Look, Mom! It's another... buffalo statue? What?

Well, it's been about a week since I left Raleigh, North Carolina, so I figured I had better write an update.

Last Saturday I left Raleigh and traveled to Chadbourn, NC where my home is located (about 2 hours from Raleigh). I stayed the night and left Sunday morning with my mom in tow! We made it to Oxford, AL in 7 hours and stayed the night in a hotel. On day three, we traveled to Jackson, MS which was about a 5 hour drive. My sister, Sarah, and her husband, Sean, live there so we stayed there for two nights and had a lovely time with them. On day 5, we departed Jackson and made it to Greenville, TX in a 6 hour drive. Finally, on day 6, we had a short 4 hour drive from Texas to Lawton, OK. In total, it was about 24 hours of drive time and 1500+ miles of asphalt.

But now we get to the interesting part where I can tell you about Oklahoma...

My first impression of this grand state was that it was extremely... flat. Of course, flat is not the only thing Oklahoma is. It is also windy, hot, wide-open, and houses the SLOWEST people I have ever met. I have yet to see an Oklahoma native who is in a hurry to do anything. The restaurant service is slow, the checkout at Wal-Mart is (horribly) slow, the cars are slow, the city speed limits are slow... even the animals are slow (have you ever seen a chubby prairie dog try to run?). The only thing that ISN'T slow is the highway speed-limit which reaches my all-time favorite speed so far of 75 mph. While my poor, packed 4-cyl engine car probably didn't enjoy my 80 mph cruising, I certainly did!

However, just when I thought I had Oklahoma figured out... it surprised me once more! As we neared Lawton, the landscape started to have more natural hills (yes, as opposed to man-made ones) and more shrubby trees. Inside the city of Lawton came the most funny surprise: there were statues of bison EVERYWHERE! Now, I don't mean "everywhere" as in: there were a couple statues located around town. No. I mean every street must have had a buffalo located SOMEwhere on its existence. Heck... the entrance to the airport has about 8 bison statues surrounding it! But I digress...

North of the city of Lawton and bordering the top of Fort Sill is the Wichita Mountain Wildlife Refuge. This place is BEAUTIFUL!

A picture I took from the top of Mt Scott.

 As seen by the picture, Fort Sill is most definitely NOT all flat! I've been told that there are free-ranging herds of bison, elk, and long-horn Texas cattle in the refuge. I didn't see any wildlife other than vultures in the mountains, but driving back from the mountains to Lawton (about 10 miles), I saw three elk and two horses (wild? not sure) in the woods by the highway that is considered Fort Sill's land. Other wildlife simply include the multitudes of prairie dogs I've seen in the middle of Lawton and the several run-over armadillos on the side of the highway. If I ever see a live armadillo it will be a lucky day.

 As for Fort Sill itself...

It reminds me more of Fort Hood, TX than it does Fort Bragg, NC. Like Lawton, it's very open and the roads make sense. If you think one road should lead to another, it usually does (this is opposite of trying to drive in Fort Bragg where only roads that don't make sense lead to where you want to go).

The only thing I haven't liked about Fort Sill so far is reporting. My orders have been completely wrong about several things, and many of the resources I was given by the ADA school turned out to be just as undependable. This has made my first day a combination of aggravations, frustrations, and moments of wanting to sue the Army for not being organized. In addition to all this, my report date (25-May) fell on the four-day Memorial day weekend, so key people in the in-processing process were not there, so none of the incoming LTs could actually in-process today. Do not get me started on how everybody just sent us to different people until we were sent back to the original person... all for the same problem! At one point I was told I was not in "the system" so I had to get an ID card to get in the system, but when trying to get an ID card, I was turned away saying "you cannot get an ID card without being in the system". What?

Nevertheless, my day was not entirely bad. The confusion only lasted four hours, and then we were all released for the day around 1300. The rest of my afternoon was spent signing a lease for an apartment, laughing at prairie dogs, setting up electric bills, sweating in 98 degrees, eating (of course), and shopping for kitchen items at Wal-Mart. I move into the apartment tomorrow and will finally be able to settle down instead of having to move every night to a new location.

For those interested, my address is:

Megan Parris
20 NW Mission Blvd, Apt L3
Lawton, OK 73507