2011 by the Numbers

I’m pretty awful at math, but I’ve always enjoyed looking at the numbers and statistics behind things. I think of my roommate my freshman year who hated doing his math homework, but could calculate odds in Poker games, memorize baseball stats, and figure over/unders for sports betting with ease. Some numbers are just more fun than others. The main reason I put these together is because I think it’s a great way to put the last year into perspective. Some of the numbers are shocking even to me, some are just laughable at best, and some are straight wags (Good luck figuring out which ones those are). There were a lot of serious obstacles in 2011: moving on from my wife leaving me, training, knee surgery, starting a masters, etc. I believe that the best we can do when life presents us with obstacles is to learn from them and try and better ourselves. 2011 offered a lot of pretty severe obstacles, and I hope I’ve learned from all of them. It was a crazy year, and while I wouldn’t want to go through it again, I wouldn’t change a thing. Enjoy!

• Weeks at home: 13 (this number surprised even me)
• Cross countries in the T-1: 4
• Hotel rooms lived in: 8, for a total of 110 days
• Cities I’ve dwelled in (for a baseline, we’ll say I was there for more than 3 days straight): 9: Austin, Houston (broke there for 4 days), Enid, Pensacola (water survival), Spokane (combat survival), Atlanta (IQT), Meridian and Roseville (MQT), Baltimore (waiting for rotator). 
• Job offers from Flight Safety: 2, oddly enough (one from a simulator instructor on an airplane from Seattle to Tulsa, and one from Flight Safety when I was there for IQT)
• Units/bases I’ve shut down: 3. Meridian, Joint Base Balad, and Al Asad Air Base
• Units I’ve spun up: 1.5 (Beale for one, Al Asad for the .5 since it was a full move)
• Times I’ve had to move on deployment: 7, including 3 tent shifts at Al Udeid, 2 at Balad, once to Al Asad, and once to Afghanistan (with one more move to come)
• Times I parachuted into Pensacola bay in 40 degree weather: only once, thank God
• Chow halls eaten in: 10
• Days on MRE’s and number of MRE’s consumed: 10 and 12
• Pounds gained on deployment (this was a good thing, I’m constantly fighting my metabolism which is too fast for my own good): 7
• Pounds subsequently lost when MRE diet started and move to Afghanistan took place: 13 (*sigh*)
• Number of Rip-Its consumed: approximately 245
• Student sorties flown: 26
• Combat missions flown: 86
• Knee surgeries: 1
• Days between my knee surgery and next TDY for training: 18 (this was a bad idea)
• Times I’ve had to call or email Finance to get them to fix my travel account: 3,729 (approximately)
• Number of days spent “camping” in the bitter cold of Northern Washington: 5
• Hours taken for Masters: 9
• Pages written on deployment for said Masters: approximately 65
• Pianos procured: 1
• Pianos burned: 1
• Rounds shot at the range at Al Asad: approximately 1,000 in 2 hours
• Flags flown (either for my family or for maintenance): 36
• Tahoes destroyed: 1 (reference video below in The Last Stand in Iraq)
• Times I’ve had to explain something FMS (flight management system) related to Jammer: approximately 45
• Times I’ve been “chiefed”: somewhere between 12-18 times
• Mustaches grown: 3
• Mustaches dyed: 1
• Times I fought with imagery analysts: 6
• Hunting seasons missed: 6: spring and fall turkey, deer, dove, duck, and goose
• Family birthdays missed: all 3 of them
• T-1 FAIPs from the 32^nd I’ve flown with on combat missions: 2
• Lowest temperature seen: -8 (Enid Blizzard in January)
• Highest temperature seen: 128 (First day in Iraq, which was, as the SrA put it, “The hottest day on record.” I asked if he meant for the month, or record for that day, and he replied, “No, I mean this is the hottest day they’ve ever seen, PERIOD.”)
• Sandstorms I’ve seen: 4
• Times I’ve seen rain while deployed: 4 (this number is staggeringly low)
• C-17s that came to visit me: 3
• Care packages from friends and family that reminded me that folks back home are thinking of me: 14
• Skype sessions, phone calls, and emails from friends, family, significant other that reminded me how blessed I am: Too many to count.

Christmas Musings

Hello to everyone, I hope the holidays have been treating you all well, and you're packing on the extra pounds for me. Surveys say that the average weight gain for Americans during the holiday season (defined as Thanksgiving to New Years at which point everyone vows to strap themselves to a treadmill as penance for the culinary sins committed) is 14 pounds. Yikes. I hope none of you have done that or I will slap you with a liposuction hose!

Needless to say, I have not been putting on the pounds here. I've looked at food too many times recently and thought, "Is this dog food? Or is it food made out of dogs?" I've eaten a lot of granola and sandwiches lately as a result. The ops schedule hasn't slowed down and won't for good reasons, but eventually I'll shift off of the vampire schedule and might be able to hit an open DFAC for a warm meal instead of tepid leftovers. But I don't want anyone to think I'm just continuously letting loose with vitriolic spews about how it sucks over here. I could have it so much worse. There have been many nights where we talk to some Army or Marine Troops on the ground in some forsaken corner of this country and I think, "Damn, these guys are gonna be chowing on MREs tonight as they sleep on this MOUNTAIN." I definitely am well off in comparison.

The greatest thing I've learned since getting here is exactly how much we as a military can do when we work together. Integrating this airframe into working hand in hand with the ground assets hasn't been a fast or easy process, but the progress made is eye opening to say the least. When we work synergistically with these units, it can be staggering to see how effective they become. I'm grateful for the guys on the ground, because they are the ones out there really moving the mission and taking the fight to the terrorists, I'm just glad we can help.

You know, I originally thought that Christmas in the desert was going to suck, but I don't feel that it did. The camaraderie that occurs on days like this is overwhelming. Obviously most people want to be home with their families, but I've never been around so many people who are so upbeat to be getting the mission done despite the miles and time zones between them and their loved ones. Not only that, but the tremendous outpouring of love, prayers, gratitude and kindness from back home has been amazing. Our mail room is overflowing with care packages, and our hallways are filled with Christmas cards from family members, friends and kids that no one knows (those are the best, by the way. Reading Christmas cards from random 1st and 2nd graders who don't know any of us always make us smile. Especially when they write funny stuff like, "Dear soldier, please don't die before you come home." Awesome). I've had friends and family alike say "Thank you for what you're doing for us over there." But I think I should be thanking everyone back home. Behind every soldier, sailor, marine and airman is a support network that enables us to do what we do. Without the amazing people I have behind me, it would be a completely different story over here. So thanks to all of you for the love and support. It keeps me smiling, which for those of you that know me, know that's more than half the battle.

So having said that, I hope that you all had a very Merry Christmas. I'll still be here for a while, but I'm holding a cup that runneth over.

Will

The Last Stand in Iraq and the Trip to Afghanistan

I apologize to everyone following this for the infrequency of posts, but now that I’m done with my Masters courses for the semester and completely spun up in Afghanistan, I can finally sit down and catch my breath… well maybe not quite yet. Ops here run at a dramatically faster pace than the cookie cutter crap we were accomplishing in Iraq, but we’ll get there soon. First I want to explain to everyone what shutting down Iraq ended up being like (if you just want to read about how we got to Afghanistan – feel free to skip down to the end with the understanding that it was similar to Burning Man without hippies or drugs.).

Last post ended with me “procuring” a piano for our last roll call, but between there and here, a lot of weird stuff happened in Iraq. For example, we landed one evening and the loud speakers were going off, blaring some frantic message about a “lost angel,” IE missing soldier. Obviously this is a big deal IF the soldier is missing because of an abduction or is injured somewhere. However, it IS NOT a big deal if the soldier missing happens to be a past-middle-age female who happens to enjoy the company of younger male soldiers a little too much.  They found this aging sergeant holed up in some guy’s room, basking in their post-coital glow (or caught them in the act…ew), completely oblivious to the fact that the whole base had been searching for her for the last 8 hours.  The army didn’t want this type of activity to continue, so they responded as they know best: by crushing morale. They shut down the Rec center and the gym from 2200-0900 every day. This wouldn’t have been that big of an issue if I wasn’t on the night train, and my day normally ended with a trip to the gym at 0200 followed by a Rec center visit at 0400. Half of our squadron was on this exact schedule, and found this to be completely excessive on the Army’s part (which is kind of a self defeating argument. When has the Army ever done something that wasn’t completely excessive?) and a real drag for guys like me who were attempting to work on masters courses. But we made due –not like we had any choice in the manner. The Base Command Group also mandated that if you going to be out at night, you had to have a “battle buddy” or as we called it, an “accountabilibuddy” with you – just in case you… sighted Bigfoot and needed a corroborating witness or something. Understand that I realize the danger of a deployed environment, but Al Asad hadn’t been attacked in over 5 years. Granted the biggest fear was from insider threats, so it partially made sense, but still. We all rolled around disgruntled and armed; you’d have to have a death wish to mess with anyone from my squadron. You would think that being caught without an accountabilibuddy would merit a talking to, or maybe a stern talking to from an army sergeant with too much time on his hands, but they took it to a whole new level. If you were caught at night without your accountabilibuddy, they would throw you in the brig! Seriously? Serving time was now the solution for not being accountabilibuddiable, and this caused a few messes at our squadron. There were other problems that as the shut down date approached weighed heavy on our minds, and our guts.

For the last month that we were in Al Asad, things were rapidly shutting down, including a lot of the traditional support that we had grown accustomed to. Places like the Base Exchange (BX), the Post Office and eventually the Dining Facilities all shut down, leaving us feeling like hobos squatting on an abandoned base. At first no incoming mail was just a drag, but once they shut down the BX and people realized they were woefully underprepared for the isolation that was setting in, everyone’s tempers started wearing thin.  This directly correlated to people’s ability to procure/use tobacco products in many cases. Everyone’s patience was wearing exceptionally thin and hearing people verbally tearing each other a new one was a fairly common occurrence. The closing of the dining facility actually wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, although I know I’m not the only one that lost an excessive/unnecessary amount of weight due to what we were forced to ingest: Meals Ready to Eat or MREs. If you’ve never eaten an MRE, congratulations! They are pretty awful. They are perfect for the deployed member who spends a lot of time outside the wire, as they are compact, and have a TON of calories. Seriously, we’re talking about 3-4000 calories per MRE. Great if you’re walking 4 miles a day with an 80 pound pack, but if you’re sitting in an aircraft for 6 hours a day, they aren’t the best solution. 

All in all, we were getting pretty haggard as we approached the departure date. I remember one evening standing in our destroyed Cadillac (bathroom) after eating my MRE dinner and trying to brush my teeth with my broken toothbrush that I had duct taped back together and thinking to myself, “We have GOT to get out of here before we all start murdering each other.” 

In typical fashion, the squadron responded to calamity and stress like I expected: more shenanigans. Every vehicle we owned became a race car, every driver a Mario Andretti or Danica Patrick, and every trip to and from the squadron a functional check ride. We pushed these vehicles to the limit, sometimes never to recover them.  One day as we were driving to the squadron I told Juice to time me, as I peeled out of the parking area in front of the CHUs:

Me: Time me!
Juice: What? Why? What’s the rush?
Me: I want to see how fast I can get to the squadron!
Juice: You’re kinda speeding….A lot.
Me: Yeah I know. Don’t worry they won’t pull us over. Even if they do, I can talk my way out of it.
Juice: Yeah? What would you say?
Me: I’d tell ‘em, “We’re in Iraq. STILL. Why aren’t YOU speeding?”
Juice: Good point.

My favorite vehicle to drive (read: attempt to destroy) was the Tahoe. Huge engine and low center of gravity: perfect for doing doughnuts in the desert. After we were done a particularly vicious drifting session, the power steering didn’t respond like it used to. Turns out “we” burned the pump out for the hydraulic steering fluid. Whoops. 

On the last official day of the squadron, we had an official decommissioning ceremony, and that evening had the last roll call during which we burned the piano I had previously obtained. I was nervous that the piano wouldn’t catch fire so I asked maintenance to assist by giving us some “accelerant,” as they had plenty left over from their burnings. Some of the maintainers (who were awesome, by the way), told me to come by on my day off to pick up the fuel. Here’s the exchange that NEVER happened:

Nameless maintainer: OK, here’s two gallons. This should definitely do the trick.
Me: Will two gallons be enough?
Nameless maintainer: Ummm, yeah it should be more than enough.
Me: OK… What is this stuff anyways? Am I gonna have eyebrows after this?
Nameless maintainer: Well, you will still probably have eyebrows, but I wouldn’t get too close to it. And let’s not ask questions you don’t really want the answer to.
Me: OK, now I’m terrified. This should be awesome.

Needless to say, if you’ve seen the pictures online, there wasn’t much of an issue trying to get the piano to catch fire. I lit one side of the fire, and walked around to the other side and someone calls out, “You might want to move, Dowd!” I look up and the whole thing is already a blazing inferno. It took a grand total of about 15 seconds for the whole thing to catch flame. I got out of the way and proceeded to run the last roll call for the 362^nd, which consisted of us telling all the ridiculous stories we’d accrued over the last 4 months or so. Afterward, we had a great video lambasting our squadron commander that J-Flo, Jammer, Seaplane, Rojo, Kami and I put together, the basic gist of it being that we recreated a debrief in which the boss was played by my hands and voice clips of Tom Cruise’s character from Tropic Thunder, Lex Grossman. It was a big hit thanks to J-Flo’s clutch editing, and my stellar hand acting.

The next couple of days can best be described as a version of Lord of the Flies, except everyone was heavily armed and we didn’t kill the fat kid (although we came close). Someone had the great idea to get rid of all of the dumpsters near our housing, so trash started piling up. It was starting to look like a desert slum village. Some Navy guy came by and screamed at some people in the squadron, demanding that we do something about the trash that was piling up. Alright, we got something for that. We began building these massive bonfires to get rid of all of the trash and refuse that had piled up. And I mean we burned EVERYTHING. If it wasn’t personal property or bolted down effectively, into the burn pit it went.  It was fairly common to feel an explosion (from canisters of shaving cream, compressed air or even Febreze) shake the CHUs, hear a smattering of raucous cackles, and walk outside and see a group of people walking hesitantly back towards the roaring inferno, fearing for a secondary explosion. Maintenance topped that with a bonfire that would’ve put Aggies to shame the world over. It started as a pile of wood and debris about 20 feet tall that they soaked in their “accelerant” cocktail, which was a mixture of JP-8 (jet fuel with a really high flash point), diesel, and ALCOHOL.  Then, they started throwing cans of air and paint into the mix, which would erupt in a geyser of flames. Seriously, you could probably see this thing from space. The MPs weren’t much of a fan of this, but at this point no one particularly cared.

Two days (the day before Thanksgiving, to be precise), three MREs and eight bonfires later, half of the squadron loaded up on a C-17 to head to Afghanistan. I had been up late the night before and early that day to do one final scan of the squadron to make sure it was good to turn over to the Iraqis who would fill the building with dust, sand and cobwebs (I didn’t know that was my last chance for sleep for the next week or I would’ve taken it more seriously). The other half of the squadron would leave a day after us, so goodbyes were said as we prepared to head out. Everyone was excited to get to Al Udeid because that meant a hot meal, internet access, tobacco products and BEER! At the Deid, each person is authorized three drinks per day…and they get combat pay. Seriously, that place is a joke. All I really wanted was some real food and a toothbrush that wasn’t duct taped together. Plus, we were really hoping to take part in some kind of Thanksgiving meal, talk to family, and enjoy a couple of days off. See, at this time we weren’t fragged to leave for three days from the Deid, and everyone was looking forward to that time. Little did we know…

We arrive at the Deid around 0330, inprocess and drag our bags to our tent, immediately drop them and press over to the Fox Sports bar. We hang out there for a little bit before the BX opens, run a few errands and pass out. Jammer was in charge of the whole crew, and he planned on reattacking later that afternoon and seeing what there was in terms of travel for us. When we all stagger out of our bunks about 4 hours later, Jammer informs us that there is a C-17 leaving that evening to our destination, and we have seats on it. Cue the mutinous rumblings. Apparently he talked to our gaining squadron, and they wanted us in place ASAP, which to me meant I was about to go a number of days without sleep. I was not incorrect. Also, it meant that there was no time off for us, and we’d be traveling on Thanksgiving evening, which sucked, but it was just part of the deployment. At least we were able to get a warm meal before we jumped on a jet out.

The other big issue that we faced was the fact that we had changed our travel plans, but couldn’t do anything about our luggage, which was palletized and sitting on the ramp at the Deid somewhere cooling its heels. Jammer tells us he has this all figured out, and relays to me the conversation he had with outbound:

Jammer: OK, we are leaving today but we need our luggage to continue as fragged.
Outbound: Well, sir… We can’t get it on the flight tonight, it’s too short of notice, and the jet already has a full cargo load.
Jammer: I understand that, just make sure it goes when it’s supposed to. Do not mark us as no shows. Do you understand?
Outbound: Well, you’ll have to be here so we don’t mark you as no shows.
Jammer: WE. ARE. LEAVING. TONIGHT. Make sure our luggage still leaves when it’s supposed to.  DO NOT MARK US AS NO SHOWS. We will already be in Afghanistan waiting on our luggage.  Can you handle this?
Outbound: So you want me to mark you as no shows now?

Only the best and the brightest, folks. The reason why this is so important is that if our group ends up marked as no shows, our luggage gets sent back to wherever it came from, which for us meant that it would head straight back to Iraq, a country we’re leaving and a squadron that doesn’t exist anymore. This was an unsettling thought to say the least. Once Jammer thought he got the message through to the guy, we headed to Afghanistan late Thanksgiving evening. The luggage issue was obviously going to be a problem, but we all carried “72 hour packs,” which should keep us supplied until the bags arrive. We travel all night, and arrive in theater around 0830 in the morning and are greeted by the First Shirt, the Sergeant in charge of personnel for the squadron. He informs us that we will begin inprocessing that afternoon at 1630, meaning after we grab chow and get settled into lodging, we’ll have about 3 hours to sleep. The warning bells are already going off in my head. Then the shirt drops this bomb:

Shirt: Ok, where is Dowd, Scuba and Diddy (names redacted)
Me (thinking “oh great, here we go” to myself) : Here
Shirt: Unfortunately, you three will be living in the tents.
Everyone else kinda sniggers, I issue a withering glare making it abundantly clear that I don’t find it amusing.
Me: OK, any reason why?
Shirt: Yeah, we’re out of rooms.
Me (barely controlling my seething anger) through grit teeth: sounds AWESOME.

The tents are, in fact, NOT awesome. They are the furthest thing from it. I have been issued less space than a death row inmate right next to the flight line and the mosque on base (although I do have a gun, which I feel completes the juxtaposition). I drag all of my crap in, mash it into the corner as best as I can, and pass out for about 3 hours before it’s time to start the inprocessing. There is no better feeling than being deployed for 4 months, doing the EXACT same mission in a different location then showing up and being treated like the new guy. Fortunately, we were all so exhausted we couldn’t muster the enthusiasm to care. I can hardly remember the details of those couple days, just that we were constantly busy, never sleeping, and normally smelling some degree of terrible. I remember having this conversation with a friend over Skype on Saturday:

Me: When do you have to head to work?
Friend: Umm, it’s Saturday morning here on Thanksgiving weekend. No one is working.
Me: Wait, what? Thanksgiving was DAYS ago.
Friend: OK, you really need to get some sleep…

All in all, over the five days from Wednesday to Sunday, I totaled up about 20 hours of sleep, but the inprocessing did get completed. Unfortunately, exactly what Jammer had tried to mitigate occurred. The outbound personnel marked us as no shows, and our luggage just sat on the ramp getting rained on while we frantically tried to stop it from getting shipped back to Iraq. Eventually it did make it, thanks to the other Iraqi refugees that were still at the Deid, and some fast talking from Jammer (although thanks to the rain, all of my uniforms were mildewing. Hooray dirty laundry). I’ve seen Jammer get mad before but never like this. He literally threatened to put contracts out on everyone at Outbound. When it was all said and done, we had survived out of our backpacks for about 10 days, which meant that our meager 72 hour packs had become 240 hour packs.

We're full up here now, and integrated well into our new unit, but that’s all I have for now. The war continues and the flying never stops. I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season back home.

-Wellen

Closing down Iraq with 3.62 Days of Excessive Morale (Working Title), and Wellen and The Gang “Procure” a Piano

Well, I know by now that most people have heard President Obama say “The troops will be home by Christmas.” This is true, if you get to go home. For most of us here, we’re going to be moving on to a different theatre, we don’t know where yet. I don’t really mind this too much, I volunteered for this deployment knowing well and good that it was going to be about 6-7 months. The idea of home sounds nice right about now, but I will go where they tell me. For all the troops that get to go home, congrats! Please have a beer for me, for I have, as Frost once wrote, “Promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.”

Closing down this country is going to be crazy, and I have no idea how it’ll all get done, but I can guarantee you it will. That’s the power of the individuals in the United States Armed Forces. You can give them a task, and they will get it done, come hell or high water. The people that I serve with never cease to amaze me.

Having said that, we will not go quietly into the night. And by that I mean we will cause some mischief before we leave. Most of the readers have a decent grasp of my penchant for attracting trouble and wreaking havoc. This time we’re just going right at it. The other day on a flight with Pittsburgh, Rojo and Lead, we started having a conversation about how we were going to close down our time in this theatre. 

Me: What if we did something huge, like 3.62 days of mayhem or something?
Rojo: You might want to stay away from the term “Mayhem.” Not everyone enjoys that phrase as much as you do.
Me: This is true; I do tend to revel in it…Well, what should we call it?
Pittsburgh: Mischief?
Lead: Again…not a good connotation.
Rojo: How about “3.62 days of Excessive Morale?”
Me: That’s PERFECT.

Once we had the working title –Rojo still calls it a working title—we started coming up with ideas of things to do for the 3.62 days.  Here are some of our ideas:

-          A flyover. Obviously! Who knows if we can do this, but it’ll be awesome if we can.

-          A tractor race. If we can’t use maintenances tractors then maybe the Army would let us borrow their Polaris Rangers. Ideally we would film this and then play the footage to the tune of Super Mario Kart. I don’t actually see the point of having any kind of race if we don’t dub over the video with the theme music from SMK.

-          “Decommission” all of our buildings. This would take place in a violent fashion. All I know is swinging an 8 pound sledge hammer is not only a good workout, but it also relieves a lot of stress and aggression. This would be beneficial to a number of people here, including me. See? I can be altruistic!

-          Get Jammer arrested in The Bang. Jammer hates doing anything that creates waves, so putting him in The Bang is akin to putting a hypochondriac in a room full of blossoming Petri dishes. Getting him pulled over and subsequently arrested would be the icing on the cake. I think the cops will be more than willing to help.

-          Last but not least: Burning a piano.

The idea of burning a piano comes from a very old tradition, reaching all the way back to the Great War. Back when the German, French and British militaries first decided to field aircraft to try and get a better look at what there enemy was doing, the pilots were actually quite genteel. They would fly past each other and salute as they went by to go scout out their adversary’s battle formations. This went along until one day, a pilot thought, “Wait a minute. I’m not OK with them seeing what’s happening on the ground on our side.” So he took a carbine rifle with him in the air that day. Later on, he sees a German pilot flying past him, saluting gallantly. So the pilot takes his carbine out and takes a shot at the Hun, gets lucky and hits him right between the eyes. Both the pilot and the plane go down. Thus, aerial combat was born.

Aerial combat develops quickly, moving from carbines to mounted guns shooting at an awkward angle, to timed machine guns that shot through the arc of the propeller. As the aerial conflicts became more and more harrowing, the pilots developed something that no one foresaw. Swagger. They knew they were the best and carried themselves as such. This lent itself to many conflicts as their overwhelming hubris led them to act as though they were exempt from having to follow ordinary rules. They fought by a different set of rules, and they carried themselves that way on the ground. Well, the British higher ups HATED this, and tried to remedy it. One idea was to make the pilots take piano lessons at the Officer Club in hopes to make them more gentlemanly. “These pilots are out of hand! Put them in front of a piano!” “Bully good idea, dear chap!” The pilots obviously disagreed with this methodology, and responded with an act of unmitigated aggression that spoke volumes about what they thought about becoming more proper: They dragged the piano outside, lit it on fire and burnt it to the ground. 

The other story behind burning the piano – and many maintain this is the more accurate one – is a tale of one of the Eagles Squadrons during the Battle of Britain. The Eagles were American volunteers who flew for the British in the RAF and helped hold the Luftwaffe at bay in the skies over Britain when Germany launched its full assault during WWII. There was one pilot who was famous among his squadron mates for his skills on a piano and was always entertaining them when they weren’t flying.  He was killed during one of the air battles, and in honor of his flying prowess and his talent behind the keys, his flying partners burned the piano he always played. They figured no one would ever measure up to his dexterity with the ivory, so why allow the opportunity? They torched the piano in effigy of their flying partner who perished defending their country.

I can’t imagine a more symbolic way of closing down the squadron then by getting a piano and torching it. To hell with formality and civility! Let’s remember where we came from and celebrate the fact that we’re leaving! We should go out with a bang I think.

So I started hunting for a piano for this stated purpose. I decided I would tackle the issue as head on as possible and tried to send an email to everyone asking for a piano. Seaplane, one of the guys who helped us come up with the format for the 3.62 Days of Excessive Morale was there as I drafted the email to THE ENTIRE BASE. Here’s what I wrote:

Good afternoon, the 362 ERS is looking for a piano to use for our closing ceremonies. If anyone has a piano they don’t have need of anymore, please contact me at your earliest convenience. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Seaplane reads this and says, “Umm….you might want to let them know what you’re gonna use the piano for. They might actually want it back.” I think on this, and say, “OK, how about this:

Good afternoon, the 362 ERS is looking for a piano to use for our closing ceremonies. If anyone has a piano they don’t have need of anymore, please contact me at your earliest convenience. Thank you for your time and consideration.

It should be mentioned that the piano will not be returned to you, nor ever available for use again.

We agreed that this covered all of the bases, and sent the email out… or at least we THOUGHT we did. I come in the next day only to discover that I don’t have access to the distro list for the whole base. BALLS. So that means that I actually have to investigate. 

Normally whenever there’s a distro list to the whole base, there’s one offending party who abuses it more than most. In this case, it was a Navy Services Lieutenant. So I figure he annoys us all the time, so I’ll annoy the piss out of him for a little. Plus, as a services officer, he might have a good idea of where we might find a piano. He directs me to check at the MWR (the recreation center) on base. J-Flo and I had the next day off, so we went reconnoitering to see what we could find. Sure enough, after a short search, we find a HUGE stand piano stashed in the corner collecting dust. I maintained my cool when I saw it:

Me: LOOK AT IT! IT’S PERFECT!!!!
J-Flo: Yeah...wait, what? It’s just a piano dude.
Me: No bro, this thing is amazing. Imagine how it’s gonna look engulfed in flames with piano wire shooting out of it!
J-Flo: Relax, don’t have a coronary over this. You act like you just witnessed a miracle.

After I collect myself, I find one of the Iraqis workers and began to inquire aggressively about the piano. He might have understood a word or two, but he gave up quickly and took me to talk to a higher up, who informed me that he couldn’t give me the piano right then. He then told me that in less than a week the army was going to take over, and I could talk to them about it. In fact, he told me that the army was going to take over precisely at midnight on Saturday. Perfect….My wheels started turning rapidly as a plan started to form.

We walked back to housing, and I ran into Doesn’t, another pilot with an affinity for shenanigans that rivals my own. I filled him in on the plan, thinking it will be good to have another guy who won’t accept no as an answer, and we began to troubleshoot how to get this piano with the smallest amount of work on our part:

Doesn’t: You said they are changing over at midnight?
Me: Yeah, that place will be a mess right around then, so….
Doesn’t: You wanna walk in and take it right then?
Me: Pretty much.
Doesn’t: Oh yeah, I’m in.

So that’s the plan, we’re going to get a truck and roll in there and “procure” the piano in the midst of chaos. Saturday rolls around, and once I’m done flying, I grab the keys to the truck and I’m about to run out of the squadron to go get the piano, when I have a thought. I see one of the Lt’s working on a packing list for a giant shipping container and I ask him if he could add a piano to the list. He asks, “So you want me to add a piano to this list? Why?” I reply, “Ehh…  Don’t worry about it. Just do it and print it. You know you can trust me.” “I honestly don’t know if I can, but here you go,” he answers as he pulls a sheet off of the printer and hands it to me. I grab the paper, attach it to a clipboard and run out the door. It’s a well known fact that a person with a clipboard must be on official business. Armed with this new weapon, I head back to housing to grab Doesn’t with one of the other LT’s who is going to help us, and we drive over to the MWR at 2330. We’re right on schedule.

We walk into the MWR, and it is everything I thought it would be: UTTER CHAOS. There’s about 50 army troops screaming at the football game on the TV and surfing the internet and the Iraqis are running around like headless chickens trying to get everything ready for the handover. Doesn’t leans over to me and suggests, “Dude, let’s just wheel the piano out the back door. No one is even going to notice us.” We walk over to the piano, open the emergency exit – after checking to make sure the door wasn’t wired, OBVIOUSLY – and wheeled the piano right out the back door. No one even looked up. We run into a snag when we realize the gate is padlocked, and we need the key from the Iraqis to unlock it. So we walk back in to confront them to unlock the gate. We stomp right up to the first Third Country Nationalist (TCN) that we see and start making demands:

Me: We need the gate unlocked.
TCN (in severely broken English): What? Gate? What for?
Me (feigning petulance at his lack of comprehension): For the piano we’re picking up. See? Right here. (I point at my clipboard.)
TCN (obviously bewildered and not understanding a single word that I’ve said): OK…one minute…thank you.

He walks off and Doesn’t and I are BARELY holding it together. I’m trying so hard to not laugh, knowing that we’re SO close to getting this piano in our grasps. I see the first TCN talking to a second TCN and gesticulating wildly in my direction. Not one for avoiding confrontation, I just walk over to them and point at the clipboard and say, “We’re here for the piano and we just need you to open the gate for us.” He gives me the thousand yard stare of someone who is desperately trying to work past a language barrier. I point at the clipboard again and raise my eyebrows, and you could see the resignation in his eyes as he gives up and says, “You are good to go” in barely discernible English, and waves me away. The first TCN walks out with me, into a different office, grabs a key and walks out with us.

We walk out as the LT pulls the truck around and try and have a conversation with the TCN who is explaining that he has no idea what is going on with the changeover. We assure him everything is under control, barely holding back open laughter. Once the piano is loaded up, we drive out of the gate giggling like school children and find BOTH TCNs standing there waving at us as we leave. I haven’t laughed as hard as I did when pulled out with the piano in the back of the truck with two Iraqis cheerily watching us abscond with their piano.

All in all, I would say it was a successful mission. Now, we have to burn it. I’ll get back to you with the rest of the story as it develops.

Wellen

The Bang Gets Pulled Over

Ever since the move to our new base, transportation has been a bear of a problem. From Grand Theft Auto, to diesel in an unleaded engine, to a van that shuts off every 400 meters or so, our squadron has had a hard time with the execution of “point A to point B.” We can take airplanes and fly them all over the desert, but trying to traverse the two miles between our quarters and our squadron is our Achilles Heel. There is one exception to this: The Bang. The Bang is our 20 passenger bus that we somehow acquired as a crew vehicle. It’s a monstrous circa-early-90s public metro style bus that we are using to the best of our abilities. Early when we made the move out here, our Commander told us, “Make this place your home. Make it comfortable.” Well, give us an inch and we’ll take a mile. With the help of some clutch online shopping, the LPA got a hold of The Bang with some battery operated lights and reflective tape. Here’s the result:

                      

It’s pretty loud. Driving this bus around with all the lights on and seeing people’s reactions is hysterical, although, it would seem that someone didn’t find this bus as funny as we do, as it’s already been pulled over once. Apparently this bus is “offensive” and someone complained, and the cops had been “looking for it.” We surmised they must not be looking very hard since we drive it around lit up like a slot machine at Binion’s. That and the cop to regular military member ratio is about 4:1.

The greatest part about The Bang is the built in Plausible Deniability factor. In order for anyone to truly get offended by the phrase “BANG” requires them to know exactly what we’re referencing, which makes them complicit. But never at any point does the conversation require the same admission from us. So they are guilty and we are innocent, and along the way, we get to mess with people, which is a win every time in my book. This is what makes driving The Bang so much fun. You’ll see what I mean later.

Last night I was hanging out in the squadron, helping out on a non flying day. I was there with a couple of our back enders who approached me with a request:

Scott: Hey, we have a proposal for you.
Me: Go
Scott: Well, it’s about The Bang. We want to…
Me: I’m gonna stop you right there. Let me ask you a question. Does what you’re about to propose cause mischief or mayhem?
Scott: Yes, I would say so.
Me: That’s all I need to hear, go forth and prosper.

In truth all they did was get some more glint tape and write BANG on the front, and make some clutch fuzzy dice for the rear view mirror. In general they just made The Bang more of a statement than it already was, and I’m definitely for that. 

Well, the night drags along and as we’re getting ready to leave around 0445, we realize we’re going to take two crews back to our housing in The Bang. Awesome! The only thing better than a gaudy party bus is a gaudy party bus full of people! We all load into The Bang and start heading home, about 12 people total. As we’re heading down the hill, I notice flashing lights from a cop car off to the right. We could easily avoid them and take an alternate route, but what’s the fun in that? So I holler at Bennett, who was driving, “You don’t have a hair on your ass if you don’t drive past these cops!” We’re all aircrew, so once someone’s manliness is challenged, it might as well be a triple-dog-dare to lick a frozen flagpole. It’s bound to happen. Sure enough, Bennett doesn’t disappoint and drives right past the cops who were pulled off to the side, blocking a side street. We go tearing past, with most of the people in the van fist pumping furiously and hooting wildly. Both of the cops notice our bus go past, half wander out into the street watching us go, completely bewildered beyond all hope. One of them actually takes his hat off and scratches his head, as if someone asked him to calculate the shuttle’s atmospheric reentry angle. Sure enough, they hop in their cruiser and start following us. One of the other guys on the bus notices they don’t have their lights on:

O’Doyle: Look how covert they are! They don’t have their lights on like they’re sneaking up on us.
Me: I think we’re just putting out enough light for both of us.

We make it back to our housing with the 5-0 still in tow. We pull off and the cops keep going, but we just assume they’re going to sweep around back, in a classic “pincer move.” Bennett drops about half of the people off and we head back out for breakfast, but not before we see the cops circling behind our housing complex, as if they are waiting for the perfect opportunity to swoop in for the kill. Turns out, that is precisely what they were doing. The moment we turn onto the main road, the cops hit the lights and pull us over. Not one cop car, but TWO! This amuses me to no end, because I cannot wait to hear their reasoning for this. My giddiness and excitement about getting pulled over aggravates Jammer to no end, because he wants breakfast, not interaction with the MPs, and as the senior officer on board, he sees this spiraling out of control quickly. The cops approach the passenger side window, and the exchange begins. Luckily for us, we had Stecker and Bennett in the front, two guys who could probably talk their way out of an empty bank vault with ski masks on.

Stecker: Good evening, what can we do for you?
Cop: Sir, do you know why we pulled you over?
Stecker: No, I was wondering just that.
Cop: Well, Sir, we’ve had a number of complaints about this bus.
Stecker: Really? That’s the first I’ve heard. Why are people complaining?
Cop (fidgeting nervously): Well… because it says “BANG” on the back.
Stecker (trying his best to make the cop say it): What’s wrong with “BANG?” What connotation are people using for the phrase “BANG?”
Cop (BLATANTLY LYING TO ALL OF US): Well… you know… some people might think it’s a bomb, or there are explosives on board.
Stecker: Seriously?

Oh you’re not even trying! REALLY?!? A Vehicle Borne IED lit up like a disco ball. Yeah, let’s advertise that we have a bomb with flashing lights and an onomatopoetic phrase on the back. They’ll come running like zombies to a corpse buffet. The cop realizes that he’s not making much sense and he’s not getting ANYWHERE talking to Stecker, who is talking circles around him so fast his head is spinning, so he asks Bennett to step out of the bus with him so he can get his information. By this point I’m laughing SO hard I can’t breathe and Jammer looks like he’s about to hit me. Of course the cop didn’t do himself any favors by pulling Bennett out. We open the window so we can hear what’s going on, and one of the first things we hear is Bennett say, “Sir, there is no regulation that says that I am not allowed to decorate my bus like this,” which only makes me howl louder. Jammer then growls at me, “You’re getting a damn bus license. We’re not throwing these guys under the bus like this anymore, literally.” I agree with him, but point out that Bennett is holding his own just fine. Come to find out, the cops actually like The Bang. They were pretty cool guys, laughing about it and saying, “We think this bus is awesome!” But I guess they weren’t kidding when they said people were complaining, which made me wonder a couple of things. Is that what the military is coming to out here? People (read: people who don’t fly AKA non operators AKA shoe clerks) have so much time on their hands that they are going to complain about a bus with lights on it? So we gave them our squadron number and told them to pass it out so the people complaining can call us directly and we can tell them how we’re not doing anything wrong, and they could probably find a better way to use their time instead of wasting ours. 

I honestly think we got pulled over by two cop cars because the first car radioed their buddies to tell them they found The Bang and to get their asses over to housing to see it. Our bus has become the vehicular equivalent of Sasquatch. I know those cops all went back to the station and bragged about pulling The Bang over, much to the chagrin of all the less fortunate MPs. “Yeah, we saw The Bang. And we PULLED IT OVER!” At least we know we made their morning more entertaining.

As we were pulling away, Heather comments, “So do you think they get briefed every morning at Roll Call to look out for The Bang? Do the cops here really have that little going on?” I replied, “I guess they really are getting a bunch of complaints, which means everyone else has too much time on their hands. I can just picture their Shift Boss, some crusty old Sergeant Major with a huge biscuit duster on his upper lip chugging coffee and screaming, ‘Alright! I’m putting out an APB on The Bang. Someone find this damn bus! People keep calling saying they are disturbing the peace. I’ve got an ulcer the size of Montana, and it feels like I’ve swallowed a small sun, the last thing I need is the Captain handing me my ass because we can’t find one F-ing bus. Get out there and get me The Bang, or you’ll all be pumping shitters in Mosul. Now get out of my face! Dismissed!’”

While this was easily one of the greatest highlights of my time out here, I hardly doubt the adventures of The Bang will be limited to this. I highly suspect that more stories will follow as the legend of The Bang is forever recorded in Iraqi lore.

Conversation of the Day

This occurred during our latest FloFit work out. We were all having a hard time with the blistering repertoire of ab workouts that J-Flo was throwing at us, and in between we had this conversation:

Meat: I feel like everything is getting stronger but my hip flexors.
Juice: You just need to stretch them out man, here's how I stretch em. Juice proceeds to lay flat and perform what appeared to be unspeakable acts on a workout mat. See? That seems to work for me.
All of us stare at him in abject shock.
Juice: What?
Me: Umm, I'm pretty sure I just witnessed you make aggressive, passionate love to an invisible woman. I am going to go vomit now. Thanks for that visual. That was horrifying.
Meat: Yeah, that was pretty gross dude.

I had to share this one, as most of the conversations during FloFit normally follow the mold of us complaining about the workouts but begrudgingly complying. This one had us all cracking up, and as most of you know, if you can laugh through the pain of a workout, it's not as tough. Take care!

Wellen

Bedouin tents, Grand Theft Auto, and Haboob attacks

Sorry again for the delayed posting, this move has been something else. Our squadron is finally settled at our new base, and the transition has been quite interesting. Our new base is nice; quiet, open and relatively laid back (even if it does smell like a rotten sulfur pit most of the time), and our squadron all lives by each other, which kind of gives it the feeling of summer camp. At our last base, we were spread out through the main base housing complex, whereas here, you can’t walk outside of your room without seeing someone you work with. Our rooming situation is somewhat similar to the last base as well: One room for two people and a door that opens up to a wide gravel pit. The problem with the rooms is that if your roommate is trying to sleep during the day – which is the case for us since J-Flo and I are both flying nights – there’s no way to avoid letting in a blinding amount of sun and most likely waking your roommate up. J-Flo and I tried to rectify this situation by making canopies for our bed. These aren’t the frilly four post beds that you’d see in Southern Living. Our room looks like a MacGyvered Bedouin village: 550 cord tied onto bolts that we backed out of the ceiling to support the sheets we tied up. When we were done, I commented to J-Flo, “It looks like an opium den in here. All we need are some sitars playing and some belly dancers.” Here’s a picture of J-Flo’s tent:

 We made the canopies one afternoon in a blur of caffeine induced productivity. We had a big pile of sheets that J-Flo brought from our last base, and while we were fixing the room up we had this conversation:

Me: What sheets can I use?
J-Flo: You can use any of them, just not the pillow. That’s my ass pillow.
Me (Long awkward pause, just staring): Umm….ass pillow huh?
J-Flo: Well, yeah…It’s my – you know what, don’t worry about it.
Me: Well, you said ass pillow. Now I don’t feel like I can move past it.
J-Flo (exasperated with me): You know, it’s just a pillow that I sit on. It’s for my ass.
Me: You mean like when you make tea and sit on the floor?
J-Flo: Well, now you’re just being racist.

Honestly though, I got lucky with a pretty awesome roommate. We’ve started working out at the same time so he can teach me some Tae Kwon Do, and for the added benefit of having someone there to motivate you. Guys in the squadron have started noticing our workout routine is a real gut check and have started tagging along, and dubbed it FloFit. Let me say this about J-Flo: He’s a FREAK OF NATURE. I’m in pretty good shape, but every time I work out with him, I find myself having to dig deeper than I thought just to keep up. I swear he’s made out of corrugated steel. One of the other guys in the squadron was tagging along and after a particularly vicious ab workout had this question for me:

Rob (choking back vomit): Where the HELL did you find this guy?!
Me (face down, gasping for air): Found him on the black market. They captured him in Chernobyl’s melted reactor core. He’s illegal in 14 states and wanted in Alaska for Caribou genocide.
Rob (still not breathing): Wait…..what?

Besides working out like a beast and flying occasionally, we’ve been spending our time trying to figure out how to get around this base. Our squadron is about 80 people strong, but for whatever reason we only have 4 vehicles with which to get around. It’s weird, we’ll be walking down the street to chow, about a ¾ mile hike, and you’ll see a bunch of Army troops driving by in nice vehicles by themselves. Dan Bell put it best, “I wish I was an Army Sergeant so I could have my own Suburban.” Most of the time, we have to end up relying on the bus routes on base, although that’s wrought with peril as well. The base is really spread out and the bus drivers are both maniacal at considerate at the same time. Sometimes you’ll be sitting at a bus stop and the bus you’ll be trying to catch will just go screaming right past. Other times, you might be walking back from chow with only about 300 yards to go, and a bus will pull up and open the door and try and give you a lift for the last stretch. It’s weird.

One of the vehicles we had was loaned to us. I don’t think we were planning on giving it back at all, in fact. It was a van (a freaking sweet van, mind you) and we named it -- Phlupher….long story -- and treated it as our own for a couple days. It was like the van from Old School where Will Ferrell and Vince Vaughn kidnap all of their pledges, except it was gold and had a body lift and off road suspension on it. It was AWESOME.  Well, we treated it great until one of the Iraqis filled the tank with diesel and completely wrecked the engine. I can’t even figure out how he put diesel in the tank, the nozzle doesn’t even fit. I’m actually a little impressed. So we were down one vehicle. Great. Well one day, there was a van that looked remarkably similar to Phlupher parked outside our housing. Someone in the squadron – we still don’t know who, and no, it wasn't me – saw it and thought, “Awesome! Phlupher is back!” So they jumped in and took it to the squadron, put a name back on the windshield and went about business as usual. This worked great for a couple of days until the van was REPORTED AS STOLEN. Uh oh. I walked into to talk to Juice – our scheduler – one day, trying to figure out when I’d be flying, and he asks me:

Juice: So do you know anything about Phlupher 2?
Me: No, what do you mean?
Juice: Well, apparently that van was stolen, and SSgt Schmidt just got pulled over and almost shot in the head.
Me (laughing so hard I’m about to swallow my tongue): HAHAHAHA!!!! You can’t be serious!
Juice: I am serious! Do you know who took that van? We have to figure out who just hijacked the van. They aren’t going to be in trouble, we just need to know who.
Me: Yeah, good luck with that. I’m sure you’ll have people lining up to confess.

In addition to trying to figure out how to get around, get the mission done, and get in beastly shape, we also have sand storms to deal with. We’re kind of in the middle of nowhere and these things can pop up with no notice or provocation. I had heard about Haboobs before, but I never thought they’d be as bad as they are. It's not so much that it's sand blowing around, it's more like atomized dust that swirls around, and gets EVERYWHERE. Yes, everywhere. Here’s a picture Juice took of one that rolled in quite suddenly:

Vicious looking, right? This normally isn’t a problem since we’re supposed to have all the gear we need. However, since I was one of the crews that delivered the aircraft, I had shipped most of my gear ahead so it would be there when I arrived.  This would’ve worked great if it wasn’t for the squadron losing track of my stuff, which found me in the middle of the sand storm with no goggles, no covering, nothing that I needed. It went from a clear day to looking like footage from the Mars landing outside in a matter of only 10 minutes. These storms are no joke. Thank God I wasn’t flying in it. So we’ve dealt with a couple of those, no thanks to the weather shop. You would think if your only job was to tell people about devastating weather phenomena that they would be able to catch these things rolling in. I finally found all of my gear buried in the back of a storage closet two days later. I loaded all my gear up into the back of our bread truck and had to deliver the DO to a jet to look at some avionics issues before I took my stuff back. He looks at all of the crap and asks, "What's all this shit back here?" I say, "It's the rest of my gear, sir. I finally found it." He replies, "you haven't had this stuff? Wow, that sucks, I'm sorry." It did suck, but I have it now, at least, despite the two pounds of sand I'm currently lugging about in my lungs.

Well, I hope this post suffices for you all. I promise to try and write more once my Masters classes calm down. Take care!

Wellen