Monday, February 26, 2007

Headin' Out

I head out tomorrow to return home. Susan, check your cox.net email for details.


Outta here,
Eric

It's the Final Countdown

It's kind of late here and I'm writing this blog. The rest of the guys in the open bay barracks have hit the sack and it's pretty dark. I thought about not posting, but I think I should.

Today was our last day of training. Technically, tomorrow could have been another training day, but we finished up everything early. Now, I have to see if I can change my plane tickets to an earlier date. I hope so.



It would be nice to spend a little more time with family. My mother-in-law is supposed to be in town then and my parents are coming up during that time, too. Maybe fate will be with me on this one.


That's it for this evening. Over and out,
Eric

Friday, February 23, 2007

On the Road Again

It's been a few days since I last posted comments here. But I'm back and ready to update you on my latest adventures. Those adventures would include some urban ops, as well as some convoy stuff. Again, I'll remind you that I don't expect my job to involve any of the above-mentioned items, but who knows.

While most of my group have been hoofing it around little fake villages, I've been in my HMMWV. As they went through this little town, building by building, I sat there with my engine idling. Whenever they needed us, they'd call us in.

Yesterday and today, however, we did some convoy stuff. Yesterday was a lot of instruction (under a tent, no seats, so it was stand, kneel, or sit on the ground). That was fun. Today, they ran us through a bunch of scenarios, in which I also drove my HMMWV, a lot. It really was pretty fun.

Now I'm down to two more days of training. I'm not sure what outbriefings we'll have to attend after that, but my return home date is still the 1st.


See you peeps later,
Eric

Monday, February 19, 2007

Urban Cowboy

So, for the last three days we've been learning about clearing rooms and marching in formations into cities, etc. Today would've probably been okay, but it was so looooong. We had the old death by powerpoint in the morning for a few hours and then we went into the "field." We had to march around, dive onto the ground, jump up, run around some more, yell a little bit, run around a little more, avoid running in front of any weapons (which were not loaded), and then stand around out of breath while we rehashed everything we did wrong. Fun, fun, fun.

It's the final countdown here, now. Just over a week to go and I'll be headed back to home-sweet-home. Can't wait.


Eric

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Fire on the Mountain

More firing practice today. Not only that, but they liked us so much, we get to go back tonight and fire some more. I guess it really doesn't hurt to have as much firing practice as possible: day time, night time, anytime. I'll take it.

Additionally, they taught us how to clear a house, room by room. Now, a lot of this training really has nothing to do with the job that I'm going to do. It's still better to have some basic knowledge of these jobs and never need it.

Less than two weeks before I get back to the family. FYI, I still haven't received the package that was mailed to me earlier this week. It might not hurt to check on its progress.


Eric

Friday, February 16, 2007

Crawling, Walking, Running

Today was another fun day. We learned how to move... Army style. We low crawled, we high crawled, we walked and we ran. And after running a little bit we'd throw ourselves back on the rocky/sandy ground. To top it all off, while we were running and hiding behind mounds of dirt and old vehicles, we had a couple of guys shooting paint balls at us.

At any rate, one phase of our training has ended and we are entering another one. For the next ten days (or so) we'll be putting into practice all the things we've been learning so far. It should prove to be interesting.


Gotta run,
Eric

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Ground Control to Major Tom

We had a little more radio and navigation training today. Again, it was pretty fun. We used a couple of different electronic items to navigate both on foot and in a vehicle. Move around, find the specified points, write down the number, Bob's your uncle, you're back.

I guess the big thing right now is all the tension. I think the constant training and separation from family is getting to many people. We are way past the polite stage now, so there are a lot of things getting to people. Small segments of our group do act as a team, but we haven't quite formed ourselves up as a complete team, yet. I think the fact that we know we're not going to be stationed together may be a barrier to the whole team concept. We'll have to see what happens over the next two weeks.

Speaking of the hard work we've been doing and the stress we're all under, we went bowling yesterday. We had to go over to the Ft. to return some items, so we stopped in. It really was a pretty good stress relief, for the most part. I was pretty proud of my first game (158). My second game was pretty good, too (122). Anyway, it made me a little homesick to get back and watch my kids doing their bowling thing.


Guess that's all for now. Miss everyone and looking forward to getting back home,
Eric

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Day 17

Two weeks to go in this training and it'll be all over. Don't get me wrong, I think having the training is nice. When you're going to a place like Iraq, it's better to have as much training and familiarization as possible. So, I appreciate all the things we're getting and I'm trying hard to pay attention to it all.

In saying that, today was a relatively short day. We learned about a specific type of radio that the military often uses in Iraq. I found the course pretty interesting and fun. There were several pieces of equipment associated with it that we also learned to use. Anything that has logical steps and processes to it, like a puzzle is always a little fun for me. Once I got it in my head, it was a snap to go back through it. It also seems like something that I won't brain dump right away. A little refresher training down the road and I'll be good to go.

We headed back over to the Ft. this afternoon and evening. We had to return the weapons of the guy who had appendicitis. He won't be coming back to train, and I think someone else will be selected to fill his billet. It's too bad, all the stuff he had to go through.

Finally, I hear that there are more Air Force folks coming in, who are going to be doing the same job as us. Their training will just be starting this weekend, though. I'm not sure when they will be headed out to theater. For the time being, I'm sure some of them will be staying in the same barracks as us.


Hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day. See you soon,
Eric

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Les Miserables

Today was pretty miserable. I had to make up a training course without the rest of my team. First we were inside having "death by powerpoint." That was no worse than usual. Then we went out to this trail outside. You're supposed to march it and identify different items. We were placed in this group with some Canadians. It was pretty cool, except they often communicate in French. So, I didn't understand half of what they were saying. While we were out there, it began to rain/drizzle. I had not brought my gloves and the rain was cold. Less than half way through the trail, my hands were red and numb. Luckily, it warmed up a little in the afternoon and I wasn't so miserable.

Now I'm back, just waiting on dinner time to roll around. One of our guys is trying to convince me to head over to our Rec Center tonight and watch some American Idol. That's around my bedtime, so I'm not sure if I'm going or not.


Just another day in paradise,
Eric

Monday, February 12, 2007

Day 15

Today was more classroom time, looking at bigger weapons. The rest of the gang get to practice shooting them tomorrow. I, on the other hand, get to make up the day I missed when I was on quarters. It shouldn't be too bad.



I forgot to mention that yesterday was my miliversary (Feb 11, 2007 = 16 years). That's a self pat on the back. So, as of today I officially have less than 4 years left to retirement.

It's late, so I'll be hitting the sack.


Later,
Eric

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Hit Me With Your Best Shot, Fire Away

I thought today was going to be just a rehash of old stuff, but it turned out to be pretty good. We went out to fire the M-16 and M-9 again. Since I recently qualified on those weapons, I wasn't too excited. I assumed we would be getting "Army" qualified, since they don't recognize the Air Force quals.

As it turned out, it was the Air Force giving our evals. So, this one counts for everything. It is even more cool because I qualified as marksman on my M-16 today. You have to hit 43 out of 50 shots on the targets to make marksman. I hit the targets 45 times out of 50. I'm excited. Now, I get to wear the marksman ribbon. Whoo hoo!

Lastly, I want to send out a Happy Valentines to all my friends and family, expecially to my wife. I know I didn't send anything out of here, but I promise to take her out for a belated Valentine dinner when I get back home.


TTFN,
Eric

Saturday, February 10, 2007

Welcome to My Blah-g

Today was kind of boring. More weapons training. Went to visit our sick friend in the hospital. Waiting to watch "Talladega Nights."


Blah,
Eric

Friday, February 9, 2007

TGIF (Day 12)

The phrase TGIF used to mean a whole lot: end of the week, some days off coming to me, hanging out with friends, a lot of stuff. It means even more right now, because there is no day off, no end of the week. Tomorrow we get to go train on using our weapons. Now, we've all trained on them before, but we get to do it again. At least all 12 of us, 13 since we added another officer to the group, will be in class together again.

The HMMWV training went well and we had our tests today. All I have to say is "100%, Baby."

One last update before I go... the enlisted guy who got rolled back in training. They finally sent him to the real hospital the other day. While he was there, his appendix burst. They had to do some major surgery to clean him up. He was still in ICU the last I heard. It really sucks because we were getting ready to welcome him to the group and this happened. I really hope he completely recovers soon.


I'm outta here... for now,
Eric

Thursday, February 8, 2007

Day 11

We continued with the HMMWV driving today, took it on some dirt roads in the desert. We got out a little early, but had to be back to do some night-time driving... with blackout lights. It was hard to see where we were supposed to go. The road was nothing more than a slightly lighter shade of black. All in all, it was pretty good.

We were supposed to have several hours between the day driving and the night driving. Then, as fate would have it, we had to go back to the Ft. to get even more stuff issued to us. There's some pretty cool things among what we got today, like a nicer helmet, some cold-weather boots, and other stuff.

This marks about the 1/3 done with training day, it won't be long now.


Eric

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

I'm Driving My Life Away

The past two days... HMMWV (that's HUM-VEE, to you and me) training. Yesterday was mostly classroom and doing the PMCS (that's a long, drawn out inspection). Today, however, was another story.

Today was all driving. The first half of the day was driving through cones in four different stations. There was the serpentine (zig-zagging in and out of cones, then reversing through the same course), back-up (between cones that were not much wider than the vehicle), diminished curve (which starts out wide and gets more narrow as you curve to the left), and the stop (in which you have to get the vehicle up to 30 mph and then slam on the brakes and stop in an expected space). They were all pretty fun.



The last half of the day was just plain driving... way out these dusty desert roads. It was pretty relaxing.

Then went to the gym and topped it off with burning 300 calories. (Obviously, I'm much better than I was a few days ago.)


Talk at you later,
Eric

Monday, February 5, 2007

Another Day, Another $60

Today, as promised, we continued our first aid training, all 10 hours of it. I had no idea people could talk so much about checking for breathing, pulse, and responsiveness; placing bandages and splints; stopping bleeding; treating shock; and any number of other things that escape my mind right now. Every-so-often we would get up, go outside, put on the gear, and do a practical demonstration for the instructors. At least that got us out of our seats.



There's a thing in the military that we call "death by powerpoint." Powerpoint is a program developed by Microsoft that allows you to put together a "slideshow" presentation. Usually, in a military briefing, someone puts together a bunch of slides with writing on them and clicks them off one by one as they elaborate on whatever subject they're teaching. I think this is so they don't have to tell you everything. They can just tell you some of the things and you're supposed to read the rest off the slides. It makes for a pretty boring time. That's why we call it "death by powerpoint." That's almost what we had today.

There were two things that saved the day: the practical exercises, I mentioned above, and a field exercise we did at the end of class. It was a simulated "under fire" exercise where I got to play someone who's injured in a vehicle. My two buddies ran over, while under fire, and dragged me out of the vehicle (literally) and had to "take me to safety and assess my condition and wounds." It was pretty fun. More than being fun, it's the kind of thing that's important to know.

I complain some, but all-in-all I'm glad to have this kind of training for when I finally deploy.


I'm about toast right now,
Eric

Sunday, February 4, 2007

Calgon, Take Me Away (Day 8)

Today was a long, long day. I woke up (without an alarm) at 4:30 am. I had gone to sleep about 9:00 pm, so it wasn't too bad. Went to breakfast, had French Toast, water, and orange juice, then went to the clinic for BP check. This morning it was 126/98 or something like that. That was a big improvement over yesterday, when it was 148/103 (but I was sick, with a temp of 101).

Anyway, the first part of today's training was pretty fun. We learned about reading maps and using compasses, changing from grid north to magnetic north, and some other cool things. Then we split into four groups of three and each group had to land navigate to three points and then return to the starting point. Our team did pretty well. We only had trouble with our first point, which was about 800 meters from the starting point. The next one was only 200 meters from the first point, and the third was 600 meters from the second. Remember, during all this we're wearing about 25 lbs of gear. That might not seem like much, but go grab a 25 lb. weight and start walking around with it. The weight might be even more, but I'm not sure how much the M-16 and M-9 weigh, plus a full canteen, and a gas mask and carrier, and don't forget the boots and kevlar helmet. It was tough, but fun.

The worst part of the day started after lunch. We had to sit through over four hours of first aid slideshows and then demonstrate what we had learned. We are also looking forward to continuing that first aid training for maybe 15 hours tomorrow. Woo hoo! Not!



An update, of sorts, on the new guy I mentioned had joined us late. The day after he arrived, we had to go back to the Ft. for more gear. While we were there, he got sick, cramping and upset stomach. Yesterday, while I was on quarters lying here on my bunk, he came back from training... still sick. Apparently he was terribly uncomfortable even trying to sit down. He lay down on his bunk at about 9:30 am and didn't get up until after 7:00 pm, then went right back to bed. This morning... still sick. He got quarters again and, as far as I know, has been sleeping all day long again. Since tomorrow's training is a continuation of today's training, he won't be able to go to that either. He has so much mandatory training to make up. I feel bad for him when he recovers. He might even have to extend his training here.

The Calgon reference in the title is kind of a double joke. One, I remember the old commercials, where women just wished themselves away into a bubble bath. That would be nice right now. Two, this barracks is not even equipped with a bathtub (not that I would sit in it, if there was one,) showers only.


Day 8 means 1/4 done, by the way,
Eric

Saturday, February 3, 2007

Lost in Training (Day 7)

At least, I'd like to think this is Training Day 7. I was put on quarters today (had a temperature and blood pressure was really high). So, I didn't get to do all the cool stuff the rest of the guys did. Unfortunately, it's one of the mandatory things, so I'll have to make it up at some point.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be feeling better. Whether I do or not, I intend to push through and get it done. I can't afford to miss another mandatory training session.

So, that's about all there is to tell. I spent most of the day in my barracks.


Ho hum,
Eric

Friday, February 2, 2007

Running Around (Day 6)

We were actually pretty busy most of today. This morning (I was having flashbacks to Basic Training) we had to put on the body armor and strap our gas mask to our belts before marching to our first class. The air was so cold, that in conjunction with my cold/flu/allergy/whatever, my lungs were burning.

Then we headed over to the Ft. again. Several days ago we were supposed to get a lot of stuff issued from Office 'A.' But that office wouldn't give it to us, something about paperwork not being in order. So, today we went back to Office 'B' (that we had already been to) and picked up a bunch of stuff that we hadn't gotten before. To top it all off, we may have to return what we got today at Office 'B' and pick stuff up later at Office 'A.' Aaaagggghhhh!

We came back to Radiator Springs and I tried to get back over to the clinic this afternoon, but we got back too late. I thouight they'd be open later, but 4:00 pm is their closing time. I'll have to see if I can get in there at 6:00 am.

Our officers wanted us all to get suited up for a quick inspection/briefing. So we put on the gear and took everything over. They looked us over and sent us on our way.

It's so late that I'm not even going over to the Rec Center. I think I'll just stay in and study for promotion.


Already missing everybody, can't wait for March to roll around,
Eric

Thursday, February 1, 2007

Greetings from Radiator Springs (Day 5)

I don't think I've spent a more boring day in my entire life. I'm still trying to get over this cold. I'm doing better, I think.

We didn't have any training at all today. I still got up at 0600 to hit the chow hall for breakfast, came back, laid down for a little more sleep, got up, washed some clothes, went to the gym, watched some of our guys play basketball, got on the elliptical machine, went to the chow hall for lunch, got a hair cut, and watched a couple of movies.

On the other hand, I was able to get through to my wife on my cell phone. That was pretty exciting. It's a first out here in the middle of nowhere. Some of the group have dubbed this little camp, "Radiator Springs." So, we talked for a little while.

We only have about an hour of training tomorrow, but we have to wear the big vest and a pouch strapped to our leg. In addition, we get to march to the location of training. I knew it would start to get fun eventually.

On another positive note, I have been using this machine at the gym. It looks kind of like an elliptical machine, but you can set it for Cross Country, Cross Training, Fat Burner, Total Body, and other things. Today I got on it and felt pretty bad, so I only burned about 260 calories. Over the past few days, however, I've burned at least 350 calories per day on it. I've been told not to get on it tomorrow because I'm sick. So, I'll start back in a couple days.

Looks like we just got a new TSgt here, too. Haven't really met him, yet.


Gotta run,
Eric