Eighty Deuce on the Loose in IraqEighty Deuce on the Loose in IraqThe life of a young Infantry team leader, his first experience in Iraq. Serving with the 82nd Airborne in Baghdad. A perspective of the war from boots on the ground. 
Articles
A project underway...
2008-11-22 04:06:00 Well after all this time of waiting and deciding how and what to do, I have begun the early steps to putting together a book! I will keep updates coming, but everything is in the begining stages right now. Wish me luck! More About: Project
A free man!
2008-07-06 16:42:00 Well my 4th of July celebrations just ended yesterday when I returned from the lake where I spent a few days with my girl and her family, just enjoying the fresh air and beautiful scenery. The city we were in put on a fireworks show over the lake, which I didn't hold much hope for, but it turned out to be pretty damn good. They even had a band playing, that was rocking out and had so many people up there dancing, to include the 2 of us! :)So anyways, to make a real quick post for now, I returned yesterday, and after a 2 1/2 hour drive I made it back to Ft Bragg/Fayetteville, but instead of going straight to my house, I had to make a quick detour. I entered Ft Bragg, with my soon to be expired ID card, and made the short little drive to my Battalion head quarters so that I could officially sign out of the Army! It was a great feeling and I had the biggest smile on my face as I was walking out of there, knowing that after all these years, my time is finally up.Today was the 1st d... More About: Free
A free man!
2008-07-06 09:42:00 Well my 4th of July celebrations just ended yesterday when I returned from the lake where I spent a few days with my girl and her family, just enjoying the fresh air and beautiful scenery. The city we were in put on a fireworks show over the lake, which I didn't hold much hope for, but it turned out to be pretty damn good. They even had a band playing, that was rocking out and had so many people up there dancing, to include the 2 of us! :)So anyways, to make a real quick post for now, I returned yesterday, and after a 2 1/2 hour drive I made it back to Ft Bragg/Fayetteville, but instead of going straight to my house, I had to make a quick detour. I entered Ft Bragg, with my soon to be expired ID card, and made the short little drive to my Battalion head quarters so that I could officially sign out of the Army! It was a great feeling and I had the biggest smile on my face as I was walking out of there, knowing that after all these years, my time is finally up.Today was the 1st d... More About: Free
Coming to an end...
2008-06-25 05:13:00 Well, for a little update on where I am today, let me start by saying that I have less than 2 weeks until I sign out on terminal leave. Basically this is like regular leave, where you're not at work or anything, except this is tacked on to the end of your enlistment. Basically I'm taking a month of terminal leave, which means, I "leave" the Army and I still get paid for one for month, until I'm officially release from the Army.So right now I've been staying pretty busy with doing all the crap required to get out of the Army. Theres tons of briefs and this you need and that you have to do, plus I still have the worst part, which is the turn in of all my equipment. Doesn't sound so bad, but when for the last 3 1/2 years and a deployment later, all my stuff has been here and there and back again, and now I have to try and piece together everything that I have to turn back in. It doesn't help when they give you a list of stuff with names that give you NO clue as to what it ac...
Coming to an end...
2008-06-24 22:13:00 Well, for a little update on where I am today, let me start by saying that I have less than 2 weeks until I sign out on terminal leave. Basically this is like regular leave, where you're not at work or anything, except this is tacked on to the end of your enlistment. Basically I'm taking a month of terminal leave, which means, I "leave" the Army and I still get paid for one for month, until I'm officially release from the Army.So right now I've been staying pretty busy with doing all the crap required to get out of the Army. Theres tons of briefs and this you need and that you have to do, plus I still have the worst part, which is the turn in of all my equipment. Doesn't sound so bad, but when for the last 3 1/2 years and a deployment later, all my stuff has been here and there and back again, and now I have to try and piece together everything that I have to turn back in. It doesn't help when they give you a list of stuff with names that give you NO clue as to what it ac...
I've been horrible...
2008-06-13 22:56:00 OK, well its obvious by the last post date on here, but I have been horrible about keeping this up to date on the latest and greatest of the life back in the states. I do appologize for that, and I just want everyone to know that I am doing good. A lot has been going on lately and for some reason I just could not find the motivation to get on here and write anything. The purpose of my blog was to tell my story of being in Iraq, and I guess to idea of telling my story now that I'm not seems even less interesting. But I'm seriously going to put forth and effort. This is just going to be a quick post to let everyone know that I'm alive and well, but I will be posting again soon to give yall an update on much of what has been going on in my life and will be going on in my life soon.Today is Friday the 13th, a day that will always hold a very significant meaning for me. Those of you that have read my blogs from the begining will know what I'm talking about. Those of you that h...
I've been horrible...
2008-06-13 15:56:00 OK, well its obvious by the last post date on here, but I have been horrible about keeping this up to date on the latest and greatest of the life back in the states. I do appologize for that, and I just want everyone to know that I am doing good. A lot has been going on lately and for some reason I just could not find the motivation to get on here and write anything. The purpose of my blog was to tell my story of being in Iraq, and I guess to idea of telling my story now that I'm not seems even less interesting. But I'm seriously going to put forth and effort. This is just going to be a quick post to let everyone know that I'm alive and well, but I will be posting again soon to give yall an update on much of what has been going on in my life and will be going on in my life soon.Today is Friday the 13th, a day that will always hold a very significant meaning for me. Those of you that have read my blogs from the begining will know what I'm talking about. Those of you that h...
Reunited!!!
2008-04-05 14:27:00 Well this past week has been pretty awesome. The main reason for that is because of a cute little 4 legged friend that I have been able to spend time with again, CHARLIE! Last weekend, I finally was able to make the trip up to Washington DC to reunite with our dog that we had brought back from Iraq. He had been in the States since Feb 14th, and it had been almost a month and a half since I had seen him and was anxiously awaiting this day.When I finally got to the house and started to go around back to see him, he was already waiting by the fence. I had left Thursday immediatly after work so I was still in my ACUs, and when I got close enough for him to see my face, he stopped, looked up at me and if for a minute he had this look on his face like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. After a couple seconds of him taking it all in, he went crazy! Once I got in through the gate and was able to be next to him, he was SO excited. I had never seen him this excited ever before. ... More About: Reunited
Reunited!!!
2008-04-05 14:27:00 Well this past week has been pretty awesome. The main reason for that is because of a cute little 4 legged friend that I have been able to spend time with again, CHARLIE! Last weekend, I finally was able to make the trip up to Washington DC to reunite with our dog that we had brought back from Iraq. He had been in the States since Feb 14th, and it had been almost a month and a half since I had seen him and was anxiously awaiting this day.When I finally got to the house and started to go around back to see him, he was already waiting by the fence. I had left Thursday immediatly after work so I was still in my ACUs, and when I got close enough for him to see my face, he stopped, looked up at me and if for a minute he had this look on his face like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. After a couple seconds of him taking it all in, he went crazy! Once I got in through the gate and was able to be next to him, he was SO excited. I had never seen him this excited ever before. ... More About: Reunited
How to Write a Book 101...
2008-03-25 11:57:00 Too bad I never attended that class, other wise I might have an idea of what the hell I'm doing. HA! I did have a job once, just after I graduated High School where I worked for an independant book publisher (nothing big time) formatting work given to us in a Word document so that it would fit on to a normal printed book page. It wasn't a bad job, but because of how young I was, I was not getting paid what I should. It was my first tech type of job and in many was I wish I would of stuck with it a bit and continued with that skill set.So for those of you who know me, or those of you who have corresponded with me, you probably already know what I'm about to say, but I'll go ahead and tell everyone else the story behind my blog. Bare with me...My blog was initially started on my MySpace Page. (feel free to add me if you have MySpace as well! :D ) In the past I have always wanted to write a book, but never had anything good to write about. Once I learned of our deployment, I ... More About: Write , Book
How to Write a Book 101...
2008-03-25 11:57:00 Too bad I never attended that class, other wise I might have an idea of what the hell I'm doing. HA! I did have a job once, just after I graduated High School where I worked for an independant book publisher (nothing big time) formatting work given to us in a Word document so that it would fit on to a normal printed book page. It wasn't a bad job, but because of how young I was, I was not getting paid what I should. It was my first tech type of job and in many was I wish I would of stuck with it a bit and continued with that skill set.So for those of you who know me, or those of you who have corresponded with me, you probably already know what I'm about to say, but I'll go ahead and tell everyone else the story behind my blog. Bare with me...My blog was initially started on my MySpace Page. (feel free to add me if you have MySpace as well! :D ) In the past I have always wanted to write a book, but never had anything good to write about. Once I learned of our deployment, I ... More About: Write , Book
Being home...
2008-03-22 22:18:00 is great!It is the most amazing feeling in the world to be back in the States after so long in Iraq. While over there, it seemed like this day would never come, but finally it did. The flight back was full of anticipation as we all just wanted to end our long journey and be back with the ones we love and care about. For myself, from the time I was last walking around the streets of Baghdad until I landed back in the United States, it was only 4 days. Mind blowing really. One we arrived at Ft Bragg, there were so many friends, family, whatever there, that it was a HUGE crowd. We formed up and marched in while everyone was screaming and cheering, and it was so hard to not break out with a huge smile across my face. The shivers ran throughout my body, and even a little bit right now just thinking about it. It was amazing and I couldn't of asked for much more. We headed back to the company, turned in our weapons and got released for 6 hours until we had to come back to receive... More About: Home
Being home...
2008-03-22 22:18:00 is great!It is the most amazing feeling in the world to be back in the States after so long in Iraq. While over there, it seemed like this day would never come, but finally it did. The flight back was full of anticipation as we all just wanted to end our long journey and be back with the ones we love and care about. For myself, from the time I was last walking around the streets of Baghdad until I landed back in the United States, it was only 4 days. Mind blowing really. One we arrived at Ft Bragg, there were so many friends, family, whatever there, that it was a HUGE crowd. We formed up and marched in while everyone was screaming and cheering, and it was so hard to not break out with a huge smile across my face. The shivers ran throughout my body, and even a little bit right now just thinking about it. It was amazing and I couldn't of asked for much more. We headed back to the company, turned in our weapons and got released for 6 hours until we had to come back to receive... More About: Home
Mission Accomplished!
2008-03-10 12:22:00 It is over. The words I have been waiting to say for so long while doing this blog, I AM DONE! And a job well done. I know back in the day when President Bush made his whole Mission Accomplished speech from the Navy aircraft carrier, the mission that most Americans assumed he was talking about was the Iraq War, which at the time was no where near done. There was and still is much controversey over his decision to make such a statement. My statement is a little less bold. I don't refer to accomplished as in the war is over, send the troops home kind of accomplished. I am referring to the work that we have done, ourselves and the job we have done.Our mission is accomplished. We received word of our deployment a few days after Christmas. We were on the deployment ready cycle at Ft Bragg where we could potentially deploy anywhere in the world on a moments notice, so it was no real suprise, at least to me, that when the murmors of a possible troop surge began rumbling, that we ...
Mission Accomplished!
2008-03-10 12:22:00 It is over. The words I have been waiting to say for so long while doing this blog, I AM DONE! And a job well done. I know back in the day when President Bush made his whole Mission Accomplished speech from the Navy aircraft carrier, the mission that most Americans assumed he was talking about was the Iraq War, which at the time was no where near done. There was and still is much controversey over his decision to make such a statement. My statement is a little less bold. I don't refer to accomplished as in the war is over, send the troops home kind of accomplished. I am referring to the work that we have done, ourselves and the job we have done.Our mission is accomplished. We received word of our deployment a few days after Christmas. We were on the deployment ready cycle at Ft Bragg where we could potentially deploy anywhere in the world on a moments notice, so it was no real suprise, at least to me, that when the murmors of a possible troop surge began rumbling, that we ...
One last CIB...
2008-03-03 10:13:00 I want to start off by once again stating that whoever runs the Firewall for the computers that we have at the outpost are truly bi-polar. Because once again I am able to log on to blogger from the outpost, a change for like the 12th time! AHH! Also I lied in my last post. I have not begun my slow voyage home, but here I am posting again, but thats only because I wanted to get this story out there.The other night, the CLC (Concerned Local Citizens) Group swung by the outpost with a guy that they had detained. Apparently they found this guy out walking around and he had what looked to be a homemade gernade. I had never seen a gernade like this. It had a plastic body and just looked fashioned. Over the past week or so there have been a few incidents with some people throwing gernades at IA (Iraqi Army) and IP (Iraqi Police) checkpoints, so I can only imagine that this is what this guy was going to do. So far they haven't targeted any US personnel with these gernades. Once we...
One last CIB...
2008-03-03 10:13:00 I want to start off by once again stating that whoever runs the Firewall for the computers that we have at the outpost are truly bi-polar. Because once again I am able to log on to blogger from the outpost, a change for like the 12th time! AHH! Also I lied in my last post. I have not begun my slow voyage home, but here I am posting again, but thats only because I wanted to get this story out there.The other night, the CLC (Concerned Local Citizens) Group swung by the outpost with a guy that they had detained. Apparently they found this guy out walking around and he had what looked to be a homemade gernade. I had never seen a gernade like this. It had a plastic body and just looked fashioned. Over the past week or so there have been a few incidents with some people throwing gernades at IA (Iraqi Army) and IP (Iraqi Police) checkpoints, so I can only imagine that this is what this guy was going to do. So far they haven't targeted any US personnel with these gernades. Once we...
I'm going CRAZZZZZYY!!!
2008-02-28 09:52:00 Ok so this is just going to be a quick update post since I am getting ready to head out and probably will be away from the computers for a little bit. But know that the next time I am able to get on and post, that I will most likely be on my journey out of this country already! :)The past couple days have brought some big changes. There were a few incidents around here, that have cause our upper level chain of command to get all Nazified with some stupid rules. They probably wouldn't be so bad if it wern't for the fact that I stay back for a few days from going to the outpost with my platoon as a part of an agreement with my Plt Sgt since I'm doing the 'left seat right seat rides' I talked about in the last post. Well now this origionally seemed like a good idea to me. A few days back, all by myself, do whatever I want. Sounded good. Now because of these new rules I can't do anything. The big one is that you have to walk around in groups of 3 or more. Seeing as how th...
I'm going CRAZZZZZYY!!!
2008-02-28 09:52:00 Ok so this is just going to be a quick update post since I am getting ready to head out and probably will be away from the computers for a little bit. But know that the next time I am able to get on and post, that I will most likely be on my journey out of this country already! :)The past couple days have brought some big changes. There were a few incidents around here, that have cause our upper level chain of command to get all Nazified with some stupid rules. They probably wouldn't be so bad if it wern't for the fact that I stay back for a few days from going to the outpost with my platoon as a part of an agreement with my Plt Sgt since I'm doing the 'left seat right seat rides' I talked about in the last post. Well now this origionally seemed like a good idea to me. A few days back, all by myself, do whatever I want. Sounded good. Now because of these new rules I can't do anything. The big one is that you have to walk around in groups of 3 or more. Seeing as how th...
The Charlie Company Surge...
2008-02-25 22:46:00 When you look forward to redeployment and to ending your mission here in Iraq, you set certin expectations in your mind as far as what you expect it to be like. In my head I had expected us to ride things out, continue to do what we normally do, but nothing special, physically and mentally phasing ourselves out of our combat mission. Well as could be expected with just about everything I have ever experienced in the Army, what you expect tends to be nothing like what is or will be.The last patrol that I went on, was my last time patrolling with my platoon in our normal patrol cycle. I still have some things that will require me leaving the FOB and continuing combat missions, but the days of spending a day or 2 out with my platoon in our typical fasion are done for. I will also be doing what we call 'left seat right seat rides' with the new unit replacing us, which is basically where myself with a few select people will spend additional time in sector patrolling with our replac... More About: Company , Charlie , Surge
One last bit of excitment? I think not...
2008-02-17 05:38:00 The last patrol that I went on was one exhausting patrol. We ended up dismounting quite a bit. It wasn't so much that over the course of the day we walked a whole lot, but it wasn't a short walk or anything like that either. Pretty much it was just not stop, continious dismounting that just seemed as if thats all I did all day. I don't recall spending too much time inside the truck. Fortunatly the wheater was just about perfect for the amount of walking we ended up doing and I even had to shed the little bit of 'snivel' gear that i had one once the afternoon hit.So for the dismounts we really didn't do much that was really noteworthy. At one point we were out walking around looking for some random donkey cart pulling a bunch of propane tanks. Now, we wernt looking for a specific one, or it wasnt because one was rigged to blow up, but because they needed to talk with someone who sold propane. OK.... not sure what for really, but we never ended up finding one. We did end...
One last bit of excitment? I think not...
2008-02-17 05:38:00 The last patrol that I went on was one exhausting patrol. We ended up dismounting quite a bit. It wasn't so much that over the course of the day we walked a whole lot, but it wasn't a short walk or anything like that either. Pretty much it was just not stop, continious dismounting that just seemed as if thats all I did all day. I don't recall spending too much time inside the truck. Fortunatly the wheater was just about perfect for the amount of walking we ended up doing and I even had to shed the little bit of 'snivel' gear that i had one once the afternoon hit.So for the dismounts we really didn't do much that was really noteworthy. At one point we were out walking around looking for some random donkey cart pulling a bunch of propane tanks. Now, we wernt looking for a specific one, or it wasnt because one was rigged to blow up, but because they needed to talk with someone who sold propane. OK.... not sure what for really, but we never ended up finding one. We did end...
Some GREAT News!!!
2008-02-14 08:12:00 Ok well it has definatly been a little bit since I posted last. Theres several factors that have played in to this. Part of it is from my time spent out at the outpost where once again Blogger is blocked. No suprise there tho. Also as I'm sure many of you all have probably heard, there was some communications cable that was cut in the Mediterranian Sea (I believe?) that has severly affected our communications. The internet at the cafes have been ridiculously slow and the phones have had a horrible connection. Also the internet has been down in my building for several weeks and with our re-deployment nearing, I decided to not worry about it and just wont have internet in my room for the rest of my time here. This means I am forced to use the SLOW internet cafes. I have been to the computers a LOT in the last week, but I've been primarily dealing with one thing; Bringing Charlie (our dog)home!Well again if you check my other site dedicated to Charlie I will have more in dept... More About: News , Great
Some GREAT News!!!
2008-02-14 08:12:00 Ok well it has definatly been a little bit since I posted last. Theres several factors that have played in to this. Part of it is from my time spent out at the outpost where once again Blogger is blocked. No suprise there tho. Also as I'm sure many of you all have probably heard, there was some communications cable that was cut in the Mediterranian Sea (I believe?) that has severly affected our communications. The internet at the cafes have been ridiculously slow and the phones have had a horrible connection. Also the internet has been down in my building for several weeks and with our re-deployment nearing, I decided to not worry about it and just wont have internet in my room for the rest of my time here. This means I am forced to use the SLOW internet cafes. I have been to the computers a LOT in the last week, but I've been primarily dealing with one thing; Bringing Charlie (our dog)home!Well again if you check my other site dedicated to Charlie I will have more in dept... More About: News , Great
March of the Iman...
2008-01-31 16:47:00 Well, I'm going back in time a little bit to talk about a few events that happened several patrols ago. The reason for this is the damn internet is down in my building again, and ever since I got internet in my room it is almost like getting the motivation to go to the dentist when it comes to heading down to the MWR computers. But now the internet has been down for a while and I have no clue when it will be getting fixed so I'm finally putting together a post to take down to the computers and upload. From what I hear the computers are running really slow so I may or may not get to put up pictures that I am wanting to include with this. Guess we'll see.The first significant event deals with the CLC or civilian armed guards that we have in some of the neighborhoods in our sector. I've talked about them many times, especially when it deals with running in to one of their armed dismount patrols at night or the weapons caches that these guys find for us from time to time. Alth... More About: March , Iman
March of the Iman...
2008-01-31 16:47:00 Well, I'm going back in time a little bit to talk about a few events that happened several patrols ago. The reason for this is the damn internet is down in my building again, and ever since I got internet in my room it is almost like getting the motivation to go to the dentist when it comes to heading down to the MWR computers. But now the internet has been down for a while and I have no clue when it will be getting fixed so I'm finally putting together a post to take down to the computers and upload. From what I hear the computers are running really slow so I may or may not get to put up pictures that I am wanting to include with this. Guess we'll see.The first significant event deals with the CLC or civilian armed guards that we have in some of the neighborhoods in our sector. I've talked about them many times, especially when it deals with running in to one of their armed dismount patrols at night or the weapons caches that these guys find for us from time to time. Alth... More About: March , Iman
I didn't know it got THIS cold here...
2008-01-20 17:56:00 Alright, well it has been a little bit since my last post and that is partially due to a little bit of laziness on my part compounded with the inability to access my Blogger account from the outpost. I was going to put a post up right before I left, but I figured, no I'll just do it once I get to the outpost. Well, as I've talked about before the people who control the firewall that prevents us from going to many websites, I have noticed are very bi-polar when it comes to allowing/denying access to Blogger. Sometimes they do and others they dont. One day I may be able to get on and the next I wont and then the next day again I can't. It's pretty crazy and it can get quite annoying sometimes. Gets my hopes up.The first thing that I wanted to post about was some updates on our situation with our adopted dog at the outpost, Charlie. As many of you know that have been reading my blog for a while, or even those of you that have noticed the sidebar link to a website I have up d... More About: Cold
I didn't know it got THIS cold here...
2008-01-20 17:56:00 Alright, well it has been a little bit since my last post and that is partially due to a little bit of laziness on my part compounded with the inability to access my Blogger account from the outpost. I was going to put a post up right before I left, but I figured, no I'll just do it once I get to the outpost. Well, as I've talked about before the people who control the firewall that prevents us from going to many websites, I have noticed are very bi-polar when it comes to allowing/denying access to Blogger. Sometimes they do and others they dont. One day I may be able to get on and the next I wont and then the next day again I can't. It's pretty crazy and it can get quite annoying sometimes. Gets my hopes up.The first thing that I wanted to post about was some updates on our situation with our adopted dog at the outpost, Charlie. As many of you know that have been reading my blog for a while, or even those of you that have noticed the sidebar link to a website I have up d... More About: Cold
"Laughter is an instant vacation." -Milton Berle
More articles from this author:2008-01-07 02:01:00 Theres many things that we have experienced here, some of them good, some of them bad and some of them, well, just there. But theres one thing about being with a group of guys that have become like brothers to you, and thats the ability to just have a good time despite the situation that you find yourself in. That is one of the greatest things I've noticed durring this deployment, is that we can be in a horrible situation (combat related or not) and just make the best of it. The last 2 days, I can honestly say I have had some of the best times here in Iraq, not by anything that we have done mission wise, but just having a good laugh at the expense of myself and others in our platoon.It all started on the last patrol that I went on. We had our First Sergeant that headed out with us, and his driver, a mortar guy, used to go out with our platoon alot back in the day. He's a great guy and a part of me misses the good times when he was along! *tear* Hahah. Anyways, he's a smoker... More About: Vacation , Laughter , Milton 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 |
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