Iraq Bound... Or How I Spent My Summer Vacation...

Well I am back in Iraq. I got here yesterday afternoon, I would of updated the blog last night but I literally crawled into the shower and then into bed. So let me tell you about the last ten days or so... lets see, I saw Pearl Harbor with my grams, Which was very somber but definitely could not be missed. I did go out drinking one more time met up with a couple of soldiers that are stationed in Hawai`i, we hung out, drank a little and wandered around down town Honolulu for a little bit, we ended up in a strip club where I bought a girl a lap dance, and gave a guy about twenty dollars in singles so he could give them to the stripper he was completely enthralled with. I will never understand my compulsion to go to strip clubs and then completely avoid strippers. The strip club was called Hawai`i By Night and it could not have been smaller if it had been in a single wide mobile home. (We will all pretend that not one of us have any idea how small trailers can be... ) Gramps and I saw The Omen, neither one of us was very impressed, and then Gramps, Grams and I went and saw Cars (the new Disney Pixar animated film) That was very good, I definitely would suggest that you all go see it. I can not believe how many movies I saw while I was in Hawaii, I think I saw at least 10 if not more... sheesh! The trip to Dallas was fairly uneventful I did get to sit in First Class on the way to Los Angeles and on the connecting flight I met a very sweet newlywed couple. They had met on a plane two years before on the way to Peru and spent a week together walking the Inca Trail, they had just got married three days before I met them and were on their way to Belize for their honeymoon. So here is the fun part I had actually left Hawai`i a night early because I was going to meet a friend in Dallas and we were going to spend some time getting to know each other. We met online and had spent much of the last week talking on the phone and decided that it would be fun to get together in Dallas and see if the chemistry we felt carried over into a physical attraction, unfortunately as she was stepping on to the plane to Dallas a guy grabbed her arm and she popped him one in the face. (My kind of girl!) Well the Airport security grabbed them both and she missed her flight. Unfortunately we will have to wait until after I get back stateside to meet in person. She really is a very sweet young woman, She is a Nurse at a pediatric hospital in Alabama. And I think we will call her “Rocky” from now on... as in Rocky Balboa. Eh it’s funny to me. So the day I was supposed to leave Dallas I met a woman by the name of Martha J. Nemechek who is the mother of Joe Nemechek the driver of the US Army NASCAR car. Yeah I didn’t have any idea who she was either, but she was a really sweet old lady and just said thank you so much for your service and that her son drives for the soldiers. It was kind of cool. The flight to Kuwait seemed endless and as I mentioned before our lay over was in Budapest, Hungary. And because of some bureaucratic BS we weren’t allowed to leave the plane, I wish I could describe how upset all the smokers were with this information but not even I am that good a writer. We arrived in Kuwait a little after ten pm on the 15th and were asked to be at formation the next morning at 0900 so that they could take accountability and let us know when our flight was to depart, after the 9am briefing I found out I would not be leaving that morning, and decided to get a massage. I have mentioned the appeal of these massages before. Attractive woman rubbing me down with baby oil, not a bad way to spend a Saturday morning let me tell you. That is unless you have the masseuse that I had. It isn’t just that she was completely repulsive. Because trust me she was. This woman was mean and I swear to you she bruised my neck and my ribs. I can not possibly describe her in enough detail to convey how truly hideous she was. I will how ever do my best. She was six foot 5 and easily 220 pounds her face resembled the Oompa Loompa in Johnny Depp’s Charlie and The Chocolate Factory except that she had teeth similar to the inhabitants on Skull Island in King Kong. If I’m lying I’m dying. I could seriously count all of her teeth using only one hand. Now please understand I am not usually one to rag on someone else’s teeth. As mine are far from being considered perfect but her teeth were hideous... Pointing every which way some were yellow one was almost black... I’m sure you at least partially understand the woman was not going to win any beauty contests anytime soon; in fact I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t even give her a participant’s ribbon. Needless to say I am just a little scarred emotionally from this traumatic experience. Yesterday morning we were told to be at the designated spot at 0730 and we would be departing soon after, after waiting for two hours they finally took us out to the airplane. It turned out that the Japanese Air Force was going to be flying us into Iraq. Which I thought was pretty cool. After we were all loaded on to the plane and had sat there in the heat for over 20 minutes one of the Japanese guys in very broken English apologized to us and informed us that “The plane is broke.” and then he asked us to wait outside and they would get another plane ready two hours later the second plane was ready and after we had all gotten on and were once again sweating up a storm the same guy very obviously embarrassed informed us that this plane was broken as well. He made his apologies and said they had one more plane and they will try again... two and a half hours later we all piled on to a third aircraft and actually made it off the ground. We had one passenger get airsick which was very unfortunate. But in the end she was alright... the plane did kind bounce around a lot so I really don’t blame her one bit. Once we arrived in Tallil I waited a few minutes for my checked bag. And started the long slow walk back to my trailer once I got their I realized that I did not have my room key as I had left it with The Man With the Big V-8, luckily he was not at work and told me that RFG had my keys as he had borrowed a movie last. So after I woke RFG up I got my keys and opened my door only to find out that my air conditioner was not working. It was beyond hot in my room (the average temp has gone up almost 15 degrees since that last time I was here!) so after I tracked down my new supervisor to let him know I had made it back. (I’ll explain that all in my next blog) and took a long awaited shower. After a shower that was probably longer than absolutely necessary I went to the billeting office and begged for them to fix my air conditioner. Which they finally got around to doing about 5 hours later... I literally passed out as they were replacing the AC unit. This morning I unpacked my things and put my room back the way it belonged and later today I will be picking up my weapon and finding out just what my new responsibilities entail. Oh the fun!!!!


Riddle me This:
The answer to the previous riddle is
Potatoes, Dice (as in Snake Eyes), Needles, Storms , I.e. Hurricanes, tornadoes, cyclones and the like. And a true lover, as in love is blind, Gramps has a ton more answers that you can check yours against.

And today’s Riddle is as follows:
In a tunnel of darkness lies a beast of Iron, it can only attack when pulled back. What is it????