Day 4

Well a few days have passed now.  I now have computer access to the JSC and USA, which is a feat to pull off at times.  lol  I’ve had one group meeting where everything went over my head.  Today I went to a scripting meeting where a tiny bit here and there would make a little sense, but nothing meaningful.  I was working mostly on identifying acronyms.  It’s really like immersion into a foreign country.  I’m learning the culture and language as fast as I can.  lol

So far I’ve worked on my first manual, which familiarizes you with the space station and all it’s systems.  It’s about an inch thick, so that gives you an idea of what I’m up against.  :-)  I’m taking notes, which helps me stay awake and get the acronyms a bit faster.  I might make flash cards tomorrow to study over the weekend.

I’m in an office without my group members yet.  They are hopefully moving to the vacinity in May, then my mentor will be in the same office instead of a building away.  But it’s alright, I get more done probably.  It would be nice to have a bit more team bonding time though.  So I visit every day before I leave so I can interact a little.

The other fun is trying to get to sleep earlier.  I just can’t sleep well here.  I don’t know if it’s Carrie being up and down all the time, the mice running around in their wheel, or just my own body, but it’s not easy to adjust my body to sleep around 10.  But once I can it’ll make things much easier.  I should be on the 8-5ish schedule for quite a few months, so if I can get a consistent 8 hours every night I’ll be doing much better with my studies.

What I find most interesting about working with the space program is that so much of my group is in their 20’s and maybe early 30’s.  It’s like the military, where relatively young people are in charge of some quite large responsibilities.  That makes for an interesting culture, but one that’s also quite fun.  The people are quite amusing and it makes for a good work environment.

I guess I’m going to keep an eye on food and unwind with my video game since I can’t do much else right now.  I’d be plenty busy if my paycheck just hit the bank…tomorrow I guess.