And it ain't in the fifty-star generals and flipped-out phonies

Well, it's certainly been an eventful past few days. I was invited to a prayer luncheon with our Battalion and Brigade Commanders, and the Chaplain from the Third Infantry Division, where the Brigade Commander presented me with another Army Commendation Medal. It was a pretty good barbecue lunch, too.

a bit blurry, but if you look real close, it's me and colonel o'connell

Then, I went back to the Al Faw Palace and attended the 100th Anniversary of the Army Reserve Re-Enlistment ceremony. I was privileged enough to meet and get a picture taken with two very powerful and influential figures: GEN David Petraeus, the Multinational Coalition Forces-Iraq Commanding General; and LTG Jack Stultz, Chief and Commanding General of the Army Reserve. These guys are my top bosses, with the exception of Congress, the Prez and the Joint Chiefs. Those three are more figureheads, though, like a board of directors. These two guys are the CEO's of our little company.

me and "big dave" (got to love my hair...)

"jack" and I share a handshake

All in all, it was a nice ceremony. GEN Petraeus said a few nice words, as did LTG Stultz, and then we had cake and pictures! In addition to the pictures, I also got two more coins and some Army swag, like a nice new backpack and a large tote bag.
In other news, our unit suffered a horrible blow with the Packers' loss to the Giants the other night. A generous percentage of our company is from Green Bay, and they have become completely demoralized and dejected. It was a pitiful sight. I think we may have recruited a few new Pats fans in the process, too.

Never been so easy or so slow

Well, we've moved in to our new digs, and have begun what I call "Phase IV" of our deployment. (Phase I: Mobilization; Phase II: Kuwait; Phase III: Iraq; Phase IV: Tents; and Phase V: Demob at Leonard Wood) It's not quite as pleasant as we could wish, but I guess we can put up with anything for a few weeks. At least these tents, although much, much smaller than the mega-domes in Kuwait, are adequately heated.

my new digs

It's been a several day ordeal, beginning with me trying to get to the post office to mail things home. What was going to begin as two moderately packed foot lockers became, rather quickly, three stuffed footlockers and two cardboard boxes of miscellany. And, to top it all off, I still have to trim some fat before we get out of here. I find it hard to believe that I acquired so much stuff in the course of a year.
After finally getting my things mailed (to the tune of $101.18...), we took another two days to shift everything over to the tents. It's taken us about six total trips to move six people's things in a HMMWV. You really can't fit as much as you would think in one of those. It all went fairly smoothly, all things considered.
We have pretty much quit our missions at this point, and given near complete control over to the new unit. We had our awards ceremony the other day, where I got the first of two of my theater awards (not counting the various service ribbons we'll get). It's called the Army Commendation Medal.

pretty-riffic!

I was also summoned to the Al Faw palace to participate in a 100th Anniversary Ceremony of the Army Reserve with GEN David Petraeus and LTG jack Stultz, the MNCI Commander and Chief of the Army Reserve, respectively. We had a photo-op and rehearsed for our ceremony, which is tomorrow. I'll post up more stuff on that in a few days, when I get my pictures emailed to me from the Public Affairs Office. Here's a few, in the mean time:

al-faw front entrance

i think you can read

here we go, fast and slow, in the big chair!

Talk to you all real soon!