Are You the Gate Keeper?

I am the Key Master. At least at work anyway. I started my job on the 15th of June and shortly thereafter discovered I am the Key Master of the Tooele Army Depot. Let me explain, the Depot is a weapons storage facility which supports the entire Department of Defense. My primary duty is handling the 3,000+ keys to pretty much the entire Depot. When I am not dealing with keys I work on tracking ammunition movements and classifications. This is a fancy way of saying "Data Entry." That is my job in a nutshell. The job is not bad and I really can't complain. I must admit the transition to civilian life has been awkward. Showing up to work in blue jeans and a t-shirt is nice and I didn't even shave on Thursday and Friday and nobody said a thing. Another tidbit about the job is the pay. I must confess I was a little worried about the pay. But I figured since the Depot works 4 ten hour shifts, I could always find a side job on the weekend. Little did I know that since my position supports the entire depot I am guaranteed 30 minutes of O.T. everyday and 10.5 hours of O.T. every Friday. With the O.T. I just got myself a hefty little raise.

Overall, the job is going good. We are still trying to get settled in which has been difficult with the kids getting sick and Katie getting bronchitis (one week prior to our health insurance kicking in, Murphy sucks). On a political side note, even though we didn't have Health Insurance Katie still was able to see a Doc for a reasonable price. I thought people without health insurance were having a crisis?

From the West Coast

I have actually been in bed about to fall asleep when I will be thinking of some really funny or even inspirational thoughts. However, when I sit down to update the blog I can't think of anything from the night before and usually just post a weird video.

For this update, I will attempt to describe the events over the last few weeks.

As most people know my tenure in the Air Force has come to an end. With the end near I began looking for any line of work possible. Starting in March I applied at so many different companies ranging from Pixar to Boeing. The first call I recieved was around the middle of April from the Tooele Army Depot. We did a phone interview (that I did not feel good about until after they called me back to offer me more details on the position) and shortly thereafter I recieved a tentative offer. The tentaive offer was based on a drug screen, physical and security. Since I already have a security clearance that part went smoothly. The physical however, was a pain. Not because of any medical issues, but because I was already on terminal leave (paid time off for those of you in Rio Linda). The medical clinic on base was giving me the run around, local docs were being stupid and trying to set me up as a "new patient" even though all I needed was a physical. To make a long story short, I managed to get into a canceled appointment on base and the Doc signed off on the 15 pages of forms I had recieved.

I faxed the physical (which included the drug screen) off to Tooele,UT then began the process of moving. By the end of May the movers had loaded the truck and on May 29th we left in two cars, one of which was pulling a trailer, to drive the 2100 miles from Southern Georgia to Tooele,UT.

I had the trip planned out, if we could average 12 hour days we could have done the trip in 3 days and 2 nights. The girls had different plans. After 4 days and 3 nights we pulled into my mom's in Tooele.

Once arriving we went to check out our house and assess the amount of cleanup and repairs required before moving in. The house needed a little TLC and not to mention some plumbing work. The plumbing needed to be completed prior to moving in and finally on Thursday the plumbers came out and most importantly the internet got hooked up. With the house ready, we cleaned out of my Moms on Friday morning and last night we spent our first night in Bountiful, UT.

Which brings me back to the job. After faxing all my stuff off I hadn't heard from the HR guy. I'm beginning to wonder if I still even had a job. Finally, last Tuesday I get a call from the guy informing me the Doc in Georgia didn't sign in all the required places and they did not want to medically clear me. Luckily, since I was here I was able to go see the Doctor at the Depot and he cleared me. I left the clinic, called the guy and got a start date of Monday. I'm excited about this job especially since they work 4 ten hour shifts. Every week is a three day weekend. What exactly I'll be doing I am not to certain, I know that I will be tracking munitions among my responsabilities

That kind of sums up what I have been doing for the last little while and why I hadn't posted. We are now just trying to unpack and work on the yard while adjusting to life in Utah. I will be certain to update on how the job goes.