Happy New Year

If I were Camp Commandant I would enforce the following New Years resolution:
No more use of the F-word and no more beards. These two things are so commonplace here.

The F-word piece really grates on my nerves, especially when used by those in leadership positions. It is used as a comma in this community and it is a childish expression of the "specialness" that these folks obviously feel they embody, without any regard to the disrespect it conveys to the unbearded, clean speaking people around them. It really sickens me.

The songs that occur to me

That wonderful Cole Porter standard "I Happen to Like New York" keeps playing in my head:

I happen to like New York
I happen to like this burg
and when I have to give the world a last farewell
and the undertaker starts to ring my funeral bell
I don't want to go to heaven
Don't wan't to go to hell
I happen to like New York.
- Cole Porter (1930)

Mail male adventure!

Thrills! I was going to walk to the North DFAC for a little variety. I ran into the Mail Males, backing up the mail truck. "It's hamburger night at the North DFAC! Hop in!" And so I did. This was my second hamburger that I have eaten here. Apparently on Sunday nights the North DFAC adds, and I know this is crazy, seasoning to the beef! I didn't really notice any difference, to be honest, but this wasn't about the food, this was about the company. The Mail Males only had 22 minutes, that's all the Lead Mail Male's OCD would allow. We had a few laughs then it was back to work.

Christmas here

I was alloted some personal time on this day, so it was out on the PTGB. The day was bright, mild and dry. A Santa from a HUMVEE waved as I passed. I stopped by the crowded DFAC and had only a light salad and a piece of apple pie, with, most importantly, a strong cup of tea. At dinner I had some steamship round with raw onions. I am not motivated to eat mashed potatoes and stuffing and gravy and cake.

I have been reading a John Keegan book, which is part of the PQP, so I was grateful for the opportunity to have some quality reading time at both meals.

What a catch!

You know you have a great man in your life when he sends you Emergen-C vitamin packets! Thank you Richard! Here, Emergen-C is like cigarettes in prison! I use it everyday to prevent that low-grade-I'm-coming-down-with-something feeling. It works, as my mother would attest.

Rumors of snow

This image was captured in the Commonwealth of Virginia a couple of days ago. My mother's backyard appears to have been transformed.

A special thanks to my mother who created a stupendous array of Christmas cookies that I will share with the world on Christmas Eve. Until then, I will enjoy the taste of those pecan bars made with real butter, those booze-imbued mini fruit muffins, and those jam and almond cookies.

I am still working out in the morning, wearing shorts. It has so far been a mild winter.

Ah, the Mail Males

The soldiers on my compound who work the mail room are a bunch of characters. I insist that they greet me with what I call the "salutation": "Welcome to the Mail room!" And they do it, the only thing that they need to work on is separating my mail/packages from the pile. They still haven't got that one down. Today I was reading a pile of Christmas cards that kids had made. Some of these cards are hilarious, some like sublime haiku, some totally misspelled. Why do the teachers allow the misspelled cards? It is because the teachers are sleeping on the job or that the liberal establishment has so thoroughly infiltrated education, so that every child's misspelling is seen as a beautiful thing?

Father Christmas

Yesterday the Chairman shook my hand, and placed his command coin in the grasp. I couldn't help but think of Father Christmas.

German snafu

At the beginning of November I picked out some gift items for my grandmother, and other family members, at the airport in Liepzig. A month and a half later, the gifts have not arrived. Well, so much for gift-giving. The German shop owner is endeavoring to find the DHL tracking number, but my hopes are not high. If my grandmother ever receives that package, the enclosed advent calendar will have lost its relevance.

The tumor of tobacco

I am blessed to have a Navy O3 (LT) here, a fellow whom I met back in Fort Jackson, in my Afghanistan world. In stark contrast to my Iraq deployment, where the Navy O3 in my life was a disgrace, this guy, Mike M is a gem. Mike is a bright, no-shit fellow with a history of coaching his boys' football team, and preaching to his students. I am sure in his Texas hometown he is an institution. He is a friend, I feel I can say, always with a wad of Red Man chewing tobacco in that gob of his, off to the side, so like a tumor. I promised him on his last day, a few months from now, that I will, in his honor, try a bit of Red Man.

House sitting in Seminole

Richard is going to move to Florida and house sit! Wow, that is going to be quite an experience for him. The house he will be living in will probably sell in five months or so. I admire that fact that he is going to check it out. The house is a block from the beach (Tampa Bay).

Working the PQP

Sundays are professional development days, for the most part. I have been focusing on completing the Professional Qualification Program (PQP) which is a requirement that I need to fulfill within a certain time frame for promotion. I have a few more chapters left. I have been fortunate to have a someone with Fleet experience in Anti-Submarine Warfare as an instructor/facilitator for the most recent chapter. It's amusing learning about submarines in Afghanistan.

"Shipmate, mind if I sit with you?"

These are the words I uttered to another woman in a blue (smurf) Navy sweat suit. Her year long tour was done. In a few days she will be going home. Her tour was a tough one, traveling outside the wire (though she can truly say that she has seen this country), interracting with police, taking fire, returning fire, her SUV teetering on a fulcrum that turned out to be an IED (in the distance the triggerman running away because the trip wire disconnected). She's up for O6. "If you ever need anything, I'm at the Pentagon."

Farewell to a shipmate

IS2 was a reserve sailor with me in Iraq, then shifted over to Afghanistan when I did. It turns out that he was supposed to be home in September, but he didn't know it. How can this be? The Navy issues us demobilization orders when it is time to go home. The Navy cut IS2's tour back much shorter than expected, but no one had communicated this to him. (We are supposed to periodically check the Navy/Marine order writing authority on BUPERS to see if our orders have been modified, which I do from time to time.) IS2, I hope for his sake, caught a flight out of here a few hours ago. Then he will return all his gear, visiting all the stations he had to on the way over here, just as I will. I believe the process takes an additional week to "demob."