Sunday, August 23, 2009

Classic Moments in Soldiering: Being That Paratrooper

A certain cockiness is an integral part of the Airborne ethos. It was on full display in the following interaction between a colleague of mine and the Air Force crew chief on our flight to Iraq:
Crew Chief: So, have you guys had the aircraft briefing? You've all flown on a C-17 before?

Paratrooper: Yeah, we've all flown C-17's. Never landed in one, though.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Killing Time in Iraq

So I'm in Iraq now. I meant to just take a blogging hiatus while I was on block leave, but then after I got back from leave things were pretty busy getting prepped to deploy, so the hiatus got extended. It'll probably continue for a little longer, at least until I'm settled in where I'm supposed to end up. See, I'm currently in trans limbo, stuck in a place I was never supposed to be in the first place. A couple of us left early to escort our equipment that was being shipped by cargo plane, and while we normally would have just changed planes at the first base we landed at in Iraq and been on our way the same day, somehow we've been stuck here for a week, trying to beg our way onto any plane or convoy leaving this place with room for us and our equipment. For me and one other soldier, it could take almost another week yet to get to where we're going. Meanwhile, the rest of our unit, who were expecting to find us waiting for them, are now waiting on us. Go figure.

I'm not exactly complaining, since it's become a strange sort of vacation, just killing time around here, but we do still have a job to do, and at the end of the day I'd rather be doing it.