Staying in Touch - 19 March 2009 - 2030

Our date to leave KAF keeps getting pushed farther out little by little. It was going to be Saturday, then I heard Sunday. Now it sounds more like Monday. I don’t think there is as much of a hurry to get us there as there was a week or so ago. It sounds like they got some support from some of the Marines who are there. I heard from Chief Bohaty today that SPC Harris, one of our mechanics who is in Bastian, fabricated some workout equipment from scrap around post. Sometime during the night last night someone stole some of the stuff he built. Needless to say, people aren’t very happy about that. I would think it would be hard to hide something like that though so if they sent out a search party I’m sure they would show up. It’s just a shame that you can’t trust your fellow brothers in arms enough to not have to keep things bolted to the ground. Today was fairly productive for me. Got up early and walked my laundry down to the laundry trailers. I then walked to the computer lab to send my wife an email and check some other things. I then walked to the Boardwalk to drop off my hat to get my rank sewn on it. While I waited I went and had some coffee and donuts from Timmy’s. I went and change my laundry over to the dryer and went and picked my hat back up. I then walked down to the barber and got a haircut. After that I check my laundry, added more time and went back to the computer lab. This time I caught my wife online on Skype. I talked to her for about a half hour, got my laundry and headed back to the tent. Not a bad little morning. Tonight I went back to the computer lab to email my wife, ate some dinner, got another Timmy’s coffee and watched some hockey. I really regret the fact that I won’t be able to stay here for the fact that I would love to get on a hockey team. Oh well. The guys who are at Bastian would have a hard time recognizing Southpark now. They put in those trailers, put up concrete barricade rows in between every other tent and put up a bunch of new bomb shelters. This morning when I got back I found that they had stacked wall lockers in front of all the tents. It’s obvious by the amount of work that is being done out here that Southpark has high visibility by the base command. Tomorrow I need to go back down and drop off my other hat to get rank sewn on. I would have taken it in today but it was filthy and I had it in the wash. I also need to make a run to the PX, hopefully with the Gator that SFC Wolf has acquired, to pick up some things like a cell phone for me and a TV and PS2 for SSG Moorhead who is already in Bastian. It seems like the hobby that has started chewing up most of my time now is writing. It seems like I spend the majority of my days now either writing blogs or writing to my wife. In my last post I mentioned that I wrote my wife a huge blog-like email, well she wrote one back. We have collectively decided now that rather than waste this whole first year of our marriage we are going to write each other and just write and write and write. Each of our emails so far are around 4 pages long (3000ish words). I’ve sent 4 and receive 2 so far. We both agreed that it’s a great idea and we are actually learning quite a bit about each other. I do those just like my blogs; I write them here in bed and paste them in an email when I get to the internet. Saves a lot of time at the computer lab especially since there is a 30min time limit there and I would feel rushed to try and write something and inevitably leave something out. Wives out there reading this, and I know there are many of you, I really suggest it, but don’t tell your guys I told you that. I’d probably get beaten down. I have heard little rumors that a few guys have actually decided to start writing a journal after reading my blogs. I don’t think, however, that they will be posting them online. It’s getting warmer and warmer over here. It rained the other night for only the second time since I have been here, and it wasn’t anything substantial. They have more dust storms here than rain storms; it is a desert after all. Please, if you’re curious about something that I don’t cover about being over here, or if I skim over something, taking for granted that civilians may not fully understand some jargon, please let me know and I’ll address them. For instance, am I tired of seeing Chief Bohaty’s bare ass yet? Yes, yes I am. And that’s just one example!