Monday January 11, 2016

Today is our first really cold morning of 2016. Temps were in the low teens. We had some snow overnight. Nancy left first for MVP. I bundled up and walked to the Y. The Y was crowded. The only exercises that I do that require equipment are pull ups and chin-ups. The brand new Y has a zillion pieces of new exercise equipment but no dedicated chin-up bar. I have complained with no luck. I guess I will do these exercises at home. I ran 1.8 miles. Left the Y at 1030 for Panera. Next Monday Panera will open at its new location which is 0.4 miles further from the condo. I read the WSJ but really did not find any article I want to comment on. Had a quick lunch and then headed out to runs some errands. First stop was Meijer's. I bought several pairs of elastic shoelaces. Also bought several Power Ball tickets for Nancy and our neighbor Sonya. I picked up our Parson's Chair at Art Van. Finally I stopped at Sears and the Apple Store. Took a short nap and then put our Parson's Chair together. We returned to our light dinner Monday. We watched the news and then fired up Netflix. It would not work. Called Netflix and they made us reload. It works fine now. More snow and low temperatures tonight, looks like winter has finally set in. Watched part of the first half of football game. Trip down memory lane: In January 1963 I was ordered to attend an Escape and Evasion course at the Naval Amphibious Base, Coronado, CA. It was required for my Vietnam deployment. The course was two weeks and included what we called a Disneyland with guns section taught by Marines, a self protection section and an escape and evasion portion (E&E). The seven day E&E course was suppose to simulate a downed pilot who had to evade the bad guys. We slept in parachutes and had to hide from the bad guys. We were suppose to trap animals and eat bark. I was not successful at either. We did have maps and a compass. We were given a location that we had to get to before nightfall. As an engineer I was given the map and compass. I was surprised that most Navy pilots were not good at map reading. Finally about day four we were placed in a POW camp and spent several nights while the bad guys tried to make us talk. They concentrated on the senior officers and did not bother with a lowly Ensign. The E&E exercise was held in the mountains outside of San Diego. On a Sunday morning we were told the class was over. We were driven to a nearby cafe and told we could order whatever we wanted. We had not eaten in a week, except for some bark. Our stomachs had shrunk so everyone ordered more than he could eat. What did I learn from this course: I can go for a week without food. I have no skills in finding food or trapping critters. A parachute makes a good sleeping bag. I gained some confidence in my map reading skills.