war is real

2005-10-21T20:52:00.000-07:00

i have cq. cq sucks.

2005-10-19T21:01:00.000-07:00

the range went well, i guess. usually i judge these types of things by whether or not someone has a weapon blow up in their face, so by that account it was a success. that actually happened a few months ago at a range -- there was a batch of bad 50cal ammunition, and it blew up one of the weapons mounted on a up-armored humvee. several were hurt, but nothing was life threatening.

tomorrow is a day full of classes, and friday is supposed to be an off day, so i'll try to write more tomorrow.

sleep

2005-10-19T04:52:00.000-07:00

i'm getting ready to leave to cover an m4 range. sleep did not go very well last night, and i'm thinking about taking ambien sporadically to get some sleep when i need it the most. last night would be a perfect example of one of those times i need it the most, because i need to be alert today with all the live fire going on, and i'm just not.

okay, i give up

2005-10-18T20:56:00.000-07:00

this is why i took zoloft, because it helps me let shit slide off of me. things don't bother me as much when i'm medicated, and life is better. of course, it's all fake, which is why i'm choosing to sit here and write about what's going on instead of taking my meds and sleeping the misery away.

so last time i was in iraq i kept this blog. we won't name it, because that would be foolish of me. anyway, the blog got some attention, good attention, but it also got the wrong kinds of attention. i went through some very arduous meetings with people who normally would have gone through their entire army careers without ever knowing my name or coming into personal contact with me. you know the type, and i don't have to tell you what i mean. enlisted don't mix with officers. they're better than us, they get paid more than us, and therefore they must be smarter than us. which is why all those meetings happened, because these people were wondering why i could write the way i could, and why, if i have a college degree, was i enlisted?

well, it was none of their fucking business to begin with, so let's get that out of the way.

so i had these meetings, meetings where they told me what i could and couldn't say anymore. nevermind the fact that the press i recieved was good press and it cast our unit in an extreme positive light. i wanted to highlight some of the good we'd done over there in spite of the things i'd seen, because i knew the army would get me help eventually and i was tired of reading stupid ass reporters and stupid ass bloggers who commented on the war without ever getting their fat asses up and actually trying to make a difference in our country. it's easy enough to sit back behind a computer screen when you're hunkered down in decatur, isn't it, but it's a lot fucking harder to walk down to your recruiting station and actually try to make a change. not that i'm recommending that to anyone.

so these meetings ended. i ended up having to run my stuff through a censor, who would highlight shit i had to take out. i grew tired of this and stopped posting. it got old, and i was tired of meetings.

so iraq ended. i came home, sought counseling and got medicated, and things were fine. i started writing this blog because i needed some form of therapy that the army wasn't giving me and still isn't giving me. life moved on, we got a new chain of command, and things were looking up. i'm up for promotion, etc. you get the drill.

so today i find out that they're contemplating opsec violation charges against me for my OLD blog. nevermind the fact that these motherfuckers were NOT HERE when it occurred; none of the people in my current chain of command, or COC, were here when all those meetings went down the last time. so what fucking right, if you don't mind me asking, do they have to bring shit like that up? they don't. they have no fucking right. they can't give me a counseling statement, they can't do shit, and i'm going to JAG tomorrow and raising hell. i am tired of having my rights impeded on just because the army is old fashioned and refuses to change because they can't see the forest for the trees.

i'm done. bedtime.

shit

2005-10-18T19:35:00.000-07:00

Okay, I love this. I realize it's not really a design and looks like ass, but there's something about it that I connect with, especially given that my chain of command is royally trying to fuck me over for the blog I kept in Iraq LAST TIME. This was almost two FUCKING YEARS AGO and the new people in charge are trying to bring me up on opsec violation charges. well you know what, fuck that, and fuck them too, because i'm writing here, and my bile has barely begun to spew forth.

more later. i need to drink beer right now. i also need to watch anchorman, because that always makes me feel better.

seriously, though -- i'll get on here on thursday and tell you what's going on. right now, i'm too pissed off to write about it, and i guess i want a clear head before i say what i'm going to say. i've got a range tomorrow, so i probably won't write, but thursday....thursday is fair game.

Comments

2005-10-18T14:30:00.000-07:00

MauserGirl dropped me an email to let me know that commenting on my site wasn't working. I couldn't figure it out, so I just changed the template. I'm not much for graphics and stuff, but I'll try to throw something better-looking together tonight.

2005-10-16T23:04:00.000-07:00

It's another one of those sleepless nights. The Ambien is sitting right over there on the counter, and all I have to do is get out of my bed, walk over to the sink, put a few of those suckers down my throat, swallow some water, and sleep will come. Sleep will come fast and it will come deeply.

I really want to take it. I need to. I probably should. But I know the downward spiral that will soon follow that night of great sleep, and I don't feel like going through it again.

Reading

2005-10-16T20:35:00.000-07:00

Just finished reading Just Another Soldier. It's a great read, as I expected it would be, although I still prefer Colby's book overall. Jason is a great writer and just Colby, you really get a feel for the experiences we go through over there. I liked My War simply because it was dirty and real, which is what the memories I have from there are like. My memories aren't full of good and noble peacekeeping missions, they're full of blood and guts and friends dying from mortar attacks. I can actually say that I probably don't remember 30% of our time over there thanks to the medications they put me on when I got home, which I guess was the intended result.

I'm somewhat selective on what blogs I read on a daily basis, but Mauser Girl has won herself a spot in my Daily Reads bookmarks just by being an excellent writer. I only wish she had an RSS feed so I could subscribe to her; I've only just recently discovered the RSS thing and it's been an incredible timesaver for me because I'm able to just scan through the stuff I like and ignore the shit I don't like.

I'm going back to my weekend.

About The Picture...

2005-10-15T22:55:00.000-07:00

A few people have written to me after recognizing the guy standing in the road on the picture up top. Most of you musical buffs will realize that this is a cropped image from the cover of Abbey Road by The Beatles. Instead of trying to write the same reply to hundreds of different people, I thought I'd go ahead and tell you why I selected that picture and why it's cropped the way it is.

That guy standing in the background? He's in one of the most famous record covers in the world, and the most famous band in the world is walking down the street right by him. To me, that's my life in a nutshell. I stay in the background of things and let others take the forefront, mostly because I despise glorifying yourself for defending your country. I know I'm fucked up in the head and so is 80 percent of the people around me, but that's one small price to pay for the liberties we're able to share in.

So yeah. That's me. The guy in the background while all the famous stuff is going on all around him.

Common Sense

2005-10-15T07:41:00.000-07:00

Will somebody help me understand why they can't give us time to spend with our families, even though we're scheduled to deploy in one month and won't get to see them for at least eight months? Why in the blue fucking hell would you schedule stuff on the weekends when all we do during the regular work week is sit around and do nothing? I know "hurry up and wait" is part of the Army and all, but it would seem to be a good idea to actually schedule work, you know, DURING THE WORK WEEK so that we can have time off on the weekends to be with our families and loved ones.

Maybe that makes too much sense. I know the Army doesn't like it when you use common sense, so that must be it.

I had a pretty rough dream last night. It was war-related, of course. We were in Iraq and the war was going on and we were all using M4's, but outside of that all the weaponry was medieval. I'm talking castles, cannons, horses, spears and M4's. Everyone died, of course, but at least there was some fucking variety in the dream and it wasn't just mortars raining down from above. I guess cannonballs are just as bad.

Emails

2005-10-13T16:50:00.000-07:00

I got an email from B. Abell Jurus, who co-wrote one of my favorite war novels of all time, Men In Green Faces. It's crazy to think that this little page is reaching so many people, including those who I have long admired for the writing they do.

To answer a question that gets posed quite often: yes, it's hard as hell to stay off the medication. The Zoloft was no problem; I was angry as hell and pissed at the world for the first few weeks, but after that everything seems a slight shade of normal. The Ambien, however, is a different story. I think you're only supposed to be prescribed Ambien for a total of 30 days, and I had been on it a YEAR when I stopped taking it. And they would have gladly continued to prescribe it to me so long as I kept showing up for formations and doing my job. It's highly fucking addictive, and I still have withdrawals around 2100 on some nights. The toughest part are the nights where I know I'm not going to be able to sleep, because then I want to take the Ambien and be done with it, but I refuse to let myself do it. It'd be too easy to get back in a cycle of medicating myself so that the pain goes away, but that seems like the easy way out, and I hate the easy way out.

Which is another reason I'm keeping my blog anonymous. I actually tried talking with my commander about registering this thing under my real name, but the chain of command flipped out on me, told me I couldn't do it and I wasn't allowed to do it, and I told them that yes, actually I was, and they told me I wouldn't do it this time. I said that it was a form of therapy, and they told me I could only write my entries and then save them on my computer, but couldn't publish them.

Well, fuck that.

I'm going to keep writing until my fucking fingers bleed, because God knows the Army doesn't give two shits whether you are suffering from any kind of PTSD or not. They just want you back on the battlefield and it doesn't matter what condition you're in. I mean, I don't mind going back, because anyone will tell you that being deployed is better than suffering through the bullshit in garrison, but give us SOMETHING, anything to hold on to that can help us through it instead of turning a blind eye and telling everyone to "man up". In my experience, being a man has nothing to do with dealing with traumatic experiences in a way where no one else knows that you're hurting inside. Shit, I've got problems, and I'll fucking TELL you I have problems. Does that make me any less of a man?

I love my job. I actually love working with soldiers. But the shit that people pull because "that's how it's always been" is grating on me.

I'll Keep Posting

2005-10-08T19:42:00.000-07:00

So I think I'm going to keep on writing. I miss the therapy that comes with writing my thoughts down on paper, and I kinda miss the interaction that comes when people actually read this thing and give me their own thoughts.

A quick updated on what I've been up to:

- I've been off Zoloft and Ambien for two months and I wish I could say that life was all peachy but the reality of the situation is that life is pretty hard without the drugs. I'm determined to suck it up and see things through as clean as I can but I'd be lying if I said that the Army doesn't make me want to shoot myself in the face sometimes. I am enjoying being able to see things clearly, but that also means that every little thing the Army does that I disagree with annoys the living shit out of me.

- If you don't have My War (Colby's book) yet, fucking get up from the computer and go to your local bookstore and buy the fucking thing. I'm only in Part Two and it's fucking engrossing reading, the kind of reading that you just can't seem to stop no matter how tired you are of looking at the paper. It's awesome and you must have it, especially if you are a frequent reader of these blogs, and I'd reckon you probably are if you're still visiting my blog after me going three months without posting anything.

Still there?

2005-10-03T13:54:00.000-07:00

anyone still read this thing? i sure haven't, at least not since i left for california in august for ntc.

ntc went well. mostly. it was sweltering hot and we were drinking hot water most days, which really pretty much took the life right out of you. it was no fun at all, but at least it's over now.

we're getting ready to deploy in november. i'm not sure of the dates and i couldn't tell you even if i wanted to, but i might write about it. i'm still tossing that idea back and forth, because part of me wants to write about it and enjoys getting this shit off my chest, while the other (logical) part of me knows that i'll have to register the site with my chain of command and lost the anonymity that i currently enjoy. so what should i do? take the site public and reveal who i am, or shut it down? or keep fighting the man and posting with a fake name until they finally catch on?

2005-07-01T20:21:00.000-07:00

We're getting ready to leave for California next week for another round of training. The past few weeks have been absolutely ridiculous, and I haven't gotten off work before seven in at least 10 days. Not so bad, you might think, but keep in mind that we go to work at 0430, before most of you have even turned in from a heavy night of drinking.

I'll be gone for 38 days, in which time I'm supposed to be able to check email and internet on occasion. To be honest, this might be the last post you ever see from me; in case you haven't heard, the military has introduced a formal rule that requires all bloggers in a warzone to formally notify the commanders that they intend on keeping a journal. I'm not going to identify myself, so the big question is whether or not I want to actually keep doing this and risk UCMJ punishment, or just stop doing it. Either way, I'm keeping a journal so that, upon my return, I can publish it, either as an ebook or with a big house. Writing has been extremely therapeutic for me and I have been medication-free for five weeks, following a relapse with Ambien. I stopped everything cold turkey, and life has been better for it, so I guess the big draw with me being a crazy soldier on medication and talking shit about everyone is probably over, and I'll go back to having one reader a day anyway.

It's all good. I'll still be maintaining a journal online....you'll just never be able to guess that I was WIR for a time.

2005-06-10T23:17:00.000-07:00

It was an entirely crazy week, and I wasn't even the one going loco.

Monday saw an attempted suicide by someone who we never would have expected to do such a thing. Tuesday saw a soldier go AWOL who, before that moment, we never would have expected to do such a thing. Wednesday saw a soldier get arrested for drunk driving and thrown in County, and I can't say we were really all that surprised.

And they call ME the crazy one. Shit, I seem half normal compared to some of these cats.

Ugh

2005-06-04T05:36:00.000-07:00

So i picked up an iPod Shuffle yesterday in preparation for the upcoming deployment. Having personal entertainment devices such as mp3 players, game boys and books is an absolute must, and I didn't want to take my 40gig iPod Photo over there because, well, moving parts and sand don't really mix well together. Come to think of it, NOTHING and sand mixes well together.

I got pretty shitfaced last night. A couple of us went out with a buddy who just got married, and we ended up at a place where Happy Hour lasts until ten at night. Not good. I had six Mind Erasers and I was completely done at that point, but then we ended up going back to his house and drinking Disarono, Pina Coladas, and vodka shots. It's now seven in the morning and I have a splitting headache, not to mention a two hour drive ahead of me.

Eureka. Someday I'll learn that the alchohol is bad.

Dreams And Promotions

2005-06-02T19:10:00.000-07:00

Nothing new on the early deployment front. In all honesty, it's probably just rumors, but I even heard it from a 1LT that works in S1, and they would probably know better than anyone about what our current agenda is. So yeah, nothing new, but nothing different, either.

Tomorrow, thankfully, is our last day of work. It's only half a day for me, however, as I'll be headed to my PTSD therapy group and talking for three hours about things I don't really want to talk about with a huge group of people. Supposedly it helps, but I haven't seen any proof of that. Most of that time, things just dissolve into a war stories-fest, with everyone trying to outdo the other people. It doesn't seem like that would be appropriate, but there's some kind of inferiority complex in the military where you always have to be one up on the other guy, even when it involves things like your friends dying.

Since I stopped taking Ambien, my dreams have not only returned, but have become increasingly realistic. And I'm not even talking about bloody, violent dreams -- I'm simply talking about dreams about cars, girls, my family, etcetera. It's really nice, even though a lot of times I wake up wishing I was still asleep. And I've also had a problem lately with sleeping through my alarm, which is a good thing, I guess, except I get in trouble when I show up late. I overslept by three hours this morning. THAT needs to stop.

In other news, I'm getting sent to the promotion board in a few months. Yes, yours truly will be promotable to Sergeant, which is crazy.

Leaving On A Jetplane? Or A Boat?

2005-06-01T20:17:00.000-07:00

So, if I disappear from here for three weeks to a month and there's absolutely no posting going on, then you'll know we've been deployed months ahead of our scheduled departure date. Nothing confirmed or anything, but there's some pretty credible rumors flying around about a post-NTC leave date, which means we'd be leaving FIVE MONTHS ahead of schedule. Yeah, not too excited about this.

I've gone five days without medication, and I'm actually feeling clearheaded. Last night, I had the first dream in a long time that wasn't about dead soldiers and flying rockets, so I guess that's a good start. I love not taking Ambien -- I'm actually about to remember things for the first time in a long time -- and so I think I'll keep not taking it. If that makes sense at all, then you're a better person than me. I'm sure the Major will have issues with me deciding not to take my medication, but the only way I'm putting that shit down my gullet again is if they get the MP's to hold me down and force it down my throat. And even then, I'll throw it up.

By the way, for anyone who is interested, the full Coldplay album finally leaked to the internet today. And don't talk to me about illegal downloading, because I've had the album pre-ordered for a month and I'll probably be buying several more copies for friends. Yes, I've heard it and it is fucking amazing and beautiful and incredible and a million other adjectives that I would use to describe it if given proper space.

Books and Stuff

2005-05-28T21:44:00.000-07:00

I really wanted to do a post on chow halls, but I got sidetracked in writing a query letter for my book so I never got around to it. I don't even know that anyone will buy this book and I'm not sure if it's worth the advances that are being tossed around and I really need an agent to handle this stuff for me, but I'm going to at least give it the old college try and see what happens. Hence the sudden inclusion of punctuation on this website and the nicer layout. I'm also thinking that I need to try and stick to a semi-regular schedule when posting, but it's a little tough to do that when your entire life is controlled by the Department of Defense.

I didn't take Ambien last night. I got a little scared because there's entire portions of the past few days that are fuzzy, and I didn't really take any medicine so there's no real reason for the memory loss. I'm thinking that the Ambien might be built up in my system and so I've got a built-in predication for memory loss, which really sucks ass. I didn't take it last night and I didn't sleep as well as normal, but today I feel somewhat clear-headed and sane. I might not be sane, but at least I can give off a passing resemblance for a few months until we go back to Iraq. At that point, my insanity will probably return full bore and I'll need more months of psychotherapy to forget about the things I see.

I'm just preparing myself.

I just finished The Tommyknockers. Probably the best King book I've read, and I've gone through quite a few of them. I guess it's sci-fi on a general level, but the story is so much more engrossing than just about anything else out there. I'm thinking of dipping back in to the Tim O'Brien catalog now, but I'm not sure I can handle more Vietnam fiction or even reality at this point. I understand that Vietnam was tragic and about ten million times more intense than anything I've experienced, and I am grateful for all the Nam vets that have written to express interest in the things I'm writing about. I've gotten letters from Dustoff pilots, grunts, medics, and even former company commanders, and every single one of them seems to understand where I'm coming from with PTSD. And so in a sense I appreciate O'Brien's books, because they hit the reality of how we all feel without being too pandering, which is also what I try to avoid here.

God, I'm rambling, and I swore I'd never do that. Boredom has a funny way of making you do that. I'll check back tomorrow with my chow hall post. Hopefully.

I Had A Dream Last Night

2005-05-28T06:55:00.000-07:00

I had a dream last night.

Normally, I don't have any dreams at all. The doctors prescribed me a blood pressure medicine called Minipress last year when I went to the Mental Health facility for the first time. I asked why they were prescribing me a high blood pressure medicine when I don't have high blood pressure, I simply have recurring dreams of friends getting their guts blown out by mortar rounds and faceless Iraqis with rocket-propelled grenade launchers. The Major (who I believe I've mentioned before) told me that Minipress is also prescribed for nightmares because it supposedly curbs them. I find this interesting because I always read the paperwork that comes with drugs, and nowhere in the paperwork does it say anything about relieving nightmares. In fact, the words "nightmare" or "dreams" or anything of the sort isn't mentioned at all.

So I've always been a little leery of the Minipress. It worked, though. I stopped having nightmares almost immediately, but I also stopped having any kind of dream at all. Not having dreams is just another way of losing your soul, which I'd already done in healthy spades thanks to the Zoloft. But in a way, I guess I've always figured that not having dreams at all is better than having dreams in which your friends are having their guts blown out by mortar rounds.

I've been taking Minipress for almost a year. Ten months, to be exact. Ten months without a dream is a long time, bud. Combine that with Zoloft and Ambien, and you've got one hell of a recipe for success. Especially when success is defined as becoming a nameless, faceless zombie.

In my effort to become not-a-zombie, I stopped taking Minipress. This was only a few days ago, after I posted about quitting the drugs and telling the Army Mental Health people to go fuck themselves. Sure enough, I was able to quit without going into tremors or DT's or whatever you want to call them. Apparently Minipress isn't an addictive substance, which is a shock to me because I used to crave the relief it brought me from my dreams about friends getting guts blown out by mortar rounds. But I quit. I did it. I didn't have any dreams for the first few nights, but last night, I did. To quote Dr. King, I had a dream.

I don't really remember what it was about. I'm pretty sure there were no guts and no mortars, but there may have been a naked woman or two. After all, once you've gone a year without dreaming, there's lot of pent-up fantasies and deviance and whatnot just trying to escape. The important thing, however, is that I had a dream.

I'm hoping this is a trend that continues. And even if the nightmares return, I'm staying off the drugs. After all, dreams and even nightmares are natural, and even if I have to see my friend Burner dying a thousand deaths every night, I'm not giving back the right to have those dreams anymore. They are my experiences, and good or bad, I'm done letting some fucking medication coat those experiences with a narcotic tinge. I may end up being a basket case for the rest of my life, but at least I won't be a coward.

2005-05-27T14:23:00.000-07:00

trying out a new newspaper-style format here. let me know what you think. back later with my dispatch on the state of the mess hall.

time management (or none)

2005-05-27T11:21:00.000-07:00

time management never seems to be important in the army. we're getting ready to ship out to iraq, back to the war zone for a second time, so one would assume that we'd get cut loose early most days in order to spend time with our family.

one, however, would be wrong.

today is my first day off in nineteen days. i had three days off then. before that, i worked 24 days straight. do the math, and you see that i've had four days off in 1.5 months. and it's not even like we have a ton to do or important work that has to be done in order for us to deploy without getting killed. no, i spend an average of four hours a day sitting around AFTER we are supposed to have closing formation simply because our first sergeant is poor at time management and prefers to wait until 1700 to actually do the work that we could have been doing all day long.

i shudder to think that this kind of organizational skill is what is supposed to get us through an entire year in iraq, when admin stuff is nearly just as important as putting a bullet between the eyes of the nearest arab.

i don't want to come off as a disgruntled employee (even though i am and will be until the day i ets). the army just makes it so difficult to take pride in your job, and it could be so much easier. we're the best fighting force in the world, and we can't even handle simple communication between folks who should know better.

on a lighter night, i'm going to spend the afternoon eating crawfish, corn, sausage and other cajun delicacies. no, i'm not cajun, but i do love spicy food and really, anything that's not served from a chow hall is worth devoting time to. i have a post on our chow hall coming down the pipe, and it's not going to make a lot of people very happy, but i'm sick of being served week-old leftovers on a constant basis.

CLEAN UP ON AISLE WARISREAL

2005-05-25T19:40:00.000-07:00

i need to address something here before it gets out of control. (i should also stop posting while taking ambien, or else the comments sections are going to be absolutely filled to the brim with people who are wondering just what in blue fuck i'm talking about in some of these posts.

the comments sections are open on this blog because i value feedback and it's a great place for like-minded posters to get together and have relevant, intelligent discussion on the matters of the day. matters including, but not limited to bo bice getting shafted out of american idol tonight. granted, i saw most of it through ambien-tinted sunshades, but that finale was outta sight. i also hate american idol with a passion. it's nothing more than another chance for corporate america to get one more swoop through the spotlight while marketing teenage kids who will no doubt go on to produce some of the worst music this side of nashville.

oh yes 00 ===i;m a music junky, severee---==== i have been known to go off on rants about Coldplay that last days at a time, so bear with me if you;re here just for the military bukaki.

pay it forward, sir!

2005-05-24T19:07:00.000-07:00

There's very few times in the army when I feel years of traditions breezing down the line, all culminating on a parade field stocked with units and unit pride. to see a change of command ceremony is something beautiful, and most people will never take a mere glance at this most-honored of traditions, The pleasantrys, the guide-ons flowing in the wind.we don't get to do too many ceremonies in garrison, and the big {parade field] ceremonies are reserved for the upper chain of command. Tomorrow we lose our batallion commander, and he's been a great commander through our last tour of iraq. it'll be sad to see him go, because we always felt safe when he commanded the squadron because he knew what his mission was and always looked out for the troopers on the ground out in the firefight, he gave us everything we ever needed and the support to do our missions with success.

you can't really ask for anything more than that. if we as the low guys in the batallion know that we can trust the main man upstairs, then everything else flows much easier as the orders make their way down to the lowest level. Us at the lowest level appreciate that, and so its an honor when we can see a great Lt Colonel off to his next mission in life,

that being said, we're also waiting to see how the new guy is going to react to us, Will he make drastic changes or keep things as they are? Lots of qeustions will be asked in the coming weeks, and they have to be asnswered.

ADMIN NOTE>> if you send me an email and i feel that it could be god information regaarding PTSD, I'm going to start including those emails on a post. I want to open it up to a community of intelligent discussions. I have a few in the pipeline that I'll share in a later post. So if you've got something to say, drop me an email and I'll get it posted.

to answer some questions

2005-05-23T20:18:00.000-07:00

it seems as though my site has attracted a lot of publicity in the past few days, likely because of a link from metafilter. that's all well and good with me, and i appreciate the supportive comments that i've been getting today, but i also wanted to address a few concerns that are being brought up underneath my posts before things get out of hand too badly.

1.) i'm not anti-unit. i love my unit. well, mostly. i love the history, the decorum, and the attitude that goes with kicking ass and taking pride in our jobs....when there's a good reason to be prideful. 99 percent of the things we did in iraq last year were awesome. this unit is a fearsome fighting machine and it's amazing to watch it work, especially if you believe in what you're doing. unfortunately, there's some concerns that need to be addressed that never will be, and that's because of the political game that goes hand in hand with any military unit of action. i could never sit here and tell you that i believe in our mission in iraq at this point., though that doesn't mean that i didn't believe it at one point. i'm simply here to do a job and get out. i'm simply a cog in the machine, but i'm a cog with some very real concerns that need to be addressed before the next generation of soldiers suffers in the same way we do.

2.) that being said, i'm sick to fucking death of people telling me that i need to "man up" and "get back out there". ptsd is a sickness, not a weakness, and it's sad that most people in the military are too concerned with appearances to actually take a stand and do something about it. instead of medicating us (which they are altogether happy to do, and i'm almost-living proof of that), why not get to the root of the problem? yeah, i've been in counseling, but all the counseling sessions in the world of the army are simply dedicated to getting you back to work so you can be enslaved. yes, i take zoloft, ambien and minipres, and the only thing it's served to do is make me a zombie. yes, i work hard and i work long hours and i don't really complain, but that's not natural because i have a million complaints in me and none of them are being fixed, only coated with a nice layer of narcotics. at some point in the next month, i'm going to mental health and telling them to stick the medicine up their collective asses, because it's not helping me and i want my fucking soul back. and if they have a problem with that, if they'd rather just have a zombie working for them instead of someone who has valid complaints about the bullshit they pull, then they can kiss my ass, because i'm done being medicated.

3.) as far as this being a "scam," i would have to say that's extremely shortsighted. and also stupid. i've already said that npr is one of the few media outlets i'm going to utilize over the next year, and i'm being extremely picky about even that, as well. i have no desire for publicity, and even if this site were still being read by an audience of one, i wouldn't care, because i'm writing it for myself. the fact that my audience has just increased exponentially doesn't change anything, nor will it changed what i write about. this isn't a soapbox though it may seem that way (usually when i'm doped up on ambien), and i'm simply wanting to write what i feel so that i don't have to spend an entire day thinking about it anymore.

that being said, i do appreciate that all of you are sharing this with me and have been so supportive in sending emails today. i even had a gentleman ask where he could donate money for ptsd research, and while i can't help with that one, i'm guessing at least one of you readers probably can.

i'll check back in tomorrow with a regular post. things have been pretty low key the past few days, but that'll all change once our line troops come back from the field at the end of the week. thank christ for four-day government holidays, one of the few very real perks about working for the department of defense.

2005-05-20T17:42:00.000-07:00

Never, EVER take Ambien. If the doc prescribes it to you for sleep, tell him to suck a nut and walk away, It's supposed to help you sleep at night, but it doesn't, and before you go to bed you encounter all kinds of acidwash movements that you don't want any part of, It's quite similiar to refined peyote, and I know a few things about that. how about instead of telling our soldiers to take medicines and more medicines to clear them of the horrible stress we endure over there, we get them teamed up in focus level groups where they can talk about the things we SAW over there. Don't listen to the majors, don't go to mental health. The only "treatement" they're going to give you is a one way ticket down zoloft and ambien avenue

2005-05-20T16:00:00.000-07:00

i just realized that there's a lot that the army has in common with "the shawshank redemption."

typically, i'd be excited right now. or drunk. or excited, and well on my way to being drunk. it's friday night, after all, and i should be planning an entire weekend of doing nothing and sitting on my ass. instead, we have to report in to work tomorrow because the rest of our unit is in the field and so thus we have to work. nevermind the fact that the rest of the entire division doesn't train on the weekends. we're different because we're hardcore, i guess.

those of you emailing ptsd links to me...thanks, but i've already gotten a ton of information on it, and i'm in a support group, and nothing really helps. even zoloft. to all you soldiers coming home from iraq...don't let them put you on zoloft. it steals your soul.

PINK EYE

2005-05-19T18:42:00.000-07:00

i have something called viral conjuctivitis. i don't know what it means, but i think it's called pink eye, and they've confined me to the house for 72 hours so that no one else will be exposed to it. it doesn't hurt, but it does itch and burn and i wake up every morning with my eyes crusted over. yeah, gross, but it could be worse.

i'm using the time wisely by watching movies and reading books. i also promised a few readers that i'd expound a bit on my ptsd post from a few days back, since it was obviously a bit confusing and erratic. i did it on purpose, which most of you seemed to understand, but i wanted to clarify to those that emailed that no, i was not high on crack. or pot. or anything else. i was trying to write in a stream of consciousness manner and i guess it came off a bit disjointed, but most of my stuff tends to do that anyway since i write off the top of my head instead of thinking about it first. that might get me in trouble someday, which is why i'm writing under a fake name in the first place.

i'm getting wrapped up in the books of tim o'brien. i'd never even heard of the guy until i was browsing half price books a few weeks back and saw "the things they carried" on display. since it was only $5 and was a pulitzer nominee, i picked it up and read it in two days. absolutely amazing stuff, i thought, so i picked up "july, july" and "in the lake of the woods" yesterday. i already finished july and it was breathtakingly good, the story of ten college friends at a 30th graduation reunion and the stories they lived and the heartache they suffer from seeing all the old folks they used to hang out with. great, great stuff, but i think i'm going to take a break from o'brien and read "the tommyknockers," since that's one of very few king books i haven't gotten around to reading. oh, and there's also that book about the o.j. simpson defense that i want to tackle. i had bill clinton's book, but it's now being used to prop up my couch after a fat ass private broke it the other day.

part two: how i stopped learning to kill and take the pill

2005-05-17T19:43:00.000-07:00

she says to take one of the blue pills in the morning and another in mid afternoon and oh whenever i feel severe depression coming on take on then too. i'm wondering what all these chemicals will do for me and i'm feeling very much like a lab rat. the army has one treatment for PTSD, and that drug of choice is Zoloft. despite the fact that i can barely even exist on zoloft, i started taking it and oh also the other stuff that's supposed to help with nightmares i've been having. body parts flying apart and landing all over my shoes, my face, the blood mixing with the rain and soaking my hair red, eventhough my stitches are holding up pretty well so they can't be from me.

she says, go ahead and take these little white pills. they supposedly stop nightmares before they happen, which is complete and utter bullshit just like every other time something is supposed to prevent something from happening before it begins. they don't work, Major, and so what am i left with?

she says to me, you could always go back out there, man up and be a true soldier. bitch, i was there once and i need some FUCKING HELP before i can go back and see those things again. are you not comprehending this? do i need to spell it out for you? i fucking hate the fact that i'm required to kill evil people who are only evil because our president wills them to be.

yeah, i'm going back to iraq. if i get shot at or placed in danger, i'm going to kill everything that moves on the other site. i won't enjoy doing it, but it's my job, and my battle buddies are more important to me than life itself, and THEY are the reason i'm going. screw iraq, screw bush, screw the army -- just remember that it's me and my battle buddies out there, and we are the ones fighting a sham war just so we can come home and get a nice welcome reception for being heroes, and then six months later nothing changes and we're back to being grunts.

change the cycle.

life can be hell sometimes

2005-05-12T15:22:00.000-07:00

i've always considered myself pretty lucky in that ever since i came in the army, i've had a pretty good set of leaders and nco's. they've always been tough but fair, and we as a platoon work extremely hard when they need us to do something. i have no problem working, because that's what i signed up to do and when something has to get done, it just makes it easier on everyone involved if we get it done right and fast the first time instead of lounging around and half-assing stuff. our leaders have also been able to foster a real aura of friendship around the platoon; depite rank, we're all friends and can shoot the shit with each other without fear of disrespect charges or things of that nature. other platoons have nco's that try to act like we're still in basic training, and i've always been glad that i haven't had to deal with that.

now, though, it's a different story. in the span of the past four days, we've gotten a new platoon sergeant and two new staff sergeants, and my life has never been more miserable. the platoon sergeant is cool, calm, and collected, and it seems like he's going to fit in quite well. one of the staff sergeants came from a support battalion and is winding down his final year in the army by spending it with us. he's 50 years old and harmless.

the other staff sergeant, however, is going to be a real pain in the ass. from the first day he got here, he's tried to make his mark by being as much of a hard ass as possible. he immediately instituted a "no cursing" rule (which i talked about earlier) and is going as far as making us ask permission to use the latrine. he's changing everything that we've done for the past two years, and implying that our standards weren't high enough and we haven't been doing a good job. which is fine and all, except he came from a tradoc (training) unit and doesn't know jack shit about what goes on in a line troop.

2005-05-10T19:57:00.000-07:00

we're going through the process of getting a new platoon sergeant. i've had the same PS since the day i arrived here over two years ago, and he's been awesome and i can honestly say that i wouldn't have learned how to play the army game as well as i have if it weren't for him. he's taught me a lot, but now he's retiring and heading back home to san antonio to smoke marijuana and sit at home by a pool that takes up his entire backyard. more power to him, i say.

but anyway: the process of getting new leaders is always painful, because you've got a myriad of inspections, more inspections, and a general feeling-out period where no one quite knows what to expect and no one knows how the new guy will react. granted, he seems nice and all (which may not be a good thing with this group), but he laid out his one single rule for us today and told his his biggest pet peeve. turns out he's one of those types who despise cursing, and he would appreciate* it if we wouldn't use foul language around him. so yeah, that's not going to go over too well with a bunch of guys who kill for a living and hate their jobs.

regardless, things are still progressing nicely for the iraq deployment. we're going to get block leave after all, and i plan on using my time wisely by doing a little traveling to california.

** by that i mean, of course, that if we do it, we'll get counseling statements written up.

media, this blog, and emails

2005-05-07T09:54:00.000-07:00

i've enjoyed the varied correspondence from folks around the world concerning this blog and my upcoming 2nd tour of iraq. i've had letters from mothers, wives, husbands and kids who are maintaining a high level of interest in what we do and the personal touch they're able to get from this thing. truthfully, i don't write this thing for anyone but myself because i've found that it's extremely cathartic to have a place where i can vent frustrations, feelings and fears and just because someone else is able to read them, it doesn't take the release away. i did it the first time around because i wnated to keep family aware of what was happening, but it spiraled out of my control and i ended up getting in trouble and even censored because of it. that's not going to happen this time, and so that's why you'll never see my use my real name or refer to my real unit. i can't take the chance of putting myself or my buddies in danger, and i won't take the chance of getting pulled into some bullshit meeting where they try to spin my writing to make themselves look good. if you look good and you care about your soldiers, it's going to reflect in what i write, and if you're a shitbag who's only trying to get promoted to full-bird, then it'll reflect that too.

i had an offer to appear on NPR's On The Media, but my field training got in the way of creating a timely response. NPR is one of the few media outlets I will use this time around, because they tell the truth and don't have a slanted agenda that forces you in line with the rest of the rah rah troops. I did some press last time around, and it ended up getting me in more trouble than anything else so fuck it, i'm sticking solely with NPR and perhaps the guardian.

we've got ntc (national training center) coming up in a few months, followed by some block leave and then our deployment to iraq. i have exactly one year and seven months left in the army, and i'm telling you, it can't come soon enough.

2005-05-01T08:24:00.000-07:00

sorry i've been out of touch. it's pretty much been a complete loss of touch with reality as a whole, so don't feel bad. we just returned from a two week field problem (which means, basically, that i've been living in the woods for two weeks and had no access to any kind of communication devices save for the regular troop net radio, and trying to stir up conversations on there is like trying to fix a hangnail. which is to say that it is impossible) and i'm only now catching up on correspondence and letters from readers. i reply to everyone who sends me something, so if you were one of the folks that have written me in the past three weeks, i'll get to you sometime in the next few days. i've also recently scored a pretty nice PDA/phone with unlimited net access anywhere, so i can start posting via that or via email.

i've got some field stories coming soon, too. it was a pretty shitty experience at times and a pretty good one at times. we're slipping back into kill em' all mode, and i'm not sure i like the feeling.

2005-04-06T18:08:00.000-07:00

i haven't been to sleep in roughly 35 hours.

AW, YOU REALLY DO CARE.

2005-04-04T16:19:00.000-07:00

new sleeping bags. night-vision scopes for our m4 carbines. complete m.o.l.l.e kits for every soldier. a gerber tool for every soldier. just when you start thinking that the army doesn't care whether or not you have the right tools to do your job, they go and ship you a complete assload of new stuff that makes you feel a little special.

we started getting our rfi (rapid fielding initiative) stuff today, and i'm pretty stoked. i think the coolest thing i saw all day, besides the scopes, was the assault ladders. small-ass ladders that automatically extend with the push of a button, allowing us to reach windows and roofs in record time. of course, there's also the new sleeping bags, which are lighter and infinitely more comfortable than the old ones, even though they were pretty nice already.

it feels like we're going to war. which we are. but i feel like i could leave tomorrow and be almost nearly equipped to do everything i have to do.

OUT OF MY LANE

2005-04-03T19:26:00.000-07:00

Sundays are just about the worst thing ever. I can think of a few that are worse, such as falling down the stairs while cradling a $2000 laptop in your arms or coming home from a long deployment to find no one waiting for you, or even looking around as all your friends come to the end of their time in the army and ETS, leaving you behind as the sole survivor of several years worth a pain and frustration. Sundays are almost as bad, simply because you've had all weekend to enjoy this elusive thing called "free time" and now you sit, merely eight hours away from having to go back to the job that you hate more than anything.

okay, before this thing gets too out of hand, i need to explain something about the army. i loved iraq. i loved the friendships, the jokes, and even the adrenaline rushes you get when someone is firing an rpg at you and you either take them out with a well-placed headshot or you sit back and hope they don't suddenly become expert marksmen with the rockets. iraq was simple, you went out on missions and you relaxed and had a good time. hell, even missions were a good time, because you were out there against god knows what and it was always interesting.

garrison is a different story. ever since i came home, i've discovered that 90% of what happens here is bullshit. the only reason a lot of stuff happens is because people above us want to look good and get promoted, and i think that's bullshit. why should i care if some fucking 2nd LT ever makes colonel? i don't. the only thing i care about is the safety of the guys around me and bringing them home safe from this upcoming deployment. if we have to work late in order to make that happen, then fine, but mostly we end up sitting around for HOURS after we're supposed to get off work because the people up in the office forgot to do some important stuff during the day and it has to be done before we can go home. i mean, why does the army look upon quality family time as such a crime? they talk about being family-centric and giving us the chances we need to spend time with our loved ones before we go away FOR A YEAR, but when it comes down to it, we're always sitting around while our families wait at home, dinner going cold on the table.

and it's always like that. if the army were like iraq all the time, a lot more people would enjoy it, and i think you'd find out that the re-enlistment rate and recruiting numbers would be a lot higher than they are right now. as it stands, people are jumping ship like drowning rats, and i'll be damned if i give any civilian i personally know ANY incentive to join the army.

i didn't want to go into this thing with everyone thinking i'm a malcontent, because i'm not. i enjoy the friendships and sometimes i enjoy the job, but i fucking hate the bullshit. cut out the bullshit, and i might even think about re-enlisting.

nah. that'll never happen.

THEY'RE ONLY CHASING SAFETY

2005-04-02T09:59:00.000-08:00

my second part to "how i stopped loving reality and learned to take the pill" will probably be posted next week. i'm still writing it; well, i say that, but i actually mean that i'm procrastinating until the last possible minute because i'm too lazy to do much of anything once we get off work. usually, a fun time for me involves sitting on the couch with a season of anything on dvd and drinking beer until i pass out and have to wake up at dark-thirty the next morning. good times.

yesterday was pretty slick, really. i figured they'd punish us for having time off since they like to do that so much, but it was really laid back and casual as far as the atmosphere goes yesterday. of course, the idiots of apache company had to go and be retarded as usual, so a lot of them got the dog shit smoked out of them. another term for you: smoked means that an nco made you do pushups or situps or various other pt excercises until you physically cannot move. so if i say that guy got smoked or this girl got smoked or a smoking was going on, it doesn't involve cigarettes or beauty. regardless of the smoking going on, we had final formation and had a our safety briefing, which is always my favorite part of the week because all they're do is playing ass coverage just in case one of us goes out and does the exact same things they're telling us not to every week. and of course, we do it anyway...i think i did three out of the five last night, actually.

HOW I LEARNED TO STOP LOVING REALITY AND TAKE THE PILL PART ONE

2005-04-01T06:17:00.000-08:00

on january 13 of 2004, i was in iraq, sitting in my tent playing ps2 with the rest of the guys when mortars starting dropping out of the sky.

real-life mortar attacks are surprisingly just like the ones you see in the movies. there's a sudden whine that grows louder and louder, quickly followed by a dreadful feeling in your gut and an urgency that drives you to run anywhere and hide under the nearest thing you possibly can. you want to hide under tanks, but they tell you that's not safe even though it seems perfectly natural to have 100 tons of protective metal shielding you from explosions. you settle for second best, which is huddling beside a concrete barrier and holding your head between your legs, as if your thighs are going to offer any kind of serious protection for your head when it's already covered in a kevlar helmet.

this time around, i grabbed my vest and kevlar, and ran outside to the gathering point. i was the first out, and given that it was in the middle of the afternoon, it wasn't surprising that there were only a few of us running in. we had guys on missions, guys in the MWR tent watching movies, and guys down at the washrack taking care of vehicles. the washrack subject is something i'll get into another day, but needless to say that it doesn't make sense, to me at least, to wash vehicles one time and then get them all dirty again as you drive them to kuwait, where you'll spend another two days on the rack taking care of them AGAIN.

so the mortars fell from the sky, and by some fate or grace or what have you, one landed directly in the middle of the field next to us. i felt the shrapnel whizzing by, and had a few gashes cut out of my lower back by either shrapnel or flying rock. it didn't hurt, but it was hot as hell and bled like a motherfucker. no one was hit, at least not badly, so we continued to huddle together and pretend like we had the best form of protection possible from the best government in the world instead of just being left out there on our own to fend for ourselves.

everything settles down a bit, but only for about what seems like twenty seconds. then i hear an unintelligible scream coming from the tent next to mine, and even though it sounds like the worst form of arabic available combined with the guttural yell of a howard dean, i can recognize that it's a call for a medic. we run to the tent and there's a gigantic hole in the middle of the ceiling and the tent is just all torn to shreds. i get that feeling in the deep parts of my stomach, like i know what's going to happen next but i really think i can put it off by pretending that i'm back home enjoying time with my family.

we run into the tent. there's staff sergeant lister (not a real name obviously) laying on the floor with...well, nothing. his stomach has been torn open, his guts are hanging out and he's dead. even by looking at him from ten feet away, i know that the medics won't have to waste time on the procedures they normally do because this guy is dead. i immediately think back to the time when we went out to the lake and lister was there, drunk off his ass. it's always routine to say that this guy and that guy was the nicest person ever once they die, but in truth, lister was an asshole and always went out of his way to belittle and be beligerent. i hatet, hated the guy, but now he's laying here on the floor dead and i'm seeing guts and i'm seeing blood and i just turn my head and vomit, because no matter how many times i see it, i still wasn't prepared. i vomit until i have no mre's left in my stomach and can't even begin to think that there might still be some liquid left inside my gut.

the moment passes. yes, lister is in fact dead and there's nothing that can be done for him. sgt. smith is injured and may never walk again, but outside of that, there's really not much to be done or say. we got caught with our pants down and there was absolutely nothing we could do about it. besides, we were going home in thirty days, so what did it matter? we'd only lost three guys our entire time in iraq, and so another one really didn't faze us as much as it probably should have.

it fazed me, though. a few days after, i started waking up in the middle of the night after having dreams of seeing sgt. lister standing over my bed with his guts hanging out. yeah, nightmares you could call them, and they sucked. i put them off, figured it was normal, and came home with everyone else to a reception from our families and friends. well, most people, at least. i had no one there and that was fine with me, because all i could think about doing was walking straight to the px, buying about three cases of beer, and getting so fucking drunk that i couldn't walk straight and would actually sleep entirely through the night.

fuck boot shining

2005-04-01T02:07:00.000-08:00

yeah, i know i don't write very much on here. truth be told, there isn't too much to write about right now and at the same time i've been too busy to sit down and write. i know that doesn't make sense to anyone, unless of course you're in the regular army. in that case, it'll make perfect sense.

if you're in stores, be sure to pick up the latest from my boy cbftw in the latest issue of esquire magazine. i couldn't have fucking said it any better myself, which is why colby is out of the army and i'm still sitting here wiping the damn dirt off my boots in a half-ass attempt to shine them and avoid a confrontation tomorrow morning. picking fights at five in the morning is about the most retarded thing a person can do and i'm already annoyed enough at that point in time as it is, so anything i can do to make people NOT talk to me that early is something i'll always look into, even if it means shining boots.

i'll tell you why shining boots is stupid. i can understand tradition and looking good and all that, but the only people who see us are OTHER SOLDIERS. it's not like we're walking around in a normal city or anything. 99 percent of the people i encounter every day are other soldiers, and all we're doing is wasting time trying to impress them. what is the fucking point? waste what little free time you're given in order to impress someone who is ALSO wasting what little free time he has trying to impress you. the fucking cycle never ends. actually, i take that back, because it'll end here in a few weeks when we stop wearing bdu's and switch to the new army combat uniform. they're snazzy and we get to wear desert boots, which means no more shining and thus no more bitching.

well, it's 1;30 in the morning and i'm drunk. i don't have to be at work until noon, which rocks the ever-loving fucking world, but if they thing that this three hours of compensation time is enough to make up for the 34 extra hours i've worked this week, they're fucking insane.

or they're in the army.

two midgets and a needle with beer

2005-03-26T10:36:00.000-08:00

'twas fun to discover that the army celebrates st. patty's day and alcholic binges but not jesus. not that i have anything wrong with alchoholic binges; i, in fact, was the recipient of a shiner bock-fueled rampage last night that included three midgets, two states, and a trip to the local tattoo parlor to get some girl's name permanently placed on my ass. only kidding, of course -- i did get drunk and retarded, but i hate midgets and i'm scared of needles.

came back from leave this past week to find a pt test, m4 qualification range, and a whole lot of disorganization waiting for me. scored a 340 on the pt test (out of 300), 36 on the m4 range, and tried to get things rolling again. we're deploying quicker than we thought, which means we'll probably be out of here before thanksgiving instead of shortly after like we originally planned. i'm ready to roll because anything, and i mean anything, beats being in garrison and having to put up with stupid bullshit all the time.

home again with the family for easter weekend. not much planned except 80lbs of crawfish, some beer, and probably some more beer. i finally finished better than sex and also grabbed the new rolling stone with the gigantic feature on the good doktor. people tell me i'm crazy, but that summabitch was absolutely nuts.

OUTTA HERE

2005-03-14T21:55:00.000-08:00

sometimes you have to be an asshole. like today, for example, when they tried to block my leave (which starts in ten minutes) by telling me that i was "mission critical," even though the most work we've done in a month is filling out sexual harassment forms. i went above everyone's heads, used the commander's open door policy, and got my leave approved.

i'm outta here. i might post more this week, but it's doubtful. i'll be enjoying the pina coladas too much.

TEN PINA COLADAS.

2005-03-14T06:23:00.000-08:00

there's nothing is peaceful as sitting outside in the beautiful sun, a lovely lady at your side and an ice-cold frozen pina colada in your hand. my weekend was comprised of little more than the scene i described above, and also some episodes of 3-4 hour naps that were as fitful as a long winter's dream. i'm refreshed, i'm awake, and for the first time in about three years, i'm actually excited to be going to work today.

of course, most of that probably has to do with the fact that today is my only day of work this week, for i'll be going on leave tonight at midnight and not returning until sunday at midnight. excellent.

i'm working on a long post about my ptsd (post-traumatic stress disorder), the causes, and what happens when you get diagnosed with ptsd in the army, including descriptions of drugs and the effects said drugs can have on reality. i want to make sure i do it right, though, so i'll probably hold off posting it until the end of the week.

WEEKEND READING

2005-03-11T10:29:00.000-08:00

i'm out for the weekend. i don't want anyone to get bored this weekend, so if you're sitting at home on the computer with nothing to do (when you should be out in a state or national park enjoying the amazing weather), then pay a visit to the mudville gazette. they are the guys that host the milblog ring i'm in, and you can find tons of other soldiers who do the same thing i do. blogging, that is. they also update their blog a lot more than i ever will, so bookmark it.

but by all means, please get off the freaking computer and enjoy life.

GROSS

2005-03-11T06:08:00.000-08:00

you know what might immediately improve the morale and quality of life for soldiers living on post? improve the quality of the food you serve at the chow hall. i went in this morning and was literally sick and disgusted after eating, and that rarely happens to me. of course, i rarely eat at the chow hall, so that's an explanation right there. normally i'd just go to the px and pick up a breakfast hot pocket or drive through burger king for some coffee, but i didn't have time to do either of those this morning, leaving the chow hall as my only option. i should have done the smart thing and just gone back to my room, but no, i was hungry and that hunger must be satiated. it's not like i need to watch my weight, either, what with the five miles that we run every single day.

i got to the chow hall, flashed my id card, and got my place in line. the whole id card requirement for the chow hall is laughable at best; does someone somewhere really believe that people are going to try to sneak in and score food? i mean, it's a last option at best, and i don't see anyone in their right mind with a chance to go anywhere else sneaking into the chow hall to eat dog food. regardless, i go through the line, and the choices are simple -- breakfast pizza, burritos, and hash browns. can't we mix in a few fruits and vegetables or SOMETHING that wasn't cooked in oil left over from last week's surf and turf day? i choose the pizza because it looks somewhat harmless, even though the eggs are a strange shade of green. grab some no percent milk and sit at the table, and decide that the pizza might not look so good. i eat it anyway, and after about, oh, one bite i was clutching my stomach in fear and pain. i literally fear for the lives of the joes who have to eat this food every day.

so now i'm sitting in my room, nursing a blossoming case of fucking nasty gas, still clutching my stomach in pain, and it's all because they won't shell out a little cash to get us some good food. i wish i could be in charge of an investigation into troop morale, because the results would be absolutely staggering to the general public.

i don't want to give off the impression that i'm bitter or anything. i also don't want to come off as slandering the army. i just want to be completely honest on here and i have the forum to do that, so i'm gonna. i feared stepping on people's toes last time because i didn't want to get reprimanded, and thus you got a watered down look at what actually goes on in the army. here, you're going to get the unvarnished truth for as long as i can muster it, and if that means pointing out the truly fucked up things that the army does, then so be it. i enjoy my unit and there's at least a few times every year when i'm proud to put on this uniform, and i'll talk about those, too. it's not all bad.

not going to be too many posts this weekend, or any weekend for that matter. i try to get out of town as much as possible, and the only time it's possible is on the weekend. i'm generally holed up in a hotel, reading books or watching television, and i don't usually have the chance to get on the computer. if i do, however, i'll try and leave an update. you're not here for everyday boring shit anyway, so i figure it'd be better if i try to keep things army-centric for now. no one gives a fuck what movies i like or which rare vinyls i've discovered on ebay this week, anyway.

HIGH SPEED SHITBAGS

2005-03-10T14:28:00.000-08:00

i fucking hate waking up at five in the morning. there's no way that anyone can expect you to be high speed at that time of the day. it's not even civilized.

for those wondering, here's a little lesson on some army lingo.

high speed is what we say when soldiers spend what little personal time they get shining boots every day, take their bdu's to the cleaners and spend $30 a week getting them pressed, and kiss just enough ass of the people above them to get noticed.

shitbags are the guys who either a) don't care about looking good or b) realize that there's more important things in life than shining boots and better places to spend your money than the local cleaners. they also tend to not give a fuck about kissing ass. of course, they could also be real slobs who should have never been soldiers in the first place, but all of these people are grouped together under one title.

it's possible to be high speed one day and a shitbag the next. when i was a lower enlisted guy, i varied between the two on a regular basis, depending upon the mood of my squad leader and platoon sergeant. i usually put forth the effort to shine boots simply because i'm bored at night with nothing else to do but drink, and mostly because doing so will avoid any useless conversations i might not want to have at five in the morning. i also take my bdu's to the cleaners because i'm too lazy to spend the time ironing and pressing them myself when i could be doing other things, like drinking or shining my boots.

today, i'm probably a mix of both. a high speed shitbag, if you will. my uniform looks good, my haircut looks good, and i didn't talk to anyone above me this morning, thus avoiding the chance to kiss ass and make myself look good. i tend to try and get a feel for how my soldiers are doing in the morning, anyway. others may not care, but i care about morale, and the absolute worst time for any soldier (ask anyone) is before PT formation in the morning. you're tired, you got no sleep the night before, and all you want to do is be left alone to dread the workday by yourself. i'm also a shitbag today (at least in someone else's eyes) because i drew division trash duty today. basically, you start in the morning at nine and walk from a certain area to another, picking up trash along the way. this duty happens every day, and we rotate between nco's to take care of the job. today happens to be my day, and we finished in roughly two hours. we were released for the day (division sergeant major's policy), which meant we could go home, take care of important business, and generally use the day to rest and get shit taken care of. a good soldier (at least in someone else's eyes) would probably say fuck it and go back to work, which would mean sitting around in the motorpool or raking leaves or something like that. but hey, i'm not the type to turn down a half day off, especially when it means i can get stuff done that never seems to get done, like mowing the grass or washing clothes. you know, the non-important stuff. i'm also taking the chance to crack open a fine pinot grigio i picked up a few days back and enjoy it, so i guess that makes me a shitbag.

an introduction

2005-03-09T19:08:00.000-08:00

so i guess the best way to start this thing off is to tell you that i'm a soldier in the united states army, and in about six months i'll be deploying to iraq for my second tour of duty. i might have written elsewhere before and i might have not, but i'm staying anonymous on this blog for personal and security reasons, the main reason being that i hate dealing with officers and having a public blog tends to get me thrown into meetings with those very same officers that i hate dealing with. despite the fact that i'll never put out any information that deals with opsec (operational security), i still always tend to get called in to answer questions about posts that have absolutely nothing to do with anything. if you're even a little bit critical of people in charge of you, they get panties all in a wad and demand answers as to why you, a bit player in this gigantic important war game, have the right to talk shit about them when they're obviously more important than you and would never do anything wrong.

i digress.

the point is, i'm staying anonymous because i want to write about the things i want to write about, and i want to talk about the things i want to talk about, and i don't want to have to stand in front of a desk while captain jackoff spouts off and complains just because you might have said something that puts a small stain on his sainthood.

i like my unit. well, i liked my unit when we were in iraq. over there, it was a finely tuned war machine, and we went about the business of killing haji's without mercy and without hesitation. i'm not pro-war and i'm not anti-war, but you can bet your fucking bottom dollar that if you're faced with either killing someone who is bent on killing you or turning the other cheek and believing war is wrong, you'll pull the trigger just as fast as i have. yes, i've killed people and i'll do it again because it's my job and, really, if it's you or them, it's damn sure going to be them. i went to iraq the first time hating the shit out of president bush, and i came home hating president bush but knowing that we did some damn good shit over there. home, though, is a different story. the only point to garrison life is doing a good job so that people above you will look good to the people above THEM and thus get promoted. i don't really enjoy that type of life; i'm the type who would rather do my job and get it over with and not worry about stupid rules and fancy regulations that only exist to make us miserable on a daily basis. and that's the problem with being in garrison; everything only exists to make things LOOK good, while in iraq everything exists to make sure you stay alive. there's something about that adrenaline rush that i'll never get out of my system, which is why i'm looking forward to going back.

so here we go. as we get ready to go, i'll post about training and life stuff that some of you might find interesting. some of you might find it boring, too, but i'm really only doing this for myself. if people come along for the ride, so be it, but i'm not going to tone anything down and i'm not going to change who i am. i already did that once for the fuckers in the office, and i am damn sure not going to do it again.

oh, and if you're an officer (like dagger, who i am a big fan of and hope i don't offend) -- it's not that i hate all officers. i just hate the ones with personal agendas that have absolutely nothing to do with helping soldiers or humanity in general.

stick around.