A Trip Through Time and Patrick's Bday

My day started bright and early at the 50th anniversary celebration of Fort Benning's Martin Army Community Hospital. I wrote the general's speech, so I went to go see what parts he used. He used most of it so the day started off well. I then spent the rest of the day going through the PAO archives.

Our building is about to get a much needed renovation so we'll be moving our office soon and we need to get rid of anything we can that way we don't have to move it. One of the first things to go is old files so that's what I did all day. It was fun! Every morning someone in our office goes through the paper and clips out all Fort Benning stories to keep on file. Well our filing cabinets date back 10 years so it was time to purge the unnecessary files.

I kept anything having to do with non-combat related deaths because we may get media inquiries about them in the future. I also kept "historic" stuff, such as the first few news reports from 2005 when the decision to move the Armor School from Fort Knox to Fort Benning was made. Finally, I kept things I may need for my speech files. Other than that, it all got tossed. I got through one filing cabinet and the recycle bin, which was empty, is now more than half full and I still have three cabinets to go.

Tomorrow is Patrick's birthday and since we'll be leaving Thursday night I decided to go ahead and get him a cake tonight. Instead of the traditional "Patrick ice cream birthday cake" I went with a cookie cake this year. I got him a funny card and Lauren made him one of her own -- complete with coordinating envelope. He got his present a few months ago, his laptop and we'll go out to dinner at the beach to celebrate, so in essence, his birthday will last a week.