Halloween Patrolling

Every holiday here passes without much notice. Hell there are barely even weekends here as everyday has the same consistency. It's a lot like the sloppy food that I'm now realizing is bland and so familiar that I greet it like a school child greets homework each night.

A friend here, a fellow shiftmate whom I'll call Hal for the sake of his mischievous outtakes brings the dreary day a shot of life. He's cut out some ridiculous paper mask which he has ripped from a magazine and he has it propped upon the front of his Kevlar helmet. Somehow he's managed to get a postal box full of bags of candy and he's hellbent on handing them out to the gates. This late in the deployment it becomes clear that neither I nor the other passenger in our vehicles cares for the consequences of being seen with a paper goblin hanging out of the turret. And when I say that I mean that we could care less what repercussions any authority figure would bring up against us.

We travel around to each gate, causing some faces to light up. Candy has that effect on anyone be it soldier or child (or Navy squid). The paper mask makes an impression too and we're all three of satisfied with breaking up the monotony of patrolling and the boredom that comes with gate duty for others. Hal screams "Open the @#&*ing gate, Happy @#&*ing Halloween!" and whips candy at their heads. He's a pseudo psychodellic halloween santa and it fits him well.

Not content to end the day with one simple spike in entertainment we roll down to the pier to inspect the ocean. We've been coming here a lot lately and meeting many of the foriegn nationals in the process. Hal is incredibly sociable and good at communicating through the thickest language barriers. He'll stand their playing charades for 10 minutes trying to get his point across.

He leaps on concrete trucks for the simple pleasure of chatting with a worker. It's not uncommon that he's offering water, drinks or magazines for things in return. He's even got a hold of homeade beer through one of his contacts.

Somehow he balances his sociable skills with a keen addiction to pyromania. Just today he was setting a box on fire, five foot flames licking the humvee. He's had infernos explode in his face from barrels doused with diesal. He's set elaborate wood effigys of words like "Happy Fourth of July"ending in a puff of burning gunpowder he removed from a bullet shell casing by hand.

Always a treat when Hal's riding with me, crazyness and all.

You can see a shot of it all here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/krimzen

Weave Man!

Everyday is a drive through a gauntlet of Kuwaiti and foreign national workers. We weave left and right along the highway, they counter-weave and we all avoid cracking each other second by second. It's a great orchestra of cars and behemoth trucks. It makes me crave driving in US traffic, but I'm relaxed anyway bouncing around like a pinball.

We stayed at the pier for most of the day. One guy makes a makeshift spear out of a steel rod and tries to hunt some tiny fish. He snags a couple of them and attaches their bodies to a fish hook we find lying around so we can try for bigger fish. My paranoia kicks in and I'm sure he's going to snatch my neck with this hook as he spins it in the air like a lasso. The fish are keener than us and only munch the guts of the fish while avoiding the hook. They take a taunting bite from each one and then show complete abandonment of interest for our bait. Navy boats pass by, surely wondering what we're up to but they never stop. Overall a good day with no calls at all, almost feels like I spent the day at Sea with the sun burning me up, hitting me from all directions.

Clever Title Here

It's getting quiet in the Hummvees. It almost feels like everything that could possibly be said has already been said. I know every little love affairr, dark secret, greatest ambition and future plan of everyone on my crew. As for juicy going home rumors, we're all experiencing things in a bubble and if by some chance we were at the far side of this bubble any rumor spreads like wildfire in all directions until all is known. The rumors are quiet lately too, the dates for going home looking more solid.

Sitting there wasting away the last hour of my shift I'm content, I feel like time is finally winding down and I'm getting lazy. My head is flopping around until I see an odd site. Four people walking towards us, two small children and a man and woman. They pass by our vehicle three times until we get out for a closer look. It's odd to see children, I can only remember one other time that I've ever seen a child here, and behind our fences it's a larger rarity.

An Indian man with perfect english starts to chat us up. He's a captain of the cargo ship nearby and hauls his family around when his children aren't in school. Seems weird to think that these giant rusting hulks are pulling around families in their gut for months on end. Stachowicz hands the younger boy some Skittles and he shyly takes them. They continue their laps around the container yard getting what little exercise they'll be allowed before continueing on to Singapore and somewhere else that escapes me now.


I've managed to grab a friends camera and search through his photos for a few to post on my flickr account. They're up at the photo site now: http://www.flickr.com/photos/krimzen

My Ethical Army

It goes without saying that your Army probably needs some ethics. When lawyers sit around a table disseminating minute details about when and how you can drive your goverment vehicle one can only feel universally confident about their motives. Because really isn't it all about rigid rules and the unwavering unthinking enforcement of them? Let's hope so or the moral fabric of your Army is crumbling.

I had an Ethics class last night. It said 1800-2000 on the board, two hours of briefing bliss. Slam us in a room, bring out a few chairs and let the colonel speak his mind to us. As a soldier it's not ok to accept gifts of excessive money from strangers. Alternatively if you've been friends with a Sheik, as some are according to the good colonel, then it's a marvelous exception to the modest gift giving rule.

Fast forward through another one of his corny jokes. We all sit in silence, cracking painful grins humoring this ridiculous dinosaur who would wither in the civilian world. Since you can't support all charities then you shouldn't be allowed to support any at all. "People call me scrooge but I shut down toys for tots, over this rule" he says with a sly smirk, oddly proud.

The rest is a mush of words, the ramblings of obsolete thinking, the absurdity of a list of decade old laws. A new slide pops up, I'm half paying attention, something about the highest base pay for a General being around $150,000, and how "WE" don't make near as much as that. Coming from someone who makes at least 3 times as much as most everyone else in the room it seems comical. And so my ethics class ends and I can't help but feel like the Army completely missed the point. Lifes more than economics and insane values. There are bigger things to worry about here, but I'll sign my name and smile and pray with grinding teeth that few of these briefings await me upon demobolization.

Lobster Day

They served lobster today. No joke, they do it about once a week with a side of fried shrimp. The shrimp is the garden variety freezer box kind and the lobster... well the lobster has its own story. You see, it never tastes the same twice. I'm completely baffled by it, it's always a gamble and even today when it tasted good it still wasn't lobster. What the hell kind of random shellfish are they feeding us?

I've posted a few new photos http://www.flickr.com/photos/krimzen

Simmering in Gravel

OK, I lied it's not exactly a simmer sitting in this gravel pit anymore. It's 76 degrees here at 8pm but the humidity is at 20% which makes this feel more like 55 degrees out here. (That's nothing scientific mind you, I'm usually oblivous to such things.) During the day it still manages to hit 100 degrees but it's also noticably milder.

When I was home I noticed some sort of cut in my mouth that was getting progressively worse. Sitting in the Atlanta airport flickering the cut with my tongue I noticed that this was actually a tooth poking through. Wisdom teeth, (or tooth) what impeccable timing you have! The side of my face feels puffy but I think the tooth is going to make an appearance without nudging my other teeth. Welcome to Kuwait you nosy molar, now be good as I don't trust these Army dentists.

Slowly I've been sliding into things again, I'll be continuing my shift tomorrow morning. This flight back knocked me down more than any other in memory. I've slept away the better part of two days after already sleeping away nearly the entire flight back.

During the few hours I've been awake I've received some great news on our final departure time. I apologize for the mixing of information, I'm sure this is getting confusing for everyone but bear with me. In mid November we should be nearing our turnover to the incoming soldiers. By December 1st I should be on my way to Hawaii where I'll be demobolizing for about 10 days. Assuming this info stays solidified it's really a best of all possible situation for me. Not only do I leave early but I also get to finish the deployment in Hawaii and avoid my original concern of being there for over three months as was originally thought. I know what your thinking, how could I complain about three months in Hawaii, but 10 will do me just fine and put me home in time for the holidays and to continue college as I'd hoped. Keep in mind this is still totally tentative in typical Army fashion.

There really isn't that much time left, three weeks of work and then the usual hurry up and wait until the end of November. It comes down to staying safe and not going nutty in this place, which unfortunatly is already becoming tough for some of the guys here. Yesterday one of the guys on our shift pulled his pistol on another person and charged a round into the chamber. Luckily he chose not to fire. Supposedly they were having an arguement and he was a bit over the edge, but that doesn't excuse pulling a pistol on your own shiftmate. Wacky stuff, I plan on minding my own business until I get out of here.

Break Complete

Fortunately for me the last two weeks were marked by tons of great visits, food, and booze. I hate to see it come to an end but it has been a great time indicator for me as I'm nearing a year of activation. There were moments overseas when I felt like I had lived my whole life there, and would continue to. Strange and foolishly dramatic no doubt, but it's true nevertheless. I finally feel like I've made some progress towards coming home and that's proving to be invaluable to keeping my head sorted out. Odd that this suddenly comes on the eve of my return flight back to Kuwait. Still it has come and I'm thankful.

So what did I do on leave you ask? Well, when I first arrived I was fooled into thinking that I was going to have cool sunny weather to bask in. I sort of bragged in my head how I was a northern boy and could aclimate easily to what I perceived as an average fall day. Turns out my perception of cool was more like blistering heat in comparison to the frosty wet weather lurking around the mountains for 90% of my trip. Luckily this was all still a nice change from the constant dusty cloudless skies of Kuwait. It could sound absurd to summer lovers but I miss damp grey days.


Getting attuned to a new sleep schedule is always a hazy experience. You sort of feel loopy and distant until you can get on a semi-permanent schedule. Part of my haze was spent on golf carts which I highly recommend. You can view a few shots in the photo section.

Speaking of haze, if you haven't tried taking a dry run for the better part of a year and then having a sip of beer it may be worth it. I found myself in the airport nursing a couple of beers and chuckling at my ridiculously low newfound tolerance. I wasn't the only one chuckling though, I tried to be slurry chatty to those passing by with uneffective results. Needless to say the rest of the trip was marked with numerous beer sampling events.

There were also endless great get togethers throughout the two weeks. Local concerts, meals, bar visits, tubs of jello shots, chicken brawls and gambling. Mmmm vices, yes please. I can't wait for my return in a couple months.


I've posted a few photos of it all here: http://flickr.com/photos/krimzen

I'd have more if I wasn't such a dolt and could get them off my cell phone... hmm

Thanks to everyone for making this leave time superb.

Off again for 16 hours of flight, yeah!