Defiantone.com

If you visit this site with any frequency you’d notice that I seldom go a few days without making some sort of post. Well, you can consider this that post. I’ve got a larger and more detailed post thats coming down the pipeline complete with photos and videos but that will come later. I’ve got to wait until the sun comes out so I can snag a couple of pics of the new digs Jessica and I share.

Thats about it for now - more to come later

While I haven’t yet reached the west coast I have arrived in America and its quite nice to be back. I’m still rocking the same clothes that I’ve been wearing for the past 60 or so hours. Traveling via military channels seldom goes without a hitch and I had quite a few.

I was scheduled to leave Iraq on a nice and roomy C-17. We got to the terminal 8 hours before our plane was scheduled to depart (standard procedure). We got on the buses when the time came for us to depart but were turned around halfway to the plane - our original mission time had been scrubbed due to a sand storm. It dashed our hopes of leaving on time. We waited for 4 hours after our plane was supposed to depart in hopes that the skies would clear - the didn’t. They sent us back to the housing area and told us that we should come back 12 hours later. A few hours after we got back they told us that our flight would be leaving in 6 hours - a full 6 hours early wahoo! It turns out that they lied - we ended up waiting 14 hours at the terminal for our plane to leave.

While there we experienced the ubiquitous indirect fire attack (they were shooting mortars at us). I was asleep on one of the benches as EVERYONE else in the room hit the deck and covered their heads when the klaxon alarms went off. I didn’t move and inch. I woke up a few hours later and laughed as they told me about what had happened. I laughed because its funny - really - it is. I guess you have to be a complete and total cynic to laugh at sleeping through a mortar attack. Truth is, I’ve slept through dozens of them and was fine. They can’t aim and the base is HUGE! The odds of probability were on my side.

So - eventually we got stuck on a C-130. I’ve got to say - worst plane ride ever. Most of you have been crammed into economy seats - these seats economy look like first class. In order to cram us all in we had to be creative. The plane had seats along the outside wall of the plane and seats in the center facing out - while seated you were facing someone else. In order to make the fit we had to alternate legs - your leg, the person across from you, your leg, another person across from you - I have a video that I’ll upload later when I have time (and I’m not paying for internet by the hour).

We got to Al Udeid (in Qatar) and we scheduled to come back to the terminal in 14 hours to catch our flight. We were supposed to meet up at 5PM. The time came near and we were told that we weren’t going to leave as planned. We were told to meet again at 5AM. We got to the terminal at about 0530 expecting to leave around noon. The airplane gods are a vengeful bunch and delayed our plane - again. Our departure time slipped an additional 3 hours. Oh joy!

I’m finally home and thats the important part - and - I’m only hours away from seeing my girl. I can’t wait.

Well, I’m halfway home and I’m trying to type this out on a keyboard that was made for germans… das ist nicht so gut.

I’m in Leipzig at the moment and I’ve only got a 8 hour flight ahead of me before I get to my connecting flights in the states. All in all, I’ve had over 36 hours of delays while I have tried to make my way home. The delays ate up my free time in Baltimore but its no big deal - I’m going to get home soon.

Well, after 130 some odd days my time in dodge is finally over and I am getting the heck out of here. I’ve got more time to kill before my plane gets here but I don’t have to sleep another night (or day in my case) in Iraq.

The most baffling thing about my trip is that for some reason I haven’t made the Iraqis free. I put together explosives and they get dropped on people and for some reason we haven’t cleaned up this whole debacle yet. I figured I, of all people, could come over here and stop the shenanigans in Iraq.

Alas, I have failed in my quest to make them free - I don’t think this one is going to be fixed overnight (or within the next 3-5 years).

Oh well -

My roommate (one of the three) told me that he was bored as hell here and couldn’t wait to leave. I told him that I really didn’t have a problem because I’m an expert at goofing off. I hope that my expertise will take me through the next week because I have little to do save for goof off and travel from one point to the next. I do have a few books I saved back in case I decide to read as well as a laptop filled with hours of music. Internet cafes are always close and there are places to play video games and watch movies. I can still go to the gym and I can eat 4 times a day if I really wanted to (I don’t). I can play card games and billiards at the rec center if I wished to do so. I could just walk around base and sweat - or I could just sweat - its warm out here. I’ve redefined warm by the way - if its less than 100 its warm. If its over 100 its hot. If its over 110 a gateway to hell has opened and is blasting us with the overwhelming heat of hell. If its 120+ well, its probably the end of the world as I know it… but, I’ll be fine.

Wish me luck - its goof off time

Leaving her behind was one of the hardest things I’ve done in years. We left for the airport early this morning and quickly found out that my original flight plan was not going to work. Instead of flying through Denver to get to Baltimore we flew direct to Dulles and took a cab to Baltimore (where our hotel is). Travel wise it worked out fairly well and we ended up leaving 20 minutes after our originally scheduled flight departed. The other option was to wait around till 2PM - the other guys wanted to get to our destination and waiting to leave can really tug on your heart. Sometimes its just better to get it over with - leaving sucks, being gone still sucks but you can avoid thinking about it.

So - here I am in Baltimore on New Years Eve and I have nothing to do. I could go out and buy beer but I’d end up drinking alone - then again, if I went to a bar I’d still end up drinking alone. Oh well, such is my life.

Well, as I’ve mentioned, I’m scheduled to depart for my four months in Iraq and I finally have a date when I’m leaving - Jan 1. I still have quite a bit to do so I can take care of all of my personal affairs but I think I’ve got almost everything else wrapped up at work. I’ve got some training records to take care of this evening or tomorrow but I’m not sure when I’ll have a chance to do it. Odds are, I’ll have to give up doing something that I might enjoy so that I can finish my work.

I’m planning on snowboarding tomorrow - pending a check on the snow reports. Jessica is off to attend a wedding so I’m taking advantage of my free time to go while I have a chance.

Leaving here is going to suck but I need a break from my regular job. I tend to last for about a year in a particular location before I need to deploy for a while, take a vacation, or just change work sections. I definitely want to come back to maintenance but some people have been scheming to put me in Munitions Control when I return. I’d rather shoot myself in the face.

Why is it that people that do a good job always tend to get screwed while the worthless ones get nothing. Today, for example, one of our resident idiots wasted an entire day away. We tend to give him menial tasks because he is completely incompetent. Keep in mind that he has the same rank that I do and that he has been in for about five more years. We gave him the task at about 10AM and he told me that I had more work to do at about 1430 when I came back from what I was doing. I started on the rest of the work for the day (knowing full well he would skate out at the earliest opportunity because he was too worthless to even help) at about 1500. I enlisted the help of everyone else in the shop and we all left at about 1645. Who knows what time he left but I don’t think he finished the menial task we gave him. What a worthless piece of shit.

It doesn’t help he tends to fuck up on anything we might give him - I’ve got troops with less than a year on station that I would trust more than I might trust him.

Ok… back from the bunny trail

I’m not sure if I am going to get the uniforms I need on time by the time I am scheduled to deploy. I told my deployment manager that I would show up in my BDU’s (greens) in the desert if all else failed. I’m sure they would see the error in their ways and get me what I needed immediately. Its a shame that we can’t get the stuff on hand before I actually leave. Can you imagine how funny I would look when everyone else is wearing some brand of desert pattern and I am rocking the woodland?

I’m not looking forward to the bag drag - I think I’ll be carrying 4 bags - and after I get the required gear I’ll have to carry two additional bags - for the remainder of the necessities (clothing, towels, boots, etc.) Its a shame I can’t check a hand cart in my luggage and use it on the other end. If I had a few bungee straps it would work like a champ.

Ok… this has been a bit of rant - haven’t had one of those in a while - I guess you can tell how my Friday has been

What a week it has been. Earlier this week I gave my apartment manager notice that I intended to move out before the beginning of the month because I was slated to deploy. I found out a few days later that I was actually not going to deploy. On top of the fact that I wasn’t deploying I had already spent the money that I normally would have spent on rent so my only option was to apply the last months rent and find another place. I was going to have three paychecks in between the day I found out and move in day so I was sure that I could pay for rent and deposit but the whole thing was going to be a giant pain in the ass. On Thursday I was told that another guy that was slated to go to Iraq had received orders to Korea and they needed someone else to go. I volunteered… as I pretty much always will. I knew that Jessica was excited about me being around and that I knew she would be down because of my decision but I knew it was a tough choice I needed to make. I will miss her greatly but I will be back - and our lives should have slightly fewer stressers as I should be able to pay off one of my creditors.

So, I’m packing up all of my stuff to move into a storage unit before the end of the month but I don’t know when I’m leaving yet. The estimated in place date is from the day after Christmas to New Years - its all TBD. I’ve got a large chunk of the apartment packed up and I can probably get the rest packed up (that I won’t use in the next few weeks) in a night or two.

This should be an interesting trip but I’ll be fairly safe out there, well, as safe as one can be. I’ll continue to post here as frequently as I can. If you remember what happened last time you’ll find that I have enough time to rant and rave - almost daily. I’m not sure how the filters/internet access are going to work so I’ll have to see how it goes.

The main point of the trip down to the desolate wasteland of Beale AFB was to complete the AFCOMAC class. I have never worked so hard since I enlisted - I’ve worked hard but its never taken that much physical effort to get the job done. We were working on a gravel covered pad and it was a dusty dirty place. Every day I had a hard time figuring out what part of my skin was tanned and what part was covered with dirt. I took a photo of myself after work so you could see what I’m talking about.

Unfortunately you can’t see exactly how dirty I really was - I think the last time I was that dirty I was a little kid playing in the dirt at my grandma King’s house.

I did have a chance to visit Reno, the Biggest Little City in the World. Andy’s parents picked us up at Beale and took us down there and pretty much paid for the whole thing. It was a pretty sweet deal. I ended up loosing the money I had set aside for gambling but it was a calculated loss. I could either spend that money on booze and be bored or spend that money on gambling and get free drinks. All in all it was a wash.

You can check out all of the photos right here

Yeah, thats about all I’m going to write.

I took a trip yesterday to San Francisco and took a few photos while there. I had the opportunity to ride on the trams and have a “Full House” moment. The weather was freakin’ great so it was a very good day to go out there and see the sites. I’ve only uploaded the pictures you see below due to my extremely slow internet connection. While down on the wharf I had the chance to get some chowder in a sourdough bowl. All in all it was a fairly cool trip and I got to see some cool stuff. I’ll upload the rest of the pictures when I get back.

I’m working on uploading the rest of the photos, you can look here for them. It may be a few days/weeks before they all get uploaded but know that I’m working on it.

this is old but funny