Flyin' High

Okay, so I wasn't really high, but Dramamine and Nyquil are as close as I can legally come. (Kidding, of course) This is the only pic from my little vacation (see Notes for my fans) that wasn't confiscated. Kidding, of course, but I don't want to push my luck with this whole picture thing just yet. If it works more than twice, I'll put up some more pics of my co-workers. I'm a little leery though cuz that was my intention weeks ago and I only got half of them up before it all came crashing down around me, so again, no promises. Good to see me again, eh?

Bloom

I made Chaplain Owens and our beloved Laurie pose for this a while ago with the intent of putting it up with that post so you'll have to refer back to the Bloomin post in the archives to see what this is all about. I won't make any promises about posting any new pics though, that would be way premature at this point!

Notes for my fans

Hey guys and gals!

I've heard a few complaints that I'm just not keeping up with this thing like I should. That's a good sign. It means someone's actually looking at it. That's why writers write. Well, technically that's only one small part of it. Some writers write for money, some because they have something to say (that's clearly not the case here!) and others for all kinds of reasons. For me, it's related to the the idea of having something to say but it's not nearly that uplifting or valuable. It's more of a neurosis. It's a compulsion to download before something really messy happens. My friends and co-workers can only take so much of it verbally so I write instead.

On increasingly rare occasions, I am able to channel this neurosis into creative works that sometimes, again increasingly rarely, are actually entertaining to some readers. But lately there just hasn't been much to say. I'm back to the old, "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all" thing. And there's no way in hell I could say anything nice about what I'm doing here. I quit keeping a journal 'cuz I can't even bear to rehash the day's events for posterity. I really don't ever want to relive these days. I just need to be done with this shit.

I thought I could get by, placate my fans, with posting an occasional picture and making inane comments about it, but that too has gone the way of just about everything else I try here - it doesn't work anymore and I can't seem to fix it no matter how much effort I throw into it. I'll continue to look into ways of remedying that, just as I'll continue to do what it is I do here. It's just that now, I don't suffer under any false ideas that it will help or amount to anything. I'm cool with that.

Now, before any of you read a cry for help into this post, or at least a sobbing for pity or attention, don't. I don't need pity or cheering up or anything like that. I'm perfectly fine with my current state of affairs. In fact, on a personal level, I'm as clear as I've been in a long time. There's no hidden message here. As I said, I'm cool with it. So fear not, legions of fans, I shall survive, perhaps even overcome. It's just that my definition of surviving is different than it was when I got here and thought I'd find gainful employment. My perspective on "overcoming" has been slightly adjusted.

Having said that, today is a good day. I just got back from a little working vacation where one objective was clearly met: I actually missed this place and was glad to be back. I got talked into attending this junket by being told, "it's only a ten minute flight and we'll be back before dinner."

Do I even need to say, the flight was over an hour and we didn't get back for dinner?

Due to the weather, we lost our return flight. That meant we fell off the radar altogether and had to beg, borrow, and steal a ride home after accomplishing nothing and spending the night in transient quarters, racing to the terminal every few hours to see if we could go "home." Apparently the system for transporting individual or small groups of people has a lot in common with the system for acquiring parts and supplies. Bad weather? Not enough rank? Hold your tongue wrong? No soup for you! Based on my experiences thus far, I can't believe we haven't lost more people in this endeavor. I don't mean in combat, we're actually pretty good at that, but simply, literally lost folks until they found their way back to another unit or post or something. I'm glad I brought cash, credit cards and a civilian passport!

The flights were cool though. I got to see a lot of stuff most people only see on TV and I got to see stuff that's different from what I've seen in the last 3 months. And for two days, I literally couldn't come in to this office.

OK. Type at ya later.
Luth

Time for a rant

My mom writes "my son's back" cuz my last post was more optimistic than previous ones. The truth is, the only reason I haven't been writing about the madness of this deployment is because I've grown bored with worrying about it so I know you guys won't want to hear about it. But for me to be really "back" I need a good rant. The folks I'm working with here are only just beginning to understand my addiction to ranting. Some of them thought they knew, yet whenever I go off on one, they say things like "having a bad day already?" which clearly indicates they have no idea how much ranting is a part of my routine. It's my drug of choice.

Fortunately, I caught about an hour of "news" today and I don't even know where to start, but Bill O'reilly is always a good place. Among all the Fox personalities, he's my favorite. In spite of his obvious disregard for balanced reporting (yes, even on Fox!) he sticks to his guns rather than forwarding the party agenda in the rare instance where he disagrees with it. But today, had he attacked someone who was present to defend himself, Bill would've had to stick to his old stand-by: winning the argument by yelling louder. Here's a link to the offending article:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-statue21apr21,0,3503675.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials
You'll have to check it out to fully understand my confusion, but it basically comes down to this: Michael Kinsley, Opinion Director of the LA times, used an analogy comparing papal selection folk to a campaign to stop a statue from being erected in Venice, CA. Kinsley's analogy notes that those who chose the conservative pope did so under a ceiling bearing nude breasts, etc... and that it's a good thing these works of Michelangelo were in Rome... not Venice, CA, where they would likely be banned. A rather clever play on those city names, eh? And nothing more than an interesting intro to an article that has nothing whatsoever to do with catholicism.

Somehow O'reilly confused this clever introduction to an article about how art in America can't be displayed in public unless it provokes absolutely no thought or reaction, with an attack on an entire faith. O'reilly falsely claimed that Kinsley wrongly associates a church with the halting of the statue's erection although it is in fact a church that has mounted the protest. Kinsley points out that church representatives protested against the nude torso in front of actual women whose torsos were also nude, as they typically are on Venice Beach. O'reilly's biggest point seemed to be that Kinsley's entire objective was to bring down the Catholic Church and was using this statue fight to do so... in his own op/ed piece, the dirty liberal.

After watching the Factor, I did something crazy... something very liberal of me... I read the piece in question. Now I'm not catholic, but I failed to see the bashing that O'reilly spoke of. I'm also not from Venice, but I've been there and was actually surprised to see a place that still held on to what it must have been 50 years ago... a wonderful mix of young and old, artists and bankers, liberals and conservatives, stately homes and modern shacks all overlooking one of the most famous and enticing beaches in our great land. Its beauty and intrigue almost led me to an understanding of why people from my beloved midwest give up all it offers for the sunny beaches of southern Cali. Almost. (I was even somewhat saddened to read Kinsley's take on the "gentrification" of the area.)

Upon reading this op/ed piece I found myself longing for my small town newspaper days wherein I was blessed with the opportunity to weigh in on local issues. I was impressed that someone of Kinsley's stature actually bothered to write about an honest to goodness local issue like this statue controversy. I was also reminded of some of the criticisms received in the mail after writing those pieces. Usually they were pretty entertaining - people who couldn't name a city councilman telling me how wrong I was for having an opinion about the council's latest decisions, which I'd covered every step of in order to report on them BEFORE writing my editorial on an unrelated issue. Who would ever have guessed that Ol' Bill would be as irresponsible? It makes me wonder if he even read the article before criticizing it... not that I'd be surprised to learn that.

Have I mentioned that I love this 'blog - how else could anyone ever argue a point with O'reilly without getting yelled at or thrown off the show. Speaking of that, I also found it curious that O'reilly chose the local issue piece over a piece about how Democrats, since 1981, have better delivered on all the promises Republicans usually spout. (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-kinsley3apr03,0,6929691.column?coll=la-util-op-ed) Now were I Bill, this is the kind of thing that would really irk me... much more than a bunch of hippies in Venice arguing over a statue. (yeah, I know it's just an op/ed piece, but so is the statue story) See, the LA times is sort of supposed to cover Venice issues, but the unbiased, national "news" show O'reilly hosts should probably be more concerned with national politics. I wonder why he laid off this one in favor of the statue one? Then again, it's probably part of the contract at Fox to support the one issue the president has been consistent on: putting the "church" back in "church and state," and unless O'reilly usurped Kinsley's intro just like he claims Kinsley usurped the statue controversy to forward his anti-catholic agenda, how else could Bill have helped Bush establish a state religion?

Short story long: All this over a local-interest opinion piece he apparently didn't even read?!

Holy crap, I can't stop myself - I almost forgot. In the same segment, Bill was upset that DNC chairmen, oh, what the hell's that guy's name, Dean, yeah, that guy. Bill was upset that Dean criticized Rush Limbaugh for being a drug user. Bill said something along the lines of "if a Republican made those kinds of comments about a Democrat, there would be a call for his head among the liberal press blah blah blah..." First of all, we have to assume that Bill means if a Republican OFFICIAL made those comments... since Howard Dean is the DNC chairman... about a Democratic official. Now Rush is a lot of things but he is NOT, by God's grace, a public official, so who cares? And C.) Can you say Ted Kennedy? What human, Repub, Dem, or Libertarian, has not made fun of him as a drunk?! Give me a break Bill. How come that "if a Dem said that" crap never works both ways? Just like the filibuster BS going on now... it's ok when Repubs use it, but if Dems might, then it's an outdated technique that must be banned. It was ok for Ronnie Earle to prosecute Texas Democrats for illegally using their staffs to campaign for Clinton, but now that he's exposed millions of illegally raised funds through Tom Delay's office, Ronnie Earle is a "partisan wacko."
What the f... ahhh that's probably enough for tonight, it's getting late.

Type at ya later.

What's Important

We got a visit from Chaplain Owens. He’s an extremely charismatic and enthusiastic Air Force chaplain from Michigan who somehow got himself mixed up with us prior to our departure from home. He’s the kind of guy who just lights up an area the minute he gets near it. At first, he wasn’t going to deploy at all, although he wanted to. Then he got sent to Al Udeid. Then all of a sudden, he shows up here... the night of “the incident”

So anyway, before any of us even knew he was here, Laurie was walking down the road when she passed him. She said “hello,” bubbly as usual, and he stopped to tell her: “Laurie, you’re the kind of person who, no matter where they’re planted, just blooms!”

I can’t think of a better way to describe Laurie and her invaluable contribution to any situation in which she finds herself. I work with her occasionally back at Camp Perry, but it’s been constant here and I don’t know if I could have tolerated anyone else, or if anyone else could have tolerated me the way she has. Our work is boring and, for the most part, thankless, and dogging each other or cheering each other up is the only way we survive.

Chaplain Owens couldn’t have come to remind us of that at a better time. Laurie’s endurance while carrying this load was beginning to wane. Our reliance on her - taking advantage of her good nature, counting on her to stay cheery - was exceeding the quota. The chaplain’s words reminded me that I’m here with great people. I promised to tell you about them, but I probably can’t do most of them justice. Laurie is one. She does what’s right even when no one’s looking. In fact, it’s especially when no one’s looking that she worries the most about making those around her happy - often at her own mental expense. She’s one of many who contributes in ways that she isn’t even aware of and who never gives herself credit for her contributions.

It shouldn’t have taken Chaplain Owens to remind all of us how much we take from each other or to remind us that we should try to give a little too. When it comes down to it, RED HORSE is a family and we DO take care of each other, but it seems like we’re all waiting for some big defining moment to do the right thing when instead, we should just concentrate on doing it in the moment, in the routine and mundane activities every day.

Over the past 18 years my travels with the guard have always reminded me of what I take for granted back home. Especially when we deploy to less than ideal locations, I’m reminded of what’s really important, worthy of worrying about, and what I just thought was important. I think about spending more time playing with my kids, sending the kids to grandma’s and going on more dates with my wife, and generally being nicer to the people who make it possible for me to serve, and taking advantage of the time I have with those people rather than the people. If everything happens for a reason, then I’m here to be reminded of that. Emails from back home suggest that my wife is reminded of some of those things when I’m gone too. I really can’t wait to get home.

But the length of this trip reminds me that some of the people who have helped me serve as long as I have are right here with me. Just as we come to rely on the folks back home, taking them for granted, we do it to each other here as well. Part of the reason for this is self preservation. We’re all trying to figure out what we’re supposed to be doing, how to do it under the circumstances, and how to take care of ourselves in the meantime. It always takes a while to settle in on a deployment, but the three months of moving around from one temporary home to the next put everybody on a sharper edge than usual. By the time we finally got here, no one knew what the hell was going on so defensive mode was in overdrive.

Now that we’ve settled in a little, we’re starting to remember who we are, why we were chosen for this particularly difficult challenge, and just what we’re capable of when we work together. If things progress the way they usually do, we’ll be bored soon ‘cuz we’ll have begun to function smoothly and have nothing left to worry about except counting down the days.

Laurie and the Chaplain reminded me of that the other day. I hope I don’t forget it as quickly this time.

Type at ya later,
Luth

(There are supposed to be pictures with this - to lighten the mood a little, but the %&#$ picture site won't listen to me)

Just checkin' in.

Hey kids. Not much new to report here. We did get our weekend on tonight. It all started with a group photo to send back to the friendly folks at The Wharf in PC. After that, Bob made us all come back up to the office "to play cards." While waiting around for the card game to start and everyone to check their email, we decided to get a couple of pizzas from the local Pizza Hut. Greg and I volunteered to fly so we rustled up a truck... the only one left, an old Ford 6 pack that starts with a knife instead of keys, and which recently had the back window broken out. We drove over and ordered our pizzas and decided to see if the PX had any cold near beer to go with it. By the time we got through the line there, our pizza was ready so we paid for it, hiked back over to the truck, popped a cold one and cruised back to the office. On the way back, we almost convinced ourselves we were heading home from work on a Friday afternoon in the summer.

Everyone was pleasantly surprised with the Clausthaler near beer(it actually tastes pretty good), but by the time we ate pizza and sat around, Bob and Greg announced they were heading home for the night - no cards having been played. However, by then John showed up so he and I gave Todd and Daryl a Euchre lesson. Now there's no one let but Todd and I. All week long our internet connection has been slow or hit and miss. Now it's working great and no one's waiting in line and Todd can't find anyone to instant message, and I don't have anything substantial to add to my blog.

Soooooo.... with that I'll call it an evening. Thanks for the comments and welcome to kavery. Nice to see some new screen names on there. Type at ya later.

Luth

Soothing sounds to salve the soul

Hey kids,
Thought I'd check in and answer a few of the questions of late and let everyone know that there appears to be a little light at the end of the tunnel... and thus far no whistles from the oncoming train.

Today while leaving the dfac (dining facility - don't get caught using the derogatory "chow hall") we heard a strange sound. This came after a conversation at lunch about the strange noise made by the constant slamming of the fridge doors where diners grab pop, juice or ultra-pasteurized milk.

Kutch was sure the sounds were blasts, and there had been a real blast right before lunch that had left it's telltale plume of black smoke somewhere south of the base. Ya see, these sounds - pops=small arms fire, booms or thumps=incoming or outgoing larger rounds - just become part of the landscape, or soundscape, I guess. So everyone just kind of gets used to it, but no one wants to become complacent so we always check with each other. Add to that the blocked eustachian tubes, inner ears, and sinuses that seem to be part of life here as well, and no one can really be sure of what they're hearing.

So anyway, we're walking out of the dfac and we all looked at each other as if to confirm we'd just heard some new sound. It was familiar enough, but low enough that we sort of guessed it might be a new boom. Before we had time to really discuss it, the strange (for this atmosphere) but unmistakable sound of a marching band kicking in to Outkast's "I like the way move" replaced the wierd sound we'd all heard. By then, of course, we knew the sound was a tuba, or would that be a sousaphone? leading the band into the song.

I wish I'd had my camera, cuz I can't even begin to describe the sight of these Army troops, in uniform, with their rifles at their feet in the stones, and their instruments in their hands, all focused on the conductor, just jamming, quite professionally but not so much as to prevent them from getting a little of their funk on, as they took us all completely by surprise sharing their talents at the entrance to the dfac.

It was hard to "maintain military bearing" and not move a little to the pleasant surprise and everyone within hearing and watching distance just kind of stopped as soon as they were close enough to watch the group play. It was incredibly cool and the rest of the day has been better for having watched the three minutes of music. I've even managed to have a few real laughs as opposed to the laughs at the absurdity of our situation, since my spirits were lightened by this surprise waiting for us as we walked around the sea vans that channel us out of the dfac at lunch today.

We'd had a few days of real desert heat, and for a while there, we figured that's how it was going to be for the rest of our time. John and I discovered our A/C wasn't working at that time as well. But, it's cooled down a little, we came home to a brand new A/C unit, and then this band... for three minutes, just magically lifted my spirits. I sure hope I can keep them there for a little while. I know I'm the only one who can, but it's just been too much of a load for the last week or so. I just dropped it for a while and enjoyed my misery. I tried to keep it to myself so it wouldn't spread, but you can't be left alone here. At any rate, I think I'm out of the funk for a while and by the time the next one sets in, I hope to be on the downhill slide.

Drink a beer for me and say hello to my homies.

Type at ya later.

No news is good news

Well, I'm sorry to dissapoint my fans with a lack of info lately, but there's not much to report here. Not much that is, if I follow mom's advice - "if you don't have anything nice to say..."

I had come in to the office this morning in the hope of finding no one waiting to use a computer so I could add my picture (at my wife and kids' request) to this. The pic was waiting and the computers were free and the internet was up - a rare combo. I logged on to the Hello site, chose the picture I had ready, added a caption and clicked "publish" and everything froze. It was still frozen last time I logged on to Hello, but that time, it told me I was sending 2 pictures instead of the one I actually sent... so that should be exciting if it ever shows up on here.

Check out the comment bison posted on the pic of John and Daryl - it will partially justify your logging on here today - it's funny! Oh, and wish Laurie a happy birthday. While you're at it, throw one in for Bob and Barrett as they're up in a few days... by then, we'll surely be out of new and creative ideas for "celebrations" here. Type at ya later.

Luth