my rusted tree

Well here we are. Almost the end of the final full month. Hell we don't even have that much left of time here. My stay here at Buehring is almost at its end, and thank god for that cause i've done had enough. Now thats not to say that my time here has been all bad. It really hasn't. I have enjoyed alot of it, and will definitly take the experience with me, and memories formed from my first deployment. Its definitly been no where near as hard as it could have been, or life threatening for that matter, but it has had its moments of difficulties, going from problems with personnel among us, to problems within ourselves, to problems back at home. It has definitly been a learning experience. Now seeing as how its been over a month since I last came here and let those of you in on what has all been going on, I guess I have alot to put out to catch everyone up on. So I'll try to do my best on letting you all know such.

I think I left off with me finally gettin to the promotion board and getting my promotable status finally. Well unfortunately I still sit on that status as the points for getting promoted has shot back up, so I sit for another month, waiting to see if I can make the enlite, and get out of the junior enlisted, bitch duty status. I mean I know I can still get bitch duty per say, but at least I'll be in a more supervisory position while I have lil privates runnin about doin it for me. :) Which is all good in my book.

Personnel problem wise, has been an up and down rollercoaster per say. Youngblood was getting into a lot of trouble and making alot of headaches for people up here, that was getting to a pretty much daily basis. Between being late for work, not showering, disrespecting people, blatantly with no sign of joking to try to ease it, to nearly starting very heated moments between a few of us, he has been quite a problem. It got to a point that our NCO's, country included, recommended him for an article 15 over everything, and pretty much told him they have given up on trying to help and protect him. Fortunately he has been forced into a FAST class, which is to help get his GT score up, so we had to send him down south to Arif Jan. So luckily for us we've been headache free for about 2-3 weeks now. And he's been down there causing headaches, and getting caught wailin on his stinky winky in an open bay where everyone sleeps. Heh. Its funny shit to think about, as I'm still tryin to get all the story on it. I just know that quite a few people in our unit know about his self debautchery.

Our replacements finally showed up a few days ago, and they seem like an all right bunch i spose. I mean I really don't care, cause with them here means I get to go home soon, and they are stuck with the hell of Kuwait. So good luck to them. Peace and chicken grease suckers!

I re-enlisted yesterday. As a few of you might know. I've been trying to for like the past month or so now, and finally had the right people and swing their rank around to get things going instead of gettin screwed out of my options. I was tryin on gettin Fort Sam down there with the specster, but unfortunately they didn't see any openings down there for me, so I got an OCONUS assignment of Alaska. Which isn't a bad thing. I've always wanted to visit there, and have always heard good things about the assignment up there from those who have been. So I am looking forward to headin on out the great white north. Hell it'll definitly be wierd on one side of things. One year i'm in a place hot enough to cook ten pounds off of ya a day, then go to a place where you want to put on ten pounds a day to stay warm. I know my southern ass is definitly lookin forward to all that snow. (sarcasm ;)) but it gets me outta Lewis, and outta the deployable shit, so I'll take anything. I had CPT Dick re enlist me, as you can tell from the pic I've placed above, and I was glad for that. As I've really liked having him as my OIC and my Vet. He is definitly a cool guy to work for and with, as he's helped me with various technician skills i've lost over the years from doing other shit. But I did a six year re-enlistment, that adds like 4 and a half years to my current enlistment, which makes this whole army thing a career it seems for me. Fuckin yeah! I've always enjoyed the thought of this gig as a career, for those of you that know me. But I guess its not a total bad thing...not sure on the good outcomes of stayin in, but hell i guess I'll find out over the years and prolly end up kickin my own ass as I go, but too late now I spose.

But yeah, here we are. I've accomplished all I can here, and all I really wanted to. Promotable status (though I would have loved to leave promoted but you can't get it all), re-enlisted, I got a place on base waiting for me now so I finally get outta the damn apartment life, and its close to country so I look forward to hangin out with him and his wife when we can as its always a blast with that guy, my marriage seems to be back in an upwards direction again-which isn't bad, just hope it stays that way now. :) So in like two to three weeks I shall be back breathin in the sweet sweet american air, with a nice cool crisp gulp of budwieser in my mouth. I can't wait. I don't care about the cold weather and all the rain i am going back to now. As it'll be better then the sand, shit filled air that I get out here.

Like I said it hasn't been a bad experience. I definitly have learned alot out here, especially about myself, but there's no place like home.

peace and chicken grease....

....happy holidays, and see you all soon.