Oh, the shame

This sort of thing just tears me up.

No, really. I'm weeping here. Weeping.

The U.S. military on Saturday formally apologized to an Iraqi village after
a soldier admitted using the Quran -- Islam's holy book -- for target
practice.

Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Hammond, commander of U.S. forces in Baghdad, apologized
to the Radhwaniya tribe for the staff sergeant, who was a sniper section leader
assigned to the headquarters of the 64th Armored Regiment.

Now, really. I am fully aware of all the many reasons why this sort of behavior is bad and wrong and offensive and counterproductive and tacky and evil.

But really. It all gets back to the one thing the entire West would like the Middle East to understand - the need to chill the Hell out.

Win one, lose one

The lawn got mowed. However, it was a really nice day. A little warm, sunny... And so it didn't occur to me that running, then mowing the back, side and front yards in a tank top was maybe not a smart idea.

Seriously, sometimes it's a miracles I made it to adulthood being this slow.

The sunburn on the face and arms will fade, but the part on my shoulders and the other flesh that hasn't seen direct sunlight in months....well, I'm thinking blisters.

Avoidance

Ugh. There's our back yard. The one that, right before we took off up north, the Mister said he should maybe mow. And which I, in a hurry, said, "will be fine if I deal with it when I get back."

It looks like...well, I've seen jungles with less foliage.



I have a lawnmower and a can of gas, and just as soon as the dew burns off, it'll off with a couple of inches!

That is, if I can't think of anything at all to do that will enable me to keep procrastinating with it...

UPDATE @ 1253 -- There was no avoiding it. I tried - Jack and I even went for a three-mile run, but the persisted in...exisiting. I'm halfway though the back, and this seemed an appropriate time to stop for root beer.

Kindergarten debate

"The word...a bad word that we can't repeat on television..."

Wolf Blitzer snivels about Sen. Joe Biden's evaluation of the President's description of "some Democrats" as appeasers. Time for definition!

tr.v. ap·peased, ap·peas·ing, ap·peas·es
1. To bring peace, quiet, or calm to; soothe.
2. To satisfy or relieve: appease one's thirst.
3. To pacify or attempt to pacify (an enemy) by granting concessions, often at the expense of principle. See Synonyms at pacify.

Well, the shoe either fits, or it doesn't. But the response to the President's remarks is interesting.

If I were to refer to someone in a generally insulting manner, perhaps by using the term coward, it would seem to me there would be only a few basic options for response.

1 - punch me in the face (not really an option in modern politics)
2 - respond, "I am not a coward."
3 - publicly shriek that my accusation is somehow not appropriate, or is insufficiently high-minded

If I call someone a coward, a combination of 1 and 2 would indicate that they believe my description to be inaccurate. Number 3 does not, it would seem, dispute the accuracy of my accusation, merely that it was not nice.

I say again, I cannot stand any of these people.

well, lookee here...

I logged into the CMP E-store this morning to see...well, if anything had appeared.



So I peed myself a little, then checked out the details. It's a service grade Saginaw S' G' (Grand Rapids). No idea on shipping yet, but I'm checking. Regularly. Like every 10 minutes.

Things I have learned

1 - The jeep can go through anything. Including trees.



In fact, one can proceed directly through those trees twice. Once heading out, and once heading back.

2 - Proceeding through those trees at a high rate of speed in the pitch black will leave a mark on said jeep.



The frame damage is...not a big deal. A little paint to cover the exposed metal, and I'll write it off as a mark of character. Kinda like a good scar. The problem is not visible in the picture, because it took a little while for the crack to spread. But spread it did, and by the time we hit Texas, there was 100 mph tape on the windshield and we were cringing at every large insect we encountered.

3 - Our insurance provider claims that the wonderful glass coverage we had in Florida did not transfer to Texas. [sigh]

Out of the north

Made it home last night - I don't have anywhere to go for a while now, and I have to admit, it's a nice feeling.

We were pursuing the elusive morel mushroom in the "northern lower" of Michigan. It wasn't a particularly good year for them, but we did alright.



There are lots of things you can do with morels, but when up north, we go with the traditional fry-em-in-a-big-pan approach.



Those are accompanied by a large pan of bluegill fillets, and together they form possibly the world's perfect meal. The blackflies that occasionally end up in the pan add a little something.

I haven't made it to the spring mushroom gathering since 96 - shortly before I graduated high school and hit the road. It was good to be back.

It's been a rough few days

of chasing fungus around northern Michigan. Updates will follow later tonight or tomorrow, but suffice it to say there were blackflies, beers and yes - fungus.

I still don't get it

I've been watching the primary returns for a few hours now. Well, except for about an hour after supper when I was asleep with an attractive man and a yorkie on the couch. But I don't believe I missed much.

I'm not really understanding where this process is heading. It looks, whenever the numbers are broken down by county and occupation and income level, etc, that Sen. Obama is winning hardcore democrats and black folks, and Sen. Clinton is winning centrist democrats and older people.

This runs me straight into what's always been my problem with the primary system - the people picking the party's nominee are the sort of people who bother to register with a party affiliation. And they may end up picking a candidate who best represents the textbook party values, but I don't know they end up picking a candidate most appealing to the entire electorate. And ultimately, that is the point.

So it looks to me like the democrats are on their way to nominating Sen. Obama, but I can really see the other argument - that he's not winning in the places and ways that the democratic candidate will have to win in November to carry the general election.

As I've said before, I'm inclined to like Sen. McCain, and so this is academic right now. I'm also apparently immune to the Obama magic, so I really don't get the wild-eyed college students. It simply seems to me that we're letting a weird primary system enable fuzzy idealists to nominate someone who has no business vying to head our government, and who is not going to do well this fall.

Stormy mornings are the best

Rain and thunder makes a nice backdrop for staying in bed extra-long, enjoying that "I'm not really awake" feeling.

However, all three dogs are nervous and Sparky has developed the phenomenally irritating habit of barking at thunder.

I really don't want to do anything, but alas, that's not an option today. Primary returns to watch on the TV tonight, so that gives me something to look forward to. Add beer, and televised politics are almost as much fun as a good baseball game.

Housekeeping, etc

Tonight, for y'all, I've got a couple of neat blogs that commentor Peggy has pointed out to me (she runs a good site herself, by-the-by).

First we have two of our favorite things, Marines and dogs, all wrapped up in wonderful package over at K9 Pride. This, folks, is a really neat site and some good insight into the world of the military working dog and its person. Drop by and encourage (now recovering from the Corps) Sgt. Dowling to keep up the good work.

Peggy also pointed us toward Lt. Nixon's Rants. That would be the real officer sort of lieutenant (Navy O3), not the laughable butter bar sort. The LT is one of those Squids in da Sandbox, and he's putting out some throughtful copy during his tour. Drop by and check him out.

We also have The Lonestar Gal, who, for some odd reason, seems to be really looking forward to moving to Texas. Well, actually, she's coming from Ohio, so she's going to moving up in the world. Anyway, she's a thoughtful one, and the recent posts on the story of her life are not to be missed.

As always, I shall continue to wander through comments and try to share neat sites with you.

Begging off

I've got some cool blogs to point out that I've been clued into over the last couple of weeks, and some other admin type stuff.

However, I'm just flat wore the heck out tonight, and so I'm going to beg some indulgence and try to get that stuff taken care of tomorrow. I am playing Army for a couple more days, but it's normal-hours administrative stuff, so I'm actually going to get to sleep well past 0530 and get home at a decent time.

The highlight of the day? A toss-up between serving as NCOIC of Cake and doing body-fat tapings. I think the cake thing would make a great efficiency report bullet.

It's not just a job,

it's a job that is amazing at screwing up my weekends.

When a battalion-wide, nobody-leaves-till-everyone-pees piss test was annouced shortly after 1800, it was not a cheerful moment. I got home only moments ago.

Worst part was, the hour or so spent waiting on the few people who were having some sort of issue with producing the appropriate amount of urine. Made me want to rip their kidneys from their bodies and wring out the required 30ml.

And in other thrilling news...

When I fired up my email here at the airport (let's hear it for the Columbia, SC airport and its free wireless!), guess what showed up in my inbox?

We have received and verified your recent order. There is nothing that we will be able to tell you about the order until we have input all orders received ahead of yours into the system. Your order will now advance to our sales area and from there to our shipping area. Please note, that unless otherwise listed, our order to ship time is 30 days. You will receive other emails as the order progresses

.
From my buddies at the Civilian Marksmanship Program.

[insert Happy Dance here]

Now, the only thing is, until they process my order and I see some details, I don't know which carbine I got. There were only 540 Saginaw S'G' service grades available, so I asked for one of those or a Saginaw S'G rack grade or a Saginaw service grade. Any would make me happy, but I am curious.

Just so long as I was clear and only end up with one. Funding one carbine is tolerated, but funding three might mean I'd have to sleep in the back yard.

FREEEEDOM!!!!

With one final, drawn-out, tiresome ceremony, my class ended this morning. Of course, yesterday night being the last night at a military class, many cheap beers were consumed.

The only thing more irritating than sitting through a drawn-out tiresome ceremony is doing it hungover. Ugh. You think we'd all learn that, but it seems to be one of those lessons that doesn't take.

Now I'm sitting back at the airport waiting on the flight home. It's a drill weekend, so I don't get to toss the boots into the closet quite yet, but I am looking forward to not sharing a bathroom with strangers again for a while.

Three days more

til Revolution, we shall nip it in the bud...

Sorry, getting my Army crap mixed up with Les Miserables. Anyway, it's three days more, and then there won't be a revolution, but I will get to leave. Which will be nice, because this course is like one long bad joke.

Question: What is the effect of a nuclear blast on communications equipment?
Answer: Adverse

No - I don't really get it either. But for some reason, being here for two weeks is career-enhancing. Ugh.

The other thing I've learned is that some of us might think it was really simple if we had all our texts in .pdf format, and all the exams were open-book. Shockingly easy. But we'd be only partially right, because that assumption rests upon the stipulation that one can use the search function. Which assumes that one can spell.

We had one dude today who couldn't find the four "types" of something-or-other. Only after about five minutes did we realize that was because he was searching for "tipes."

Your tax dollars at work, folks.

BandAid, meet Sucking Chest Wound

Here's an odd one - Iraq: Bill proposed to ban toy guns

Iraqi lawmakers are working on a draft bill to ban importing toy guns and fireworks, hoping to curb increasingly aggressive behavior among children who have grown up amid real war, a lawmaker said Tuesday.

So, the good news is that these people are in every country.

The not-so-good news is that as of earlier this month, the Iraqi government is still struggling terribly to meet the benchmarks for government progress set forth as the "way forward" for their country.

But as long as they're progressing toward meaningless nannyism, perhaps they'll garner some more support from folks on the left in this country.

"The culture of violence has prevailed in our society and controlled the Iraqi family and that it has affected the culture of children," said Samira al-Moussawi, head of the parliamentary committee on children and women, which is preparing the legislation.

Good lord.

The bar is OPEN

I bolted out of class like a scalded cat. I ran three miles to ward off guilt, then schlepped the laptop over here. Check this out:



Yes, folks, this appears to be the last bar in the DoD where one can drink and smoke. And there's non-restricted internet. It's wonderful.

The class I'm in is not really worth comment, but it's over next week. So that's a plus.

In other happy news, the Mister swears he launched my paperwork to the CMP today second-day air (for guaranteed Monday delivery). So I cross my fingers and hope I get drawn for one of the Saginaw variants...

Yeah - that's going to be a few extra drills I'l have to dig up if I get picked, but still...

Still out here

I'm hanging out in a parking lot at my deep south training location. The all-ranks club here provides free wi-fi that is NOT restricted by the Army. However, the ranks club appears to be open three days a week. At least they left the wi-fi on.

The class is...well...about what you'd expect out of a professional education course for an Army that needs every warm body in uniform. Not real challenging.

Here's a sign outside the building we're in. It's for another class - fortunately, we are not being forced to tote rifles around, but they are. I apologize for the poor quality - it's a camera phone shot.



I really hope you can make out the bottommost word in quotes. If not, it's "LIVE." I am forced to wonder a little bit about any education system that requires folks to practice clearing weapons in a manner that's apparently inconsistent with how they'd clear them of live ammo.

Then again, the Army seems to routinely change its mind about the best way to clear an M4/M16, so there's always room for...interpretation? Or something?

There are some Navy folks here who are being...reprogrammed. Or whatever the term is for the training they give Sailors who are coming over to do Army work in Iraq. We don't have any real contact with them, but they don't seem overwhelmingly concerned or despondent, which I think is positive.

OK. I'm off to try to hunt down a cold beer before the exchange closes. Y'all take care. I'll be back to you reasonably soon (perhaps when they open the stupid club).

Some things never change

Including this one - I'm sitting outside a southern airport with a few guys with short hair and pile of green baggage, waiting on some promised "shuttle," smoking cigarettes and wondering if the shuttle would show up if I ran inside for coffee.

Who am I kidding? Of course it would.