Saturday, December 28th
6-8 am full press typing, then 8-9 outside for just a walk on the track. Brisk but nice morning. After lockdown, football till 2, then outside for a workout 2-3. Pretty much football rest of the day, one of the biggest football days of the year.
Was fun to see 2 former Oregon QB’s play again as the Chargers dominated though Nix played well as Denver lost in OT. Also not surprised to see the Colorado Buffaloes get whipped by BYU. In my view, they have been overrated all year “buffaloing” the media on their greatness, as well as Coach Deion’s greatness:)
Sunday, December 29
Sure enough fog is back, so no library at 7 or 8 today. Guess I’ll try and be productive in my cell writing on top of my locker:) Bummer for us, the fog lasted till 10, and since we do a mandatory lockdown 9:30-11, we got to stay in till 11. Definitely a slow start to the day!
But it got better, as I went outside 11-12:30, skipped chow, and had a great workout on what became a blue sky, warm midday. Definitely helped my attitude adjustment!
Afterward, skipped church, and did some email/typing, NFL till lockdown at 3:30, followed by NFL Sunday Night. Really was epic football weekend with Denver and Rams, close games yesterday, and tonight’s Commanders/Atlanta OT game, and everyone having so much riding on these scores! Tomorrow should be a normal schedule day, so hopefully finish my release plan to send my daughter to help update the prior one in WORD on my old PC, plus lots of typing on my blog. And hopefully no fog:)
Monday, December 30
The good news is no fog and a beautiful day weather-wise ahead. I’m all fired up to have a productive typing morning, followed by Education and teaching class 12:30-3. Mainly to get some stuff done I couldn’t yesterday. Then boom! 7:45 the guard yelled “outside” out of the blue. Heaven forbid we had any notice, like ” due to construction on the fire sprinkler project next 6 weeks plan on being outside” . Nope, nothing. So we had to scramble to pack our stuff, make our cell perfect and inspection ready, and be outside at 8. I knew we were getting close to beginning, but I figured after the Holidays, not one day before New years Eve! Oh well…
Brought my coat with me which I never use as I couldn’t have sweatshirt with our prison uniform. But even at 8 am it was nice enough, and after one loop of the track the sun was strong enough to make things bearable so off it went. So I basically walked the track for 90 minutes then gym, chow, gym till 11:30, education till 3. For some reason they hold us in the gym for an hour +/- each time.
Rest of the day was lockdown, then Monday Night Football and reading. Being outside with no phone or email, all 200 guys wait in long lines rest of evening for phones, computers and showers. No reason to fight it, but its a pain to be productive anywhere now. Will be same next 4-6 weeks a they finish the fire sprinkler project.
Tuesday, December 31
Another day no fog, should be 70 with not much wind. Shaping up to be a beautiful Rose Bowl tomorrow weather-wise for my Oregon Ducks!
Today started off with some good news at 6:30 am. Due to being outside, the case manager had a 6 am semi annual team meetings with 10 people or so. One was my friend Steve, who I helped on 2 of his BP-11’s appealing disciplinary action. The case manager informed him the Victorville charge/BP-11 is being over turned and eliminated which is a huge win. This is where the guard “found” a weapon in the air duct. Won’t make up for 60 day SHU, no evidence, writeup or hearing. Terrible. His second BP-11 hasn’t been ruled on yet but he should hear next week, so fingers crossed. With being overturned hopefully he would go to camp later in 2025 assuming his court appeal doesn’t over turn his verdict first. Good way to start the day!
Off to library 7:30-10 before chow and going outside. Either later this morning or this afternoon the big project is to get a haircut and get rid of my beard I’ve had all of 2024. Its part of my “getting ready” with a positive attitude that 2025 will be a year of “justice” so am planning ahead:)
For lunch, we got a sack dinner brown bag again(same bologna and PBJ ingredients), plus they served us 2 dinner entrees, tonight’s and tomorrow’s- pork taco and beef and broccoli, pretty impressive if you’re in prison:) Also a pint of ice cream, I was impressed, been awhile! We haven’t bought ice cream at commissary for 3 months because the freezer has been broken and not fixed…
After my haircut, pretty much normal lockdown till 5, then Penn St vs. Boise State football. Really good game. Some of the guys were going around at 9:15 before the doors shut and wishing folks “Happy New years”, can’t say I was feeling it or wanted to. To me just another Tuesday night.
Wednesday, January 1
Happy New years! 2025 will be a much better year. I’m determined. I really don’t even want to think about having to spend 5 more Holidays here so my appeal needs to work, God willing!
New Years day is always a good time to size up how I did on my mid year, July 2024 goals, so here they are. I’ll start with what I achieved first:)
Achieved-
* Consistently posted blogs
* Caught up on 3 month backlog typing and posting journals and book reports
* Got Appeal filed with the 9th Circuit
Achieved but not a Goal:)
* Assisted 10 or so inmates with legal research/preparing administrative appeals and court filings
* Finalized a business plan for A Better Tomorrow
* Got baptized again!
* Read 50+ books and wrote 15 book reports
Semi Achieved
* 200 pushups/day- closed to 100/day
* 120 sit-ups/day- closer to 80-100/day
Not Achieved
* Run 2 laps in 8 minutes- didn’t try yet because of my inflammation:)
* Speak Spanish sentence fluently- quit tutoring:)
* Sending 30 letter to influencers for A Better Tomorrow-on hold
* Filed for Canadian Treaty Exchange- have to wait until Appeal ruling
* Get medical treatment for my autoimmune and mold toxicity thru BOP
I need to pull together some 2025 goals as well!
The day was pretty much 2 lockdowns and 2 Bowl games, unfortunately with my Oregon Ducks getting crushed in the Rose Bowl. I literally can’t remember turning off a Duck game in the second quarter in 40 years, but I did!
After chow went outside 6-7:30 to get a good workout in, felt good!
Thursday, January 2
No fog thankfully, so back to construction routine being outside 7:45-3 every day. Really kills my computer time, the only time I can do is 6-7:30 am or after 5 pm. Not going to get much done in the morning with shower and all. The evenings are tough to type, as now everyone wants to use the PC’s(4 for 200 guys) to email as well, so wait times go from 15 to 45 minutes. Just makes it really hard to be productive and motivated during the week now. Guess I’m going back to my old ways from email suspension days , hand write everything and type weekends/whenever. Lovely…
Afternoon was gorgeous today, 72 and mild. Basically walked the track worked out from 12-2. Got some real sun as well, not bad for Jan 2!
Today was switchover on free phone minutes for everyone, down from 500 to 300/month. Those with no First Step Act, say 50%, have to now pay, mainly illegals and those with 924(c) gun charges usually from drug offenses. BOP totally messed up on the phone change implementation with no explanation that there are no free minutes for anyone until their 30 day phone minute renewal day, 25th for me. Plus somehow everyone lost minutes they had as well. Over a 3 day period, I went from 310, 144, 240 minutes “remaining” till the 25th! So everyone has to pay until their free minutes kick in, and the system can’t track free minutes so we have to track manually for the 300 during the month. What a mess…
Turns out their software didn’t work like they thought, plus they were going to let us pay for minutes above the free 300, but cant figure out software for that functionality either. This is nationally by the way:)
Friday, January 3rd
Started with 7:30 medical, a 6 month follow-up from my first appointment when I was trying to get them a copy of my doctors letter. They re did my labs in October, look good fortunately, and my blood pressure is good- 126/82. But they can’t test for what my doctor can, so I’m still no where as to confirming my issues since the medical records folks never mailed a request for medical records to my doctor these past 6 months:). I at least got them to look at page 1 of my doctors letter which they didn’t really understand without reading the whole letter. Finally, per their request, they did agree to look at a copy of my doctors lab reports that I have at home, so my daughter will send them, and will receive next week and we’ll try again!
8:15-3 was outside rest of day. Spent 3 hours walking the track, at least 20 laps. After lunch I parked at far end of he track by myself at a picnic table and did some writing for 30-45 minutes , 2 laps, write again, etc. Nice way to not be cooped up! Finally back in at 3!
After lockdown/chow, watched TV, spoke with a new inmate today. He’s a J6 guy, been on CNN and Fox a lot apparently, so was interesting to hear his story. He’s part of the final push by the Biden Admin to get everyone sentenced. He’s counting on being home in 17 days for some reason:)
Have some long time friends coming to visit tomorrow, down from Portland. Our kids grew up together for 8-10 years, literally sleeping at either house on a regular basis. We’ve done lots together over the years as well! Great people and looking forward to spending time with them. Hard to believe its been 15 months since I’ve seen them!
Praying for Liberty and Freedom and to see my Family and Friends soon! BJ
