Vacation

Tomorrow I get to leave for vacation.  My vacation officially starts one week from today, but I am leaving Taji in the morning.  I get to travel from here to Kuwait with my coworker Derek.  He is very laid back and we get along well.  He is very calming and has talked me out of being overdramatic about things a few times.  I think it will be nice to have some company-a battle buddy for the first part of this journey.

I am SO excited.  I am sure I have been this excited for a vacation before, but I can't remember when.  It has been a long 5+ months in the desert.  It feels like it took forever for this day to get here.  This is a much needed break.  I had the day off today so I could pack my stuff.  I was thinking about everything it is going to take to get home.  It seems like a very long journey and it hasn't even started yet.  It will be worth it.  I will take lots of pictures because vacations are an adventure as well.

I am going to leave you with a couple of pictures.  The first is of me in "Spotty" as my boots have been named.  It was so muddy I actually got to wear them to school once.  The second is a sign warning of danger.  Lots of love, M.

Fun Times

I had the chance of a lifetime.  USO brought Toby Keith to Camp Taji for a concert.  I first heard about this a couple of weeks ago at the cookout I wrote about.  I honestly thought that these people were messing with me.  Sure enough, they weren't.  I got an email the next day announcing his arrival.

Tuesday night was the big night.  It was SO exciting.  You could feel the excitement in the air.  People all over base were in good spirits.  It was great to have something fun to do.  I got to be in the front.  We arrived early and sat up front until the show started.   He played for almost 2 hours.  It was a great time.  Really great.   Here are some pictures.

PS  While I was standing in the crowd listening to Toby sing "American Soldier" to a crowd of service men and women, it occurred to me that moment might be a little more "American" than a cookout.

The Great American Cookout

I don't know of many things that are more "American" than cookouts.  I have been giving it a lot of thought.  Now, I know that we Americans probably didn't just dream it up all on our own, but I know we do it well.  Spring is a great time for cooking out.  The thing is, even here on a base in the middle of the desert, we cook out.  I have been to the Air Force living area a couple of times for farewell cookouts, but in the past 2 weeks, I have been invited to a couple more.  They were totally voluntary-and very fun.

The first was 2 weeks ago and there were several people from my step aerobics class getting together.  I was invited and decided it would be nice to get away from the usual suspects.  One guy dreams of opening a BBQ place one day.  The food was fantastic.  It was nice to take a break from the norm and spend a couple of hours just hanging around talking.

Last Sunday, a woman who works for my company, but not with me, invited me over.  She had people who backed out at the last minute and I got lucky.  I didn't have to bring anything.  I showed up just as it was getting dark.  There were only 4 of us there, but it was a perfectly lovely evening.  The temperature was perfect.  She made potato salad with food repositioned from the d-fac.  It was so good.  As I was sitting there enjoying the crazy stories from life as a contractor, I was thinking about how nice it was to escape the norm.

It seems that there are many people around base who have been cooking out since the weather improved.  This is the perfect time of year.  It is warm during the day-I don't dare say hot because every single time I do, I am reminded that the hot hasn't started yet-and very comfortable in the evenings.  The chill the evening/night brings is no longer in the air.  I like going for a walk at dusk and smelling all of the delicious food people have on their grills.  It seems like such a simple thing, but for a little bit of time, we can forget we are surrounded by T-Walls, barbed wire and fried catfish and simply enjoy the evening with good food and friends.  Happy Grilling.  Love, M.

Slim Pickins

We get our stuff shipped on trucks.  This is true of mail, PX/BX stuff, and food at the D-Fac (Dining Facility).  Occasionally, when shopping at the BX, or waiting for Valentine's Day cookies, I have noticed that we are overdue for a shipment or two.  In the past, it hasn't been very extreme, just a slight inconvenience.

This morning, the D-Fac had fried catfish.  Did you read that?  Catfish...for breakfast.  Maybe I jumped ahead of myself a bit.  About a week ago, I noticed that they were out of lettuce.  I have seen a tomato shortage before, but there has always been lettuce.  I had been in the mood for a salad all day, got my plate, went to the salad bar line, and low and behold, there was pasta salad, beet salad, all of the stuff you would put on a salad, but no lettuce.

Since that fateful day last week, I (along with everyone else on base) have noticed that the food selection has been on a downhill slope.  The choices had become much more limited.  Seriously, we have had pasta for lunch for the past 4 days.  Last night, I skipped dinner, but was told it was ALL fried food.  Yesterday, there were no eggs at breakfast.  And so began the talk about how we would all be given MREs if the truck didn't arrive.  There was a lot this talk.  But, this morning was a new low.  Catfish for breakfast. 

Last night, I heard a couple of things.  First, there has been some issue with the supply route.  "Thank you Captain Obvious," was what I wanted to say.  Second, that a truck would arrive with groceries sometime soon...Insha'Allah (more about this later).  I spent the morning thinking about what would happen at lunch.  Wondering if that truck would ever come in.  Praying for a piece of fruit.  We joked around about how the lunch menu had changed and they would be serving onions and ketchup packets.  My stomach was really growling as I walked into lunch.  I scanned my card and asked the super nice lady who works there if the truck had arrived.  An enormous smile broke out as she said yes.  Reinforcements had arrived.

Let me tell you this-iceberg has never looked so good.  Love, M.

So long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Adieu

People come into your life for a reason.  The time you spend together may not be long, but it can be meaningful.  This is what they (whoever they are) say.  It's true.  In my life, I have been blessed with people who have made my life better-repeatedly.  Of course there have been those I have only met in order to learn some valuable/hard lesson, but I learned something from them anyway.  But this post isn't about them, it is about the blessings.  The people who have saved me from going completely crazy.  The people who have brought me perspective when I needed it.  The people who have made me a better person because I know them.

I had to say goodbye to my friend Kathy tonight.  When I arrived in Taji, Kathy was on leave and returned just a couple of days after I got here.  She worked in the building where we have our "office" so I would see her around, but we didn't actually work together.  In fact, while I had spoken with her a few times, we didn't really actually get to know each other very well until I went to team-building.  She is a great encourager.  That is one of the things I really like about her.  She is positive and encouraged me from my first volleyball game, until the end.  No joke, she told me to keep working out when she gave me a hug goodbye at the airport.  She is the reason I moved past reading the running magazines and actually started running.  More than encouraging, she is a woman of integrity, which is something I admire in others.  She has a very strong sense of what is right and wrong and doesn't stray from that.  It made me reevaluate my own life to make sure that I was making decisions for the right reasons.

I gave her a hard time one day about inviting someone else to go to the gym after work in front of me and not inviting me.  From that moment on, she didn't give up.  She asked me every day.  And most days, I went.  I went through a couple of weeks when my body was more sore than it has ever been in my life and all I wanted to do was take a day off, but she somehow talked me into going back.

Beyond encouraging me to live a healthier lifestyle, she has been a good friend to me.  She has listened to me vent, let me have a minute when I couldn't take it anymore, and quietly closed the door handing me a ROLL of papertowels when it seemed that a Kleenex wasn't going to cut it.  When she knew I was having a rough day, she checked up on me.

For the past month, I have been saying, "I can't believe you are leaving so soon.  I am not ready for you to go."  And she would reply, "I am ready to go.  I miss my family."  I would say, "I know.  You are ready to go, but I am still not ready for it."  She has a husband and two kiddos at home who are ready to have her back.  I am very happy for her to get to go be with her family.  I just wish I would have been able to spend more time around her.

I will leave you with a picture from the Master Sergeant's last team-building today, softball.  Love, M

More Funny

Some of you know that we had a break from teaching.  I am not going to get into it here, but it was too long.  We are back in the classroom and better than ever.  I got a new set of students.  They are just as funny as the first group I had.  I find that I say, "Oh my gosh" on a fairly regular basis.  They think this is hilarious.  We will finish the day with a joke or two.  Somewhere along the road, they decided that jokes weren't good enough and they needed to give me riddles.  Every day (sometimes every hour) they will give me a riddle to solve.  Some of them have been super easy, others I think might be lost in translation.  Nevertheless, it is great fun.  They call it my homework and I fake complain about how much work they are giving me, just like they complain about how much work I have given them.  My assignment this weekend has something to do with ducks that I am certain was not translated correctly because I have NO idea what the answer will be.  Oh well, I have a couple of days to dwell on it. 

My favorite exchange from this week:


When students sneeze, I say, "Bless you."  I have done this since the class started and they always repeat it as if it is the strangest thing I have said in class.  Then they will ask how to spell it.  For whatever reason, this happens every single time someone sneezes and I say it. 
Today a student said, "Bless you (no, I had not sneezed and neither had anyone else). Teacher, do I say 'Bless you too?'"
"Nope, you can say thank you," I said. 
"Nope?  What does this mean, 'nope?'"
"Oh my gosh.  Have you finished the exercise?"
"Oh my gosh.  (lots of laughter) Fifty-fifty."
"I will explain it after it is 100% finished."

Good times.  I do love teaching.  Love, M

Funnies

I get to see and hear a lot of funny things.  Here are a few.

A colleague's question to me, "What do good cooks use a microwave oven for?"
My response, "To reheat things."
Student, "My wife reheats things for me."
The response to the entire class, "There you have it.  If you don't have a wife, you need a microwave oven."

On the back of the truck:  4X4 (decal on truck) = 18...seriously?  The =18 and seriously were written by two different people.

During a safety briefing, "A leatherman does not make a soldier an electrician."

Me, "Will you cook chicken today?"
Student, "Yes.  I will cook the children today."
Me, "Thank you for using an article this time, but cooking children is not a good idea."

That's all for now.  I am sure there will be plenty more where these came from.  I know I have been slacking in this department.  I will work on it.   Love, M.