Looking back

As my time in Iraq is quickly approaching the end I have found myself looking back over the past 9 months. From the training in Williamsburg, VA to the crazy trip up to Iraq to the hotter than hell months spent in Iraq it has been a wild ride but a worthwhile one. I signed up for this deployment not sure what to expect and I'm leaving as an Iraq veteran. I'm one of "those" people now. Granted, I'm not an M-4 wielding, ACU wearing soldier, but I did experience some aspects of war. I may have spent most of my time making sure nothing infiltrates American soil, but that doesn't mean that my job wasn't any less important. I have come to realize that now. It has been an honor and a privilege to send these guys and gals home to their families while the rest of us stay behind and carry the torch for them just a little bit longer. Well, it's now my time to pass on the torch. I am both excited and saddened. We may all have not gotten along for the past 8 months and have had our fair share of headaches, but in the end it's all been worth it. This has truly been one of the best experience of my life so far. I have a lot of great things awaiting me in the States and I can't wait to see what the future will bring. There is a person that will be waiting to join me on the journey and with that I am even more excited to see what the future holds for us. Had I not come on this journey and decided to basically put my life on hold, I would have never had the opportunities I have had. I have seen and done things that most people only read about, but now I can actually say that I have been there done that. No one can ever take this adventure away from me and it has definitely made me a better person.
The next couple of weeks are going to be busy and nerve-wracking, but at the end of the day I know that it just brings me one step closer to going home.

It's MY blog, right??

I received a comment on my post "Soap Box" that I would like to address. Here is the comment that I received;

"Now I totally understand that your fighting for freedom or rights to vote or whatever reason you thinking you're there. I have nothing but respect for military personnel. I did my time, in fact, my girlfriend is still in the Marine Corps on IRR. Now that being said you're wrong on this. Why should you encourage somebody to vote just to vote if they don't like the choices? Would you expect somebody to choose "would you like hit in the face with a baseball bat, or hit in the face with a brick?" No, you wouldn't. There are many reasons for people not to vote and not all of them are invalid. If people just go on voting because they can it's just a flip of the coin which idiot gets in based on little or no useful qualities. Many people who do vote just because they can haven't the slightest idea of the overall picture. Voting for a President based on knowledge of one issue is wrong too. They should be informed but if they aren't that's where the wrong lies. Voting shouldn't be a right it should be something each individual must earn. An IQ test should first have to yield reasonable results, then an issues awareness test must also score oh say 80%. Based on your conversation with this guy maybe his reasons for not voting weren't good but you cannot say that this is absolutely never excusable."

Now, with that being said, I welcome ALL comments on my blog, however, who are YOU to tell me that my opinion is wrong? What makes your opinion more right than my own considering this is just a forum I use to vent some hostility every once in a while?

On the edge

I'm on the edge of losing my mind. I can't stand this deployment anymore and I totally can't stand the people that I'm deployed with anymore. Well, I really couldn't stand them from the beginning, but now they are completely intolerable. I'm tired of looking at them and hearing their voices. Get me the fuck outta Balad!! I'm going nuts up here. I'm in prison and I don't even get a Get Out of Jail Free card. WTF!! 8 months is way to long to have to check people's dirty underwear. I know, I know what am I complaining about, right? Hell the Army (and I totally have the utmost respect for) have to do 12-15 months in this shit-hole and I'm bitching about my 8 months. Oh, then we have the Air Force (or chair farce HA!) that only do oooohhh 2-4 months over here and bring every damn piece of uniform issue they can cram into their 15 bags. Please! I really don't care if I'm pissing off any AF people that are reading this blog, you don't like it then go read your weapons manual cause Lord knows you all don't even know how to CLEAR one! HA! It scares me to see them even walk around base with a weapon! Oh, here's a good one for you. I was in the DFAC the other morning and some TSGT comes walking in with his M16 shoulder slung.....WITH THE MUZZLE POINTING UP.....HELLO!! Look around you dude, see anything that doesn't look right considering you are the ONLY jackass carrying your rifle that way?? DUH!! I don't even carry my pistol anymore. There's a good chance I may just use it one of these days. HA! Just kidding!! Can you tell I'm a little stressed out?? I even had to go see the Combat Stress dude and I've never seen a minute of combat yet. Well, except for the occasional mortar round that likes to make it inside the wire. I guess that's kinda combat, right? Anyway, I had to tell the docs that my chain of command has created an environment ripe with stress and our job is not rocket science, but for some odd reason everything has to be made harder than it really needs to be. They are wanting to keep us up here past Thanksgiving! Fuck that! Get me to Kuwait where I can get away from these pukes for just one sliver of a second and see some new faces for a change. Oh, you remember the fraternization that was going on??? Yep, busted! We had to submit sworn statements to what we saw with those two. They went to Mast and BUSTED!! One didn't even come back up here. Thank GOD! The tension up here is still so thick you can cut it with a knife though!! AND I have been told to watch my back when we get back to VA during out processing. Whatever! I have no problem calling shore patrol or the cops! Get me outta here!!!

It's coming.....

It's just around the corner, lurking, poking it's head out just to take a peek. It's glowing in the distance like a giant warm sun just waiting for me to round the corner and cast it's glow onto my face. It's coming. The end of this deployment is coming and I can finally taste it, feel it, sense it, smell it. It's coming........

Soap Box

Let me preface this post by saying that I'm taking a big risk by posting this and that ignorance knows no ethnicity, education level or background. With those things being said, let me just hop right up on my soap box and tell you all about a nice little conversation I had the other night with a civilian contractor who was waiting for a flight out of the country. I'm sure most of you know that the Democratic National Convention has been going on in Denver, CO the past two days and if you don't what rock are you living under?? Anyway, I'm sitting in the terminal on my laptop listening to the convention via the tv over my shoulder when the afore-mentioned contractor starts to ask me questions, random questions that I don't even remember now. He then lands on the topic of the convention on tv. He states that he didn't like either of the candidates and was not going to vote. I stared at him in disbelief at what I was hearing. Was this guy SERIOUSLY saying this to a service member in uniform serving her country in IRAQ??!!!! I asked this guy if he was serious and he said yes he was. I asked him why he wasn't going to vote and he again said that he didn't like either candidate so why bother? Why bother I asked him??!!! This is where things start to get ugly. I told him he should "bother" to vote because it's his duty and his right and I pointed to my uniform and I said "I wear this and sit where I am so that you CAN vote". This didn't seem to phase this man one bit. He then proceeded to tell me that since his candidate of choice did not make it he didn't see the point to vote now. I asked him if he voted in the primary to get his candidate a little closer and he said No. Even uglier now. I then told him that since he didn't find it necessary to even try to get his candidate in the race, then he really didn't have any room to complain about the two that were voted in. He then tried to tell me that he voted in the last election and it didn't go his way and he still hasn't seen any change so why bother again? Is this guy serious!!???? Unfortunately, there are wayyyyy too many people out there that think the way this obviously mis-informed person thinks. I told him I was done having that conversation and I was going to shut up before I got myself into trouble. I was appalled at his audacity to sit there and tell a uniformed service member there is no point in voting!!!! OMG!!! What the hell has this country come to?? Has the current administration poisoned the minds of Americans this badly that they feel there isn't anymore hope at all??????
On a side note, the frat issue was basically swept under the rug and the two in question were basically just given a slap on the wrist and told to knock it off. Nice huh??

WTF???

I've never been one to dime anyone out in my blog, but perhaps it's time I start. Nah, just kidding!!! There is some crazy crap going on at my work and people that I work with. We have this crazy thing called Fraternization (I'm sure you all remember my posts from my training days how this was DRILLED into our heads not to do it) and it's rearing it's ugly head up here in not a nice way. I really could care less who you are screwing on this deployment, but when it starts to involve the work place and preferential treatment of others, then I have an issue. That is exactly what is going on up here. NOT by me....I just had to throw that out there. And, me being the nice person I am, will not even go into anymore detail so as to not bring these people into the light anymore than they already are. They will show their asses soon enough. HA!!! Probably literally and figuratively.
Anyhow...the craziest thing happened on my way to work tonight. My roommate and I were walking and saw a huge flash over our shoulder and I shit you not we were ready to hit the deck thinking we were taking incoming (can anyone say PTSD when this is all over). We were freaking out and started to walk faster then we heard it....the THUNDER!! It was lightening and thunder! What the f&*k??? Next, the wind started to pick up and became a blinding dust storm with 40 mph winds! We couldn't see a thing and were getting pummeled with small rocks and lots of dust. It was in my mouth, my hair, my nose, my eyes! It was awful!! Then, I feel what I think is rain. Sure enough, it was sprinkling amidst the chaos. We finally make it to the PAX terminal and the entire lobby was full of dusty-smoke clouds. The dust bowl was so bad it was coming in the vents. As quickly as it all started, it was gone. Crazy damn Iraq weather. Why on earth would anyone want to live here on purpose????

Starting to See the Light

R&R is over and I'm back at the daily grind. I'm starting to be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel with this deployment. We had to fill out some information today for our redeployment which made all of us very happy. We don't care if you ask us to jump up and down and shit eggs we will do it if it means we are going home soon. Of course, we still have a little bit to go before we will really be short with this tour, but that time is quickly approaching.
I got stung by jellyfish on R&R and no, no one peed on me! HA!! It was sooo hot down in Qatar and the humidity was disgusting. I felt like I needed a shower right after I took one. Now I know what the dry heat is everyone talks about. I went on a couple of tours on R&R that were pretty fun and I definitely took advantage of my 3 drinks a night. However, the base was pretty much no different than up here and it was actually pretty good to get back. I hate living out of bags and schlepping my crap all over the place, especially when my flight gets bumped and no one bothers to manifest us on another flight and we have to arrange for transportation back the base we just left and start all over again the next day. I was never so happy to finally get on a plane even if it was a C-130!
We have free wireless internet for a trial period here in the PAX terminal and we are all sitting around with our laptops sucking it all up because it's not going to last much longer. Oh how the little things, well in this case big things, amuse us so much! It is so great to sit and play on my cute little laptop that I have missed so much. I will be getting my cell phone back in about 36 days and the guy that has been babysitting it is now demanding visitation rights and some sort of support after she is gone. HA! There will be lawyers involved with that because I won't give in to his demands.
The night before last a couple of us here at work were sitting out back listening to some Bob Marley and smoking the hookah pipe. The moon was full, the temperature was just right. I could have almost been back home. It was nice. Moments like that are few and far between, but great none the less.