OIF

Well, a year has come and a year has gone. I thought for this segment, I would list some of the things that I and other soldiers have endured.

During the course of this year I have:
Visited a new country
Talked a different language
Kissed my mother goodbye in tears
Lied and said "I'm not scared"
Cried over the phone to my girlfriend
Watched an incredible sunrise
Watched an incredible sunset
Heard a mortar round shot
Heard a mortar round land
Been 200 yards from an impacting rocket
Been less than that from an impacting mortar round
Been 300 yards from an exploding IED
Walked on the Iraqi streets with a bullet in the chamber begging the people not to start anything because there were children around
Laid on the streets under a truck with my weapon ready to fire
Watched a building wondering if a sniper was going to take a shot
Asked my friend to tell my girlfriend I loved her if anything happened to me
Stood in a crowd of Iraqi's
Yelled at a crowd of Iraqi's to move back and get away
I've been scared
I've been happy
I've cried
I know what it smells like when a motar explodes
I know what it sounds like when a car bomb goes off
I know what a 50 cal sounds like in the distance
I know what it feels like to not be scared of a noise anymore
I know what it feels like to not have your family there
I know what it feels like to not be there for your family
And if there's one thing I've learned in this year, it's that I could have lived without this.

I love you all, I'll be back soon
God bless.

Hey everyone. I don't have much time, so I wanted to write really quick and let you all know that I'm still doing fine. Not much has changed. We heard some explosions today but from what I hear they were all outgoing.

We have some more stuff going on, but it's stuff that hasn't happened yet, so I'll have to tell you all about it later. And I will in a couple days. Sorry I don't have more, hope you're all doing fine. Love you and God bless. Thank you so much for your prayers and support. Peace.

Hey everyone. When I finally woke up Christmas day (after staying up until 0400 Christmas Eve night) it was pouring, an absolute downpour. It rained pretty much all day on Christmas and made one huge muddy mess. Christmas Eve was nice, that night was gorgeous, and the 26th was really pretty today, as is today, but for some reason the weather decided to punish us on Christmas. Oh well. The day really wasn't that bad, like I said, one more day closer to coming home.

We have had a lot more updates on the movie website including some downloads. You can now download the AFBM movie trailer, a forfeit movie that Whitney made with pictures from 3rd ID, and he put up a song that I completed called "Paper Idols." If you want to download any of these, go to www.afbmthemovie.com and either scroll to the bottom and download there, or click the "downloads" link to find the links. You can stream or right click save as.

Time's coming soon to an end, but it seems that dates keep getting pushed back. They have changed the way advanced party works here. Initially, the advanced party was supposed to go down with the vehicles before the main group got there and so they could clean the vehicles and be ready to roll out as soon as the main party got there.

But now, the dates for the vehicles to go down have been pushed back so much, that the main party is going to go first and the "advanced" party will be staying behind to make sure the vehicles get line hauled. But we will all be leaving Kuwait to go back home together so it doesn't matter whether or not I'm in the advanced party.

We got two days off for Christmas Eve and Christmas so now I'm trying to get used to going to work again. Two days off...hmmm, sounds like what they would call a weekend in the civilian world, but after two days off it seems like I haven't been here to work in weeks. I get bored when I'm cooped up in the trailers for too long anyway.

I suppose that's it for now. I appreciate ALL my comments on Christmas. And I'd like to extend my thanks to the readers that don't know me the posted. Thank you everyone. Well, I'm going to go for now, thanks so much for reading and I appreciate your prayers and support. God bless, see you soon.