April 25th Take #2

Hey, I had a thought....finally something good to say about the Army. If you read one of my first posts, you saw the bit on the first breakfast they served us here. I was convinced this would be regular practice and I'm really bummed I didn't get a picture of it but I'm very happy to say that despite the jambalaya MRE's and "hot eggs", we never again did receive the boxed breakfasts like to first day that consisted of year old orange juice, corn pops, apple jacks and pop tarts. Thank God for small favors. I also wanted to add in some more pictures. These are also located on Face Book but just in case, I put them here for posterity. Enjoy. This was taken after our Saturday day morning romp through the woods. What a wonderday morning. Crisp and cool spring day. In the picture below, all but three of us were Navy JAGs. They ended up being the best shooters in the group. Ironic. For my own edification and future reference - Left to right back row: LT Johnson, CAPT Welling (ER doc and former A7 driver....cool), LT Tiley (lone USCG representative), LT Robertson, LT Voogd Front Row: CAPT O'Rourke (marathoner extraordinaire), LT Chockley, Me, LT Faust (aka Little Miss Sunshine, there are some people who are just too strinkin' happy), LT Prager I got to be the driver of truck #3 during our practical convoy exercise. It was a blast and thank God it wasn't hotter. We "survived" the IED's and ambushes and had a great time. Video will be posted on Face Book.

Below was M16 qualification day. Me with my two room mates, 2 Navy Captains. Great people and we meshed well making this experience a whole lot more bearable. Left, CAPT Rinda Ranch-Hillis, me, and CAPT Beth Ahern (Bostonian and marathoner extraordinaire). These are some pictures of getting ready for convoy day.

April 25th

Well, one last quick blog before hitting the trail on our way out to the desert. The last week has been pretty cush compared to the first two. We got off early on Thursday so a couple of us headed down town to Columbia to check out the Ale House. Fantastic beers and food by the way. The "old section" of Columbia is being rebuilt and is a combination of new architecture and the ols style south brick buildings. In a couple of years when the ecomnomy rebounds, this place will be a hopping town. There's already a lot of bars (classy ones, not just USC college dives although I hear in 5 Points, these are aplenty) and really nice restaurants (non chain, local type). In any case, a room at the Hilton, a workout before dinner and off we go. I guess Thursdays are big nights here and the hard an "art show" akin to First Friday in Honolulu. All the local tourist and art shops stay open late and host a free wine bar at each place. After that and a sotp at the local outfitters (because you simple can't walk past a kayak shop or an Army/Navy surplus place without going in for a $5 t-shirt...in this case a nice pair of wool boot socks and a new wrist band after ruining the originial in the sands of the rifle ranges). The next morning was another workout, a nice breakfast in the all-ya-can-stomach gut-buster (or butt-guster) and then lunch at IHOP for more gut busters (mmmmm....pan crack...). We finished out our time downtown with a very brief trip to the South Carolina Capitol Building. Very interesting. There was a highly conspicuous lack of anything having to do with the Civil War. All the artwork inside (it was beautiful and extensive, very nice cupola and about 50 foot ceilings) was of the Revolutionary War era. Everything is open for public viewing although you can't just wander through the aisles of the Senate Room. My last night in the US was with another 13 mile run, some laundry, and then my feet up while watching the Cavaliers stick it to Detroit. No beer but after yesterday's hangover, yeah, not so much. We have some time before getting on the buses for our all nighter. Haysoos for one, is packed up and ready to go. Being a lot of dry land operations we done here, he's been somewhat negelected for safety purposes and is anxious to get out and get some fresh air. That's about it from Camp McCrady/Ft. Jackson, South Cakalaky. It's officially the calm before the storm...

April 22

Not a lot to update today. More Army/Navy communication buffoonery but then, why change now. Flight out of the country is on Saturday so I'm just finishing up a few last minute loose ends. I've managed to cram all my crap into 4 sea bags which is amazing. Like, do I really need all that stuff? The old-fashioned frame backpack cracks me up the most. It's not even the desert cammie pattern. It's like something out of the cold war era. Back in the 80's this would have been considered "high tech". Now it will live the next year of it's life tucked away in a bag not to see the light of day for another 370 days. No worries, however. It won't be lonely as it will be accompanied by my mosquito netting (times two), gear mosquito treatment (times two), canteens and canteen holders (times two), bed roll, and sleeping bag. Rumor has it I'll use the sleeping bag once. For grins, maybe I'll pull it out sometime in December and pretend to go camping. I can light a chunk of C4 in my hooch (it burns nicely without exploding I hear from some snake-eaters), warm up a cup of hot chocolate in my old fashioned aluminum canteen holder/cup and stretch out on my old fashioned sleeping bad just like I was at SERE school again. Ah, the good old days. When the blogs get boring, I'll post some stories about SERE school. That's Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape - POW camp. Good times. Spring time. Maine. 5 feet of snow. Rain. Getting bitch slapped by a 6 foot/250# man. So the gear is safely tucked away and tomorrow is light. We get liberty from tomorrow afternoon until Friday @ 2300. That gives me from tomorrow night until Friday night to 1) work off the hangover and 2) get the stench of booze off my clothes. Just kidding, I wouldn't do that; we're not allowed to drink and I don't break rules. I can't yet post where the flight will take us due to OPSEC (Operational Security) but suffice to say, it should be interesting if we get to stretch our legs at one of the stops. If the military has its way, we'll move from the cramped airplane to a stuffy room in some podunk terminal with no chairs, a single one-holer for each gender (190 people total so do the math...) and no food. Speaking of food because that constitues about 75% of my waking thoughts, I had chinese at some fast food joint last week and it was tragic. It was outdone, however, by this evening's tragic chinese meal at another place that looked far more promising yet failed to produce. Gone are the days of eating at real Korean and Chinese places where the pork still has the snout attached and there's duck on the menu. Gone are the awesome spring rolls with peanut sauce from the Down to Earth Market. Alas, I've been ruined. I've gone from not eating asian food at all to being a complete and utter snob about the choices. The good side of this evening's meal was 1) it was off base and 2) the spring rolls were pretty good. Of course if you deep fry anything, it tastes fantastic. To top is all off, I'm already hungry again. Seriously. In any case, one of my experience should really know better than to order ANYTHING but ribs, pork rinds or hamburgers in the south. Duh. Yesterday was a bonus though. Taco Bell with an espresso shooter from Seattle's Best. Not the kind of thing you really want to do right before bed but hey, let's live dangerously shall we? It's a good thing we are all in separate bedrooms here. Dinner was the bean burrito with a side of beans. So we leave wonderful Ft. Jackson soon but not soon enough. The funny thing is we'll probably all be begging for some familiar place soon as we launch into the twighlight zone that is the Middle East. Hopefully I'll be able to post some pictures. There are lots of camels out on the Udari range (where the next phase of training takes place) but if luck holds, I won't be subjected to that phase of pain. Just FYI because it is Navy tradition to "count the days", as per my orders, the official count for RTB to US soil is 367 days or "366 and a woo". See ya on the other side of the ocean. P.S. For those that are wondering, Joe is doing well. He officially took over as XO of VFA-143, the Pukin' Dogs on April 19th and I have only recieved about two emails since. He's busy flying some very long missions (about 6-7 hours each) and spends the rest of his time doing paperwork and generally being part of the problem as they say. He has a nice single room on the carrier which is reserved for the CDRs and above. This means you're only sharing your toilet and shower with one other person. High falutin' livin'. He's been to Bahrain on a port call but I don't know where he will be next. I'll keep you all posted.

April 20th

It's been quite a while since I've been able to post and for that, I apologize. The internet here is shared amongst about 200 people so between being sleep deprived and fighting the internet connection, it's been tough to get the stuff out on paper so to speak. I think my last post left off with the Battalion Fun Run. I don't know why they call it that except as a huge inside joke. There's absolutely NOTHING fun about the Battalion Fun Run. Ooops, just went back and read that I wrote about that particular Charlye Foxtrot already. Well, it was so bad it deserves more so here it is. The Battalion Fun Run SUCKED!! OK, vent complete. Last Thrusday was by far the toughest day out here but the good part about it was that it was so busy that the day flew by. It was a 0300 wake up. For those in Hawaii, this means I was dragging my sorry ass out of bed while you were all thinking about going to bed. I almost made some phone calls but it was 3 am for me after all. I'm not terribly social at 3 am. Our first evolution of the day was something called "Low Light" fire of the 9mm pistol. The funny thing was that while we were all there on time (because they love to call us dirtbags if we're late), the people running the range were an hour late. The sun comes up early here just FYI (about 0600 these days) so there wasn't much low light left by the second round of shooters. This brings us to "hot eggs". The food in the Army is such that when you have the luxury, and let me assure you I now realize it is in fact a luxury, to have hot food for breakfast, it's what they call hot eggs. It's an entree all it's own. Seriously, whereas one might order the filet mignon at a restaurant, one gets an entree of "hot eggs". This is one thing the Navy does very well (these days - it wasn't always so). We get hot meals almost 24/7. We can get 4 squares a day (which is why so many Navy people are fat). Hot eggs? What the hell is that? I know omelettes, scrambled, hard boiled, over easy, etc., etc. but "hot eggs"? This apparently means runny scrambled and completely tasteless. Here's the state of the union however - they were fekkin' fantastic!! I'm here to tell you when you get up at 0300 and have no food for 5 hours, dirt will taste like a fine steak. Michelle S., if you're reading this, know that the only "organic" food I'm getting these days is the occasional bug that finds its way into my mouth while out on my afternoon run and the dirt that transfers from my hands whilst eating said "hot eggs". Ok, not entirely true, I stopped at a health food store this weekend and scored one ginger kombucha and a loaf of Ezekial. Nectar and mana.... Speaking of food and the state of the union, I'm now a coffee drinker. 38 years I've managed to Heisman regular Cafe Americano. And it's not good either. In fact it tastes like the most horrible stuff I've ever consumed and yet I can't seem to help myself. While out on liberty in Columbia this weekend, I stopped at a Starbucks on Sunday morning and had the most fantastic espresso known to man (better than the usual Starbucks) and it brings me almost to tears to drink the swill they serve in the name of caffeine. So, were still on last Thursday. 0830, our sumptuous meal of "hot eggs" complete, we head over to "Bastogne". For those that are history buffs or fans of "Band of Brothers" Bastogne is named after the famous offensive from France in WWII. This is where Ft. Jackson keeps da big guns. I shot an M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ground/m249.htm), the M240 (yes boys and girls...SEVEN....POINT....SIX....TWO.....FULL....METAL....JACKET!!) http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m240g.htm and the coup d'etat: the .50 cal machine gun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.50_BMG). The .50 cal is like a cannon. As they say in France, tres cool. Here are some pictures from Bastogne... So from Bastonge we headed back to the firing range for some M16 training. All in all, I shot several hundred rounds from 5 different guns. The only thing that would have been better would have been to shoot a Howitzer. We can't have it all I guess. The day finally ended at 1800. It's not often one does a 15 hour day and I certainly don't recommend it but at least it was entertaining. The only problem is that the next day I woke up completely sore from donning and shedding the 70# of gear we are wearing. Last Friday was a cake walk compared to Thursday and we did some preps for Land Navigation and more EST training called Shoot/No Shoot. It's a really neat trainng where they have real video connected to some M16's and set up a scenario where you have to decide whether to shoot or not. Excellent training. Why are they wasting my time with that useless Battalion Fun Run when I should be getting much more of this?? Saturday was really light and involved a short land nav course only. I won't go into it but suffice to say that if you can read a road map, it's laughably easy. In any case, it was a beautiful spring morning in South Carolina and a nice walk through the woods - sans 70# of gear or "slick". Saturday evening, I hitched a ride to the Hilton in downtown Columbia. The town is really small and comprised mostly of residential areas and the university. After a mexican meal that was big enough to choke a donkey, it was off to my room for the rest of the evening. Nothing like room service and pay per view (Revolutionary Road with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslette. 4 out of 5 stars. Was excellent, great dialogue, great character development but lost that last star because it's such a downer.) Sunday was a relaxing day getting ready for today. Up again at 0415 for the big "march". It's a mile hike in full battle rattle. I'm here to tell ya that it wasn't fun. Like....really. Just not fun. Once we got to our destination, it was good training. We are doing Convoy ops tomorrow so we set up our plan. Next was some IED training (Improvised Explosive Device) on how to recognize and what to do if you see one and finally some real brief training on how to "take a building". This is the deal where you are in 4-man teams, kick in the door and storm a house. Pretty cool but I'm really hoping this never fekkin' happens to me. Tonight is our transportation brief where they tell us when we leave the country. Rumor is Saturday but we'll know for sure in a few hours. Whew! I now have carpal tunnel in addition to a sore back and a bad attitude! For the record, I thought I might state for the record that yes, I have kept up the training. PFTHT!! The Army can't keep me down entirely. Since I had no goals, I made one up and decided that I would run 50 miles a week for the last two weeks. Success. In the last 15 days, 118 miles were covered not to mention a few elliptical and weight routines. Grrr... A final word of advice: don't run angry. But if you do, come prepared with more than one pair of shoes. Aloha.

April 14th

Another dose of the army today. I keep hoping that when I sit down to write that today will be the day that I won't have anything bad to say about the Army. Alas, it isn't today. I was up at 0500 to head to the range today. Didn't fire a shot. As I was gearing up to get on the line, it started to rain and we sat for two hours while we waited for it to pass. This was finally the point where they decided that it was time to call uncle and change the plan. We flexed to a brief in the afternoon and when all was said and done, when we were released at 1630 this afternoon, I recieved about 1+30 worth of legitimate training. From 0530 to 1630... As they say in Hot Shots Part Deux, "War! Iiiiiiiit's faaaaan-TASTIC!" Yes, I know, obscure quote. It's my blog, I can quote whatever I want. So, we getting on the bus today to head back from the range and there was a dirt pass through some....well, we'll call it "landscaping" although I don't know that anyone outside the Army would really consider this landscaping. One of the drill sargents was walking up through this dirt path and as we passed, he tells us to turn around, that we weren't allowed to walk on the dirt path. His reponse to my WTF was that he "worked there". My follow on question: "So, this is a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do type organization?" His response, "yeah". This is your Army in action folks and pretty much defines what's wrong here. This also resulted in 11 miles around the track until I finally came down off the roof. What day is it? The 14th. That's 9 and a woo {Meaning: 9 days plus one wake-up (w/u)} before I get to put this shit-hole in my rear-view. The good news is that there are 200 other Navy folks with which I can commiserate. It's very cool that where ever one goes, there are always the runners and triathletes hiding in the group. I spent the two hours sitting on my ass today talking to one of the Navy Captains about running marathons and sports nutrition. In the absence of common sense and efficiency, one can still connect with others of like mind and manage to find some enjoyment in the day. Thank God for small favors.

April 13th

So today was the dreaded "Battalion PT" day. Excuse my french but that was the larget single cluster-fuck of an evolution that I have ever experienced in my entire career. And in 21 years, I've seen a few. Get up at 0345 to do a couple of windmills, stretches and run 1.2 miles? Seriously? Not only that but there are two companies worth of people out there which amounts to about 185. Try to do anything organized with that many people and yes it's challenging. But add in the fact that these idiots have a van on site at the PT field that is blasting something along the lines of Seether and you're starting to get the idea of where I'm going with this. No one can hear anything. Now add to that the fact that in the Navy, we simply don't do drill. "Drill" for the uneducated is "march-and-make-pretty-like-all-in-step" because if you can't fight well, you might as well look good. Navy folks don't do this and it takes practice. Doing a Battalion Fun Run means running (i.e. drill) in formation with nearly 200 people. So here's the scene: you have a transition zone where everyone gets out of the water at the same time, all carrying M16s and 9 mm's, gear flaying everywhere, and now we want to get all those bodies out on the road out of T1 all at once...in an orderly manner...in the pitch black of a cloudy moonless morning. Good luck. Chock up three more hours of my life courtesy of the Army that I will never get back. And no workout to show for it. The funniest thing is that we weren't 1000 feet down the road before the weak were already falling out of our 11 min per mile "run". Not that running fast is a required qualification for being a good human but you'd think that in the military at least, physical fitness would be higher up on the priority list. Mix a little Navy and Army incompetence together and you get a recipe for disaster. Did I mention this was all at 0430 in the am? What a great day. The silver lining on this cloud is the fact that we got done early today - 4:30 in the afternoon. Tomorrow I'm going to voluntarily pistol-whip myself by getting up at 0330 and doing my workout before training since we'll be at the firing range shooting M16's all day. Dragging myself to the track every afternoon after the fact is killing me. Last week I did 52.5 miles of running out of sheer desperation and the need to vent steam. By working out in the am, I hope to 1) get my body clock on Hong Kong time just for kicks and 2) get to the end of the day so impossibly exhausted that I no longer have the energy to bitch. Tomorrow will be the test bed. I'll let you know...

April 12th - Easter Sunday

It's Easter Sunday. They gave us the day off which was, you know, swell of them. I spent the morning sleeping in for 12 hours. Glorious. It's the Sabbath right? (Some dog show is on in the back ground and there's a miniature poodle being shown. What the fuck is up with the ball of hair on the ass? Seriously? It's a tuft of fur in the shape of a ball on their hips? Who decided this was haut couture? Ugh. That's not a dog!) So not much to report other than we've been shooting and waiting. I'm now officially numb to the waiting. At this point, I can see how POWs managed to while away the hours. You just have to either have a REALLY long book (Tolstoy War and Peace for example) or a really vivid and active imagination. Since my pockets are already bursting at the seams with other gear like, you know, food, there's no room for books. My mind is wandering in weird directions these days. An interesting thing about the situation here is meeting the people that are going through this with me. Many (most?) are activated reservists that have a wide variety of occupations on the outside. There are the obvious for the medical, law enforcement, and legal folks but there are also some others. For example, there's the LT that stands in front of me in formation that used to work at a bar at one time and a HOnda dealership at another. Can't remember what his current occupation is but it has nothing to do with the SWO pin on his uniform. There's the guy that's a college professor. The woman from Puerto Rico who's a medical administrator (didn't knwo the Navy had them but apprently so). And a myriad of other things. Hearing their stories is interesting. I tell them I'm full-on active duty and an F14 RIO to boot and I get some weird looks (like, "WTF are you doing HERE?"). The one real downer so far that I haven't written about is the first aid class we had last week. It involved a power point slide that showed pictures of real soldiers with wounds from the battle field. This is depressing. As I told one person, "As someone looking for peace in this world, that's something I didn't want to see." It's just very sad to see real evidence of the violence that we do to one another. There were pictures of enemy soldiers as well and it wasn't any easier to see. I know they've done bad things to us but in the end, they're still human beings without legs and arms or missing half their skull on an operating table (the pictures we saw were straight from the OR - no bandages, no hiding the gore). I hope I never have to be exposed to this; call me a coward... Well, it's 1800 and there's a 0400 wake up tomorrow morning. I"m off to finish up some stuff before ending this day. 11 days to go and counting.

April 8th

OK, I actually gave up playing computer solitaire to write this so I'm hoping something good actually comes out on the page. Already well under the remotestest possibility of 8 hours of sleep, I might as well press on regardless of the 0400 wakeup tomorrow morning. Nothing like rolling out of bed into full "battle dress". In the meantime, if I get writer's block, I have the company of VH1's Greatest One Hit Wonders of the 80s. Oh the good ol' days. Little did I know when I was listening to Quarter Flash as a kid that 23 years later, I'd be writing about listening to it under these circumstances. Lest I bore you with yet more stories of Army, I'll keep the bitching to a minimum except to say that we were on the range from 0730 until 1515 today and I actually got about 2 hours of legitimate training. For the daily MRE (Meals Ready to Eat) report, we have: beef ravioli, peanutbutter and something labeled "wheat bread", an oatmeal cookie, and (of all things) fried rice and a lovely capri sun from the 2009 vintage (it was a good month). Now for the verdict: ravioli wasn't bad. I should know as I grew up on the stuff. Heated it would have been much better but just imagine eating really think chef boyardee out of the fridge. I suspect that after this little summer camp, my digestion will never be the same but then again, if I can fix it after 5 cruises on Navy ships, anything is possible. I didn't touch the peanut butter. Not worth the calories. "Wheat Bread". This is a misnomer. If this shit is wheat bread, I'm Chrissie Wellington. Seriously, it has the texture of a REALLY bad biscuit and the flavor of wallpaper paste. If you read the ingredients, it looks harmless enough but that explains the complete lack of taste. (If you would like an MRE so you can, in fact, verify my review, please let me know. I will grab a few and try to mail them to you.) It's not food. This is something thrown into the MRE to add 300 more calories (500 if you toss on the peanut butter) to hungry and desperate grunts on patrol. Read comments about breakfast the other day. The people who decided this would be good food for soldiers should be prosecuted. Oatmeal cookie. Despite the fact that I'm not a dessert eater, this cookie is pretty good. Ingredients are harmless (mostly) and the taste is good even if the texture is a hair on the dry side. Overall, on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best meal I ever had at the Kalapawai Cafe and 1 being dirt, this meal was a solid 5. Moving on....Fried rice?? Really?? With ravioli? Who combinde these? Shit man, you gotta love globalism. Tomorrow, I'll look for the MRE that has Chicken Pad Thai, toastadas, wienerschnitzels and fried okra. Yummy! On the other hand, the turkey sandwich I made for myself this evening with a side of Ruffles and 2 squares of dove chocolate for a chaser was a solid 7. Best meal I've had all week. Now for some good news since I've been doing much too much bitching lately. Of the 2 hours of legitimate training we received today, 30 minutes was devoted to "Hummer Familiarization". We got an up close and personal look at an Army "Humvee" with a ride included as long as you were tall enough to ride the ride. With 65# of gear, I've compressed my spine almost to the point of being under the 48" stick but thankfully, I just squeaked under (or over in this case) the wire. So off we go on the back roads of Army Base Ft. Jackson. There are 5 seats in the humvee - driver, passenger, gunner, and two back seaters. There's not a lot of room especially when you have 5 men in full battle gear and the extra tactical gear that is loaded in the vehicle on patrol but for today, it was roomy (if not comfortable). The seats are sorta hard as one would expect which is a real pain in the ass when going over bumpy roads (ha ha..I's a cah-meeedee-an). Contrary to popular belief, these vehicles really aren't great off road. They'll do but they're no Jeep Wrangler. It was a beautiful day here in South Cakalay and rolling down the windows while driving through sand roads in the forest was definitely the high point of the day. If I could have stuck my head out the window like a dog, I would have. Anyhoo, we each got a shot at gunner and driver. I was gunner first and the first driver took off out of the lot heading for the woods. Along the way was a construction site with some large puddles. I'll post the video on Facebook when I get a chance. It's priceless. You'll love the audio when the mud hits me square. Quid Pro Quo when I was the drive and he was the gunner... :) All in all, not a bad day because I've pretty much stopped caring about laying my rifle on the deck, and stopped trying to hold up all that freaking gear. Today we also did an M16 trainer which included some indoor laser sighting and shooting which sounds boring but is actually really interesting. If my rifle fires well tomorrow, it should be fun. In any case, what's not to like about the smell of gun powder. It's the smell of....victory.

April 6th

The 0430 wakeup came early this morning. Did you know there was such thing as 0430? Tomorrow I will get to find out what 0400 is like. Well, it's one way to get on east coast time. I think I ran across one of the most priceless moments of this entire trip this morning. I don't think it will be topped. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture to prove that I'm not making this up but I imagine the EYE-denitcal will happen again. Soooo...muster at 0500. RUSH to get to breakfast (a 30 second walk) because we don't want to be late to our 0630 brief. Seriously, they leave 90 minutes to eat breakfast (which as you will discover shortly doesn't take 90 minutes) and walk the 400m or so to the auditorium. So in we rush thinking we were going to be served breakfast. Guess what it is? A package that contains the following: 2 mini bowls of three cereal choices - fruit loops, apple jacks or corn pops, Boxed milk (boxed milk???? eeeewwwwww!!!), canned orange juice (about 4 oz worth), poptarts and a nutragrain bar. This is what we're feeding our warriors folks. Pure sugar. At 0500. Follow that up with an MRE at....drumroll please....1:30 in the afternoon. One of the first things they told us when we got here was that they were "going to take care of us". If this is getting taken care of, I certianly don't want to be left out in the cold. Plus it's like product placement central. Every junk food known to man must want to get their crap into military distribution. Too bad they can't get Red Man and Jack Daniels in that breakfast pack. Follow that up with the courtesy bottle of Purell (in a neat little cammie bottle - how cute). Deep down inside (ok, not so deep down inside) I'm majorly freaking out here. Thank God for the trip to the commissary yesterday for a loaf of bread and some peanut butter. I didn't realize my stash of organic bars, the loaf of bread and jar of PB would be gone in a matter of days. I pondered this over a Red Bull that got me through at 2:00 pm this afternoon. After this is all over, I just may never touch fast food or junk food ever again. (Beer doesn't count.) So today, we were issued out "battle rattle". It includes: one tactical vest, steel chest plate 1" thick, steel back plate 1" thick, shoulder protectors, side protectors and one groin protector. Additionally, we were issued one kevlar helmet (that weights about 10# - I finally have a 10# head!!), and a bunch of other shit that I will never use including a tent, 4 mosquito nets (yup, four - your tax dollars hard at work), two sets of gloves, 4 sports bras, watch belt, two canteens, canteen carriers, camel back, helmet goggles, two sets of sunglasses (cheap Oakley knock-offs), sleeping bag, ground mat and a packable shovel. Not to mention the fact that this stuff weights about 60 pounds which is damn near half my body weight, this is waste, fraud and abuse at it's best. Do you wonder why the military spends so much of our money? This is why. Some guy wrote to his congressman about how badly he was outfitted and as a result, the entire military heading over there is geared up with more shit than you can shake a stick at. Supposedly lots of it is returned but not the stuff that touches skin (gloves, helmet liner, cold weather fleece and raingear, cammies, etc.) That is prime tax money hard at work. Depsite the fact that I will likely be doing most of my stuff behind a desk, I now am the proud owner of a sleeping bag and packable shovel. Yippee skippee! Tell me then, folks, why we can't spend more money on, like, a loaf of bread or whatever and a pack of banana muffins along with some fruit for breakfast? It'd be cheaper that the freakin' fruit loops any way. Just wondering. Score one more victory for me despite the day: 5.5 miles on the tack and 30 minutes on an eliptical. Now that deserves a yippee skippee. Tomorrow: rifle issue and range firing in full battle gear after about three hours in the class room. Did I mention the 0400 wake up? I'll be in Kuwait time before I leave this place if they have their way. Some one drink a beer for me please?

April 5th - First full day with the Army

So I though I forgot Easter this year. I freaked out for a second until I got back to my room to google it to find out that it's next week. Whew! No point in playing the game if you're not going to follow the rules and milestones. For the record, I love the fact that I can "google Easter". It just sounds funny. It's right along the same lines as the woman back in Hawaii who gives me my massages. This woman is unreal, a master, a healer and seems to have a direct line to the Source. She's damn near a throw back to ancient Hawaiian healers. You get the idea...she texts me to remind me that I have an appointment. Good to see that the kahunas are at least on board with cellphones and other haole technology. :) So first item of the day, technology ensured me that I did not miss Easter. Win won for Rosie today; count it because they are few and far between lately. As I mentioned yesterday, I'm in this cottage-like set up. I think I also mentioned that having JO's would be better than having O6's. I hereby retract that statement. I met CAPT "Hardass" today and she's a bull in a china shop. This is one woman that I will NOT stand in the way off. You do want to be close by though because the entertainment value of watching her tell a Master Chief he's fucked up is PRICELESS! This may actually be one of the first Surface Warfare officers I've ever truly respected. It may be becasue she was a pilot first but really, you just have to love being around someone who drives through base at 55 mph (in a 35) and really doesn't care. One of the first words she said to me was, "this place SUCKS!!" Wow, a breath of fresh air. She's taking over charge of all the IA's for the Navy meaning she's actually in the chain of command for the people that work here. I don't think they realize it. They told her if she wanted liberty next weekend, she was going to have to put in a special request chit. For those of you not in the know, let me put it like this: It's like having to ask your children if you can go out and play. I think her answer to the Master Chief was a simple, "yeah....NO!" We compared notes from San Diego and had the same problems with the same people so I have at least a little validation for my bitching. So that's one of my room mates. As I always say, could be worse! Since there is a Navy instruction stating that no alcohol will be consumed within 12 hours of firing a weapon (OK, that makes sense), they've completely nixed booze. Even on Saturday nights when there's no chance that we will be firing weapons any time soon. Conveniently enough, in order to make life easy for the few that work here, they've made life very hard on the other 300 people actually going through the training. Never mind that we are going to Afghanistan, Iraq, Somolia and other assorted places. Like I said in previous posts, it's the little things in life that make is bearable. Is it too much to ask to have a beer on Saturday? Wouldn't be such a big deal except for the Master Chief (previoulsy mentioned) is fat and obviously beyond Navy Standards for PRT. "Do what I say and not what I do". Hmmmm, that's the way to build morale! The Navy really knows how to take care of it's people. Good news. Hmmmm.....OK, there is some. I got out and ran 14 miles this morning. Some might not think this is good news but it is. The bad news is that by the time I was done, my body was crying out for food. I haven't eaten a real meal since Friday night (snacking since then - all day yesterday and no the roast beef didn't count). I went over the the exchange and packed on massive amounts of fat and grease in the form of a Charlies Sub and fries...yes with Sprite. I feel like the preacher that just opened a porn mag. "I'm not supposed to be doing this but it feels soooooo good! I hope no one sees me!" Follow that up with a Red Bull and we can pretty much say I've fallen off the wagon. Time to close the porn mag, open up the Reader's Digest and get back in form.

April 4th - Transfer from San Diego to Ft. Jackson, South Cakalaky

Another day, another dollar... This morning we transfered via C-9 to Ft. Jackson just outside of Columbia, SC. The flights were uneventful (Marine C-9 which meant no nonsense and wasting no time). We got to Columbia early after a stop in Kansas. I'd say Podunk, Kansas but that would be an insult to Podunk. I took a picture but have no way to load it up right now. Once in Columbia, it was finally green and beautiful. The drive from the airport to the base was about 30 miles on country roads lined with pine forest. No time to be existential but it was certainly nice to see. It's been a long time since I've seen country like this. It was a beautiful spring day here and the sunset (over an Army parking lot littered with army vehicles) was beautiful. After standing in yet another line, we were finally done with the check in and some chow (I passed on the stew....you just never know). So here I am in my palace (the four room "cottage" sure beats the open bay barracks. O5 women and O6 men get their own accomodations. If the other women don't show up, some JO's will jump in which would actually be preferable. Thye have a tendency to liven the place up. We're sharing a bathroom but it's clean enough and we were given towels. Not only that but we have a fridge and a coffee maker. Not that I will be drinking coffee. I had my last espresso for weeks yesterday. I tried to get one this morning but the shop was closed on Saturdays. This could potentially be worse that no booze. We were told that regardless, alcohol is off limits. Fuckin' great. Fuckin' army. Leave to the Army to entirely pull the fun out of everything. So my last beer and my last espresso. I'd trade all the cable TV (our cottage has DirecTV) for a morning espresso. Crap.

April 3rd

So, here I am eating potato chips and drinking a beer despite the fact that yesterday, I learned my cholesterol is 204. For one who knows me this is entirely unsatisfactory for several reasons. One, I like numbers: heart rates, workout times, percentages in zone, race time, how fast I did something, how much I weight, how fast my Harley goes, how long I've been doing something, how many flight hours, how many traps, and on and on. Especially for a person who has a Masters Degree in Holistic Nutrition, 204 is unbelievable. I chalk it up to (I know...I know) the nachos I had at Taco Bell and the load of french fries I had at a greek restaurant the other day. It certainly has nothing to do with the fact that I've downed up to four drinks a night and am not eating well or making good decisions about my diet. It's not my fault; that's my story and I'm sticking to it. So that's my current state of mind. Despite the fact that it's entirely unsat that my cholesterol is about 50 points too high (I've had it tested as low as 150) I'm still sitting here drinking beer and eating potato chips. The last week of my life has been an exercise in anger management and patience. I thought I had mastered both but once again, God has stepped in and said, "SCHYA! WHATEVER!" Day 1: lots of briefs. No big deal. Day 2....Navy Medical. For those that haven't had the pleasure of dealing with a socialized medical system which is basically what military medicine is, let me forwarn you that no matter what Hillary Clinton says, we DON'T need socialized medicine. Do you know why it takes weeks...months to get an appointment despite the fact that you are dying from cancer now? Because the PA (that's Physicians Assistant...that's right, you don't even get an official MD) is so busy wasting time chatting someone up that people end up waiting hours and days to be seen. There's no way I can do this justice. Imagine spending 8 hours waiting to see a doctor for a simple signature, being told to go home because he's done for the day (at 3 or 4:00 pm) and then when you get to see him finally (the next day after waiting another 2 hours or so), he spends a whopping two minutes clicking buttons on a computer and 20 minutes asking questions about your personal life that have absolutely no bearing on your medical profile. This is the limit for me. I think at this point, I'm probably lucky that he didn't suggest I see a psychologist for being unstable. My behavior was deplorable but frankly, I wasn't much in the mood to care. This was another interesting experience at medical and almost deserves its own post but since I'm feeling ornery, it's included here. So I'm in immunizations for 4 hours waiting for 1) a shot I've already received that the jack ass at my previous medical dept didn't log and 2) only takes 30 seconds. 4 hours. Did I mention FOUR HOURS? Plenty of time to catch up on....anything. But since we were told we weren't allowed to bring computers into medical, we're forced to sit in a hot room and read (if we can stay awake that long). This is why they issue these neat uniforms; so the droll doesn't show. So this chief sits down next to me and the only thing I said for the next 30 minutes was my initial "how's it going?". That's all it took to loose the flood gates. This man talked incessantly about his children, his job, his philosophy on life, you name it. Unreal the personal information he shared with me. At one point he briefly asked about my career. I mentioned F14's and he said, "So, how do you like those F16's?" OK. I can deal with that. That's about all I got to say about that because he delved into some other topic. He also asked briefly about my family and said I had put it off due to career. 5 minutes later he asked how many children I had. Make the bad man stop.... On top of all this, someone seems to have determined that the answer for me is definitely "no". Like for everything. Like getting specific directions for the post office in Solana Beach and then not being able to find it. Wasting 30 minutes of my already limited time. Getting to a store (that I drove 30 miles to go to) only to walk up as they clicked the door locked at the end of the day. Like the girl at the coffee shop taking a break every time I show up to get an espresso. Like the face plant I took today on the gravel track by the Q caused by stakes that entirely blend into the background (being wtinessed by several construction workers). Looking for the UPS store that the guys said was at the Exchange and that "you couldn't miss it" only to find that one, indeed, could miss it....numerous times. (No, I never did find it.) Like being issued 60 pounds of gear and being told that you can only bring 40 pounds of gear onto the flight that takes you to your next stop (seriously. I don't make this up) Only a few examples of the dozens of examples this week. Like now when I went to drink my beer...it was all gone. Who came and drank that while I wasn't looking. Seriously? Wow, I really need some love...and another beer. I know, this is the standard American whining about how I didn't get my coffee and that's fine. I'm a bad person who's spoiled. Oh well. It would be nice to catch a break because when you're heading off to the middle east for a year, when you're leaving all the people you love, when you're leaving the once place on planet earth that you really feel is home, it's the little things that make it bearable. You expect life to be painful once you get in the desert but certainly not here. Let's just get this over with so I can go home and see my husband. If it's just a case of being a bad dream, could someone please wake me now? I'd rather have insomnia.