Vive la... France?

Okay, I know, I'm quite aware of what we all think of the French in America but to tell you the truth they are some really cool guys. The French military is working here in Afghanistan and I actually have the pleasure of working with these guys. To tell you the truth though, when I first found out about it I wasn't too excited to have to work with those "frogs". My view point has changed though. From what I've seen so far from these soldiers is that they are very polite and hospitable. They are more than happy to provide accommodations in order to make you comfortable. Plus a lot of these guys speak pretty English fairly well, I feel kind of dumb not being able to speak any French back to them as a courtesy. I'm trying to pick it up though... It's just coming kind of slow. The first night that we hung out with these French guys they threw a trick question at us, "so what do the Americans think of the French?". Yeah try answering that and keeping good relations with them at the same time. It's kind of hard, we made it work however.

On a side note though I thought that I would write a little story about one of my last missions. You'll like it, it was pretty funny. So for our last mission we went up to a little village that is buried all the way up at the top of the mountain in this tiny valley. The roads up there were horrible, actually quite nonexistent. There were some points where our HMMWV's were bottoming out and even having a hard time fitting through some of the passes. The drive up to the village was about 2 1/2 to 3 hours long and it did nothing but bump you all around. We finally got to the top of the mountain and made it to this little village that was tucked up in the edge of this valley. We got out and went and met with all of the villagers. We talked to them to see what they could use, see what we could do to help them and to just see how things were in general. They seemed pretty happy with the way things were so we decided it was time to head back. Before we left though they told us that if there was one thing that we could do it would be to fix the road, yeah no kidding. So we took off and started to make our way back down the mountain. Again just bump after bump, turn after turn. It was getting pretty old by then. Than it happened. We were about half way down the mountain and out of no where a thundering boom that could have been mistaken as God's anger came crashing over us. BOOM!! What was that? Without hesitation, without time to think, without telling myself what to do I instantly looked up out the turret of the HMMWV to see where the rocket fire was coming from. Everyone in the truck thought that we were done and let out the only reasonable reply, "OH, SH...!!!". I thought that we were done. I didn't see any explosions, I didn't see any Taliban on the ridges ambushing us, all I saw was a giant F-15 fighter jet flying close to 100 feet over head. Now I'm not sure if you know your distances when it comes to fighter jets but 100 feet is about 100 times closer than I want to be. Turns out the BOOM was nothing more than the explosive sound of an F-15 breaking the sound barrier right over hear, 100 feet over head. To make it even more explosive, at the time we were tucked down into a tight little ravine and the sound just echoed. I took into consideration what just happened, I checked my underwear and tried to slow my heart rate because I now understand that I get to live another day. After I got my heart rate and adrenaline under control and realized what just happen I couldn't help but to laugh about it. I seriously thought that I was done, but it was just a friendly jet flying over head and saying hello. And for you Meg, I know you're probably reading this freaking out that I thought that I was a goner and thinking how is that funny? Well it's because of the mere confusion of what was happening and having it turn out to be something completely harmless. I love you though, please don't worry. I'm all gravy baby. I'll even attach some pics for your viewing pleasure. So, pleasure away. Until next time.

Can a wrong be a right?

Today I want to write to you all and not really post of news but to leave my post up as an open discussion. Meaning that I want reader participation and have you leave feed back on your opinion of the matter that is to be discussed. With that I will now be on with my post.

If sometimes doing something that you know to be right turns out to actually be wrong, can doing something wrong actually turn out to be right? Lately I had someone tell me that I had a very combative personality (thier translation was that it meant that I have a very intimidating presence), so I'm not sure if I just have a skewed perspective on things or if that person was just full of crap. I'm of course going to think that he was just full of crap. All of this spawned from a conversation with a Special Forces guy who instanly started to sway away from conversation because he thought that I was looking for a fight when all I was doing was obliging him in conversation. That's a story for another day though. After that is when one of my team mates told me that I have a "combative" personality.

Now before I actually get to the question I need to first set it up with a scenario. A man (we'll call him mister combat) walks into a public shower and witnesses a larger man (we'll just call him larger man) shaving the back of his neck and his chest with some hair trimmers. Now, Mr. Combat initially thinks to himself, "good, he's just trying to have good hygine." After that though is when Mr. Combat sees it. Larger man has apparantly never seen what protrudes from his butt crack and over his shorts because I think that he would probably pay more attention to that than his neck and chest if he had. After seeing the amount of hair that was escaping from Larger man's shorts Mr. Combat was fairly positive that Larger man has probably lost things such as keys, wallets and girls phone numbers in there. And that's when it happens. Mr. Combat asks himslef, "self, is it more rude to tell Larger man that he should probably trim his butt crack too, or to just let him go running around completely unaware of the situation and continue to lose more keys, wallets and what I'm sure is to be hard earned phone numbers?" I made my choice and I am now living with it. My question to you though is what would you do? Would you let Larger man continue to go through his hot days in Afghanistan with a super sweaty butt crack and having him go through pair after pair of underwear because of all of the sweat? Take some time and ask yourself and than get back to me. Maybe by than I'll be able to find something worth Blogging about. Thanks and in the most non-intimidating way please have a great day.

First time for everything

I did it, I actually did it. Man I can't believe this, for the first time in my life I just bought something off of EBAY. It wasn't just through the "buy it now" function either. I put a bid out there and actually fought for this product. Okay so it wasn't just one bid either, it was several bids and it was down to the last second. It was about midnight for me and I just wanted to go to bed but the suspense of winning or losing was just too much that my body felt like I had just slammed a Red Bull and was full of forced energy. I was exhausted but my body just kept going. "How much time is left? 6 minutes, come on. Now, how much time is left? 5 minutes and 42 seconds? Aghh, I can't take this." This went on until the very last second where I finally threw out my high bid and found out that I won it. It was all mine, I AM THE VICTOR!! The best part of it all is that what I won wasn't even for me, it was for my amazing wife Megan. She emailed me the other day so sad that her CHI hair straightner had broke. She wanted to just run out and instantly but a new one for 100 bucks. I said no of course because I'm a "meany head" like that and because I had a plan of my own. I was going to go against the standard of just going and buying something, I wanted to check out other routes and EBAY just happened to be it. I was able to get a freakin' CHI hair straightner for... ready for this, $66 bucks. Wait, no I take that back, it wasn't just a CHI hair straighter it was a CHI Turbo. Do you know what this thing can do? It can heat up in 6 seconds plus it just looks cool. I'm not really sure as to what makes it more that just a CHI but I do know that it heats up in 6 seconds and that's pretty amazing. That means that both the CHI and I have something in common, Megan can turn us on and we're both hot after just 6 seconds. That was just for your benefit babe, I love you. Really though it's true;)- Well I think that I'm must contine my EBAY adventures because the rush of not losing to a bunch of other, I dare say, LOSERS was amazing. I slept so well after that. If any of you have any fun EBAY adventures let me know, we can be buddies. Until then, keep on bidding.

Who wears short shorts?

Lately, I've kind of been trying to get myself back into the swing of things. Actually I guess that I'm trying to get back to the point that I was when I first joined the Army, 163 lbs. Now I know that unless I dedicate 100 percent of my time, body and mind to it than it's probably not going to happen, so I'll settle for... let's say 175 lbs. I've been hitting the gym everyday, except Sundays, sometimes even twice a day. Plus every night before I go to bed I bust out 40 pushups, 50 supermans, and try and hold the plank as long as I can trying to hold it for 2:00. Well the main point of this post is that I've been catching a lot of flack lately because of my new workout shorts. People have even gone so far as to say that it looks like my sexual preferance when I wear the shorts is aimed towards men. So I'll let you decide. Remember I just got back from the gym so I'm looking pretty ragged. Plus I'm including a blast from the past for you to see what I'm aiming for. Again enjoy the pics and I'll post ya later.

P.S. I don't like men, I do like my wife (who is a female) though. Wait, actually I freakin love her.

What, Birthday!?

As some of you may know, or may not know, my Birthday was on the 6th of July. It actually sucked. A couple of friends did however try and make it at least somewhat fun. We got some pizzas and watched a pirated copy of 21. It wasn't too bad, but it still was just lame. Anyways I got a package in the mail form my lovely wife and my amazing in-laws that kind of make it a little better. So thank you to all of you who remembered and tried to make it a special day. You did great. So here's a couple of pics of the sweet shirts that I got. Hope that you enjoy. I mean I guess that it's kind of hard not to when you're checking me out. Lol.

Three of three, the begining... or maybe the end

Now this is one that you can laugh at. A couple of days ago we went to another Afghan Police headquarters and checked up on them to see how they were doing. While we were there a bunch of kids started to crowd around on the other side of the fence and ask us for water. So of course we gave them some. Than one of our guys started to make different poses at the kids and they started to copy him. So another guy got on top of out HMMWV and started to do the YMCA movements and again they started to copy him. Than we got them to finally do the Karate Kid pose and of course they did it. In this case pictures speak louder than words. So take a gander and enjoy.

Two of three, AKA: the middle

This one isn't really a funny one but it is still one that I'll always remember. About two days ago I had the chance to go and drop off some humanitarian aid items to an orphanage. It was probably one of the saddest thing that I've ever seen. When we first arrived I went into the orphanage with a couple of others to talk to the headmaster and see what we could do to help them out but when we first opened up the gate to walk in that kind of became second on the list. Instantly we were swarmed by just kid after kid. They all had the biggest brightest smiles on their faces even though they had dirty worn down clothes on their bodies. They all even had their heads shaved because of the hygiene issues. Every kid did their best to try and grab you and hold your hand. They would just look and you and say hello mister. Trying to get through the crowd of kids was a slow task but worth it. At that moment I was really able to take a look at my life and see what I really had. I stopped to make sure that I was able to say hello to every kid that wanted to say hello to me. It was a great feeling, knowing that we were there to see what we could do to help these kids. We finally made it though the kids and into the building that they had they unfortunate situation of calling it a home. The building was nothing more than a couple of windows and walls to protect them from the elements. We went to the headmasters office and sat down to see what they needed and the simple answer was, "Everything". The headmaster told us that they had approximately 130 children in the orphanage and every single one needed anything that they could get. The people that I went with told him that they would arrange for approximately 130 new mattresses, sheets and blankets. They also told him that they would get a bunch of hygiene items and clothes for the kids. The headmaster than took us for a walk through of the building. We went into the rooms that the children lived in and saw what they had to deal with. All of the beds were lined up head to toe with mattresses that weren't even as thick as some of the blankets that we have at home and every kid had a locker that was about 10" x 10" x 12". It was just enough space to place what few clothes they had and any other personal items they had. The carpet was just plane gone, completely trashed and dirty, or torn to shreds. I kind of felt bad because I loaded my HMMWV up with a bunch of items for the kids like sandals, back packs and soccer balls but I only took enough for about 30 kids. So instead of just handing them out to all of the kids I just gave them all to the headmaster to hand out to the kids. I said good bye to the headmaster and wished him the best of luck with taking care of the kids. I loaded back up in my HMMWV and drove off. It really sucked seeing the kids in that kind of a situation. The headmaster told us that most of the kids were in there because the Taliban had killed their parents. It was hard to go knowing that they needed help but we did what we could do for them at the time. Hopefully soon enough the whole country can see a new way of life. Not one that's torn apart because of those who control by fear. So when you go to bed tonight make sure that you let your loved ones know how much you love them and care for them and let them know how grateful you are to have them in your life. Things can change in just a blink of an eye and I see that now that I had the chance to meet those kids. I'm now going to just let all of you know how much I love you and miss you. I really am so glad to have the family and friends in my life that I do. I am grateful for the life that I have and will never complain about the extras and amenities of my life. I'm just glad that I have the people I have to share my life with. Thank you.

One of three, in reverse

Okay, I've kind of come to realize that I'm kind of long winded when it comes to telling my stories. I'm going to tone it down now though. I know that most of you probably don't like spending forever just reading about my excursions, so I'm now going to just keep it brief and make them shorter. With that I now offer my first story to you.

Every Friday we have a bazaar on base, bazaar is just the word for market, it's where a bunch of vendors come and sell things. In other words it's nothing more than just tourist trap that is brought on base. I went just for the purpose of looking for a leather/fur blanket like what Danny and Mindi have. So I went down and actually found like 10 different vendors that sell these blankets. So I stopped at one and started the whole "traditional" negotiations. I pointed out the blanket that I was interested in and let the bidding war begin. Now the standard for negotiating is that the first to offer a price is already considered the loser of the deal, I was not the loser (well in that context anyways). I asked and demanded an answer from the man on how much he wanted for the blanket and he replied "$120". Sorry but I couldn't help but to start laughing. The guy was out of his mind. 120 bucks, no way was that blanket worth that so I rebuted 35 dollars. Of course he said no but I was just testing his prices. He than responded that he would go down to $80. That still wasn't going to cut it so yet again I fired back with 40 bucks. He shot me down one more time and he asked me "mister, final price how much for this blanket?" I told him that $45 was my final offer. I wasn't going to go more because the blanket wasn't really all that great. The guy of course turned down my offer so I thanked him and walked into his rival blanket sellers tent, they're right next door to each other. I went in and found the rug that I wanted and again asked how much for the rug, even he started out at $120. These guys are good, they talk and find out what the others are trying to sell for. Well, nothing new happend with this guy other than I finally told the guy that I wouldn't go any more than $50 bucks. He said no and again I left to find another blanket stand. I got about half way down the row of shops when all of a sudden I hear some one behind me yell, "mister, wait!!!" I turned to look and see who it was and it was the shop keep that I was just talking to was running after me waiving his hands in the air. "Okay, 50 dollars! I'll take 50 for the blanket" I agreed and walked back with him. The funny thing happened when I got back to his little shop. He started just throwing my blanket around while he was folding it and kept saying to himself, "No profit for me today. No profit for me." I didn't really care, business is business and if 50 bucks wasn't good enough for him I'm sure that he wouldn't have chased me down. So after he got my blanket all bagged he turned to and said to himself, "First sale of the day, I guess I'll just have to try harder." I guess so buddy, good luck with that whole $120 thing. I'm sure it's going to work out great. Now the good thing about the story is that I'm sure the guy still made a good deal off of my 50 dollars. I'm not to worried and that I was able to get it for about 20-30 dollars cheaper than one of my buddies just a few weeks ago. In the end though, I was able to get a really nice, queen sized, supposed "seal" fur blanket for just 50 bucks. That's what I said I'd pay and that's what I wound up paying. It all worked out.

Paradise, keep telling yourself that........

Hey everyone, I felt that I would get on and share a super fun story that I have for ya. It comes from one of my latet missions. Well it wasn't really a mission, just a trip to go and get some equipment. So here it is, hope you enjoy.

The other day my team leader came up to me and told me that we (my team) had been volun-told that we were going out on a mission to pick up a HMMWV (hummer) and that I had to pick one of the guys off of my fire team to go and do it. I decided that it's not really anything that any of us want to do, so I volunteered myself to be the one to do it. I was a little bummed about it though because it's not really my job to be a battle field repo man, but what can I do besides suck it up and drive on. Than he told me where the HMMWV was. I compare it to a uniformed officer going into the middle of Compton and and picking up a car. Yeah he's a cop but really I don't think they care, he's not well liked there. Well the same with where I had to go, the "Compton" of Afghanistan (AF). Just as a little side note, my superiors feel that they can call on us more than any of the other companies bcause they don't really trust the others to go out side of the wire. Kind of makes you think twice about being good at what you do. So the day comes and we go out. I got to at least ride in one of the new vehicles, it's called an MRAP (mine resistant, ambush protection). They're pretty nice. Well at least when it comes to keeping you alive. It's basically 18 tons of armor rolling down the road. Yeah, NICE!! Comfort wise is a different stroy though. The seats feel like they're made of armor too and you have a four point seat belt that basically pulls you into the seat. My butt fell asleep in 10 minutes easily and I still had plenty of ride left. The ride is about two one way. We finally got to the base and got the HMMWV ready to go. Now keep in mind the HMMWV belongs to one of the other companies so it's their responsibility to keep it in good shape and running. After things were ready to go they decided to make me the driver. I'm fine with that, if something happens I know that I have control. I jump in and get the truck going and I put in reverse. Nothing happens.... the truck just sits there. I gas it and the engine didn't even rev. "Great, I get to drive a broken truck." I put it in park and than back into reverse, it goes this time. We get loaded up and start to move out so I reach up and turn on what A/C it has and nothng but hot air blows out. I already hate this day. I now have to be a repo man that gets to drive a broken truck with no A/C. The HMMWV is about 6 tons of pure armor. You can't open the windows while driving or it doesn't do anything to protect you from exposions. Let me tell you that the armor sure heats up fast. Ten minutes after leaving I have a steady stream of sweat running down my face. It was tollerable until it starting running into my eyes. It got so hot in there that I had to wear my gloves to touch anything. I tried to grab my pistol with my bear hands and it burnt me. The guy that was sitting next to me kept burning his leg on the metal door. I'd guess about 150 to 160 degrees in the truck with no wind to cool you off. Fine I can still handle it. It sounds bad but I'm alive, nothing has happened to us in "Compton" yet and plain and simple I'm a soldier that is expected to just keep going when it goes bad. Than life just had to throw something else in there. My truck started to over heat and we hadn't even got to the hills yet. So I turned on the heater in the truck to try and pull some of the heat off of the engine. it started to work, just a little bit though. I seriously felt like I was going to pass out from heat exhaustion. IT WAS HOT! About 30 minutes later though we got to another small little base and we pulled in to give the trucks a break after climbing up some hills. We instanly jumped out of out the truck and went running to find a mechaninc to help with or truck. They came over and changed out a contol valve for the A/C and we put in some antifreeze because out truck was almost empty. It all took about an hour and a half to fix our truck. It as kind of fun though because I helped them the whole time just to get it done and out of there. So we take off again and start working our way home. Most of the ride is on narrow switch backs through the mountains. We got to one point where we were right by a river. As we came around a corner we ran into yet another problem. A big delivery truck with huge containers about the size of a train car was teatering on the edge of the road, blocking our path and also getting ready to fall off of the edge. I wished that we could have helped but it was part of the plan. We couldn't stop a whole convoy to help the truck. So we drove down the hill next to the river and went four wheeling through the Afghan country side. We had to go through the river a couple of times and one of those times my truck just happened to get stuck. Perfect timing for the transmission to quit again. I put it into reverse, nothing. I put it into drive, nothing. I tried four wheel high and low, but nothing. We weren't going anywhere. Finally as I'm getting pissed at the situation I put it into reverse again as I yelled a couple of words and it started to go. I'm not to fond of just sitting there and making a target of myself especially when my truck isn't even working. We finally got around the falling truck, the river and all of the mud. We worked out way back to the road and kept going. An hour later we finally go back. It was perfect timing too. I was hungry, tired, and ready to get rid of that HMMWV. I got back and called it quits for the day. I was done. it was a fun little mission, about 10 to 12 hours for the day. Now it's hard to complain though. I got to see how I would react in a crappy situation and other than not having any air in my truck for the last little bit it turned out just fine. I've still got all of my body parts and I'm alive. Not every day is like that though. That was just an every now and than event. It wasn't the first and I'm sure that it won't be the last but the main thing is that I continue to keep my cool and be happy that at least I get to have the opportunity to experience another crappy day. There's other bothers in arms here that don't get to because they paid the ultimate price. I love you all and I hope that you all are safe and well. No reason to worry about me, I make sure that I take every step to keep myself safe. I miss you all and can't wait to see you in a couple of months.

Yes, my face is now as hairy as my butt

Okay, so I've decided to add a new segment to my blog. Why? well I'll tell you why. There are some of you out there that don't think I can grow a beard. You think, "oh, I'm not even sure if he'll be able to grow as much as his younger brother going through puberty." whom, if I may, is quite freakishly hairy for a freshman. Yeah, I said it. I think that when it comes to testosterone flowing through my body, it decided to take a detour and focus it's efforts on my manly good looks. Disagree if you may, but the proof is in the pages. (writers comment: I'm pretty sure that's a real saying, "the proof is in the pages". If it's not I need to figure out how to make it one.) So for those select doubting few, or rather all please feel free to check back to my blog weekly and see the status of what I have dubbed as "My super sweet beard of 2008". Yeah I had to give it a year because I'm not sure as to the next time I'll actually be allowed to grow one. And to those of you who feel that you can do a better job at a beard, I extend to you an open invitation to try and out grow me. So as for this inauguration week, I would like to thank you for stopping by and supporting my new segment. Please enjoy what the pictures and also what the future has in stored.

Diamond in the Rough

Hey all, I know that by now I'm sure that I've lost alot of my readers. For that I apologize. I have been a very bad blogger. I know that it's been about a month but I now have internet in my room. So please just hang in there a little bit longer as the future of aronisagonegone2 is about to change. I promise that I'll be better at keeping you updated. Believe me there's so much that I want to share with all of you. So stay in touch and you won't regret it. While I'm on today I just want to share a little bit about what I've been doing. I'm not going to give details but I'll tell you what I can, so enjoy.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to actually go out and talk to some of the locals. Oh man was it the coolest experience ever. You come to a country with certain expectations, but when your expectations are exceeded it makes you sit back and re-think the situation. I'm still kind of in awe of how my trip went yesterday. Okay so, on with the story. We, my team and I, went to a local city to go out and meet with the people and see how they are doing and to see what we can do to help them. The other team that we roled out with is called the Police Mentor Team, PMT. So when we first arrived to the city we stopped by the local Afghan National Police, ANP, compound to see how they were doing and to just talk to them about the area. These policemen were some of the most dedicated personnel I've seen. They believed in what we are trying to accomplish all the way down to the core. These men stood ready to throw their lives in the middle of the fight just to get that extra step and foot hold in this war on terror. The Afghans in general are smaller people so these policemen's stature wasn't too overwhelming, but what really grabbed and demanded your attention was the heart these guys have. Their demeanor was bold and powerful and you knew that you were surrounded by some of the best men Afghanistan had to offer. They invited us to go out and do patrols with them. Of course we said yes. You think that we would pass up an opportunity to go out with men of this devotion. No way, or at least I wouldn't and didn't.

We were off. I jumped in the back of one of their Ford Rangers and held on. If you've seen the way the Afghans drive you'd understand why I held on. These ANP tore out of their compound with their engines roaring, lights flashing, and sirens screaming. They flew down the streets swearving through traffic, commanding respect of the road and making their pressence known. I couldn't help but to have a smile on my face the whole time. This was raw and powerful. The ANP lead us through the city on a high-speed tour/patrol. We had our interpreter tell the ANP sergeant in charge that we wanted to go to some of the neighborhoods and see the people. He was more than happy to oblige, he just told us in the back to hold on. The ride was going to get a little rough.

The shiney dark green ANP Ford Rangers turned off of the main road on to some dirt roads and picked up speed. The rear tires lost traction and just spit dirt with how much power these ANP's were feeding the engines. Bump after bump I held on to the roll bar in the back of the truck, making sure I didn't lose balance. After a turn here and and a turn there the ANP decided that the location was as good as any. They parked and blocked off the roads, or at least the dirt paths they had as roads. Everyone jumped out of the back of the truck and started getting together to talk about what the plan was. Everyone but me that is. I jumped out and caught my foot on a stupid tow hook on the back of the truck and almost fell on my face. The ANP were quick to laugh about it but they than came over and gave me a pat on the back and walked me over to the group.

It turns out that everone decided that I was in charge of this whole expedition and the decision was up to me. Well, let's not waste time than. We came to see the people so let's go and see 'um. On the corner there was a little stand that was surrounded by kids of all ages and a couple of men. I walked over to see what they had for sale. Once I got to the stand I was amazed at how the children and even the adults were quick to welcome us. Some of the children even did so in english. Wow, how amazing. Some had better english than the others but the fact that they tried was warming. I saw that they had a stack of fresh green cucumbers sitting in a pile for sale. So I asked how much they were and found out that they were two for a dollar. I talked them down to three for a dollar and bought six. I than broke them in half and handed a half to each of the smaller children. They were probably some of the juciest cucumbers that I had seen. They just dripped when I broke them in half. I than saw that they had cold sodas and candy for sale. So I bought six cans and gave them to the ANP that we went out with and bought three bags of candy and handed the candy out to the children. The kids went crazy, they surrounded me and just said "mister, mister" and put their hands out. Some just grabbed but most just stood there and asked. They're smart little buggers too, they play the sympathy card. They'll come over holding their baby siblings and give you a sad face. I dare you to say no to that. It's baiscally impossible. So we talked to the locals for a while. It was great to actually get out and see what we could do for the people, that is why we're there after all. So after saying good bye and thanking them for their time we were back in the trucks flying across the dirt roads. Working our way through the neighborhoods and finally back to the main roads. Once again we held on as they tore through the traffic back to their compound.

Once back we unloaded the trucks and I was quickly volun-told that I was going out on foot patrols with the ANP to go and get the best kabobs in the country. We loaded up our gear and headed out. We worked our way throught the streets. Stoping and saying hello to the shop owners and people on the streets. We walked a little ways through the business district of the city and found the kabob shop. It was awesome to watch these guys cook the kabobs. They threw the skeweres down over hot wooden coals and just sat there and fanned them until the meat was cooked. Once they were done they sasoned them and wrapped them up in some flat bread, called nan, and wrapped them up in newspaper for us. As we waited for the kabobs the ANP sergeant in charge bought a couple of bowls of fresh made icecream for us to share. The first bite was hesitant but quickly changed to a pleasing surprise. It wasn't what we're used to but had the same concept. It was just a little plane and sweeter than what we have. After the icecream we were off back to the ANP compound.

Back at the ANP compund our Humvees were fired up and ready to go. We got back and thanked the ANP for their hospitality and we took off. Rolling out for another long convoy back to base. It was hard not to think about the experiences that I just had but my attention was needed else where. For this convoy I was the truck commander, TC, and was responsible for the people in my truck. Making sure they're doing what they need to and keeping in commuication with all the other trucks. You have to be focused. The experience will never leave me though. It was definaely one for the books.

I hope you found yourself being able to actully feel what it's like to be here. It's a rough gig. There's not a day that I don't miss my wife and want nothing more than to just see her and kiss her, but I can't. Still life goes on and I continue to try and do what I came to this country for, to help them find their feedoms and give them a better life.

I hate Washington (the state)

Hello everyone. As I'm sure most of you already know I am now back in Washington and let me just tell you that I hate it. I had the amazing opportunity to be able to come home last wednesday night and stay for a couple of days, it was actually a four day pass. I had the best time with my beautiful wife. My flight landed at about 8:00 pm and I knew that Meg was going to be waiting for me when I got of the plane. So being the kind of guy I am I had to make sure that things didn't go exactly how she was expecting. My plane landed in the second terminal and SLC so Meg planned on meeting me at the bottom of the escalators by the baggage claim. I however decided that wasn't going to happen. I ran from the second terminal down to the first terminal, out side by the taxi's and passanger drop off, around to the second terminal and snuck inside without Meg seeing me. I scoped out the area and saw a beautiful, hot, sexy lady standing all by herself looking intently for someone to come down the escalator. So I snuck up behind her, put my hands on her waist, and whispered in her ear that she needed to look harder. Before I could finish whispering in her ear though, she turned and screamed with an amount of joy that I'm not sure that I have ever witnessed before. I loved it. After our wonderful greeting we jusmped in the car and headed to St. George. It was great we basically did nothing. We sat around and just enjoyed each others company (and for those of you with "adult" minds I really mean that we actually just enjoyed each others company). Also because we aren't going to be able to see each other for our b-days we did a little gift swap. My gift was super awesome, Meg made me an americana themed quilt. I loved it, love it, and will always love it. I also had a chance to see my family. It was great to see everyone. As great as it is though, it always comes with saying a good bye. I hate it. I want to just be able to be home with my beautiful wife and not have to worry about a thing. I guess that I only have a few more months to endure until it's over. Well it's actually ten but on the big picture scale ten months is nothing. I know, I know Meg, you don't need to tell me. I know that I'm full of crap and that these next ten months are going to be forever but I've got to stay positive. It's the only way to get through it. Well I love you guys and for those of you that I didn't get to visit with while I was home I should be back in about five months so we can get together than. Can't wait to see all of you again and take care. I love you Meg, more than you can ever know.

Uncle Aaron Redux

Well, well, well, it looks like lil' whit finally decided to drop by and join the family. The only thing I can really say to that is, "hallelujah". I am finally an uncle, well again. I've been an uncle since I was seven, yeah kind of weird when you're that young, but the thing that makes this time so freakin awesome is I know have an Aunt Megan by my side. And as I'm sure that all of you know, things are just so much better when you've got Meg with ya.

I've decided to turn this post into another one that just praises Meg and tells her how much I love her, and appreciate her, and miss her, and how I look forward to seeing her in 110 hours and 23 minutes, but before I do that I have a few other things I would like to address. First off is my beautiful niece, lil' whit. I just have to tell ya that I'm so sorry that I wasn't there to experience you passage into this wonderful world and your joining of your amazing family. And yes you truly do have an amazing family. As weird as your dad may seem he's still a good guy, I promise. I've also seen your pic's and you are one cute little baby. Just please don't cry when you see my ugly mug in about a week. I know that you're used to being around a good looking family however you're just going to have to get used to the idea that you've got an ugly uncle. Be happy though because my beautiful wife helps make up for it so it shouldn't be too bad.

Now to my family and that means all of my family, big (Danny) or small (lil'whit), near or far. I love you guys. You are seriously the freakin sweetest family that I could ever ask for, even the family that didn't ask for me (sorry Megan's family). Ya'll do the best in making sure to keep in touch, for your touching posts (Laurel), and just letting me know that the love and support is there. I can't wait to see all of you again. I really do miss ya.

Finally my wife, my partner in life, my BEST FRIEND, the only thing I can ever really say to you is that I LOVE YOU. I love you more every single day and know that there will never be a day that my love for you doesn"t grow. You always have a way of taking my words and breath away when I talk about you. I feel like a young naive high school kid that has found the girl of his dreams. I start to feel a shortness of breath when I think about you, my heart starts to rev up like a race car and jump out of my chest, and the only thing I can ever say when I get off this phone with you is "Ahhhh, I love that woman." You drive me crazy, especially when I get to see pics of you on your blog. Because let me just tell you that Meg Babe, you are looking so hot. It drives me crazy not being able to see you. At least I'll get a little taste in just a couple more days. So again I love you, I love you, I love you.

And to all of you friend, family, or even weird creepy strangers that just pop in to read my blog, Yes I love you too. Thank you for everything and remember to those about to rock..... We salute you.

Ode to Meg Ann (it's basically Megan)

I decided that I would make a post that is focused towards my amazing wife. I put a lot of time into it, so please enjoy. There's also so pics for your visual entertainment. Also if you are one of the wierdos that are later mentioned than please stop visually and any other way entertaining yourselves with the beautiful pics of my wife. Thank you and read on.



Ode to Meg Ann,

I'm pretty sure that I'm your biggest fan.

(if I'm not well than all of you sick wierdos out there better get out of here because she's MINE)

I also really love your can,

and to that I don't really know what to say other than I'm a man.



Ode to Meg Ann and all of her hair doo's.

I don't really like it when she watches me go poo,

or when she runs around and acts like she's two.

I guess that she is a woman so what am I to do?



Ode to Meg Ann and to putting up with... well, me.

I am a man and I guess that means I act like I'm three?

But wait I'm pretty sure that when you're two than you're younger than three,

and that doesn't make sense because she's way more mature than me.



Ode to Meg Ann and all of your cute little crafts.

They are always so awesome, even when you make me cut out the rough drafts.

Also because it rhymes, you're so cool because you went down the river with your family in some rafts.

basically you're just super cool, just end that with something that ends in -afts.



Ode to Meg Ann and the eternal gift that she has given me,

I get to be with her forever and that makes me so happy.

There's not a person that I love more and on a daily basis crave to see,

I couldn't ask for a better way to begin eternity.



Ode to Meg Ann and this one is true,

this little dumb poem can't even begin to explain how much I love you!

I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you.

and maybe just one more, I love you!

It's a start

Well last night was the first night that I actually sat down and took some time to write in the super rad camo notebook that Laurel gave me. It was actually pretty fun and I now want to make it a regular thing. I also have the idea to write in it about my whole deployment and turn it into a book. Maybe not for sale on the market but just for fun. With that, I've decided to post my first entry for you all to read because it really talks about things that are important to me. Also when you read this make sure that you realize and understand that it's a draft, they're my daily entries, so they're not going to be perfect. It's mainly just meant for your enjoyment. Well, hopefully you enjoy it. Oh no, now I'm actually worrying about what you guys think about my entry. Time to cut the crap and just post my entry now. So,....Enjoy?

10 Mar 2008
"freakin' me out you wear a mask called counterfeit, freakin' me out you wear a mask" screams Fred Durst of Limp Bizkit in my headphones. I know that it's a little heavier that I usually listen to, but it was just one of those days that I need to get some rage out. It kind of has a ring to it though. I'm actually thinking about making it my official theme song for the deployment, it just kind of fits. If you know me then you'll understand that you never really do quite know what's going on in my head, with me, or even what I'm thinking about you; hence I'm wearing a mask. I don't really know where I get it from or even where it comes from. It's just always kind of been there, the secrecy thing. I've always really been an outward social guy. I've just never felt like or wanted others to know what I was doing or thinking. It was so prominent early on that my parents decided to give me the nickname SAM, Secret Agent Man. You can call it a shield, a defense mechanism, or whatever you want, but the fact of the matter is that the "shield" is there. I just feel bad for my wife, MHE, though because she's the one that actually has to deal with it. She's done a great job so far with getting me to open up more but I'm still pretty closed about things. Especially when I feel that it's something that I'm protecting her from, like an issue that she doesn't really need to deal with. I realize that it's not fair for me to do that to her, but it's hard to place undue stress in her life if I don't need to. Well anyways that's neither here nor there. The point of this collection of dated entries is to highlight some of the more memorable events of my deployment. I've never actually done this before so if I'm off and on with it then I apologize ahead of time. Also I've decided to to call this a collection of dated entries because quite frankly to call it a diary or journal is kind of, well... Gay.
So here we go, for my first entry I've decided to talk about my motivations. I feel it's only appropriate because unlike a lot of the soldiers I'm deploying with, I chose to be here. Now I'm not saying that they didn't choose to be here because they did when when they signed the dotted line. It's just that I volunteered to come on this deployment. I know that you may have your own opinions about that due to whether you're a Democrat of Republican, a Christian or Atheist, or even if you're rich or poor; the only thing I ask is that you hold your judgements until you see my side. If you still feel the same at the end as you did at the beginning then that's fine, in fact that's your right. Man do I love how you have that right and I ask that you exercise that right as often as you can. It only pays tribute to every Patriot that fought and gave their life freely to pave the roads to our freedoms.
What are MY motivations? Well it's quite simple. In my house we live by what I call the three fundamental "F's", which are faith, family, and friends. Maybe not in that order, but they are all just as important. These F's are my motivations. Go ahead, say it in your head. Better yet, say it out loud. No wait, YELL it out loud, "Faith, Family, and Friends." Because I've found that without these three things in your life you're not really living a very complete life. Not saying that you can't have a happy life, I'm just saying that you can't have a very complete one.
Let's start with talking about friends. Friends are always there, you have them from the time that you're really young and with any luck you'll still have them by the time you die. I know I will. What is a friend though? You may all see it a little differently, but I'm sure that no matter who you are, a friend is basically the same to you as it is to the guy sitting next to you. Well it's time to exercise my rights as being the author and tell you what a friend is to me. A friend is someone who, above all others, will be by your side through the thick and thin; they'll be there until the end and they won't worry about how they made it, they'll just be happy that they did. I'm one of those guys that has a lot of acquaintances, but only a handful of true friends. They're my true friends for a reason and I'll never lose them as a friend just because of what people may think of them or of their short comings and down falls. If you're one of these people, one of my true friends, than you'll know it. I try and make it pretty apparent. So thank you to all of you.
Faith takes a strong person to understand it. It's not for the faint of heart or the weak. It takes real courage and strength to be able to place your life and salvation in the hands of a being that can't even be seen. It takes a person with real dedication to live the kind of life that has been asked of you to live. As for myself I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and I know without a doubt that Joseph Smith was the lords Prophet that restored the true church to this earth. This isn't a recruitment effort so I won't go into it any further. My point is that my faith is what guides me through my journey in life and I try to do that the best that I can. I for one am far from being perfect, but what is perfect is the fact that I try and live the best life possible and that follows my faiths beliefs. I once had a Bishop of mine tell me, "It's easy to run out there and live the life that follows the wrong path. What is hard and tests your faith is to run out there and live the life that follows the right path. Life is meant to be a test." How will you live your life and how will you pass the test? I don't know but I'm ready for the journey down the right path.
Finally and most importantly we have Family. Everything I do in this life is for my family and their best interests. Hopefully throughout this collection of dated entries you'll find that I hold them very dear to my heart. My whole goal in this life is to be the best person that I can be so that my family can be able to look back when my life has come to an end and say they that they were proud of the person I was. It's basically the same way that I feel about my father. He is the man that I try to emulate. To me he can do no wrong. He IS my role model and the man that I proudly and without hesitation call my father. I don't know if you read this dad, but I love you and am proud to be your son. All I know is that if I can only be half the man, father, and soldier that you are then I'll have lived a great life. I'd now like to take the time and talk about the center of my world, MHE, my wife. She is the one person that above all others I have the most respect for. It's a hard thing to be married to a soldier. It's even harder when the soldier is me. Man, she has to put up with so much crap. I promise that all the crap that we go through is for the best. I sacrifice a lot of our present so that I can make sure that we have the best future possible and it's not always easy. So MHE, thank you for being my wife and hanging in there through it all. The person that I am today and the person that I will be in the future is all due to her. She is my anchor that keeps me grounded. I haven't always been the man that I am today, I have my past. One thing I do know for certain though is that she is my future.
Which brings me to why I'm here, getting ready to be deployed to a hostile region for a year. It's because of the love that I have for my wife. It's because, like I said before, I sacrifice our present for a better future. This deployment isn't some chance to get away from the wife for a year and go hang out with the guys. If I wanted to do that I could just call up one of my true friends and go do something. I wouldn't have to go to a country where they tend to shoot at us guys in uniform. This is for me. This is for MHE. This is for us. I love you MHE and I always will. It may be rough right now but I promise that it will be better in a year.





So I hope that you now feel that you have a little more insight into my life and get a feel for who I am. Thanks for your time.

Relaxed grooming standards

Well I've got some news for ya'll, I found out that in about three more weeks we get to start our "relaxed grooming standards"; it's where we don't have to shave anymore and can grow out our hair and beards. So for those of you who will be lucky enough to see me when I get home in April you'll be able to see me like never before. I'll be all shaggy and scruffy. Also I just wanted to let you guys know that my super freakin' awesome wife sent me one of the coolest packages ever. It had some candies with nice little sayings and some writing stuff. With that I'd also just put it out there that Laurel, I did not intentionally forget the journal. I just had alot of things going on when I was packing and it got left behind, but because my wife is so in tune with my needs she made sure that I got it. So again thank you Laurel and thank you MHE. Well that's about all I have for right now. Tomorrow we get to go and shoot the pistols so I'll let you know how it goes. Peace out.

So sad, I just shaved my 'stach!!

I would like to start this post by apologizing. I realize that it has been almost a month since my last post and a lot has happened. Due to this reason I'm not going to worry about updating it because it would be TMI. I will however start blogging about my current situations and I' m sure that you can guess what it is from the title of my post. So as you all know I am now separated from my beautiful, awesome, caring, loving, smart, fun, energetic, optimistic, perfect wife. I am now in Ft. Lewis, WA and it basically sucks. I'm away from my family and WA actually kind of blows. It's cloudy and rainy and all of that is mixed with the cold so it makes for miserable training weather. Well to counter the depression that accompanies the weather and my family situation (meaning that lack of family) I had to find things that kept me sidetracked. I decided on a mustache, yes that's right a mustache. I'm not entirely sure if I can even physically grow one, but I decided to give it a try. I started about three days ago and it was going better than expected. People were actually noticing. I'm not sure if I was getting reaction that I wanted with the mustache unless the common reaction is blatant laughter in your face then yes I was getting the attention that I wanted. I don't really care though because the fact that I could even develop some hair on my face was pride enough for me. So this morning I woke up, showered, brushed my teeth and then shaved. WAIT!! what was that? A-Ron are you an idiot do you know what you just did? You just shaved your 'stache. Oh no, son of a gun. I really just shaved my 'stache. Well folks there you have it, my most current update, I shaved my beautiful three day old mustache. Also if you guys want to get a visual of it just imagine what it would look like if Kyle tried to grow one for about a month. Yeah it was pretty ridiculous but I'll try again and this time I'll keep ya posted on my progress. Well that's about all I have time for so I'll sign out now and let ya'll know that I love ya and miss ya; unless you're some weirdo that I don't know that's just checking out my blog, in that case thanks for checking me out. Well until next time. Ciao.

And they say that fingers in the nose are bad

As you know I'm preparing to leave the great ol' US of A in the near future and because of this I've been doing some medic training. At first it was all fun with learning how to use bandages to patch up wounds, learning how to use needles for chest decompression, and even learning how to put a tourniquet on someone to stop the bleeding, but then things changed. After all of the easy stuff the training decided to take a turn for the worse. They decided to teach us how to use something called a Nasopharangeal Airway. If you've never heard of this I suggest you Google it and take a look. However because this is my blog I feel that I'll just tell you guys and if you want then you can look it up later. Let's start off with you trying an experiment. First what you'll need to do is hold up your pinky and take a look at it. Compare it's size (and I mean the circumfrance of the finger) to the size of your nostril. If you need further help comparing the size go ahead and try jaming the thing in your nose and see how far you can make it. You'll probably find that you didn't make it very far, you might also want to go and wash your hands now. So now that you've experienced that let me just go ahead and tell you about my experience. It was towards the end of a long day of training when we arrived at our class. We took a seat like we had in all the other classes and waited for the block of instruction to begin. The teacher/Doctor walked in and told us that we would be learning about opening airways on patients. He then pulled out a small tube and explained that we would be using it to open air ways. He then proceeded to tell us that we would accomplish this by craming it up the nose of the other person. I then realized that that little tube wasn't so little anymore. We were then told that we would b practicing this on each other, that tube then looked like it was the size of a garden hose. The good part about it was that there was only about 6 tubes for a class of 40 people. So the process was done on a volunteer basis. So what do you think that I did, I volunteered. Why, why, why?? Anyways, as it is I wasn't the first volunteer. There were other retards out there that submitted their nostrils to punishment. Watching the first guy was probably the hardest. He was about 6'4" 230 pounds and had a huge ol' schnoz. I saw the tube go up and then it stoped. Then I saw them twist the tube and try and jam it in there even further. Then I saw this guy actually shed a tear, and then another one, then came the moaning, and finally the STOP, THATS ENOUGH. My Gut fell to the floor, it was my turn. I walked to the front of the class and sat down. I felt like I was sitting in the executioners chair. Why did I do this again? I threw my head back and opened my nose as wide as I could. Then I felt it, my nose stretching to the size of a watermelon. Pushing, pushing, then HOLY MOTHER *&#%$*(&(*%$&@#($*&(*@&#(%*&(*&%$(@*)_!)(*&)_(*!#)($**&&$%(*(*&@#($(& WHAT WAS THAT!!!!!! He's stabing my brain, he has to be in my brain. Then it slid in further. It felt like it was lubed down with Tabasco Sauce. I had Mount St. Helens going off in my head. Is this over yet? NO. Further and further the tube goes. it doesn't stop until my tonsils stop it. then with one quick smooth pull it's all over. It's out and I feel Freedom for the first time in my life. The only good thing that I can say about haveing a tube stuck in my nose and down my airway is that it basically cleaned everything out of there. I was able to breath pretty well after that. So I just want to tell you all now that if you ever need your nose cleaned out, I'dbe more than happy to help you out. Just let me know. All I can say is I don't think that I'll ever do that again. Well I'll try to keep you guys posted on everything else that we do. Hopefully nothing like that happens again. I guess we'll see though.

Oh Say Can You See... That I actually started a BLOG

Good evening all. As you may notice I have recently lost some of my man-hood and actually started a blog. I know, I'm still getting over it myself, but lets look to the future and get pumped up for the many exciting times that we can now share together like when I catch Osama. It'll also be a lot easier than trying to send a mass e-mail to everyone. You guys will be in my thoughts and prayers, especially you Kyle (I think that you need all the help you can get when it comes to girls). Anyways, I really hate to cut this short for it being my first post, but it is my One Year Anniversary and I've gotta GO!! Good night and sweet dreams