Soldier's Paradise II

Homeward Bound

2005-06-08T06:09:00.000-07:00

It is getting closer and closer to the time I am supposed to leave and I am getting more and more excited. Not only because I will be home for Father's day and my anniversary, or because I will get to play hide and go seek with my son or Halo2 with my wife, but because I GET TO LEAVE THIS GOD FORSAKEN PLACE AND ALL OF THE IDIOTS OVER HERE! My only regret is that I have to leave some of my guys to augment the team that came in to replace us. Some of them wanted to stay,but some of them REALLY didn't. Sorry guys.

As my fourth tour in this region comes to a close I feel very blessed and fortunate to have spent twenty six months here and never been shot at (unless you count SCUDs) and to have never seen many of the horrible things that too many of my brothers in arms have. I have never seen a personal friend die in combat. I have never seen children or women die in combat zones. I have never had to take the life of my enemy. I am thankful for all of that and so much more.

I realize that many of the guys that are truly forward and have seen and experienced all of the things I mentioned above still look at guys like me with disdain and to a point I can understand that, but let me just say that we do not choose our assignments. At least I did not, and I would have gone forward and executed to the best of my ability and done my best to serve my country to the extent that it needed me to. As I said before I feel very fortunate for the assignments I received. I hold the highest respect for those Soldiers, Marines, Airmen and Navy Personnel that went forward into the truly horrible areas of this war and fought valiantly to sustain our way of life and take liberty to those less fortunate.

To the Mothers, Fathers, Husbands, Wives, Sons, Daughters, Brothers, Sisters and Friends who have lost loved ones in this war I am honored to serve in the same military force as the loved ones you've lost and could never hope to thank you or them enough for the sacrifices you and they have made, but I hope my simple thank you brings a momentary smile and a fond memory.

Thank You.

The Home Stretch

2005-05-28T13:02:00.000-07:00

We are back on our "home" camp from our mission, that was a booming success, and it actually feels great to be back. We got to unwind for a few days and now we are right back in the swing of things. The new LT that we got has created a "super team" out of my team and Bunk's team. They should be really well prepared for what ever comes their way after I leave. A couple of my guys are not thrilled about having to stay, but they are happy about the extra money.

I didn't realize how much work it is actually going to take to get out of here. I kind of miss the days when I was more of a pee on and wasn't really responsible for anything. This time I have to sign over responsibility for two different transmission systems, a data package and all the peripheral equipment as well as write to Non-Commissioned Officer Evaluation Reports for the two NCOs from my team that are staying. I will actually enjoy writing these up as I have enjoyed working with these two.

I need to get all of my guys a current PT test and a weapons qualification before I can get anybody out of here so my projected fly date may be falling backwards, but I gotta take care of these guys first. As I get closer and closer to being home it becomes harder and harder to think of anything else, but I know I have to stay focused on the now and just look forward to the later. In any case I am down to weeks and not months anymore, so I am excited!

Owww....Quit it!

2005-05-18T04:12:00.000-07:00

For the last couple of days I have known that I have at least one hernia again. I get a burning sensation really low on my abdominal wall, and every so often I move just right and I get a really sharp stabbing pain that causes me to immediately discontinue what ever action I was doing. Like a knuckle head, I have not discontinued my Gym attendance. I have been making good progress and just don't want to stop. Got to be a looker for the wife when I get home you know. Besides, I am like 90 percent sure I had the injury before I began my gym workout any way so what is it really gonna hurt, right?

This morning I decided it was time to verify my injury, so I was off to the TMC (Troop Medical Clinic). When I got there I checked in and then sat in the waiting room for over an hour before my name was called. I had to sit there and watch person after person come and go. After nearly an hour and a half I walked up to the counter to see what was going on. The Triage nurse told me that they had my file and it should be any minute. Then a couple of minutes later some one came out and called my name. As I got up and walked over she told me that they had lost my slip and needed all of my information again. Now I got to have a seat for a while again. After about twenty more minutes I got called back and placed in a room, where my vitals were taken and then I was told that a doctor would be in to see me in a few more minutes.

After about fifteen minutes a doctor walked in and apologized for the wait and then took all of my information, to include my vitals... again. Now I am starting to get scared. These people lost my records twice in one visit and I hadn't even been seen yet.

The female Navy commander (O-5) that was attending to me was quite....Different and had a "great personality". She questioned me about my medical history and the hernia repair I had in Germany. After the small talk was over it was down to the nitty gritty. She actually said "Ok, stand up and drop 'em". I did and she began her exam. Poking and prodding. She found a hernia on both sides. As she painfully prodded me she asked "does this hurt?"...Ummmm YES! I have been poked and prodded in that area several times since my repair and it has always hurt.

Anyway, after she had finished her exam she confirmed what I was already pretty sure of. I have a double inguinal hernia. One for each side...Yes!!! What's more, if it wasn't hurting too bad before it sure is now. It is more uncomfortable now than it has been since the last time I had it checked out for pain. That's a different story all together.

The Commander then said "Ok, let's go up front and schedule your consultation." When I asked how soon that would be, she told me it wouldn't be before next Wednesday. That's not soon enough as I won't even be in this country anymore. So she told me to wait until I get where I am going. Even then I am almost at my return date so I will probably go when I get out of here, but I will put the surgery off until I am back in the good old U.S. so my loving wife can baby me. I know she will be looking forward to that. Sorry Dear.

Running Sucks

2005-05-13T02:26:00.000-07:00

I hate running. I have for as long as I can remember. Maybe it's because I have a knee that hurts when I work it out, maybe it's because of the wonderful botched hernia repair I got from the Army or maybe it's because I weigh nearly two hundred pounds and my poor legs just don't like to carry me around at any rate of speed over a walk. I knew I was gonna have to start running sooner or later however. I couldn't simply keep going to the gym and throwing up weight because as I continue to get bigger (heavier) it's only going to get harder and harder to run. So I ran.

Last night was the first time I have run further than from my barracks to the bus I was about to miss in almost six months, and I was none to excited about it. I ran with the NCO who is here to replace me and one of the cable guys attached to my team. I will call the NCO Bunk and the cable dawg C.S. We set the time for 1900L, shortly after sunset. There is no way you are gonna run here when the sun is up. None of us are trying to die from a heat stroke. We set the course. We were going to run around perimeter of the camp roughly 3.1 miles. We set the uniform. Anything we wanted plus a reflective belt. I used the free one the Air Force gave me that made me "car proof", and we were off.

Bunk set the pace because he is a big dude so we all naturally assumed he would be the slowest, and we set out at slow jaunt. The kind of run that soldiers always complain about. "My knees hurt, We are running too slow!" I liked it, but I guess I was starting to step it out a little too much. I was starting to "feel it" and really picking up the pace. Bunk yells out like a little girl, "Slow down man! You keep speeding up." "Was I? I didn't notice...." I said with a wolfish grin. Bunk held tight with C.S. and I for a little more than half of the 3+ mile stint, and then he had to start taking breathers, which I didn't mind... at all.

As we rounded the last turn and started the last half mile back to the start point I was itchin' to go, but I stayed back with these two guys. Bunk was really breathing hard and C.S. was gettin' there two so I waited. We got inside that last 1/8th of a mile or so and I bolted. Man it felt good. The wind mixed with the sweat all over me felt great in the heat and I was amazed at how good my legs felt. They just kept pumping harder and faster and I came across the start point at a full sprint (which for me isn't that impressive) and I was done!

Today my hip-flexors hurt worse than they have in a year and my knee is screaming, but I was proud of myself. Today I get to do it again. Great.

Careful is the Key

2005-05-04T04:06:00.000-07:00

Dark had fallen and a dust storm was rising. I knew visibility was going to deteriorate quickly so I began to get nervous. I was alone, and I felt it. The rocks under my feet made a crunching sound that pierced the night and gave my position away with every step as I made my way through the small lighted buildings. As the dust storm intensified the light from the buildings and pale moon became less and less effective.

After two maybe three minutes of walking throughout the rocks I was at the corner of the last building. I had nearly made it to my destination with out encountering any hostiles. As I peaked out around the corner it looked clear, but how could I be sure with the limited visibility? I couldn't just stand there speculating as to the safety of the situation. I just had to go.

I made my move around the corner and was on my way. So far so good. The rocks began to crunch a little louder as my feet began to shuffle more quickly with my rising anticipation level. Right as I got to the steps of the building I had to get to, the lights of one of the hostiles began to loom from down the street, but it was too late I had already made it.

Once inside I knew exactly where I had left it. I reached down inside my duffel and pulled out my reflective belt. As I strapped it around my waist I knew my trip back to the recreation area would be safe. Certainly no car could hit me with this thing on.

Sound stupid? Ya, I thought so to. We are a couple of days into our current mission and this portion is on an Air Force base. The Commander here makes everyone wear reflective belts after the hours of darkness. The apparent reason is too many airmen have been hit by cars out here. Come on now. I am sure these people were either wearing headphones while running (which is not authorized) or doing something else stupid. It sucks that someone got hit by a car, but it really was probably from their own negligence. Do they really think these shiney belts are gonna help?

Hot Situation in a Hot Country

2005-05-01T04:20:00.000-07:00

My guys and I are out on our mission now and set up in system, again. Things have not gone all that well again either. It seems we have been set up for failure since day one. Each time we have managed to over come all of the bad situations they have managed to put us in, but we are still faced with all of the bad publicity that seems to come with the bad situations.

Before we came out here we had to break down our last site, wash all of our trucks, recover all of our equipment and load back up in trucks in one day. Then they split our equipment into two sections that were supposed to arrive in the operational area on separate days. Well when we got here, because we had to pack so much equipment in such haste (no one else had such a tight time line) we found that there were some critical pieces of equipment in some of the trucks that were not arriving for several more days!

Of course all of the equipment that we got out here without that we needed came down on us, and some of the blame is ours, but what they have to realize is that when I am not afforded the time to even check my guys loads once that there are very likely going to be mistakes. I am a fairly competent NCO but when you tie anyone's hands behind their backs it becomes very difficult for them to perform miracles.

We have managed to duct tape and bubble gum a lot of things. We always seem to make the best of what ever situation we are put in, but it would be nice to just have things go well for once. Keeping our fingers crossed.

We have managed to keep our spirits high in spite of the circumstances. A little less than two months left as long as things don't change, again.

Friendly Fire

2005-04-17T14:05:00.000-07:00

When you have been working your butt off to try to please everyone and succeed at your job, the last ting you want is to have someone from "your side" stab you in the back. My guys and I have spent over three months busting our butts to get this package up to speed. We have had to deal with everything from equipment failures, to incorrect and insufficient information to install our circuits. We have met every test and passed with flying colors, but these knuckle heads that we are supporting seem to be out to get us, and now it seems that the OIC (officer in charge) that has been placed over us is working for the other team!

We have repaired all of the faulty equipment, built spares of anything that we could possibly build spares of, helped get all of the information for the installation of our circuits straight and helped engineer the network. Most of this is above and beyond what the guys of this package should be expected to do, nevermind even know how to do. How have we been repayed? They made us tear everything down and start over for time. Nevermind that the equipment that we are supporting still hasn't gotten their stuff straight or that us tearing down will impede their progress, just execute. So we did. They gave us 24 hours from the time we rolled on to site to have our site set up and all circuits reinstalled. I knew my guys could do it, even though apparently these "evaluators" who really had no idea how to evaluate us because they don't even know what we do didn't think we could do it. Well not only did we do it, we beet the allotted time by....12 HOURS!!! You would think there would be some kind of congratulations in order. Not the case. They gigged us for having our generators too close to the shelters. Well I tried to explain to them that the area that we had to work in did not allow for us to put them as far away as they were supposed to be. Didn't matter. Then they gigged us for not having everyone in the same uniform. The guys that were setting up the antenna had their helmets on and the rest of us did not. This is strictly for safety, because they were dealing with large metal objects that were overhead and there is the danger of possible head injury. Regardless how nit picky can you be?

About three weeks have gone by since the evaluation and I guess Chief (Our OIC) was bored so he asked a buddy from his unit to do him a favor and come out and check out our grounding. This guy shows up on site one day and starts looking around and taking pictures of our grounding. He found some deficiencies of course. There is always room for improvement. If we were perfect every time would any of us really be in the Army? So this guy leaves and tells me he will email chief a report of his findings and suggestions for improvement. I thought that was very nice and helpful of him. Well this nice and helpful guy, then wrote up this monster report making us out to be incompetent idiots, and sent it to everyone in our chain of concern all the way up to our first general officer! oh yeah but didn't bother to send anything to us. Now they people who have wanted us to fail since the beginning are all in a buzz with the new fuel they were just supplied by none other than our very own OIC. I'm sure glad this guy isn't in my unit back in the rear.

I can't wait until this mission is over and I can leave all of these backstabbing petty people here in their wonderful little desert paradise to bicker and backstab among themselves.

A Little Predictability Please!

2005-04-15T22:46:00.000-07:00

For as long as I have been in the Army, I have heard commanders talking about how they intend to make our lives (their soldiers) as predictable as possible. I'm not sure exactly what they are doing to accomplish this, but it seems as a whole the Army needs to rethink it's strategy here.

This deployment has been a perfect example of the vast number of shortcomings we are having in this arena. I graduated BNCOC (A school required for the rank of Staff Sergeant) in September of 2004, when I got back my 1SG called me into his office and told me that my team was to rotate into theatre and replace a team on the ground. "Oh, and you are leaving in two weeks." Hey congrats, I know you just spent two months away from your wife and son, and all of last year deployed, but here you go again. That's ok. I have been in long enough to know that this is what my job is, and I can accept that. What has got me riled up is, they knew when they sent that team out they were going to have to replace them, so why are my guys and I getting two weeks notice?

Well two weeks turned into two months as Thanks Giving was approaching. What the heck is going on? All of us have put our lives on hold to prepare for deployment and we are sitting on our hands waiting for a decision to be made. Who makes the decision? What is it they need to decide? and When are they gonna tell us what is going on? Soon word comes down that "you won't be leaving until after Thanks Giving so if you and your guys want to take leave you can, but we need your leave requests by the end of the day." Hmm, it's 1400L and end of day formation is at 1645L, great I have a little less than three hours to find out if fourteen guys want to take leave for Thanks Giving and then get all of the requests done for them.

After we all return from spending time with our families for Thanks Giving, it is back to the waiting game. What is going to happen now? Time went by and time went by. Before we knew it we were a little more than ten days to Christmas. The word comes down again, "You won't be leaving until after Christmas so get your leaves in ASAP." Wow. Nothing like last minute. So I get all my guys psyched up to go home for Christmas and enjoy the biggest holiday of the year with their loved ones, and then....Psych! Your plane leaves in four days. Can you jerk us around a little more?

I guess I shouldn't have asked that, because as I have stated before the people we work for out here have managed to pick up right where our unit in the rear left off. Now with our replacement team on the ground, and right before a major exercise we are being jerked around again. The team they sent has ISSUES! First of all one of the team chiefs they were gonna send with the package doesn't have a security clearance so he had to be scratched the day before they flew. That means I have to leave my guy in his position to fill the gap. He was none to pleased about that. Now we find out that another soldier in the package doesn't have the proper security clearance and will be going home. More than likely I am gonna have to leave someone for him to.

Now the magnifying glass is on the new team. The Package NCOIC is brand new to the unit and does not know the equipment so there is little faith in him, even though he is a competent NCO capable of doing the job. They don't have anyone trained on a crucial piece of our equipment, so they might need some one to stay for that too. "Maybe we should just keep the old team and send the new one back." Gee, that sounds great. We are supposed to get an answer in a matter of days. I'll believe that when I see it. That means that myself and another NCO on my package will be back up over 500 days deployed in a two year span for the second time in three years.

At least I am making a tax free buck.

I want to clear something up really quick. On my losing weight post, the weight loss is not intentional. It is entirely accidental. My goal weight has been and still is 205. I just want it to be mostly muscle mass not flab.

Losing Weight Like Crazy

2005-04-10T03:59:00.000-07:00

In June of 1993 there was a fairly long haired 18 year old kid who was graduating high school and ready to move on to bigger and better things. He stood just over six feet tall, but only weighed about a hundred and twenty pounds. People were forever asking him if he had a tape worm, or if he had been sick when he was a kid. He really did look skinny. He WAS skinny. Yes that kid was me. Who would have thought that I would ever weigh about one hundred and eighty five pounds (which I know is by no means large) and be worrying about my weight. Not that I think I am fat, but the extra weight does make it harder to perform well on your PT tests.

When I joined the Army I weighed a whopping one hundred and twenty five pounds. I was so light in fact that the recruiter had me drink as much of a gallon of water as I could on the ride from Yuba City to the Mepps station in Sacramento. Let me just say that I had no problem performing when it came time for the urinanalysis. As a matter of fact I was begging for it. Can you imagine trying to duck walk with an over full bladder. OUCH!!! Since then it has been a constant struggle for me to try and gain weight just so I didn't feel so much like a walking toothpick. When I left Germany I weighed one hundred sixty five pounds and was in the best shape of my life (I still hated running). When I left to come out here this time I weighed between one eighty five and one ninety, and was by no means in the best shape of my life. In fact when the platoon sergeant they put over us out here met me he asked if I was a chunky kid growing up, because of the weight I carry in my face. "ME? Really, are you talking to ME?"

I have cut back on the junk food. As a matter of fact I have cut back on food period. Really I am eating one good meal a day and a couple of snacks or light meals through out. I know that is a dieter's night mare, but you have to remember I was a hundred and twenty five pound twenty two year old... I don't sweat that stuff too much. I really hadn't even been thinking about my weight until the other day I ran into a girl that I went through AIT (Advanced Individual Training, It's where you learn your job after basic) with. The first thing she said to me was, "Wow! You look totally different." I wasn't sure how to take that but my response was, "Yeah I guess sixty five pounds will do that to a person."

But having been thinking about my weight since then I have noticed I am much skinnier again. I had to get a larger size pants before I came out here, because the four sets of DCU (Desert camouflage Uniform) pants I had gotten four years ago at Huachuca were getting a little/lot small through the waist, AKA Gut. I went from a Medium Regular to a Large Regular. For those non-Army types, the first size is for gerth and the second is for height. So I came out with two Large Regulars and two Medium Regulars because I couldn't get them both exchanged at once. To my surprise this morning, my Large Regulars felt really loose around the waist, so I put on a set of my Medium Regulars. THEY WERE LOOSE TO! Uh oh. I am not trying to get back to the bean pole days. I checked my belt and the bend of my normal wear was about an inch and a half farther across the skinny side of the buckle.

I made a comment about my double chin to my wife today, but I guess if I keep going the way I am I won't have to worry about that either. At least I'll be thinner than I am used to for the PT test tomorrow.

Good News and Bad News!

2005-04-07T11:47:00.000-07:00

As I was walking up to the office tonight I ran into a bunch of the guys that had just gotten off shift and were coming back to get some sleep before they have to go to work again tomorrow night. Smiley, one of the guys on that shift had this big old grin on his face. Nothing new really, how do you think he got the name smiley anyway?

Smiley has been expecting the birth of his son for the past several days, so I put two and two together. Today was the day. Apparently he had received a Red Cross message and was sure that it was the news of is son's birth. As we walk into the office Rod is already inside on the phone. It didn't take much to get him to realize his phone call wasn't quite as important. He got off and Smiley called the Red Cross to get his message...His girl friend had indeed gone into labor. He called her father and got the number to her hospital room. After a short conversation with the tired mother, all had been confirmed. He was a new Dad, the baby boy is strong and healthy and Mom is ok and recovering from labor nicely. Now he is calling all of the loved ones he can think of to give them the news. I only regret that he had to be here instead of home to be with his girl friend for the birth of their son.

That's the good news. The bad news is actually why I came back to the office. I had to write about it or I felt like I was going to explode.

I thought I was gonna get by without one this time. For some reason it has happened every single time I have been deployed, but this time the chances were slim so I wasn't too worried about it. Besides, I didn't want to think about it because I was afraid I would jinx it.

No one on the data package is married. In fact Triple H has just gone through his divorce. I am the only one on the Tri-Band team that is married and Joyce and I are going as strong as ever. That only leaves PS from the Tac-Sat team, and they have been kinda shakey ever since he joined the military from what he has told me.

He came by my room this evening to tell me that our platoon sergeant had been trying to get a hold of me all day and had some questions for me, then he paused. "By the way, I am going to need to set up a JAG appointment." My heart sank. I knew what was coming next before he even said it. Tonight his wife told him she couldn't take it anymore, and she wanted a divorce. I wanted to scream. I have seen this too many times out here now. I know his heart is breaking and there is not a damn thing I can do for him except be here to listen to him and try and be as big brotherly as I can. I get very attached to all of my guys, even the ones that I want to kill sometimes, so it hurts my heart when this stuff happens. I can only imagine the kind of pain he is feeling, and I just wish I could make it all go away.

The sun will still come up tomorrow and hopefully he will know what his next move is going to be. If not I will try to help him make the best decision for himself and then I will do everything in my power to make sure it happens.

A Day Off!

2005-04-07T05:42:00.000-07:00

I hope everyone like my new page format. I do. It is much easier to modify. I have never been one to sit and write in HTML and this one is easier to do that in than the last one. Thus the change.

I'm off today! Can you believe it? A day off. I got back to my "personnel storage area" last night about 1am and almost immediately fell asleep. Joyce can attest to how immediate, immediate really is, and I didn't wake up until Wil came barging into our Pod at around 11:30am! It was wonderful. Almost immediately I got a phone call from the XO in the company I am attached to and he needed to see me in his office. Now that that is over I am in my office checking my email and writing this post.

My deployment here is already almost over. It really doesn't seem like we have been here as long as we have. When we come out of system somewhere around the end of this month we will have a couple of days rest before we head out for our big deployment culminating exercise, and then it is only a matter of weeks until I get to hold my son and wife again! Our replacement team should start trickling in any time. It will be nice to have them here so far in advance. We will get to give them a much better hand shake than we got from the previous team. The poor handshake from them was no fault of theirs however. My unit is notorious for piss poor planning and they only gave us an overlap of about five days with them. Nowhere near enough. They made a valiant effort however and did a much better job with the time we were given than anyone should have expected, but I think you all know how that works.

I have made some really good friends out here and strengthened some older friendships so the deployment for me was a success. I hope my guys got something out of it all. I know I have watched several of them grow up a lot, and some I have watched stagnate, but that is to be expected to.

One more day off and then it's back to the rat race. I'm gonna enjoy my time and even go to church again tomorrow!

Changes and Additions

2005-04-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone know I will be changing to a different template in the next couple of days, so don't freak out when the site looks totally different.

To make a long story short I was trying to add some stuff to my links column and this template is just not user friendly so it's FIRED. By the way I linked to another Military Blogger. Here Blog is very entertaining so you should check nit out. Otherwise I wouldn't have linked to it...Duh.

A whacked Couple of Days

2005-04-04T02:06:00.000-07:00

It was several days ago now and I meant to write about it sooner, but you read the title of this post so you get the idea. I got to see my son and my wife in "real time". I bought a Web Cam out here and we had a mini video tele conference over yahoo messenger. What a joy that was. Joyce said that when Reid saw me on the monitor he smiled and said "Ohhhhhh, Daddy!" He then began to wave at me. Talk about getting choked up! I was wondering if he would even remember me when I get home. We talked for about an hour and he showed me his new and favorite toys and his new "Cheese" face. I guess when you tell him to say cheese to a camera he scrunches up his face and gets this big cheesy grin. It is really cute.

The next morning my guys and I got issued a bunch of new equipment that I for one desperately needed. We got new boots, a new helmet, and some more really high speed gear. I needed the boots like you wouldn't believe. One of my pairs of desert boots are going on five years old and are well past the point of broken in and well into the broken down stage. Which means I only had one pair that I could really wear, and any one that has been in the military and had to wear these combat boots can attest to the fact that if you can't rotate your boots your feet can get really ugly really fast. I was starting to have a really hard time keeping my feet in good shape because of that. Now I have two more pair that are in great shape and a lot better than my others were even when they were new.

Well when that morning ended so did the "good times". Since then I have been working my butt off and had very little time to myself. I usually call Joyce everyday and talk to her for a half an hour or so. She has only gotten 10 minutes of my time in the last three days and it is starting to get to me that I am not getting to talk to her. Partially because the last time I talked to her I had to tell her that the rumor she had heard about us coming home early was just that, and that I would be coming home exactly when I was originally scheduled to. She didn't take it to well, as she never does when this happens, and yes it happens every time. You would think she would get used to this. I try to keep her shielded from the rumors, but some how I always fail, she gets her hopes up and I have to crush them. Yeah.

I have gotten so tired that this morning I slept right through my alarm and didn't wake up until an hour and fourty three minutes past when I wanted to get up so I could call Joyce before I had to get on the road for the fourth time in three days. Needless to say I didn't get to talk to her again. I was doing laundry after I got off work (four hours after my shift was over) the night before last and luckily there was no one in the laundry room so I got my stuff straight into the washers. The washing part went off without a hitch and by about 12:45am I had my stuff in dyers. I sat on the floor by one of my dryers and started day dreaming about going home and where Joyce and I are going to go on vacation when I get back. Then I woke up...Literally. I had fallen asleep with my head against the wall. It was 03:20 in the morning and my laundry was well past done. I groggily gathered up my clothes and wandered back to the bay where I sleep, set my alarm for 06:30, and slipped off into another couple hours of uncomfortable deployment sleep so that I could be semi rested to start another wonderful deployment day in less than four hours.

Hopefully I will be able to get myself and my guys some time off soon. We have all been working at least twelve hours a day, some of us much more for going on three weeks and we are all getting really worn thin. At least time is passing fast.

A Ray of Light in a Sea of Darkness

2005-03-23T03:25:00.000-08:00

Last night my guys made me very proud of them. Nothing had been going right all day. We had been getting jerked around by our chain of command as usual as to what exactly we were supposed to be doing. When we finale got the word that we were supposed to roll all of our equipment back to our home camp one of our trucks kicked the bucket. We had to get the mechanics out to look at it and they were none too pleased.

When we finally got under way our first serial, including myself had been under way for about 30 minutes when the phone rang. Our platoon sergeant who was in the second serial had lost his ID card and was not going to be allowed to leave the camp we were on. He thought maybe one of my other NCOs would have it. So our serial stopped on the side of the freeway to check. No one had it. We were underway again.... At least for a moment.

When the Mitsubishi Pajero that was leading our serial of four military vehicles and itself had pulled off the freeway, it had damaged a tire causing it to go flat. We were immobile again. This is where my guys impressed me. The convoy was stopping again and word quickly spread as to what was up. They sprang to action. Soldiers locked and loaded and took up very good defensive positions to ensure our convoys safety, all of this with no prior coordination. It was the first time I had really seen my guys come together as a team so well. Some of them pulled security while the others worked on getting the Pajero back online. It was beautiful. Well my guys execution was beautiful. The repair itself was a night mare!

A Mitsubishi Pajero is very much like a Montero back in the good old USA, and much to my chagrin the jack that comes with this vehicle is about 5 inches tall when compressed, and about 14 inches tall when fully extended. Well if you subtract the about 8 inches that the vehicle is already off the ground and then add the about 6 inches of play the suspension provides, you guessed it, the darn thing wont even lift the wheel off the ground. What is the point?

After working with this stupid little jack for about 40 minutes trying anything and everything we could think of to get the wheel off the ground our saviors arrived. The local police. Surely they would have a real jack to lift this piece of junk off the ground. There were a few moments of relief and then utter despair. These guys didn't have a jack, they don't have radios, and these guys don't even have weapons. What exactly do these guys do anyway? They zoomed off to find a jack.

In the mean time we continued to try to find a solution. Breaking into our own truck to try to find another jack. We pulled out the hydraulic jack for the 5 ton truck we had. This thing was at least three times the size of the Pajero jack. It surely would have lifted the vehicle off of the ground...If it had any fluid in it.

We spent the next couple of hours trying to work some magic with little to no equipment. What we finally ended up having to do was prop a chalk block under the suspension and to get our mini jack out, find a bunch of wood to raise our Mr. mini about 4 inches and get the wheel off the ground. All in all we spent nearly three hours on the side of the road for a flat tire. It's funny to look back at now, and actually, it was funny at the time to.

Now we are wrapping up preparation for our next headache, I mean exercise and we'll see how long this one lasts. At least we are getting a lot of training.

A Couple Days Off Can Work Wonders

2005-03-18T10:24:00.000-08:00

I have had the last two days off, and man what a difference a day or two makes. I was almost at the point of pulling out all my hair and curling up in a corner and just going to sleep. Today I feel much better. I slept from around 10pm last night until about 2pm today and it felt great.

I got up, took a shower came in to check my email, and went to church. It was a very reinvigorating day. Now we'll just have to wait and see how I feel after tomorrow.

I hope to be able to post pictures soon. You can see what my storage bin looks like. I kid you not, I live in a converted container. It's nice to have my own space though so I'm not complaining.

There was a hole six people at church today. I guess the unit that had the biggest presence is gone. They were all in a finance unit in Utah. I am happy for them being back home.

I am and am not looking forward to going home. My unit in the rear often times leaves much to be desired, but to be with my family is worth any hardship. All of the little things that are going on with everyone in my family I wish I could be there for, good and bad. I will be soon and for as long as I can manage. There is a good chance that the Army will deploy me at least once more before my time is up but at least I am getting close.

Joyce and I are getting bills paid off, so that's a good thing and there isn't too much opportunity for me to rack up new ones out here. Though I do try. I'm sure if you could talk to Joyce about it I have been a spending machine. The things I do I do well or why bother, and I am good at buying toys.

Well I need to go to bed and get ready for the next wonderful day in this soldier's paradise.

Duck Tape and Bubble Gum

2005-03-16T01:19:00.000-08:00

I'm trying as hard as I can and I know I am a little....okay maybe a lot melodramatic, but it seems to be getting harder and harder to hold everything together. I am seeming to lose control of my guys, at least it seems that way to me.

One of my NCOs has taken it upon himself to disregard bits and pieces of what I tell him to make happen or even to do himself. He doesn't communicate well with others, but I knew that coming into this mission. He is a "doer", and he figures he can do it faster himself than get anyone else involved. Sometimes that is a good thing and some times it is detrimental to the TEAM. The biggest place it has become a problem is when there has been an issue when I wasn't there and he doesn't tell me anything about it and then I get blind sided by it later on, and look stupid because I have no idea what happened. The picking and choosing of which instructions of mine he will follow and which he will not is really getting my goat however.

He's not the only one either though. The other day Smiley got a speeding ticket on the compound. It could have happened to any of us, but regardless of who it happens to, it reflects on me.

Mo as found a new way of getting under my skin. He is no longer looking for someone to kill every minute of the day, at least not visibly. He is now pushing every limit of my uniform standards. He is also becoming a "sharpshooter", in other words he is constantly telling me how he would do things differently. Now I have been known to have a hard time dealing with constructive criticism, but I can accept a logical suggestion when one comes along. Let's just say not of his have been anything remotely close to logical.

This morning our way back to camp from shift the garrison commander paced our vehicle at 160kph. Yup that's right around a hundred miles an hour. Needless to say he was none to thrilled and he called in our license plate and vehicle to all of the camp gates. We got stopped as we were pulling into our home camp and received the lovely news. As it stands right now the driver got a citation and all of the rest of our names have been sent up as being in the vehicle. I was not driving but by position I am responsible for the actions of my soldiers. Now I was asleep at the time of the occurrence, so I had no control over the situation, but that is no excuse. Even if I had been awake I probably wouldn't have said anything. I wanted to get to bed as badly as the rest of them.

I know this sounds like a vent session, but it really isn't. I accept full responsibility for everything that I have mentioned above. I let the actions take place and for that I am wrong. I need to get a tighter grip on what is going on out here. I had it good for a while, but I am getting worn out and that control is slipping through my fingers. I think the bottom line is it is just time for me to call the whole Army thing quits. I don't enjoy any aspect of it any more, and I have always believed that if something doesn't make you happy, don't do it.

This month I have two years left on my current enlistment and I have less than any intention of continuing my service. Until then I just hope I can scape up enough duck tape and bubble gum to hold this worn down soldier together.

Where to Begin?

2005-03-03T05:04:00.000-08:00

About three weeks ago my guys and I were up early hustling about in the dark trying to get ready to go quietly. This was it, our first opportunity to shine. We had to roll off post to another facility and put all of our systems in service, I expected some "hick-ups" and "bumps in the road", but I didn't expect this.

To save some sense of brevity I will sum up. We didn't get all the info we needed for our mission until after we had arrived on site, we have had vehicles perform poorly, and the window of visibility on what we are doing is HUGE! It has been a good learning experience for my guys and me as well as a humbling experience for myself. In spite of that no one in their right mind would call this mission a success. I guess all we can do is roll with the punches.

I got my first disciplinary counseling since starting my military career. The stress of not performing to my own standards was really starting to bear down on me and during a butt chewing that I have never been great at taking gracefully I lost control. I was disrespectful and unprofessional with a senior non-commissioned officer. I was immediately ashamed of my actions and worse still I did so in front of one of my soldiers. Not the example to be setting ever, let alone in the situation we are in. I apologized my offended superior and we are still on very good terms, but I have not been able to shake the memory of how immature I acted.

A few days ago I had the opportunity to take a long time soldier of mine to the promotion board. He has been my soldier off and one since he was a PFC and there is an immense sense of pride watching him gain his promotable status. We have not always seen eye to eye on everything and I still feel he has a lot to learn before he can be an effective NCO, but that is what I am here for right? I just hope I can get back into being the example I need to be.

On the trip between posts for the board, I locked and loaded for only the second time out here. As we pulled up to a stop light I saw the barrel of what appeared to be a shot gun sticking up between the two front seats of the car in front of us. Upon closer inspection it was a little boy with a toy shot gun, but it was not really identifiable as a toy at all, except for the size. It was slightly smaller than the real thing. The little boy was just being a little boy, aiming the toy weapon at road signs, and other traffic, but I couldn't help but think how irresponsible that father was, letting his child behave the way he was. If I had not realized earlier that it was a boy with a toy gun, I could have killed him. I have no urge to take any human being's life, but if it came down to a position where I thought I or any of my guys was in danger of not going home to their families you bet you butt I would. I could have killed this child, and then would have forever had to live with the knowledge that I not only killed a human being, but a child and for no real reason. Worse still this young man in the driver's seat would have lost a son.

I am left wondering why the world has to be this way. It seems so much easier to be happy, at home with your family, living peacefully together. Will we ever get there?

Simple Pleasures

2005-02-11T02:45:00.000-08:00

I am never one for traveling a lot when I am deployed. I like being near my stuff and my guys, and let's be frank the less you move around the less likely you will become a target for some one who wants to hurt you or worse. So when I found out I was going to have to leave my guys for several days to go somewhere for a planning conference I was less than thrilled, even though every one kept telling me I would love it where I was going. I thought I had been pretty much everywhere in this sand box and it was all pretty much the same, with slight variations of course.

When Big Wil and I landed I thought I was right. This place was just another wide open space with nothing more than dirt as far as the eye could see, and after several hours here there was nothing to change my opinion. Then I found it. THEY HAVE A CHILI'S HERE! and it sits right off the edge of a beautiful heated in the winter and chilled in the summer pool. They even have a hot tub here! Obviously my opinion has now changed. That Mushroom Swiss burger was the best Mushroom Swiss burger I have ever had! I may get a chance to go off post soon to go shopping downtown, and from what I have heard that is quite an experience too!

I am still looking forward to getting back to where I can make sure everything is straight with my guys and call my wife every day though, and yes post to this site on a regular basis.

Common Courtesy

2005-02-02T23:29:00.000-08:00

Visions of sugar plums danced in my head, when on the side of my bunk there arose such a clatter that I had to roll over to see what was the matter. PFC "Gung ho" Mo is standing over me with the clip board that our sign out sheet is on. "Hey Sarge, I need you to sign this for me and GDub."

I had to roll back over to look at my clock. 12:35 am! "I only went to sleep two hours ago!" What ever. I signed it for them, rolled over and began to try to go back to sleep.

I had just settled down for a long desert nap, when on my head there was a tap, tap, tap. Now I'm getting angry. I looked at my clock, 4:40 am! As I rolled over I was steaming, "WHAT!!!" PV2 Mangina has now made my blog again, and not for anything good. "Sarge can you sign me out?" I had to resist the urge to jump out of bed in my boxers take this inconsiderate private out side and make him sweat until I decided it was time for me to go back to bed. I signed the sign out sheet and rolled over hoping I could at least sleep until my alarm was set to go off at 6:30 am.

Here is how this all began. About a week ago I told the guys that they had to start using a sign out sheet because I had told them that they needed to tell their supervisor any time they went anywhere. Well there had been several instances since then that I needed someone in particular and no one, including their supervisors knew where they were. Well the other night I needed SPC GDub for a conference call back to the rear for an issue he needed taken care of and guess what. He didn't sign out so his supervisor and myself had to run all over the camp looking for him and still didn't find him. I was hot. I told them all the next morning that if they were not in the bay and they did not sign out, one time was going to be a counseling statement and the second time I was going to recommend Article 15. For those of you who don't know what that means, it is the action taken to punish insubordination. The soldier can lose rank, money and free time. It is pretty serious, but these guys seem to forget we are in a WAR ZONE and personnel accountability is not something to be played with. As well as having to sign out they had to have their supervisor's signature as an approval measure.

I think these two knuckle heads did this crap last night deliberately to get back at my control measure. That's Ok, I woke up with a major chip on my shoulder and guess what they were both sleepin'. Oh yeah, I got em. I went to take a shower, and yes I signed out, and when I came back I walked into Mangina's area. "HEY, get up! Take out the trash, and if you ever wake me up for something you knew you were gonna be doing before I go to sleep you will seriously regret it! Got me?" "Yes Sarge."

Next it was Mo's turn. I walked up in his area and he looked so comfortable with his hands folded under his head. I slapped him under his arm, hard. He looked like he was gonna piss his bed he was so startled. "Man, don't you ever wake me up in the middle of the night for something you knew you were gonna be doing again!" "I told you I was gonna go to midnight chow sergeant." "EXACTLY MY POINT! Next time you had better get my signature before I go to bed!" "Hoo-ahh."

I think I gave these two knuckle heads a lesson in common courtesy they will not soon forget. At least they better not.

Happy Birthday to Me!!!

2005-01-31T22:00:00.000-08:00

I get so sick of being up before the sun comes up, even though it is an every day thing. As I have said before we have been working on getting equipment out of here and we had to be up at like 3 am to further facilitate those efforts.

After spending the majority of our day away from our new private home we were finally returning "home" at around 2:30 pm and as usual I was one of the last ones to get back. As I was walking up to our door a Navy Chief Petty Officer came walking out of our bay with the all too familiar form that assigns you to quarters in his hand. Yup he had eleven new guys that were being assigned to our bay. I told him our situation with needing a bay that we could secure for our upcoming missions, and he was very understanding. I went up to housing to plead my case and had very little success. Apparently there have been too many soldiers coming in lately to furnish us with our own bay. I think this is gonna be a trend so we are leaning towards accepting our little storage areas to live in instead of keeping the bay. We didn't even get to enjoy our privacy for two full days. Oh well.

Of course all this just had to happen on my birthday. Yes that's right I'm another year older. I hit the big three ohh. I sure feel older than that though. I don't put much stock in birthdays so it wasn't really a big deal not being home for it, but I would still have liked to have been home just to be home, you know? I managed to pull the right strings to get my guys the rest of the week off though, since we have been working so hard and such long hours. That almost makes everything else worth it. It really lifted spirits when I told them they didn't have to be at work until next Saturday.

Got to play in my company's team football game for my birthday, and that is always a treat to. I am a football fanatic, and I'm pretty good to even if I do say so myself. My performance last night in our 22 to 6 victory should be sufficient evidence to support that. Three catches, two interceptions and five tackles. Yeah this old man even plays both ways! I've been downgraded to a tight end from wide receiver as I have gotten fatter and slower with age, but the hands are still there baby, and I make one mean middle line backer since I am really good at reading alignments and routes.

Any way I am going to go enjoy some well deserved time off (while it lasts) and maybe take a nap.

Promotions and Moving

2005-01-30T07:53:00.000-08:00

Today has been a very busy but good day. It started off great promoting a motivated young soldier who has a lot of potential. We are still carrying over the high we got from moving yesterday. We did all of our vehicle maintenance so I was able to give most of the guys the majority of the day off.

PV2 "B" is a self motivated young soldier. Many who come straight out of AIT are. Too many fall by the way side however by meeting other soldiers that have fallen by the way side long ago and became lazy, unmotivated, unproductive soldiers. "B" truly deserved his promotion to Private First Class today. His team chief is a fast trackin' NCO that has a lot of self motivation himself so "B" has a good opportunity to learn from a good example and stay on the right track.

We moved from one open bay to another yesterday, but this one is ours! We each got to move the beds and wall lockers around to make our own private little spaces. We also get to lock the door when we leave for work so we don't have to worry about our stuff while we are gone, and oh yes that is a real concern with all of the turn over of units. Stuff can disappear in an instant. We are all still in basically one big room together but the wall lockers make pretty good partitions and it almost feels like we have our own rooms. Some of our "rooms" turned out so nice in fact that the guys are beginning to ask if we have to move into the little storage compartments, and in fact I would like to stay in the bay as well because it is easier to disseminate information to a group that all lives in the same place.

Last but not least I have to write about one of my favorite guys. PV2 Mangina has been bothering me to write about him ever since he found out I was writing a BLOG, so here you go buddy. He is such a funny guy, he keeps us all laughing and I'm sure he will find his way in here several times before the end of the deployment for legitimate reasons, but at least now he might leave me alone about it for a while.

"No Secondary Load on the Wash Rack!"

2005-01-27T22:08:00.000-08:00

Washing trucks to send them back to the rear is generally a pretty simple operation. You request a wash rack. You wash the trucks. You have customs inspect them for cleanliness and you send them back. Not any more.

It's nothing new for unimportant, weak people to get a little bit of responsibility and turn their little piece of the pie into the most pain in the butt operation imaginable. That's what has happened here. It is nothing new for the Army to ship equipment in the back of trucks to it's final destination. We have been doing it that way for years, and frankly it is the only way for many units to ship it's peripheral equipment. Well apparently the staff sergeant in charge of the wash rack where I am has single handedly changed that for the entire Army. Pretty impressive if you ask me.

There is no secondary load allowed on "his" wash rack...At all. So if you need to ship equipment somewhere in your vehicle you are just plain out of luck. Well I am not the kind of person to tolerate stupidity or to kiss any one's butt. I simply never have and I'm sure not going to start with a staff sergeant who doesn't even out rank me.

Here's the whole story. It all started when we rolled all of our trucks on to the wash rack to begin cleaning them to send them back. The customs inspectors had told us that we had to have all secondary loads on the trucks when they inspected them before they left the wash rack. When I asked them how we were supposed to do that when we had to wash the trucks I was told that we would have to download the load, wash the trucks and reload them. Ok, execute. Everything was going just fine. We had all of our loads downloaded and were in the process of washing the trucks when the staff sergeant of the army walked past me on his cell phone and pointed to our stuff that was stacked neatly out of anyone's way and said " get that s*&t off of "my" wash rack right now." He then proceeded to walk on by ignoring me as if his job was done. Not wise.

Being as bull headed as I am I disregarded the order of this man who doesn't out rank me. He at least owed me the courtesy of explaining his stupid request. He did not. We continued as if he had said nothing to me at all. About fifteen minutes or so later he walked back by and pointed to my stuff and asked me why it was not yet off of "his" wash rack. When I began to try to explain to him what the customs inspectors had instructed us to do he interrupted me and began as if he was a two year old to shake his head and repeat "no secondary load on "my" wash rack". After about, literally 30 seconds of this my patience was gone. Not that I have that much to spare. "Are you gonna shut up and let me talk sarge, or are you gonna continue to act like a child?" Needless to say he wasn't pleased with my reference to his maturity level and even more needlessly to say I didn't care.

Now he decided to bypass me and went straight up to one of my specialists standing close by and ordered him to get the stuff off of "his" wash rack. Now I am seeing pure red. Who does this idiot think he is? I immediately ordered Spc. Smiley to "stand fast" meaning don't even think about executing this idiot's order. The staff sergeant of the Army then spun on me as if he wanted to fight saying "if you don't get this stuff off of my wash rack I am going to have your whole operation removed from "my" wash rack right now." I proceeded to tell him that was fine then he could tell the Brigadier General who ordered the return of this equipment why it didn't get on the plane.

He stepped back and called his boss on his cell phone. I took the opportunity to call mine as well since it appeared I was going to need back up on this. When his boss showed up and mine showed up they managed to come to a legitimate compromise which was all I wanted to do, and our stuff got washed and inspected and we went on our merry way. All this idiot needed to do was talk to me instead of acting like a little brat and we would have never had to get anyone else involved. I hope I never become so unreasonable with anyone about anything.

Mixed Feelings

2005-01-24T06:11:00.000-08:00

Joyce and Reid will be returning home soon. They have been at her mom's since shortly after I left. Every time I have been deployed she has gone home to her mom's and while I have very little problem with her going home to mamma so to speak, every time she does there is controversy of some sort. Joyce and her mom always, it never fails, begin to get on each other's nerves and butt heads. I guess that is normal for an adult child returning to the nest. It's hard to accept your mother's incite and rules when you have been living on your own for any given amount of time. As well it is hard to accept the fact that your child is now an adult and just might be equipped to make decisions for themselves. In fact often times that person takes offense to the other's "suggestions".

I have a hard time hearing about the arguments and the bickering, especially when it has to do with how my wife and I have decided to raise our son. Frankly it's our decision and if you disagree with us.... Well um, tough. I don't care. We'll get over it. It's still going to go our way. Get it? On the other hand now Joyce is going to be back home a thousand miles away from both of our families and I am going to worry about her. My company doesn't have the best record for support of it's deployed soldier's families. Joyce has a hard time being alone and I don't blame her. Also, because I have been gone so much and with the high rate of change over in the unit she does not have many friends back there. We have been trying to get Reid involved in a play group with some of the other soldier's kids so that will help and there are a few people back there that we have begun to build couple type relationships with, but when half of one of the couples isn't there often times those relationships are well, broken.

When Joyce was working things weren't as tough. She had friends there and had something to do during the day, but Reid makes that rough to. Might just have to bite the bullet and put him in day care. I'm for it even if it only works out that Joyce working just pays for the day care. At least she gets out of the house and interacts with other adults. We just want to be sure he doesn't get some "bent" provider that damages our most valuable possession. Why does it have to be so hard to care for the people we love the most? I wouldn't change anything about either of them, I'd just like to see them more, be there to kiss Reid's owies and go to sleep with Joyce in my arms every night.

Inflated Self Worth

2005-01-20T01:32:00.000-08:00

A couple of days ago as I was walking back to my sleep area from work, the same path I always take and I was stopped by the camp Command Sergeant Major.

"Hey Sarge, You didn't see the sign?"

The sign he was referring to says something along the lines of no parking except for the post Command Sergeant Major. I assumed since I wasn't driving anything and certainly wasn't parking there that it didn't have anything to do with me. I guess I was wrong.

"That sign means this is my area. I didn't run barriers and chains all the way out to the street so soldiers could just walk around them and cut through my area."

Of course my only response was "Roger Sergeant Major.", but what I wanted to say was, "Oh so rather than have us take a few steps through your little private dirt yard we should walk out in the street to observe your space?" Fricken ridiculous. Any way as I walked to work this morning I noticed a few soldiers quite a ways in front of me walking through his little dirt patch again and suddenly they all got off and walked out in the street. As I got closer I saw that this pompous man has the front door to his quarters opened and is sitting in his doorway so he can harass the soldiers who walk through his territory. How pathetic do you have to be to take joy in picking on soldiers who are thousands of miles away from their homes and families fighting a war, just because you have the rank to get away with it?

We still haven't moved out of the open bay we are living in. I have been number nine on the waiting list for two weeks and am beginning to believe they are lying about the waiting list at all, because I have two soldiers already in the permanent quarters who are telling me people have been moving in and out all through out that time span. If people are moving in and out I should be moving up on the list. There is something constructive that CSM could be spending his time on. Fix the quarters problem instead of picking on troops.

I haven't written in a while because I have been really sick. The "Kuwaiti Crud" has really hit me hard this time. Yesterday I went to sick call and they told me I have a cold. Strange considering I have never had a cold that came with a 100 degree fever before, but what do I know? Anyway, they put me on Claratin, some antibiotic, a cough suppressant and an inhaler. Sound crazy to you to? Good I'm not the only one.

Hopefully I can get out of the open bay soon so I can get away from all the other sicklies. We'll see.

Blocked!!!

2005-01-13T02:16:00.000-08:00

Well it seems the Army is trying to stop my writing! Just kidding of course. They have how ever made it more difficult for me to do so. I have had to enlist my wife to help me get my words on the web. It seems that the camp that I am located on has blocked everything other than ".mil" web addresses. This could be for a number of reasons. Most likely it is because of some knuckleheads who have found a way around the system and have been abusing resources. Oh well it’s just a minor inconvenience I guess.
It is a major morale diminisher for the troops however. They now do not have access to Yahoo mail, ESPN.com, NFL.com or anything else on the web that is interesting in the least bit to browse, not that I think you need anything more than NFL.com anyway, but that’s only because my fantasy football season is over.
Hopefully they will come to their senses soon and start letting people back on the web. I was talking to a friend who is out here and I guess this is a regular ploy it will last a little while and then be back to the way it was a few days ago. We’ll see.
I should be getting close to moving into my own room! Just think no one sleeping above me, no listening to Moe snore one bunk over, no smell of fifty guys crowded into one area for an extended period of time. It almost makes me feel bad that I am the first one on our list to get a room… I did say almost. It will be a pain in the butt getting information to them though. I guess that’s just a sacrifice I’ll have to make for some privacy (sniffles).

Show Off!

2005-01-11T04:14:00.000-08:00

That's right tomorrow night I get to show off. As most of my friends and many of you know, I was a vocal performance major in college before I joined the Army. Well tomorrow night is Karaoke night at the camp recreation spot, and I'll be there! A couple of nights ago they had open mic night and my guys kept trying to convince me to go and play my guitar and sing, but all I can play on the guitar so far is "Mary had a little lamb" and "Row, row, row your boat", and I sure wasn't gonna get up there and do that.

Some of my friends think I am too cocky and confident when it comes to singing. What they don't understand is it takes a kind of bravado and confidence to get up in front of people and expose yourself to their criticism. I have just become comfortable in that spotlight and have grown to enjoy it.

Work is about to get really busy for me and my guys so it will be nice to get up there and relax a bit and have some fun with my guys. I tend to be a personable guy and usually get along well with my soldiers, but lately I have been a little grumpy with them due to the amount crap I am having to deal with that they don't see, and all of the stupid crap they have been doing. It will just be a good opportunity to get up there and let the guys see that the "ole sarge" is just another one of the guys, for the most part.

Man that "ole" really hit home just then. I'm about to turn 30 this month and while I know that's not old, I am at least 4 years older than all of my guys and one of the NCOs that works for me is only 20. Kinda puts things in perspective.

What Weekend?

2005-01-07T10:01:00.000-08:00

The company I am attached to has Thursday and Friday off because those are the local weekend days, however I am quickly beginning to realize that because these people don't have anyone here to go home to, or worse yet a real home to go home to they work all week. I'm not digging it. I get at least twenty calls a day of Thursday and Friday. I don't even get that many on the normal work days! I LIKE MY DAYS OFF!!! I have been putting in like 16 hour days every since my equipment got here any way. I need and want my time.

Thursday I woke up to Revel's Ballero... That's my ring tone. It was my platoon sergeant, and he started out the way you never want to here a conversation start on a day off, "I got bad news man". It was to. Seems the company I am attached to pulled an okay Doke on us. We had to sign for a 5-ton truck from another platoon so we could use it to pick up some of our equipment. That was Wednesday night, the last day of the week..... So I thought. Well now, Thursday morning it seems that exact truck happens to be over due for it's services and they have to be done right now. Since we signed for the truck it's our responsibility to ensure the services are completed, so I have to wake up two of my guys and tell them they have to go to the motor pool and do the services on the truck. Yes it was over due before we signed for it.

That's not the worst of it. Turns out due to the severe mistreatment of the truck one of the tires is ruined and must be replaced. I don't know if any of you have ever changed the tire on a 5-ton, but it's no fun. It has to be torn apart to get it off. Then the new one isn't much easier to put on. After working on that truck from around 0830 to after 1600 and not finishing it the motor pool decided to call it a day. "We'll pick this back up on Saturday" (the equivalent of Monday). IF IT DIDN'T HAVE TO BE FINISHED ON THURSDAY THEN WHY DID I HAVE TO GET MY GUYS UP ON THEIR DAY OFF!!!!!! I am gonna have problems out here. I don't deal well wih stupidity or getting the short end of the stick, and it seems both portions are going to be in abundance out here.

Just to add insult to injury, I was holding an E-7 or Sergeant First Class position as the Tri-Band team chief. That is one of the reasons I chose to go back to this company after working in the S-3 for over a year. The company commander out here has seen fit to give my position (that he doesn't own) to the guy that he made our platoon sergeant. The reason he did that is because on paper our platoon doesn't really exist so he had to create a slot to justify having the platoon sergeant with us. Nothing against him he is a good guy, but he can't do my job, so now I get to do all the work of the E-7 slot I was supposed to be holding but get none of the credit. Looks like it's really gonna be another great trip to the sand box.

Locked and Loaded!!!

2005-01-04T13:18:00.000-08:00

It didn't really dawn on me how immature and inexperienced some of these guys were until today. I had to roll my guys out to pick up a few more of my guys that had just come in with some more of our equipment today. In my vehicle I had two specialists and a private first class. I will call them Mal, GeeDub and Moe to observe their privacy. Mal is driving, GeeDub is engrossed in his Pokemon game boy game and Moe is grinding his teeth in anticipation of the trip. I can tell he is a little overly pumped up and I am curious but don't want to push it just yet so I wait.

I guess I should have known well in advance what to expect. I have four soldiers that have never been deployed and probably never been far from home before. Moe is one of them. Before we left he asked me if I thought we would get the chance to kill anyone. My shocked response was something like "Are you frickin' kidding me? I sure pray to God we don't HAVE to kill anyone!" Then he said something about wanting to get at least nine confirmed kills while he was deployed. Anyway I just kinda brushed that exchange off as a young soldier's bravado. It all came running back to me today though.

As Moe continued to squirm in the back seat he began to make me nervous. When I asked him what was bothering him he asked "I was just wondering, if some one runs into our vehicle, can I shoot them?" "WHAT??? Of course not!" That's just what we need Moe putting three rounds in the chest of some elderly local who was driving like the rest of his or her country men drive over here. Then I noticed he had is magazine in the well of his weapon, and though that made me a little more nervous, that was ok, cause if something did happen at least he would have less reaction time. "Well what if I see some one driving along side of us with a weapon?, Can I shoot them?" Wow. "No man! Tell you what, if he is making aggressive gestures at you while he is loading you can aim your weapon at him, and if he aims at you, then and only then can you shoot him." Right about then Mal noticed that Moe's muzzle was pointing right into his kidney. (Mal) "Hey man! You better point that thing somewhere else or I'm gonna beat you with it." (Moe) "It's on safe." (Mal) "So point it somewhere else."

As we got to where we were going we passed an armored vehicle that the local security force had posted and Moe went into action. He grabbed his Kevlar and started freaking out. "Chill out man. He's one of the good guys." Needless to say the trip was interesting, but six hours later we were back safe and sound. Nobody got hurt, but I got a wake up call. I knew I had some noobs to take care of but I didn't plan on having Gung hoe shoot em up commo guys with me. Good training I guess.

Headaches and aspirin

2005-01-02T02:02:00.000-08:00

These guys are starting to get to me. Maybe it is the stress of being in charge of so many guys and maybe it is just that they all keep screwing up. My senior Specialist got promoted today, but before that took place he had to miss PT formation, Yah that looked good. It really wasn't his fault as the difference in frequency of the electricity over here makes US clocks lose about five minutes every half hour. For those of you that don't understand how, you'll just have to take my word for it. I don't want to bore anyone with the science of the matter. Any way he missed most of PT, then we were supposed to meet outside one of the buildings at 0830 to shuttle everyone down to the motor pool for the 0900 formation. Only two of my thirteen soldiers (including myself and yes I was one of the two) were on time, and three of the eleven late ones didn't even bother to shave!

Needless to say we all had a long talk after formation. I think they get me now. I am a very relaxed and easy going leader, but we have been here less than two weeks and I am already wearing thin. Things had better improve quickly or they won't be liking me as much very soon. At least now I have two Sergeants to help me out with these knuckle heads, and soon it will be three and four so things should improve. I hope for their sakes.

Bah Humbug!

2005-01-01T01:17:00.000-08:00

Yah happy new year....What ever. So many people kept coming up to me last night and telling me that, I was getting to the point I just wanted to crack them in the jaw. I didn't of course but I sure wanted to. I have always just blocked out the fact that it is Christmas or New Years or Valentines Day or my birthday, (all of which I will be missing this year) and the constant reminders are just irritating. I am normally a festive person and love the holidays. They are a very special time of year for me as I look forward to seeing my Grandparents and much of the rest of my family over that time span and I just don't even want to think about it when I am not there.

Man this hurts! Not the holiday thing, I broke my finger playing football the other day and since I am a "home row" typer it is very painful everytime I hit a key with that finger and out of habit I can't stop! I know that I need to go to the doctor for it but have been avoiding it. Not that I am afraid they will hurt me more but because it is my darn ring finger on my left hand, and I have a horrible feeling they are going to want to cut my wedding ring off because of the swelling. It is pretty ugly, big and black and purple. It's straight though which is the other reason I haven't gone. I might just be able to ride this out since they should not have to re-set the bone. I don't want them to cut my ring as I believe with all of my heart that the circle is a beautiful representation of the bond of marriage as it never ends, and if you cut my ring off it would have two ends and that would break my heart, not to mention the fact that the design of my ring would make a perfect repair impossible, so I would be left with a flawed ring or a replacement and frankly I would almost rather lose my finger. Don't worry, I won't let it get that far.

I went to church yesterday for the first time since my return to the box. There were fourteen members there and the sign in sheet had over fifty names on it. I know it is difficult to attend sometimes out here as there is so much work to do and you don't always get the Sabbath off, but fourteen out of fifty? Kind of sad. I hope to be a big contributor here as I was last time, but I guess only time will tell. I still feel ignorant compared to most as I had been inactive soooooo long.

I hope everyone's New Year was a joyous one and safe at that.

Return to the Sand Box

2004-12-28T06:11:00.000-08:00

A week later I still can't shake the feeling of being here before... Of course that's because I have. Things haven't changed all that much, not that I really expected them to, and I have managed to obtain my third helping of the "Kuwaiti Krud". That's the semi permanent head cold you are issued upon arrival to Kuwait. There is so much smoke, and dirt and God knows what else in the air over here that you get a perpetual headache with cold like symptoms that never seem to go away. The smoke stacks near the camp that the guys lovingly call the "Scud Goal Posts" constantly spew their effervescence loveliness into the air and thus into our lungs.

I am back to living with scores of other guys, all within double arm interval of each other, but hopefully that will end soon, as me and my guys are semi-permanent and should be moving into small dismounted storage bins called "Pods". That's how we rate. We live in storage bins, and what's worse we are grateful for the storage bins. Should we all get checked?

I am a sports game fanatic and have been absolutely absorbed by ESPN's NFL 2K5, that is until I let one of my guys get my XBox out of my wall locker the other day because as the package NCOIC I had more work to do and they all wanted to play. I can't say for sure who did it but one of the knuckle heads apparently didn't know that XBox's aren't dual voltage. Man you should see what 220 volts does to a circuit board that is meant only for 110 volts. Circuit boards for instance have all kinds of little doo-hikees on them that I guess could be described as all different sorts of people. You have your little fat guys which most of the time are your Capacitors and your copper haired guys that are your Coils, etc, etc. Well when you feed them too much electricity they get sick and what happens when people get sick? Often times they throw up. Well that's what these guys did. All over themselves and each other. Not sure what they had been eating, but the vomit came out all white, foamy and dried really hard. Did it stink you ask? Like nothing you could imagine unless you have smelled a capacitor or like device throw up before. Oh well guess it will be a while until I get my 2K5 fix.

The wife is handling my recent departure fairly well I guess, considering I left 6 days before Christmas. The offspring is not handling it so well. He has taken to throwing himself on the floor and banging his head on the ground in fits of rage, and STUBBORN. Let me tell you, he might be the most bull headed little two and a half footer I have ever met. How do you explain to a little man that can't even speak very well yet that his dad is defending his country and won't be home for about six months? Oh well, at least someday maybe I can tell him my story and he will be proud to have me as his daddy.