The One Month List: Army Parking Chicken and Iraqi Sock Monsters

I apologize to everyone for the tardiness of this post. We’ve been pretty busy lately and not a whole lot has taken place that has truly been note worthy. It’s still hotter than hell around here, and nothing makes me happier than showering in some tepid water – you can’t even really call it showering, it’s more like “pushing sweaty soap around your body and praying you don’t smell when you’re done” – and then walking back to my room (all of 300 yards) and breaking a sweat before I get to my door. I hear it’s supposed to start cooling off soon, and I can’t wait for that. 

My schedule as of late has been a veritable nightmare. For four days in a row I would have to show progressively earlier and earlier, which completely messed up my sleep schedule. There were a number of nights where I would have to ride the “A train” (take an ambien) just to fall asleep. All in all it wasn’t too bad, just incredibly disorienting. Most days don’t pass without someone asking, “Anyone know what day it is?” So at least I know I’m not the only one whose schedule is completely jacked.

I’ve now been here over a month which according to one pilot is monumental because, “Now you can start counting weeks instead of days, and it’ll go by a lot quicker.” I have my doubts but I’ll give it a try. I’m coming to the realization now what all I’m going to miss and it’s an aggravating list: football season, deer season, dove season, spring turkey, my mom’s birthday (already missed this), my brother’s birthday, Thanksgiving, my dad’s birthday, Christmas, New years, and possibly all of duck and goose season. LAME! But, at least all of these things are annual occurrences so there will always be next year. Besides all of the events I’m missing (and the obvious people I miss), and in recognition of me making it a full month here, I present a couple of lists of things that I take for granted back in the states as well as some of the things I will have a hard time adjusting to when I get back:

Things that I miss:

·         My quiet house

·         My BED

·         My own kitchen and cooking for myself, and not having to walk a mile to get to the food

·         Carpet (seriously, all of you take it for granted. It’s WAY more awesome than you realize)

·         Good coffee. Maybe it’s just the milk they use here (which may or may not be goat’s milk, I’m still investigating), but something just tastes off.

·         My 4Runner and its sound system. Even though our crew vans have only 40K miles on them, they look like they’ve been driven in a desert demolition derby on a weekly basis. Seriously, these are some haggard and worn down vehicles, like someone every day empties about 8 Dust Busters straight into the AC unit just in case you didn’t did the full effect of sand and dust on the walk to the van.

·         The color GREEN. Something else I took for granted. Everything here is brown, or tan. Or a tannish brown. Or a brownish tan. You get the point.

These are just the first things that come to mind, but you get the idea. Here’s a couple of things I certainly won’t miss:

·         Sand. Yes, it does get everywhere.

·         Mind crippling heat. At 128 degrees outside, I was pretty sure the blood in my brain was boiling and melting my frontal lobe.

·         Getting chiefed all the time for the littlest things: i.e. reflective belts, mustache being too mustachy, shirt not tucked in, socks too long or not long enough, flight suit not zipped up enough, and God have MERCY ON YOUR SOUL if you put your sunglasses on your head.

·         Not having to wear PTs all the time, or the confounded reflective belt

·         Not having to walk across a gravel pit to shower/go to the bathroom, or being terrified of contracting some disease in the facilities

·         Not having to walk across gravel PERIOD (seriously, half of this country is gravel, the other half is sand)

·         Not having to play Army Parking Chicken. This game is played by army assholes who like to walk in front of me while parking. I’m pretty sure they say to each other, “Let’s see how slowly I can walk in front of this Captain trying to park his van without him freaking out and getting out and screaming at me.” Jokes on them, I just floor it now and let our POS vans groan and creek right past their digicammed bodies as they dive out of the way. Let’s just say “Aggressive Parking Procedures” is a new term in my lexicon, and definitely a technique now being employed. Watch out for me when I get back.

·         Pagers. Yes I have a pager here, every Mission Commander gets issued one in case they have to get a hold of you. I laughed out loud when they gave it to me and the obligatory questions followed: “Is this building pager friendly? Do you have a pay phone bank around here?” The comm guys didn’t find this as funny as me.

·         Controlled detonations. ‘Nuff said.

And finally, here’s a couple of things I can already tell I’m gonna have a hard time adjusting to:

·         Not carrying a gun everywhere. I honestly thought it would be a drag at first, but now it’s just something normal, and preferable. I’m sure there’s gonna be a couple of days when I get home where I’m rummaging through my house sure that I’m forgetting something just to turn out I’m not wearing a holster and a pager. Although I bet students would listen A LOT more if I was carrying a gun around. Maybe I’ll just wear the empty holster as the definitive idle threat to students: “If you mess this up, and if I were to be carrying a gun, this conversation would sound much different!”

·         Not getting to wear my boonie cap. My boonie cap is a chief magnet because the edges are rolled up like a cowboy hat. Seriously, it’s catnip for them, but it’s worth it! If it looks like a cowboy hat, feels like a cowboy hat, maybe it SHOULD be a cowboy hat. I will miss it dearly.

·         Having to do my own laundry. Here they have an Iraqi run laundry service which has a two day turn around, and they do a damn good job. Although I have discovered lately that sock loss is an international conspiracy, because even they lose one of my socks every now and then. They aren’t stealing them; what would they do with just ONE Nike sock? At least at home the sock triage will be my fault and not on the shoulders’ of the Iraqi Sock Monster.

·         Having to file a flight plan – how do we fill those out again?

·         Teaching ground ops to students…this is going to particularly suck hard. There will be much wailing and gnashing of the teeth coming from me.

·         Not having immediate access 24/7 to caffeine products. It’s INSANE how much caffeine is available over here. I came over here with a slight caffeine dependency, and I can already tell I’m going to leave here with a crippling addiction. I’m talking drink-caffeine-until-my-eyes-vibrate-and-I-have-moderate-night-vision addiction. Coming back should be lots of fun; mind crushing headaches are in the forecast upon my return. Someone should get that show Intervention to show up, because I’m gonna be jonesin’ like a crackhead.

I had been thinking about these lists for a while, and they are obviously not all-encompassing, but a good glimpse of the things that I look forward to when I get back. I hope y’all enjoy, and look forward to hearing back from y’all. Take care!

-Wellen

Friday Night Fight: Air Force vs Army Logic

Welcome to the Holy Month of Ramadan, when terrorists fast during the day and let mortars fly around the clock – I assume this is because they are hungry and cranky. Well, that and the fact that they HATE us with an unfettered passion. Radical Islam actually dictates that if the zealots die during the month of Ramadan, they will actually be let into a better part of heaven… Like the velvet rope section or something. As a result, attacks are slightly more commonplace this month.

I don’t want anyone to get the idea that I am in some sort of immediate peril. Yes, there are mortars flying over the rail, but for the most part they are just taking pot shots at us, and have NO chance of hitting anything.  We also have a really advanced early warning system which if it detects an incoming round, it will try and ascertain (through simple trigonometry and launch analysis) where it will land, and warn the people in the area. The horn that goes off is normally quite noticeable and persists until someone decides the attack is over.

The other night I was taking a break from trying to kill myself in the gym and flying circles over Iraq and found myself in the Rec center checking email and chatting online with some friends.  I had some head phones in and was listening to some tunes, and as result, I did not hear the siren go off or the incoming call. I did, however notice when people started diving for the floor (I do have some  situational awareness), and I followed suit. It must not have been quite fast enough for a nearby Air Force Master Sergeant, who took time out of his trip to the floor to “encourage” me to move faster. His tackle form was well practiced. I felt like saying “If this Indirect Fire Attack were to hit RIGHT here, you persuading me to the floor would not save me.” But I figured it’s kind of like the safety cards on airplanes that say “calmly affix the oxygen mask to your own face before you help your neighbor with theirs,” which he obviously had never read. His Master Sergeant manual must read, “In case of an Indirect Fire Attack, get on the ground. Unless of course there is a Captain sitting nearby not moving his fat ass fast enough for you. In which case, ride him to the ground like you’re hog tying a calf at the rodeo. In this way, you’ll both be safe, or if not safe, then at least you’ll be RIGHT.”

So here I am face down on the grimy floor, pondering how many diseases might be in immediate proximity to my face, when the alarm stopped going off. Protocol states that you’re supposed to stay on the ground for a couple minutes, and then move to shelter until the “all clear” is called. I guess some people decided after the horn ceased that they should be ok to get back up and continue tweetin’ the deets (“Indirect Fire Attack! ROFL!”). The Master Sergeant noticed this and went apoplectic. I could honestly see his eye start twitching. He sat halfway up and bellowed, “DO YALL HAVE SUPER POWERS THAT KEEP YOU SAFE FROM MORTARS?!?!” (Which I thought would’ve been quite helpful, and a really cool super power I had never thought of) “GET YOUR ASSES BACK ON THE GROUND FOR TWO MORE MINUTES!!!” The recipients of the ass chewing reluctantly complied, while the Sergeant got back down as well. For the next 90 seconds, I could see his mind churning, trying to figure out how best to make sure everyone knew he was in charge. I already knew I was going to comply with whatever he came up (within reason), but when he jumped up to take charge, he ran into a road block that for once wasn’t me. It was an Army Sergeant.

The Air Force Sergeant jumps up and begins screaming at everyone in the rec. “My name is Sergeant Smith with base Security Forces. There has been an indirect fire attack in the proximity. You are all ordered to exit this building and seek shelter in the hardened bunkers. NOW MOVE!!!” I had seen some of the hardened bunkers outside by the basketball court, and I, like so many people started hurriedly packing my gear up. I didn’t think that this was the most logical decision, but I was tired and I didn’t feel like going toe to toe with this guy. Well, the Army Sergeant sitting at my table did.

Army Sergeant: “Wait, we’re going outside?!? We’re getting shot at!
Air Force Sergeant (still screaming): “Everyone is directed to move to the hardened bunker until the all clear call is made.”
Me:  (I continue packing but at a much slower rate and thinking to myself) “this could be awesome; maybe I should watch these two lock horns…”
Army Sergeant (upset that his logic doesn’t appear so logical to the Air Force Sergeant): “Seriously! We’re getting shot. I’m not going outside, that doesn’t make any sense.
Air Force Sergeant (totally losing his mind): I’M IN CHARGE HERE! EVERYONE IS MOVING TO THE HARDENED BUNKERS!!!
Me: (thinking to myself), “I was right. This is AWESOME.”
Army Sergeant (enraged): “F*$# THIS. I’m going to the coffee shop.”
Air Force Sergeant (notices I’m the only one still left in there besides him and the Army Sergeant who just walked out): “MOVE IT CAPTAIN!!!!!!!!!”
Me: (thinking to myself), “OK, maybe that was too slow…”

So I go outside and find the hardened bunker already chock full of people who are obviously enjoying so many people in their personal space. I see all of these soldiers and airmen huddled into this bunker, frightened, shaken, and maybe a little annoyed, and I see them for what they really are: an unwilling audience. I decide to screw with all twenty some-odd people in the bunker. I start out by yelling out, “Everybody listen up! This is Captain Dowd. I’m gonna go ahead and take some accountability.” Everyone groans out loud while I chuckle to myself, thinking how much fun pulling rank can be. I then ask, “By a show of hands, how many people don’t have a reflective belt on?” This elicits more groans (as normally higher ranking Sergeants are the ones griping at everyone about this, and DEFINITELY not air crew), and a few hands go up. I respond with, “Well GOOD WORK. Now we’re all dead. Everyone knows that reflective belts repel mortar attacks, and you just ruined that for everyone. Thanks A LOT.” Everyone laughed and loosened up a little bit, and shortly thereafter, the all clear call was made. No one was hurt, and I do know that the Air Force Sergeant was doing what he was trained to do, and he did it well. He might not have made any new friends, but no one can say he did not follow protocol. In no way am I saying what either guy did or said was right or wrong, I just took it for the comedic value I found in it. Hope y’all enjoy, and I’ll update again soon. Take care!

-Wellen

MC-12 Diet Plan

This is my MC-12 diet plan (patent pending). I'm sure this diet will soon gain followership just like the South Beach Diet or Atkins or another similar faddish diet regime. Give this a try if you want IMMEDIATE results:

1. Eat a normal meal whenever you get up. Normal can be your definition, I just wouldn't call anything like "pound a baker's dozen worth of doughnuts" normal.
2. Sweat through your fire retardant flight suit on your walk to work.
3. Fly a 4-5 hour sortie in an aircraft that is practically devoid of working air conditioners, rendering the ambient cockpit temperature a balmy 92-95 degrees while you sit and bake in the sun. Sweat through fire retardant clothing and body armor once more.
4. Skip lunch (because you're retarded and forgot to pack one). Instead, satiate yourself with a power bar, caffeine products and the thought of what you would be eating if you had even the most infinitesimal amount of foresight required to pack said lunch.
5. Land, and make it back to work. Sweat through clothing once more.
6. Head back to your domicile. Sweat a little more.
7. Go to the gym. Turn up the temperature (approximately 85-90 degrees should suffice) and sweat the rest of your fluid out as you put your dehydrated body through the rigors of a challenging workout that ordinarily would have you running for the trash can, but since you have nothing in your gut, puking is not an option.
8. Clean up, attempt to rehydrate. Go eat a normal dinner. By this point your stomach has shrank to a size best described as "indignant withdrawal." You won't be able to fit in as much as you'd like.
9. Do this EVERY DAY for 6 months. Results guaranteed.

This has been working wonders for me, hope y'all find it as effective as I have. Take care!

Wellen

Combat Flying, part II

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . .

Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God. 

— John Gillespie Magee, Jr

I'm fairly certain that Magee wasn't referring to flying over Iraq when he wrote this. It would've sounded quite different. How many words can you rhyme with dust? Before I even start talking about the flying, a brief history of the McDozen is necessary to understand what the jets are like here in Iraq *Note: This is not the expressed view of the United States Air Force. This is the expressed view of Will Dowd and all thoughts and historical data herein contained are possibly inaccurate, wrong, and overall merely hearsay passed down from the slightly disgruntled pilots of this program.* OK now that THAT is out of the way, here's how the program started: 

Around 2007ish, Chairman Gates got pissed that the AF wasn't doing enough for the tactical ISR realm. A lot of officers got yelled at and it fell to one group to "fix" the hole in our air assets and come up with a manned ISR asset that would rectify the situation. I think a bunch of colonels probably sat down with a couple of bar napkins and said "How do we stop getting yelled at about this?!?" And thus developed the MC-12 Project Liberty Program.

The basic idea they came up with (a remarkably good idea I must say) was get a King Air Beechcraft 350 and gut it, put in a whole bunch of intel, recon and surveillance tools that the Air Force could use to support ground forces as an airborne tactical MANNED ISR asset. So obviously, the first step was to talk to Beechcraft and get some jets to do this. I feel like the conversation went like this:

Air Force Guy (after explaining their idea): OK, so that's our plan, do you think y'all can help?

Beechcraft Guy: Yeah! That sounds awesome let's get right to it. How many jets do y'all want?

AFG: We're gonna need like (insert number here) total.

BG (seeing a large bonus looming in his immediate future): AWESOME! We can definitely do that. I'll start putting the paperwork together.

AFG: Great, this is such a relief. When can we get the first jet?

BG: Umm, lemme see. OK, it looks like the first aircraft will be delivered to you in July of 2010 (or some arbitrary date really far away).

AFG (panicking): WHAT!?!?! No no no, I think you misunderstood me, we need these jets NOW for retrofitting. Like yesterday quick.
BG: Hahaha, yeah right, that's not really how this works. You give me an order, we build the airplanes, we ship them to you, then you can do whatever you want with them. Did you think we had a bunch just sitting around?

AFG (obviously aghast that his plan is falling through): Well, no...or maybe... But regardless, we need some jets right away. What can we do?!?!

BG: Well, there is one thing you can do, but... you might not like this...

AFG: Tell me, PLEASE. Anything will work for now.

BG: Anything?

As a result of this exchange the Air Force ended up buying a number of Beechcraft off of the general market...Ebay for all intents and purposes. Those first jets that they bought from the public (doctors, lawyers, oil companies, etc) became the initial MC-12 fleet. Some of those jets are still here in Balad. It is into this world I now take you.

So since the jets here were bought off of the general market, there are some very small differences between the tails that we have here. Some of them are inconsequential and meaningless, but some of the differences make going from one jet to another kind of like time traveling. A few are brand new with ridiculous avionics, then you step into another, and beyond looking the same on the outside, the cockpit is much older with completely different avionics. My very first combat sortie was in one of these jets, that I've NEVER SET FOOT IN BEFORE. So we're getting ready to roll to the airplane, and the acting mission commander asks me, "So did you get to fly one of these birds in training?" My response was full of confidence: "Ummm...no. I've seen pictures though, I'm sure I'm good to go." We get out to the jet, I get settled into the seat and immediately say to myself, "Where the HELL IS EVERYTHING!?!?" Every switch seemed to be in a completely different location. Ground ops for a combat mission is fast paced and the last thing you want is a pilot holding everything up for the back enders. This was my greatest fear come to fruition. I started sweating profusely (more than I already was due to the oppressive heat) and tried my damnedest to find everything. To my own credit, I did get most of the checks accomplished in time mainly through sheer force of will, but there were a lot of these questions: "Where is this switch exactly? OK, and what does it do--you know what, nevermind...I'll ask later." We finally get the engines spinning and are taxiing out for takeoff and the weather is HORRIBLE. I'm talking about howling winds and blowing dust to the point of obscuration. The tower couldn't even see us when we made it to our runway. It was, in short, a beautiful Iraq day. I'm thinking to myself, "Great, different airplane, horrible weather, first flight in a combat zone. If I mess this up, my balls are gonna get punted all the way back to the states." But I remembered I am Will Dowd, and I imbued myself with my overwhelming self-confidence that has gotten me this far, and pressed on. We take off, and no kidding were in this sand storm immediately and stayed in it until we finally leveled off. Thank God the jets all fly the same way or else I would've really had my hands full. 

We make it about halfway to where we're supposed to work, and we get a call from base saying to pack it up and turn around for a weather recall. Apparently the dust storm was kicking up even harder and visibility was going to drop down to only a quarter of a mile for a couple of hours. For those non pilot types reading, that's REALLY BAD. We head back and try to loiter over the base for a little so some sort of training can take place, but another jet calls that the visibility is dropping faster than anticipated, so we needed to land NOW. We got vectors around for an approach which we shot down to the bare minimums with some howling crosswinds and luckily got the airplane on the ground before the sandstorm really rolled in. All in all it wasn't a real big issue, it was just a touch too hairy for my very first sortie in Iraq. It counts though right? I guess it has too.

So while everyone has visions of grandeur for their first combat sortie --another particularly special pilot actually told us that he was going to practically save the world from Al Qaeda, nuclear armed conflict, global warming AND zombies on his first mission. We laughed in his face and told him to go peel labels off of Gatorade bottles -- I was just happy that I didn't mess up my first ride in a different jet, and that I then got it back on the ground safely. While I didn't think that I was going to solve world hunger while flying (my delusions of grandeur only go so far), I was at least hoping to experience some of the day to day ops that we execute. But I'll take a safe recovery any day and call it good enough for now. Take care, more updates to follow.

-Wellen

Combat Flying

I've started combat flying, and while I have a few funny stories about it, I can't convince myself to be funny during this tragedy in Afghanistan. It's such a shame that men like that put their life on the line for the people of Afghanistan, and this is what they get. I was reading last night and I came across one of my favorite verses:

All who rage against you will surely be ashamed and disgraced;
Those who oppose you will be as nothing and perish.
Though you search for your enemies you will not find them.
Those who wage war against you will be as nothing at all.
                                                              --Isaiah 41:11

While my job entails finding terrorists, I'd like to think that this verse means not that they won't be found, but that eventually there won't be any more enemies. My thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the operators who lost their lives.

I'll hopefully post again tonight after my flight

-Wellen

Shitty Bill and the Five Finger Knife point

In order for this story to make even a moderate amount of sense, a back story is required:

Back when I was going through Pilot Instructor Training around February, I remember flying with one Lt. Col on a day when I truly had my shit in a sock. It was a great formation/air refueling ride and I was really firing on all cylinders (which was a miracle given the situation I was going through at the time). We got back after the flight, debriefed the formation, knocked out an emergency procedure, and started the individual debrief. I did great, and at the end, he told me, "Dowd, you're gonna make a great IP when you get back to Vance. Just remember, when you point at a student and say 'you need to do this,' you still have three fingers pointing back at you." He demonstrates this by pointing at me with his index finger, and sure enough, he has three digits pointing back at himself. I respond: "Well that's an easy fix sir. All I do is knife point." And I demonstrate this by pointing all five fingers at him at once. I thought this was funny, and was grinning like a jack-o-lantern at my clever end around, but this UTTERLY defeated my IP. His shoulders dropped, he shook his head and sighed, "Have a nice day, Dowd." AND WALKED OFF. Clearly I won this battle. Ever since that day, I've been using the knife point to illustrate to students that I am, without a shadow of a doubt, 100% correct.

I also found that the knife point is a good way to demonstrate to anyone a level of severity. A simple knife point might just mean "Here is the crux of what we are discussing," while as a knife point that is launched from the end of your arm like an ICBM whilst flying and yelling at a student, "I HAVE THE AIRCRAFT. GET YOUR ASS TOGETHER, YOU ALMOST KILLED ALL OF US!" makes for a less subtle indicator. It's like the exclamation point of violent hand gestures. One Marine friend of mine told me once, "I don't have hands, just knives where my arms stop." This is the mindset required for mastering the knife point. And, it leads me to the topic of this post: Shitty Bill.

Shitty Bill (his callsign from AWACS) is one of our sensor operators who is truly hysterical to be around for a number of reasons. One, his idea of a normal intro to conversations involves explaining his BM for the day in graphic detail. This in and of itself is not that funny, it's more humorous to see people who don't understand that's his idea of a conversation starter. Two: his graphic reliving of Trailer Park Boys (a Canadian mockumentary of a group of Canucks who live in a Trailer Park). And three: His absolute lack of an attention span. I've been around people who probably should still take Ritalin, and Shitty Bill would be their spokesperson, if they could focus long enough to nominate someone for the position. He's more pingy than an Irish Setter at a cat show. And this makes for a some hysterical interactions.

The other day, a group of us were reviewing Flight Crew Information Files as a prerequisite to get us ready to fly. FCIFs are all info about the airfield, current ops, and general information that people decide other crews should know about before flying. Some of it's quite dry, and as a result it was quite a chore to keep Shitty Bill on point. I was, for all intents and purposes, reading to the crowd, and stray air molecules kept getting SB off task, and eventually my patience wore thin and, as one of the other pilots, Dan, commented, "Instructor Wellen came out." A vicious knife point was delivered across the table with the following admonishment: "Shitty Bill, I need you to focus!" This brought him back on point... for the time being. About 45 seconds later, SB decided again that a different topic of discussion that had been bouncing around the forefront of his ADHD mind was more pressing, and he attempted to diverge from the task at hand AGAIN. This brought about a much more forceful knife point and a much more stern point of order: "BILL. BRING IT IN. Focus! We only have about 15 more minutes of this. As much as this pains all of us, we have to get through these. Please use all of your remaining brain bytes to pay attention to me. Eye contact! Over here. HEY! Over here. Look at me. FOCUS, dude." He was brought back to base camp once more... but AGAIN, about 5 minutes later, he got bored and started on another topic. This was the last straw. A knife point emerged like a lightning bolt from Mount Olympus: "Bill, if you so dare usurp the floor from me again, I will tear off your head and fill the empty space between your ears with the paper copies of the FCIFs so that no one will doubt me trying to imbue this knowledge upon you!" At this point everyone else was pretty much was in tears, but I finally found order and finished the task at hand.

Today, we were eating dinner and Dan and I were talking about Will Ferrell's surprise appearance at a Round Rock Express game posing as a closing pitcher: Number 99, Rojo Johnson. Shitty Bill asks what we are talking about and the ensuing conversation occurs:

SB: What happened?
D: Will Ferrell showed up at a minor league game as a fake pitcher named Rojo Johnson
W: Yeah, it was in Austin. I know a couple people who went to the game, they said it was hysterical.
SB: So what was this, like, the little league world series?
Dead silence as the whole table stares at him
W: Seriously?
D: Yeah, really?
SB: What?!?
W: Knife pointing emphatically Dude, Dan literally just said it was a minor league game! What is your deal?!? Why can't you focus?
SB: Sorry man, I wasn't listening!
D: But, you just asked!

The whole table fell apart and we all laughed hysterically as Shitty Bill tried to explain why he decided the 5 seconds of conversation following his inquiry were forgotten. I've given up on trying to knife point him, there's some force field around him that renders him invulnerable to the power of the knife point. But such is the magic of Shitty Bill. I just hope he's as good as tracking targets as he is at changing subjects!

Hope y'all are doing well. More stories to follow!

Wellen

Lost puppy

Recently found puppy. Follows nonstop. Talks about Barksdale. Large reward offered for anyone who claims. Contact the 362nd to claim. Tranquilizer darts recommended.

Don't dare proselytize your religion, but if you don't do Crossfit, prepare for the Sinner's FIRE!

A similar marketing scheme
Let me preface this blog by saying that I don't care how you get in shape. If you want to get into shape and you don't know how, then ask. If you don't want to know how, I won't tell you. I find that presumptuous and rude. But if you do work out and what you do to achieve the end goal of improving personal fitness, then good for you! If long walks on short beaches works for you (it does for me) or unicycling or even jumping double dutch, I DON'T CARE. Just don't cram it down everyone's throat. Obviously there is a story to this rant:

The link at the top is a very similar stance to the one the base command staff has taken here. A large group of MC-12 operators met at the Ops Group building to in process (IE, listen to a bunch of briefings, enjoy the air conditioning, and assist gravity in holding office chairs down), and one of the first briefings we received was about personal fitness standards. Those of you that know me know that being in shape is vitally important to me. Those of you that know me well, also know that I do NOT like Crossfit. I don't like running around the gym, getting in everyone's way and hogging equipment (although I will say, the Crossfit facility here is all on it's own. I wish we could do something similar at Vance). I also think it emphasizes reps over form, but that's a discussion for later.

An officer is briefing us about staying in shape, and he begins by telling us that the base commander is somewhat of a Crossfit "zealot" (that was his choice of words). He then tells us that he has lost 6 pounds performing said activity himself. Good on him! He emphasizes eating well and then tells us that some people like to walk around the DFAC (dining facility) and JUDGE what people are eating. REALLY!?!? The DFAC has a number of choices for food ranging from incredibly healthy to atrociously bad for your system. That's why people normally deploy and either get into shape or fall out of it --pun intended. Then, the officer giving the brief looks at one of the MC-12 pilots and says, "You're kind of big, you could use to lose a few pounds. Maybe you should give Crossfit a try." WOW. So now we're publicly humiliating people into this work out regime?!? Let me remind everyone that proselytizing a religion over here is a punishable offense. Apparently, attempting to shame an officer into a workout program isn't. I immediately thought of the clip above of Ricky Bobby saying, "If you don't chew Big Red, then F you!" I think that would be an awesome way to try and get people to sign up for Crossfit. Have a video of me playing in the gym: "Hi, this is Will Dowd and if you don't do Crossfit, then F you!" I know everyone would sign up then.

In the mean time, I'm sticking to a strict diet of corn dogs and french fries in hopes someone will publicly castigate me for my choices in the DFAC, just to see what happens. I'm about to head to the gym right now to try and quell my immense feeling of shame for being a fatty, because in the desert you can't get into shape without this program. It's science, I don't make the rules. Y'all take care!

-Wellen

The journey from the Deid to Balad as well as my adventures with uniform transgressions

Salutations from the land of sand! And I mean that, this place is a barren
wasteland of dust and sand. We landed Thursday at approximately 200am local,
about 600pm your time. I walked off the plane and was greeted with a blast
of hot air that was not unlike stepping in front of a giant convective oven
on full crank (Right now as I type, its 118 outside). Even in the middle of
the night, its about 100 degrees. Then we (the MC-12 crew) got to inprocess
with the other 200 people that came with us, which was a demonstration of AF
inefficiency the likes of which I've never seen. If I wasn't tired from
traveling for a full day, cranky from not sleeping (despite ambien's best
efforts), and already sweating through my flight suit from the oppressive
heat, I might have actually been impressed with how poorly organized it all
was. After getting inprocessed through immigration we then stood around
until we could get our chem gear and body armor. All of this took, no joke,
3 hours. By the time we could even attempt to find our bags, it was 530 in
the morning and the sun was already climbing rapidly, the temperature with
it. In that amount of time, I drank 6 bottles of water and was sweating like
a whore in church. Now recall, I've been traveling for 30 hours at this time
and slept maybe 5 hours, and eaten once. We were all exhausted and grouchy,
and we hadn't even seen a bed yet.

We finally catch a ride to billeting and we get to wait around for another
30 minutes while they figure out where to stash us. We get our tent
assignment and get to walk the 1/2 mile to our billeting. It looks like a
soft sided aircraft hanger with about 20 bunk beds (So much more room for
ACTIVITIES!!!!) in it and a huge air conditioner in the corner. We drop our
gear, and immediately hike back across base to the chow hall. After eating
half my body weight in omelets and french toast, we staggered back to our
tents to pass out. The idea is sleep when you can and eat when you can,
because we don't know when we might head to Balad. I crawled into my bed
around 800am local, midnight your time. I immediately woke up thirty minutes
later SWEATING. The tent was suddenly over 100 degrees. You know its hot
when you flip your pillow over and it's so hot it burns your face. So at
this point I'm miserable, pouring sweat, tired and groggy and as
uncomfortable as can be. I grab all of my gear (no easy task yet) and get
dressed and prepare to walk 4 tents down to where Jammer was thrown,
apparently his tent was almost empty. I walk outside, and IMMEDIATELY go
blind in my left eye! In my haste, I forgot to put sunglasses on and my eyes
were fully dilated from sleeping and walking around a dark tent. DAMNIT, OW.
It is unbelievably bright here and my left eye took the brunt of it.
So I stagger into Jammer's tent, find an empty bunk using only my right eye,
drop my gear, grab my sunglasses, and start back across to billeting. I'm so
grouchy at this point, all I can see is torch fire and mob violence in my
mind. Fortunately the guy working at billeting was really nice, and confused
why a Captain was put in the enlisted tent (!@%#^#&). So I make it back to
my new tent only moderately soaked in sweat, try and cool down, and fall
asleep around 1100am. I slept until 530pm local, woke up disoriented, and decided to stagger across base to eat some dinner.

At this point, we ventured over to the Fox Sports Bar. Let me take a moment
and explain how surreal this experience was. I walk in around 2200 and I see
a bar nicer than anything in Enid, or North Oklahoma for that matter.
Everyone is drinking beer and having a damn good time. My first thought was,
"Holy shit! They call this deployment?" My next thought was, "Is that Ben
Peterson?" In fact, it was. BEN F-ING PETERSON. So I spent the evening
drinking with BP, Alisa Fellhauer, and about 5 of my former students.
The Air Force is indeed a small force, even smaller
for pilots. Luckily all of the former Vance students were happy to see me,
despite me having shit down a few of their necks for being awful. We had the
three beers allotted to us, and took off for the night. We then had to get
ready to possibly catch a C-130 to Balad, show time around 0030 with a T/O
of 0430. We pack all of our gear up, turn in our linens and head to the pax
terminal. The ensuing bullshit that these tards dragged us through was
almost impressive.

So we checked in to try and get a C-130 flight, and Jammer (Maj Smith),
Stecker and myself are "Space R" on the flight. I thought space R meant we
were some level of priority, but apparently space R means "slightly more
important than the unicycle tires and rubber dog shit we were gonna haul,
but that means reconfiguring the plane so maybe you won't make this flight."
I missed that memo I suppose. So tomorrow we get to check out of billeting,
drag all of our gear to the passenger terminal, see if there are seats
available (there probably won't be) and then either proceed with the flight,
or more likely, drag all of our gear back to billeting, check BACK in (we've
done that twice already), and go pass out again. It's annoying because all
we want to do is call and see if seats are available and THEN check out if
the seats are there. When we asked the A1C (very young enlisted airman) if
we could do this he acted as though we had asked if we could go dig up his
grandma's grave and steal her jewelry. I told Maj Smith that we should pull
rank and get that to happen. I guarantee if it happens on the third day, I'm
gonna go in there with a mexican wrestling mask on (of course I brought one,
never leave home without it) and put the guy working the counter in a
sleeper hold until he consents to our "ludicrous" request to call ahead for
the OK to check out of lodging. It's getting kinda old. But not all is dark
in the land of infinite sun. Other than the bull that the self-licking
ice cream cones of the Air Force are dragging us through, I'm enjoying the
vampiric lifestyle. Go to sleep at 0500, wake up at 1400 (or later, who
cares?) and then go to the gym, the dining facility, check email, and wander
around like the neglected recalcitrant that I really am at this base. I've
been chiefed about three times already for my apparent lack of regard for
the garbage these losers call OPSEC. Just this morning I was in the DFAC
and walking to the door and took my sunglasses off of my food tray and put
them on my head. That lasted about 3 seconds before this trunk
monkey chief jumps around the corner like a damned jack-in-the-box and
literally bellows at me to take my sunglasses off of my head. The seventh
circle of hell is reserved for these douches.

Today should be another adventure --I'm hanging out at the pool
(Mantanistan...thanks Reutter!) with the C-17 crews until the bag-drag-n-back that is bound to happen takes
place. I hope I get to Balad soon, mainly because my 72 hour pack is running
out of clean clothes...and by clean clothes I mean clean sides to my
underwear. Take care guys, hit me back!


Hello again everyone, I have finally arrived...somewhere. They tell me
this is Balad, but for all I know I could be in the Sahara. It would
fit: flat, sandy, windy, and hotter than even the Deid. Today was a
record high of 124 degrees and it certainly felt that way. But I
digress, let me explain how we got here.

My last day in Al Udeid was nice actually, a little gym, a little
fooseball, and a little pool time with my C-17 buddies. But all good
things have to come to an end. What we had to do was pack all of our
stuff up and check out of lodging --why do I need to check out of a
tent?!?!-- and head to the terminal, AGAIN. We show up and check in
for Space R and they tell us there are 14 seats available and we are
numbers 10-13 for the flight. So I guess we get to go, right? "Well
not if someone shows up in the next two hours that has higher priority
than you" is what the guy at the counter says. My response was
dignified: "Who in God's perfect name could be more important than
four mission essential officers who are late for there duty report
date?!?!?!" Jammer recognizes the murder in my eye before this guy
does and reigns me in just before violent thoughts became actions. So
we then got to wait around for another hour and a half to see if the
President was going to show up and kick us off of the flight. He in
fact didn't so we were set to press! We just had to drag all of our
bags, get em tagged and prepostioned for palletizing. Then we had to
wait for another hour for the C-130 to show up, then wait for an hour
for them to get the pallets ready...etc. etc. I swear it felt like the
army was running this thing. We had a 1530 show time for a 2100
takeoff. It was insane.

So we get loaded onto this C-130 and proceed to lose approximately 10
pounds sweating in the back of the jet before we took off. Once we
finally got airborne, we were in for a nice inflight meal, a decent
movie, and maybe a hot towel before we landed! Not really, we were
sitting on web seats getting violently shaken around. I swear some of
our guys lost fillings, it was like a flying paint mixer. 3 long hours
later, we landed in Balad. After grabbing our gear and dragging it to
the terminal, we were greeted by a female Senior Airman who was
practicing being a Chief. The first words out of her mouth were, no
shit, "Welcome to Balad, please roll your sleeves down." It was still
over 100 out and we just dragged all of our bags in from the eaves of
a C-130, just before midnight, and this 22 year old is going to Chief
me?!?!? My planned response was, "Ma'am while I appreciate your fervor
for the AFI 36-2903, I assure you that my sleeves are rolled up not in
an attempt to spark a flash of blue and silver indignation in you, but
merely to cool my furry arms off as I have been dragging bags for the
last 20 minutes helping my enlisted troops who couldn't drag their own
bags due to an all consuming nicotine addiction. In addition, I shall
inform you, I AM A PILOT AND I WILL DAMN WELL DO AS I PLEASE WITH MY
SLEEVES AND THERE IS NOT ONE DAMN THING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT." Luckily
for her, I was sweating and out of breath -- not to mention so
completely shocked at her lack of respect or kindness-- that I
couldn't say anything, I just stared at her like she was growing an
extra head. So I let this go, unwillingly, and we get settled in for a
number of angry briefings from her. Finally, she's all done, and we
call the 362nd to come pick us up.

The first sergeant and a couple of pilots show up to help us load up
and move all of our gear to our billets. Unfortunately, there aren't
any rooms available!!!! So it's back to transient aircrew (another
tent) for us. $&%*^!! We're thoroughly pissed, because it might be for
about a week! We go check out our squadron and a little bit of base
(around 200am, not much to see, just dust and concrete barriers) and
grab some food, then head back to our tent around 300am. Today was a
bunch of inprocessing: getting checklists, turning in paperwork,
getting weapons issued -- I'm now packing heat -- and trying to get
ready to fly. We did learn that we will be moving the squadron in
about 6 weeks. Can't say where to because its still undisclosed, but
it's gonna happen. The post office is shutting down here in two weeks
so I can't even get care packages, which is truly disappointing.
Anyway, I need to be heading in. I'm terribly tired and we have more
inprocessing to do tomorrow. But I did just find out a room should be
available in a day or so which is much better. Hope you all are well.
I'll update as soon as I can.