It was soooo hot today...

...that I waterboarded myself.

So I guess my requests were heard. They found some volunteers to do the SAPP patrols on the ATV's. Basically a unit here was not too busy on their night shift and their supervisor decided to find some work for them. Luckily for me he found us and asked if we had any work for them. Now I just have to make sure those guys are doing them correctly, and occasionally fill in the gaps they leave.

So since I got lucky with my last request, I'll throw another one out there. With my luck this one will most likely backfire and I'll end up back on the ATV's, but I'll go on anyway.

Every Wednesday here on base they have a 5k run. Yeah. A 5k run in the desert heat. Who these people are who participate, I'm not exactly sure. I know the majority of the participants are British and the majority of those British runners are Gurkhas. (I Highly recommend reading about the Gurkhas by the way) With that being said, I'm sure you've seen on the news that the British troops are almost completely withdrawn from Iraq, and Kuwait will soon follow suit. Which leads me to believe that there will not be that many participants.

The military polices' involvement in the race is to block off all of the roads the runners will be on to insure no one is driving around creating a hazard for the runners. Now we put barricades up at every intersection, but the people working here on base apparently don't let police barricades stop them. They simply get out of their car move the barricades and drive right through them as if they owned the base. It's really unbelievable how these people just completely ignore them. So, now, in addition to putting out the barricades we have to drive up and down the route making sure no one is going around the barricades. When I catch them, everybody I confront has some "important meeting" that they "have" to be at, and this road is the "absolute only" way for them to get to this "critical" meeting.

I know I'm sounding really lazy complaining about the "work" I'm doing out here but these 5k races are soooooooooooo boring and drawn out. The race goes till about 7am or whenever the last person finishes. I'm supposed to get off at 6am. First let me get back to this last person finishes bit really quick. Now, I really admire the people participating in the run. It's extremely hot and the dust in the air has got to make it that much harder to breathe. You'll never catch me volunteering for one of these(insert fat joke here), but people come out and walk the 5k. Seriously? I have to stay out till the last person finishes, and you're walking it? If I only had to do it monthly rather than weekly I would have a little more tolerance of this. So, I propose, instead of doing it weekly, lets do it monthly. This way I only sound sort of lazy.

You Know You're In The Desert When...

.... You eat Habanero peppers to cool your mouth off.

Work has been pretty busy this week. In addition to my regular work, my collateral duties and volunteering at the USO has been making the days go by fast. Last week I also started doing the Sexual Assault Prevention Patrol or SAPP. We have never had any incidents here, so this is merely a preventive measure. I'm sure whomever created it has it at the top of their evaluation report. Something to the effect of "Spearheaded the creation of SAPP.......as to date, because of my genius program, we have had no incidents"

It's a good program to have, but they ask that we ride ATV's so we can get into places our vehicles cant. Which at first sounded like fun, till I got a sore throat from breathing in all of the dust created by the ATV. Also, when I'm done my patrol my uniform is covered in dust, so for the rest of the shift I look like a dirtball. And the kicker...ATV's DONT HAVE AIR CONDITIONING. I think the goals of the program could be met just as well, by getting out and patrolling the areas the vehicles can't get to on foot, or maybe just making it someones sole job. Give them a uniform more comfortable like a bike cop would wear or something. So anyway, that's my rant I guess.

In happier news I got care packages yesterday. I got 3 from back home, and 1 from group called Operation Gratitude. Check em out. Great program.

I wanted to thank all of you back home that put stuff into the care package my Mom sent out. It really made my day. Except for Trent's diaper. I could have done without Trent's diaper. All of the other stuff was great though. I'll have to pace myself on eating the sweets. It's been tempting to pick at them before I go to bed. Below is a picture of all of the stuff that was sent:



So thanks again to all of you!! PS..That big bag of laundry was not sent. That is mine and it is clean, I just hadn't put it away yet.

Lastly, Christina's Aunt and Grandmother bought her another Sphinx over the weekend. It's name is "Roo". In case you didn't pick up on it, our cat that just passed was Kanga. Kanga and Roo.

Miss Everyone....7 more months!!