Very very very full day

Well tell us Brent how full was it? Well let me tell you. We started out the day heading out to a mortar range. The Polish were training the Iraqis on how to use mortars. Now let’s just say that Headquarters in Baghdad was a little leery of this training. Most of the time when we are attacked it is IEDs or indirect fire which includes rockets and mortars. Now we aren’t accusing the Iraqis of using things against us but they have bad apples just like we do. So teaching them the right way to do indirect fire makes everyone a bit nervous.

The Polish did a good job of showing them the ropes and I hadn’t seen a 60 mm mortar fired before so it was interesting to watch. Once that was over we headed back to Camp Echo. Convoys are always an interesting thing and I got to do a little bit of aggressive driving. There was one truck in particular that didn’t want to stop so I played a little chicken he got the idea and stopped but it’s always a little exciting to have things like that happen.

We made it back to Camp Echo and unloaded the truck. Now you just don’t jump in a truck and drive off like you do your POV (privately owned vehicle) We do what we cal pre combat checks. It’s basically going down a checklist to make sure you have everything and that it is packed where you know it should be and where you can get to it if need be. From water and food to the stretcher. We have to have the radio frequencies we will be using and make sure we know the route. The list is quite extensive and when you get back you have to put stuff away. It ell you all of that because upon our return we found out we had to go to a ribbon cutting ceremony at a school. This was of course after we had unloaded almost everything.

So we load everything up and head back out with our Colonel and the Polish general. We go down into the city and end up taking over several streets and the helicopters keep flying overhead. We make a pretty big presence when we show up. There are kids everywhere. Some are more obnoxious than others. They want candy and water and whatever we will give them. We had a bag of suckers. LOL if orgot this part. On our way into the city or through the city we are hauling butt doing 40 or so and the kids are always waving and what not and I start chucking suckers. It made me think of being in a parade except we were doing 40 MPH. I was doing a hell of job leading the little suckers. You have to take into account when the sucker leaves your hand its already doing 40 plus what I add. I’m sure there is some pissed of parent because a kid has an imprint of a sucker in the side of his head.

So anyways we finished at the school and headed back. Wait…. Forgot to mention the haphazard wiring all through the city. OMG!! No wonder they don’t have power half the time. We are rolling through the inner city and our radio antennas are bouncing under all of these power lines and what not. I was worried we were going to rip them down. I’m quite sure we broke a few but we didn’t leave the city wearing any around our turrets.

So back to Echo, the AC died in our Hummer…. Not that it really helps that much, we get back and I drop off my hummer to be fixed and the power goes down to part of our camp. This is fairly normal when it gets hot. SO Now that I am back I can’t get my paperwork work done since the power grid is down. Well I do some odds and ends and the power comes back I finish my paperwork and decide I should go do PT. I go run a couple of miles run through the chow hall and then work on my deck , which we are building on top of our trailers. SO that was my day. Busy very busy.

My internet has been out so this was actually yesterday (Monday)

check the bottom for pictures