To Whom It May Concern

The Big Sandbox

I was excused from my Army National Guard drill on the 9th and 10th of this month in order to spend time with belly, and to make up for that missed drill I was to attend a recruiting function at Camp Ashland on Saturday the 16th, where I would be the NCOIC (non commissioned officer in charge) of equipment, in this case, a station (much like a booth at the fair) at which high schoolers/potential guard members could look at our M915 A3 semi truck and trailer and I'd answer questions about them.

On Friday night, I got home to a frantic answering machine message from my unit, telling me to call "immediately" upon receiving the message. I didn't like the sound of that, and sure enough, upon calling, received notice that we had been put on activation alert for possible deployment to the 'Sandbox'. Now, not sure if I need to explain what 'Sandbox' means, it's basically one of a number of places, all in the middle east. In our specific case, it means one of two places basically, and most likely one place... Iraq.

I made a few phone calls to let some people know what was going on, belly's parents, my parents, a few service providers (cable television/internet, cell phone, credit card companies) checking on what I'll need to do when my deployment begins. I don't want to be stuck at the last minute realizing that I've got things I should have had done months before, I procrastinate enough as it is heh heh.

So the day after the call I was at Camp Ashland running our station, answering questions about the truck and our mission, "this is the primary transportation vehicle in the United States military, 450 horsepower, 1450 lb feet of torquer, 100 gallons of fuel at roughly 3 miles per gallon" etc, etc. I started to notice that every officer of the rank of Major or higher seemed to be making a beeline for our station and pretty much asking the same question and making the same comments.

"So, I hear you got the call last night?" or "Yes, I'm sure you will do just fine, the 189th Transportation has made one hell of a name for itself." That sort of stuff. What this tells me is that there are people above us who know a lot more about it than we do at unit level, so I would say, it's about a 99% sure thing that we are going to be over in Iraq.

When you ask? Train up is likely to start in mid to late July or early August. Probably 'in country' (Iraq) sometime nearing the end of September to early October. So, with this in mind, belly and I have moved the wedding plans up by one year. If something were to happen to either of us, I want everything to be financially and legally secure, and this is really the best thing for us right now. It certainly shakes up the time table for belly's parents, but hopefully not too badly.

I was trying to work out the pay scale for what I will earn while over there, and I can't seem to pinpoint exact numbers, except to say that it's going to be over $50,000. That won't be too bad. I also look at this differently than I'm sure a lot of guys in my unit would... I have 15 years in and I've never been overseas, and although it's not a real 'wish' of mine to be in Iraq, it is a goal of mine to get overseas time while in the military, and my time will start running short in a few years. This also gives me the opportunity to give something back to the Army, to my country.

Also, if I do have to go, I want to go with the ones who got me here. Our unit is ex infantry, as infantry we were one of the best trained Army National Guard units and it showed whenever we went head to head against the regular Army. We didn't win every battle but even if we lost (rarely) we inflicted a lot of damage on those we faced. That's why I find it quite funny when ignorant people say "Oh... National Guard" as though we are substandard to the regular Army. Oh, I'm sorry, you fucking ignorant douchebag, we are required to not only be proficient within our military jobs, but also to have regular civilian full time jobs on top of that. This isn't the National Guard of the 1970's, regardless of what the uneducated might think.

But anyways, lemme get off the soap box on that one. I've got a lot of work to do in the next three months, and quite honestly a logistical nightmare in terms of what to do with all of our stuff while belly is at training and I'm deployed. But I'm not too worried. It's all going to go just fine, a few rough edges I'm sure, but nothing belly and I and our families won't be able to work through.

Current Lyrical Ramblings
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Get off your fuckin cross. We need the fuckin space to nail the next fool martyr.
- Eulogy, Tool