As most of you have probably read in the papers not that you wanted to read it but it was forced upon you by the press Ramadan has finished up here and what occurs after that is a celebration that ranks up there with our Christmas or Thanksgiving. They call it the Eid ul-Fitr, and depending on whether you’re a Shiite or Sunni you get to celebrate and feast for about four or five days, throw in some travel time and you get the picture. This whole country shuts down big time. If you’re a Christian your screwed, where in the hell is the ACLU when you need them????? Oh I forgot for the ACLU Islam is good Christianity is bad, I keep forgetting I must have fallen asleep during those sensitivity training classes we had at drill!! Our Soldiers last class was on Thursday and we released them at 1300 hours and all of them except 2-3 made a bee line to the gates on post and headed for home. I don’t know who moved faster the Soldiers or the officers, because by Wednesday the Senior Officers Quarters was like the OK Corral empty, big time!
A few of us thought that maybe the Iraqi Army should continue with the fasting at least on the officers side of the house. From what I see you really don’t have to look at the rank of the officers uniforms, just look at their bellies the bigger the more senior they are. Dad you’d be a General here in
Where as most of the US Transition teams are taking off because they have no Soldiers to work with, we are using this time to get caught up and concentrate on getting those small but vital things taken care of. Major Y has finished up on most of the PR&C’s, now getting them approved by the finance folks in the IZ is another issue. You gotta love those bean counters, most of our facilities have come well under the estimated cost and the amount that we got budgeted for those facilities, thanks to the team scrubbing and getting rid of things that the Iraqi’s probably don’t need for their depot. Do you get kudo’s , a pat on the back, nada, zippo. But God help you if the actual cost of the winning bid exceeds the cost that was budgeted and funded for that building. Who cares if you have already saved over $12M, the finance folks start drooling and begin going into a maddening frenzy and rant, “what do you mean you need more money, what are you building up there a Taj Mahal”? You need to relook at the plans and start cutting out fat, there’s no money for the difference. Excuse me, what happened to the money we already saved you? I guess their hearing aid batteries die and they can’t hear anything you’re saying. On days that I have already run my only stress relief is to ensure I bang my head against the wall a few times and I suddenly feel much better! They say laughter is sometimes the best medicine, so we all look at each other and then start laughing about the “guys in the IZ who have no clue what is really going on telling us how to manage your project and how to suck the proverbial egg!”
Tomorrow should be one of those days that will go by like lightening. Our NCOIC is down in the IZ testifying in a non-judicial punishment trial which leaves the Major and I. As luck would have it, tomorrow we’re getting another fuel delivery and as you read earlier, those are like a circus and take up a large part of your day, so the Major will be handling that. I in turn have to take one of our interpreters to the gate for his vacation and pickup two other interpreters who are coming off their break. Problem is that at the same time I have to be somewhere else to meet the PDSS (Pre Deployment Site Survey) folks that will replace us next year. I was one of the guys who did this for our group last December. Basically it’s like a recon where you visit the areas that you’ll be working at, speak with those who are there, get info, soft copies of docs, SOPS, pictures and points of contact. At least one of the other O-6’s will do his brief first, which should give me time to drop off and pickup the interpreters, they know that I don’t wait more than 5 minutes, so if they are late they’ll be sucking some pond water and will have to wait until I am done with the PDSS folks.
I plan on giving them an overall view of the project, showing them the north and south Maintenance Depots, walk through a couple of the buildings that are being worked on and then answer any of their questions. I spent 2+ days when I did the PDSS last year, they have 3 hours, go figure! Good news is that I finally earned my tour guide tab. A couple of the guys at another site here at Taji conduct so many tours that they decided to have the alteration shop make a tab much like a Ranger or Airborne tab that says Tour Guide. Since it has a Velcro backing they store it under the pocket cover, but put it on your left shoulder when they are giving a tour. Few if any Soldiers notice it and when they do they usually bust out laughing. The criteria is 25 tours or 50 General Stars (total number of stars that all the generals you have briefed have combined). I am way over 25 tours and right now am at 18 stars and may get number 19 tomorrow depending on who decides to show up from the IZ.
The hot weather has finally ended as of late this afternoon. The wind has shifted and right now we are at a nice 81 degrees which at 2200 hrs in unheard of. Our high was 94, for the next 10 days it looks like highs in mid 80’s and lows actually working themselves into the mid 60’s. It is sort of the same kind of weather that we get back in
The Colonel
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