A day in the life

The sun comes up between 5 and 6 am and goes down around 9 or 10 pm. Long days. I am able to get out of bed in the mornings. I believe this is attributed to the lack of nicotine flows through my veins. The patch does not put near the same amount that my body has become accustom to. I don’t usually go to the office till 0900. This is usually because I do not leave the office till late in the evening. With the time difference that evening is the best time to handle any stateside affairs such as purchases with the Government Credit card. I wish I did not have this but someone has to do it. This morning I was lucky enough to catch my wife on Instant mail. We usually wait till in the evening here but I caught her in the evening there. The time is really confusing. We are 9 hours ahead but if you use Texas time then we are 9 behind. I just add three and change from am to pm or vice versa. After we talked I rode my bike to the chow hall for some of that Good Army Chow made by people who I have noticed don’t eat it. They are refered to as Hodgies (Iraqi people) but most are Indians or Pakistanis. They work for next to nothing but are being paid millions in their eyes. I talked to the man who sews on our patches and he said he did not have a job in his home country. “No work” he said. I asked if he was married and he said “Not yet” with a smile. I think he may have someone in mind. Anyway I think I am rambling. Oh yeah breakfast I had to eat because the ulcers in my mouth have made eating a chore and I get tired of trying before I get full, Plus I am out of coffee and refuse to drink Maxwell House. I guess I should not be picky but something are just not the same as “Folgers in your cup”. After eating about half my food I headed off to the weekly supply meeting. This meeting is where the supply guys get together and gripe about what is going wrong here and how it is next to impossible to account for property. We also share secrets and contacts for “drug deals” to get things that cannot be obtained through the system. IE Near beer fresh meats and extra milk and so on. The mess hall will not give you more than you can carry out so we have made “contacts” to help us. It is mostly a complaint session though. Afterwards I rode back to the office. The office and the house are right next to each other. We have it the best by far. I think I have mentioned before that most have to go outside and use the plastic bathrooms and walk to a shower trailer. We have a complete Hodgie bathroom. Every thing here is strange. The shower is among the strangest. It is a corner of the room with plumbing sticking out of the wall. The strange thing is until us westerners got here there was no shower curtain. I guess they just stood there in the corner and splashed water all over the room. We quickly got something rigged up to fix that problem. After a few minutes in the office I remembered that I forgot to re-dispatch my truck on the day prior. My supply clerk usually handles this but she is headed home for some much needed R and R. So I have to do everything myself and try to remember how to do things that she has been handling since we arrived. I feel lost in my own supply room. I quick trip to the motorpool and redispatch. Takes a little while as the vehicle has to be completely inspected to ensure that it will not fail when it is needed. After that it was lunch time. I managed to eat a little more. I have found something that I really like in the chow hall. It is some hard rolls. I mean hard as a rock. I cut them in half and add lunch meat and cheese a few jalapenos and some black olives and then nuke the whole plate for 35 seconds. This makes the bread soft but only while it is warm. I add a bag of chips that has a bunch of writing that I can’t read. They have Ketchup flavored chips here. They are okay but I would not pay for them. Wash it all down with a Gatoraide. I must admit that I really tried to make this sound good. The main line is where the problems come from but I will tell you about that when I get to the dinner meal. After lunch I was buried in paperwork. I account for 4 different types of property. The totals of this property are in excess of 10 million dollars. I know the exact figure because I was asked to total it up. This property does not leave unless I have a Hand receipt for it. I must know where it all is at all times. You know you have been doing it too long when you can remember serial numbers and locations without looking at your paperwork. The Commander called and said he wanted to go shopping. Having this credit card at times is a benefit. I really needed to make it to the PX because I needed some shaving gel and some bath soap. The benefit is he borrowed an NTV( Toyota Land Cruiser) to get us there. It could have been an Opal for all I care as long as it has air. Remember we are experiencing a cold front. I looked at the temp gage just now an at 7:30 pm it is 106. The high was supposed to be 118 and I am sure we made it. After the shopping trip the CO dropped me off and it was again chow time. I mounted my trusty bike and rode to chow once again. Today was steak night. Usually steak night is on Friday. Okay right now you are picturing a steak a real piece of meat cooked by someone who knows how to prepare a steak. Well riding up to the mess hall on steak night is the only time it will seem real. They cook the steaks on a BBQ pit outside. Still sounds appealing huh? Then they put them in a pot with water in the bottom and carry them in and put them in the oven. This makes these lovely smelling steaks taste like liver by the time they are served. I had fried shrimp which is hard for them to mess up. I ate half the steak and all of the shrimp and again wash it down with a gatoraide. The sodas here taste odd. My soda of choice has not been seen since my return trip. I have seen a Fully leaded Dr Pepper on occasion but the Dt DP is the best. After dinner you guessed it back on the bike and back to the office.

Well in a nutshell that is a day in the life. I censored and left out arguments with people not doing there jobs. Some things are best not shared.