Great Job Sun!!

A super big shout out to the gang back at Sun, which based on the earnings call from last week must have kicked some big ass this past quarter!! 9 cents earnings per share which beat the analysts expectation by 4 cents, another quarter with a profit. Thank you all for your hard work and dedication, rumor has it that the bonus isn't too bad either! I heard the party last Friday with the beer and munchies was a pretty nice one. Although I couldn't celebrate drinking beer I did have a non-alcoholic beer for all of you!

You all should be glad to know that we've been reviewing design plans on these buildings and have been able to reduce the amount of structural changes by a fair amount which means less cost and more savings for us taxpayers! Tomorrow we have more design reviews with the J-7 Engineer guys and if all goes well those will be approved by them which means monies will be obligated and the USACE can solicit bids for those buildings and get the construction up and running!

It was an interesting meeting with my Iraqi counterparts this morning. Besides all the usual stuff that goes on during these meetings I got a chance to discuss with them the meaning of responsibility and the importance of delegating that responsibility to others and holding them accountable. Culturally with the old regime responsibility was avoided at all costs because if you screwed up jail time or some serious punishment would be handed out in a heartbeat. Because of this getting the Iraqi Army and specifically lower ranking officers to take the bull by the horns is very difficult to do. When we need to have a decision made on the spot or in a short time frame they want to defer everything to their boss who is swamped up at the Ministry of Defense with more pressing manners than some of the decisions that we need to resolve at our level.

The temperature has been somewhat cooler, 114 versus 120 and in the mornings today it got down to 84 which is a nice change from the lower 90's. It makes running more enjoyable, and now that I have found a couple of decent dirt routes running has been a lot more fun. It's been quiet here of late as the artillery guns have been silent for almost a week, that plus the dust storms have kept the choppers out of the sky and from flying over our barracks.

The first few Soldiers from our unit here at Taji have left for their 4 day Rest and Relaxation at Qatar. I am curious to see how it went and what activities they signed up for. The good news is that you get 3 beers or glasses of wine a day while you are at the R&R site in Qatar, and can do whatever you want or not do anything at all but chill out while down there.