Well well well

Here I am, finally able to post and yet I haven't put any thought into what to write. Such is life.

I've been on duty all week, as I've mentioned. It's generally said that even duty gets old eventually, because time ticks by so slowly and it's awfully boring. Well, not this duty. This has been just a real treat, let me tell you. Not once this week did I mind even a minute of duty, and if anything it made the week fly by. I've been keeping myself terribly busy between reading the Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, which I finished, and watching assorted movies and especially watching Lost. I watched fourteen episodes in a day and two the next night and have been waiting for the next disc. Well, now I've got it and my computer lost its mind; it appears that the battery may be failing badly, or there's some wacky short circuit somewhere else. And even when it does stay on, it freezes up whenever I try to do much of anything. I have been considering taking my laptop out back and shooting it.

We finally had a lance corporal promoted to a corporal. It was Cox, somebody I've never mentioned on here before, a five-year arty lance corporal, which is usually the mark of death because arty is basically closed out for promotions Corps-wide. He's a good Marine though and he's been a solid lance for so long that I guess they took pity on him and just gave it to him. He deserves it, and it's encouraging to see them actually promote one of the lance corporals. We've had a staff sergeant become a gunny, a sergeant become a staff sergeant, and about six corporals become sergeants, so it's about time one of the lance corporals picked up.

I put together an Excel spreadsheet that automatically calculates the days, hours, minutes and seconds left. The other day I checked it and noticed that we have less than a thousand hours left. That's some pretty good stuff. I can't wait to get back to you all, unlimited internet, good steak, beautiful women, and beer (not necessarily in that order).

I really don't know what else there is to say. I'm not terribly eager to get back to the missions once I get off duty tomorrow, but I guess it'll make time pass quickly and keep me on my toes. I hope everything's going terrifically well back home for everybody, and I can't wait to see everyone again.

Exciting scuttlebutt

Not too much today, just a quick update.

We've been having some pretty slow days lately, which is fine with me. I got to test out the new bulletproof glass shields we got on our humvees for the first time today, and it rocks. I feel much safer, closed up in a nice bulletproof glass box on three sides. Other than that I've just been reading (finally finished up with Atlas Shrugged and started Teddy's Iran book, which I'm enjoying), watching movies and doing busywork.

The exciting news I heard today came from my vehicle commander, the NCO directly above me. He told me that not only he himself but other NCOs as well have brought up my name when they discuss who should be meritoriously promoted. Unfortunately, it can't happen until I get all my professional military education (PME) stuff checked off. I'm finishing the first one tonight, which I just got today, but I'm still waiting on at least two more MCIs (Marine Corps Institute classes), namely Terrorism Awareness and Personal Finance, which I have been trying to get my hands on unsuccesfully since January. I talked to the NCOs in charge of the PME stuff a couple weeks ago and asked them to look into why I haven't received the classes yet. It looks like my address is still wrong in the system, which it has been for a long time. Now that they added an option for me to change it myself, though, my leadership has already had a full load checked out for me and sent to the wrong address. So hopefully I can disenroll the ones sent to the wrong address (29 Palms) and reenroll with this address, or possibly just contact comm school and see if they've gotten them and can forward them. Now I've got a fire under my butt to get that stuff done, if it means I could realistically be meritoriously promoted. Also, I'm working on bettering my PT scores. I've talked to two different guys who are willing to PT with me on a more regular basis so we can all stay in shape and improve our PFT scores. That will help a great deal for promotion.

That's it, gotta go!

Making up for lost time

Pearl Jam sang, “I know someday you’ll have a beautiful life, I know you’ll be a star in somebody else’s sky, but why, why, why can’t it be, why can’t it be mine?” Indeed, I say.

So, I’m not dead after all. I guess that’s probably not funny, but it’s a sure thing that I’ve been out of touch for quite a long time, something like ten days without phone calls or emails or posts. We had a two-day mission last five days, and haven’t had a day off (off meaning without a mission, since it’s pointless to even talk about a true day off, which hasn’t happened to me in several months) since, and not even enough hours free to make it to the MWR, especially since they no longer run buses to our distant compound from mainside between the hours of 2300 and 0600, which makes me irate (I is for irate). I’m not walking two miles to the MWR after a long day. If we ever get any short days, then we’ll talk.

Frankly, your worrying about me is pointless and makes me angry anyways. All it serves to do is censor me and make me feel guilty, and given the amount of danger I see, it is in fact quite silly to waste your time like that. Frankly, if anything is going to happen to me then it’s going to happen, and your worry will not change that a wink, I’m sorry to say. I have accepted it and came here and stay here of my own free will and with full knowledge of the danger, so know that if something does happen, it will happen with my full acceptance of it and I will be happy regardless. Don’t think I will ever allow some cowardly insurgents to determine my outlook or my frame of mind. Don’t get me wrong, however; I do appreciate your concern, but for your own sakes, don’t lose any sleep over my safety, because I’m not. If anything, just convert your worries into prayers and leave the worrying to God.

When I first got to Hotel I was on this kick of listening to the soundtracks of the original Star Wars movies. Well, there’s this one song called “The Duel” on the Empire Strikes Back soundtrack, that plays at the point in the movie when Luke is fighting Vader, and when I first really listened to the song I almost fell off my rack. It is the quintessential song of some small hero standing up to boldly fight an incredibly powerful evil against impossible odds. I could imagine no better way of putting that to music. It left me wondering if John Williams is some distant relative of Jesus Christ, like thirteenth cousin five times removed or something. I made several of my friends here listen to this thirty-second snippet, this part I think is absolutely flawless and possibly the most powerful sounds I have ever heard in any thirty seconds, and they listened to it and thought I was loony, couldn’t understand for the life of them what I was so excited about. Ah well, I guess genius can be lonely.

There are a few bad habits that I intensely enjoy such that I can’t see myself living the rest of my life without them. One of those I’m enjoying right now, and that is eating in bed. I’m lying on my bed inside my sleeping bag with my laptop on my lap and some soft and chewy chocolate chip cookies to my side, stuffing them in my mouth and feeling happy as a lark. The combined joys of eating cookies and laying in bed makes me feel so good that I probably ought to go to confession.

Several of my friends have been sending me good stuff lately. Jackson, Dukes, Sarah and Teddy sent me a box with a book on Iranian-American relations, Maddox’s highly entertaining book, a Magic Eye book and some colored pencils along with some also colorful pictures. One too many pictures, perhaps (ugh…). Matt Berge sent me some Star Wars novels, something I haven’t enjoyed since middle school, so those should be entertaining. Amanda Freel sent me a signed copy of Sean Hannity’s book Deliver Us from Evil. And what does Mr. Hannity have to say? “To Roger – a great American! Thank you! God bless!” Good guy, that Sean Hannity.

A great deal of excessive C.Y.A. (cover your ass) action by assorted superiors lately has left a bad taste in my mouth. None of it dealt with me individually, but all of it affected me in some negative manner (I say this to ease any fears). For instance, we have to fill out these trip tickets logging all the hours we use our vehicles, and they have to be renewed every week, and when the drivers from our platoon came to get them signed for this week, it took us two hours because the staff sergeant in charge of motor t. wouldn’t give them to us unless we had humvee driver’s licenses, which none of us had. He played stupid and went to talk to the CO, who directed him to go ahead and sign the trip tickets. The catch is, everyone here knows almost nobody here has humvee licenses, and everybody knows that hasn’t changed, but they have to put up this little charade where they pretend they didn’t realize it all this time and shrug their responsibility of it off on the CO. Nobody here will act on anything without dumping responsibility for it off on someone else in case it causes problems. I understand that they are going against the rules and they could get in trouble for breaking those rules, but the absolute lack of willingness to take personal responsibility makes me see red. I joined the Marine Corps believing it to be one of the last few bastions of personal responsibility, going against the standard government red tape, but this deployment has continuously proven me wrong. The Corps is no freer of ridiculous responsibility skirting, blame-gaming and politics than any other government service, it turns out. It’s so obvious how damaging such political maneuvering is that it frustrates me to no end how prevalent it is today, and not just inside government but everywhere. Everyone tries to arrange any meaningful action so that they can not be blamed if it goes wrong. It’s childish. I believed Marines to be men of action and above such scheming, but too many Marines in high position appear to be men of careful wording and precarious shirking of responsibility. They’re not all like that, but the fact that some are is shameful. Marines these days ought to be afforded several years of law school training so they can become better leaders, the way things are sometimes. I will be damned if I ever become like that. That is backwards by my moral reckoning. I would sooner break such a rule loudly and outright than quietly pretend I’m not responsible for taking action. All that behavior does is reinforce the fear of action, causing us to avoid doing anything meaningful we could be held accountable for until we no longer take any action at all. I will not stand for that, sure as hell not in my Marine Corps. (And for Dad, on that note: “It was a lie, and the more I saw of them, the more I hated lies.”)

So anyways, that’s my soapbox stance for the week. Unfortunately, I have to be up in three hours or I’d write more spirited, philosophical rants about the downward spiral of human society. Thanks for all the stuff you’ve been sending me (and Mom, those peanut butter cup Keebler cookies were…almost illegally tasty). Hope everybody’s safe and sound back home, that everybody’s enjoying their last few weeks of summer in my proxy, and that you save a little fun for me when I get back (just a couple months and some change left). Love y’all. Except for the hippies.

(Note: This post was 2.5 pages single-spaced in Microsoft Word. Pat yourself on the back for making it through.)