Dinner!!!

Ah what a great day in the kitchen! I got to serve dinner tonight to probably 500 of my closest friends! Meatloaf and Chicken Cachitore (sp?). It was me, the Commodore's Chief of Staff, and my boss, CAPT Ware serving food; and the Commodore was working in the scullery doin' the dishes! It was fun, but what I was doing was just a small part of what our Food Service Assistants do every day, that it really doesn't compare at all.


It was a mental release though! Every day I am dealing with all kinds of issues that make me have to think. It was fun for a little while to just ask, "Meatloar or Chicken? Noodles or mashed potatoes? Pease or squash? Do you want gravy on those potatoes?" I was working the line for about an hour and forty-five minutes, but it went flying by! I'm sure I'll do it again while we're out. We have encouraged all of our NOG's (Naturally Occuring Groups) to volunteer to spend some time in the galley while we're on deployment. So in addition to being part of the Command Leadership Team, I'm also a member of the O-6 NOG (Captain's on board), a member of the MSC NOG (Medical Service Corps Officers), a member of the ROS NOG (Reduced Operating Status group), and I'm a member of the Egg NOG. Actually, I just made that last one up!

Oh well, it's almost 10:00pm and my helo is taking off at 6:00am tomorrow to fly me over to the sites ashore so that I can see for myself what's happening. We've seen about 2,000 patients so far and have provided over 7,000 services. We've performed roughly 30 surgeries so far and will do another 120 or so before we leave. We did our first clef-lip repair today as well as our first club-foot repair. We are pinning at least two broken femurs (the thigh bone) which will allow the two patients to walk again.

Anyway, doing lots of neat things! I've got to get to bed!