Air Force Appreciation Tour

Hey there true believers!

I am sorry that I have neglected this post, but I have been really busy and starving....more on that later.  So I am going to start off this post with some good 'ole fashioned complaining.  (Does my  blog seem like a bunch of book reviews and complaints?)  Well that seems like all there is over here.  I guess if you count my training (4 months in Indiana AHHHHHHH!!!!!)and all that I guess I have been deployed for about 6 months now which is about a normal Air Force deployment for my career field (note that I said career field because some pukes deploy for only four months), but I am about ready to get back to my real life again.  In all reality I have been here a little over 3.75 months here and I have become a little bored.  Nothing really happens here and that is boring.  The Nine Inch Nails song "Every Day is Exactly the Same".

For about 3 1/2 days we had no food...I mean a lot of people complain about how the food lacks nutrition, but people really blew their lid when the kitchen was out of service.  I just walk over to either the bazaar or French Dining hall to eat because sometimes you just don't feel like eating breakfast foods for dinner.  Occassionally with the bazaar you found a hair in your food, and you can taste what the local feed their animals (it begins with a "P" and ends with "OOP")  and sometimes the French Dining Hall has mysterious European things, but the desert rocks my face OFF!  My time is limited so I have to time manage like a MOFO, and thus I am working out or reading (if you didn't guess) in the time I get off of 10hrs of work. Thanks to everyone for the care packages, because they sustain me in times like these. 

There really isn't much job satisfaction with my job.  I really get no feedback if I do a good job, and I get STOMPED on the rare occasions I mess up.  I am basically accepted to perform at a Captain's level, but still treated like a stupid Lieutenant...which I still am for another 7 months, but who is counting.  There really isn't anyone around here to vent to because the other lieutenant in the other unit with my same job is a giant DOUCHE. 

Okay, so I let this sit for about a week and my mood has changed from pissed to merely irritated.  There is a difference believe me.  Through out this week of me trying to calm down, the door to the barracks hallway has broken leaving only one way of escape (how safe is that?), and it has been non-stop raining.  Normally this wouldn't be such a problem, but in the land of moon dust this is really really really bad.  Raining is an overarching term for precipitation.  It has transitioned from raining Cats and Dogs, to Bulls and Hippos, to sleet, to snow that doesn't stick.  It's not really the precipitation that bothers me.  It is more the 1/2 mile walk in the rocks and mud to get to the latrines and showers that bothers me.  I will be so happy for the sun to come out and dry the mud so that walk to get clean doesn't feel like that scene in T2 (shame on you if you haven't seen it) where the T-1000 is frozen by Nitrogen and the T-800 shatters him with a bullet (Hasta La Vista Baby!) There were also wonderful sinkholes in this journey where you take the wrong step and for .008 seconds you think that you might fall through the earth back to America (hmmm maybe I should try that).  When the ground is dry you are only at risk of rolling your ankles....so its a lose-lose situation (kinda like having the first Superbowl in Jerryland be between the Packers and Steelers)

I know that my family in El Paso is under siege due to the weather over there, but it is a similar case over here (except for the snow....for which I am jealous).  After your long journey to the showers, you might find that A) They are all occupied, B) One of the showerheads is broken, or (the worst one of all, but El Pasoans can relate now) C) The pipes are frozen and you have absolutely no water to conduct your Triple S routine.  So after trekking down the deadly path to get clean you are dealt your first disappointment of the day.  The second being chow.  So stay strong El Pasoans, while you may be on water restrictions at least you don't have to check the toilet seat before you lay down for fear that an Afghan pee'd all over the seat (psst They squat to pee. Ewwwwwww) 

A fellow Airmen, a senior NCO, stated how everyone feels.  "A PRT is the Air Force Appreciation Tour" Whether is be the length of the deployment, the shitty living conditions, or (gasp) dealing with our Army brothers on a daily basis.  Before this deployment I was really considering switching to the Army, but my Squadron commander back home, the wise man that he is who has in fact deployed with a PRT too, told me that this would be the best taste the Army.  They can keep their Army.  I know that Shamy's have a four generations stemming back to the Army, but my Dad made sure that I joined the Air Force.  Thank God I listened to him.  I think I will only do one more assignment after I get back from this deployment.  After working toward getting in the military for 8 years of my life, I am not sad to say that after 3.5 years of being Active Duty I am not really impressed.  This is supposed to be the greatest adventure of my life and I am stuck on a base most of the time.  All I can say is at least I am not a BAFFIT (someone who stays on Bagram Airfield there whole tour).

Stay Frosty, (No pun intended)

JoJo