The End Is Near

Today was the last BUB (killer weekly meeting) that I will ever have to attend in the Navy, Lord willing. Now I just have one day and a wake-up, and hopefully no chances to do anything memorable. For a second I was going to get sentimental, but it is impossible to have any nostalgia after having sat through a three hour meeting. (One interesting note is that the Battalion Commander, who is also nearing his time to go home, ended the meeting by talking about three very optimistic meetings he has had with Iraqi Police Chiefs in the last week. One police chief, “who never has anything positive to say except about himself,” had an optimism that was notable to BC.) If I happen to get out of here on my birthday, that will be the best birthday present I have received in many years.

One More Last

Today I took my laundry in for the last time at Rusty. The laundry contract ran out since the fiscal year is over, so a new company came in. While they were switching out washing machines the laundry facility was closed for three days. Accordingly, there was a long line to turn in laundry today. I am not sure if it will even be done, but I won’t wait around for it since I never want to wear my Army issue battle pajamas again anyway.

My Favorite Person in this Hemisphere

My replacement arrived yesterday. He is an Air Force captain. Because he will relieve me in five days, I think he is cool.

A Win-Win-Win-Win Situation

I might as well have won the lottery. Yesterday we change our clocks, and there was once again the embarrassing confusion about falling back that we had about springing forward. Word was passed and repassed about the day clocks would change with the last word I got being that the change would be two days ago. This means that I changed my clocks a day earlier than planned and thus got an extra hour of sleep two nights ago. And then last night the real time change happened and I got another extra hour of sleep. If you are reading this in the comfort of a home that you actually want to live in, you did not get the extra hour of sleep either last night or the night before. I do not mean to flaunt my well rested good fortune when you are tired from a normal night, but my extra hours did not come at your expense. Please, no hard feelings. Here is where jealousy and hard feelings might be justified – I will get another night with an extra hour because I will be home the first Sunday in November. So I will have had a 25 hour day AT HOME without having to have had a 23 hour day to make up for it. Before you try to make yourself feel better by bringing me down by point out that I have not really gained an extra hour since I am beginning the year in Eastern Standard Time and I will be ending the year in Eastern standard time so I didn’t really gain three hours, realize that there is a fourth win in this time switching situation. When I fly home, I will only have crossed seven time zones instead of eight so I will have less jet lag to deal with. This time change good fortune makes a year in Iraq worth it.

The Birthday Continues

I am being overwhelmed with cards, books, and snacks. Thank you for them all, even if you just did it to support Kate’s nefarious plan to force me to admit my thirty-ness. You win. I’m thirty. Or will be soon, Lord willing.

One packaged I received contained Organic Beef Jerky. I will be forced to get my preservatives and artificial hormones elsewhere – hardly a challenge for me. I note that the package says “best if consumed within three days of opening.” Not a problem. Another funny marking on a package of cookies I received: “Now better tasting.” Doesn’t leave much room for guessing what the research department found about their previous recipe. I am glad to report that the package is completely correct.

The Slippery Slope to Anarchy

Today I broke one of my cardinal rules. Because I want to be ready to go to bed at a moments notice, I do not allow myself caffeine after noon. That is, I know, a little conservative, but when it comes to being awake when you want to be asleep you can never be too far on the side of sleep. At about 1300 today the chaplain and the commo were walking out to go to the coffee shop and happened to ask if I would I wanted to come along. Being inherently cheap and well supplied with coffee by friends and family, I have not paid for coffee (or food) since leave – why buy what you already have? Even more than I am cheap I am perceptive (queue laugh track) so I knew that the chaplain and the commo were really asking if I wanted to “hang out” as the kids say these days. Friendship is worth paying for so I graced them with my presence.

I am always self-conscious when I order coffee at coffee shops because I cannot keep the tall, grande, and vente sizes straight. Also, the coffee aficionados order with such grace: “Tall skin mocha grande frappe with whip, add one shot espresso” or however they say it. I know that the baristas at the Starbucks back at the states sense that I cannot tell the difference between McDonald’s Special Blend and the Organic Eco-friendly Light Roast Summer French Blend from Ecuador. Even though I am the customer I am not right when I order. So I overcame my fear and ordered as best I could. I specified decaf when I ordered my double mocha over ice, and the third country national scoffed at me with his eyes in a barista way. The sneer was not as pronounced as I would have gotten in the states, but a coffee shop is a coffee shop and baristas have standards that apparently are international and span all languages. “No decaf, sir.” Iraq is not Burger King, and you don’t always get it your way. Besides, the chaplain and commo were laughing at me since their standards of sleep hygiene are not up to mine. I gave in and had caffeine, and the chaplain and commo were grateful for my company.

Happy Birthday to Me

One milestone toward going home has past (last haircut at Rusty today) and one is approaching. There is no conceivable way I will be home before my birthday, but even though I will be gone I have not been forgotten. I have received five birthday cards in the last three days. Some of these cards are from people who I would expect to remember my birthday – close family. And some are from people who I would not have expected - friends I haven’t seen in years and people from my church. In all cases, I am honored that people remember. Even more impressive is that the cards I have received are early – if I ever remembered to send a card to someone with unreliable mail I would end up using the unreliable mail as an excuse for sending the card late even though the reason would invariably be that I forgot. (One more benefit to marriage is that “my” cards are no longer late.) Thank you all.

The Worst Story Ever

This story is terrible, so if you want to maintain any hope in your government or its bureaucracy, just quit reading now.

Recently we had a new South Carolina National Guard unit RIP in, and with that came a replacement of the Michigan unit’s member of the TOC team. The new guy from SC is on night shift and is mostly quiet and on the older side of forty-five. I was walking back from breakfast at the start of my day as he was coming back from his pre-bed meal at the end of his day. I got to talking to him and he told me his story. I almost wanted to cry, and for a moment stopped thinking that being an IA is the most pathetic way to tour Iraq.

This soldier had completed the required twenty years for retirement with time split between the National Guard and the active Army. A short time after his twenty were complete, he contacted the retirement records bureau to verify something or the other and they informed him that they only had records of him serving seventeen years – three years of his National Guard time were gone. Since his career had a three year gap, he would have to serve three more years if he wanted retirement benefits. They assured him that this would not be a problem because there was an SC guard unit just coming back that he could attach to and spend the rest of his career without deploying – they were from the government and were here to help.

So he did. He enlisted. And they transferred him from the unit that would not deploy to the unit that is here now. That is bad enough that, if it had happened to me, they would have to take away any live bullets I might have for their own safety, but the story gets worse. When this guy retired, he was a captain who was on the path to promotion to major. Unfortunately, the portion of records that were lost were the portion that included his promotion to captain, so for all the Army knew he had served his whole time commissioned as a first lieutenant. The military has a rule that if you do not get promoted in a certain amount of time they ask you to get out of the military to make room for those who will get promoted. “Up or out” this policy is called in an unexplainable moment of simplicity and clarity in naming. So this soldier who had retired a captain, but for whom the Army had records for first lieutenant, was past the time for promotion to captain from first lieutenant. You are correct – this does not makes sense, but since they had no record that he was promoted to captain he could not be promoted to captain so to get his retirement he had to enlist and is now a sergeant.

Every morning when we do turnover, this poor soul gets an earful from the intel section master sergeant who feels that he needs to vent his family problems on some unsuspecting solder. (n.b. the venting is most likely the source of his family problems vice the solution.) This master sergeant does not know that the man he is condescending was and should be a captain. If there is justice in this world, they will find his paperwork and one day he will get a letter setting the wrongs right. Until then he has a story worse than an IA.

Perpetuate to Validate

When I arrived at my current duty station, there were seven (7) officers in the TOC: Terry, Bob, Dave, Jake, Angela, Selmer, and Mark. Currently there are three (3): Terry, Jake, and Lara. You would think that with a cut in the work force of 57%, assuming all officers contribute equally, would stress the officers who are left. I do not believe this is the case. The case, rather, is that tasks are created to match manning instead of the opposite. In at least one case, an officer who would weekly brief the commander and all of the staff with a brief series of slides left and with him left the slides from the brief – shorter and no value lost. Jobs are not made to accomplish tasks, but to fill time and make people feel like they are contributing to the team. In another officer’s particular case, her fifteen minute brief turned to minute and a half brief when her job was taken over by a moderately junior sergeant. I think the only reason we even include what used to be her briefing is so that she does not feel that she was just wasting her time (she was moved out of the TOC to replace another officer who left).

John Paul Jones once said, “I wish to have no association with a ship that is not fast, for I intend to go into harm’s way.” I think that JPJ would have stayed in port rather than gone to war with the joint effort that is Operation Iraqi Freedom, 06-08. I once was offered by a Navy O-4 that he would show me how to brief my actions as a member of a staff so that the boss knew how much I contribute. It’s a rain check I still possess.

It Still Works

Yesterday we conducted our semi-annual verification of weapon function. – and once I brushed the dust off mine they still worked. We were each issued our five bullets for our pistol and five for our rifles. We all trooped out to the range and fired our five bullets and walked back. Some people decided they had to drive, but that is understandable since it is a five minute walk. There was a unity of opinion that Friday morning was the wrong day to schedule our five bullet shoot because that is the day of the big battalion meeting. Everyone ended up getting there on time, but breakfast was rushed (the things the troops in the warzone must endure!). The worst part was that I had to wear my sixty pound individual body armor which most “go outside the wire soldiers” wear every day. As I was putting it on it ripped the thumb drive out of my pocket by my lanyard and I lost it. At least it was my unclassified one.

In the Blink of an Eye

Yesterday was a day of incredibly good news. My relief has not only been named, but he is part of the group of unfortunates who are already in country. This Air Force captain should be arriving at Chez Rusty on September 30. If all goes well, I could be on a plane home October 10 and if all goes less than well October 16. (Let’s not discuss worse than that.) Either way, that is a win for the home team because I was supposed to be home around 22 November. There have been rumors about for about ten days now. Today it is official.

In about two weeks I could be leaving Rusty instead of eight. That means that I could have four or five weeks at home that I thought were gone – an amazingly wonderful occurrence no matter how you slice it. It is also sobering and indicative of this entire IA process. This all started when I came back from a wonderful Thanksgiving with my mom’s family in Indianapolis and found an email waiting for me that hinted that an IA was in the offing. As the week went on rumors increased, but no word was passed. Then on December 7 at 1543, exactly sixty-five years to the minute as the USS Arizona was sinking in Pearl Harbor (too much drama alert), I got confirmation that I was the chosen one. Just like that almost a year of my life was gone. It wasn’t fair. There wasn’t any ceremony or gravity like I at some level expect at losing so much. Only my first level boss even told me or said good-bye in person. 2007 was just gone. Talk about life being like grass that is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire.

When something like that happens you want to scream to the world that as an American I have a right to fair treatment. Maybe 2% of the Navy gets sent over here, and the number of junior officers with viable careers over here is much smaller. Most Navy people over here on IA’s are O-4’s who haven’t been selected for command and are hoping for the extra push to make O-5 or chiefs hoping to break out for senior chief. There are quite a few people from non-deploying Navy communities for whom this is one year away from home out of the past ten of their career and when they are done they will retire with four more on shore. Most of the junior officers in my job are pilots who HAVE some background in what I’m doing and have three years on shore so their tour is about 30% of their shore duty. My orders were for two year. They wanted 50% of my shore duty, and I had plans that I was actively pursuing to stay in the Navy. The pilot JO’s would still have two years, whole shore tour length, even after they finished. There were a hundred reasons I shouldn’t have been chosen. The bottom line is that this is not fair.

If there is one thing I don’t like it is reality that isn’t the way it should be. When Kate and I went to a marriage seminar once, the speaker said that most unhappiness in a marriage comes from people dwelling on how things should be instead of being thankful for how things are. Fortunately, I have a nearly perfect wife who gives me nothing to be unhappy about, but it is super-easy to find those things in the Navy. They irk me because they are wrong and could be righted. Even now, the Task Force IA has put out guidance about how this jaunt in the desert should positively affect my career, but my detailer has essentially said “Sorry, Charlie,” on that one. Could be fixed easily, but it won’t be. It is a detailer doing what he can instead of what he should, and that is just the way of life.

So today I am on the good side of unfair. It is completely unfair that I get to go home at eight months instead of the required nine while other people are staying for three longer than originally planned. It is arbitrary, and just like that five weeks of my life are given back. I’d like to think that someone at BUPERs looked at my case and appreciated me as a person, but it was nothing like that at the human level. It just happened. No pomp or circumstance, no validation of my service and suffering. Just the way things work out. Today it is a flower quickly fading; a year ago it was grass to the furnace.

Maybe I’m close enough to the end where I can get safely philosophical, point out lessons learned, and impute some meaning to this nonsense that is 2007. If there is any one thing I can say I’ve confirmed for certain it is that life is unfair mostly in bad ways but also in some good way. The bad unfairness that I have gotten is certainly not as terrible as the random unfairness that many soldiers and there families have experienced while I’ve been here, but it is more terrible than the unfairness that the guys back home are complaining about even as I’m typing. Bad stuff happens in this fallen world we live in, and we do not have a right to better. To expect any less is unrealistic and to dwell on it is to sell peace of mind too cheaply. Good stuff happens, too, which is equally unfair and undeserved. Maybe this time I’ve learned enough to be thankful for the good instead of thinking it is my due. I’m coming home soon.

International Language

I have heard that a smile is supposed to be an international way to show friendship. I’m not so sure about all that, but I do know that food is a way of showing acceptance everywhere. It is very important for our troops out here to eat with the Iraqis they interact with even though it often results in the runs. Women going through the line at the DFAC often get larger portions even when they do not ask for them while some men grumble that they cannot get two chicken cordon blues (a very popular dish) even when they ask for them.

I am a creature of habit when it comes to food. Every morning I get the same thing: I go through the sandwich line which is a 24 hour operation and get a sandwich with mayonnaise, mustard, lettuce, tomato, onion, and pickle. I then go to the omelet line and get a cheese omelet to put on my sandwich. I’ve done this every day since I got back from leave. The first week or so I got looks of insult from the sandwich makers since I had refused their meats and cheeses, but they soon got used to it. Since the sandwich line is not busy in the morning I chat a little bit with the sandwich artist, emphasis on “little” since he speaks very little English. His name is something like Desaby and he is from India. Maybe. He now starts making my sandwich without asking what I want and he also has started putting on double tomatoes.

The omelet guys also recognize me and have my omelet cooking before I get to the grill which has the added benefit of making sure that my eggs are cooked the whole way through. Most days the head cook will see it’s me and throw in a little extra cheese. Breakfasts might be the only part of Rusty that I will truly miss.

Armed Forces Network

Armed Forces Network (AFN) is the military television channel that provides American television for service members and their families overseas. On all of the televisions in public places here (the DFAC, various lounges, etc) we are treated to AFN Europe which has the normal fare of news shows from each major network, sports, and the various what’s-happening-in-the-military-today segments as every variant of AFN has. The difference lies in the spaces that would be filled by commercials if there was any profit motive. These commercials substitutes tend to be either low budget affairs put out by military units stationed in Europe or recruiting spots with higher budgets. They do have the added benefit of making you appreciate capitalism.

These low budget affairs range from amusing to disappointing. There are public service announcements suggesting that Europeans do not like rude drivers or rude people. There are security reminders to report suspicious activity. And then there are the Navy spots. Apparently COMNAVEUR has put out an open invitation for sailors stationed in Europe to break out their video cameras and embarrass the fleet. Today I saw a PSA encouraging professional reading which had to two sailors (who were only slightly overweight) at the base library to engaging in a reading competition of books of the CNO’s reading list. The winner of the competition did a victory dance wholly appropriate to the winner of a reading competition while the loser sulked in the background. It was disappointing, but not the most disappointing I have seen by far.

The most disappointing is a spot promoting “the Sea Chanters” or “the Singing Sailors” or whatever the COMNAVEUR’s choral ensemble is called. This group of peppy, smiley sailors apparently sings show tunes to entertain European dignitaries who have the misfortune to be the Admirsal’s guests. Judging by their commercial, they really get into it: I have never seen sailors smiling so brightly or dancing so spiritedly from the waste up while performing hand motions to songs from Broadway. From the waste down they were in the military at attention; from the waste up they were performers! Just to emphasize their combination of Naval tradition with jazzy, peppy performance style, they are wearing the uniform that midshipman refer to as service dress bozo which is service dress blues (the black, double-breasted suit) with a bowtie in place of the normal tie. It was only worn by those who had forgotten to turn their formal uniform into laundry in time for formal dinners.

If airing of this spot was limited to embarrassing the Navy in Europe I would not complain. Unfortunately, this promo is aired in our DFAC and is the only face of the Navy that many soldiers ever see besides mine. Soldiers tend to be a macho group who make up for any lack of brashness they may have with an excess of bluster*. The Sea Chanters are polar opposites of macho – let’s just call them a little too secure in their masculinity. So us sailors who have been abandoned by our service out in the middle of Army land have to deal with a service image of a bunch of smiling show tune singers. Thanks, COMNAVEUR.

*This gross generalization is based on an application of the 90/10 rule. 90% of your problems will be caused by 10% of your sailors. 90% of the extra time spent tutoring will be with 10% of your students. As Shamus the carpenter/mason/shepherd proves in the famous admonitory joke, 90% of your reputation is determined by 10% of your actions. So it is with my perception of soldiers. Most are decent people, or as Sean Hannity would call them, “Great Americans”, but the 10% who stick out in my mind are brashly blustery enough to claim that one can be tough and wear a beret at the same time. They argue that having over 40 pieces of flair on a uniform (have you seen Gen. Petraeus?) proves, PROVES military accomplishment. Thus even though my generalization is not true of all, in this case I do not feel the least bit hesitant to establish a rule using the exceptions to the normal.

Party Time

Thursday evening several of the EWO’s on the FOB went to a party on the other side of the FOB where there is a contingent of NATO folks and some Aussies. They are involved in training the Iraqi Army staff at there Military Academy / Staff College that is on the FOB but on the other side of the fence. I felt very adventurous going over to “the Iraqi side” even though it there are Coalition Forces who live there, including the Marine Master Sergeant who invited us.

The Hungarians were in charge of cooking. There was grilled meat and grilled cheese, onion, and tomato sandwiches. I would not have guessed that it was ethnic had I not know it was before hand. The rest of the party involved talking to the Americans that I knew from my side of the fence while the NATO people talked with the people they know. If that sounds anti-climactic I have been accurate.

Next The Leaves Change Colors

Lows in the 80’s, highs barely north of 105. Football on Armed Forces Network. Fall is in the air.

We’ll Call It Market Research

Stereotyping is BAD. Although very few people reel at the fact that Heineken sponsors Wimbledon and Budweiser sponsors NASCAR, every American knows that only Klansmen and other white males stereotype.

Thus you will understand that, even though this vignette occurred over a month ago, I’m still processing it. I was sitting in the TOC, a large open room where all conversations are public. I hear, “I’ve never been on food stamps – my daddy was white.” The woman who said this must have noted my minor cardiac arrest, but rather than offer asprin, she said to me, “Sir, you probably don’t even know what food stamps are.” “Of course I do.” “How?” she asks. Now everyone knows what food stamps are, and I was slightly taken aback that she would question my cultural awareness. However, saying something like “Some of my best friends were on food stamps,” would not help my case since I have no credibility as a member of an oppressed class, and I have never asked any of my friends if they are. I sarcastically responded, “Oh, I’ve heard stories about them.” She thinks this is hilarious and typical of a white person, so she turns back to the person to whom she was originally talking who has heard our whole conversation and says, “He’s heard stories about food stamps.” I, wanting to know the proper, sensitive way to show that I have knowledge of food stamps in the future ask, “How do you know what food stamps are?” “My mamma’s black.” When you know you can’t win, don’t take the conversation any farther.

Even though stereotyping is BAD, it can be funny when the stereotype fits too well. Chief and I were out doing some last minute maintenance at 8:00 with just the crew of the truck, a sergeant and two privates. We get to chatting and the sergeant volunteers that he was pretty upset when he found out he had been assigned a female gunner (evil, and I don’t approve of that viewpoint), but he says, the first time she came out to the truck she was carrying the fifty caliber machine gun and the extra barrels, no small feat. Before they got on the road the first time, he asked if she had checked her head space and timing, standard machine gun checks, and she snapped back that she knew how to operate her @#%$ machine gun. The sergeant clearly approved of his gunner and her competence. She lit up a cigarette, and since I feel like an old man around most soldiers, I felt compelled to give her a hard time about it as I do for all soldiers under twenty who smoke. I asked her how long she had been smoking, and she said since she was eight. I gave her that “are you kidding me?” look and she said that was nothing – she had started dipping when she was four. Her brothers started her on cigarettes, but her dad started her on Red Man. Is anyone surprised that she came from Okiefenokee, Georgia, population 200, rather than Manhattan?

My Tour In Iraq Through The Eyes Of A Specialist

One of the new companies in my battalion is a National Guard unit from South Carolina. One truck was going across the FOB to the Duke shop for the first time, so I rode with them to make sure they got there. One of the soldiers riding along was a specialist, one of the lowest enlisted ranks that is usually made at 16 months. They are a little nervous about Lieutenants, or Captains as they tend to call me (same rank different name for Navy and Army).

We got down the shop and I start working on installing my little system. This red-headed South Carolina specialist walks up and says in his slow South Carolina way, “Sir, what rank are you?” Since I’m the only person with two bars as my insignia who calls himself a lieutenant on the FOB, I’m used to this question. “I’m a lieutenant, but I’m still an O-3 like your captains are.” Confused look. “Oh, I’ve never seen an officer do mechanic work before. I thought captains are supposed to be company commanders.”

If it weren’t so innocent and accompanied by the same look of confusion that I daily experience over my current job, I would have thought he was trying to be mean.

Redneck Autobody Shop

The civilian contractors have two vehicles to get around the FOB and transport things like their laundry with. One is a little white Nissan pickup with red flames painted on the side, and the other is 2005 black Suburban. There are many of these types of vehicles with exactly the same paint scheme. All of these vehicles are less than four years old and are trashed. There is very little pride in ownership most likely due to their being no ownership. None have ever been washed, and KBR probably thinks it’s cheaper to buy new cars than bring out another civilian to change the oil.

The Suburban that the contractors have is in notably bad shape: the passenger side back window and cargo area window are both broken out. Today when Chief and I showed up at the shop, two of the contractors had a large piece of plexi-glass that they were cutting to replace the broken windows since rainy season is getting closer. They had finished putting on the cargo area piece of plexi-glass with self-tapping screws and were caulking it silicon. It was an improvement only because it was so bad before.

Chief, who used to be a Navy hull tech (person who makes things out of sheet metal and plexi-glass, among other jobs) and who is a bit on the obsessive-compulsive side about things looking nice, took over the job because the contractors had not made very good cuts and the plexiglass looked jagged and unprofessional. In Navy plexi-glass school they teach the score-and-break method for shaping plexi-glass which is fine for straight lines but is not good for making replacement windows for Suburbans. I am quite proud of myself for coming up with an idea that the professional doers (as an officer I’m a professional supervisor unlike the chiefs and contractors) of using the Dremel Tool. I even cut the window much to all of the chiefs’ chagrin and did quite a nice job even though I was an officer using a tool.

The window that I replaced looks better than the back window that the contractors replaced. Even Tank, a contractor whose parent’s naming ability fits their son’s size and mentality, said I did “good.” I think that is just evidence that he’s been in Iraq long enough to have low standards for the word “good.” Honey, when I get home we’re going to get a car to put on blocks in the front yard so I can fix it up with plexi-glass and self-tapping screws. It will look “good.”

A Matter of Perspective

Yesterday a bomb went off next to one of my trucks, a not uncommon event. No one was hurt, but the guys who were in the truck were fairly new to theater so it was a memorable experience for them. Part of my job is going out and gathering some data when such a thing happens, and as long as no one is hurt, it is one of my favorite parts of the job. Soldiers tend to be much more talkative and expressive after their trucks get blown up so it is easier to get to know them since otherwise I am one of the outsiders on battalion staff.

One of the junior guys in this truck was all grins, as you could imagine you would be if you just escaped from death to safety, and he was also completely soaked through with sweat. From the top of his blouse to the soles of his boots he was soaked through. In a grinning voice he said to no one in particular but also to anyone who may be willing to hear, “This is great: I’m so soaked no one can tell I wet my pants.”

I thought this was funny because I’m pretty sure if my truck got blown up I’d wet my pants. So would you. Or at least we would fully understand if someone did. Before I could even laugh, his squad leader busts through in a near perfect impression of the XO in the movie “Down Periscope”* and yells, “Start pushing,” so the soldier starts doing push-ups. As near as I can tell, the squad leader thought saying “wet my pants” in the presence of an officer on battalion staff was unprofessional while dropping a soldier who is covered in sweat and had nearly been blown up was redeemingly professional. I know better than to interfere with these things because Army logic and Navy logic on these matters diverge.

As Chief and I walk to the next truck in the group to gather the last of our data, she asks what that was all about with an incredulous voice. As has become my most common expression of body language living among the Army, I find myself shaking my shaking my head and shrugging as I recount the story. We are both bemused because Navy professionalism dictates that treating someone in a way to let all around know exactly who is the boss is highly UN-professional and could be called abusive of one’s authority. I say that this is a matter of perspective, but deep down inside in places that don’t get published on the internet I do not feel that way. I can’t say that, of course, but I will mark this down as one more event in my “Navy Appreciation” log which grows longer every day.

*I forget who the actor was, but he was excellent at playing the short, everything by the books as they are written in his head, disciplinarian to the point of comical autocrat who had a chip on his shoulder but no respect.

Cold Desert Nights

I’ve heard stories about people freezing to death at night in the desert after almost dying of heat stroke during the day. If you’re outside in Baghdad, that is not the likely. It stays hot outside all night. Hot. Inside the weather is not as predictable because inside weather depends on third country national air conditioner repairmen. Last week it was warm but not terrible. Someone decided that good enough was not and put in a repair request.

The third country nationals came through. It is now cold. The reason being that while TCN’s do a great job at repairing the air conditioning unit, they don’t know how to install thermostats. I’ve heard rumors that there is one in the building, but I can’t believe that it is connected as my room temperature at night is sub-Arctic and I have never walked past our air conditioner when it is not running full speed. Last night I slept with two blankets, a sheet, my sleeping bag thrown on top, and a knit cap. The knit cap was a gift from a family in my parent’s church that when I originally got it did not think would be useful, but that I now find very useful. Thank you.

Glasses

I left my second pair of Navy issue glasses, a pair that wouldn’t be too ugly if it weren’t for the frames, on Chief’s desk when I went home on leave. I came back and she somewhat apologetically said that my glasses were missing a nose piece. I didn’t really care since I left them on her desk and she only has one pair. She is a little particular about clutter, so I’m at fault for leaving them on her desk.

Since I have gotten back Chief has taken more and more of them, one piece at a time. First it was a screw that held the lens in, then the second nose piece. Right now they are lying completely disassembled and oddly enough Chief hasn’t complained about them cluttering her desk at all.

Making a Room a Home

Yesterday I put a bit of personal touch in my room. One of my companies was leaving so a sergeant gave me his mini-fridge. I have zero need of a mini-fridge since it would only encourage eating between meals, nevertheless it was free. I set it outside for about six hours to defrost, and it is now in my room… acting as a nightstand. It has been plugged in for about a day now and has not cooled down at all. Again, I’m not too concerned because I needed the night stand and have no real need for a fridge. If it cools down I won’t have to walk the twenty feet outside my room to the community fridge. If it doesn’t I have a night stand with about two cubic feet of hermetically sealed storage. It’s really a win-win.

Fall is Coming

We just got a TV with cable in our TOC, the battalions Tactical Operations Center. The Armed Forces Network plays football games not in real time, but continually. I think you could watch college football three days a week out here, and if you didn’t look at the scores ahead of time you could stay entertained. Oh the curse of constant connectivity and the internet, taking away the joy of football and cable by giving the scores in real time when cable is replaying! The first game I saw was Navy vs. Temple. I’m usually more of a naysayer when it comes to Navy athletics since I see them competing with academics, but being over here in the midst of the Army makes having a good Navy team a benefit. We won, and Army lost to Akron. There are lots of things I will present as arguments of the Navy’s superiority to the Army, but football isn’t one. Thank goodness Navy won though, because if Army had won and Navy lost I would hear about it all week. Instead, on this one issue, there has been blessed Army silence.

New Shoes

I got the shoes delivered that I bought on line, a new pair of Asics 2120’s. At first I thought they were too big and didn’t fit, and then I measured them next to my current shoes which have worked quite nicely and they are exactly as big. Imagine: two pairs of shoes that are both the same size and mass produced by the same company turn out to fit the same. In a fit (note: pun) of pro-Navy feeling I bought the shoes that are blue and gold. Now I’m afraid to wear them outside because I know once they hit the moon dust outside they will turn an off-gray shade of brown like my current shoes. I’m currently debating whether to carry them to the gym or just save wearing them until I get home.

Such goes the excitement and newness of Iraq.

A Significant Step

Today we had a barbeque at the shop for the longest serving EWO on the FOB because he is going on to a happier place. We collected money for someone to buy uncooked food at the main base in Baghdad when they went on a supply run, a move which I think is silly since you can get food for free that is cooked. The BBQ was not about me, however, or about what I thought about wasting money on frivolous social events. It was about Sr. Chief. His 280 day mark is September 18, and he will not get home until September 22. This is not a happy subject with him since the 280 in-country was supposed to be semi-sacred. One could argue that it still is semi-sacred since sacred is an all or nothing word, but I digress. The true significance of Senior’s departure is that my group of EWO’s is now the most senior in Iraq which also means the next to go home. Of course being next is not the same as leaving soon, but you can’t leave soon until you are next. I’ll start holding my breath now.

What Public School Self-Esteem Education Hath Wrought

When public education comes in contact with the real world, the result is pride, desperation, and stupidity encapsulated in a cry for help on a bathroom stall wall:

“Stop Erasing my Artwork, stupid Bathroom cleaner PeoPle!” (as written, caps included)

A Reprimand

Today I was pretty busy down at the shop doing real work installing things as opposed to office work. One of my battalion’s first lieutenants came in to the office sign some paperwork, an action which today I was not involved with, thankfully. On the way down to the shop, the lieutenant had stopped by one of our local Hajji shops and bought a Hajji vision DVD that had eight movies for the price of one. Hajji vision is the semi-racist slang for pirated DVD’s which are usually sold for a dollar. Most are one movie for a dollar, but you can also buy multiple movies on one DVD where you sacrifice quality for quantity while still getting the great low price. They are almost always high enough quality that you can make out the plot. (I have only seen about four or five movies on Hajji vision and have never bought any even though it is a win-win situation for the buyer and the seller. Maybe the producer loses out, but two out of three winning must be okay, right?)

So everyone is looking at the newest purchase which is a collection of eight Oscar nominees: Chariots of Fire, Rocky, the Deer Hunter, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Next, and some others. I had seen exactly one of the movies, Chariots of Fire. Everyone thought this was completely unacceptable. I was accused of Communism, un-Americanism, and being culturally deficient, a berating that took close to a quarter of an hour. I’ll accept guilt on one of those counts. So the lieutenant gives me the disk (forces it on me, really) and tells me that I have to watch the rest of the movies. I bargained my way out of having to give written reports. In an attempt to be more culturally proficient, I will blame my cultural deficiency on my parents, my economic circumstances growing up, and on being a white male. If I hadn’t forgotten the DVD down at the office I would get started on cultural proficiency training tonight.

Gone, But Not Forgotten

As the new academic year starts at USNA, I know that I am not completely forgotten. In addition to still being on the Math Department email distro list, Koichi, who last year was certified as the greatest teacher at USNA, has gotten most of my old students together and made a DVD for me. Thanks for brightening my day.

Jointness

Yesterday for dinner I ate in the DFAC which is slightly out of the ordinary, but football was on the TV so I decided against taking carry-out to my room. The best seat I could get was next to two Air Force majors. One of them noticed that my uniform said Navy so we started chatting. They were both impressed that the Navy would “let me out of my career field so early.” As they were both majors and thus concerned about how every job they get will affect their career, it is starting to make sense to me why they thought I must be special to get to work with the Army, and that I was luck to be out here so young.
In 1987, the Nichols-Goldwater Defense Act instituted a requirement for “joint experience” to advance beyond a certain level. This really does make sense. You wouldn’t want the highest level decision makers in the Navy to understand only, for instance, the tactical employment of submarines. So the Department of Defense instituted two phases of Joint Military Professional Education (JPME I and II) that you should complete by the time you make O-5 and O-6, and as a requirement to make flag rank you have to serve in a joint billet. These billets have been traditionally difficult to get assigned to early in your career because more senior people need them to advance and when you’re a young submariner you should be learning the tactical employment of submarines instead of how to lead infantry. Billets that were designated as joint also tended to be broader in scope, not focused on the day to day employment of troops but on, for instance, the employment of large portions of the Army and how it fit together with the Navy in the grand scheme of making war. Again, this all fits with the idea that Nichols and Goldwater had in mind. As an example of a joint command, the Strategic Command in Omaha has about equal numbers of Air Force and Navy personnel since we both have strategic nuclear weapons. There are also some Army and Marines thrown in, I’m sure. The commander of StratCom used to switch between a Navy admiral and an Air Force general, but the last commander was actually a Marine. Going there was my second choice to teaching at USNA, but even if I had gone there I would not have gotten credit for serving my joint tour because I would have been in a job that was too narrow in scope to see how the Navy fit in with the big picture. There were only certain jobs that got the joint credit because they had a wide enough scope to see how the different services all contributed to the whole national strategic objective. It was a career hurdle that was a pain to get, but it really did make sense.
“So why can I so freely admit that something the military does make sense?” those who think I’m cynical may ask. Is it really me writing? I can say that the Goldwater-Nichols joint service requirement makes sense because they completely changed it this year. Like anything involving government that was not broken, after twenty years of good service we must find a way to break it. The old requirement for joint service did not “capture the broad experiences that many officers were having while conducting the global war on terror.” Something that sounds that well thought out usually precedes a strike by what is known as the “good idea fairy.” The good idea fairy that human tendency which causes people to make changes to a system that is working fine based on no relevant experience. For some reason congress changed Goldwater-Nichols so that there is now a point system which weights your experience and gives a certain credit to different experiences. The result is that I am getting joint credit right now. Let me say that again for all of you more senior officers who struggled to get the right billet: I am getting joint credit. Furthermore, since my joint credit is in a warzone, I get three points a month whereas an O-4 in a previously joint billet would get only one point a month. This is supposedly good for my career, but it is utterly ridiculous.
Here is my “joint experience”: I have been rented out by the Navy to the Army to fill a job that involves turning wrenches and working on a box with three switches and a USB connection. My joint command is headed up by a bunch of guys who are not from a variety of services to reflect the true joint nature of our armed forces, but are all Army. I just happen to be a Navy guy who is stuck with the Army. What am I learning about the Army that will give me a broader understanding of how the services work together to accomplish the National Command Authority’s goals? The first thing I have learned is that the Army generals who invited me out here think that their people are so untrainable that they cannot learn to operate a box with three switches and a USB connection free of Navy supervision. I have learned that the Army thinks the Navy doesn’t contribute to national security because our deployments are not 15 months. I have learned that they whine like two year olds about 15 month deployments. I have learned that most members of the Army are completely entertained by the Navy rank of Seaman and can find hours of amusement making jokes about sailors of that rank. And what has the Army learned about the Navy? I don’t know for sure, but I would guess nothing since by their own generals’ admissions they are untrainable.
That may be a little harsh. I’m sure they’ve learned to resent the Navy, too. Afterall, we only deploy for six months to hop from liberty port to liberty port. They would probably also say something about the Navy not having a PT uniform. The whole point of this is that this is not at all professionally enhancing and it is a travesty that I get joint credit for it.

Bound to Happen

Explosions! Fire! Destruction! Living in a war zone, it is just a matter of time, and two days ago was my time. Yes, my building was “got.”
We had a voltage spike from 220 to over 400 volts on the generator that supplies my barracks. It wreaked havoc on our building. One of the switchboards started smoking. The air conditioner was down for at least five hours. Many people lost everything. Well, they lost their DVD players, TV’s, personal refrigerators, and some even lost their alarm clocks. I got off easy – only lost a power supply to my computer which I replaced for $35 – but that is only because I don’t have a TV or refrigerator. The internet, which I got rid of, was down for a day which almost gave me the feeling that I would suspect an investment broker would get when he sells a stock right before it crashes.
We’re recovering. The AC is back, and people are managing without big screen TV’s. Just goes to show that no matter how much steak and lobster you have, war is hell.

Someone Knows This Is A Big Week

I’m writing this on 11 August which is my anniversary. I just got off the phone with my lovely bride of six years. The irony that it her anniversary is on the same day as mine confirms that we are MFEO as they say in the shows. Here’s another bit of irony. Even though today is Saturday we had chapel tonight as tomorrow is yet another memorial service. (Audible sigh. Those really get old quickly.) So tonight we had church, and as I said, today is our anniversary. Irony of ironies, the text comes from 1 Corinthians 13 – the love chapter. And if that is not enough, as an illustration of the “when I was a child, I used to think as a child…” part of the passage, the chaplain describes how at a first birthday party it is cute when the kid dumps her face in the cake, but you would think something is wrong if a twelve year old did the same thing. So the love chapter on my anniversary, and the illustration of a first birthday on the week of Sarah’s first birthday. What are the odds of those two things being on a church service held on Saturday which also happens to be my anniversary? Spooky.

One Bright Spot

If the World War II raw recruit was a hayseed (I remember my grandpa telling stories about drill instructors calling cadence with “Straw foot, hay foot” instead of left/right because many farm boys didn’t know the difference between left and right), then the raw recruit of this war is a punk. No example necessary. But they are fun. About a week after I get here, I was shaving in the bathroom and this pimply face kid notices my navy shirt and starts talking to me. He must have really needed to hear his voice, because he tells me all about how he grew up in Asia, had spent time in the Philippine militia, and how he didn’t really agree with having to call officers sir. He was a likeable enough guy, but he was really a self-centered punk. He told me how he was not really meshing with his unit, but how that didn’t really matter because he was just in the Army to pad his resume so he could get a job with the “contractors.” I assume he meant CIA or some soldier of fortune organization that he had seen on TV. He was a real character, but I can only say that because he was someone else’s problem child. If I had been his platoon sergeant, I would have popped him in the jaw.
I saw the same kid again in the bathroom yesterday. He remembered me because he said, “You’re an officer, right?” (Obviously he was still not big on the sir thing, but there are really more interesting things to be concerned about in my mind, too. Not having to care about those types of things is one advantage of being with a service whose professional future you really don’t give two hoots about.) I had no rank on as I was about to take a shower. I said, “And you’re the guy who used to be in the Philippine militia.” He said, “Last time we talked, I was really having some problems in my company, but I’m not any more.” He went on to tell me how his company was doing (they have taken no KIA’s, and he is rightfully proud of that since they are in a particularly bad neighborhood.), how he was reenlisting to get orders to Korea, and quite a bit more especially considering that I really just wanted to take a shower. The change in his attitude, no more chip-on-the-shoulder all-about-me tone, was really refreshing.
There is no doubt that this war is messing up a lot of people physically and mentally. It is not easy going from a garrison environment on the FOB to a war zone outside the wire once a day, and there are some really bitter, disillusioned folk in this area. But this war is also shaping a generation of punks into a higher quality of punk than they would have been otherwise with a little bit more of an appreciation for what they have and for the other people around them.

Tut, Tut! Looks Like Rain

Not really, but there were some clouds in the sky today in the middle of the day. It was not cloudy in the “portends of precipitation*” type way. They were more of a “there is hope that somewhere in the atmosphere there is moisture” type of cumulus-nimbus types of clouds. I’m not the most observant, but I don’t think there are many clouds during the day. It has been a balmy 109F which is a welcome break. I no longer feel like all of my flesh is burning off as soon as I step outside which is another much appreciated change.

*I do not know if portends should be followed by “of” or not. Brandon? Tim? Dad?

First Step to Recovery

Hi. My name is Matt and I have a problem - I live in Iraq.

How many more steps until I get to go home?

Life in the 90’s

Back when I was a kid, in my junior high and high school days, we didn’t have the internet. I mean, we weren’t totally primitive because if you wanted to check your bank account balance you could go to the ATM so human interaction was avoidable, but you couldn’t just go to your banks website and know your account balance in 30 seconds. I’m not quite sure how we did research papers, but I know that I never had a teacher warn me not to use Wikipedia as a resource. There were inconveniences of course, but the pace of life was slower and people tended to know each other personally, by voice over the phone for instance, instead of by email or IM.
Iraq is many years behind the times, but I don’t live in Iraq. I live on Rustamiyah, a semi-American outpost that seems to be a cross between living in my childhood Tulsa and living on the moon, with mortars and rockets interspersed with putrid sewer air. I think that should paint a clear picture. One of the innocences I have recovered from my childhood by living here is a self-imposed semi lack of internet. I thought I would go nuts, but it has been about ten days and I’m doing just fine. If you are reading this, you should deduce that I do have some internet access, but it is not the on-demand, high speed, click-on-an-icon-and-be-there internet that Americans have come to take for granted in the years since my youth. I have found that I don’t have to check the Corner on National Review or refresh Drudge every fifteen minutes. In fact, I never had to. I just thought I did because those are the most interesting things on an information super-highway that is really not that interesting.
After slowly devolving from high speed internet in America back to a state of dial-up and then eventually to no internet (on my personal computer at least), I have discovered what the ancients of my parent’s generation once knew: the internet is not life. It is not even a good substitute. Sure, it is boring having to live in reality out here, but if I had, say, a family around I think that having no internet would bring some benefits. Don’t get me wrong. I know that the clock will not turn back, and I wouldn’t really want it to. Al Gore’s net is here to stay. But checking your email only once a day is scandalously liberating.

Medical Records and 2007

I sometimes compare 2007 to a traumatic amputation. I mean no disrespect to those who have actually lost a limb because my loss is slight in comparison, but in 2006 I was the equivalent of driving along minding my own business. I took 2007 for granted – next year had always been there and I had always thought it would. Then December 7 came along and a whole year of my life was gone. How did that happen? A puff and a cloud and it’s gone. I could draw the metaphor out talking about phantom pains and 12 steps of coping or however many steps it takes.
I think I’ve found a metaphor that is better though, and even though I sometimes doubt it I know it is true. There were quite a few things the Navy gave me to do in preparation for renting me out to the Army (no, not that metaphor) many of which included medical exams (no metaphor there either). So I checked out my medical record and went and got shots and filled forms out, etc. On January 1 the family drove down to Norfolk for check-in. I had all of my paperwork in my backpack, and when I showed up the next day to get all of the same shots again and fill out all of the same forms a second time my medical record was gone. Not just gone. It was G-O-N-E. That’s not something you want to lose because it is important to you the person, not just you the sailor. I searched everywhere and even called up and asked Koichi to check out my office. I had Tim search my house. I called the Medical Clinic in Annapolis to see if it was there. It was gone. All I could figure was that it had fallen out of my backpack when I stopped for gas. To this day I do not know where it went. They made me a new one in Norfolk, but I have never really felt like it was mine.
Part of applying to medical school with the Navy is filing what is called a contingent resignation which is required because the Navy drops you in rank. Part of the contingent resignation is sending in some forms that are in your medical record, but not in your hastily assembled record made so that you can deploy on time. These forms are in your real medical record that you’ve had since July 1, 1997, when you were just a little plebe. They want to know about the real medical you, not some fake medical you that was contrived in Norfolk a couple of months ago. When I checked with the Rusty medical staff, they said I would have to find a way to get to the Green Zone to go to the big hospital so that I could get all of the tests done so I could get the right forms filled out – this is not an easy prospect. Besides, I don’t like the idea of riding around Baghdad, and who wants to get blown up after successfully passing a physical? Not this guy, for sure.
I called Hawaii, where these forms had originally been filled out, and they said they had them electronically. The corpsman was actually very willing and helpful when I called him on Saturday (he was on duty), but alas he has not come through. This was starting to be stressful since Navy Bureaucracy has set a deadline on when my contingency resignation must be filed, and Navy Bureaucracy makes no exceptions, even for people that Navy has lent to the Army. Bureaucracy yields to no man when it has the tonnage to run him under, which Navy Bureaucracy has tonnage to spare. On a lark I decided to call the clinic in Annapolis to see if they could help, and the guy there tells me they have my medical record. I still tilt my head and blink when I think about it. The corpsman who I talked to had a mastery of phone skills that complemented the poor phone connection so I did not get the story of why my medical record was where it belonged. (In his defense he was new, and like most corpsman probably wouldn’t have thought it was odd for a medical record to be stored in the medical records vault, so I didn’t pursue the question.) He was very helpful and emailed me all of the forms I needed.
I have never been one to comment on the silver lining when there is a dark cloud to mention, and 2007 has had plenty of dark cloud. Tonight will be the exception that proves the rule, a turn of phrase which I find vacuous and am ashamed to have written. I’m convinced that somehow my medical record is a better picture of 2007 than getting a limb blown off, although I can’t explain how. Maybe how will never be known, but who is certain. When you have a miracle like a lost medical record showing up exactly when you need the forms that you can’t get any other way, then only a fool could doubt that a whole year could be lost forever.

A Weather Watcher’s Note

Those of you who have stood under a low flying helicopter will agree that helicopters accentuate the day’s weather and add several miles an hour to the local breeze. If it is cold and rainy outside, underneath a helicopter there will be driving rain and an unpleasant wind chill factor (conjecture as I have not personally experience the concept of cold in Iraq). If it is hot and dry, low flying helicopters will make it hot, dry, and dusty. This “helicopter effect” is magnified by multiple helicopters flying in formation.
Helicopter pilots, being pilots and having a high probability of being cocky, probably believe that a) they create the weather system in a global sense (“Hey, it’s windy wherever I go, ergo it is windy everywhere, ergo I create the weather…”), and b) think that they command the world to move up or down, backwards or forward, and side to side, by their sheer coolness and knowledge of the mystical powers of their control stick. I will allow them to keep the second misconception as there are several pilots I care about, and I would hate to be the one that crashed their conception of physics. But not the first. The weather effects are local. LOCAL!
They would never use a word as geeky as ergo in normal speech, either.

Advice to Graffiti-ists

Bathroom stall graffiti, or “Latrine Art” as they would call in on National Public Radio, has varying character in different military locations. At Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, the public stalls were alive (oh, yuck) with debate on the differing strengths of Native Hawaiians and Howlies, with neither making a strong showing. The transient latrines in Kuwait made a clear distinction between arriving soldiers (“3RD Infantry Division will kill’em all,” type sentiments), departing soldiers (“Thank goodness I’m going home” or “Write your senator to stop the war,” were two main themes. The second often spawned lively debate in the thinking room.) and Marines (not quoted due to the family friendly nature of this blog, but always pro-USMC.) Port-a-johns usually just have “Shout-outs” from different area codes marked with a city name (“760! O-town, baby!”) or some tasteless art made iteratively less tasteful. I believe the lack of air conditioning stifles whatever intelligence desire there may have been to debate. Except on the subject of religion: many a port-a-johns on the other side of the FOB has the message of an ardent evangelist whose preaching has merit but whose presentation style is not mine personally; his calls to repentance are denounced vigorously by non-believers even in the heat and stink of the port-a-john. In latrines frequented by the infantry, public service warnings are issued to all who may sit and read to avoid whoever the perceived least manly member of the unit may be.
Whatever your graffiti style may be in your home latrine – be it scholarly debate, denouncing a person or group based on perceived shortcomings, or a humorous Leno-like top ten list – you will not be as successful impressing your intended audience if you do not give adequate attention to spelling and grammar, being especially cautious of using words with homophones. When you say that another person “prolly” has done such or such an act, the focus will no longer be on the debauchery of the individual. Based on experience, it will turn to the intelligence of the author. When you misspell your request that people of another race stop causing whatever problem for which they are responsible, you will “prolly” be denounced as an ignorant member of a different race or socio-economic class. The convert rate tends to be lower when the syntax of the promise of divine protection in war is incorrect.
Take care! It is the little details your readership will notice. You may have the best case against the war in the world, but write “affect” when you meant “effect” and “prolly” no one will ever write their senator.

Happy Hawaiian Memories

Since I no longer have internet in my room, one of the more important uses for my computer is playing music. I don’t require much variety in my life, so I have about ten CD’s copied to my hard drive, and I only listen to two of them regularly. My favorite by far is Ko-Aloha by Daniel Ho. Not only is Hawaiian music easy on the ears, this was Kate’s, and by extension my, most listened to CD in Hawaii. Some nights I am once again sitting on the couch with Kate and little Sabrina is playing on the floor in our first house there. It is a unique memory that I treasure because in retrospect having only one small child is peaceful in a way our house will never be again, and because that house was so distinctly Hawaiian.

Based on the number of layers of paint on the walls, I would guess that it was built shortly after WWII when Americans would be satisfied with single wall construction and louvered windows in place of air conditioners. There was tile on the floor and the cabinets were old, but it meant that you were in Hawaii. It meant you were at home. About six months before we left the island they tore it down to build new housing which was indistinguishable from mainland housing. Sad. Those nights at home between duty days and underways will probably always be one of my happiest memories.

I do have to be careful listening to Daniel Ho, though, because another distinctly Hawaiian memory that he brings back is walking up to SubBase on Pearl Harbor. I hope they never tear those buildings down because they also capture Hawaii. The main building has a huge native Hawaiian tree that I’m sure Rhonda could name in front of it, and is where Husband Kimmel had his office in December 1941. The whole of SubBase is almost frozen in time. If I had to guess which year I would say 1964. Submarines had their heyday during WWII and the Cold War when they had a more appreciated mission – an imperative if that is the right word. The buildings just make you feel like you are still a part of those eras with their oldness, and even when the submarine brass is around those buildings, they seem to forget their mania with passing the next inspection and finding ways to be more by the book than the next guy. It is hard to be a Nuke – a word with a meaning that any submariner knows and any Submariner disdains - when you are on SubBase because it is the hallowed domain of warfighting Submariners. As I said, gotta be careful with Daniel Ho because, unfortunately, submarines are filled with Nukes and not the Submariners of old and nostalgia makes for Department Heads.

But I can love our old house without need for care.

Oh Holey Underwear

Note the “E” in Holey.

I really love the laundry guys here. They are mostly cheerful even though they have a hot, fly-infested office. Most of them are from Macedonia and one is from Palau, I think. One reason they are cheerful is that for them, being here having a good job is a real blessing they do not have at home. Like all of the KBR employees, they are under appreciated.

One note, not even a complaint, is that I think they use old food processors as washing machines. While my utilities are holding up pretty well, my t-shirts and socks look like they’ve been laundered in a warzone. One other note: they probably don’t use Tide because they don’t get whites white. One soldier commented that Crayola was going to come out with a color called “KBR Gray” because laundry comes back a tan-gray color that isn’t even in the box of 96 crayons. I blame the Iraqi water. That’s probably what eats holes in my unmentionables, too.

Under the “Oddly Enough” heading you can file this tidbit: the PX here does not sell men’s underwear. They do sell some frilly women’s stuff which makes me wonder, but no men’s underwear. The reason for this (for lack of men’s, not presence of women’s frillies which I won’t comment on) is that the Army has a uniform replacement program. Every month they pass around a list of uniform parts and you can order up to $50 dollars worth. Underwear is on the list, but that has not helped my situation. When I first got here, the list came around and I signed up for some stuff, and they didn’t turn the list in. The next month, the Battalion cancelled the uniform replacement order because they decided to save everyone’s money and give every soldier four new sets of uniforms with the replacement money before the soldiers went home. This decision was made before the Battalion got extended, so there were only two months left and underwear and t-shirs were not a concern. Then they got extended and restarted the replacement program and passed the order list around… while I was on leave.

Honestly, I don’t need anything new, but being able to order stuff and get a package delivered with all sorts of unnecessary stuff is a bit like Christmas. You can order the cool sweat wicking t-shirts that melt in bomb blasts, extra infra-red American flags or cold weather stuff to help you get through the Baghdad summer. I’ve been promised to be allowed to participate this month, but I’ll believe that checks in the mail when the postman delivers. I just hope they don’t give me four more pairs of Army uniforms when I leave.

Welcome Home

By now one of our companies that left Rusty three days ago should be home or at least close. E 1/125 is an infantry company that was attached to our MP Battalion because there are only so many MP’s in the world. They are Michigan National Guard, so even though they should be flying out of Kuwait any moment, they still have about a week of demobilization left before they get home back to their normal jobs and lives. Even if they are not quite home, every one of them is (wild guess alert) happy to be back in the states even if they are not looking forward to the family and job messes that I know some of them have. I overheard one of them say he would rather stay in Iraq than go back home, but no matter how tough your home situation is it is better to have family difficulties in the US than Iraq.

Four of their soldiers went home early. One was killed in September and three were killed two days before Christmas last year. It was a rough tour for them, but they did well. They had a bunch of quality guys, especially their comms sergeant SSG Bansimer and their intel liaison SPC Palmateer, who I’m going to miss.

Well done, guys. You did Michigan proud.

On The Way Home

Today is the day that my Battalion would have been on the plane going home had it not been for the extension of all Army deployments from twelve to fifteen months. One sergeant looked at his watch and said, “Well, we’d probably just be taking off right now.” Even if they are going to get about two years at home (My unit will. Others are just scheduled for one.) it is a real punch in the gut to have 90 days tacked on in the middle. Both of our active duty companies that were extended (National Guard and Reservists didn’t get the extra 90 days) lost a soldier during that that extension time. As if it would not be hard enough without thinking they by all rights should have been home.

There is no other hand to losing a soldier, but on the other hand of the extension I am now in my eighth month of extension beyond the limit when I “by all rights” should have been home. It still irks me when soldiers get snarky about how easy the Navy has it with our eleven month tours. The nerve. We are out here running their equipment. They can’t run their own gear by themselves and then they have the cheek to say that those who are running it for them are getting a good deal. Everyone loves to point out how much worse their lot in life is than the guy next to them – I don’t begrudge them that. But I’ve really about had it with that particular line of self-pity. When this war is over, the Army will go back to deploying once every blue moon, and the Navy will continue to deploy on a routine basis at pretty close to the same rate the Army is now. You can bet your last dollar that we will never go crying to the Army asking them to stand our watch.

Although every time sailors have to hang around soldiers it is also safe to guess that we will whine to them about how hard our life is having to deploy all the time. They won’t want to hear it from us either. Even though then it will be legitimate.

Tan Lines

Barefoot is not the order of the day on Rusty. Even though the weather is decidedly summerish, the Army insists on wearing trousers, long sleeves and boots. The more I wear this, the worse I feel for thinking the British Navy’s topical whites (the same thing as our summer whites with shorts) looked silly. Anyone who says that white leather dress shoes with knee high socks and shorts is anything less than stylish has never worn ACU(WABUS)s (Army Combat Uniform (Worn Also By Unlucky Sailors)) in August in Baghdad. I’m taking my summer whites in for tailoring when I get back, against American regulations or not.

Back to my point. The only time I wear shorts outside is walking to and from the gym and to and from the shower. The only time I wear my foot-massaging Addidas shower shoes is walking to and from the shower. Today I noticed that I have tan lines on my feet. I always thought Kate was a little neurotic about sunscreen (I can say that in this forum since it is a matter we have agreed to separate opinions), but now I’m rethinking. I’m still not convinced that sunscreen is needed for playing in the backyard for fifteen minutes, but sunscreen may have some merit in the desert. I still won’t put it on just to go to the shower, but I will reserve judgment and withhold derision from those who do.

Not The Biggest Threat In This Neighborhood

Today as I was walking out of the hospital, I paused to put on my boonie hat and safety glasses. This there is a soldier sitting in the waiting area looking nervous. He asks how I’m doing. I reply fine and ask how he’s doing. It soon became obvious that he was not concerned about my welfare, but instead need someone to listen. He told me that he was not doing well and was in fact very nervous about getting his anthrax vaccine. Based on the looks of his uniform, he had been in the dust for more than one day and by his unit patch on his sleeve I knew he had been in country for a while. What could make a soldier in Baghdad nervous? Of course the answer is getting vaccinated. It was not fear of needles that our brave young soldier confided. To me, an officer he had never seen before, he proclaimed that he would refuse orders to get vaccinated if the vaccine would threaten his fertility. He was the last of his line, he told me in the fifteen seconds we talked, and he didn’t want his family name to be extinguished. What was this family name that he felt a moral burden to carry on you ask? Why, Jones, of course.

A new technological era

Sorry I didn’t post last night or the night before. There is a reason that goes beyond the laziness that is inherent to hot weather. Drum roll: today I entered a new era of Rustamiyah internet technology. I have finally decided that the price the contractor charges for the service you get is not quite a good bargain, so I gave up the in room internet. Since the original intent was to be able to do webcam with my girls, there is really no loss, but it after going a day without my own net to surf I am amazed at how many hours can just disappear when one link leads to the next. Now I get to use the one unclassified office computer and take turns, which might be slower than the Rusty service I did have. Sorry in advance if I’m slow(er) answering emails. We’ll see how long I can go without going nuts and signing up again. August might end up being a long month.

Thank goodness for air conditioning

That is a complete days thought by itself, but as it might leave you with an incomplete picture of my day I will go further. Today was quite a bit dustier than usual, but most of it was high in the air. I didn't get any of that nasty grit in your eye or grit in your mouth stuff except when I had to replace a cable underneath a truck, a completely weather unrelated event. The main effect it had was canceling some of the voluntary air missions. Makes since to me that when you can't see as well you won't take a risk flying the brass out to FOB Holeinthewall to see (or be seen by) their troops. Viva la dust!

The other missions that fall in that voluntary category is taking people in to the main airport to go home. One of our contractors down at the shop was supposed to go home today, and he wasn't pleased that his flight was canceled. Another one of the EWO's was supposed to go on R&R, and let me tell you, I have never heard a more spirited defense of Naval aviators compared to Army pilots by a non-pilot in my life. This EWO went on a tirade (to the rest of the Navy EWO's of course) about how the Navy would fly in this weather even if they had zero visability and gale force winds with the carrier pitch thirty degree even if the wings had fallen off their planes, etc. etc. He was so vocal about the superior qualities of Navy air that there was a moment he almost sounded like a pilot himself.

So after a couple of hours the dust goes away and the brass starts flying again. And people get to go home again. And you start wondering what day of the week it is until you go get dinner. And that is another day in the books at Rusty.

Not a bad day...

...considering the company and the location. I must be getting back in the routine because I'm starting to notice the days by the meetings and meals. Today is surf-n-turf and BUB meeting day. I'm really impressed how KBR keeps trying. Today, in addition to a steak that looks like it came from a cow, there were crab legs, crab balls, lobster tails, and fried scallops. None live up to civilian expectations, but all of us out here really do owe a thanks to a country who tries to do right by us. Next time you see the cost of the war, remember that it could be cheaper, but the guys who have the bad jobs deserve the good meals.

The best part of the BUB was not that it was under two hours. The best part was that I got out with no additional tasking. I'm learning better and better that giving additional information, even if it pertains to my portion of the war, really doesn't add anything. All it does is generate random tasking, which is the worst kind since spur of the moment questions often have impossibly difficult and meaninglessly unrewarding answers. I avoided that today, so life is good.

We also got water back in our bathroom, but the same day the water truck was repaired the hottentots hit the other bathroom with permanent pipes. What's with these people? What do they have against hygiene? For the love of Pete, let us shower!! And if you would quit messing up the rest of the country, everyone out there could shower, too. What a wonderful world it would be. I don't think their stated goal is "War on hygienic practices" because no one would be silly enough to make war on a method rather than the people who practice it. I think they make war on us because we bring hygiene to their country which threatens their way of life.

But come on, guys! Just behave and you won't have to stink. And neither will I.

Something special in the air...

Jim, nothing against you and your fellow American buddies (except no leg room and charging for meals), but yesterday it was not American Airlines that has something special in the air. As I walked out of the hospital, I heard a series of booms, about three in a row. From my personal vantage point on this war, there are several types of booms that are common. It is not uncommon to hear IED's exploding outside the FOB, artillery counter-fire although not as often as I would like, and all too often incoming mortars and rockets and the like. Some would say they each have their distinct sound signature, but I was not a sonarman so I can not tell for sure. To me, a boom is a boom and the biggest variance is in how loud the boom is.

These booms that I heard were a cross between machine guns and IED's, similar to a Mk-19 for the benefit of Tim and Koichi. They were also of the not so loud variety, which is my favorite type. As I was taking my first step to the nearest bunker, I noticed a bunch of people just standing around looking at the sky so naturally I did too. There I saw two of the cutest little helicopters just going around in circles, and every third or fourth pass they would unload with five or six rockets. As I watched, I was reminded of stories from WWI where soldiers would watch dog-fights from the trenches, only there was no enemy in the sky and Rusty is a far cry from the trenches. I would much rather everyone out here in Iraq just behave so that no more of these booms and this shooting would go on, but since that doesn't seem likely this week it is nice to know that our helicopters are shooting back.

One for the grandkids

I will now make a statement that even the most simple among my readers (a null statement made simply for rhetorical purposes as my readers are decidedly not simple) will agree without hesitation: when given the choice, it is always better to choose not to be shot than to be shot. If you disagree with this or even quibble, you are a loon. This obvious statement could be codified with the smart man's rule of warfare, were there such a code. I make this disclaimer lest any of you doubt that I, being a smart man who follows even hypothetical smart man's codes, DO NOT WANT TO BE SHOT. Not in Iraq, not ever, not anywhere. Disclaimers like this are inevitably followed with a something that makes you wonder if the disclaimer is just there to ward off critics, and this is no exception. At risk of being lumped with the loons, I proceed:

As I walked into the clinic tonight, the sea-foam green curtain was drawn around one of the trauma beds, a terrible thing to see as sea-foam green is well known in naval and literary circles to be a harbinger of pain and unhappiness. The positive sign was that the whole hospital was not in code blue status, but any sane person still hates to see sea-foam green. As the night progressed about thirty minutes, the doctor* who I would want to be operated on had I been shot (WHICH I DO NOT WANT TO BE) came out with what in years to come will be a momento this soldier will show his grandkids. He had been shot from behind and the bullet had gone through his left tricep and entered his chest... almost. The bullet had pierced that part of his under arm that connects to his pectoral, stayed completely outside the ribcage and had lodged itself in his Bible. You hear stories about people carrying their Bible in their pocket and it stopping the bullet from hitting them, and while the bullet still did hit him, the fact that it hit his Bible rather than changing course by two inches killing him should be enough to confirm in a lifelong way the belief that caused him to carry the Bible in the first place.

Now I will repeat this once more: I DO NOT WANT TO EVER BE SHOT. If one is to be shot though (WHICH I DO NOT WANT TO BE) that's about as neat a story as you can get, in an outpatient only down for a couple weeks, sort of way. Not nearly as neat as my hopeful war story when I get home: I WAS NEVER SHOT, but a (distant) second.

*This is the doctor who did the operating in the Washington Post story I linked the other day. Some say the story is embellished, and one doctor proudly claims that he was the main hurdle over come, but it is still a cool story.

Lieutenant "Trend Setter"

I was never known as the cool kid back in high school, and it was not until I joined the Navy that everyone started to dress like me. As a matter of fact, I would mark "fashion leadership and trend pioneering" as one of my least developed qualities. I don't remember that trait on the aptitude tests results, but I probably never scored high enough to register. Until I joined the Army. As far as I know, no member of my battalion missed service for appendicitis before I did. By the time I got back, two other people had been taken out with what will soon be called "the cool kids infection." Today I went in for work and the sergeant who works the night desk for the intelligence section said she was having generalized belly pain yesterday which localized to the right lower quadrant coupled with loss of appetite. What can I say? They aspire to be me. They flew her out for appendicitis this morning. I expect more will find the golden symptoms in the next few days.

In the nineties the saying was "I want to be like Mike." Here in Rusty at the moment it's "I want to be like Matt." Honestly, if I was in the Army I'd want to be like anyone in the Navy, too. Can't blame 'em.

The loss of a vital part of the team

I have found out why the showers were down last night, and why they continue to be down today.

My particular bathroom is not hooked into the city water, or wherever the underground pipes run. We are fed by an above ground tank which is a governmentally-wonderful idea in a desert. This causes the cold water to be indistinguishable from the hot water to the point that I still do not know which is the cold and which is the hot water tap in the shower. I probably knew at some point in April, but now there is no distinction and I keep telling myself alternatively that I remember the plumbing following the left-hot, right-cold convention and that I remember it being switched. Maybe they both feed from the same place. I don't know.

There is another design feature to my bathroom's plumbing being separate from the pipes underground: it is required to be filled daily by a truck. I suppose that the truck gets its water from a tap and I prefer not to contemplate the source farther than that. I don't know why they don't just run a pipe out, but KBR in all of their wisdom has decided that it is cheaper (or at least more lucrative) to hire someone to make the water run than to dig a ditch and put in a pipe.

Back to the lack of showers. There is a rumor going around that this water truck got blown up during one of the mortar attacks. The drive was not in it at the time, or I would be able to confirm this by reading the casualty report. So I have no way of knowing whether the truck was blown up or if it is just broken down. The bottom line is that it doesn't really matter since there is no water. Before you start feeling too bad for me, the next shower down still has water so I just have to walk a little farther. Ah, the trials of war!!

Late post

So as we received the all clear because the mortar had landed far away (aren't you glad your story for today didn't begin that way), I got a call on our "around the FOB" radio for Chief. Normally Chief would be carrying the radio, but since she is at the main base I had it. One of our units had a truck break down and they wanted to know if they could take the truck down to the contractor shop to swap the machine I run from the broken truck to the one that would take it's place in the morning. It was about 8:45 pm, and the contractors would be down for the day. Getting in touch with them would be a pain, and even though by the book all maintenance is supposed to be done at the shop it would be really easy to just go down and swap the thing out myself. So I told the guy that I'd be down at the motor pool in a minute. When I got down there, I saw the perks that Army life (or is it just enlisted life) has over officer life.

Americans go to war with their trucks tricked out. The box I install is just one of about 20 different things that are in every truck that goes out of the wire, in case you were wondering where your tax dollars go. There were probably twenty or thirty people down in the motor pool getting all this gear out of the broken truck and putting it in the spare truck. There was music going, and the guys who weren't moving gear were washing the windows on the truck. In general, the guys were just having a good time. Some guys were getting wrenches for the ones inside doing the installing. The more senior guys were showing the young guys how to install some of the gear. And even though it was well past bedtime in Baghdad, 2007, there was almost a block party attitude.

I got my piece of gear in, and they were about done with the rest of the truck as I was leaving. The down side of course is that walking within three feet of a Humvee in Baghdad automatically covers you in sweat. And for the first time since I've been here the showers are down. So much for my nice new sheets. So goes life.

PS These are the doctors at my hospital:
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/27/AR2007072700007.html

A bright, sunshiny day

Today was a not so bad day, even a nice day when normalized for location and temperature. I'm not just saying that because I had lobster and shrimp for dinner. I did skip the steak because the last few times it has had an unsteak-like, almost mealy texture. I'm not saying it was a good day because our weekly three hour, Geneva-convention-banned-due-to-it's-torture-like-qualities Battalion Update Brief was canceled. No, today was a nice day because I woke up this morning with Christmas music running through my head. Must because the new set of sheets I got that are Christmas tree green. Or maybe not. Really have absolutely zero idea where it came from since this Rustamiyah is not normally considered festive or snowy. Nonetheless, it's hard to have a bad day when you have Joy to the World going through your head. Even in the middle of summer. Try to prove me wrong. It's just like the one Lay's potato chip challenge. Of course the hard part is thinking of Christmas music in 115F weather. I don't see it happening often, because if we had Christmas every day it wouldn't be special anymore, would it now? That's what my mom used to say anyway. But once a summer won't ruin it, I hope.

101st Post

I am tired so this will be shorter than it should be. It's still hot here. I got a haircut today. Still trying to get paperwork in for med school application.

There was another memorial tonight. It is the third I've been to even though there have been many on the FOB. Every soldier memorialized has had in common that they like vehicles, one trucks, one his Passat, and this soldier motorcycles. Internal combustion seems to be a big part of every soldier's life. In addition to planning on getting a Harley Davidson when he got home, this guy also like martial arts and was really excited about the next evolution of his tattoo, or so his friends said. I probably would have had nothing in common with him even though the standing room only in the chapel proves he was a good person. He also had five children, and this was the first memorial I went to that had pictures of family as well as soldier pictures. His youngest was a daughter, Hannah, who was going to turn seven this year, and wanted her dad to be home for her birthday. His oldest son liked art, and his dad had set up an apprenticeship with his tattoo artist. His unit was supposed to have gone home in June, but they got extended from 12 to 15 months. Even so, his wife gave a message to his company about how proud she was of them and how she really hoped her husband's memory would inspire them to keep doing what they are. In short, it sounded like she really supported what her husband was doing. I hope this all ends soon, but even more I hope it ends successfully.

He would have been 28 on August 3.

I just put new sheets on my bed and am going to try them out.

Slow going

Today's big event, not quite at the milestone level, was that I worked out for the first time since my operation. The operation really took any guilt out of being lazy while at home because I was, after all, convalescing. I paid the price for the convalescence today. I had tried to get back in the routine I had been in before on Monday, but half-way through my run (treadmill) we had incoming so I had to go to the bunker. (Which used to be a right turn out of the gym door but has been moved to the left side of the exit. No one told me.) Being mortared is another convenient excuse to put off working out, so I quit rather than go back in and finish. Blamed it on loss of momentum. Quitting is always easier when you use big words.

Today was the day I would not take the convenient excuse, unless the bad guys offered it. I drank a bottle of water before I left, and after walking the eighth of a mile to the gym almost felt dehydrated again. Luckily the gym has a refrigerator with plenty of water in it. Unfortunately, the refrigerator is set at about 70F which is a good setting for an air conditioner, but by my western standards is a bit high for a fridge. I made it through my three miles, a distance I have chosen because any longer on a treadmill gets boring, about three and a half minutes slower than where I had been. Granted, I wasn't pushing myself too hard, but adding over a minute a mile is pretty pathetic.

It should be easy to drop time now that I have started so poorly. Am I a silver lining guy or what?