Week 2

To all of my loyal readers: welcome to week two of my adventure! After a long weekend, Graham and I returned to the firehouse Monday morning refreshed and ready for another exciting week. With wide eyes, Graham and I walked into the firehouse to a smiling Susan. Smiling Susan is rarely good. In fact, never good. Because it means one thing: a big filing project. And oh boy, this was this a BIG filing project. First, we were handed a big folder of the Chief's records of the 2015 invoices and a big folder of Susan's records of the 2015 invoices and we were told to consolidate the two. Unfortunately, these invoices were sorted by date and the final filed invoices had to be sorted by company, so Graham and I spent the morning filing both piles into folders for the various companies, and then pulling out the company folders one by one and making sure that there was only one copy of every invoice. Now that probably doesn't make sense to you, because I explained that very poorly, but then again you probably don't really care and probably just skimmed over that section. And I don't blame you. I would have as well. Regardless, the tedious task took the entirety of the morning, and 11:30 could not have come soon enough. Today's choice: Five Guy's Burger and Fries! Graham and I were actually both craving this Friday, but with the big game against MICDS that day (lol) we decided that it was better to save for Monday. I ordered a double cheeseburger with bacon, with no toppings, and Graham ordered a double cheeseburger with bacon, with quite literally every single topping. We both thoroughly enjoyed our meals, albeit the fact that we were walking blobs of grease afterwards. Truly a fantastic burger however, scoring an 8.5/10 (making it the second highest scoring meal, I believe). We returned in the afternoon to another smiling Susan, which only means more filing. This time we had to do the same task with the 2016 invoices. Luckily this pile was much smaller, and we were able to finish it in the afternoon. What a day, what a day.

Tuesday morning, Graham and I walked into a not-smiling Susan. This meant we were being handed off to the firefighters today to complete their tasks. Now if you haven't been able to tell thus far, if we were with Susan for the day, expectations were we would be doing filing, and if we were with the firefighter, expectations were we could be doing manual labor. So, today was a day for manual labor, which was rather nice after a very shall we say "relaxing" day of filing yesterday. In case you forgot, Tuesday means maintenance day at the firehouse, so Graham and I got to join the firefighters in cleaning the upstairs this morning. We mopped and vacuumed and did whatever other cleaning tasks we were assigned. The firefighters were so pleased with our efforts, they offered to buy us lunch today! The restaurant of choice was Jimmy Johns, and asked for a #16 and Graham went for the #4. As the paid for our meal, we ate lunch today with the firefighters which made for very interesting conversation. While I was devouring my Turkey Bacon Club, we talked about the life of a firefighter, why they chose to be firefighters, what they do on their 96 hour breaks, etc. Overall, the meal scored a 7.5/10, but the company and conversation was truly priceless. Ok that may be a bit cliche, but in all reality it was a very interesting and entertaining lunch break. In the afternoon, Graham and I were assigned to wash the grease off of the deck, as the firehouse was having an Open House this weekend and wanted the patio to look clean. Graham and I obliged, and after a few hours of scrubbing, the patio was once again white and day two seven was over.

Wednesday morning we walked in to see Mr. Niemeyer, the firefighter who coordinated the project for us. This was actually only the second time that we had seen him, and the first day that he was in charge of us (the first day he had meetings or something). He decided today would be another good day for car washes, and with the open house coming this weekend, asked us to wash the Chiefs car, the two fire trucks, AND the two ambulances. Fortunately Graham and I had become pretty good at the whole car washing thing, so we're able to finish 4/5 of the cars in the morning, leaving only one ambulance for the afternoon. Today for lunch we decided upon Crazy Bowls and Wraps. Graham went for a crunchy chicken bowl, I went for a buffalo chicken wrap. Both filling and delicious, scoring an 8/10.  We returned in the afternoon to a smiling Susan. Uh oh. She wanted us to finish up some last filing after we wash the ambulance. So Graham and I quickly washed the ambulance, finished filing the last 2016 invoices, and all was good.

Day 9 meant the last day for Graham and me. We were originally scheduled to work for 11 days, but due to our success in lacrosse, we now only needed nine days. With the house very clean, the trucks shiny, and the files filed, it took Susan and the crew a little to decide what Graham and I should do for our final day. They eventually decided on cleaning the windows! This firehouse has a lot of windows, and after the entire morning of spraying peppermint scented cleaning stuff and wiping, only about 2/3 of the windows were clean. Now for lunch, Graham and I were in predicament. On one hand, it was the last day so go big or go home, but on the other hand we had the state quarterfinals this afternoon. Ultimately, there was only once choice that was a big bang but also healthy (enough): the one and only OB Clarks. I ordered the OB Special, essentially a French dip, and Graham ordered a chicken sandwich with proven cheese. The sandwiches were satisfying and healthy (enough), but since it's OB Clarks I kinda have to give it a 10/10. Hooray OB Clarks! Anyways, Graham and I returned for our final two hours of work, and spent this time cleaning the remaining windows in the house. When 2:30 hit, it was a sad moment. It was over. Susan and the crew started bawling and we all had one last big group hug. Just kidding. It was a pretty uneventful and anticlimactic ending to be honest. We said out thank you's, they said their thank you's, and we went our separate ways.

As a whole, I enjoyed my may project and my time spent at the Brentwood Fire Department. Although the work we did was not the most exciting, I felt very good about helping to make the lives of the firefighters and Susan easier. They all quite literally devote their lives to the good of others and are truly extraordinary people. Well as they say, all good things must come to an end, and the end of this blog side is the end of something good. I hope you all have enjoyed reading (and by that I really just mean Hollie because I'm not sure anyone else is really going to read this whole thing).