I am a bad fan of the Chicago Bears or I am a fan of the bad Chicago Bears. Pick either statement, they both apply. However, my dear husband is an obnoxious fan of the Dallas Cowboys or a fan of the obnoxious Dallas Cowboys. Both of those statements apply as well. For all you Aussies who understand only footy (Rugby or Aussie Rules), I am talking about gridiron football. Why I let a football game and football team matter to me so much, I can not explain. When the game is on I am transformed into a mad yelling nutcase complete with chants, boos, jumping up and down, and yelling obnoxiousness. Zeke decided that this was a fun game that Mommy was playing and he would join in: “Watch da foobal Mommy?” Soon he was chanting “Defense…Defense”, jumping up and down and telling me, “Give me high five, Mommy!” When the game started to look dire, I ran upstairs to get a rally cap. A rally cap can be any hat worn inside out or backwards or both. Wearing this on your head helps your team to come back when behind in the game. I am a great believer in the rally cap, but my husband is not. Our current home had been sitting on the market for quite awhile with no action. When we put in an offer to buy the house, I had a peace that this was the house for us and that everything was going to go smoothly. Well, someone was lying in the weeds and put in an offer soon after ours. Both offers were being presented to the seller at the same time and our realtor was going to the negotiations on our behalf. We prayed and called my family to pray. The realtor called and it didn’t sound good. Dale and I were watching a baseball game and it was in the bottom of the 12th, 2 outs, with a runner on second. The tv cameras scanned the crowd and I saw a guy with a rally cap on. “That’s what we need to put us over the top,” I told Dale and stuck a rally cap on my head. 20 minutes later, the realtor called to say we got the house. If that didn’t get him to believe in the rally cap, I didn’t know what would. I was convinced he would accept the rally cap’s validity, but he didn’t. He likes dominating winning teams, he doesn’t want the game to be close. I, however, like to think that all is lost and be miraculously delivered from misery. The change in emotion is fantastic. However, my rally cap did not work during the Bears/Cowboys game partly because my eldest son was sitting across from me with Cowboys gear reminding me that I had failed to win him to my side and mostly because the Bears quarterback once again played awful. My gloating, obnoxious Cowboy fan husband called me after the game. The one time, so far, I was glad he was thousands of miles away and he has to call me to rub it in. But, today, good news: our quarterback is benched and my rally cap is back on my head. I’ll see you in the playoffs where payback will be sweet!
I love books and I love to buy books for my children. Therefore, we have a lot of books. However, I do not have a lot of bookcases. I dream of one day having a house full of nice solid wood bookcases instead of the hodgepodge of particle board and unpainted pine shelves that I currently own. I periodically make a pledge to not buy another cheap bookcase. I declare that I will save my money and invest in wooden bookcases that will survive our relentless moving. Then, I move to a new house and have piles of books with no where to put them. I see in the newspaper ads that Big Lots has white particle board book cases for $25 and I think “I could buy a bookcase for each of the kids for less than the price of a nice one.” So, off I go to Big Lots. There are people who love Big Lots, the Dollar Store, and yard sales. I am not one of them. I greatly admire frugal people. They love to search for the best deal and save money. I like to go to the nearest shop and spend too much for an item, because I’m too lazy to look around. I walked into Big Lots and told myself to walk out before I purchased more cheap bookcases, but I couldn’t be stopped. Big Lots is a dangerous place. It convinced me I couldn’t pass up a great deal on a jewelry table and a child’s table with stools. So, I came home to assemble all my various purchases. I had help in assembling. Gabe operated the screwdriver and Zeke helped with the hammer. Zeke has a special knack for hitting my thumb. I successfully assembled the jewelry table and the child’s table with stools and was beginning to feel cocky that I was finally getting the hang of these home improvement tasks. Gabe, Zeke, and I started on the first bookcase and I made sure the unfinished edges were all facing upwards. Gabe worked the screwdriver and Zeke worked the hammer. We screwed the boards together and carefully pounded the nails that held the back on. I then went to put in the shelves and realized that I had connected one side with the peg slots facing out. I let out a frustrated scream and scared Zeke. All my new gained confidence was gone and I was reminded of the two other home improvement fiascoes I had this week. Josiah was out mowing the lawn and came into tell me that the lawnmower had stopped. Assuming that it had run out of gas, I went and got the gas can and filled it up. I went back inside and seconds later Josiah came in to tell me the lawnmower was smoking. I went outside to find the lawnmower coated in oil and smoking. All I could think was that Dale had mentioned to me that the weed eater took an oil, gas mix and I must have filled up the lawnmower with the wrong can. I stood there thinking, “I can’t believe I’ve broken Dale’s brand new lawnmower.” I sent the neighbor kid to bring his dad who concluded that when Josiah checked the gas, he also checked the oil and forgot to screw the oil cap back on. The oil bubbled out onto the engine which resulted in the smoke. I was much relieved. This week I also decided to shock myself by attempting to pull out an old fashioned multiple plug expander from the outlet without turning off the power. I didn’t do so well in electrical engineering at college, but I do remember learning that if you grab a bit of metal connected to a power source, you will get shocked, and get shocked I did. I have had many offers of assistance for home improvement tasks and have finally agreed to accept one, because who knows what I could do next.
Last week, while recovering an Army vehicle in Iraq, Schweigart, 22, was shot by a high-powered rifle and had a bullet pass through his arm and chest. The bullet went through his nipple and into his Bible. Hitting the Bible may have saved his life.
I just read this article in yesterday’s Mideast issue of the Stars and Stripes. The article was written by John Anderson, a reporter for the Wellsville (N.Y.) Daily Reporter. You can read the full article at the Wellsville Daily Reporter.
PFC Schweigart states that he received the Bible in bootcamp and didn’t want to go into combat without it. The bullet, fired by a sniper while Schweigart was recovering another vehicle, went through his left arm, into his side, out his chest and into the Bible. If the Bible had not stopped the bullet, it could have hit the inside of his Interceptor Body Armor (IBA) and then ricocheted back into his chest again. That by itself is pretty amazing. However, what I find even more amazing is his reaction immediately after being shot. Here’s what he had to say about it:
My Lt. Colonel was standing next to me and asked me if I needed anything. I said yea, I need my Bible. He reached in my pocket and saw it, and there was the bullet.
He’s laying there after being shot by a sniper and asks for his Bible.
Luckily Mugs bought me a Bible that fits in my cargo pocket!
I had my first meeting as the MAO OIC this morning. For 3 hours, 0900-1200, I had the pleasure of participating in the GRN weekly Provincial Reconstruction Brief Project Review Board (PRB). During this briefing, we discuss in detail the status of ongoing construction projects throughout northern Iraq. Today’s PRB was an off week. Most of the talking during an off week is done by my higher headquarters - GRN. Next week will be an on week where the talking is done by the area offices, such as MAO. So I’ll get to talk more next week.
As of 6 July 2007, USACE has completed 3463 construction projects throughout Iraq with a construction cost of $4.87 Billion, yes Billion! At that time there were another $2.4 Billion worth of projects ongoing. USACE is very active throughout the entire country. Take a look at the USACE GRD website to get more information on some of these projects. One of the focus areas for construction is schools. Right now, I have 12 different school construction projects being managed by engineers in my different offices.
Back to the real topic of discussion - meetings. I have another weekly conference call on Sunday mornings. This one focuses on all construction projects involving provincial primary health clinics (PHCs). COL Pfenning, Commander of GRN (my boss), is keenly interested in anything to do with the construction of PHCs. So we update him each week on Sundays. On Mondays, I attend the Civil-Military Operations (CMO) crosswalk. This meeting brings together the different US agencies in the Mosul area of operations (AO) that are involved in reconstruction. On Wednesdays, I have a tele-conference with the Dahuk Resident Office (DRO) and Erbil Resident Office (ERO). Those are two USACE offices that work for me but are located in their respective provinces. During that tele-conference, they provide me the project status that I need for my Saturday meeting. On Thursday, I do a project review with the project engineers located here at MAO. Then on Friday evenings, I meet with my senior Area Engineer to go over the final slides for Saturday’s tele-conference. You may have noticed that on Tuesdays, I don’t have a meeting!
