The Kandahar Contract

Organizing for America | Event | 2 PHONE CALLS ON 9/11 - Illinois!

2009-09-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

Bill and Bob's Excellent Afghan Adventure: From Lizette Alvarez To Homeland Security

2009-04-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

Bill and Bob's Excellent Afghan Adventure: From Lizette Alvarez To Homeland Security

LT Nixon Rants: Dept of Homeland Security Sez To Be on the Lookout For "Disgruntled Military Veterans"

2009-04-14T20:50:00.000-07:00

LT Nixon Rants: Dept of Homeland Security Sez To Be on the Lookout For "Disgruntled Military Veterans"

HuffPo’s Commentariat Damage Troop Morale

2008-11-12T21:54:00.000-08:00

Read it at Civilian Irregular Information Defense Group. I had to post it over hear to get a track back in to Bill and Bob's Adventure.

The Belmont Club: We've got him now

2008-03-20T15:39:00.000-07:00

The Belmont Club: We've got him now

This Is My Old Blog

2007-09-23T14:52:00.000-07:00

I have been off of Blogspot for a long time, but I like to comment on other Blogspot blogs so reactivated my account.

Please come over to Civilian Irregular Information Defense Group and take a look.

Candyland

2005-03-14T14:59:00.000-08:00

Welcome to Candyland! is the traditional greeting for FNG's at KAF. Most effective when accompanied with an evil grin and body language suggesting the greeter's opinion of the FNG's chances of sticking it out in this place.

Kandahar Air Field is a concrete runway, surrounded by plywood shacks, shipping containers, tents, and a few real buildings. The world's sole remaining superpower projects power from places like Charleston and McChord and Moody and Schofield Barracks into Central Asia through here. Loudly. At all hours of the day and night. The C-17's hit their reverse thrusters right outside my tent. This is the logistical support base for Operation Enduring Freedom in southern Afghanistan.

This used to be the Kandahar International Airport and will be again, someday. The terminal building is being slowly renovated. It has been uninhabitable since November of 2001. We kind of messed it up when we took it.

Afghanistan struggling with more than bad weather, and it may get worse

2005-03-14T11:12:00.000-08:00

Afghanistan's seven-year drought ended with the harshest winter in 15 years. It has been so long since water flowed in and around Kandahar that a regional training compound was constructed in part on a wadi. The flood photographs are awesome, but the world at large is unaware of what happened because the news was dwarfed by tsunami stories.

Mud. Everywhere. Khaki colored soup. Knee deep at the latines up from from the laundrymat. Hail hitting the puddles like machine gun bullets. Bitterly cold winds that numb the fingers and fog the brain, turning a simple task like unlocking a padlock and opening a CONEX a tortuous exercise in endurance. The weather has sucked since Christmas.

Every Hand's A Winner, And Every Hand's A Loser

2004-12-02T20:16:00.000-08:00

HAVELOCK - David "Little Dave" Bradley White, 38, formerly of Kinston, died Thursday, Nov. 11, 2004, in Afghanistan. Little Dave formerly worked with U Save Auto in Havelock. He was the owner of Blondie's Auto in Havelock. Most recently he worked in Afghanistan with an independent contractor. Funeral services will be held at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 18, in the chapel of Cotton Funeral Home. Burial will be held at 2 p.m. Friday, Nov. 19, at Hampstead Sea Lawn Cemetery. Survivors include his wife, Jenny White of Havelock; daughter Britnie Miranda White of the home; three sons, Brandon Nicholas White of Springfield, Ill., and Steven Anthony White and Christopher Donovan White, both of the home; sister Cathy White of Enterprise, Ala.; and three brothers, Glenn White of Havelock, Brian White of Norfolk, Va., and Ricky Royal of Surf City. The family will receive friends from 6 to 7: 30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 18, before the service. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to David White Fund c/o BB&T of Havelock. Arrangements by Cotton Funeral Home.

He had been here 35 days. His tent mates found him dead in his hooch around 0630 local. Cause of death unknown. Still haven't been told what killed him. Must not be catching.

His fellow employee's raised $21,000 to send to his widow. That will go pretty fast. He was a long time in no pay status waiting to get here. If you can spare an Alexander Hamilton, send it to Jenny.

A whole bunch of people turned out to see him put on the C-17 taking his body to Dover. His Honors Detail performed their duty with notable precision and military bearing for a bunch of civilians. Most were prior service, I suspect. All were dressed in black The North Face fleece jackets and khaki pants and looked sharp.

Somewhere in the darkness of the Afghan pre-dawn, Little Dave broke even. Everybody else lost.

Gravel

2004-11-10T05:10:00.000-08:00

Before we took this place from the Taliban, this place had a small stretch of asphalt road, concrete runway and taxiways, and a lot of dust laying on the ground just waiting for a breeze. This is a desert, but there isn't a whole lot of sand. Mostly dust. Over this dust the Americans have laid gravel. Big gravel. Fist-sized, ankle-twisting, tank trail gravel. Somebody had to make this gravel from rocks and haul it here or all we would have to walk on is dust. Walking on this stuff was a trial for me when I first got here. You can tell who the FNG's are, they are the ones walking with their heads down, studying the ground in front of them.

Several truck loads of small gravel have been dumped in my neighborhood, graded and rollered, and the difference is amazing. You can actually walk to the shithouse in flipflops and not hurt your feet. It feels like civilization. I think I will judge a camp by the size of its gravel.

Gun Slingers

2004-10-30T16:20:00.000-07:00

This Army of One business is well illustrated by the wide variety of pistol holsters and rifle slings in use. Back in the day, when dinosaurs ruled the earth and tanks had piston engines, uniformity was the rule and there was always some anal retentive captain or sergeant major around to hassle you about your privately owned non-issue gear. Now they sell it in the PX! Most troops here are armed at all times, even the Air Force. Lots of aviators here, so lots of pistols, but very few pistol belts. Thigh rigs and cross draw shoulder rigs are all the rage. The cross draw shoulder holsters position the muzzle of the pistol diagnally under the toter's arm, thus covering anybody who happens to be behind them. Eating chow while looking down the barrel of a 9mm is pretty much an every day occurrance. I had a shoulder holster when I was tanking. It put the pistol directly over my left shirt pocket and smashed my cigarettes, but it kept the muzzle pointed DOWN.

I like thigh rigs on crack troops. Reminds me of garters.

Very few soldiers seem to use the issue sling. Everybody wants a two point sling so they can diddybop down the road with their carbine over their shoulder, across their back, muzzle down, with their hands in their pockets and their shoulders hunched over. These people even run PT with their weapon slung across their back. This army has apparently forgotton the double time at Port Arms.

Field jackets are scarce. DCU ECWS are occasionally in evidence, but most people wear black North Face fleece jackets as an outer garment. They even have a store here full of North Face stuff. Back when I was being all I could be, I would not have gone far wearing a field jacket liner without the field jacket.

Times have changed.

Stronghold

2004-10-13T04:15:00.000-07:00

People who think BFE is out in the middle of nowhere have never been to BFU.
Not much to this place. Nuclear blast-proof aircraft shelters, cracked Soviet concrete taxiways, plywood buildings, shipping containers, tents. Reminds me of North Fort Hood.

The streets are named for streets in Manhattan. The first action of Operation Enduring Freedom was staged out of here three years ago. It is still an important transit point supporting the GWOT further south. I'll probably be through here again on my way back to the world. This installation is my introduction to this theater. They have a real nice Internet Cafe, airconditioned and not dusty at all.

Shorts are a no no here. Host nation sensitivities to display of bare naked legs, even male legs.

Saw a gray fox at a picnic table at the Green Beans Coffee not 10 feet from where I was standing my first morning there.

We sat in briefings all day, then just waited around for a plane ride. Our luggage came in from the capital city on a truck, and we had to unload it and drag it through the sand and gravel to our tents. Those little folding dolly carts that roll so well on the airport linoleum ain't worth a crap in gravel.

The folks going to Bagram got their ride early the next morning. The Kandahar folks got told to pack up that afternoon. Built the pallet under the supervision of a real laid back Air Force Sergeant. Footlockers on the bottom, then duffel bags, then carry on bags, then sleeping bags, strap down the net, then tear it all apart because somebody who thought he was going to Kandahar is now going to Bagram and his stuff has to come off the pallet. Give up your ID Cards and get on the strange looking 20-seat Japanese bus. Sit on bus an hour. Go back to Transportation. Wait. Get back on bus. Get on C-130. Sit. Watch while the pallet, now sitting on the C-130's loading ramp, is torn apart again to get somebody else's stuff off. The Loadmaster is not laidback. After four and a half hours of trying to be gone, we leave.

Red nylon webbing for seating. I fall asleep. When I wake up the interior of the aircraft is darker than a bag of assholes. No lights at all. Pitch black. Land at Kandahar after about two and a half hours. Kandahar is not very impressive in the dark. It is not that impressive in the daylight, either. Walk off the ramp and get on another little Japanese bus. The Terminal Building has been condemned. We go to a plywood shack that serves as the terminal now. Forklift brings our pallet. We tear it down and get our stuff. White Mercedes truck comes. The bed is five feet off the ground. We must load our gear on this. Taken to a big white barn tent full of empty cots. Welcome to Candyland.

Yak Air

2004-10-08T06:20:00.000-07:00

The next leg of the journey put me on a 40-year old Soviet Yakolev-40 aircraft operated by the national airline of this former Soviet Republic. A bus with wings. Has stairs under the tail you climb up to get into the plane. Russian stewardess and the biggest Asian I ever saw flying it. Koreans don't get that big. Land in the dark, as usual, at a civil airport on the southern frontier. Very few lights on. Met by escorts from the company, put in a bus and driven through the darkness to a well lit area visible for miles on the horizon. That's the US stronghold in Central Asia. Go through the outer security checkpoints, manned by indigenous personnel. The van driver says those troops get paid about $3.00 US a month and would hit you up for whatever they could any chance they got. Got to the inner ring of security. Concertina and Hesco barriers. Bored American MP's searching our carry on bags. Taken to a plywood shed, told to sign a piece of paper, given a sleeping bag, led to a tent full of empty cots. This is where we'll be until we get a ride south.

Wheels Up

2004-09-27T23:08:00.000-07:00

Finally left the southwestern metropolis. Saw the Mississippi River from 37,000 feet. Saw Detroit, Toronto, Buffalo, Montreal and Quebec City all lit up at night. Saw sunrise over the Irish Sea. Eleven hour wait for the connecting flight in a major European airport. Place is built like a greenhouse. Planes there unload by stairs to the ground, then you get on buses to be taken to the terminal. All kinds of ground vehicles scurrying about. Lots of little white pregnant roller skates, most with body damage of one sort or another. Had a bomb scare. An unattended bag cause the police to move everybody to the far end of that particular section of the airport. Took about an hour to sort out. Interrupted my nap. Slept a lot on the trip. Got tired of that place. Finally boarded a much smaller aircraft headed to Central Asia. Many hours and several naps later, arrived at the airport of the capitol city of this former republic of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Customs wearing Soviet style garrison hats big enough to catch the wind and fly. Few lights on outside, dim inside. Energy conservation, I guess.

Get taken from airport to hotel. This city at dawn is not pretty. Still pretty Stalinist, with the addition of Japanese and Korean billboards selling various capitalistic gimcracks. Lots of decrepit high rise housing units. Cabrini Green comes to mind. Nice hotel. Got to stay there all of eight hours.

I was told at 0800 local to come down to the lobby and get on a bus at 1200. Went down to the lobby at 1155 and was told transportation would not be availabe for a few days. Went back to the room and snoozed. Phone in the room rings at 1600. Told to get down to the lobby and get on the bus. Get dressed, grab stuff, and make it down to lobby in 5 minutes from a dead sleep. Another interesting ride. Seems to be as many Russians walking around as natives. Stopped at a red light. A Russian-looking dude is walking his horse across the street. Didn't see any camels.

Another interminable wait for another flight. This particular waiting are is not real comfy. The X-ray and metal detector drill is more regimented than usual. Everybody in a big hurry. These security people don't smile. Don't even have my belt and shoes on before they load up the bus out to the aircraft.

Body Armor

2004-09-14T13:05:00.000-07:00

Ther are some sorry sunzabitches in this outfit that will scratch your name off the computer waiting list and lie about calling out your name. Hope the internet cafe at Kandahar is better organized.

Saw the helmets and vests we are getting. Dark blue, like a journalist's. I saw the stuff, and it seems like I should be writing something deep about the meaning of war, or something about the significance of going to a place where body armor and ballistic helmets are needed, but all I really care about is how much space they will take up in my NBC gear bag. I have a bunch of my stuff in that bag. I have more stuff now than I left home with, thanks to She Who Must Be Obeyed and Bass Pro Shop, and I am depending on that gear bag to haul the excess.

I'M ON THE LIST!

2004-09-13T16:22:00.000-07:00

Yippee! I know when I'm going now. Light at the end of the tunnel. Hallejuh! I have been treated well, fed well, can't complain about much, but I am glad to be getting the hell out of here. Not many hoops to jump through on this side. I am ready for the next chapter of this saga.

Falstaff's Battalion Was Genteel By Comparison

2004-09-13T07:41:00.000-07:00

Thus did James Clyman describe the intrepid adventurers who answered General Ashley's advertisment in the St. Louis paper in 1823. I don't think there are beaver in Afghanistan, but the Rockies are but foothills compared to the Himalayas.

This is a helluva crew I am thrown in with. The quiet and the loud, the short and the tall, the humongous and the anorexic, the bowed out and the driven in. Sam Watkins of Company H, 1st Tenn, would say this outfit beats Forepaugh's Double Ringed Circus.

And all of us somewhat out of the ordinary. Everybody I have talked to has had somebody to tell them they were crazy as hell.

It is not a sane world over there. A certain amount of craziness is a survival tactic.

Shopping Malls and the American Dream

2004-09-13T07:26:00.000-07:00

This outfit is set up in a shopping mall. Wednesday week before last I walked it. Pretty generic American mall. I sort of had an epiphany walking around that mall. Buying and selling, consumerism, the ability to have what you want, the pursuit of happiness; the principles of America are embodied in the shopping mall. They have shopping malls in other countries. I was in a Breuningerland in Boeblingen, Germany that was pretty slick. I hear they have shopping malls in Kuwait. When we get American or European style shopping malls in Iraq and Afghanistan, we will have won the war.

Bird In A Gilded Cage

2004-09-12T16:25:00.000-07:00

Something tells me I am going to miss air conditioning, and soft beds, and nice hotels, but I have been here two weeks and I am ready to go. Too much time on my hands. Walls closing in.

I am in the day room they set up for us. TV loud as hell. Minnesota just whipped Dallas. People trying to read over my shoulder. Never been in an internet cafe. Perhaps I am in one now.

Thursday a week ago I signed the contract. 14 pages worth. Secrecy clause. This blog may suck because I can hardly say anything.

Friday She Who Must Be Obeyed, the Goddess T., came over here and we had a wondful Labor Day weekend together. Just like a second honeymoon. Even got up at 0430 and watched the sunrise at the beach. Very nice memory.

Getting crowded in here. Will try another post tomorrow.

OPSEC

2004-09-11T11:35:00.000-07:00

Wednesday we sat on our butts and listened to powerpoint briefings. The OPSEC briefing made me paranoid about what I can post on this blog. To get from where we are to where we are going is a journey of several stages, with layovers in some "interesting" locations which I may be able to describe without identifying them. I can't identify units or name any names. I am not clear about linking to articles which do. I'll do the best I can, but blogging is not my primary mission. I don't want to get my chain of command down on me. SPC B. had some rights under the UCMJ. I have the right to remain silent.

Day of Infamy

2004-09-11T04:23:00.000-07:00

I got to New York 5 weeks later. A Canadian bank there had been run out of their offices and was relocating to various locations in Manhattan. The company I was working for at the time sent me.

I went to the top of the Empire State building my fourth day there. The southern tip of Manhattan was still obscured by smoke rising from Ground Zero after 5 weeks. A couple days before I came home I went down there. Never smelled anything like that. All the cops were wearing gas masks. Mostly a burnt plastic smell, with some rubber thrown in, and something else which may have been organic, or maybe not.

Money ain't the only reason I am doing this.

Medical

2004-09-10T05:53:00.000-07:00

Get on a bus at 0430. Be where they told you to be at the time they told you to be there. Sit for two hours. Get on another bus. Ride. For an eeevil, rich corporation, they are in a pretty dumpy part of town. Get off bus. Stand in line. Pee in cup. They only want half a cup. I have much more than that for them. Avoid pissing on your hand. Get back on bus. Get off bus. You are now at a maintenance shed about the size of an aircraft hanger. Trailers are parked inside the hanger. Inside the trailers are our tormenters.

I was really sweating this. I had people praying for me. That worked. I had to huff and puff eight times to pass the Pulmonary Function Test, but I did it.

I was advised the night before to shave my chest or the EKG techs would be rough with me. Never tried that before. Never will again. Itched like a bitch. I think the EKG techs would have been gentle.

Finally got to eat around 1100. Best chicken salad sandwich I ever had

Charlie Foxtrot

2004-09-09T16:53:00.000-07:00

Get up at 0500. Catch a bus at 0600. Stand in line for chow. Eat. Wait. Join a milling herd of humanity. Stand in line. Do this all day. After evening chow, sit through a four hour medical briefing and paperwork filling out drill. Wait for a bus. Ride bus. Get back to room approximately 15 and a half hours after you left it. Go to bed because you have to be up at 0400. And don't eat anything after midnight.

The Journey Begins

2004-09-09T16:14:00.000-07:00

Hotel room webtv can be aggravating. I ought not to complain. These are pretty nice digs.

I arrived in this southwestern metropolis 11 days ago. Air travel isn't any more fun now than it was three years ago. Went to NYC that time. Narrow seats, screaming babies, $5 drinks. Duffel bags have gotten heavier since last I lugged any through an airport. I must have looked like a potential expat because a guy came up to me asking about ground transportation to the hotel. I need to ask him why he thought I would know. I dragged the bags out to the pick up point and sat on my duffel bag and waited for my ride, feeling very soldierly. Waited. And waited. That was the first test. There would be many others. The van driver was a real sweet heart and made us step over a pile of luggage to load our bags. He drove us to a shopping mall. We dismounted, unloaded the bags, and found a chow hall set up in what must have once been a big clothing store. Feeding the new troops impressed me. Somebody must know what they are doing. The hotel we were told we were going to is not the hotel we ended up staying in the first week. That hotel is in charge of billeting, and the farther along you get in this process, the closer they put you to the chow hall. I stayed in the first hotel they put me in until yesterday.

Goodbye, Ivan

2004-09-03T07:36:00.000-07:00

Ivan is a rat terrier and my wife's baby. I named him Ivan the Terrier after she went a week without naming him. How do you call a dog with no name? Very smart, very affectionate, very protective, barks too much but nobody sneaks up on us. Best dog I have known personally. Leaving him was harder than leaving my human family members. Humans can talk on the phone.

AFK

2004-08-29T01:40:00.000-07:00

Blogging will be light for the next two weeks. Leaving in about 6 hours. Have in-processing and training to to get through, then the long flight, then starting to work. Probably be able to get to the internet cafe by September 18.

She Who Must Be Obeyed can't understand how I can sleep at a moment like this. She's packing my stuff right now, suspicious of who I am chatting with. I tell her I am writing about her. She warns me that it better be nice. She has a comment to make about almost every item she puts in the bag.

"Do you know how few men have the luxury of their wife packing for them," she asks. Yes, baby. I know.

"Remember, your sweater doesn't go to the laundry." Yes, dear.

This is harder on her than it is on me.

Al Qaeda Strikes Out in Kabul

2004-08-28T04:12:00.000-07:00

A major target for al Qaeda is the Bagram air base, north of the capital, Kabul. The sprawling base is surrounded by hills, brush land, farms and villages. Plenty of places from which to fire rockets at the base. But in the last three months, 13 weapons caches have been found in the area. The caches contained over 12,000 weapons, including heavy machine guns, anti-personnel mines and 107 mm rockets. The mines and rockets are favorite terrorist weapons. But good relations with the local Afghans has led to the discovery of the weapons caches, as well as firing positions set up for 107mm rockets, and some of the terrorists themselves. A few Afghans, mostly followers of hard line Taliban leaders, support the terrorists. But, in general, Kabul is a hostile area for al Qaeda.

Meltdown

2004-08-27T09:40:00.000-07:00

The following is reconstructed from memory:

Please
If I take something down or modify it DON'T BE THE F---ING MORON WHO REPOSTS IT!

Two comments on the previous entry, GOOOAAL, were deleted by admin moderator. One of those comments consisted solely of this link to the Mudville Gazette.

If this entry makes no sense to you, disregard last transmission.

The Professionals

2004-08-26T10:53:00.000-07:00

The kids are at school, She Who Must Be Obeyed is in the rack, and I am watching one of my favorite movies, a 1966 bandito movie with Lee Marvin, Burt Lancaster, and Jack Palance. I wannabe a dynamiter and light fuses with a cigar. Don't think I will crimp blasting caps with my teeth, though. First time I saw that movie was in an AAFES theater in Japan. I was 11. Made a big impact on me.

We stay because we believe.

We leave because we are disillusioned.

We come back because we are lost.

We die because we are committed.

I love all those bandito movies, even the sorry ones. I even sat through a Jane Fonda movie to watch Gregory Peck be the The Old Gringo. Hell, I'm an Old Gringo, now. When I am done in the 'stan, I want to visit Chihuahua and see how much the one place is like the other.

Tuesday night I got my flight info. Leave home Sunday. A great adventure is about to begin, and I'm blogging and watching movies and waiting for my old lady to wake up.

I am becoming pessimistic about the future of this blog. CB's blog has brought him a world of unwanted attention. He got outed by National Public Radio and his name and unit were exposed. The name of his blog got changed, posts of his are disappearing, SGT Hook has had a post to mysteriously disappear on him, and things are not looking good for the military wing of the blogosphere. It remains to be seen how much useful blogging I can accomplish without:

A. Blowing my cover

B. Giving somebody an excuse to accuse me of violating OPSEC, and

C. Pissing off my chain of command and getting sent home on the FTS

She Who Must Not Be Disturbed has thoughtfully provided me with hard copy diary books that you write in with a pen or pencil. Sounds primitive, but it'll work. She has hounded me for years to write a book. I've started several. Never got beyond Chapter One in any of them. Writing is hard. Convincing myself that anybody would want to read my drivel is harder.

Good news from Afghanistan, Part 3

2004-08-22T23:41:00.000-07:00

Chrenkoff is an Australian INFOWARRIOR who is doing a great job of countering the incessant media negativity with GNFI and GNFA. Read GNFA Part 1 and Part 2, while you're at it.

I am supposed to leave home in 6 days, and if all goes well I should be in Kandahar 11 SEP 04.

Damn We're Good

2004-08-20T02:12:00.000-07:00

One of the advantages of a quarter century of monogamy is knowing what works. Definitely worth losing sleep over. She Who Must Be Obeyed, the Goddess T., The All Merciful is appreciative and cheerfully fixing SOS and hashbrowns. I get rewarded twice. It don't get any better than this.

Camels drink prodigious quantities of water before a trek across the desert. Same principle.

CB Gets Instalanched

2004-08-19T22:41:00.000-07:00

CB is the reason I have this blog. He is an M240 machinegunner in a motorized rifle squad of the 3/2 Stryker Brigade. That's his blog under Free Republic on the blogroll to your left. The Instapundit, the Godfather of the blogosphere, mentioned him yesterday. If CB wasn't famous yet, he is now.

I have to be careful what I put on my blog, lest I become famous someday. There is a guy name Jerome Corsi who co-authored Unfit For Command who has caught a ration of shit for posts he made on Free Republic. Once you make enemies the trail you have left on the web can come back and bite you on the ass.

Planning for the pitfalls of fame already. Am I conceited or what?

Losin' Sleep Over It

2004-08-19T00:59:00.000-07:00

I used to be a creature of habit. Had to be at work at 0700, had to be out the door at 0620, had to be on my feet NLT 0550. I was usually crashed by 2300, sometimes earlier, rarely later unless I didn't get off until 2300. That was the routine for 9 years.

That routine came to a screeching halt five weeks ago.

0439 Eastern and I'm blogging.

I'm ready to be gone. Too much time waiting. Not that much that really has to be done before I go. Much to worry about. For myself I am really only worried about not making it through their physical and getting sent home and never getting over there. That would suck. That would suck severely.

The rear detachment I'm leaving back at home station worries me.

Aw, fuck it. This blog is not a soap opera.

A High Standard

2004-08-14T08:42:00.000-07:00

A Successful Blog (via Instapundit) makes me doubt whether I am going to have the time and energy to make this blog a success. Hmmm. Who gets to define "success"? I do. It is not unsuccessful until I admit that it is.

VJ Day

2004-08-14T03:59:00.000-07:00

Not very many remember anymore. 59 years is a long time.

New Boots

2004-08-12T20:03:00.000-07:00

Got a brand new pair of boots this morning. Herman Survivors Big Timber II, Made In China

Got a pair of Dickies work pants made in El Salvador.

Got some Liberty denim bib overalls, made in Russia.

Got some Carhartt Washed Duck Pants (quack, Affleck) assemble in Mexico of American components.

Is that multinational enough for you?

Non-uniformity

2004-08-11T22:12:00.000-07:00

Went shopping today. What is the well-dressed American civilian wearing at construction sites in Central Asia these days? Simpler last time. I could choose the OD wash and wear fatigues or the newly authorized green, brown, sand and black woodland BDU's. I am my own quartermaster now. I must fight the inclination toward military-style clothing. Can there be too much khaki?

I started this blog because Blogger made me do it. I wanted to post a comment on MY WAR - Fear And Loathing In Iraq and they made me jump through hoops to do it and I ended up with a blog out of it. I had a blog once but lost interest in it. Took up too much time and all I was doing was linking. CB has motivated me to try again.

If all goes according to plan I should be in Kandahar in a month. Don't know how much time I will have to devote to blogging when I get there. We shall see.

While we wait for this blog to get good, check this out.

First Post

2004-08-11T17:41:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my blog. Not much to report yet. Check back later. In the meantime, go here.