out of my left arm. The weather was beautiful, so I had all of the windows down. I had my arm out the window. Burn, baby, burn! It still hurts today, and it is already Monday night, LOL.

MONDAY:

Today I went to work. I drove the 35 this morning with Paul. Paul is an instructor I hadn't worked with before. He is a fun guy to work with -- he isn't boring like some of the other instructors. After the morning run, we had to catch the light rail and a bus to get back to our cars. Luckily, we get paid for that time, too. It was more than 45 minutes, altogether. In the afternoon, I got to drive the 2X. That was an easy route. Not hard at all, and pretty darn quick, too. I get to drive these routes with Paul again tomorrow.

After my morning session of driving, I went to pick up some clothes and things from Mel's. I got a bunch of clothes and some shoes, and we had a great talk about Things(tm). I am much happier now than I was just earlier today. Things will work out between us, I can see.

When I got home, C wasn't here. I got online and checked e-mail. Talked to a few friends via AIM. Made some leftover pizza for dinner. Just then, C came home. She demanded the phone right away to call her dad. So I got offline, and let her call her dad. After the call, I got back online and we looked up a doctor for her. Hopefully she will be able to go to him for cheap/free.

OK, I am exhausted and I need to get up early tomorrow....

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

I'm getting pretty bad about not updating my blog. I guess I'm just so tired after getting home from work that I just go to bed vs. writing in the blog.... Oh well, I will try to recap the past few days...

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FRIDAY:

Today was my CDL test day. I woke up at 4:30am and was at work by 6am. I worked with Richard, who was one of the instructors in my class. On the pre-trip inspection, I forgot to mention the steering wheel and the horn, but I nailed everything else. Doh.

On the skills lot, I made the right-hand turn but got 2 points off for showing one of the white lines and the space between the next line. I "aced" everything else, in Richard's words.

On the road test, I got a 98 out of 100. Richard said this was the highest score he'd EVER given. He said the next closest score was a 93 or 94.... I made a right turn a little too fast for him, and I made another turn a little too wide for him. Other than that, he said he was very impressed. I was happy, too!

After the road test, I was able to go home. It was 9:30am.

I got home, changed out of my uniform, and went to run some errands. I got everything done, and when I got home, I switched into another top -- I spilled some lunch on the one I was wearing and treated it with Spray-N-Wash.

C got home and we watched some TV. I gathered the laundry, and we went out to the laundromat and threw in 4 loads of wash. While washing, we went out and got some dinner. After a nice dinner, we went to finish up the laundry. C pulled out her work shirt and pants, and left around 9:30pm to go to her part-time job. I was left to finish the laundry. The remaining laundry finished around 10pm, so I packed it up and went home.

I folded and hung the laundry, made the bed with the freshly-washed sheets, and feel asleep.

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THURSDAY:

Today was my second day at Boulder Division. I worked with Royal again, and again, had a great time running the M (in an MCI DL3), the Driver's Bus and the T (in a Neoplan MetroLiner). Today I had memorized the routes, and did pretty well finding my way around.

On my lunch break, I found the office where C goes for therapy, so now I can tell her how to get there much more quickly than the way she's been going. It took me 35 mins to get there from home, whereas in the past it was taking her 50 mins to an hour.

While working with Royal, we started talking about the Bolder Boulder race that is coming up on Memorial Day. He said they were looking for drivers to work that day, so I volunteered. The Bolder Boulder is a 10k race that is the 4th largest running race in the world, and it's held every Memorial Day in Boulder, CO. We would be transporting runners and spectators from the various park and rides from the entire Denver/Boulder metro area into the race area. Sounded like fun to me! Oh yeah, and I'd be paid 8 hours of overtime. Schweet!

I made some hamburger helper and baked beans for dinner. The hamburger helper was pretty good, but the beans were kinda funny tasting. C didn't like them and only ate a small helping.

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WEDNESDAY:

Today was my first day in Boulder Division. I had to be there at 4:15am, so I set my alarm for 2:30am. It was only 31 miles and 35 minutes to get there. Not bad considering it takes me 20 minutes to get to the Platte Division and also 20 mins. to get to the East Metro Division.

I worked with Royal today, an instructor based at the Bolder Division. He came to Platte to help our class out, so we had already met. I like Royal a lot -- he's helpful, he actually friendly and talks to you, and he's very laid back. These all seem to be qualities of the drivers at the Boulder Division.

We drove the morning route M. Four trips in an MCI DL3. Not bad at all. Pretty easy run, lots of highway 55mph/65mph driving.

In between our morning and afternoon shifts, I drove around checking out Boulder. They have a neat mall area downtown. I cashed my check (we get paid every other Wednesday) got some gas, got a car wash, dropped off some film to get developed (OK, OK, it was a CompactFlash card -- I needed to print some digital pictures), got my tire patched (there was a screw stuck in my rear passenger tire that's been there a few months), and walked around the mall area.

For the afternoon run, we did something called the "Driver's Bus" or the route "DB." Basically, we take anyone from Boulder Division that needs to get to the Platte Division there. We had only one other person on the bus, and she was a complete ditz. Once at Platte, we went to the start terminal of the route T, down in the Denver Tech Center. We drove the T -- only one trip on this shift -- and brought people from the Tech Center back to Boulder. Really a nice, easy trip.

I forgot exactly what I did that evening, though I bet it was pretty much come home and crash, LOL.

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TUESDAY:

Today I worked with another instructor out of the East Metro Division. I was supposed to work with Julio again, but he is our union representative, and had to attend a grievance session. He knew it was coming up, so he scheduled me to work with Ken Smith. With Ken, I drove a route 20. At the end of our first trip, I broke our bus. I was just tilting the steering wheel to get out of the seat to stretch, and then the tilt mechanism wouldn't latch. So I drove the bus all the way back downtown (from NREL) with the steering wheel tilting back and forth. It actually made me laugh on several occasions.

Downtown they had another bus waiting for us. We switched buses, and kept moving. The rest of the route 20 went pretty crazily -- we got way late because we loaded several wheelchairs, several bikes, and we had a few people who weren't in wheelchairs that requested to use the lift. In the end, we were more than 20 minutes behind.

After our shift, I came home and had some of the leftover lasagna for lunch. Good stuff.

Then I went back to work to do a 90X and an 83L. Those were pretty easy runs -- each run only had one trip. After work, I thanked Ken for working with me. He was a nice guy, and was calm the entire time, even though we were running very late.

More boring stuff about my life....

SUNDAY:

Woke up. Took a shower. It was a beautiful day out and I needed to get out of the house. Went downtown and took a bunch of pictures. 260 of them. Ran into a bunch of skateboarders at the gate to the city, and got some awesome pics of them jumping off of a stairwell. In the same plaza were a bunch of drummers, hammering out an African rhythm. Really a neat vibe....

Here are some of my favorites:









After getting home, I talked online with my friend and ex-girlfriend, J. She and I caught up, and had a great conversation. She still rocks!

MONDAY:

Today I woke up at 3:30am to go to work again. Got to work and met my instructor -- today it was Julio. I hadn't previously met him. He is a nice guy, and is the "grievance rep" for our union. We drove a route 153 (Chambers Crosstown) and I picked it up pretty quickly. Fun route to drive. After work, went to the Stout St. Clinic and got poked. They poked me three times before they found a place to get a good blood draw. I almost passed out, again.

Then I came home and had lunch. Surprisingly, C was home. She had a migraine and called in sick to work. We ate lunch together, then I went back to work. I worked with Julio again, and did a different route -- a 48X.

After work, came home. C was making lasagna for dinner. Yummy.

Now I need to do some homework for work -- need to make a cheat sheet for my routes tomorrow.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Wow, I haven't updated my blog in a while. Doh.

FRIDAY:

Went to class. Today was the last day of class. We talked about what will happen on our revenue trips, and then drove around in the skills course. After the skills course, we worked on the CDL pre-trip.

After work, I went back to the Stout St. Clinic and got the medication that was ordered the previous day, and made a few more follow-up appointments. Now I have about a month's supply of both medications.

When I got home, I checked my e-mail. C came home and asked me if I wanted to go to the GIC for "sexuality" night. I had only been once before, but I figured I'd go. We went to the GIC where I saw a friend of mine I hadn't seen in a while -- she'd changed her hair and had different glasses, so I didn't even recognize her at first! She looked great. We talked about a lot of stuff. We had a licensed therapist there to run the group, so she and I talked about some of the issues I'm having, and I broke down crying in front of everyone.... Argh.

We got home from the meeting late, and I needed to go to work the next day (yup, Saturday), so I just crashed. Hence, no blog entry.

SATURDAY:

Today, I woke up at 3:30am and went out to the East Metro division of RTD. It took me about 20 - 25 mins to get there. I was way early -- we needed to be there 30 mins before our pull-out time, but I got there around 4:45am. The instructor didn't show up until 15 mins before pull-out. His name was Qureshi, but he liked to be called "Q."

We drove the route 105 all morning and part of the afternoon. I got to know the route pretty well -- we drove it 7 times. I got off at 4:30pm. I went out to the car and inflated my tire. My rear passenger tire has a screw in it, and I have to re-inflate it every few days. Luckily I have a portable air compressor that works off of the cigarette lighter in my car. That took about 20 minutes (yes, it works, but it is SLLLLOOOOOOOOWWWWW....).

I got to drive home in light traffic. When I got home, C wasn't home. I hopped on the computer to check e-mail, and literally fell asleep at the computer! I logged out, changed clothes and went to bed. I woke up around 10:30, and figured I'd write this. :-)

In any case, I'm headed back to bed.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today in class we took another and our final quiz for the first part of training. I got another 100% on it. Today's quiz was a map-reading and route problem-solving quiz. Our instructors posted the average scores, and I am still at the top of my class -- 99.50%. The next closest person has a 98.58%.

After the quiz, we went driving in regional buses. The buses we drove today were Neoplan MetroLiners:





We drove up to Boulder, and got to check out the Boulder Transit Terminal and the Boulder Division. I might choose to work out of Boulder as most of their routes are regional or "inter city" routes. I prefer to drive on highways and have few stops, so this would be the place to do it.

After work, I went to the Stout St. Clinic to get refills on my medications. I made appointments to follow-up my medical appointment on Saturday as well as a mental appointment. Unfortunately, they are both after I run out of my medication, so I needed to get refills. Lisa, a worker there, really helped me out. We know each other from all of the time we spent in the clinic waiting to be seen the first time, back in March. She got the nurse who drew my blood on Saturday to talk to a doctor. After they got a doctor to talk to me, they had to find my chart, which took another 20 minutes. Once they found it, they told me that the blood they drew on Saturday was left out on the cabinet and not sent to the lab, and that they'd need to draw more blood. Argh. I made an appointment for May 17th in the afternoon.

Here is a pic of my name badge:



When I got home, I checked my e-mail, and then C came home. She packed a bag and took off -- she is babysitting for a friend of hers tonight, and then taking her friend's two kids to school on her way to work in the morning.

After C left, I went grocery shopping. I went to Wal*Mart and bought $77 worth of groceries. I got enough food for lunches all next week as well as at least 12 dinners. I guess I am becoming a bargain shopper, LOL. I even got a lunch bag so I won't need to keep using plastic grocery bags.

OK, I have to make lunch for tomorrow and get to sleep. Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today we took our quiz on transfers. I got 100%. I am still number one in the class. Yay!

Today we went driving on regional routes in intercity buses. We also drove through the airport drop-off areas. I got to drive a MCI DL-3, the same type of bus we had at Raz.

After we got back, we all got our name badges -- the ones that pin to our uniforms. Mine just has the RTD logo, "ERIN" and my employee number: 17225.

Got home, made some dinner. C went out to a meeting and came back just as I was finishing dinner. We ate together and watched some TV.

I'm pretty tired -- I need to make some lunch for work tomorrow and then get to sleep.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Took another test at RTD today -- I got another 100%. Yay.

Today we drove regional routes in InterCity coaches. I got to play around with a Neoplan "2800" as RTD calls them. They're nice -- fast, tight turning radius.... Only bad thing about them is the tail swing. My instructor today showed us just how much tail swing these buses have by putting a brick by the rear wheel and having us turn away from it. The rear of the bus was way over the brick in only a few feet. Crazy.

Tomorrow we'll get to drive the MCIs that I drove back in Portland. RTD calls them the "1900" series.

After work, I came home and washed the dishes. There was a nice pile in the sink.

Camille came home and we ate some dinner. I was crying during dinner. Not fun. She and I had a serious talk about finding me a therapist. She asked what I was looking for in a therapist. The first thing out of my mouth was "gender issues." Upon reflection, I don't know if I need a therapist who specializes in gender issues. I am living full-time as a woman, and I haven't had _any_ "gender issues" since then. All of my issues are depression- and relationship-oriented now. That made me think a bit....

In any case, I need to hit the hay!

Night.

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Sunday was pretty boring. Stayed home all day. Surfed. Moped.

Today was more fun. Woke up at 4:30am, showered, got ready for work.

At work we took another three tests. I got 100% on them all, and now I am alone at the top of my class. I have a 99.33% overall. All for missing that one question. Damn.

After the tests and our homework review, we hit the road. They made us do everything like we would coming in for a day of work. They gave us a run number, and we had to do everything from there to figure out where we were going, our time points, bus number, etc., etc. It was neat to actually be at a division and doing this.

After we did that exercise, I got to drive the 15L out and back. I was alone with an instructor today, so I got all 4 hours of drive time in to myself. This is the first time this has happened -- usually I am paired up with another student and we split the drive time. Driving the 15L today and picking up passengers has really helped me realize that I can do this job, and not only that -- I enjoy doing this job, too.

After driving, we came back to class and learned that we will be driving regional routes tomorrow in intercity buses. These are the same type of buses I used to drive in Portland, so it should be a piece of cake for me.

After work, I came home. C got home from her job around 5:35pm. We made some dinner, and then watched Wheel of Fortune. She's actually pretty darn good at that game.

After Wheel, I went to the GIC. I haven't been there in forever. At first, it was just the group leader and me, but then three others joined us later in the group. We had a good group tonight.

I just got home a few minutes ago, and I'm exhausted. Gotta get up at 4:30am and do it all over again tomorrow!

Goodnight!

_erin

Link/Tip of the day:

Tip of the day: Don't kill yourself.

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More boring stuff about my life....

Well, this morning I went into the free clinic here in Denver (the Stout Street Clinic, for those Denverites out there) to get a refill of my depression medication.

Last night I was in a Bad Place(tm) mentally and knew I needed to get the Wellbutrin refilled. Turns out I've been out of that medication since April 27th. My roommate C knew something was up a few days after I stopped taking it -- she kept asking me why I was grumpy and if I was OK or not. Last night was the breaking point that motivated my appointment this morning.

In any case, before seeing a doctor at the clinic, I met Jenni, a med student there. Jenni was going over my health background, and when we arrived at general physical health she asked me some interesting questions. My roommate came with me and made some comments regarding my frequent urination. This lead to even more questions and a blood test and a urine test.

Turns out that I have type II diabetes. I have had, for as long as I can remember, the following symptoms of hyperglycemia (high blood sugar):

* thirst
* frequent urination
* flushing/hot flashes

These symptoms triggered the tests. Surprisingly, it was never previously diagnosed.

On March 25th, 2003, I had my DOT physical for Gray Line of Portland. There, the doctors noticed I had borderline high blood pressure and borderline diabetes. They told me to watch my diet and exercise. I did.

Almost exactly one year later, on March 27th, 2004, I had my DOT physical for RTD. At this physical, I told them that I was previously diagnosed with borderline high blood pressure and borderline diabetes. They specifically looked at my urine and blood pressure, and told me that I no longer had either of these things. I attributed it to my weight loss and was actually happy to know that I was free of yet another worry.

I guess that relief was unfounded. I have type II diabetes, and they want me to go back in next week for monitoring.

In any case, I just wanted to share.

After the clinic, C and I went and did some laundry at Smiley's.

After laundry, we came home and made some lunch. I made a pork stew from the food that was donated to us by my co-workers. They gave us some US Gov't canned pork and some vegetable soup. I dumped them in the same pot, added some water and spices, and it came out pretty good. I was surprised, to be honest. I had never even _seen_ canned pork before. Surprisingly, it was tender and tasted pretty good, too.

We watched a few movies, and took a nap. I was actually online when C fell asleep, but then I started yawning, too.

When we woke up, C went out to the GIC. I didn't feel like going out.

I am now watching SNL. I'm up pretty late considering my schedule, but I guess the nap helped. :-)

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today we did more driving in articulated buses. I got to drive a route 25X and my co-driver, James, got to drive a 46L. We didn't pick up any passengers today -- that will be on Monday for our "limited revenue" training.

After work, I went to see Mel. She sent me an e-mail saying I had a package and some mail to pick up. I replied asking her if I could pick up some clothes and shoes too. When I sent the e-mail, it was already past my bedtime, and in the morning, I just got up, showered and went to work.

After work, I went up there to pick up the stuff. When I arrived, she was in the garage. She came out the front door and handed me the package and the mail. I asked about the clothes, and she refused. I said OK, I will be back with a truck for all of my stuff sometime soon, and she said that I wouldn't be able to do that -- that if she disputed anything, it would "stay where it is."

I got home in a pretty pissy mood. C said as much to my face.

We ate dinner, watched a movie.

C called maintenance because our toilet got stopped up and we don't have a plunger. They came, and made things worse. They spilled shit-filled water all over our kitchen floor when they overflowed the toilet. The guy plunged the toilet and then tried to bail on us. Uh-uh. Not happening. We told him to mop up the floor. The mess wasn't there before he came -- he should make it just like it was before he created the mess. He used _our_ mop to clean it up, and did a half-assed job at that. We had to clean up what he didn't get with 5 or 6 bath towels. Gross.

To make things more interesting, Mel sent me an e-mail tonight that made me cry. I was on the verge of crying when I left her mom's house earlier today, but this clinched it for me. The fact I'm off my depression meds probably didn't help matters, either.

I am exhausted -- physically and emotionally. I don't usually stay up this late, but I needed to vent.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....





Yesterday and today we have been driving the articulated buses. The buses are 2001 NABI articulated buses.

Articulated buses, or "artics" as we call them, are the buses that bend in the middle. They are a ton of fun to drive and not much harder than a standard 40-foot straight coach.

Yesterday we took them around the skills course and played around with backing them up and then briefly took them out on the road. Today we went out on the highway, drove around the tight corners downtown and then went into our two underground stations to practice driving them in and out of the tight spaces in the stations.

Fun stuff!

Yesterday we got paid. It is the first check I've seen in quite a while. It wasn't quite what I expected, either. Oh well. It is a fun job.

Today C and I went grocery shopping. We went to Wal*Mart and got a lot of food.

After we got home, I took a shower. It's been extremely hot here in Denver the past few days. Today it was 90 degrees and broke a few records.

I broke a tooth yesterday. I was eating some popcorn after I got home from work as a snack, and a kernel cracked my tooth. It hurts like a sonuvabitch and I don't have any health/dental coverage until July 1st. Argh.

Here is a pic of the piece of tooth that broke off:



Today at Wal*Mart, I bought some dental wax, and put it over the exposed root. This allows me to eat and drink, which was extremely painful before the wax. Some friends suggested I get a "fix it yourself" kit at a drug store. Others say get to the dentist before it gets worse. I will try the fix it yourself kit, and then go to the dentist after I get health insurance.

In any case, I'm tired and heading to bed.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Damn. Today went well. Except for one thing. This morning we took our "general knowledge" quiz. I did well. Very well, in fact. But I missed one question, messing up my possibility of getting a perfect score. Damn. I found out that I am still at the top of the class, though. I am in first place.

After the test, we went out driving again. This was our second revenue trip. Today I drove a route 0 down Broadway, and Bruce drove back. It was a lot of fun and I did pretty well.

After driving around a bit, we went into the CDL skills course at RTD. I took some pictures there while Bruce was driving around (see bottom of the page of pictures for the most recent ones).

I did all of the skills perfectly the first time around, so I was pretty happy.

After the skills practice, Bruce and I did the CDL pre-trip practice. See, even though I already have my CDL, they make us pass all of the state requirements to obtain a CDL. I don't mind -- it's good practice and review considering I did all of this 11 years ago.

After class, I stuck around and helped my friend (the same one who called last night) with her homework. She's bright, and Gets It(tm), but is having problems locating some of the information they require us to write down. I will probably do my homework every day after work with her.

I got home around 5pm. C was home and watching some TV. She made a great spaghetti dinner. Now it's bedtime.

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today was fun.

We took another graded test in class. I got 100% on it again, meaning I am still at the top of my class. I told my instructor that I _will_ be the second person she's seen to get a perfect score on all of the tests. :-)

After the test, we went out on our first revenue trip. I drove a route 15 along Colfax Avenue. I did the westbound leg and Bruce, another member of the class, did the eastbound portion. We picked up "real" passengers who paid "real" money. It was a lot of fun for me. Bruce was still learning how to pull in to stops. Riding with him was a little rocky, but everything went very well. I think I wouldn't mind driving a route 15, even though many drivers knock it because of the "weirdos" that frequently ride it.

Today our instructor asked which division we would like to work from. I'd like to check out Boulder division before I make any decisions in this regard. Boulder has most of the regional routes, which is what I would prefer. Regional routes usually take highways and have very few stops at the beginnings and ends. I like this type of driving much more than city driving, stopping every other block or so. The Platte division is only a few miles from where I'm currently living, and would be a convenient commute, but if I worked there, I would have to drive mostly city routes. Decisions, decisions....

After we got back from driving our revenue trips, we hung out on the CDL skills course. I think I impressed our instructor -- I did all of the maneuvers without making a mistake. I was happy, too.

After class, I stuck around and did my homework there. I realized that for me, it is much easier to do my homework there than at home. Our dining room table is small, and the chairs are too high for it. They make me lean over when I'm writing, and after a few minutes my back hurts quite a bit.

After doing the homework, I came home. C had just taken a shower and was getting ready to go out. She asked if I'd like to join her, so I did. We went around to a few places, and then came home. By the time we came home, I had a major headache. C gave me some Excedrin, and that seemed to work well.

A friend from my class called me to get some help with her homework. I sat on the floor in the bedroom (see above for why I prefer the floor, LOL) and helped her do the homework on the phone. She is the only other woman in the class, and we seem to get along quite well. In helping her, I found two mistakes in my own work that I had done after class.

Tomorrow we have a "general knowledge" test, so I reviewed my class notes. Hopefully I can get 100% again and remain at the top of my class. :-)

Goodnight!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today was OK.

Watched one of the movies we rented -- Lost in Translation starring Bill Murray. It was pretty good.

Went out to drive my route for tomorrow to make sure I know where the terminals and stops were. Got some gas while I was out.

Went out grocery shopping with C. Picked up some stuff for packed lunches and for dinner at home.

We ate dinner, and are heading to bed.

Good night!

_erin

More boring stuff about my life....

Today was good.

Woke up, showered, did my RTD homework. C showered, then we went and did our laundry.

After laundry, we dropped by the GIC to find out that the group leader hadn't shown up yet. Went to Denny's and had a late lunch, then went back home. C changed her top (she spilled some mustard on it), we called the GIC to see if someone was there. Someone was, so we headed over there.

We watched a movie called "Soldier's Girl" -- the story of Calpernia Addams and her boyfriend, Barry Winchell. It was a good movie -- I had read Calpernia's story previously, but hadn't seen the movie or read her book.

After we got home, C went to help her friend deliver papers, so I am home alone. I'm tired and it's late, so goodnight!

_erin