Hot milk for breakfast

[Phaedrus]

that's enough, dear. they are right. stop it, please

sorry...

You're talking about the innuendo, of course. Not the "madly, passionately and utterly in love with" thinig...

Because no way are you going to stop that.

[IcSyU]

You do realize that many people on CF right now haven't even been alive for 21 years???

March of 1989 represent! I remember 21 years ago like it was just yesterday!

[herbicide]

Hadn't ever heard of Ghurkas before. If anyone is interested there is a 6 part documentary that are about 3 to 5 minutes each on youtube. Named Ghurkas 1, Ghurkas 2, etc. Kind of a fascinating unit.

Here's the gist:

They're a British military unit made up of men from Nepal. They are hugely respected by the military around the world. Some seriously tough ********.
In WW2 there is a rumor that they would sneak across Japanese lines and cut the shoelaces of Japanese sentries (I don't know that I spelled that right) just for the fun of it.

they all carry a small curved knife called a kukri.

Worth looking into if you're interested in military history/units.

As a bit of a history nut, I know they are one of the most feared and respected warriors of modern times.

Phaedrus, stay safe, we enjoy the stories.

Also, is Phaedrus a reference to something of Greek history?

[Bader]

March of 1989 represent! I remember 21 years ago like it was just yesterday!

Well at least you weren't born in the 90s. I think I taught a few students that were last year though.....gross.

Happily old balls of the college student world currently. June 1986.

Back on topic, stay safe Phaed. You truly have a gift with writing, and your jack of all trades life sounds like heaven to someone deathly afraid of getting stuck behind a desk for the rest of my life!

[Phaedrus]

As a bit of a history nut, I know they are one of the most feared and respected warriors of modern times.

Phaedrus, stay safe, we enjoy the stories.

Also, is Phaedrus a reference to something of Greek history?

Socrates was something of a hypocrite. He created Phaedrus as a straw man, whose arguments he always defeated in order to attack the Sophists. The problem with the dialectic, is that contrary to the Socratic ideal that all truth can be found through argument, in reality all you really discover through the dialectic is who has the best arguing ability.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phaedrus_(dialogue)
I discovered Phaedrus when reading "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". And I agree with Robert Pirsig in that Socrates misrepresented the Sophists.

Facts do not represent Truth, Progress does not automatically mean Good, and Science may work, but it's not Sufficient. Of course, to deny Facts, Progress and Science is also folly. But people prefer to oppose (and embrace) simplicity, not complexity, so the natural order of things is to create straw man out of those with whom you disagree.

Huh. Short question, long answer. If you REALLY want to dive into this stuff, surf on over to another friend of mine's web-site and meet Dr. Marc Tyrell, who is a Symbolic Anthropologist from Ottawa.

http://marctyrrell.com/

[istatefan]

Official steely eyed killer cool guy pic:

Wow! Quite the contrast in pics, from the "guy next door that you drink beer with" (former avatar with the flannel shirt) to the guy that you are afraid to drink beer with.

Glad to see that the "military" world has upgraded their equipment. The tactical vest rocks! Sure beats the "LBE" from my days in uniform. Am I really that old?

Thanks for the posts. Great reading (still love the military history and such)!

By the way, out of curiosity, may I ask what the sidearm and rifle are that you are carrying (if it is not sensitive information)?

Stay safe!

[Cycofan1]

Well, they say that karma evens out, and that was demonstrated by this morning's circus. I checked out of the hotel at 4 am and got into what I thought was the airport shuttle. Nope, it was just another taxi cab, that didn't know where I was to go.

Remember the post about Dubai, and how I was treated like royalty? Well, when the taxi driver dumped me at the curb, I became just another person, in an Arab country, trying to fight a mob to get on an airplane.

Boarding aircraft is a non-distributive activity. In other words, it's not a zero sum game. X amount of people have tickets, and the airplane will take them all. But because the Dubai departure gates for M.E. countries are chaos, people react by becoming mob-like. But the odd thing is, there is a definite gentility to followers of Islam. It was a "gentle, cultured" mob and we all got through the seemingly nonsensical boarding process unscathed.

There was craziness at the gates as well. You are bussed out to the aircraft, and the wrong buses were at the wrong terminals, so instead of renumbering the buses, or shifting them 50 meters over to the correct terminals, they had all the passengers shift among the 5 terminals in a game of terminal twister. Lines were crossing and melding and folks were getting on wrong airplanes in another mob scene, but shockingly, we got off the ground only 1.5 hours late.

We flew in an ex-AA DC-9/MD-80 with old-fashioned turbo-jet engines. It took forever to get off the ground, and you've never lived until you've flown into Kabul airport in a civil jet. The do NOT screw around. The pilot actually entered a slight power dive at cruising speed, and then waited for the last moment to decelerate prior to impacting the end of the runway nose down at full power. I'm thinking they've been shot at, before, and you have no doubts that you've entered a combat zone.

I got ambushed by a con-artist at the airport, who made off with $15 in "fees" for my baggage. It was worth the $15 just to see him work his con.

I finally linked up with my guys. Amazingly enough, I'm working with Ghurkas. Think 5'0" guys who can kick your butt without breathing hard. Just to make me feel at home, they had a protective vest and we convoyed to my temporary home.

I'm told that I deploy to somewhere else in Afghanistan on Thursday. I'm not saying until I get there.

I also met my personal ride. It is an ancient Russian Mi-8 HIP helicopter, and comes with a Bosnian crew. Good bird. One of my favorite aircraft of all times.

Gotta go inprocess, will update later.

WOW that sucks.

[JHudd]

Wow! Quite the contrast in pics, from the "guy next door that you drink beer with" (former avatar with the flannel shirt) to the guy that you are afraid to drink beer with.

Glad to see that the "military" world has upgraded their equipment. The tactical vest rocks! Sure beats the "LBE" from my days in uniform. Am I really that old?

Thanks for the posts. Great reading (still love the military history and such)!

By the way, out of curiosity, may I ask what the sidearm and rifle are that you are carrying (if it is not sensitive information)?

Stay safe!

That is still what we have in our unit, he looks to be a bit better dressed than your average Soldier. We are supposedly fielding the new vests this FY but they are still not as nice as he is wearing. Shoot we just switched out our old M-16 with the M-4 last month.

[CycloneErik]

That is still what we have in our unit, he looks to be a bit better dressed than your average Soldier. We are supposedly fielding the new vests this FY but they are still not as nice as he is wearing. Shoot we just switched out our old M-16 with the M-4 last month.

I always enjoyed seeing how far the Red Bull really is on the funding chain. We still had PRC-77s when I went to be the S-6 in the 1-168, while we had been using SINCGARS for 10+ years in the old 234th Signal Battalion (which was pretty far up the funding chain).

It was fun seeing both sides. Then I joined the 734th Maintenance BN, and they were preparing to field SINCGARS. Blows me away.

[Phaedrus]

That is still what we have in our unit, he looks to be a bit better dressed than your average Soldier. We are supposedly fielding the new vests this FY but they are still not as nice as he is wearing. Shoot we just switched out our old M-16 with the M-4 last month.

I'm not here in any military function. I work for the State Department as a contractor, so we pretty much wear what we want, grow beards, don't have to observe military rules, etc..

But we still run M4s and M9s. Though my M9 is anodized green, instead of the blue-black that I'm used to. I really, really wished we were running Glock 19s, though. A much better pistol than the M9.

If I had my druthers, I'd either run an M1911 or a Glock. Those are the two pistols I shoot the best.

[Cyclonepride]

Phaedrus, you should seek syndication. Seriously. You write extremely well, and have an awesome story to tell.

[Phaedrus]

So, this morning I awoke to see a beautiful coat of barf all over the ground, here in lovely Afghanistan. Walking to breakfast, I got barf all over my hat, and my coat, and my boots were fully coated with barf, as well. Later on, when I worked out, my running shoes became "barf-logged," which was quite uncomfortable.

What is this "barf" I speak of, you may ask? Well, due to some diligent research on my part, I found an on-line Dari dictionary, and discovereed that the word for snow, is "barf". I find it semi-hilarious that the juvenile term for vomit is the same word for snow. But then, I never did fully grow up.

I had my first full night of sleep last night, and feel tremendously well. My alimentary system has also adjusted to the strange new foods I am forcing through it, and that helps quite a bit. I still get strange looks from my non-Nepalese/Afghan co-workers, when I tuck hungrily into a plate of vegetable curry, boiled mutton or Dal. We had bits of mystery meat, yesterday that was served on the Nepalese version of Nan, a type of flat-bread. It came to the table, still sizzling, and even the pickiest eater (surprisingly, most of the guys and gals at our camp are very picky eaters) enjoyed it.

Which begs the question: How do you spend a career as a military contractor, living and working in some of the most remote places on the planet, and be a picky eater? Myself, I don't bungee jump or sky dive, but if it's strange and edible, it's in my mouth. I love discovering new kinds of food. I guess it's a by-product of growing up in Northwest Iowa, in a German/Scandinavian culture where the most common seasoning is "bland" and "overcooked."

One thing, though; you need to like oily food to get along, here. Luckily, I work out a bit, or I'd be ballooning up, quickly. Since I've lost a ton of weight since 2005, I surely hope I do not return to being a butterball. Breakfast normally consists of liver sausage boiled in oil, and/or English style bacon (thick cut and soft, instead of crispy), oatmeal, potatoes and exotic mixed fruit. We have a macchiato machine, which I adore. Middle Eastern coffee is to die for. Kofe is an Arabic word, after all.

I got up extra early this morning and washed my clothes. We employ several Afghan women at our camp, to do cleaning and laundry, but they take too long to the laundry back to me, so I need to sneak around to get it done, or risk being scolded. And trust me, an Afghan woman knows how to scold. Well, I used an Afghan brand of soap, which kind of made the eyes water, but the black long-sleeved underarmor shirt I work out in actually smells clean.

At my prior job, my commute was excessively long, so I had an apartment there, and never brought this shirt home, so I was always washing it myself, and it was always stinky, even after washing. But whatever is in this mystery soap, gets the smell right out of it. I imagine it is some nasty material that is not EPA compliant, but they don't particularly care about that, here.

Well, I had a colleague take a picture of yesterday's feast. I'm off to his office to get it on my memory stick, and hopefully, I can post it, here.

[herbicide]

I'm not here in any military function. I work for the State Department as a contractor, so we pretty much wear what we want, grow beards, don't have to observe military rules, etc..

But we still run M4s and M9s. Though my M9 is anodized green, instead of the blue-black that I'm used to. I really, really wished we were running Glock 19s, though. A much better pistol than the M9.

If I had my druthers, I'd either run an M1911 or a Glock. Those are the two pistols I shoot the best.

Why don't you use what you like? Or will they not let you?

On the Greek stuff, never got into Socrates much, read the Illiad and Oddessy though. The Oddessy is my #1 read.

[istatefan]

That is still what we have in our unit, he looks to be a bit better dressed than your average Soldier. We are supposedly fielding the new vests this FY but they are still not as nice as he is wearing. Shoot we just switched out our old M-16 with the M-4 last month.

The "Red Bull" from your avatar brings back old memories. I remember the "old" "Viking helmets" (we had another name for them back then ;-). I also remember when the transition from the M-16 A1 to the A2 was a big deal. I've never seen an M-4 up close, but I am hoping that it is more of an upgrade than the A-1 to A-2 was!

Anything has to be better than the "LBE" in my opinion!

[SeattleClone]

What a coincidence! I saw a pile of barf in the parking lot at HuHot tonight, and you could tell it was from HuHot because of all the noodles. But I went in and ate anyways. Also, I almost stepped in it.