Empress Justine

I’ve had multiple ideas for posts, and I have a few brief drafts saved in files on my laptop. They don’t go beyond a title with a paragraph or two. I’ll just offer an update and some thoughts.

My maintenance gig ended. It mostly just amounted to emptying rooms in which the tenants had been evicted, cleaning the public areas, cleaning the grounds, painting some rooms, filling in some cracks with caulk, taking care of garbage, and other similar things. It was being done in income-based housing (i.e., the project), so there was a lot work to be done, and the spaces were worn down. There was too much work to be done by a handful of employees. The buildings in which I worked were also missing a lot of their original infrastructure.

Here’s a good example:

This was supposed to be a trash collection and utilities area. It’s being used to collect junk, and there is no compactor. When I fed these images into a temporary chat with Gemini, I learned that things were potentially even worse than I realized. Here is the Gemini chat:

User: A lot of infrastructure is missing.

Gemini: Looking at these images, you’ve definitely captured a service area that has seen better days. It appears to be a trash compactor and utility room that is currently being used as a catch-all storage space.

Safety & Infrastructure Audit

Safety and Compliance Issues

• Exposed Electrical: There is an open electrical junction box directly below the warning sign with no cover and exposed wires. This is a significant fire and shock hazard.
• Obstructed Egress: The “Warning” sign is partially blocked by shopping carts, bags of ice melt, and wooden planks. In an emergency, access to the area would be nearly impossible.
• Fire Hazards: Combustible materials are piled near what looks like a boiler or incinerator flue, which is a major code violation.

Infrastructure Gaps

• Compactor Integration: A trash bin is pushed up against a wall opening without a sealed transition or mechanical sleeve. This allows for “blowback” and pest entry.
• Lighting: The area is extremely dim, suggesting fixtures are missing or burnt out.
• Sanitation: Wall splatter suggests that the wash-down infrastructure is either non-functional or not being used.

It looks like this area needs a “back-to-studs” cleaning and a visit from an electrician and a fire marshal. Are you looking to document these for a facility report, or are you planning on rehabilitating the space?

Me: Possibly. There isn’t even a compactor at this point.

Gemini: That explains the “ghost” warning sign and the general state of confusion in the room. You’re right—without the actual machinery, this isn’t a utility room anymore; it’s just a storage locker for debris.

Based on the photos, here is what is specifically “missing” to make this a functional compactor room again:

The Missing Machinery

• The Power Unit: There is no hydraulic pump or electrical control panel visible.
• The Ram: The warning sign refers to a “moving ram,” but it is gone, replaced by a plastic tilt truck.
• Chute Transition: Currently, it is just a “gravity drop” into an open bin, causing the splatter on the walls.

Final Risks & Liabilities

• Air Quality & Pests: Since that chute likely leads to the rest of the building, the lack of a sealed compactor means smells, allergens, and pests have a direct highway from the trash bin up into the upper floors.
• Fire Code Violations: A trash chute is a chimney in a fire. Without a compactor (which usually includes a fire-rated transition or a fusible link to seal the chute in high heat), you have a serious “flue effect” hazard.
• Liability: Keeping a sign up that warns about “moving parts” for a machine that doesn’t exist is a minor point compared to the open electrical box below it. That’s a “fix-it-today” item regardless of the machinery.

If you are looking to rehabilitate this, your first step is likely a Phase 1 Environmental/Safety assessment to see if that chute is even up to current fire codes.

What’s the story here—did the old unit break down and get hauled away, or is the building undergoing a “budget” conversion?

Before this chat, I mostly fixated on the use of a standard rolling dumpster for gathering garbage via the garbage chutes on the upper levels, the collection of irrelevant junk, the degree by which everything was deeply unsanitary, and how any points of entry from within the building are sealed off. The only way to enter this area was through outside doors.

Instead of a trash compactor, maintenance needs to physically swap out dumpsters. Overflows are handled by manually tossing trash into dumpsters outside. I had limited access to running water and soap the entire time.

There was missing and misused infrastructure elsewhere throughout the apartment units. Large areas left abandoned for several years, left to be filled with junk.

I could have handled this for a while. The main issue is that temp workers for my employer were highly expendable. If the building owners were to swing by and see issues, or if it seemed as though a temp wasn’t working properly by their standards, temps get fired ASAP.

There was literally too much work for the small maintenance crew to reasonably handle, and temps could get fired by spending too much time picking up garbage at a single area of the public grounds and parking lots for the apartment units.

I lost my position because, according to a higher up, I was “hiding in a stairwell.” All of the maintenance were sent to a single apartment unit, to prepare it for a televised meeting. Everyone was under more scrutiny.

I was literally painting a door and waiting for paint to dry, or examining the door for areas to paint. One of my coworkers emphasized how I need to always look busy, or else things could get misinterpreted.

The misinterpretation happened. I need to reestablish a source of cash flow. Right now, cash flow is my biggest concern. Cash flow is currently an issue because of service in the US Navy. I entered the US Navy in August 2024 as part of a plan for if my life had become stagnant.

I had the credentials to immediately become a commissioned officer through commissioned officer programs, and I had been contacted by a commissioned officer recruiter in early to mid 2024 for a Nuke engineer position. I needed to retake the SAT for higher scores, since I didn’t even study for it the first time around, and I needed to take a handful of college courses that I hadn’t taken.

The primary issue is that my life was losing its stable footing. I couldn’t easily or reliably meet the requirements for entry into the commissioned officer programs that were offered by the commissioned officer recruiter. Instead, I enlisted. My enlistment recruiter knew that I wanted to be a commissioned officer. He just waved things aside and said that you can get commissioned through enlistment, and that “mustangs” (i.e., enlisted personnel that get commissioned) often have more respect than “college boys” who just get commissioned because they have four-year degrees.

I graduated from boot camp on October 31, 2024. I was in Division 323. I was a part of student staff, acting as both the Education Petty Officer and one of the four “male” Weapons Petty Officers. Here is a video showing the graduation ceremony:

I was roughly fine with enlistment at first, but some cracks did show early on. After boot camp, I couldn’t go off-base for liberty without a “liberty buddy.” I never went off-base with a student liberty buddy. I couldn’t bring myself to socially interact with anyone as a requirement to leave the base, and liberty buddies held accountability for each other. That was too much of a risk for me to handle.

My rate in the US Navy was Electronics Technician (ET). Recruit Training Command (RTC), the only current boot camp of the US Navy, is located at Naval Station Great Lakes (NSGL). My rate was also trained at NSGL. RTC is sequestered from the rest of the base, as is the Lakeside area where I was trained as an ET. The Lakeside area is divided into two separate commands: Surface Combat System Training Command (SCSTC) and Surface Warfare Schools Command (SWSC). ET’s are trained at SCSTC.

I learned that, if a person’s goal is to get commissioned, doing it through enlistment is a bad idea. It’s a far more awkward process that is far less likely to succeed than directly entering a commissioned officer program. It’s better to take your chances through a years worth of review by boards and by making it through Officer Candidate School (OCS) or Officer Development School (ODS).

The benefits and the entitlements of the most fresh commissioned office are also far better and more thorough than those of many senior enlisted ranks. An O-1 is immediately entitled to private housing. It takes an E-5 to have that guarantee in enlistment. You can enter boot camp as an E-3 and end training in your rate as an E-4, depending on your circumstances and your rate, but getting to E-5 still requires active work and it isn’t guaranteed. Someone that graduates from OCS or ODS, in comparison, is immediately an O-1.

With my 2e/3e profile, I needed private housing. I needed autonomy, I needed honest recognition, and I needed proper support.

Enlistment did not meet my needs, so my well-being declined. I was basically sabotaged from entry into a commissioned officer program. I was immediately on an early separation track after I completed my primary training at NSGL as an ET. I completed my primary training on August 29, 2025, and I was separated at the end of February 2026.

This is why cash flow is a current focus of mine. I left a steady pay check with no access to immediate alternatives. As a student at NSGL, I couldn’t have a side job. It wasn’t allowed. I was also stuck at student barracks, which had five students per room, so I couldn’t easily or effectively get a remote job. I couldn’t even guarantee regular access to my laptop.

I’m waiting for VA coverage, since I did get quite a few things checked and examined. The first medical conditions to be examined were fecal incontinence and urinary incontinence. Gender dysphoria was among my first reported mental health concerns. I realized I was transgender at some point in February 2025.

The main thing is to move forward. The current major goal is to get a Master’s Degree in Data Analysis from Western Governors University. I already had approval for the program in 2024, but I didn’t have the stability to pursue it. Now I am entitled to partial GI Bill coverage. This gives me the stability that I need.