Get me outa here on the first thing smokin'....

So I've spent the last month here in Fort Worth working in the Project Management Office of LOGCAP IV for the DynCorp, CH2M HILL, Taos Logistics (DCP) team, and I'm so ready to go. This is not exactly what I envisioned, so I"m starting to push kind of hard to get deployed as soon as possible.

I went to church today, and I was struck by the scripture quoted on the meeting program:

"As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country."

Proverbs.

Seems ironic - in that I'm trying desperately to get deployed to this far off land, that this scripture would be staring at me today. I guess that scripture is my prodding from the Lord to be a little bit better about keeping this blog up to date, and making sure my family hears from me often.

This past week has been quite a busy one - I think I worked 80 hours - and most all of it in areas that I never contemplated working on. Most of my time now has been put into helping out with the Recruiting and Human Resources efforts on a total program level as well as on some specific ares - such as Risk Management and Site / Camp Management. I've helped the program develop a spreadsheet tracking tool (not the best way to handle this amount of data) to track over 7,000 employees and staff, and report on the comings and goings of that staff in a daily staffing meeting.

These meetings are brutal....very to the point and very pressure filled - and if the program I put together isn't working - it's even worse. So - early mornings, late nights, long days - but now I think it's looking like we have a grip on it, and the Program Director appears very happy with the output we give him daily. Whew....just kind of stepped up and offered to help - and ended up being married to its success or failure. I have a feeling that's how this whole next year will be.

Karen and the boys have been doing mangnificently - I'm so impressed with all the things Karen has stepped up and is handling. She's my "hero at home" as the song goes. Unfortunately, this week she has come down with the flu bug, and is really quite ill. I feel bad I'm not there to take care of her, and take the pressure off. These are the things that break my heart.

We have been communicating on Skype fairly regularly - which is nice to be able to see each other on the computer and talk. I think that will help with the distance and time apart.

Time to shut down for the evening....

Saying Goodbye a second time

Since I hadn't left for Afghanistan yet, and the prospect of spending labor day weekend in a hotel was not that appealing, I used some of those hard earned frequent flyer miles and flew home to Colorado for the weekend.

It was wonderful to see Karen, Jake and Jonah, and to spend some time taking care of those last minute things which I didn't get done the first time. Of course, there is always a giant list of things that still don't get done, and I feel bad about that.

As wonderful as it was to see Karen and the boys again, it was torture to say goodbye to them a second time. I think leaving them, was far worse this time, than it was 2 weeks ago. I'm not sure I could do that again.

So - why am I still in the US, and not in Afghanistan yet? Long story short.....there aren't enough beds at the US bases there to handle all of the existing life support personnel, new soldiers going into the country, and our contract folks as well. So - I wait.....not what I envisioned, but I wait. I really just want to get this show on the road.

The First Aid Merit Badge.....Not

So when I was a Boy Scout, one of our main requirements was the First Aid Merit Badge. Closely joined to that, and also required was the Emergency Preparedness Merit Badge. Today - in preparation for deployment to Afghanistan (similar to when I deployed to Iraq) we had to complete basic "First Aid" which is not like any first aid class you'll find anywhere else.



Part of the training was the usage of several life like "dummies" with various "battlefield" injuries which we had to learn to provide 'basic' first aid to in order to sustain life until help can arrive.



Reality begins to sink in.



I guess the most important thing we learned in addition to the actual first aid, was to gain control of yourself, in order to help others.

Let's look at the run down...we worked on major arterial bleeds, severed limbs, open and sucking chest wounds, abdominal wounds, head wounds, shock, psychological injuries, CPR, etc....

Its hard to be cute or joke about these types of subjects, but I think most of us in the class had to use some gallows humor to not think too hard about subject.

Here's to hoping I never have to use anything I learned today.