The Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss

Well, I'm back from another multi-day extravaganza in the northern reaches, i.e. Mosul. The weather was absolutely perfect, making the drive quite a bit more bearable. Some jelly-beans and Code Red Mountain Dew helped as well! I did get some decent down time up there as well, enough to devour Neil Gaiman's new novel Anansi Boys in 2 days!

Nothing too new to report about HERE, but word on the street is that they finally broke ground on the new armory back home! This will be great, as, while our current armory has lots of history(and asbestos!), what it doesn't have is a lot of space.

Well, I'm beat, so off to bed for now! TeddY2K out!

Clarifications

As there seemed to be some confusion in the comments, I got promoted to sergeant, not first sergeant. The first sergeant was present for the promotion and helped pin on my new rank. Also, I forgot to mention that my team leader helped as well (which is standard, and I forgot most of you probably wouldn't know that).

As for bring your family to work days when we blow up stuff, YES we do actually do that sometimes. At our annual training two summers ago we had a family day. Families were able to watch a couple of live rounds fired (although, the impact is too far away to see), and also were able to shoot blanks from some of the small-arms. This was an especially big hit with the kids. Not sure if/when we'll be doing this again.

Word is the constitutional referendum should pass; we'll see how that works out.

That's it for now! TeddY2K out!

3 Stripes and You're Out

Wait.. that's not quite right... However, those of you that are more "militarily inclined" might get what I'm hinting at. Yes... I got my promotion! Two nights ago actually, but, every time I've come in to use the computers in approximately the last 48 hours, the internet has been down. I got pinned by the first sergeant, and one of the lieutenants, which was pretty cool as the LT is one of our favorite officers. He should make a good commander someday. It was also cool as, even here the guys maintained our unit promotion tradition and dumped cold water on me as I conducted pushups after getting pinned. An additional surprise was that a couple of the guys from my old "Top Gun" section who are currently "up north" were able to be there as they were here in Baghdad for the night. Due to operational requirements, I won't take on any additional duties/responsibilities at this point, but those should come along once we come home to the states and get back to doing what we used to do: blowing stuff up! That's really all that I have at this point, other than that the weather is refusing to cooperate and continue the downward trend; it was back up to 105 today. Hopefully it works itself out soon. I'm ready for cold weather!

SGT TeddY2K out!

Still Here

Nothing too exciting really going on lately. Mostly just going out per usual on mission, hitting the gym in the evening, then the internet. Haven't been promoted yet. Weather is a lot better, although the sun can still get pretty warm in the afternoon when there is no breeze.

Karen, I DO have a real mail address (imagine how much of a ruckus people would raise if they couldn't send their soldiers real mail)! You can get it from my parents, probably Ali, or the grandparents. Not really sure who else has it, but it is circulating around. Or, if you e-mail me (sorry, I don't have your e-mail addy I don't think) I can send you my real adress.

Dad, what would the dates be on that NY trip? I am trying (for once!) to somewhat plan ahead, although, letting me know immediately isn't imperative. I also want to go visit some folks in Europe next summer, and may do an Army school at some point (for one to help pay for travel!). Will worry about a real job after that!

That's it from sunny Baghdad for today. TeddY2K out!