No Appropriate Title

Well, 9Apr08 has arrived.  Things are spinning up in order to spin down, at least for us.  The trickle exchange of new for old is occurring as you read this.  Soon I'll be moving and you'll hear me bitching about the Romanians and Bulgarians on the internet and in the PX as I did about a year ago.  To the right is Goddard's comment about the Romanians stood for quite a while before I removed it.  As a reminder, "Those Romanians love them some internet!"  It's hard to believe (not really) that almost a year has passed since he said that and soon there after we parted ways, half our team north and half west.  Soon we'll be coming back together and heading home to our respective places to assimilate.  

The difference now is that the Fobbits of Kandahar won't be as irritating to me, Kuwait will have essence of a Mediterranean beach and Ft Riley will be a welcome site and the horrific Atlanta traffic will probably draw up a certain amount of peace for me instead of the road rage of old.  

When I see my wife, daughter, family and friends I won't look at them the same.  I can't.  I wasted so much time on the things that don't matter, wrapped up in the American Dream of consumption.  With the benefit of hind site and near death experiences, my picture is more balanced and my appreciation for my family, friends and life in general has taken a new level.  With God's (the real one) help I'll maintain this healthier, simpler view and carry on contributing to His grand scheme.

With all that soulful growth stuff in mind (I can't go down the emotional path too long without veering off), I look forward to coming home to my house, taking a walk and eating dinner with my family, sampling my way through Whole Foods with Mandy and Leah, visiting every brewery within traveling distance, vacations with all my family and friends, having my wife reign in my daily visits to Starbucks on the way to work and  going to the hospital, getting pages all day long and standing in the OR discussing the crap equipment while driving a Synthes nail (good plug, eh) into a femur.

These are just a few of my favorite things!

Camel Day

Being that the locals in the US don't usually have camels hanging around the back yard, SGM decided it would be in our best interest to learn to appreciate the modes of travel we have available to us at home.  This has been tossed around for the last few months as an absolute necessity before departure, thus yesterday became "Camel Day" at Camp Georgia.  Yes, they are rigid to ride on.  Yes, I had to coerce the brothers to fall back down into anatomical position after dismounting.  No, they are not the quality that you may find in Saudi Arabia........nothing here is.  None the less, I rode a camel.  Lawrence has nothing on me!

1 Month

Yep, here it is.  Minus one month before I depart from this phenom that some call a country.  It's more of a conglomerate of peoples that live close to each other and do their best to disturb peace. Anyway, enough of that.  I've seen war movies about how hardened vets get close to the end of a tour and get all pent up with caution.  Well, that's so real with the caveat that you actually have to operate off the "day spas" in a less than hospitable environment.  The desert holds many secrets and a few of them I'd like to see stay put.  I find myself much less willing to go and do risky missions and more than that I don't want to leave the asphalt when moving from place to place. My father always taught me to "FLAP" (Finish Like A Pro) and I'd say of done my fair share of that this year but I find myself wanting to "FLOP" (F the Last OPerations).   

Back

I've arrived home again and slept well last night for the first time in 4 days.  The first thing I did was bust out some shorts and celebrate being away from the "Flag Pole."  It's absolutely insane how uptight Camp Phoenix is.  It has to be the salute capitol of the world.  Way too much brass up there.  You can't walk 5 feet without saluting to or back at someone.  God forbid you make a no cover, no salute policy like the NATO commands do.  Woops, don't want to set a bad example for the world.  Ahh, the US military, we are so wound up we can't allow people to relax and just do their job.  "Ah to be" as my mother would say.  Anyway, I'm back in the South, thank God, and actually in the real war zone.  Ironically it feels sooooo liberating!

Happy Easter

I've seen that alot of new stuff has come across the wire on the internet so I thought I'd update this to let everyone know that I'm fine.  I've been on the move alot lately and haven't had much I can talk about to report.  Right now I'm up enjoying some "down time" in Kabul.  Nothing I'm willing to admit to here except I'm ready to get away from all the brass and worthless uniform policies around this place!

Anyway, I truly hope that you all have had a happy Easter and remember why we celebrate it.  No matter what your faith is, unless you're Muslim, this place will make you appreciate how wonderful Jesus really is and how freeing it is to believe in him.  That's all I can say without busting my politically correct bubble!

Carry on!

Happy Easter

Check out the new side bar

My boredom with the Afghans and Taliban have drawn me closer to a new hobby.  Hunting of another sort, if you will.  Out with the old, in with the new!  Yep, for your entertainment I'm willing to sacrifice minutes a day in capturing Talimice.  They bait us with mines and IEDs so in turn, I'm bating in their mice with little bits of honey leading up to some provolone on a mouse trap.  It's working like a champ!  Anyway, the side bar will be named after Pinky and The Brain, the infamous Warner Bro characters.  

Did you say you wanted a picture or two?  Here's #4 hanging resting in the burn pit.  I have to keep it informal thus I may become attached to my victims.

Addendum:  Soon after the death of #4, #5 was captured and interrogated, found to be useless and "taken for a drive."  Note for interest.  Always drag one of your senior NCOs into your sick schemes.  As an officer, it's always best to have the plausible deniability effect to fall back on. Top #4, bottom #5

I got nothing boss!

The internet actually came up for a while today so I started to put some blog material up and actually published it for about 20 minutes or so.  After realizing that the press would probably hound my family and get me put in prison for stating pro American, pro Christian and anti Taliban sentiments, I deleted it.  Call me weak but truthfully my rant was founded on press releases from the BBC and local press.  I figured spilling my opinion of the Islamic culture (IN THIS COUNTRY) would get me in trouble by mindless liberals out to get the bad American soldier who tramples across the world doing Satan's work.  So, moving on to a more cheery note.......

One of my best friends, who will be kept nameless for his safety from those mindless people, had a daughter in the last few days.  Congratulations!  Welcome to the whooped dad club! Every penis in the world has just become a problem.

In other news.  We have to be fairly aggressive driving on the streets of our lovely, star bright albeit smelly and dusty city.  One of our gunners is quite verbal, to say the least, to traffic that may delay our movement from point A to point B.  There's nothing like, well....anything to stop you at point A.5 if you get my drift.  So, we get people out of our way.  This particular guy has numerous, exhilarating sayings that ooze of intelligence far beyond his rank (for real).  Phrases like..."Get off my **$& road!" and "It's my road until I'm done using it!" "Are you friggin blind, oops, sorry!"  "Get your ass (for real, a donkey) off my road!"  He has a special way about himself.  He's the guy that wrote the eulogy for the cigarette....get my drift.  Smart and sassy!

Well, today we had a genius driving in the middle of the road, coming toward us and this gunner is waving and shouting, the whole Rules of Engagement thing, and finally points his 50 down down at the guy and screeches out with a trailing up and question mark pitch "Are you trying to die?"  Come to find out the guy didn't want to see Allah today and politely left about 20 ft of tire markings on the road and probably some fecal matter on his seat.  I know this was one of those "had to be there and had to know the guy" moments but man it was funny.  The pitch of his voice was so comedic.  

OK!  My moment.  Moving on.

Bev thanks for the box.  It took less than a month to get here.  Mary Lou, slowly getting your stuffed animals out to little girls and sometimes Police when they don't intentionally try to get us killed.  That's a plus in my book.  They get a star or stuffed animal for playing nice.