After the short Kabul trip, it didn't take long to get back in the DC swing of things - making my own lunch, commuting, appreciating the slightly reduced gun-per-person ratio...the transition was almost seamless. I did have some daily breakfast bacon withdrawal, but I’m over the hump now.
I did get nice personal notes from Hillary and John during the #SecState transition. (I like to think that I'm on a first name basis with both of them.) (But I'm not.) And while technically I was blind carbon copied on the notes, I know when someone bcc's you that means they really like you.
After a week of relative normality back in DC, I headed to the Foreign Service Institute for a week of contracting officer's representative training. I ended up driving each day, and on the first day of walking through the parking lot, I noticed a detail that confirmed I was at FSI. I think there are a lot more personalized license plates in VA compared to CO, but I assume only in the Foreign Service do people use their Posts for their license plates: I saw variations of cities in Turkey and Georgia (not GA). The training is a prerequisite for my COR certification, which is required for my job, so it was pretty important. I managed to pass the test without violating the ethics rules, so I'm good to go.
The most exciting news was the recent arrival of the OBO Construction Management bid list! Of course, it probably doesn’t directly impact us new hires since we're generally supposed to be in DC for 1 to 2 years for our first tour. We'll see though! It also seems like the OBO bidding process is somewhat continuous. I don't expect any resolution soon, but it'll at least be interesting to watch and learn.
(This post written while listening to Oasis Fade In-Out)
