Starting my Internship

The beginning of February signaled another milestone in my LGO journey:  the start of my 6-month internship at Sikorsky Helicopters in Stratford, CT.  Having moved out from Seattle last year with only three suitcases and a few shipped boxes, I was confident that I could make the  move to Connecticut with a couple of loads in the back of the Honda that I'm borrowing for the internship (thanks John!) .  The plan was to take everything that I could in the first trip , and leave the overflow stuff at Cynthia's until I could come back and retrieve it.  Well, after the 6th load, we realized that we needed a better plan.  What started with a Honda soon evolved to a Zip Van, and then this happened:

That's right, my "simple" move turned into quite the ordeal but eventually we found the right equipment for the job.  And this was without any furniture!

We eventually made it down to my new place in Shelton, CT just in time to pick up the keys to my apartment and get a few things moved in.  Luckily, my rented furniture from CORT arrived the previous day so I was all set.  That night we stumbled upon an amazing italian restaraunt in the next town over and had wonderfully authentic Napolitano pizza!

I signed the lease for my apartment without ever visiting, but I have been pleasantly surprised by the place.  The building is brand new, it has a great on-site gym, and from what I can tell about half of the residents work for Sikorsky.  The town itself is pretty quiet, with 40,000 people spread out over 32 square miles.  It's definitely the smallest town that I've ever lived in, but it looks like there are a lot of things to do outside once the weather gets a little warmer.  As it is, the whole town has about 2 feet of snow on all the sidewalks and trails.  Solution: Head to Boston or New York on the weekends!

The first weekend, I went back to Boston for some skiing, Malaysian food, and lot's of climbing.  The skiing was at Wachusett, which turns out to be one of the closest ski hills to Boston.  The snow was great, but we definitely weren't the only ones with the idea to ski and the lines turned out to be pretty miserable.  We ended up spending most of the day at the terrain park because there were no lines and I was once again able to confirm that I can't ski a rail .

On Saturday night, our resident LGO Malaysian Weng Hong hosted a great event to celebrate the Lunar New Year.  It was well attended by LGOs and it was great to see everyone and catch up over some delicious food!

On Sunday, Cynthia decided to celebrate her birthday by climbing 29 routes at the gym in one day.  She recruited a whole contingent of friends to work the belay and we had a great time helping her toward her goal (which she definitely achieved!).

The next weekend Cynthia came down to CT and we both headed down to New York form there.  This was my first time in NYC since 2000, so it was fun to be a complete tourist.  Our goal was to see a Broadway show by entering the ticket lotteries, and it turned out to be wildly successful.  Unknowingly, we had picked a day with off-and-on snow flurries and very few people wanted to wait outside, so the odds were pretty good in our favor of getting tickets.  We ended up seeing Kinky Boots and Newsies and they were both excellent.  We spent the rest of the weekend meeting up with friends and eating some great meals around Manhattan. 

Times Square

Rockefeller Center

As for the internship, things have gotten off to a bit of a slow start.  There have been three separate snowstorms in my first three weeks (each bringing at least 8 inches of snow), so I've missed at least one day of work each week due to weather. 

This sight has been all-too-common.  I'm definitely ready for Spring!

Sikorsky (part of the much larger UTC) is like a lot of big companies in that it takes a week to get a computer and another few weeks to get all the accounts working, so I'm just now getting set up with everything.  I'm working in the Supply Management group, so I've been spending the time meeting everyone and learning all about the process for government contracting.  We're still working to define my project for the internship, but it looks like there will be plenty to keep me busy! And it's pretty neat to be able to go downstairs and see Blackhawks being built (see this article for some pictures).

Trading planes for helicopters...for now! (Photo courtesy of vtolblog.com)