Just wanted to post a quick note.  Should be returning to Texas at the end of this month/early next month.

I'll post a longer blog soon about my thoughts on this, as well as an omnibus of my experiences and feelings having been here a year.

Well, theres the newsletter for August, as well as the new picture.

Standby for the blog...

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I lied.  No blog yet, but heres a second picture.  I drew a few comics today, so now I just have to Scan and edit them.  I'll try to do so tonight. 

Well here it is: I'm already posting a new blog.  Will wonders never cease?

As you probably didn't notice, there is still no new comic up.. but what's this behind your ear?  The drawing, for those of you not in the know, is of two characters of mine who I have been drawing off and on for years.  One day, a comic will come from them, but until then I continue to recreate them..  I think this is one of, if not my best.

In other news my legs are about broken after another eight mile officer PT run today. I almost passed out, and several of the captains were puking, and pretty much no one had a good time.  I wondered to myself:  If a Katusha rocket hits this formation, will the rest of the Battalion go home?

This whole John Karr thing is pretty crazy...  I have some jokes about this, but I'm having a problem writing them down in a way that wont get me blackballed.  Instead I'll say that this guy is a good candidate for the Michael Jackson therapy.  You know, where he sicks the Jackson Five on you till you don't want to be a pervert anymore.

So there you have it, a new blog post and a new drawing.  Two out of three ain't bad right?  Let me know what you think of the drawing.

The past few months have been pretty intense.  Not in the form of combat, but just in general.

I started realizing that there is a trend starting to develop of unfinished projects that I start. I'm starting to see that my goal of developing as an artist has not progressed at all, and that the online comic I started has not been updated in a long time. Therefore, I'm refocusing on both, and plan to release one new comic each Wednesday, and develop a new drawing bi-weekly. I'm thinking that Saturdays are a good day to release those. I guess it's your job to keep me honest.

I've been watching a ton of movies lately. Here's the list: Hard Candy, Superman Returns, Saw, Death Trance, Sniper 3, The Cave, The Warriors, Smallville Season 5, Straight into Darkness, Lady in the Water, Weeds Season 1, Ultimate Avengers 1-2, and the Die Hard and Lethal Weapon sets. Most of these films/shows were excellent.

Don't let all this movie watching get you thinking there's no work being done.  This week I completed a company newsletter as well as a design for our company t-shirts.  That was in addition to all the normal every day missions.

Operation Together Forward is now in full swing.  Sections of the greater Baghdad area are being systematically separated and cleared.  Of course the Iraqi news media is doing their part to tip off the anti-Iraqi forces that we will be coming, just as they did in Ameriyah months ago.  You may remember that little town as the area I was shot at a while back.  Recently, separate operations there inside the Ã?evil mosqueÃ? netted RPGs, machine guns, detonation cord and other nice goodies.

Dates are now beginning to come into season here.  I got to try a few from a tree in Dora and decided to get some of my own.  The picture is of the bunch in my room growing riper by the day, and the ones I ate a while ago.  Interestingly, interpreters tell me that there are around 350 types of dates in Iraq.  Some taste better than others, and I'll let you know what the verdict is once I've tried a few.

That's all for now. I'll try to be more forthcoming with the updates in the near future.

click here and now here

The past couple days the news media here have been interested in my time home, my communication with a 3rd grade class, and now my reaction to the Zarkawi death.  I was on the tv news 2 nights ago (as linked), some liberal radio station yesterday morning, and tonight I was on the 10 and 11 o'clock news here.

I think that in my small town the war is not as real as it is to larger military towns.  Despite the fact that we have the Naval Postgraduate School, and the Defense Language Institute here, these are both training bases, and no one really feels the strain of combat rotations.

It was nice to be able to offer some responses to some human interest type stories.

So far the time I've spent home has been much like I anticipated.  I've been spending time with Vince, Scott, and Lisa, as well as my Grandparents, friends and immediate family.  I've been eating good food, watching all the TV I have been missing, and reading a truckload of comics that have been arriving here. 

It's been a good week, and I look forward to one more good one.  Frankly Im just happy to have made it through the most evil day of the century.  I was a little worried when on 06/06/06 my page views were showing 4,666.  However at 1906 (or 7:06 or 6:66) that evening I was happily eating dinner at a nice restraint and listening to a very good pianist)

Let me know if you want more details about anything.

The *new* website is now up and running.  So far I have posted the first 3 comics and people seem to like them.  If that is you, please don't hesitate to use them in myspace comments, friend my other account, send out a bulletin to your friends and enemies, or just scorn me and do nothing.  As I type this I have the next 6 prepared, and ready to be posted in the near future.  I figured I had better make a few extras right now, considering pretty soon I will be uninterested in Iraq, the Army, or anything else of that nature.  

What I will be interested in are people, beer, and real food.  Ill let you know how that all turns out in a few days.

Oh yeah!  I'm going home!  You may have guessed that, due to recent posts.  However, did you know it happens in like.. soon?  Tonight even!  Here's to hoping the Army doesn't lose my gear, or take 5 days to get me there.  Ive got stuff to do, but I'll post more when I get stateside.

The past few days in Iraq have been going by fairly quickly.  The missions have been pretty standard, though a couple of them have been new, and taking us to areas which were more dangerous than usual.

In one such stop, I spoke with a Shia security guard who told me that the people in that area have a very unique view on Americans in Iraq.  He said that the people believe that we work with Al-Qaeda to set off bombs against Shia civilians, and allow them to carry out attacks.  These people make up some crazy stuff, and they dont know any better because the enemys disinformation campaign is better than ours.  Another such story is the one where our battle damage is far worse than is actually reported.  However, every time they destroy a tank, we suck up all the wreckage with a secret machine.  COOL!

In further news, I was driving down the street the other day and some Iraqi guy flashed me the shocker.  If you know what this is, imagine my joy.  The only sad note to this little tale is my camera wasnt recording, and so I have no proof.  Curses.

I am starting a collection of Iraqi patches that I am receiving from security forces.  So far I have one from the Iraqi Army, Iraqi Police, Oil Protective Force, and Electricity Protective Services.  They all look pretty cool, and each is a neat story to tell.

In a couple days I get to go home and back with family and friends for a few weeks.  I am looking forward to the break and the chance to relax for a little while.  I'll get to drive down some streets without the thought of bombs going off, etc.  Looking forward to seeing Lisa, Vince, Shelby, Scott,  and whoever else decides to show up in Monterey while I am there.  What I'm not looking forward to is going back to much hotter weather.

Finally, I would like to end this brief post with a link to a really funny short video...

This is just a quick post to cover an interesting topic.  While I don't completely understand the entire issue just yet, this topic deserves some consideration.  Net Neutrality is a term which has been getting some coverage lately, due to new legislation which might cancel it.  Its a case of "you didn't know you had it till might be taken away" sort of thing.   Scott Kurtz over at PVP sums this topic up best as:

"...Internet service providers and cable companies can not discriminate against any data, traffic or programs running on their network. Everyone gets a fair shake and no preferential treatment. End users can reach all websites without interference from their provider. It allows the playing field to be level and encourages innovation."

If this were taken away, say... by some legislation, it would allow those ISPs to dictate what pages you are allowed to go to, or redirect you to their sponsors without your consent.  A widely used example of this would be if you wanted to go to google.com and instead were sent to yahoo.com because yahoo paid them off. Askaninja puts this a little more humorously with their Hot-Dog-On-A-Stick argument.

In the end I am not trying to tell you what to think about this topic, but instead invite you to visit some of the aforelinked pages and think for yourself.  You can also visit this one.

Oh, and to my stalwart Republican friends, Moveon.org and most Democrats think this petition is a good thing...*gulp* lol.

Just thought I would share with you a painting that was just finished for me.  The subject of the painting is a small area in a city where we got shot at a few months back.  I like it a lot because it demonstrates what I see Iraq becoming one day, enshallah (if God wills it).

A strong Iraqi soldier stands in the foreground, his weapon at his side (in a safe direction even!)  Nearby is a new Iraqi 1114 (HMMWV), and in the distance a combined presence of an American and Iraqi patrol.  This is the type of image I will take home with me and tell people about.  This is the reason I am so grateful I was able to spend time on a MiTT, and get to know these people better.

To me, they are no longer the goofy looking guys you see on a checkpoint entering or leaving the green zone.  Nor are they the people my current soldiers eye with distrust.  They are, as a whole, my brothers in arms.  The future of their country.

Also, as a special note for mothers day:

Thank you to all the mothers out there, and the ones who will be mothers one day.  Your task is not easy, and I thank you for it, if you do it well.

To my mother in particular:

From a battered womb (this goes back to our little joke) to long nights, and the occasional broken heart, God knows I have not always been the perfect son.  You however have always been the perfect mom.  Thank you for your continued support while I am deployed and I look forward to being home again soon.

I love you.  And I'm glad you liked the presents.

Well, a lot has happened lately, but unfortunately I cant talk about all of it.

Here are a few things I can talk about.

The virus hit rather suddenly, throwing me headlong back to the dark ages.  Time seemed to stand still and reason warped around me.  I had been tricked.  Bamboozled.  I think its safe to say we can blame the white man for this, as I do for all things which confound me. I blame either the white man or the Devil.  One of the two, but not both.  OH, OH, or Democrats!

Anyway, be it the white man, the Devil or the Democrats, I was had.  And had good.  So I swing the ol Dell by the S6 shop and 2 days later wham, boom, I have my computer back.  I spent quite a long time adding all my software back on, and downloading all the stuff I needed. Things have slowly returned to normal.  A driver here, some software there and it seemed I was back on road to normality.  Except now it likes shutting down on its own; and, good old fashioned American DVDs wont play, but the burned ones do.  What the hell?

In more positive news, Ive been taking road trips.  Ive seen all sorts of places in within a 100 mile radius of Baghdad, and its generally been all good.  Most notable was my trip to Hillah and the Babylon area.  Its a beautiful, lush area of particular significance because of its biblical significance.  The only drawback?  The 2 ½ hour drive through IED-infested roads.  Still, to visit a place that is thought to be the origin of civilization is a great opportunity.  I just wish Iraq was more hospitable to tourists.  By the way, did you know that you and I write in Arabic numerals?  Proof here!

The real reason why I was moved from 8-10 CAV became apparent to me after my initial counseling with my Battalion Commander.  In my eyes it is their failure to understand my MiTT mission, clear and simple.  We will see, after my upcoming one-on-one counseling with my old Squadron Commander.  What is clear right now is that my current team is happy with my performance.  Ill leave it at that, but it seems to me and to my commander that I am doing well for him and the Battalion team as a whole.

Had a couple days off out of the past few and I managed to do a little drawing.  Here is one of those, and I hope you enjoy.