Day 2 Details

Got our uniforms today and we were required to wear them immediately.  Issued t-shirts, khaki pants, khaki shorts, black pants, black belt, hard hat, safety glasses, sweatshirt and raincoat.  All with the Americorps NCCC logo.  Nice and comfy but not particular attractive.  The shorts are long enough to be giant capris and the crotch on the khakis goes down to my knees!

Also got drug tested, TB test, and tetanus shot.  Hoping the second-hand smoke from weed won’t show up on my drug test.  Many were out and about smoking in public after it was legalized in Seattle in November…outside the shopping mall, at the bus stop, or outside a bar.

All set up in my new dorm room as well.  My roommate, Colleen, is from South Carolina and recently got back from Peace Corps in Malawi.  Feels like a good fit.  We’re both quiet, respectful and independent. 

There are a total of 26 team leaders in the FEMA Corps training and they have placed us all on the 3^rd floor of the dorm.  Most are under 30 but a few of us are older.  We spent most of today getting to know each other.  We all have a wide variety of backgrounds and come from different parts of the country…but the one thing we seem to have in common is an interest in emergency response and community service.

Time to chill out for the evening.  We start physical training tomorrow at 6 am.  We start with a baseline test and count # of pushups and situps in a 2 minute period and get timed for a 1.5 mile run.  Brings back scary memories of the Presidential Physical Fitness Tests in elementary school.