On All My Motions

 
No major issues, just little items barely worth the effort to write them down.

• My car had to go into the shop again. Again, covered by warranty, but still that’s three days now (out of the last month) that it’s been unavailable to me.
• The latest edicts from the Army make it clear that I won’t be able to get anything resembling an age waiver. So, I have a bit over two years, and then I’m gone. Which means if I want to deploy again, I’ll have to find a unit that’s going out and volunteer to be attached.
• I’ve picked out the story I’ll be remixing, and I’m about 700 words into it. It will require quite a bit more than that, but I have nine days remaining to finish it, polish it, and get it posted.

Finally, this probably pertains only to people on the West Coast — or even in the Seattle area itself — but it’s worth noting:

( Find Marizela )

( Entertaining, insightful entry under the cut. )

And so we proceed.

 
My life has been so damn boring lately that it hasn’t seemed worth the trouble it would take to write it out. Gradually, though, enough small things have accumulated that I’m willing to give a brief summation.

( First cut — Personal Stuff )

( Second cut — Job Stuff )

( Third cut — Fanfic Stuff )

Okay, there we are. Enough for now.

 
So, here I am.

Our replacements showed up weeks ago, trickling in a few at a time (that whole ash-cloud-over-Iceland has scrambled flight schedules all over hell and creation). We showed them where everything was and how everything worked and then, when the time came, turned over operations to them. I had to keep going longer than anyone else, by a few days, but in compensation I didn’t have to train any replacements because the department I’ve been running was slated to be closed down. My verdict on that: “Either I’m so awesome I can’t be replaced, or I ruin everything I touch. And I’m fine with either one.”

There were over a hundred of us when we first arrived. There are barely two dozen now, because our own personnel were likewise sent out a few at a time as their operations ended, so that most of them are now either at a transitional base elsewhere in Iraq, or are already awaiting us in Kuwait. (And if that isn’t a little slice of heaven, nothing is. Yes, sarcasm.) For five days now I’ve been sleeping in late, wearing my PT uniform — shorts, t-shirt, running shoes — instead of the full ACU ensemble, and that came at just the right time because within the past two weeks temperatures went back up above 100° for the first time in months, and then it started getting even hotter … I actually got a mild sunburn on the top of my head, because till now I’d always worn my uniform when I went outside for more than a few minutes during the day. (I’d also been shaving my head, for convenience, but stopped last week because I calculate it’ll take longer for the hair to grow back in than it will take us to process out through Fort Dix.)

My daughter and her fiancé are planning to visit my wife within the next couple of weeks. If absolutely everything went perfectly, I might get home in time to see them before they had to start back. One learns, however, not to count on such things. Honestly, what concerns me most at the moment is the possibility that I could be stuck in transitional status, without adequate Internet access, during the week when Remix Redux 8: Magic Eight Ball goes live and we start trying to guess who among our favorite authors may have been responsible for this work or that one. Okay, I’m shallow.

I’m ready to stay here awhile. I’m ready to be home. But being stuck in the process, that’s kind of a pain.

 
I’ve been back for some time, actually. It took me three days to return from leave (as distinguished from the four days required to get home); I arrived very early in the morning, slept for ten hours, and then spent the rest of the day getting officially reinstated on the roster and recovering my weapon from the arms room, plus a certain amount of general relaxing. Since my office was toward the end of its weekly cycle, I had the advantage of a few more days of light duty before starting back into the regular schedule.

The weather remains mystifying. The summer just past never got as hot as I remember from 2003-4; the winter never got as cold (or wet), and remains similarly temperate. Does this mean that the summer to come will be the type of unholy scorcher I experienced the first time through? Remains to be seen.

One thing is different. Our division headquarters now has the Iraqi flag flying out front, but no American flag. What the hell? I could understand along with, but not instead of. Okay, it’s their country … but it’s our base. I’m in the U.S. Army, so why am I serving ‘under’ the Iraqi flag?

I’m back. Overall, I like it. Now the party can resume.

 
So, if I’d waited just a little bit longer, I’d have had more to report yesterday.

After I’d made my year’s-end post, I went to the chow hall for dinner. On my way back, I got a special treat: our hosts in the Iraqi civilian sector decided to help us celebrate the onset of the new year, with fireworks. Not much for visuals, but the sound was certainly impressive. I went prone behind a concrete blast wall until it seemed to be over, then reported to HQ for accountability. After which I went to my CHU to do some reading before bedtime …

… and wouldn’t you know it, those lovable scamps decided to send some more holiday cheer our way? That one I waited out hugging the floor of my CHU, then continued reading, and then on to bed.

It bothers me, though. They went to so much trouble to help us celebrate, and I just know there’s next to no likelihood that I’ll ever be able to reciprocate in the same spirit. Because of that, all the people who tell me they’re praying for me and those serving beside me? — I would greatly appreciate if you would dedicate some of those prayers to the prospect that someone, somewhere out there, may be in a position to recognize those who made such a generous effort of their time and ingenuity, and offer them a suitable reward.

With copious interest.

 
This morning brought another of the many wonders that accompany life in-theater: the unannounced drug testing. To make it better, it was for almost three dozen people. Better yet, I was one of the designated observers: as in, my duty was to directly monitor the providing of urine samples.

Trust me, the thrill wears off really fast.

For those of you who don’t have the pleasure of going through it on a regular basis: one has to drink copiously for anywhere from 30 to 90 minutes, to ensure that one is capable of providing a sample 1] on demand, 2] of the proper amount, 3] on the first try. (Because something that we do all the time without thinking about it poses a slightly greater difficulty when you’re being watched in-process.) And then, having delivered, you pee more or less non-stop for the rest of the day.

***

I turned almost all of my duties over to my assistant team leader this past week, trying to accustom him to the workload in advance of my mid-tour leave. Went okay at first, and then yesterday it became clear that he was a full day behind schedule. On the day before the week’s work was due. So we’re still behind schedule, and I’m not pleased, because — to prevent us going two days behind schedule — I wound up doing some of the stuff that I wanted him to learn. So it’s the same routine next week.

This is annoyance, not hardship. I’ll have to be sure, though, that he understands where he fell short and what he needs to do about it next time through.

And another day passes.

The weather continues to be stunningly good. I know, talking about it — maybe even just allowing myself to consciously recognize it — is an invitation to five-pound snowflakes. I can’t help myself, though, it’s just so nice here.

It’s only three days until next year. 2010 … wasn’t that Arthur C. Clarke’s follow-up to 2001: A Space Odyssey? The future is now. I can still remember how odd it felt to start writing 1961 at the top of school papers, just when I’d got comfortable with 1960.

As part of the continuing effort to keep as many as possible of the military people here occupied in actual military pursuits, the guards for the facilities on-base are contractors. No, not the ‘infamous’ Blackwater (now with a different name); these, I believe, are Ugandan, polite black men in khaki uniforms that appear just slightly more comfortable than our own. There’s been some kind shift recently — wage negotiation, perhaps — and a different crew has come in. Same basic uniforms, same general appearance … but where the former carried the familiar M16 or M4, the new group has folding-stock AK47s. The last several years I’ve become so accustomed to keeping a sharp eye on anyone carrying an AK, it’s a bit distracting.

Still looking to do further work on the fanfic I mentioned. Maybe later today.

And that’s it for now.

 
It is difficult for me to articulate, or even to fully contain, the building fury I feel as I follow the news coverage of the mass shooting at Fort Hood. My current location is nine hours ahead of Texas, so the whole thing began only just before I went to bed last night; it was all over the news when I came in this morning, a mature story before I was even aware of it. It’s unavoidable, then, that my reactions will belatedly trail the events by a significant margin.

To begin with, it seems to me that it would be far too easy and convenient to attribute Hasan’s actions to his ethnicity and religion … and inexcusably lazy and unrealistic to dismiss those things as potential motivations. The man is cited as saying that he didn’t look forward to the prospect of finding himself in conflict with fellow Muslims, which hints that he bought into the notion that we’re engaged in a war against Islam, instead of against hateful, violent and intolerant people who regularly kill more Muslims than we do. At the same time, this incident does not at all have the characteristics of an act of jihad; rather, it looks very much like the kind of vicious, despicable suicide-by-cop — preceded and precipitated by mass murder — demonstrated by the even more vile Seung-Hui Cho at Virginia Tech. (That Hasan is likewise a Virginia Tech graduate is a jarring but not pertinent coincidence.)

Next is the continuing focus on the stress Hasan was facing as he approached an undesirable deployment to Iraq (or to Afghanistan, the reports continue to vary). The stress he was facing. At the risk of being politically incorrect — which, come to think of it, doesn’t bother me at all — I have to wonder, just how big a pussy WAS this guy? People are trying to kill me here (at a distance, by rockets, but they’re still trying), and I have easy duty … and back in the States, a psychiatrist was burdened by unbearable stress because he’d spent so much time listening to returning combat veterans coping with varying degrees of PTSD? Cry me a fucking river.

On top of all that, however, is that I don’t care why he did it. I don’t care. I don’t care that he was religious, or conflicted, or stressed, or didn’t believe in what he was about to be sent to do. Things got tougher for him than he could handle, and he responded by going out to kill as many of his fellow soldiers as possible. The same people who would have saluted him (and some of them may have done so) on his way to the killing ground, the same people who would have looked to him for support in dealing with the things he was too much a coward to face. He’s not a person anymore. He threw that away when he decided to become a murderer. There’s a word for people like him: EVIL. It’s not the only word — treacherous, contemptible and walking filth come to mind — but it sums up the essential nature of what used to be mistaken for a man.

I’ve spent more than my share of time in Soldier Readiness Centers, being processed to and from deployment. It’s a long process, it’s boring, and it’s made marginally better by the professionalism and courtesy of the people running the program. You don’t expect to face imminent death there, and for damn sure you don’t expect it from one of your own.

I’m sorry he was shot. Better if he had been torn to pieces.

 
Catching up for the moment.

( Personal, military, and political stuff under the cut )

And that, I think, should do it for now.