I'm never nervous to try new things. I am rarely intimidated, but when my sponsors dropped me off at library corner, and I started walking between the new library and all the construction... I was scared. All these giant stone buildings and hundreds of cadets that I didn’t know... What did I get myself into?

My fears were eased when I saw the little gray and yellow "Public Affairs Office" sign. Inside were civilians, officers, and enlisted soldiers eager to meet me and help me along my way. Major Sowers was the first to introduce himself, and helped me jump into the loop.

I followed Deb to an IPR meeting about R Day. Oh, the acronyms that I didn’t know before I came here. IPR is an Interim Progress Report, an R day is Reception day, where new appointments arrive at the academy and begin their in-processing.

Back in Taylor hall, I gained internet access with Carol’s help and looked at ArmyStrong blogs (where we are now!), as well as the archives of “The Pointer View.” I then spent about an hour looking through the old papers to find pictures of the Supe (USMA’s Superintendent) for a collage being made in honor of his retirement.

In the afternoon, I followed Lieutenant Colonel Tribus and Major Sowers to Arvin Gym where I saw the dedication of plaques for cadet awards in honor of Lieutenant General Hal Moore. Phenomenal. No other way to describe it. Absolutely amazing. His speech was short and quirky. For an old man, he was very vivacious and I couldn’t help but laugh at his silly, overused, jokes. He claims that he graduated at the top… of the bottom 15 of his class. For those of you who do not know, GEN Moore wrote We Were Soldiers, along with Joseph Galloway, about the First and Second Battalions of the 7th Cavalry Regiment during one of the first major battles of the Vietnam War, the Battle of Ia Drang (Think large unit warfare). I’m picking it up from the library tonight :)

More newspaper searching followed, then headed “home” to my sponsors and exercised. I’m very excited for what tomorrow will bring!