manrymission.com

You may have noticed a new “Tags” section at the bottom of each post. Mugs noticed:

The endless tags are driving me mad.
What is the point of them? Just curious.

Manrymission.com is powered by Wordpress, a blogging platform. I am currently using version 2.5. When version 2.3 came out late last year, Wordpress added tags functionality. Tags are basically a list of keywords for a specific post or even for an entire website. They are used to aid in searching and finding content on the web. In my understanding, they are different than the categories I already use. Categories are used to describe the main theme of a particular post.

Anyway, I have added the Tags section as an experiment. For the next few weeks, I’ll watch the traffic on the site to see if adding Tags has any impact on the number of visitors.

Five years ago, when we headed overseas to live in Hawaii, our pets did not travel with us.  At the time, the quarantine was long.  Our Siberian Husky, Czar was 12 1/2 and Hawaii would have been a torture for him, so he was given to a friend and ridiculously spoiled for the last year of his life.  Our Ragdoll cat, Magnolia also decided she loved the good life lavished on her by a dear friend.  So, for close to 5 years, we have had no pets.  When you must live as a renter, it is very difficult to keep pets.  It severely limits your choice of places to live.  So, we told the kids that when we returned to the States and owned our home, we would once again get pets.  Dale’s deployment delayed the fulfillment of the promise, but now that I’ve started, there’s no stopping.  Dale went with the children to choose fish.  They happily named them which I discovered was probably not a good idea after some fish died and had to be replaced.  I had somehow missed the time worn advice of “Never Name Fish!”  However, fish were not enough.  On Saturday, we will be bringing home a Golden Retriever puppy.  I have spent the last several months reading dog breed, dog training, dog care, and dog cleanup books.  The kids and I watched multiple episodes of the Dog Whisperer and on Saturday, we wandered lost through the aisles of the pet store choosing brushes, dishes, toys, leashes, etc.  Before Dale brought home Czar, our first dog, there was no preparation, no research, and no plan.  Reading all these books and watching all these shows, I have concluded that we did everything wrong with him.  Czar was never completely housebroken, he chewed up everything, and ran away every chance he got.  We loved him dearly, but here’s hoping I can do it right this time.  For the last month, I have felt like I am preparing for a baby.  Instead of nursing/formula, crib, and diaper brand decisions; I must now decide which dog food, kennel, and brushes are the best.  Dog food is very complicated now.  There is endless research on dog food nutritional value and endless personal reviews that alternate between “this food is excellent” and “this is rubbish, it made my dog sick”.  For now, I am going to feed him the food the breeder uses as well as a dog vitamin.  Yes, a dog vitamin.  In the midst of debating how much I’m willing to pay to ensure my dog has the proper nutrition, I’m feeding my children waffles with peanut butter, chocolate chips, and syrup for dinner.  And no, I didn’t give them a vitamin.

Last week was filled with art and music events at the school.  On Wednesday, Josiah and Abby played for their middle school band concert.  Josiah plays the baritone and Abby plays the flute.  They both started band 4 months ago and have improved greatly since.  Dale was able to hear the band play at chapel when he was home for R&R.  In fact the blog picture shows them wearing their band uniforms of white shirts and blue ties.  The band played Turkish March, March Militaire, Rock Island Express, and Jump Street Boogie.  For Jump Street Boogie, they donned gold satin vests, black shiny hats, and sunglasses.  I found it quite amusing.  I am now going to have them play Rock Island Express for halftime of Bears games to fire up the crowd.  The crowd, of course, is Zeke and I and the “Defense Defense” chant.  On Friday, I attended the Art Show with Abby and Gabe.  Gabe won a third place ribbon for 2nd grade with his colored paper flower pot and Abby won Honorable Mention for 6th grade with her drawing of an abandoned building.  The High School hosted the Art Show and the work of all the winners K-12 was displayed.  They had live music in each room.  A boy played piano in the main room and two girls played violin in the hallways.  Everyone was dressed up.  Gabe was happy to wear his tie.  Josiah, however, opted to stay home and watch Zeke rather than subject himself to another mandatory tie event.  The level of artwork was impressive.  One student’s scratch off artwork was phenomenal in the detail, some of the paintings were lovely, and the robot created out of junk was clever.  They served hors d’oeuvres and a lovely red punch.  Gabe in his crisp, clean white shirt wanted very much to have a glass of that tasty punch, but he was denied by his unfeeling Mother.

I visited some project sites in Mosul today, east of the Tigris River. Chris Johnson and his 1-8 Infantry Battalion are responsible for the neighborhoods I visited today. The Iraqi Operation Lion’ Roar is still ongoing; however, the curfew has been relaxed a little. So there were people and cars out and about this afternoon. It was nice that most everywhere we went, the residents were smiling and waving.

Rick was once again able to coordinate for dedicated air coverage for our entire move. The 4-6 Air Cavalry unit provided two OH-58D Kiowa Warriors. Having eyes in the sky gives me a good feeling. We traveled today in the REVAs again. I was glad that today’s move only lasted for an hour, not like the 9 hour days in Sinjar and Rabiyya!

Our record for today was 1 win, 1 loss, and 1 tie. At the first site we visited, the contractor has done really good work. The construction is progressing well. That was the win. At the second site, a different contractor seems to have done no work at all. The pump station is in total disrepair. That was the loss. The tie was at the third site. At this location, the contractor is still finalizing his design and has not broken ground yet. I knew that before the visit, but I wanted to check the site before construction starts.

All in all, it was a very good day.

Visiting one of our newly constructed wells north of Sinjar Mountain, we encountered a goat herder and his family living in the pump house.

In a previous post I mentioned the family with 7 kids living in the tent next to a pump house, but this family actually took up residence inside the pump house. Based on the satellite dish in the picture, I think they might be distantly related to the Manrys!

As we were preparing to leave, the goat herder offered us glasses of fresh goat’s milk. While warm, chunky, goat’s milk may appeal to some, I had to politely decline the offer.