May Project Day 1: The day was sunny and mild, the sun emerging from the cluttered horizon as we turned left in Eulalie. We pulled into an ally parking lot, locked the car, grabbed our good attitudes and walked into the firehouse. This was a moment of great anticipation for us May Projectors because the fire fighter who organized our project was not scheduled to be on shift that day. The firefighters at the Brentwood Fire Department and most other departments in the Saint Louis area work 48 hours on duty and 96 hours off duty. In order to keep the house fully staffed and functional Brentwood employs three complete teams. And on this particular Monday, our sponsor, Mr. Niemeyer was not on duty. So as we walked through the doors we were happy to see that those in the lobby knew exactly who we were and we're happy to see us. We met the interim chief (after the old chief retired last week) Mr. Terry Kurten and Susan, the house secretary/administrator. After a quick outline of our basic expectations we were introduced to the active crew who then gave us a tour of the house. The Brentwood Fire Deparment consists of engine deck on the west side of the house where four two-story garages lie perpendicular to the road. Inside, the fire trucks and ambulances are stored, cleaned, and maintained. While we were touring the inside of the truck we observed the extreme complexity of the equipment. Take some time to guess how much a fire truck costs now a days. Thinking? Got a guess? Here's a hint: it's high. Did you adjust your guess? Is it higher now? I'd probably raise that number a little bit more. So now does your guess seem a bit ridiculous. You're probably close. A fire truck costs $800,000. That's a lot of scratch! East of the engine deck, is the administrative side of the side. On the first floor are numerous office spaces for the different positions, a conference room, and a copy room/supply closet. Above are the living quarters for the active crew: a large common room with a tv, comfortable chairs and a ping pong table, a full sized kitchen and dining room, a work room with desks and whiteboards, multiple dorm rooms and bathrooms, and an outdoor deck. Below both of these spaces is the basement- relative unused and empty except for the work out room and laundry room. The current fire house is relatively new so all the amenities are modern and nice! After our tour we reported back to Susan for our first task- filing. Tyler and I spent the majority of our time on that Monday morning in the conference room quickly working to print and stick labels onto Manila folders that were then but into one of the many filing cabinets in the back room. Our project was organized by street name so as the day progressed we becameMay Project Day 1: The day was sunny and mild, the sun emerging from the cluttered horizon as we turned left in Eulalie. We pulled into an ally parking lot, locked the car, grabbed our good attitudes and walked into the firehouse. This was a moment of great anticipation for us May Projectors because the fire fighter who organized our project was not scheduled to be on shift that day. The firefighters at the Brentwood Fire Department and most other departments in the Saint Louis area work 48 hours on duty and 96 hours off duty. In order to keep the house fully staffed and functional Brentwood employs three complete teams. And on this particular Monday, our sponsor, Mr. Niemeyer was not on duty. So as we walked through the doors we were happy to see that those in the lobby knew exactly who we were and we're happy to see us. We met the interim chief (after the old chief retired last week) Mr. Terry Kurten and Susan, the house secretary/administrator. After a quick outline of our basic expectations we were introduced to the active crew who then gave us a tour of the house. The Brentwood Fire Deparment consists of engine deck on the west side of the house where four two-story garages lie perpendicular to the road. Inside, the fire trucks and ambulances are stored, cleaned, and maintained. While we were touring the inside of the truck we observed the extreme complexity of the equipment. Take some time to guess how much a fire truck costs now a days. Thinking? Got a guess? Here's a hint: it's high. Did you adjust your guess? Is it higher now? I'd probably raise that number a little bit more. So now does your guess seem a bit ridiculous. You're probably close. A fire truck costs $800,000. That's a lot of scratch! East of the engine deck, is the administrative side of the side. On the first floor are numerous office spaces for the different positions, a conference room, and a copy room/supply closet. Above are the living quarters for the active crew: a large common room with a tv, comfortable chairs and a ping pong table, a full sized kitchen and dining room, a work room with desks and whiteboards, multiple dorm rooms and bathrooms, and an outdoor deck. Below both of these spaces is the basement- relative unused and empty except for the work out room and laundry room. The current fire house is relatively new so all the amenities are modern and nice! After our tour we reported back to Susan for our first task- filing. Tyler and I spent the majority of our time on that Monday morning in the conference room quickly working to print and stick labels onto Manila folders that were then but into one of the many filing cabinets in the back room. Our project was organized by street name so as the day progressed we became more and more familiar with the many streets in Brentwood. We labeled and filed so quickly that we actually beat the delivery of the supplies (more labels and folders) we needed to finish the project. So as we waited for the arrival of the supplies we cleaned and disinfected the weight room. After wiping all the weights squeaky clean we took a lunch break. We went to Nacho Mamas. It was yummy. When we returned the supplies had arrived so we quickly finished the labeling and filing. We then moved to the copy room where we were instructed to completely reorganize and neaten the supply closets. After a bit of planning and lots of sorting pens, pencils, and paper the 5 shelf chaos turned into a thing of beauty. Clean and organized we left the supply closet and he fire house for the day, satisfied after a good days work. We vacuumed those floors like we born to do. We moved reclining chairs sucking up crumbs previously left untouched. We got on our hands and knees reaching the farthest corners in the farthest bedrooms. We made it our mission to vacuum every square inch of the upper living quarters of that Brentwood fire house. And it was a success. 

May Project Day 2: When we arrived on site the second day we were greeted by many new and friendly faces. The change in day meant a new shift of fire fighters, fresh off a 4 day break. Susan, per usual welcomed us as we walked into the lobby, snagging a Kit Kat from her candy bowl. She introduced us to Jake who was in charge of giving us our assignments for the day. We started off with an exciting one! Dusting the railings on the two staircases in the house. Adrenaline pumped through Tyler and I's veins as we picked up the orange micro fiber rags and began running our hands along the rails. We gripped the metal railing like a marker fits around the top of the marker, firm and snug but comfortable too. We made are way up and down the hand railings sparing no parcel of dust, vanquishing all dirt and making the railing safe to cleanly hold again. After this big tilt we moved on to another cleaning task- vacuuming. Some experts are opposed to vacuuming, claiming that it strips life of its natural excrement. Other view it as a detriment to the safety of modern furniture. Mario Buatta, a random woman attributed to this quote on the Internet, claims that "dust is a protective coating for fine furniture" and therefore should be left alone. But Tyler and I decided that these traditionalist theories were outdated and overall insulting to those hard working progressive people living in this new age. So we decided to push the haters aside and conquer the dust so that the many boys and girls after us can live in a world where they have the freedom to clean their furniture and carpets if they so desire. We made it our mission to cover every square inch of the upper living quarters. And our mission was a success. We vacuumed under beds and under chairs, sufficiently ridding the carpet and floors of all crumbs and grim. Satisfied with our work we broke for lunch. We went to Carl's. It was yummy.   In the afternoon we returned back from lunch to find the sky had finally opened up and the constant grey drizzle of the morning had ceased and gave way to a clear, sunny, beautiful day. With this new weather development we were assigned to wash the Chiefs cars for the afternoon. Both the Chief and the assistant chief are issued to drive fire equipped red Ford Explorers. And after a month or unwashed us and generally nasty spring Saint Louis weather they were well overdue for a wash. So we went to work. If you are going to wash a car by hand a fire department engine deck is the ideal place to do it. Hoses line the walls equipped with nozzles capable of multiple different settings. In each garage on the floor are big drains with squeegees to push the water down and out of the garage. So we were more than capable of washing the two explorers. We sprayed them down, gave them a good soaping, rinsed them off and then made sure to dry them with precision and care. An hour or two later both cars looked good as new. So we dried  ourselves off cleaned up the garage and retired to our cars after a good days work.

May Project Day 3: It has now come to my attention that I have written 1200 of the required 1500 words in just the first 2 day reports, and as much as I love ridiculously  detailing our days here I don't want to bore any of you readers and I certainly don't want to overachieve as a second semester senior so from now on I will begin to do the minimum. It's been a good ride and I truly enjoyed voicing my prose to you so far but as we all know, all good things must come to an end, and all great things end sooner. So here goes the basic, dry minimum- in the morning Tyler and I helped Susan compile a list of all the residential streets in the city of Brentwood. We cross referenced a master map with an incomplete list of street names filling in where need be. After we filed we relabeled the drawers of the tool kit in the engine deck. Simply reprinting the existing labels and peeling the old ones off before sticking the new ones on. Then we took a lunch break. We went to Fort Taco. It was surprisingly yummy. In the afternoon we moved file cabinets from one room into another room, making better use of the space. After we finished moving the cabinets we were done for the day. 

May Project Day 4: In the morning Tyler and I moved items from the old fire house (which is now being used for storage) to the new house. The chiefs picked and marked which items they wanted and then left us to get them into the new house. Once we had transported the items we cleaned them. Then we broke for lunch. We went to Lion’s Choice. It was yummy. In the afternoon we moved the cleaned items into a room creating a new filing room. We then filled the shelves with the necessary items and were finished for the day.

May Project Day 5: In the morning Tyler and I washed the ambulance and the fire truck. Being large vehicles this task took a long time seeing that we had to had soap and hand dry everything. We finished just before lunch. We ate at Saint Louis Bread Company. It was yummy. After lunch we washed the inside and outside of all the windows on the garage doors. Some of the windows were high so we used a ladder. This was concerning because it was Friday the 13^th. But luckily we didn’t die.

May Project Day 6: In the morning, on the start of week two, Tyler and I started to tackle a large filing project. We were to organize the fire department’s invoices from the past couple of years, cross reference them with a set of copies, and then place the full new set in alphabetical order inside a filing cabinet. This project took us the entire day. We broke for lunch in the middle of it and ate at Five Guys. It was yummy.

May Project Day 7: Tuesdays, as previously mentioned are maintenance day at the firehouse and on this Tuesday we helped the crew with cleaning. In the morning we vacuumed the entire house, dusting where needed. Since we were working directly with the crew we took our lunch break with them and ate together at Jimmy Johns. They were all very interesting guys and getting to know them was a pleasure. In the afternoon we cleaned the deck.

May Project Day 8: On Wednesday we spent the entire day washing the many vehicles at the fire department. We washed both trucks, both ambulances, and both chief’s cars. As described earlier washing the vehicles is a time consuming process so these activities took the whole day. During our lunch break we at Crazy Bowls and Wraps. It was very yummy.

May Project Day 9: What turned out to be our final day of may project, thanks to a lacrosse playoff win, was spent washing the windows of the house. Our final lunch was spent at OB Clark’s were we enjoyed some celebratory chicken wings. Overall my time at the Brentwood Fire Department was very enjoyable. Everyone was incredibly nice and we were very welcomed!