Mark's words...

Mark went on a mission with another guy to recover some vehicles, below is what he said about it...


...we are back. we woke up on Thursday at like 6 in the morning, Schienbein and I worked on trucks most of the day, then we rolled out back to leatherneck at like 7 PM. It took like almost 3 hours to get out of the kandahar base, because we had a new unit with us. They did not PMCS their trucks (look them over and make sure they are good to go.) so as soon as we started rolling they called out over the radio that 2 of their tires were flat on their trailer. They were driving HETTS, huge trucks and their trailer has 48 tires on it! so it took them like a hour and a half to fix it. then as soon as we were rolling again another one of them hit a concrete barrier and blew another tire!!! the convoy commander told them to just roll with it(they had another 47 tires =))

So we finally got rolling(I was pulling the same truck that I brought up) one of the bridges we had to go over the taliban tried to blow up a week or two ago, so the army built another temp bridge thing over the hole in it. It could only hold so much weight so the HETTS had to go through the river below and the rest of us went over the bridge. One of the HETTS got stuck in the river so that took awhile to get them out.

After that we went through Kandahar city, they enacted a curfew on the city because of recent attacks so no civilians were outside at all. There were Afghan police everywhere in the city, at every intersection and in their little outposts all over the city, and we were the only vehicles on the roads. It was kinda creepy, but we had the roads all to our self, which made it easy and quick to get around. Oh on a side note, on the way up to Kandahar on the other side of the road we say a little boy get hit by a Afghani truck =( we stopped about a block up and our interpreter jumped out at a police check point and told them about it. We were not allowed to call for a medivac(helicopter) for him since we did not cause the accident. but the police took him to a hospital like a bat out of hell.

Well after many rips it(kind of like a red bull energy drink we get for free over here) and packets of beef jerky we got back to leatherneck at like 5 in the morning on friday after 10 hours of sitting in the truck. It was kinda peaceful out there being the only people on the road all night, and the country did not look like such a dump in the dark. lucky for us nothing else broke down on the way back and I am writing this to you after getting back to the hooch and crashing for like 6 hours of sleep....

Keepin' on

I'm not going to lie...I momentarily forgot that the blog existed, my bad.
The past two weeks have been very busy...a blur, really. The move went good, the pup is good- got comfortable with the place right away. Lyle (father in law), has dog-proofed most/all the yard in the past two weeks so Trooper is finally able to run around, and enjoy the backyard. He does less running, and more eating sticks/anything on the ground...but i'll pretend he runs around.
I am mostly unpacked, but still have some boxes that need a home. I've really enjoyed being here, and have managed living alone fairly well. Less than 3 months until Mark gets to see his new home! Some pictures below are not in order, thanks to my old-school computer...

Trooper in his chair. Half of the living room. My sister asked why I keep the kennel there, I figure he is most comfy in the living room when i'm home, so I thought he would like spending his days there too.

Dining room, which is more organized now. These pictures are from last week.

Closet that Lyle built me! The shoe rack is my favorite, and sadly, Trooper's favorite too. He just helps himself to a shoe and away he goes.

Other half of the living room- just representing with the flag...Mark would be proud :)

I have ones of my bedroom, but Id feel creeped out if everyone knew what it looked like, so use your imagination! I'll put up more of the office and upstairs/guest room, sometime later.

Mark is doing good. The temperature over yonder is heating up...last I heard it was about 80 degrees during the day. How it goes from 30 to 80 in a matter of weeks is beyond me, but at least they are enjoying it more!

They had to send two guys home due to medical reasons, so they are a bit short staffed, but keeping busy. It sounds like they are all pretty antsy to get home. Less than 3 months, which sounds short, and excruciatingly long at the same time. I'm grateful that my days go by so fast, it's one less that I have to wait.

I haven't written in so long, so i'm not sure if anything else is going on!

I'm loving the weather and spending most of my mornings/evenings outside with the pooch, but otherwise working. Keeping busy though!

thanks to everyone who helped with the move and/or contributed to our sparse home. It's nice to finally call it "our home."

H

Excitement of the house sort

I never entirely understood other peoples excitement of getting a first home, but I think I have enough excitement for ten people and finally get it.

We closed on the house today, and spent all day unpacking boxes, painting, doing dishes and...I guess that's it!
It doesn't look like we even touched the house, but lots of work was put in today- thanks to the parentals and Laura!

It is almost midnight, and the alarm will slap me in the face in 5 hours (gotta find time to run SOMETIME!), so I will leave you with a couple of pictures. Excuse the grungy get up- we were workin' hard!

Momma, myself (with keys and door opener in hand) and our Realtor, David.

Starting to unpack- we're about halfway done bringing boxes in.


Laura and the Madge hard at work!

Not sure what kind of painting skills I had, but I tried!

I can imagine the jealousy of that dining room table.



Oops, how did he sneak in there! He is extra adorable lately.

H