A Travelogue

For the third night in a row, last night, I didn't sleep in my own bed. Of course, this time it was my own fault.

We got back from P5X-208 around 5 or so, er... 1700 hours, right. As soon as we stepped through the gate, there were a couple of moments where I really thought I was goin' down, gonna smack my knees into the grate and just take a nap on the ramp. Luckily I didn't, because in retrospect, that woulda been pretty embarrassing. Especially now that everyone's told me we had a pretty nice, smooth mission compared to... well, everybody else.

So the routine is: Get home, Get checked out, Debrief, Go write your report. We got home, and then we got checked out. The nurse who did it was nice enough. No major anythings. She winced along with me when she pushed around on a sorta dark bruise on my arm from falling, but she didn't say anything, which was nice, because the rest of the team were sitting around nearby and none of them were complaining. And she apologized for having to keep me a little longer to run extra tests for having dropped yourself in a room of cold, foreign sea-water. I looked around for Kelly but she wasn't around, which was a shame. She owes me one.

Next up: Debrief. Have I mentioned I hate meetings? Man, it's like I park my butt in a meeting chair and my brain says, "Oh, nap time." I mean, I lived through it the first time around. Old news, boooring. But I tried very hard not to be a 12 year old in a history class and managed to at least look like I was alert. No idea if I succeeded.

Anyway, I got to talk a little about stuff, and it got me kinda worked up to start working on the translation from the Haleauau journal. Only I figure I sat there looking at whatever for maybe ten minutes before crashing out.

SOO when I woke up at eight and called Sonya for what I thought was a late-ish night coffee, I got somewhat bemusedly informed that it was indeed 8 am. In the morning. Cripes. (s'Why there's no journal entry for yesterday.)

I didn't shave or shower, and the closest clothes I had at hand were civvies, all of which Silverhawk called me on later, much to my embarrassment. I mean, I was happy enough to've got my hair to lay down flat. She didn't yell at me though, really. Just off-handedly mentioned it when I was leaving, so now I'm left to wonder whether she was just making sure she did her job and doesn't really care if I go around in BDUs all the time, or what. But I don't think I'll make her resort to yelling just to test my hypothesis. Which is why I changed before going to work, and why I changed back into them after dinner at Sonya's. And when did I start thinking of her as Sonya? If someone'd told me a year ago that the woman whose work I was shamelessly stealing would be inviting me to her house for dinner, because the commissary in the top secret alien-fighting military base I work in is utter crap, I might've bashed that person over the head with a book or something.

Anyway, the point is, yesterday I was on a planet far, far away, checking out hidden doorways and high tech alien labs, and today I spent mostly in my office, translating an alien language that used to be an earth language, and wow. Just. Wow.

Note to self: Self, come up with cover story before Maggie starts to ask. Also, think up a way to give Sean Lester a musical education without sounding like a music snob. Maybe a mix CD? Is that gay? If it would keep him from singing along to his headphones, I might not care how gay it looks.