Hello Internet.

It’s been a while I know, and I’m sorry. I decided that I’m going to take up writing in my little blog again. It makes sense when I think about it:  It keeps me on the level and starting the habit now will give me a way to keep in touch with all of you out there once I jump across the pond. Everyone wins, everyone is happy.

So as life currently stands, its close to two a.m. and I have to be up in about two or three hours for formation.

I guess I should also fill you in on more recent things in my life, for those of you who don’t know.

I last left off while in Fayetteville, waiting to for a school date to open up. Well the school date came and here I am, in Augusta GA. The place isn’t bad, and at first it’s pretty charming. Then, like the Lifetime movie special, it’s true character comes out.

Augusta is a place where for the most part, people are more than happy to be the least that they can be. They are satisfied with the minimum life has to offer and as long as there is a Wal-mart and a church within spitting distance, they’ll be fine. The downtown area is the only redeeming icon this place has going for it and it’s not enough to make me stick around.

So in order to pass the time, I kinda sorta picked up volunteering. Yes, I know, but it’s true. I am a part-time cadre at Georgia’s Youth Challenge Academy (YCA). The YCA is a pretty neat program that takes “at-risk” youth from all over the state and puts them in a “quasi-military” environment. Basically I’m a drill sergeant. Still, I find these kids interesting. A majority of their time with me is spent with my constant, loud yelling. If not that, then we go on long runs. And yet, they somehow still look up to me. I’m loud with them, and stern, but I still respect them and treat them better than they have been their entire lives. I actually convinced a few cadets from the last class that were originally going to join the Marines to instead go Airborne in the Army.

When I’m not doing that, I’m in school. The pace and hours are pretty hectic. It’s been a while since I’ve worked day in day out from 5am to 530pm. It’s not exactly bad, but it’s just strenuous. This leaves me with roughly three or four hours in a normal afternoon to try and shove my life into. Initially, this was hard since the sun went down so early, but now that summer is on us, I have an hour or so to hit up the fantastic FATS trail system here in town.

Oh boy, FATS. The Forks Area Trail System is a wonderful, outrageous mountain and hiking trail that’s about thirty minutes away from post.  From the skinny to the brown wave, it’s almost non stop pumping and it’s amazing! I cannot stress how much fun it is to fall on this course.

If you don’t mind, Internet, I’m going to attempt sleep. I’ll finish this off later. I promise.

Alright, so I’ve been busy.

It hasn’t really been a very productive busy. Most of my 2 weeks back has been spent under the influence of alcohol (drunk, I suppose), living it up, and buying stuff.

If you haven’t noticed, I also upload a whole bunch of photos from a cool little place called Radford. The university there was holding this thing called Quadfest.

It kicked so, oh so, much ass. I could go into details about how every single house had a party, there were no less than 10 kegs per block, and the female to male ratio was above 2 to 1, but you could pretty much tell from the pics.

I came back sunday night (I think) and called up Leo. We drank a 24 pack and a bottle of wine in about an hour and a half. It was all really Rock Band’s fault. I love the drums.

And so all week was spent kinda sorta working. I had BAR, a day off that was spent in Smithfield, and earlier today was a parachute jump, but for the most part it was a good week. I have another 4-day, but have elected to stay here in Fayetteville to reformat Sonia’s new computer and do some Dogwood festival stuff. Good times.

D.C. can wait till next week. Even if its just a regular weekend.

Thats all I feel like typing for now.

Today was neat. I woke up really early, considering that I’ve drank pretty well (not blackout, ignorant shitfaced, just really really buzzed).

Today was all about Cingular. I got a chance to fix some billing issues and they even credited my account with some sweet cash! While I was at the phone place, I also upgraded my phone to an LG Shine. Jessica, a ‘customer service rep’ helped me pick it out, and its pretty neat. Its one of those slidey ones. Oh, I also got my second line disconnected, and they are sending me another phone on top of that.

Since I’m thinking about going to Washington DC this upcoming weekend, if its a 4-day, I went ahead and ordered a brand new Garmin Nuvi too! This is on Amazon. I also bought a car, btw. Its an 03 Pontiac Vibe, and its not my style, but it is so useful for all the stuff that I’m going to be doing in the next few months that I had to get it.

Also we had a little party here at Krystal’s. It was fun, and now I’m drunk again, I suppose.

Night.

So. Its Sunday morning, about 3ish in the AM, and I’m drunk, I suppose.

I’ve been home since around Thursday afternoon and its been an amazing amount of fun. I’m living in Krystals house, and I don’t think that they realize just how thankful I am for everything that her family has done for me. I wish there was someway of repaying them.

I’ve managed to stay busy with all sorts of random stuff, like buying things and hanging out with all sorts of characters. This night was spent with Leo, Erika, Tony and Sam. A great bunch. We all went to some club and danced and drank and socialized. Photos later.

There really isn’t much to say about all this. Hung out with Manny and Cory some too! Over at their barracks on Saturday night was all the brand new 21st chem guys. Alot of them didn’t know that I was ‘alumni’ and as such were a little confrontational. They were put in thier place when they learned the history(I was probably one of the only people to ever get special mention in the company safety briefings). Good people, but they need to learn to not talk about work after hours.

I’ve been going to a bunch of places just to soak things in. The mall, Starbucks and Barns and Noble top the list. It felt good just being in those places. Struggling to stay awake right now.

I bought a new car too! Its an 03 Pontiac Vibe. It pretty much the best car I can have right now. Great storage space, gas mileage and a place to put my new bike. I also bought a new Giant mountain bike, so I’ll probably start hitting the trails within a week or so. Manny also wants me to start working out with him at night. Combine this with the swimming that I’ll be doing midday and i’ll be ready for a mini-triathlon before you know it.

I also bought a new in car GPS thingy too! A Garmin this time. Its pretty nice. I still want a handheld one for camping. Preferably one with contour maps.

I know it goes a lot that I stand for, but I went to go see Sofia’s family the other day too. They really are just alright people, especially her sister, so I’m gonna help them out with some geek stuff and whatnot. I kinda laughed at her Dad’s reaction to everything. It hard typing whilst smashed.

So it looks like we might have a 4 day weekend coming up, and if this is true, I will be heading to DC for nothing but sheer fun and photo ops. yay.

If you want to go or will be in the area, hit me up!

Thats about all I can do right now. So tired.

There was more, but I can’t remember, especially with my horrible memory. Look for it later

Drats.

I’m home.

More at eleven.

Finished clearing today. I just had to do my SGLI and thats about it. We should be under lock down sometime in the next few days, then on a C-17 to Manas. Splendid.

To say that I am anxious about getting back would be an understatement. That cloud of uncertainty is still there.

It’ll all be fine. Everything works out. It always does.

I really need to sleep more often, I never get to the end.

Yeah, I’m still in Afghanistan. Since I got kicked out of my room, I moved in with a contactor that had a spare bed. Pretty cool guy.

I’m just about done with processing, but there are a few things that I still need to do, mainly the “don’t beat your wife, don’t beat your dog, don’t kill yourself’ talkin’ to. It’s actually usually a really funny breifing.

The 101st guys have been bugging me. I think that they are starting to realize that I’m leaving, and they don’t exactly have a solid feel on what to do about the websites. So there was all this commotion. I got everything figured out and calmed down a few people, but there are still some folks kinda disgruntled at me, which is fine. If they don’t like anything that I built, they can take it down and make thier own page. I’m still the ‘who-is’ owner for cjtf-a.com(http://www.whois.net/whois_new.cgi?d=cjtf-a&tld=com), it still says ‘designed by Rich’ at the bottom of the site. They really just weren’t happy with my answer of ‘if there is a problem, just go google it.’ They want to call the hosting company when there is a problem with the site, I guess so they can get laughed at.

 But whatever.

And of course, there is still that looming, not fear, but something, about going back home. An uneasy, unsettling feeling. Fifteen months is a long time to be away from regular civilization, regular people, and I’m thinking that I’m just worried about how to integrate myself back in. (How will I sleep without jets taking off at all hours of the night?) The core question of ‘what next?’ still hasn’t really been answered, and anytime someone asks me what I’m going to do on return, I answer with ‘I don’t know’. And that bothers me kinda.

I could always fall back on work. I have 6 (maybe 7) clients lined up for when I get back. Three of them are government related and want some help with Knowledge Management(I’m kinda good at that).  The others are friends that want porfolio or shopping sites. I’m most excited about Glenn’s site, for varying reasons.

Some Cup-o-Soup sounds fantastic right now.

Its late, and I don’t feel like proof-reading this.

Well, I’m prepping up to get back already.

‘Bout damn time. I’ve spent the past week pawning all my work off to 101st people. They need to learn at some point and while I’m still here to clean up messes is a good time. One of my projects here was a pretty big hit, so I’ve also got other orginizations breathing down my back for a ‘how-to’. I’m thinking about just showing them google. blah.

Part of getting ready I guess is thinking about what I’m gonna do with my swag. Thinking about it, I’m pretty much catching up on a years worth of living. So as such, I don’t have a problem spending a few nickels and dimes here and there.

My shopping list so far is kinda big and expensive. I’m almost scared to think how much I will spend in the first month alone. Here’s what I got:

• Car
  • Hooptie will do until I can get to my next station and get a muscle car. ‘67 Fairlane?!
• Mountain Bike
  • More that you think. gear too.
• Clothes
  • Not too much. Some pants, threadless tees, big fat dookie rope gold chain
• Travel expenses, with trips to:
  • Texas, for leave and legal reasons
  • New York
  • Boston
  • D.C.
  • Baltimore
  • Atlanta
  • Philly
  • Anything else I can hit in a 4-day

And thats about it. I might not make it to one or two places on that list by the end of summer, but I’m going to try. Either way, Its gonna cost a lot of money, so I’m doing research for cheap, fun things to do while in these cities. I already have computers and guitar hero controllers, so I really don’t need that stuff. I’m also staying with friends, so I don’t have to worry about rent too much either. Should be good times.

I bought another rug today. Its a nice chubi (pronounced kinda like ‘choo-bee’). Natural dyes. I got it in exchange for web design services!

Also, for those of you that know them, Cory and Javi got hit by an IED. The roadside bomb went off in front of them, a big one too. Javi is ok, but Cory had to go to Germany for surgery. Keep him in your thougts.

I just took some sort of pill, so I’m not too sure how long I can go before I pass out.

Tonight, all the dance halls were off the chain. On Saturday’s here on BAF, we have salsa and hip-hop nights in various locations. I was dragged by a buddy to both of them and had a surprisingly good time!

Now I’ve been to hip hop clubs, and salsa joints, but not in the same night. It was intresting to see the two cultures back to back. You had the hip hop place, actually the old Korean Snack Bar, jam packed full of people, everyone on each other, dancing wildly or standing around and talking. It was a rough, but at the same time very lively and welcoming scene.  I, of course, was actin’ a fool, and danced around until Juicy came blaring over the monitors. Thats when shit got wild.

The salsa place, known as Popeye’s  during the day, was almost elegant in comparison. The atmosphere was definetly different, and the smells from the coffee shop only added to it. Here people apologized for bumping into each other. Gentlemen still walked up to sitting ladies and asked for a dance. By the end of the night, almost everyone had danced with everyone else. I joined in once or twice, but for the most part, I simply enjoyed being there. The music, dancing and Spanish all around me made it feel like home, so I sat back, drank some coffee and soaked it all in.

Both places were fun in their own aspect. I took a few photos, but not too many. I’ll be sure to post one or two later.

People from the 101st continue to roll on in, and its starting to really set in that ‘yes, you’re on you’re way home’.

Its also Sunday morning now, so  happy Easter. I don’t see too many bunnies in Afghanistan, but I have seen a few Peeps… those tasty little bastards.

Stay classy.

Another day. Sigh.

We’re in the middle of the Afghan New Year right now. On thier calendar its the year 1387. I thought that was a little cool. I’m using this as a chance to change all of my new year resolutions.

Lets see if I can’t make some better decisions this time.

There was this crazy ceremony here on BAF too. I managed to take a few photos, since I was there to actually work and stuff, but a few of them came out pretty good. I’ll have to post them on myspace later.

There were colorful Afghan ladies, in some sort of formal garb. I also met this ANP (Afghan National Police). This dude was cool as hell! He didn’t speak a lick of English, but we all understood him as well as he understood us (soldiers are the same all over the world I guess). Through body language, he let us know who was pretty cool and who wasn’t from some of the local government. He even had some cool emo tattoos on his hand (a lot like my heart on my sleeve), but he did his prison style.

Other than that, life consist of getting to know the new 10st people here and waiting to be kicked out of my sweet room to live in a tent. meh. They aren’t that bad and I’ll get to improve my poker skills.

I’ve got more training to give, but even with that, its still slow. I’ve killed some time cleaning and moving stuff around, playing some wicked guitar hero and brushing up on my PHP. I’m working a few projects right now, some personal and others business. The ones for work are more fun since its working toward something. The ones for me are just little crap projects.

I’ve thought about buying a house in Fayetteville while they are still cheap. If I can hold it for a little while, then resell it, I’d make a killing. One of the guys that I work with does this on the side and with three houses made more on the side than in the Army! I’m hoping that when we get back, he’ll walk me though how to do all this jazz. It could be fun, and I have nothing else to do with my swag.

Who needs plan A when you’ve got plan B