The Intrepid Reporter

Rants and Raves and How Old am I???

2009-10-28T20:03:00.002+03:00

OK
Back again but not really motivated to do the “Usual Wrecking Ball” job. Maybe after I warm up a bit on the keys... The Old I.R. of fame & legend (if only in his own mind) is sort of at the burnout stage in this tour. Normal to see as I’m now looking at the One Year Marker in Baghdadland, formerly known as the Saddam-A-Go-Go. Yep. One more year checked off and ‘check the box’ for weirdness, incoming fire, and the usual bullshit that goes along with being here. The past couple of weeks have been the hairiest out of the past twelve months, seeing that the “High Hardheaded Weirdbeards” and associated “Dirty Haj Brethren of Bad Body Odor and Offenses against God and Humanity” have started up to their old tricks, and the incoming has claimed a couple of lives over the past few, Ye Olde Intrepide Reporter is a bit off his stride.

Hell… how can one NOT be off one’s game? Another year… this make 6 years of being over here in various positions, with the most common one being BOHICA. That to the newbies means “Bend Over, Here It Comes Again.” I’m surviving, but as I’m also approaching another major life marker, I’m a bit on the down side. That major marker being my Birthday and the “BIG Four Fuckin’ Oh.” Yep. The reality is I ain’t a young’in no more. I’m old. Hell... the fact that I’ve made it thus far after the past 6 years of intensely strange stuff in itself is a minor miracle. Two shrapnel wounds, a bionic kneecap and too many traumatic brain injuries to count later, The I.R. is more amazed that I’ve retained the barest mentality, and that I’m not in a home somewhere drooling all over myself whilst waiting on my mush. I mean hell, I can understand the whole ‘mortality’ thing better than most at this point. Some of my friends have been like “You should celebrate!” and I’m like “Shut the fuck up. What the fuck evar!” as I’m now feeling slightly bitter. 6 Years on near continuous field operations has me spent like a smoking shell casing left on the range. It’s hard to wake up in the morning facing 40, and coming to the realization that I’m still HERE as opposed to THERE with my wife and kids. Anyone for a nice, tall, cool, glass of ‘Haterade’ for breakfast hmmmn?

I mean from what I understand, it’s a normal thing for a guy like myself (formerly athletic, now ½ crippled by my standards) to be hatin’ on the four zero. I think I’m entitled to it. I mean shit, the guys who wake up in my mood at least are waking up in their own fucking hemisphere. In their own fucking bed… going to a job they may hate, but where the most dangerous thing they may have to face that day is a paper cut or a layoff. Me? No layoffs to foresee, not until we wrap Iraq up and put a bow on ‘er, but sheeeee-it…. I’d strangle a busload of Nuns in the Vatican to have a ‘normal’ lifestyle again.

Unfortunately, I’m faced with a thing called R-E-A-L-I-T-Y. A word that seems to elude small children, the mass media, the military and politicians alike. Reality is there isn’t a way for me to come home in this fucked up economy. Reality is short of a lottery win or finding the pot ‘o gold to pay off my huge-mongous mortgage means I’m stuck in the (temporary) tax free shooting galleries. That until the aforementioned politicians figure out how to rape me even more than they already have and tax the fuck outta me. Delusional is another word for those people, minus the small children… lil kids are supposed to be that way, whereas these demented motherfuckers whom I’m about to unload on, well, they get what they deserve IN SPADES.
Yeah… time to unlimber the “Rant-O-Thon.” Been a while but after reading the headLIES for the past couple of days, I’m ab-so-fucking-lute-ly done with being Mister nice I.R. I’m calling it like I sees it. My particular Rant of The Day is for the Mainstream Media LIARS and ASSHOLES who they are COVERING UP for. Specifically: Body Count.

A VERY sore subject for me. It’s like a hot knife through my heart to read about our U.S. Casualties. The fucking media vampires and scumfuck editors couldn’t get enough of splashing death and dismemberment of our brave troops on the headLIES and front pages when they were capable of dropping said bodies at the feet of the “Bushitler and Darth Cheney” and helping the Goddamned Code Pink Fuckstains. Yeah I’m heated. Why do you ask? Well lets see… we just had the SINGLE MOST amount of casualties in ONE day and the media has managed to ‘spread it around’ and, despite stating the “largest single loss of U.S. life,” it’s been played like nothing. Now granted, I’m not in the US, but the ‘play and spin’ on the major news media websites can give me a gauge as to how things are playing back home, and we DO get CNN and ABC on the AFN (Armed Forces Network) TV to show what’s happening back home. Right now? I’d have to say “Fuckin’ Bupkiss.”

14 Guys bought the farm in 2 count ‘em TWO Helicopter accidents. Now, the editor in the back waving his fucking pencil wants to say “Well I.R… they reported that.” Yeah? Well what about the 8… count ‘em EIGHT OTHER Joes who got blown the hell away by various I.E.D.s and attacks… all on THAT SAME DAY. Nevermind the announcement of the recovery of 3 contractor carcasses who got shot down three days before? Hmmn… they, the “Department of Propaganda” A.K.A. the Mass Media Myrmidons or “The Obamanation’s Mouthpieces” have very cutely sidelined it and spread the news around to make it LESS of an event. Can you IMAGINE the screaming foaming at the mouth uproar if such a mass-cas list was unveiled under the Bush admin? Granted we’ve all seen it before, but it really gets under my skin… That’s 22 guys/gals gone to the Final Formation with the Head Sky Pilot… Never mind the ‘mercs’ who bought it… add them in as legit casualties and you get 25 in one day… That’s ¼ of a hundred… a HELL of a lot of blood on the hands of the man who stated Monday: "While I will never hesitate to use force to protect the American people or our vital interests, I also promise you this—and this is very important as we consider our next steps in Afghanistan: I will never rush the solemn decision of sending you into harm's way," Obama said Monday during a visit to Naval Air Station Jacksonville. "I won't risk your lives unless it is absolutely necessary." (stolen from A.P., all rights reserved… for me that is, to shove it up the AP Editors Collective Asses if I ever meet the sonofabitches face-to-face.)

Lets break down that little Statement from the “Cow…er... Commander in Chief.”

1) “While I will never hesitate to use force to protect the American people or our vital interests, I also promise you this—and this is very important as we consider our next steps in Afghanistan: I will never rush the solemn decision of sending you into harm's way,"

I.R. Translation: “I won’t hesitate to throw you to the wolves, if the Lobbyists who pull my pathetic strings order me to. However, because there’s an election coming up, and I can’t afford to piss off the Nutroots of the Demon-cratic Party that elected me, I’ll put on the brakes as best I can.”

2) “I won't risk your lives unless it is absolutely necessary."

I.R. Translation: “Once the election is over, all bets are off, and you’re all cannon fodder again.”

Is it any wonder we’re having MAD Morale issues? I mean Holy Jumping Dog-Balls Batman! With statements like that, it’s amazing we haven’t seen more Joes just saying “Fuck it, Fuck you, and FUCK OFF.” The main reason is that these kids are FAR better trained and have been fucked over so much in the past 7 years that they are, for lack of a better word, used to being assfucked by the politicians and the media.

I’m waiting. I still maintain that eventually, these kids/men/women of the Armed Forces are going to FINALLY get tired of the lack of accountability and stupidity coming out of Sodom-on-the-Potomac. They’re going to come home and for lack of a better word, come home ALL SORTS of PISSED off. Heavily trained, and unemployed, the nightmare that the current Dot GOV should be thinking of is three words, modified from an ‘already happened in history’ moment. These being “Modern Bonus Army.”

For those of you, who don’t know your history; check the Wikipedia entry for “Bonus Army.” In the FIRST Great Depression, the unemployed homeless and indigent Vets from Dubbaya Dubbaya Uno made a HUGE homeless camp on the grounds of the Washington Mall. They wanted/needed their bonus money that had been promised to them early, and in response, a thoroughly terrified Political Class unleashed the US Army on them in direct violation of the Posse Comitaus Act. This, mind you was in 1932. Now, officially, the Posse Comitatus act doesn’t hold sway in D.C as it’s a Fed-Gov territory, and in reality, this’s the SECOND time that the Feds freaked when their Mil-Vets demanded financial remuneration. The first was in 1783 when the Pennsylvanian war vets marched on the then-capitol of Philly. The feds being feds set up the new Area of Operation A.K.A. Washington D.C. as exempt from Posse Comitatus so that they have the full power of the US Military as their tools to put down rebellion and insurrection… pretty slick of them I think…. Without it they’d be run out of town on a rail on a regular basis. That in itself wouldn’t be a bad thing. Who was it who said “"A little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical."? Jefferson I believe…

I’d have to say that if “The One” turns tail and hauls balls out of the ‘Wars’ the “Three Strikes You’re Out” rule might be in full effect. My own opinion is that the reason we’ve stayed on for so long in all of these wars is that they, the Political/Patrician/Elites/Ruling Classes have got to KEEP the military kids busy… if they don’t and we go to a ‘neutral corner’ so to speak, and what with the economy being in poor, nay ABYSSAMAL shape, then the LAST Thing they want is to let a quarter million HIGHLY SKILLED and WAR HARDENED veterans loose in America… Hence all of those reports that ‘slipped out’ calling on Homeland Security to keep an eye on Vets and the like… they, the fucking Fed-Gov have turned from being the “arbiter between the states” to being “Lord High and Overseers of Any and All Aspects of Your Lives so Shut up Peon, lest you be smited.”

Dunno about y’all, but I’ma getting tired of all the rules, regulations, expectations and bullshit that seems to be flowing like a broken sewage pipe out of D.C. Whatever happened to “Freedom?” I mean it’s sure as hell isn’t a ‘party thing.’ Political Parties, the “Repuboobicans” and the “Demoncrats” are strictly the means that the elites keep us divided and busy while they loot and rape us. And between the intentional dumbing down of our children in Public Schools, is it any wonder that any parent worth a shit is homeschooling these days? Even my 11 year old is aware of how retarded the school system is and DEMANDS to be taught at home. Hell, the threat of punishment in our house is “Do you WANT to go to school? We can sign you up and drop you off right now if you don’t behave!!!” Household Six only has to drive by the public school and point out to the kids that if they keep acting up, that THAT is where they were going to end up, with the dummies, malcontents and Mexicans. (As a side note: No bash on the Mexicans intended, but the illegal immigration in our A.O. is so bad that the school is running 50 to 60 kids PER CLASS and has to be bi-lingual because of insane overcrowding… due to this the quality of teaching is bottoming like a lead hulled boat, and the kids know it.)

Anyways... enough ranting for the moment. I gotta go to lunch.

OK Back from “The Ptomaine Palace” also known as “The Dagger Inn” or even now, the “Raider Inn.” Yep… how many name changes does a place go through? Too fucking many. When I first got here, the Camp I lived on was “North Victory.” Then just “Victory” Then, some asshole started calling it Camp Al-Taheer, or “Liberty”. This begat the split between “East Liberty” and “West Liberty,” as well as splitting East Liberty into the subheadings of “Camp Blackjack” and then, renaming it to, and not limited to, let’s see… “Tigerland,” “Ironhorse,” hmmm… and now, if to be believed,” “Camp Firesweep” whatever the fuck THAT means. One of my guys I work with thinks the “Firesweep” sign is more for identifying the Fire Department in the East Lib side, but it’s all the way up at the main entry to the area, mounted on the Main Entry Signframe that USED to say "Tigerland" or whatever, so until I’m told otherwise, I'm in an A.O. that sounds like a Gay Retreat off of Long Island.

Whew.

Is it any wonder I feel sorta kinda schizophrenic on a near daily basis?
More later, if I have time or inclination… 26 Days and a Wakeup til the Big Four Oh. Man I hate getting old….
Until then, I remain, The Intrepid Reporter.

Despite being CENSORED...

2009-10-07T21:28:00.001+03:00

Greetings from Baghdadland, formerly known as “The Saddamn-A-Go-Go!”
Now, to start this particular rant, I need to state that I’ve been advised by Council… namely my mouthpiece(s) (read my Lawyers… no joke) that my intel and such might be ‘tweaking the nipples’ of the FedCorpGov. My reaction to this is twofold:

First: Fuck ‘em.

If they can’t take a joke, then fuck ‘em. I’m not revealing ANYTHING OPSEC-wise. EVERY single thing I throw out here is generally filed under “been there-done that” and for the most part, the fucking “Dirty Haj” ™ know what they done did. It’s not like I’m going to give anything away that could adversely affect our operations here, and for sure I’m not telling anything until such time as I see it on the AP/Brietfart/Communist News Nutwork. As an aside… the editor, who’s been on a lovely hiatus wants to know what ‘OPSEC’ is… ok poindexter… for you, again, I’ll spell it out in cake-eating civvie terms so you don’t have to google it.

OPSEC is Operational Security. I.E. ANYTHING that could give critical info to the enemy. I TRY like hell to NOT give anything away in my rants, rambles and general verbal diarreah, but hell… generally in my experience (6 years now) the fucking Haj know more about what we’re doing than we are. I operate under the OPSEC rules as it not only keeps the ‘Joes’ alive, but is also responsible for keeping my favorite thing, namely my pretty oversized pink carcass, in one piece. Now, granted, giving up some info like that the Commanding General prefers to take his morning shit in “X” latrine at “Y” time is a violation of OPSEC, I try to avoid stating it… after all, I wouldn’t want the “Dirty Haj”™ dropping a round or setting a bomb off while I’m dropping the ‘morning deuce’ as every man / woman is entitled to a quiet morning grump. I mean only a TOTAL savage like the Haj would do something as dirty as that right?

Second: The blocking of my access to this webpage seems to be more of a ‘blanket policy’ since the Obamanation took over. Under the ‘Shrub’ I was able to rant and rave nonstop. These days, not so much. Seems the Neo-socialists out there feel that whatever info I provide (as well as others who use Blogspot dot com) is either detrimental, or they just want to shut up anyone who feels that we’re in deep shit, seeings that we’ve got a no-brained neophyte running things, and since “The One” took over casualties are skyrocketing. Haven’t heard much about that in the “Lamestream media” now have we? I mean it really pisses me off that under Bush, every casualty was waved like the proverbial “bloody shirt” as evidence of failed policy. Now that the Moron is in charge, we see nothing.

Fuck them motherfuckers is what I say.

If telling the truth is against the law, Costa Rica is looking that much better now.

To Whit: As courtesy to my concerned lawyers, I’ll start off by saying that said attack that I’m going to talk about was on Fox News, ABC, CNN and all the other plethora of dinosaur media. Difference is, I was there. We got hit a few nights ago… first time in a LONG time. We took some SEEEEEERIOUS incoming… which in “The Big Country Bible/Dic’nary” means more than 10 rounds in a 5 minute interval. The fucking dirty unwashed Haj lobbed them in 10 minutes after our Close In Weapons System was tested… that’s an insane 20 MM gatling cannon that used to be mounted on ships and is designed to shoot down cruise missiles… some wayward lunatic (of my make is my guess) figured out when we were getting pounded back in 03-04-05 by rockets and other mortar like bullshit that if it (the CIWS) could shoot down a fucking cruise missile moving at warp factor 5, why the hell can’t it shoot down a terminal velocity object like a rocket or mortar? Thus, as it was written, THE LORD shined down aponst the Navy Loons head, an IDEA was borne, and IT WAS GOOD.

They took the guns off of decommisioned destroyers and mounted them on flatbeds with it’s own generator. Looks a lot like an R2D2 with a big ole dick sticking out, but when this dick comes, it spews a wave of 20mm High Explosive Proximity BBs.

Needless to say, they test fire them, and the test fire lasts a few seconds worth of ammo… which translates to like the ENTIRE mag of 20mm. ( I have no idea in real life mind you) They waited til the test fire, and then 5 minutes later, before it could get reloaded, the fucking Haj Bastards dropped on us. No OPSEC violation there. THEY sure as hell knew what was going on as when the CIWS goes off, it can be heard for 20 + miles. Ain’t no lie there… when that fucker goes off, pray to God or ‘insert-diety-of-choice’ that you ARE NOT standing next to it, elsewise yer gonna need a hearing aid. Loud? No fucking shit Sherlock. I figure the fuckfaces had heard the test, and knew it was a good time to hit us.

I spent the majority of the rest of the night in the bunker, wearing only my helmet, shorts, t-shirt, flip flops, and sucking on a jug of my homebrew. Best way to ride out a shitstorm I’ve found is drunk as a fucking skunk. Figgered also the way I was dressed, ain’t no way St Michael (Guardian Saint of the Airborne and Special Forces) was gonna let me show up at the Pearlys looking like a ragbag/legg. I was generous passing around my squeezin’s as I’ve always been a giving soul, and I figgered also that was NOT the time to be hebrew in giving, seeings that if I DID by some chance get hit, if I didn’t share, the guys might not be so inclined to save my fat ass.

So then it’s begun

The drawdown means we’re getting kicked back to an “05” sort of timeframe, and what with “The One” in the White House bowing and scraping before all and sundry, the bad guys are feeling fucking frisky. No longer are they feeling like that “The Hammer of God” was to fall on them lest they make a stupid move, but more like “We can do it, and that joker ain’t gonna do shit about it.”

My call: McCrystal will resign inside of 4 moths if he’s not backed. Affy is decending into a Tribalistic Infatada/Jihad, and we’re now playing the role of the Russians/USSR circa 1983. I mean we’re dealing with a TOTAL guerrilla war, and we keep trying to frame it under conventional methods. God help me for saying so, but >shudder< Joe “Never go full retard” Biden has the right idea in that we should allow the SF to go in and culturally assimalate the Affy’s and work from within, to include growing beards and living like the locals. The ‘conventional model’ of warfare IS NOT GOING TO WORK in Affy. We’re talking tribalism at it’s core, which has outlasted the Brits (x2) The Indians (x2) and the Sovs (x1) and I have NO idea how they think that we’ll far any differently. Problem is that the ‘Cold War Warriors’ in the “Puzzle Palace on the Patomac” keep thinking inside the box, when it’s already been proven it doesn’t fucking work. The issue I’d have to say is most of the senior brass out there have a issue with being able to let the SF kids “off the leash” and because THEY themselves were never allowed to (I mean when did you ever hear outside of Special Forces dudes being allowed to have beards?) do the ‘fun outside the box stuff’ that they shy away from proper SF type missions.

Otherwise, I’m gonna keep this short. (For a change) but things here are hairy, and getting worse, seeings that “The One” is a total fuckup of the first order. My advice at this point would be he needs to make a decision, and stick with it.. this waffling and vaccilation in only causing our enemies to gain confidence. Right or Wrong, make a fucking choice Mister President. Us dudes/dudettes on the ground can NOT afford the luxury to wait otherwise.
Until my Next, I remain
The Intrepid Reporter

Baghdad to the US to Costa Rica and back...

2009-09-14T14:56:00.002+03:00

Greetings and Que Pasa!!!
El Intrepid Reporter here, blogging again. Many moons have passed, and the Editor and Poindexter In Charge has taken a bit of a break, so I decided that tonight, as I’m in rare form, should take advantage of the situation, and Blog as far as things are, have been, and possibly might be. The wild whackness and weirdness that continually inhabit and infiltrate my life are yet again in full effect.

This time, the Reporter of Infinite Fame, Fortune and World Weariness is hitting you from Esparza, Costa Rica. I’m in town for Lil Country’s impending nuptials, which take place in 3 days as the clock states. I’m here in Central America as the “Best Man” as spurious a title as it may be, but, nonetheless, after a First Class flight (literally I’m saying… screw flying with the common folk anymore… bigger seats… better food… free booze… how the hell can I argue with that?) I’m ensconced in the bar that I have a 1/3rd ownership in, and am attempting to turn the ledger sheet red if I’m capable. Lord Knows I’ve been a ‘good boy’ lately, despite the inherent weirdness in Baghdad. More on that in a few. Point being, I’m melting Brain Cells by the friggin barrel load, and I also managed to become “walking wounded” within the first 4 hours in country.

OK: Hmmmn where to start: Well, lets go with Baghdad. Last time I blogged was many weeks ago… almost a month and a half truthfully. Unfortunately, if nothing is happening, and I’m bored, and there ain’t shytte to write about, I’ll go the easy route and say to hell with it. Not like I’m getting fucking paid for this anyways right? Well, all that changed 2 days before I was due to rotate home on R&R. (Not the pay thing… the local sit-rep) This, as the long term followers of my writings (pre-blog) know that this is a familiar situation. Every. Single. Time. It gets fucking old. Every time I’m going on R&R, no matter what time of year, the fucking Haj decide that “this time” is the “perfect time” to start lobbing rounds / actively trying to kill us infidels. It started early one morning with a world class explosion. World Class means, in the IR book, strong enough to rouse me from a dead vodka-induced coma. The explosion made international news. The “Dirty Haj” took advantage of the whole goat rope that the change of “US Troops to Iraqi Troops” and nuked a whole fucking neighborhood. Like 79 people KIA’d but probably more, as the counting of the bodies with a bomb THAT big is usually, at the morgue, a situation of “How many Left Arms do you have? We need a body count of casualties.” Sort of gruesomeness that I’m happier to avoid. I mean how the fuck do you get an accurate count when an ENTIRE neighborhood gets vaporized? It brings back memories and thoughts of Dresden and Hiroshima and Nagasaki. No one will ever know exactly how many died, and the way theses dudes hit the block, same principle can be applied.
So yeah, here I am, crashed out, dead to the world in a magnificent Harem Inspired dream (tell me I haven’t been in Iraq too fucking long eh?) and I get jolted right out of the fucking bunk. As in physically thrown out of the fucking rack. Talk about a “Hey what the fuck?” moment…

SO yeah, I “got the fuck outta Dodge” ASAP, and got home. Home… what a wonderful place… as long as the Household Six isn’t in full on rage at the Spawn for misbehavior… Yeah… the kids are at that tender age when they think backtalking, smart mouthing and generally being little assholes is in ‘vogue.’ Seems this’s a regular thing these days when I’m gone, but I’m hoping to crush this little rebellion like a 40 pound maul on a cockroach: decisively and brutally. Gotta keep the Six happy don’t ya know? But after momentarily threatening grievous bodily injury and/or crippling them they seemed to behave, up until I split for LC’s wedding here in Costa. I wasn’t out of the country 12 hours and they were acting the goat, being all jacked and racked. Difference is the Lil Basterds forgot I’m only on a 4 day bounce shot, with a return that promises to be a real Smackdown when I get there.

So: here I am in Paradise. Not a bad place actually, Costa Rica is laid back, chill, humid and covered with more Greenery than Florida. Real life rainforests, giant assed lizards that are reminiscent of the Iguanas I had to deal with in Guantanamo Bay, and currently, one hell of a Thunder Boomer Storm that’s knocked out the power, so’s I’ll have to be posting this later. The Casa Of the Red Neck as the crib is called, is a botanical garden spot after the past 5 years in fucking Iraq. Avocado trees, lemon trees, lime trees (who knew?) banana trees and even coconuts are growing right in the yard. When Lil Country offers you fresh produce at his table, you can be damned sure it was picked right out of the tree. Another aspect of being here is the beer. Damned good beer. Imperial Silver being my current brewskie of choice. It’s the National Beer of Costa Rica and comes in Silver or just straight Imperial. To be honest, I got me a hunch that the guy who started the brewery > might < have been one of the “Sieg Heil” escapees from old Dubbya Dubbya Dos. The beer is a first rate Bavarian, and the symbol for it is a what appears to be a modified Austrian/Hapsburg Royal Eagle. I’m not casting ANY aspersions, but it does seem awfully convenient that the beer here is a german style brew with what appears to be an Imperial German Eagle (slightly stylistically modified of course) but man? I wanna ask the founder: “Where were you in ’42 Mien Herr?”

(Lil Country notes: The 3 main beers of Costa Rica were originated by German Ex Pats)

So anyways, as far as the local brew-ha, I’m in like Flint. Good stuff, and Lil has stocked the cooler with approximately 10,000 bottles in 2 giant coffin sized coolers. I’d say that should take me through the weekend, and if not, well, Imperial delivers much like the milk man. Leave a case of empties (24 in a hard plastic case) out on the front porch, and the Beer Man comes by and drops off a fresh case. Good thing they don’t have that in the States as I’d be trying to break records for “single largest empty/reload in history” But, OK: as we go: Tonight was a good party… Lil Country’s Grandma, Great Aunt, Father and a couple of other relations thrown in for the mix. I spent most of my night regaling them with stories of Lil and Me and Middle (yep even Middle Country made a showing) back in the day and the sort of trouble we used to get in. It was all in good fun, and I’m sure I horrified that nice ole lady, but she was laughing her ass off all night, as were we all, so it wasn’t that bad… The only negative was I took a tumble. Yep… the Old I.R. of poor co-ordination and even worse balance was in full effect. And this BEFORE I began boozing in earnest. I was sober, but missed a small step on the back bar. Head over ass over teakettle. Damned near destroyed my right knee, and gave myself killer road rash on the left knee, as well as breaking the knuckle on my right hand. I really know how to party these days… I swear, any more tumbling, and I’m going to start using a walker when I’m boozing. So anyways, this all was before the night began… I ass ended myself, and mutilated myself pretty well, and as I lay there, bleeding, Middle Country races over to check the concrete. “Whew… damn Big, I wasn’t sure you wouldn’t’ve done gone and shattered that!!!”

Gee… Thanks a lot asshole.

On retrospect, it was a funny comment, and yeah, I did shake the house when I hit, but damned man… kick a brother when he’s down… that’s cold. The bonus in all this self flagellation was that Lil’s wife to be was worried when the old right kneecap swelled to about 5 times the norm, and so she called in a doctor. Yep. Full on house call. I was impressed that they even do that shit, but within 40 minutes, a nice dude (Jerry I think his name was) in full surgical scrubs and a bag right out of the movies shows and proceeds to check me over. A few prods, couple of pinches, a few of me screaming “OOOOWWW!!! That hurts man!!!” and out he whips Mr. Magic Morphine Needle.
Yay! Nothing sez “Good Times Ahead” than getting a ½ a grain of Morphine or one of the many mix-it-up derivatives. A quick stick and pull, and all of a sudden, I could have been physically on fucking fire, and I wouldn’t have given a shit. Knee? What knee? Pass me the beer. All I wanted was to be propped up at the bar with a beer within reach. This also was the EXACT diagnosis that Jerry or whatever the hell his name is/was/is going to be was that I should stay in a chair, knee elevated and beer to “help with the pain.”

MY kind of doctor let me tell you.

Also: The cost of this little adventure? Lets round it out… one housecall, complete with medication and a script. Any guesses? Try around $6 yes SIX United States Dollars. Yep. To hell with socialized medicine or whatever that lame assed President or whatever have to say… gimme them Costa Docs any day of the week. In the US I’d expect at least a grand to start… just to get a fucking sawbones to the house would have to offer like my first born, and indentured servitude to the insurance company for the next 500 years, and oh yeah, my soul probably on top of it. In Costa? I mean talk about a killer time. The funniest part was since my future sister-in-law is friends with Jerry, he decided to help prop me up in a barstool and we then spent the next few hours drinking our asses off. I mean not only does he do housecalls, he stuck around to keep me company while I got shitfaced. Now THAT is service!

So that rounds out the first night, or at least my part in it. It’s all sort of hazy at that point, as the Morphine kicked in, as well as the beer and ‘other’ recreational materials that are legal there, and the only other aspect of the night was the “Night of the Mariachis” which, I think personally sounds like a Mexican horror show complete with a Guitar wielding Mass Murderer in a cheesy suite covered with Spangles. Well, I guess it’s a Costa Tradition that the groom to be serenades the bride to be from the front door, and seeing that Lil Country can’t sing anything but “Margaritaville” (and that’s NOT the song you want to woo a broad with) so he hired a roving band-o-mariachis to do the singing for him. Yeah… and unfortunately, these guys weren’t the ‘cool’ mariachis from “El Mariachi” or “Desperado” (think gun toting guitar cases and such…. Only I could think that’d be the ‘cool mariachis’) Try the “Cheesy Mister Mustashio’d Mariachi Man” with bad pelvic thrusts and even cheesier shirts. I know it’s a tradition, but DAMN. Bad porno style mustache, and playing a guitar and singing in Spanish loud enuff to wake the fucking dead. I mean he was loud enough to bellow out and wake my ass from a narco-induced beer haze to the point where I gimped out and caught him on video. I’m glad I did, or I might have written off the entire episode to the drugs and booze.

OK: So I passed out… the video I shot at the time of myself shows a sweat soaked IR sitting in the midst of loud trumpets and even louder partying, which that I can tell, was a smashing success, and judging from the incomprehensible mumbling and rambling such of a “Fear and Loathing in Costa Rica” type that it’s obvious we had a great time. The next day, well… it wasn’t bad, but it was challenging to say the least to rise from the dead and roll. The wedding practice was fun too… I got to see another culture and how they throw down for a party… this makes now a German Wedding (back when I was stationed there) an Egyptian wedding (back on vaykay in Luxor) and now a Costa Rican wedding/Central American wedding. Out of them all, to include the standard American wedding, the Costa Wedding tops out on the top for radically good times.

They did the traditional High Catholic Mass for the wedding itself. OK… I’m catching heat from the pencilnecked editor on my timeline… Now, mind you… the scattershot approach I’m having to writing this down is primarily as I’m somewhere in the “simian” category for brain power right now… Fucking Neanderthal man has more brains available to him than I do… that critical fluid that envelops the brain to keep it safe from impact and shock? Mine’s been replaced with 100 proof and beer. Lots and lots of beer. I’m not exactly on the razor’s edge right now… unless said razor was dragged behind a car down a gravel road for a bit…. That’s more my speed at this point… so where was I?

Oh yes… well the wedding itself… It was held in a small church at the top of a big assed mountain. Which leads me to yet another tangent: Everything in Costa Rica is either on a mountain, going up a mountain, or right at the seashore. Finding level ground here is a fucking jo0b in itself. EVERYTHING is on a hillside, going up or down is about what you do. You want level? Go to the beach. Of course that’s as soon as you get down the fucking mountain. Mountains covered in rainforest mind you… pretty as hell, but thank goodness there’s roads cause I sure as hell wouldn’t want to do it the ‘old fashioned’ way with machete and breaking brush. How they ever settled half of these places is a miracle in itself. So anyways… oh yeah… Church… Mountain…wedding… ah yeah as we last left our hero and his doomed bro: Well one good thing was the Church was Saint Michael’s. As in the patron Saint of Paratroopers. Lil Country took this as an AWESOME portent for the marriage and for the future, seeing that the last two went down in hurtling flames and such. The front had a etched picture of St Mikey crushing the living shit out of a demon or something, and looking pretty mellow while performing said act of divine retribution. The etching was pretty vivid… I didn’t get a picture of it as since I had to be best man, I thought it’d be in poor taste humping and schlepping a big assed camera all over, and that seeing I had to escort the Maid of Honor (a chick I call “Camel-toe”for reasons I’ll explain in a bit) I thought leaving the Kodak moments to others was the proper thing to do. So yeah, it was a threateningly almost rainy day…. The sun started out nicely, but the cloud cover rolled in as the ceremony started. I wasn’t too concerned, but the Bride Lindsey would have been heartbroken had the skies opened up. Thankfully we got a break, and the rain held off until the reception.

The ceremony, well I won’t bore you with particulars, as needless to say it was a High Holy affair with the priest either confirming or admonishing the congregation (tough to say as my Spanish ain’t so good) but his tone carried conviction, and they had all the whistles and bells in all the right places, even if the language wasn’t what I cottoned onto for a Catholic mass. The ritual cannibalism (“this’s my body, eat me” or words to that effect) went off without a hitch and there wasn’t any sign of lightning bolts at either Me, Middle or Lil C, so I guess all was well in the world and God was cool with what was going down. Leastways I didn’t by some miracle burst into flames when crossing the threshold of the church, and didn’t get burned by holding the cross, so all’s well that ended well.

Like I said, thankfully the rain held off until the reception… which was a gas. It was held in the roller rink of the town in Esparza. It was the biggest open space that could be found in the AO for the party, and man, it was friggin PACKED. Must have been at least 400 plus packed in there, and did I mention the heat? Ah… seems I overlooked that little note.

This gets it’s own paragraph. Does the word “Equator” mean anything to you? How about “ Under the magnifying glass?” Not as in being looked at closely, but as in “Scorching the hell out of you hot” and humid? Yeah… I mentioned rainforests earlier. Jungle… wet jungle. Wet hot assed soaking in your own juices hot. Not Iraq hot which is scorching and dry, but this’s Viet Nam hot… Jungle Hot… Tarzan stuff…. I went through an average of 3 shirts a day… soaked in perspiration… gross I know but such is life at the equator… Thank GOD John’s house was fully equipped with washer and dryer or I woulda been out of clothes after 2 days. I mean there’s sweating and then “looking like you fell into the fucking pool fully dressed” sweating… either way a definite exchange of environments.

Enough for now… I’m too hungover and burned to continue… More later... I remain, the Intrepid Reporter.

Pirates and Iraq Upates

2009-06-27T21:52:00.002+03:00

Ok Dear Readers… I’m back and feeling better… the workload has been upswinging (is that a word?) and the Old Intrepid Reporter is out doing his gigs on a regular basis, attempting to maintain sanity and status in driving himself to an early grave. Baghdad has seen a bit of an uptick in the ultraviolence, but not to worry me Droogs… Ye Olde I.R. of fame and lore is safe and sound on Base.

Seems the stuff as of late has been concentrating downtown in the typical “Shiite Versus Sunni” Deathmatch, and the favorite tools of the tools in question are indiscriminate Car Bombings and such. Myself? I say we do an open invitational… get all the guys who have a beef on both sides WAY out on the edge of nowhere. The location wouldn’t have to be too far… the friggin country is a wasteland once you leave the cities… Round them all up and drop them off in a 20 mile by twenty mile enclosure, and then air drop a pile of machetes and such whatnot edged weapons in the center of the containment area. Fence it off with 20 foot high T-walls and tell them it’s a case of “Thunderdome” to the extreme.

Two/Three/However many teams enter, only one can leave. Whoever wins gets to run the show.

Problem is, these jokers for the most part these days are cowards. They use little kids to do the dirty work that they are too cowardly to do themselves. In the entire time I’ve been over here, I’ve witnessed AND participated in too many incidents where only ONE American, Singular, Beef Fed, True God Believing/Fearing Type One Each has it out with 5 or more Hajjis. In my case... it was the other night when I went out for a cold beer and a dinner in Baghdad. Two of the waiters decided to beef, and then all holy hell broke loose.

I was there with my bro from back in 04, codenamed “Grumpy” as he’s a retired First Shirt who thinks the Army has gone to hell in a handbasket. He’s only a few years older than I am, but salty? Can you say Dead Sea salty? Grumpy thinks that these guys are too pampered, what with the ‘net, sat-phones, AC and all that other jazz that we NEVER had in Gulf One (yeah… remember that one?) so he tends to be sort of grumpy and pissed off on a regular basis, (hence the codename) and has what’s been referred to as the “Poo-Face.” The Poo-Face being the look a father gets the first time he opens up a diaper for the first time, and gets a load of what his prodigy has sprung forth. Yep… The Poo-Face.

Well, long story short: The bar went into “Mayhem Mode” and I got pissed off when my $22 steak ate the floor. Up to that point, I was going to stay the fuck out of it, as messing in a Bar in Baghdad when the Locals decide to get frisky can be potentially lethal. However, when the steak got rendered Hors De Combat, it was on like Donkey Kong… Or maybe King Kong? Whatever…. Anyways, I jumped up and waded in and, with Grumpy at my back we had the shitfest settled in about 45 seconds. Can’t really say that I blame them… I roared in a Drill Sergeant voice “AT THE FUCK EASE!!!!” as I waded in, and which I’m sure that they didn’t understand, but they DID get that the 340 pound six foot four American Gorilla was perturbed and was choke slamming motherfuckers to the floor left and right.

You’ve NEVER seen a room mellow and clear so fast.

Needless to say, dinner was on the house, as well as all the beer I wanted. The Maître d was falling all over me… I swear it had to be Man-Love Thursday or something because this guy kept giving me the Ay-Rab kiss on both cheeks (how French!) and offering me a job. I told him he couldn’t afford me. (man... now I sound like the whore I am!) I mean hell do I look like I want to become the “Dalton” of Baghdad? Hell no!

Ok… the editor has been heard from, and to clear up the obscure reference and to quiet the geek down, the Dalton line is a throwaway from the Patrick Swayze ‘Roadhouse’ movie where he plays a ‘cooler’ (I guess that’s slang / kool-dood lingo for a professional bouncer) named Dalton. This dude here wanted me on as nightly security. Fun is fun, but damned if I don’t not get enough sleep as it is.

So otherwise, while perusing and sliding around the ‘net I found this gem that I lifted shamelessly from the brit Daily Mail website… (my comments are in the parenthesis.)

Luxury yachts offer pirate hunting cruises
Luxury ocean liners in Russia are offering pirate hunting cruises aboard armed private yachts off the Somali coast. (Sounds fun! Where and who do I have to talk to to sign up? Can we take friends? I'm sure Bob Owens from Confederate Yankee would love to go! How about a group package deal?)

Wealthy punters pay £3,500 per day to patrol the most dangerous waters in the world hoping to be attacked by raiders. (A bit on the pricey side but still….)

When attacked, they retaliate with grenade launchers, machine guns and rocket launchers, reports Austrian business paper Wirtschaftsblatt. (OH HELL YEAH!!!! Git some!!!)

Passengers, who can pay an extra £5 a day for an AK-47 machine gun and £7 for 100 rounds of ammo, are also protected by a squad of ex special forces troops. (Wonder if they will give me a discount as I don’t need a former Spetnaz bodyguard, and do they have a bulk ammo discount? I mean if I get to go, and go ‘live’ I’m planning on eating up the proverbial Metric Fuck-ton of ammo)

The yachts travel from Djibouti in Somalia to Mombasa in Kenya. (Getting there is half the fun I suppose)

The ships deliberately cruise close to the coast at a speed of just five nautical miles in an attempt to attract the interest of pirates. (Ye Olde “Bait and Switch”…I LOVE IT! Just like the British Navy used to do with “Q” boats to take out U-Boats… make the fuckers think you’re a lamb, then show them that yer the wolf!)

"They are worse than the pirates," said Russian yachtsman Vladimir Mironov. "At least the pirates have the decency to take hostages, these people are just paying to commit murder," he continued. (wah wah wah...And of course, a killjoy has to be heard from… How much you bet Mr. Vlad The Yachtsman has a small arsenal to protect himself on his tub?)

Is that the GREATEST piece of marketing you’ve ever heard of? Legalized Terrorist Hunting! Talk about a brilliant “The Best Offense is a Good Defense” kind of thing… I mean for real… They attack, and expect to ransom you or your boat. What to do? Go out and lure them in, and cull them. It’s magnificently Darwinian in many ways. Free enterprise at work! Only the truly desperate or retarded would now think about hitting a cruise ship in the East African Ocean… Oh well Stupid is as stupid does I suppose. I mean it frees up any and ALL governments from looking like bullies, and helps elimnate a pesky problem.

And for the bleeding hearts out there who say “But they are so poor and it's America's fault yadda yadda…” Hey… Fuck you. After seeing the Iraqis bounce back, the only reason the Somalis don’t get their shit together is that they’re a bunch of ignorant malcontents who live on the hard work of others, as well as our food donations. Their tribal chiefs LIKE the situation and don't want to change it because they are in charge... rebuilding and reorganizing means they'd have to give up their little fiefdoms, and there ain't no WAY they are going to allow that. Hell we have the same issue brewing back in the states... Ever heard of "Term Limits" Senator Kennedy? Hell, the first thing these tin-pot shitheads do when they take over a country is line the intelligentsia of the nation against a wall and summarily execute them. I just wish all those neo-sixties retreads teaching in our hallowed halls could see that. The first people on the 'disposal' lists are those who empowered them to begin with. For historical facts, look at Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao and the current "Gargoyle of the Year" Dear Leader Kim "Kid N Play Called: He Wants His Hairstyle Back" Il-Jong.

Either way, I should really look into starting up my own little business like this… I mean for real… talk about a potential cash cow. And it’s all legal. The laws of defending oneself on the ocean has LONG been established. So fucking what if they are making money off of “murder.” I don’t see it as murder by a long shot… more like pest control and eradication. I think I’ll see if Lil Country is up for this for his honeymoon… it’d sure be a cruise to remember!

Until the next writing bug bites… I’m gonna hit the fartsack and count nekkid wimmen. Until then I remain, The Intrepid Reporter.

Rebel Rouser

2009-06-20T23:55:00.003+03:00

Yes folks.... The IR back again with the latest and greatest from Iraq... but in this case, Iraq takes a sideline. My dad, as those of you know, cashed in this past month, and truthfully, it's been a bitch for the ole Intrepid Reporter to have much to say... those who know me have been in shock, and many have emailed me asking "What the fuck?"... well I'm here to tell you, the verbal abuse I had was directly influenced by the Old Man, and in his passing, I just have had one hell of a time being able to write. Call it the "Death of my Muse/Father." Dad didn't teach me much to be honest...his athletic skills rated right up there with a retarded child in a wheelchair and the only things he ever really taught me how to do, as well as FedBro (my baby brother) was how to drive and shoot, and most improtantly, how to WRITE.

Thusly, its a motherfucker to try and capture the moment, but thankfully due to lugubrious amounts of liquid mind lubricant (Smirnoff 100 proof) that I'm now capable of formulating a coherent thought. The title of this blog is "Rebel Rouser." This is a Duane Eddie classic rock song that, since the Old Man cashed, has been my 'monument' to him in that, as a child of the 50's, Dad LOVED Duane Eddie, and the music that was produced. Every time I start getting ripped, I play it, and hoist one for the Old Man, and hopefully, somehwhere, he's smiling, and if we're lucky, he's hoisting right along side of me.

The othe reason for this post, well... truthfully, one of the few things that was passed on to me, well, as stupid as it sounds, was his ability with a Zippo. Yep. The Old Man, being a child of the "smoking generation" was the ability to manipulate a Zippo Lighter like a fucking Ninja with Nunchucks. I was getting plastered about 15 minutes before this (truth being I'd been getting hammered all night) but the realization that I had my "Countries INC" lighter (Zippo, type one each) and was flipping it, whipping it, and generally doing what would be considered 'bar tricks' with it, whe it hit me, "Hey... here's another thing the Old Man taught me."

Once I realized it, it was like a ephiphani. Dad, being a "Doctor of Some Literary Rupute" (published in like 60 languages and 148 countries), that his true worth was more to me in his day-to-day things that, at the time, seemed minor, but now have a great impact. I'm a ninja master of the Zippo because of him. And it's something, being that my baby bro has never nor EVER will be a smoker, is sort of a 'secret club member' with him. I mean my baby bro ALWAY had cars with Dad, and I was barely a motorhead to say the least, but having this ONE thing that was shared to me, well Hell, its special. Iknow to those of you you who are out there say "So fucking what?", but to me, the ability to one-hand-snap-and-light has new meaning to me, and now, ya'll can look forward to more postings, as I think I've now buried the demons of the past behind me.

Best Regards until my next, I remain, the Intrepid Reporter

...and Back in Baghdad...

2009-05-23T18:18:00.003+03:00

OK friends and neighbors. Back again. This time with a legit update on casual observations I’ve made here in the Land of The Baghdad Café. Ye Olde Intrepid Reporter had a tough one, what with his Dad getting a bad case of the “deads” and all, but seeing that I’ll be home shortly to celebrate his life and see my wife and kids, that about evens the score. So, as the late great Paul Harvey used to say…”Stand by…for NEWS!”

One observation in the ‘supposed’ drawdown is the uptick in Iraqi military activity. I’m not giving any secrets away because even the bloody insurgents can tell the difference between the US troops (grey-digital ACU uniforms) and the Iraqis, (desert tan old style US camo) Seems that the Iraqis, from my observations, are getting more ‘hot n heavy.’ A few weeks ago I was on Route Irish, formerly known by Newsweek magazine as “The SINGLE most DANGEROUS section of highway in the known Universe” (quick aside: my how things have changed!) and as I rolled down the pockmarked pavement, what should I see but a convoy of Iraqis.

Not just any convoy tho. I counted one T-72 Echo model, one T-55 with IR spotlight and night vision variant, two BMP-1 export models, a World War II vintage armored car and an MT-LB Command Track all being moved on what appeared to be the old US Army prime mover flatbeds. Now at first, I thought that these were more ‘trophy’ vehicles. To explain, the Army LOVES taking and shipping the old armor that the Iraqis either abandoned or lost to us and sending it back home so they can park it in front of the Unit’s buildings as a “See what we captured?” For the most part it’s bullshit, heaping , steaming, type: many each. The unit “captured” in that they went down to a muddy field where the tank/apc/whatever has been sitting since the Haj abandoned it in 2003, dug it out of the mud, slapped a fresh coat of paint on it, and then bring it back home to the States to display in some byzantine display of “pseudo-military prowess on the battlefield” Anyways, I digress per usual:

The stuff I was seeing was completely refurbished. As in if not factory new, at least depot-level refinished. Now to those of you just arriving, you may ask “Hey Big Country, how do you know what those tracks were?” Well, for the pencil waving editor, I’ll provide the following. My first MOS (military occupational specialty a.k.a. as my job) was 11 H or Hotel, which was Heavy Anti-Armor Weapons Infantryman. Means I was a tank-killer, and that tank identification was and still is my bread and butter. How many guys do you know who were given a complete set of “Janes All The Worlds Armor” identification books for Christmas? And I don’t mean the little paperback jobbies… but the gorilla two-grand- a-book ID books that even some libraries have trouble getting. Mom and Dad thought they were the PERFECT gift for their lunatic TOW-Gunning son of a gun. Ergo, I’m a fucking expert who still as a hobby lives and breathes Armor ID.

Now, the interesting part on this was as the same day I saw the tanks being moved downtown, I also saw something that reflexively froze my blood in my veins. I was on my way out to Sather when I heard a helicopter overhead. Now, being here for 5 years, I can tell you much like any Vietnam vet can tell you if it’s a Huey overhead or not. I can pretty much distinguish between a Blackhawk, Kiowa, Apache, and a Chinook. On occasion, there are the odd Hueys, being Bell 206’s that the Iraq Government uses, but this time it was different… A deep resonant bass sound… Loud… make that LOUD!!! And thevibration emanating ran from my chest to my inner ear it was so deep and loud. I looked up.. and what do my eyes behold:

A Hind. A motherfucking Hind… Mi-24D model… The reason we developed the AH-64. A pure-d BADASS mo’fo of a Warbird. The Bane of the Afghan Mujadaheen (back when we wuz still buddies) up until we gave them the Stinger MANPAD (typical jihadist… no sense of loyalty or gratitude) and when I was in the Army, the feared and preferred weapon of out adversary, which makes a distinct sound when flying at you… Flying in Iraqi colors no less!

Seems between the Heavy Armor and the Hinds I’ve seen cruising around lately, one of two things are happening. One is that the Iraqis are beefing up and not going to take any more shit from anyone or Two, well…

Hell… I got nothing. The amount of firepower that I’ve seen the Iraqis fielding lately is immense, and I HOPE bodes well for our guys starting to ramp down. Granted the Maliki Government doesn’t want us to go, seeing that there are ten thousand political parties/loyalties here and this government is pretty weak in the hinterlands, but the Iraqi Military might be getting into a position to take over. I mean with the firepower they are accruing, it sure is as hell possible we might see a “Saddam the 2nd” except under the guidance of the “Kinder Gentler” United States and whatever puppet is currently in charge there. It could happen. The majority of Middle Eastern States LIKE having a strongman in charge… ye olde ‘velvet covered iron fist’ ideal. I guess we’ll just have to watch and see, and see what cooks over the next few months.

Stay tuned as it’s bound to be interesting.

Dr. Dad.....May19, 1942 to May 6th 2009

2009-05-09T23:32:00.005+03:00

With great sadness I announce the passing of my father, Dr. Dad. at 1055am on Wednesday May 6th, 2009. He died peacefully and slipped away while I was on the phone with the family... he waited until we were all together. I’m staying on here, per his wishes, and Mom is being supported by #2 Son , His wife and Household Six. There will be a Celebration of his Life in New Hampshire at a time to be determined. I leave with this prayer written by my brother in arms, “Lil Country”: :
Subject: for your father

Hail Mary,
Full of Grace,
The Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou among women,
and blessed is the fruit
of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary,
Mother of God,
pray for us sinners now,
and at the hour of death.

Amen.

Our Father, who art in heaven
hallowed be thy Name,
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those
who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.

Amen.

Lord our Father, please watch over Bill Sr. the father of my best friend. Keep him well at your side with his faithful companion Bomber. Understand his faults and forgive him his vices. He is a good and honorable man and he will stand at your side when he is called from this world. Knowing his son as I do I ask you try not to irritate him, the Irish have such ill tempers. If you feel the need to tame his spirit, a few shots of whiskey should suffice. His council will be indispensable as I am sure you know, after all, you did make him the man he is. Please guard his soul among your most cherished so that when his family arrives at your gates he and Bomber will be there to welcome them.
I ask this of you in the name of the father, the son and the holy spirit,

Amen.

I'm staying on here in Baghdad. Dad, when I saw him last on R&R pretty much said that we're not going to let anything like his death stop me from completeing the Mission. Charlie Mike. F.I.D.O. Fuck it. Drive on. Hard as hell, but necessary, as I'm STILL cleaning up the mess here from my R&R.

Cancer ate him up. I'm actually happy for him, if thats the correct term, nay, relieved as well that his suffering is over. I guess it was really bad at the end. Now, as Middle Country said, "He walks with the Angels."

Myself, I prefer Rhah from the movie "Platoon" and his philosophy: “And if there's a heaven and God I hope there is, I know he's sitting up there, drunk as a fucking monkey and smoking shit. Because he left his pains down here.” I'll miss you Dad.

More later... I had a LONG one I was working on the night before he died, and I'll throw it up later when it's appropriate. Until then, Peace, and tell your parents you love 'em while you can.

WTF? Home? Iraq had less problems...

2009-04-06T22:52:00.002+03:00

OK Dear and Gentle Reader, The Intrepid Reporter is back and has all sorts of 'fun from the home front' stuff going on. Needless to say, I made it home for my well deserved R&R (Rest and Relaxation to you civvies) or my historical fave, I&I (Intercourse and Intoxication) both of which I've been attempting at a new land-speed record. Household Six and the Chilluns have been thrilled to have me home, but nonetheless, there have been a few 'wrinkles' in an otherwise pristine time.

What? Problems you say? Problems? Aye... A whooooole LOTTA identity theft of the I.R. and specifically my bank/debit Credit Card. Seems that for the past 5 years I've been bouncing around the Middle East and dealing with "The Ali Baba Credit and Trust" banks of the area. The Baghdad International Federal Credit Union issued me a personal draft good up to 40 Million Iraqi Dinar (which is worth about 450 pesos or 12 US Dollars when rounding up on the centavos, 'course if I get it in Canadian Dollars, we're talking enough to get a 12 Pack of Molson lite!) So anyways... here's the ole I.R. on vay-kay and I go and use my debit here stateside. Now the only issue I've ever had was ye Ole Bank of America sometimes freaks when my location changes, as in at 9am US Time I charge something in Kuwait, and then 10 hours later, I'm running a bar tab in the airport at Dulles. Usually a 2 minute call to the security folks is good enough to wrap up any questions, but this morning was a special case.

Now those of you following this here reportage know that I've discovered various watering holes in and around Baghdad. Another sure sign of a building economy is the "Intrepid Reporter Economic Progress Theory of Bar Expansion and Alchohol Availability." This Macroeconomic Theory dictates that the Success of an Economy can be Measured in A) Quantity of Boozing Locales and B) Quality of Beverage Available. The more places available = the more money being spent on booze and the quality of booze available = the more money people are willing to spend to get the "good stuff." Kuwait being a prime indicator of the facility of B) in that a bottle of Johnny Walker Black runs $200 a liter. But anyways, It'll need work, but suffice to say, I've been drawing $$$ USD specifically from the various ATMs and kiting checks through the on post exchange to insure a steady cash flow to insure proper lubrication of my synapses. In kiting the checks, I've been monitoring my check flow thru the web on a daily basis to insure that I don't bone the check cashing ability in that if you ricochette one with AFFES, you lose the $100 daily ability they provide.

Imagine my shock this morning when on opening the account, I find I'm in the hole over $300. This from a balance of over $2K. Looted you say? Aye I say... Yeah... Howabout them fuckin Apples? I spend years all over the world in the Center of Shady Central and I get ganked here in the Homeland? Fucking nice huh? Needless to say I went into "Red Alert: Money is missing" mode and called everyone and anyone and rifled through 40 different fraud departments and got damned near 80 % of the bogus charges KIA'd before they got spent out. The only problem was they wouldn't tell me who specifically or where specifically said bogus calls/charges came in from. I do KNOW that it's in Massachusetts from where one person slipped, but they did say I'd need a subpoena to get said info. Unfortunately, thats not a good idea in that my way of dealing with this would be the $99 flight into Boston and show up whatever Ghetto these scumfucks live in, and give them like 30 minutes to shit say, $50,000 USD or I'd have to kill them. Yeah, extortion and hell, considering how they pissed me off, I'd kill them out of hand anyways.

Eh... the only thing that'd be bad is having to dispose of the corpses. In Iraq, carcass-disposal means leaving a body in an orange jumpsuit minus a casaba. The Military and Dirty Haj take care of it from there. The military cleans it up, and the Dirty Haj take the blame, gleefully from what I've seen. Those assholes even tried to make a claim on the mass shooting at the Immigrant Center in New York.... Silly Haj, Massacres like that are done by homegrown psychos, not radical Islamic Wierdbeards. The average "wants to get into Paradise" fuckhead understands that if they WERE in fact to go after a 'soft target' like a mall or something "Mom and Apple Pie" like that, that we'd be all out in a bloodfest against them. THATS why I think they haven't done anything like that. Fact of the matter, the reason they DON'T go for the soft targets is that, besides the "Blue States" that generally are filled with their "Hug a Fucking Commie" filthy Anti-American bastions, the only thing left are Pro-American Red States, and the odds of them getting to cause mass mayhem are pretty slim, as generally the gun-toting folks (like myself) are armed to the teeth, and would live for a chance to slowly shoot one of the "Allahfucks" to pieces. I know I would. If they DID go after a Mall, in say Brookline MA (home to one of the LARGEST jewish populations outside of NYC) then the People of the Socialist Republic of Taxachusetts wouldn't be able to wring their collectivist hands at the oppression of the Hamas and other such things.... Killing Liberals only makes other Liberals into Conservatives, and we can't be having that now, Achmed can we? After all, the old saw of "A Liberal is a Conservative who hasn't been mugged yet." stands hard on that.

More later... I watch the unfolding "Mad Minute Massacres" nationwide with both horror and a sense that we're only seeing the beginning. Keeep your powder dry and remember that I told you here first that this's only the beginning of the "Summer of Madness"... More later y'all!

R&R

2009-03-29T21:32:00.005+03:00

Whooo. OK How many days since my last posting? When was the last time I had internet? How about fucking hot water? Geez... So much has happened, and yet not. Well, lets get to the story as it stands now... Your Intrepid Reporter is in Baghdad, Land that Sanitation and Good Manners Forgot, and will be for the next 24 hours. Then, I sky.

YES!!!

R&R after 5 or so months... 5 and some change actually. Time to kick the dirt offa da bootz and roll to the House, Cold Beer, kids and a warm and (hopefully) Willing Wife... truthfully, she'd damned well better be willing after this long assed enforced celibacy... anyways... Well, lets see...

When we last left the IR, he'd been forced to work long hard assed hours. Nothings changed there. No time off, no internet and no fun. The only relief has been the occasional Extreme Sport of "Drinking Outside The Wire" at the Iraqi bars. A sport not for the faint of heart, nor even the fucking sane. Despite the Militarys enforcement of "No Booze No Fun No Sex" General Order Number One, which happens to end with a codicile written in 'weasel speak' (meaning lawyerese) that "And if we haven't thought of it and written it here, it too, is strictly prohibited." Well, despite that I say "Fuck it." and go for it. I mean what sort of Contractor would I be if I didn't bend the rules now and again? I mean hell... My wife sez there is no 'Black and White' with me, just 'Shades of Grey' as the Dead song goes. I mean as I say "No harm, no foul" then hey? Sometimes you just gotta say "What the fuck?"

Now before I quote Tom Cruise again, I'll pause to beat my head with a fucking mallet, and then I'll continue... So as I was saying, the internet has been totally dicked up lately. Only recently did the genuises I work with figure out how to get it running so I'm good. Fat lot of good of course, seeings that I'm leaving tomorrow, but given the option of staying? OH HELL NO! So yeah, I finally finished the Compound that I was tasked into costructing. Head Hajji Overseer again. Unlike the last job I did back in '04, this one was pretty smooth, albeit that we got ripped of by the Haj on our generators... they said they were new, but two days into the running of them, the fucking muffler broke off of one of them, and the other one runs like a fucking poorly tuned Asthmatic Yugo. Have you ever stood close to a 30K generator running flat out? Think LOUD. Like holy shit loud. Now, imagine it if you can, being even louder. The muffler keeps it so that you can think... without it? the damned thing sounds like a Kenworth running at 110 miles an hour flat out. LOUD LOUD. As in "shakes the fucking walls down" loud. So I get the blame.

Oh yeah... did I mention I have a new boss? I'll refrain from going off... lets just say he looks about a Large Long in an Orange Jumpsuit and I was pricing Machetes in the PX yesterday. Dude had better remember that this IS Iraq and accidents and "The Dirty Haj" do happen.

So yeah, I have to show one pic of the construction :

This is when they started to lay the T-Walls which are supposed to protect us from mortar and rocket attacks, and yes, the Hajji supervising is in fact digging deep in his asscrack. Yeah... "IMPORTANT Note to self... do NOT shake hands with the foreman." The dude kept working that hand there to the point it was obvious that he had 'something' wrong and man, there is just waaaaaaaay too much info just in the fact that I didn't INTEND on that picture being taken. I was snapping away and I happened to catch him at it, but considering the frequency that he was doing it, I'm surprised that ALL the pics of him didn't show "Mister Itchy Ass Haj" doing it in all of them.... Ugh... what a country...

So on other news... One serious note... According to GlobalSecurity dot Org, there have been 38 US Service men and women Killed/Named KIA since the Obamamessiah took office. How many of them have you heard of?

Ahhh thats right... you won't or haven't. The Mass Corporatemedia, also as I call them, the Demomediamania Mob, made up of the likes of the Communist News Network and such have downplayed the loss of our brave warriors. How many times did the media slavishly and completely run every single casualty when Bush was in office or when McCain was running for office, being dragged into the spotlight and laid bloody at the feet of the Republicans? How many families were devastated by these fucking vultures and scum-monkeys by being asked "How does it feel that your son/daughter died for George Bush's war?" Hmmn... like I said... it's time to target the media... physically. If you're a vet, the next time a newman comes over to you, just knock him the fuck out, or, if you're disabled, hose 'em down with Bear Mace. It's the least they deserve. I mean how many times did those Goddamned Vultures DEMAND the right to film at Delaware when the coffins were being offloaded? A couple of hundred that I could see. Now? Not so much. Fuckers. "Freedom of the press?" Howabout the freedom to kick your scummy fucking ass when I get the chance?

I'm truly disgusted. 38 of our best, killed, but no one fucking mention or honor... the Media Clowns used to cover every single death... granted they had an agenda, and I disagree the way they did it, but at least they still allowed America to see that our best had fallen, and allowed the rest of America to pause and maybe reflect, or even say -GASP- a prayer for them and/or for thier families...

Now these fucking douchebag fucking worms hide and bury the news, so as to not 'stain' their "Chosen One." I swear to God in Heaven that when I hit the States tomorrow, if theres a media crew there filming or asking or interviewing troops, I'll have a tough time restraining myself.

Anyways... gotta stop thinging about it... it gets the blood boiling and I got my Irish up so to speak. I'll leave it at this: I'm final;ly going to be home for a while, and am looking hard forward to it, so I may update when I'm there, but that remains to be seen... I'm just thrilled to be going home to my family, cold beer, hot, clean water and flushable toilets. No more blue water poo boxes for 3 weeks!!! Until then, I'll holler at you later!

A Few Comparisons...

2009-03-11T09:59:00.005+03:00

Ok Today Ladies and Gentlemen of the Studio Viewing audience, Your Intrepid Reporter of Fame and Legend is going to relate a few things I noticed in watching a Discovery Channel show the other night. Seems that this was a show talking all about "The Greatest Generation" and the entire World War Two experience as it were. This was a somewhat edjamacational show for those who aren't ardent students of history, but the part that got me, and what sort of teed me off was the constant harping on how "hard the troops of the line had it." And how it was soooooo tough and that the 'younger generations' couldn't 'appreciate the hardship that those troops had to endure.' I call Bullshit on that. They kept having intersperced interviews with some of the guys who were 'on the line' back in the day, but the overwhelming tone of the entire show was "you young folks don't have it as hard as we did back then!" sort of crap. The "I walked up two miles to school everyday, uphill, both ways, in a blizzard!" sort of bullshit. This got me to thinking, and speaking purely from a neutral point of view, those guys back then had it as cake compared to today. This picture I ruthlessly stole from a reinactor website for the 82nd Airborne. The reinactors claim total authenticity, and seeings it was a good shot, it shows how much "Battle Rattle" the grunts in 1944 had to hump. Now granted, the average load bearing gear back then compared to today was primative, but man... the amount of stuff these dudes have on what was called a "Routine Patrol Pictured" shows the basic combat load of an Airborne Infantryman in the field. Notice the Ammo pouches... 4 to a man, 2 on each side, one 'clip' per pouch. Each guy is also wearing a 'steel pot' with liner, and wearing a small rucksack. The weapons pictured are M1 Garands... heavy as hell but a solid 8 shot weapon. Also visable on one guy on the left is the sheath to a knife, probably a close cousin of the K-Bar the marines carried. Add one canteen per man, and realize they were operating in Europe in June...

Now: Compare this to the dudes from the 2nd Infantry Division in a picture shot in Iraq last year. It's not totally clear, but I know, from Experience, that these guys are saddled up in a Kevlar Vest with Plates that tips in ALONE at 50 to 72 pounds depending on the size. Thats just the body armor. Add in at least 3 ammo pouches/bandoliers of ammo holding 2-3 magazines at a pound apiece, throw in the rest of the gear, usually to include a CamelBack water carrier (3 liters of water) and the other ephemera that a grunt humps and ugh! Lets see "The Greatest Generation" take all that and hump it. Granted, the helmet and body armor help save lives, and they didn't have the high speed technology back in the day, but to have to wear ALL of that and in Iraq where the average mean temperature in the summer is like 120 degrees? Cut the "Generation X'ers" a bit of slack here gang! As a contractor I have to hump my own armor and helmet every time I go out on mission, and man, it shows me to be a fat and out of shape former grunt that I used to be. Hell... back in MY "Old Army Daze" WE didn't even have a set of armor like these kids are running around in, never mind suffering the heat while being basted in yer own juices while wearing this stuff. Add in that back in WW2, you KNEW who the 'bad guys' were, and usually where they were, and you were allowed to shoot them. Whereas our guys now are fighting a 4th Generation style conflict, where the 'bad guys' are invisible, and then, even then, shooting them might get you hemmed up and faced with a murder rap... even if it means saving your own peoples lives! To quote Martin Sheen in "Apocalyse Now": "Shit... charging a man with murder in this place was like handing out speeding tickets in the Indy 500."

Yeah, pluses and minuses to both eras... I'm not bashing the WW2 vets per se, but just in the portrayal that the media (AGAIN!) seems to like to do to our guys on a regular basis... Enough ranting on the media for the moment here.

Things here in Iraq have gotten off to a fucked up sort of start these days, but then again, worldwide, I have a feeling that we're building towards 'something.' That something isn't tangable, but considering the number of mass shootings in the States (10 in Alabama or some such place as of this morning) and the mass murder/suicides and shit thats happening all over because of the economy, stress and all the nasty business that the current Administration seems hell bent on creating in an attempt to create a socialist paradise, well then, it's enough to make a person like me a bit MORE paranoid than usual. I mean Hell, Iraq: Suicide Bombings two times in as many days, with Mass Casualties. Ireland: IRA assholes killing Tommies (Brit Troops) in an ambush and then killing a cop the next day. United States: Multiple Mass shootings in random areas at random times.

Mass Hysteria? Not yet, but definately the pressure is building. The Current Abomination...er Administration is also NOT helping matters worldwide. Between the "Hug Me Fuck Me" message that they keep sending out, and the outright fearmongering going on on the news to further his agenda, shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit. I'm in Iraq and I only see what the mass media feed me on AFN on the tube and what I can garner off of the web, and even I can see things are getting funky. The summer hasn't hit, and the economy keeps getting trashed out, taxes are about to hit the roof, and I got a hunch it's time to restockpile some shit as it's not looking too fucking rosy in the future. Think "Pre-9-11" stupidity. In June/July of 2001, I saw a similar trend of 'pressure building' that subsequently saw a 'pressure release' of 9-11 and the series of unending wars going on.

Now, in 2009, the economy is tanking, the wars are winding down, the gummint is broke and looking to tax the ever loving shit out of anything that moves, all the while taking over whats LEFT of the free market, and man, It don't look good. Me, I say stock up on food and essentials cause they ain't gonna be around much longer... Just look at gun sales... even the 'common herd' is spooked, and the people in power know it. As the Chinese Curse goes "May you live in interesting times..."

It's been how long?

2009-02-27T18:40:00.006+03:00

Wow.... Time flies when you're working your ass off, day after day, slaving for "The Man" and not having any down time.... Yep the IR here with not so much for the scene in The Baghdad Cafe, formerly known as the Saddam-A-Go-Go. The only thing I've been doing is 'ye olde nose to ye olde grindstone.'

Seems that "The Big Boss Man" came to town... and I'm burned out for it... Yeah... The Corporate Head honcho showed up and I'm better for it in many respects, especially since he's carried the Corporate Checkcard and Pimp-Roll-O-Cash to smooth out the purchases and such that I've been screaming about over the past few months, it's helped me with my job SIGNIFICANTLY.

My biggest issue though is there's hardly any 'skate time' Not when the guy who's in the "make or break" side of your career is sitting right behind you for 12 hours out of the day. Considering the poor bastard is working AS much if not more, then I'd be amazed... He sits and works with us all day long and then he still has to go home and be joined to the computer, as the States are like 8 hours behind us.... meaning when the Corporate Pinheads schedule a 4pm Eastern Standard telconference, we have to be up at like midnight here... AFTER having already done a fucking 12 hour shift... But it's the reason I haven't had too much commentary to throw out there as of late. I've been flat the fuck out busy busy and to the point I haven't updated anything, to include facebook, myspace or any of the other bits of entertainment you loyal readers follow me and the Not So Much Lately Adventures of the Intrepid Reporter.

But, as of late, Baghdad is quiet. The changeover between 4th Infantry Division and 1st Cavalry Division is pretty much over with now. Yep... leave it to me to be 'back with the Cav' again like I was in 04-05. I just can't seem to escape 1st Cavalry Division... it's like a reoccurring cold, or actually, considering how the Cav annoys me, I'd say it's more like having a case of herpes... flares up and annoys the shit out of you at the most inopportune times... I mean it was being in the Cav that got me hurt many many moons ago, and it was the Cav that screwed me over every time I turned around during my Med Board, and then, in 04, it was the Cav that abandoned me, Lil Country, and the rest of the CACI folks when they 'pulled the line of battle' back during a particularlly hairy week, leaving us as "Fresh Meat" for the Dirty Haj if they felt so inclinded. The Cav... as I say of the patch

"The Horse Never Ridden, The Line Never Crossed, and the Color Right Down The Back."

That about sums up 1st Cav... and I've EARNED the right to bag on that unit... Having spent 4 years and all the shit I went through, I have DEFINATELY BT-DT-GTTS.

But yeah. Baghdad is quiet. Mosul now? Not so much. Reports filtering down through various 'shall remain unnamed' sources have filled the IR up with all sorts of tales... Seems that the Surge that the Media loved to lambast but now keep their mouths shut about worked in that the US Army, combined with a newly re-energized Iraqi Military, succeeded in driving the majority of terrorists and babyrapers right out of the Capital. They headed North into Kurd Kountry... Sunni Central from my understanding of it. We've taken some casualties (another thing you WON'T hear from the media as trumpeting casualties lays it on the Obamamessiahs Lap rather than George "I'm Outta Here" Bush.) but we're still winning.

Which brings me to my point of an earlier post. I didn't get ANY responses about beating on the reporters or such ideas. I mean "Beat The Press" is such a cute bit of wordplay, and the idea of taking some of these neo-socialist fucking hacks and feeling the impact of my "mighty right fist o' death" on one of their smarmy, mewling, puking, plastic-enhanced grills, and having the satisfaction of watching caps and teeth fly like so many chicklets from a goalies' mouth.... Damn... I need a cigarette... That would be OH so nice. To see Dan Rather get stomped (even though just pushing him over or hiding his dentures would be good enough) while singing the R.E.M song for all of his inordinate Anti-American Tirades... to see all of them Tarred and Feathered properly. Properly in that the tar is heated to such a degree that said victim(s) would usually die from the 2nd and 3rd degree burns even before all the feathers could be properly applied.

I'm now OFFICIALLY on the "Anti-Press Bandwagon." The country is broke, broken and we've got nothing to show for it than a neophyte president who's wholly incapable of stringing a coherant thought into a concerted sentence without the use of a teleprompter who was elected more by a festering neo-liberal bunch of malcontents who, rather than actually do their jobs, were content to be Democratic Cheerleaders and get a man elected who, in reality, scares the ever loving shit out of me. Me? I'd prefer if The Hillaroid had gotten in... better the "Socialist Demon You Know" than the "Closet Muslim Neo-Fascist You Don't." The Press succeeded in swinging the vote, and is now complicit in hiding the ABYSSAMAL job that their chosen one is doing.

4 Trillion dollars.

4 with 12 zeros.

4,000,000,000,000.00

God Help us. I'm barely making ends meet working my ass off for the "Imperial Federal Government" and I'll be lucky if they don't chop the 'tax free' duckets off of my tax return. It's like the ONLY reason I stay here. Tax free is the ONLY reason, and making 100K a yearhelps too. No such thing as that in the states now eh?

BTW: One last note: My mailing addy has changed to

"My Name"

MNCI-C6

APO AE 09342

DSN 485-5981

The DSN Number on the bottom helps the mailroom folks to call me when the stuff shows up. Please feel free to mail me anything and everything. My "other mother" Susan sent some of the most KILLER chocolate chip cookies, which actually made it here inside of 5 days of her mailing them... My thanks for those... they rocked!!!! Any booze drugs or anything else... well, I'm NOT supposed to get them, but at this point, any and all donations are gratefully recieved. Seeings that I'll be home in the end of the month, (R&R Baby YEAH!!!) I'm really looking forward to it.

OH One more thing. Let me know if anyone wants a job over here... working with me. I'm literally hiring another Logistician, so send me them resumes to all who are interested. Until then, I remain, the Intrepid Reporter.

Iraq and Evolution to Revolution

2009-02-08T10:54:00.001+03:00

Greetings and Salutations from Iraq, the country that time, common sense and anything Decent forgot!!!

I’m live (for now) here at the Baghdad Kit Kat Klub, formerly known as the Saddam-A-Go-Go and hanging pretty regularly in the Sinbad Bar and Grill at the BIAP Hotel and Convention Center. I’m regular enough to know all of the wait-staff, and am now pretty familiar with the “movers and shakers” here in country. The Sinbad is the magnet for “People of Power” who wish to chill, among which are NSA, CIA and State Department types… Me? I get by ‘cause I know the owner of the place. Yeah, it’s all about who you know, or if female, who you blow. To a point, I spent one night getting boozed up with a member of the Iraqi Parliament, Mr. Nabeel Musawi, who is listed as the “Leader of the Loyal Opposition” in many theaters, but is also a member of the Iraqi National Congress. Yepper, the Old Intrepid Reporter is moving up in the world, and partying with peeps who are the “top o’ da top” here in theater.

Truthfully, it was a fascinating time hanging with “Naib” as I called him, which is short for his name Nabeel, and also Arabic for “Chief.” He was excited by the upcoming election, but terrified by the concept of the Obama folks and the future of Iraq. To understand, this dude was against Saddam BEFORE it was cool to be against Saddam. Back when old Saddy used to send agents into other countries to assassinate his critics. His biggest fear was how the Americans might leave, and that his people would not be fully ready to “take the helm” Another fear is that we’d leave before the Iraqis are ready to defend themselves from the Iranians. Seems that the age-old hatreds are still there… I mean REALLY old as in “Persians VS Babylonian” type hatreds… the whole “This is SPARTA” timeframe shit… these people are REALLY into holding a grudge let me tell you… Either way, the election went surprisingly well, and for once was without any sort of ‘real violence’ that I’d seen in ’04.

Nicely done Iraq. At this rate I’m gonna be out of a gig…

So anyways: Back in the States… now known as The United People’s Socialist State of Obamaland.

Let me begin this section with a small warning: Just WHAT. THE. FUCK. I mean I knew that the Obamamessiah was going to be bad news, but it’s like the bad news a Doctor gives you :”We’ve found a growth and it’s dick cancer” kind of news. I mean I knew Obama was gonna play towards the Muslims and try to Eat some Islamic Ass in some Leftist Neo-Marxist “Rodney King Can’t We All Just Get Along?” Worldview, but Holy Shit! Check this little number:

“By executive order, President Barack Obama has ordered the expenditure of $20.3 million in migration assistance to the Palestinian refugees and conflict victims in Gaza.

The "presidential determination" which allows hundreds of thousands of Palestinians with ties to Hamas to resettle in the United States was signed on January 27 and appeared in the Federal Register on February 4.

President Obama's decision, according to the Register, was necessitated by "the urgent refugee and migration needs" of the "victims."

Few on Capitol Hill took note that the order provides a free ticket replete with housing and food allowances to individuals who have displayed their overwhelming support of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the parliamentary election of January 2006.”

What.
The.
Fuck.

We don’t even have the ability to take care of the fucking people in our own country, and now we’re gonna import a Whole Horde of Dirty Hajj into the States? I mean I could understand if we were using them as targets on a live fire range or something, but what in the Name of Screaming Tree Jesus is the Obamamessiah fucking doing? Hamas? In The States? OMFG give me strength.

Talk about going the EXACT opposite of the Bush years idea of “We’re fighting them there to keep them from fighting them here” and now a turnabout of that to “C’mon in… the jewelry is in the dresser, the good scotch is under the mantel, and try not to rape my wife too hard.” Mentality. I’m NOW convinced that a LOT of the nutbars who were screaming “He’s a closet Muslim” might have been onto something there. The quote of “hundreds of thousands” scares me fucking shitless… there just ain’t that many Seven-Elevens or taxis in America to provide them with a job, and when the Dirty Haj get to the states, the first thing they’re gonna get is a welfare check and a free house? FUUUUUUUUUUCK!

It’s enough to make a white man join a ‘social club.’

Me? I’m DOUBLING my order of ammunition this month and REDOUBLING an order for some more Mountain House prepared foods. My advice? Do the same. Guns, food, water and look into the whole “Hardening the House” thing cause I got me a wild hunch it’s gonna get reeeeallly fucked up in the states soon. Until then, I’ll keep working until I need to come home.

Don’t start the revolution without me.

Despite the Recent Mortars...

2009-01-25T13:17:00.008+03:00

I've been really busy on the job, but have been trying to update and such. FINALLY though, I"VE GOT BANDWIDTH!!! Which means y'all get a few pictures, and later, hopefully if it works (not in this post mind you) but video too. The pic above is of a new 7 or 10 story building in the Baghdad area... It's a new business center, and as you can see, they want YOU to KNOW that they are, as the sign sez "OPEN." It's a sure-fire positive sign of things getting better. A picture that would NEVER be published in the states, but here it is, Brought to you by the letter "F", the number "69" and the World Famous Intrepid Reporter.This one here I just sort of snapped on the way home. What struck me is how the Media, Other Governments and Liberal Fucktard Assholes of the planet (and in our own country) try to make us out to being an "Army of Occupation." Let me ask thid: In World War Two: Did we allow the krauts to keep flying the Swastika when we won? Answer: Fuck No! So, my 'proof' of this NOT being an occupation is this: a simple Iraqi National Flag flying proudly on Route Irish... which in itself is amazing as in 04, normally I stood a decent chance of getting shot if I stopped to take a pic like this.

Now, to update on other things and ephemera. Before the "One" was crowned...er...cor'nated...er... I mean the in-auger-ated "One"... you know, that black dude. Anyways, the Dirty Haj had been throwing all sorts of nastiness our way, which in a word, SUCKED. That and the closure of the Duty Free... no more easy booze unless I go to a bar OUTSIDE the wire, which in itself is an adventure, as it means
A) going to bar

B) drinking like a fish as fast as possible (Chug 3- 1 liter Beers and 3 Double Jacks in 45 minutes)

C) jumping back in the truck and hauling ass back to base and getting inside a 'safe zone' before the buzz REALLY kicks in. (Gotta appear sober at the gate, lest the authorities become aware you've been boozing.)

It's sort of an "Extreme Drinking Game" put to it's fullest extent...

Said Bar being located pictured above, the Baghdad International Airport Hotel and Convention Center. Home of the Sinbad Bar and Grill. Yep. No shit folks... and yeah, that is a functioning fountain in the froont. They've recently added on to the building and added a Shisha Cafe, which is where you go to smoke up the flavored tobaccos through a Hooka Pipe. It's a nice hotle, but a bit pricey at $225 a night for a suite. But considering it's 6 bux for a beer and 3 bux for a decent shooter of booze, I'll risk the $$$ and the time to go. Seeing the asshole in the back waving his hand... What do you want? OH? WHY would I risk life, limb and my ass in going out there? Well... the answer is simple Poindexter:

I live in fucking Stonehenge.

Big fucking rock walls surround every fucking inch of my house, my yard and my life. THIS is why I booze...

You would too, if'n you were here.

Until Later, I'll keep my head down, and my liver lubricated. Email me those of you who do, and let meknow what you think of the pics and such. Otherwise, I remain The Intrepid Reporter.

Damn I though it was too quiet...

2009-01-19T19:03:00.003+03:00

OK Dear Readers
The Intrepid Reporter of Lore and Fame, (if only in my own twisted mind) has been in the nightmare mode that Baghdad has become. Namely the Dirty Fucking Haj (TM) has been getting active again.

Yeah.. we went from "Dead and Boring" to "Potentially Dead From Incoming." This sucks man. I've Been There Done That with this shit before. Hell, I took 2 seperate pieces of shrapnel in 04 when I got caught at Logbase Sietz during the "Worst of the Worst" back in the old days... I really DON'T want to relive those days... like when my fucking house got hit in Sept 04. For those of you just joining the IR Report, I was smart enough to go to work on September 14, 2005 fifteen minutes early. Thankfully I did as my house took a DIRECT hit from a chinese 82mm mortar round which, if I had been there, would have reduced the Intrepid Reporter to grape jelly. I was early as I got into a pissing contest with my so to speak manager at the time, who had given me shit about the fact that I was always JUST on time and never early. That morning I decided to show the prick I could be early, and because of it, I'm still alive. Thanks be to Jesus that I went with my urge to show the prick that I could be early.

Anyways:
Right now, man, lately, we've been under some INSANE level of incoming… like compared to 2004, not so much, but considering that when I got here, it'd been over 9-10 months since any, mind you, ANY rounds hit, and for like 3 days/nights in a row we've had between 2 to 4 incoming rounds. The Close In Weapons System called "Cee-Whiz" has been getting the majority of them, except for the one that jammed/fucked up the other night. Mind you OF FUCKING COURSE that was the one that impacted like right across from my house. Shook the walls blew dirt and stuff everywhere on my porch and roof and rattled my nerves pretty well… killed my buzz too… the bastards!

I can deal with incoming however, it's the side effects like negating a mellow night and having to don my Dragon Skin. Let's face it, it's uncomfortable to lay in the bed and wear that stuff as Household Six was on the Skype Phone with me and heard the whole thing. Hell hath no fury like an Enraged/terrified Italian/Sicilian wife. She sez "Wear it" and well, I tell her I do. Realistically, so far today/tonight it's quiet, but it's only5:44pm local. They seem to shoot at us later in the evening, right after the evening pray call. The real pain in the ass is that we don't seem to have a CAP (Combat Air Patrol) over us of Apaches like we did 'back in the day.' It used to be they'd shoot a few rounds at us, and the Apaches would get a grid location from the "Far Finder" Radar (which tells them roughly within a few meters where the rounds came from) and the next thing we'd usually hear was the beautiful sound of the Bushmaster 25 mike-mike blasting the hell out of the retards who were stupid enough to shoot at us.

The reduction of forces has me nervous actually. They seem to be 'building up' towards 'something.' The word on the street is that they want to 'test' the new POTUS and what with everything I'm reading/hearing/seeing on the net/radio and TV, his talking about shutting down here in Iraq sooner is only going to provoke them into doing to us what Hamas is/has been doing to Israel. Meaning small provocative attacks that are pin pricks… not very effective on causing casualties per se, but makes life fucking miserable for the Joes and us Scumbag Contractors.
Otherwise, y'all say a little pray for the ole IR... things here be a bit off the chain...
Until Later
The Intrepid Reporter

The Coolest Foot Patrol EVVA

2009-01-11T20:14:00.004+03:00

An interesting thing happened onto the way to the latrine this morning...

Now isn't that a show stopper?

Yeah, things here are quiet, and rather than go into how boring it is, I'll make mention of some of the wacked out weirdness that I'm so fond of reporting. Now, granted, the Intrepid Reporter of Fame and Legend (if only in my own mind) does his 'morning abulutions' like any other dude, but this morning was a real shall we say interesting experience on the way to the throne. Like I said, I was on my way to the Throne Room to my morning Shit, Shave and Shower (generally in that order, unless I have a case of the Explosive Shits) and as I came out of the hootch, I heard some music. Faint, but definately music.

Now here in Baghdad, depending on the time of day, sounds blasting out of the ethers is generally classified by three prime catagories. These being:
1) Announcements of Controlled Detonations and such stuff. They at least try to warn us when they're gonna light off some serios "boom-boom" so's to not freak out the REMFs.
2) Announcements of Incoming. This usually is after the fucking rounds have impacted, the followed byu the "All Clear" as the idiots in the TOC realize the rounds have already either hit, or been taken out by the CIWS.
3) Howling Hajjis baying to their god. 4 or 5 times a day, at any given time... now granted, I've covered this in other reports, so the people just tuning in have to realize that like multiple times a day the Fucking Hajjis play the Muezzinin Music or Islamics Call To Prayer. Granted, entertaining the first few times you hear it, but after a few weeks of it, you want to choke the fucking life out of the dude baying into the mike.

Now none of this matched, and there was a distict rythm to said music. It got louder as I got outside of the T-Wall barrier, and then started to form into something more comprehensive.

Techno. German electric boogie Techno.

OK I thought, what sort of deranged dudes would be blasting this at 0600 am in the fucking morning? Well... as I turned the corner, who should be bouncing and beboppin along but a squad of Grunts. And when I say bepoppin, I do mean it... They were in full battle rattle, rifles slung and unloaded, but still wearing their gear fresh off a patrol overnight in Baghdad proper. They were sort of "struttin it" to the music, and in step and kind of boppin along like they were back on the block or something... except stateside, they'd never be armed as heavily as they were. I looked closely, and the trail soldier was obviously the source of the tunage. I looked closer, jaw on the ground mind you as this was one insanely bizarre sight, and saw that the trail Grunt had a pair of speakers mounted on the top of his body armor complete with specialized carriers in ACU pattern. He obviously had them plugged into a IPod or something, and had the volume cranked. I was staring (obviously at what to quote Mr Clean from 'Apocalypse Now': "This shor nuff be a bizarre enuff sight in the middle of all dis shit!") and the Trail Grunt looked over and broke into a HUGE grin at the OBVIOUSLY befuddled contractor and said "This is the COOLEST foot patrol YOU'LL ever see!!!"

Yeah it was...

Happy New Year - Peace on Earth - Keep your head DOWN!

2009-01-01T09:22:00.003+03:00

Happy New Year to all from the Baghdad Cafe, formerly known as the Saddam-A-Go-Go... The title of todays missive from the front has nothing to do with the situation as such, but was a title header from my mouthpiece, Mi Consigleri, you know, my Lawyer. He's a great guy and has been a friend of the family for years and years at this point. I was able to re-connect with him and his wife, who I had sort of drifted from if only in a physical sense in that I hadn't seen them in nigh a many year or so. But when my Brother "Mr Fed" got married, they were there, and since then, I've attempted to maintain some better contact, if only in the respect that I gave them the blog location, and told them that thats where they could find my adventures, as well as any long-distance shouts for counsel, legal or otherwise.

But, New Years Day in Baghdad... and I finally took some pictures from outside the wire. It was a short trip, curtaining my usual "resupply" as the gate is now out of control with 'contraband' searches. Yeah. They caught wind of the many trips some of us were doing out there to get the hootch, and subsequently, I'm done in that it isn't worth my job to get a buzz on. So now I'm back to being 'dry' until further notice. Eh... it'll make Household Six happy in that NOW I'll be saving money instead of spending it.

Now... I started this on the 1st of January... I realize that it's now like the 10th, but the reason for this is the fucking Hajji-Net that I have to use suffers from an UNGODLY lack of connectivity and bandwidth. A squirrel on a treadmill hooked up to a generator a'la Gilligans Island would have a better chance of maintaining the loop. I'm stuck posting now with no pictures, but I promise, once I get them up and get in my new "personal" bandwidth, I should be able to post. I guess it'll be a few posts, as I've been somewhat 'camera mad' lately. I've got some great shots that I want to share... the stuff the normal media won't show in any way, shape or form.

But to give an update, New Years, as stated was a boring afair to a certain degree. Quiet, dull and booze free. The only thing as of late (and right on time I might add) is the IR came down with some abdominal crud that now has me booked to the gills with killer levels of antibiotics. The docs here, per usual, are great, and since it wasn't sure what exactly I have, they decided to kill anything I may have, had or ever may get. Overkill works for me. The main reason I went to the docs was I was feeling a might 'sore'... specifically it felt like someone had kicked me in the scrote. Yeah... too much heavy lifting as of late and I done went and strained the 'vital area' and then, whilst in there I mentioned that I didn't feel so hot all around the whole abdominal thing. They checked, gave me antibiotics and then Praise Be To God, a script for the groin pull of Percocet! The doc initially tried to give me naprosin or some such shit, but after explaining that naprosin was like eating tylenol (no good for me... not enough pain killing ability) she hooked me up with the percs, so I'll be plenty happy and painless for a few days at least.

On to other things, The workload here has been pretty heavy... lots of heavy lifting and such. The VSAT dish I'm helping to field weighs in at 1000 pounds total, which, I guess for what it's capable of is lightweight. If this's the light model, God help me if I ever had to fuck with the heavy. The military is all about getting 8 of these things shipped in and fielded every two or so weeks, but what with the holidays, shipping issues, and the usual bullshit that comes with working for the "Green Machine" it's taking a bit longer. Needless to say, besides being a "strong back-weak mind" I've also been doing other duties and trying at the same time to have some fun.

On the fun side, there ain't been no bombs, rockits or durned mortar rounds round this way since that one night waaaaay the hell back when the SOFA agreement was signed. MockRetard Al-Sadist's boys demonstrated their displeasure with it, and subsequently, I found out that the Apache Gunships shortly expressed their opinion, which from my understanding was a 'permanant' end to the arguement. Gotta love the Apache... 25mm Bushmaster "Deathcannon" and Missles to rip open a battalion of tanks... what chance does the Dirty Haj have? I mean if you haven't seen that gunsight footage of them assholes getting blown to fertilizer, I suggest a youtube search of "Iraq Apache Gun Footage" and it should come up. Gruesome even in Nightvision Green but OH so sweet!

One thing I FINALLY got to do was build a deck on the front of my hootch. It was a bitch to do as I had to utilize "Ferengi Modes of Acquisition" to secure the lumber. Thankfully, the stuff is usually just laying around in piles, and I was fortunate enough to 'acquire' enough to complete the project... The trick is to pull up and LOOK like you're SUPPOSED to be loading the lumber on the truck, and if asked, have a cover story ready. That and finding time to work on it. I had to do it on 'my time' usually during the down time right before dark. I usually work from 8am until 4pm, and then I have a break until the emails stateside start coming in at 8pm to 10pm... plus other shit that crops up like having to go to the airport and other such shit. Either way, it took me a few weeks, but now I've got a nice little deck that extends out on the front porch, and in the summer it'll kick ass for relaxing after work. That and it keeps me out of the fucking mud here for the rest of the winter season, which was part of my reason for building it. I'll post them pics too when I can.

Other busy fun things here are that I'm starting to get replies on my BIG project, which is building a compound for the company here on Liberty. We got some solid bids, and I expect the beancounting assholes to try and have their say, but seeings that I got a good bid back in early November that they didn't take, and the price has now doubled, I advised them to not be fucking stupid and jump on this shit. It amazes me how corporate can be so dumb... I had gotten a GREAT bid of lik 78K to build and outfit our stuff... it's now at like 200K... The reason being supply and demand... what with Baghdad shutting down (everything but the Embassy I hear) and coming here to Liberty and Victory, the space and supplies are in short supply, but GREAT demand. I TOLD them dumb bastards that this would happen, but they blew me off, "because they know best"... Suuuuuuuuure you do... stupid suited fruits in wing tips sitting on a Ledger with a thumb in the ass and a pocket protector in the jacket. Me? I'm just the 'guy on the ground' with 5 years overseas experience... WTF do I know?

Well, break out the lube oil and bend over boys... this'n here's gonna be an allllllllll day affair.

Otherwise, Like I sdaid, quiet... almost too quiet. We'll have to see as RUMINT (Rumor Intel) is that the conventional wisdom is that the Dirty Haj are gonna try to 'test' the Obamamessiah. Me? The next week or so I'm keeping the body armor handy as in the past, RUMINT tends to be a 60-40 kind of thing.... 60 percent of the time it's total bullshit, but that 40% is what can kill you. I'll upsdate more, and when I get some fucking bandwidth, I'll share more pics. I can't even post the pics to my fucking MySpace or Facebook page either! Fuck. Anyways... Happy Belated New Year Y'all!

The Christmas Trip and Other Observations...

2008-12-28T19:22:00.001+03:00

Hi Ho! Merry Bah Humbug and all that rot… Christmas is OVER thanks be to God! OK, granted the holiday is supposed to be a celebration of the Birth of Jesus Christ and all, but to those of us here in Iraq its just another day, especially those of us who are missing our families… especially my kids. Christmas #4 away… God this’s lame, but hell, I had a good time despite the “missing my fam” thing.

Specifically, I managed to get a flight out to Spiecher on Christmas Night. Now this in itself was a phenomenal thing in that I finally got to have a ‘birds eye view’ of the country again. My first flight left out of Victory kind of late. I’m not going to give specifics as there’s just too much danger in giving out info like flight times and locations and such… “Loose Lips Sinks Ships” is still a realistic fear. Case in point:

While waiting for a flight out, I saw a ‘gentleman’ come walking up to the helipad. I use the term ‘gentleman’ in the respect that he was in a Brooks Brothers suit jacket, and the rest of the outfit, from his arrow shirt to his Bally shoes screamed “Washington D.C. Bigwig” and was bec’ fin. As in tres chic. Well, what the hell he was doing travelling with us ‘commoners’ was beyond me. Usually dudes dressed like him are chartered their own birds, complete with heavily armed gunship escorts. Well, Mr DC as I’ll call him, well, he was obviously expecting the aforementioned treatment, and obviously, he wasn’t happy about flying ‘coach’ with us common swine. He was on a cell phone yelling at some poor bastard and lambasting the shit out of them, switching from Arabic to English and back and forth. Thing was he then started telling “Look, the flight leaves at “X” time and will be landing at “Y” time at helipad “Z”.

Whoa. Big Time NO-GO!!!

See, the Dirty Haj have the ability to tap our cellies. Lets face it, the cell phone towers are out ‘on the economy’ outside of the wire, and you and I BOTH know that the Dirty Haj use the technology. Shit, the Second Battle of Fallujah, the FIRST thing the fucking Jarheads did was waste the cellie towers so’s the Dirty Haj wouldn’t have their normal means of commo. And it worked… quite well from what I understand. The First Battle of Fallujah, they DIDN’T do this, and the Dirty Haj had better co-ordination because of it. The second time, fuck the locals and whoever else it upsets. Them towers got nuked first. So to continue…

I waited til Mr DC was off the phone, and went over VERY politely and asked him if his cell phone was a NSA (No Such Agency) secured cell. He looked confused and told me no, at which point I delivered a VERY POLITE but firm admonishment to him about Operational Security, and that if I was going to be flying with him, I didn’t wan t him broadcasting to the fuckin bad guys all the info they need to bag us… I mean if he wants to kill himself, then fine, fucking go for it, but I’d rather make it home to my family. I also mentioned that since he WAS so high on the food chain, (State Department I later found out… like the Mo’Fo’ in Charge) that the Bad Guys were probably LOOKING to bag him, and please in the future don’t be so fucking clueless.
As I was delivering this, his PSD handler (Personal Security Detachment) listened in, and was nodding like the whole time. He thanked me (politely right back atcha!) and rolled to get his bag. Later he came over and apologized pretty well for having been a dumbass, and that he was embarrassed that a contractor pointed this out to him, and that he should have known better. Either way, he was cool, and I got to correct someone WAAAAAAAAAY up on the Food Chain!!! God, it made my day so to speak… so to continue yet again.

The flight was long one. On a UH-60 Blackhawk. Good bird… just really REALLY cold at night in the winter. The only heat comes from the turbines leaking in through the roof. The other drawback, we had to still wear full battle rattle. In my case, an HUGE ass heavy fucking body armor of Dragon Skin and Level Four Titanium Plates. Wears on the back (send some Percs Mom!!!) and leaves me sore for days after. So anyways, the info that was wild was this… Baghdad is ALIVE and doing GREAT!!! The whole city, with minor exceptions, was completely lit up, and despite past things, there seemed to be an assload of vehicles, civilian, type many each boogieing around the town. Two or three years ago, the only thing you might see were HMMWVs or tanks tooling around after dark, and if you DID see a car, it was usually blown to hell by the Good Guys because the Bad Guys were the only ones who’d be breaking curfew.
Yeah, the city was lit up like New York or LA (unheard of in 04 or 05) and the people were out and about. Despite the Masshole Mediaheadache lying to you all, the people and country are coming back, and the infrastructure is coming back, as well as the power and other shit too. Case in point, they are now installing and almost done with the installation of all of the light poles on the way to Baghdad International Airport. The Army cut them all down back in 04 as the fucking Dirty Haj like to place shaped charges against them, and blow them up on convoys coming by. Now? Not so much. They’ve been setting up the new lights and even installed an irrigation system so that the route (Route Irish mind you, 2004’s voted “The Most Dangerous Section of Highway in the Known Universe… one hell of a title eh?) this so that the route will be green again and lush on the way to and from Baghdad.

(In Dice Clay’s voice) Dan Rather? Yeah… I FUCKED him!!!!

For real… No mention of this. No mention of ANYTHING positive STILL! I’d have to say, that when it IS all said and done, that I’m forming a group named “Iraq Veterans Against The Media” and promote senseless violence on ANY member of the media, print or television. Assault them on the streets… beat the fuck out of them. Firebomb their businesses… after all, they pretty much encouraged the Dirty Haj to do the same to the troops during the entire fucking war, so I say, like Karma, Payback is a MOTHERFUCKER. I mean how quickly would they buckle and bend? Even the government would be for this… at least the current administration. I’m buying that web domain name too. I’ll build the website on the side as another project, and I’m going to stock it with an exhortation in “weasel-speak” that I lift from the Earth Liberation Movement website… “weasel-words” in that I personally am not responsible for what happens, but if something does, I’ll condemn it per se.

But otherwise, the trip was cool. I got to visit old friends and we got bombed on shitty tequila. I ended up holding Gina’s hair (not the wife but the friend) while she hurled her guts out… she hasn’t had much along the lines of booze as of late, and the Tequila was a bit of a kick in the head. I ended up keeping her from barfing all over herself, and because of that, and that I got her in her bunk without too much hassle, I consider it a night well spent. Problem was, the next day I was hungover as the tequila was REALLY BAD. I normally don’t feel a hangover, but that day, Yepper… it was ugly.

The flight back was uneventful. I flew back on a CH-47 Chinook or “Shit-Hook” and that was great… fast, warm and I bought myself a set of ‘in-the-ear’ headphones for my MP3 player that aren’t available here on Victory, and wore those as opposed to regular earplugs. Yeah… flying on these birds, there ain’t no soundproofing, and earplugs are mandatory unless you never want to hear properly again. These lil earbuds allowed me to jam the fuck out to a killer soundtrack of Rob Zombie and other ‘combat style’ music, (read Heavy Metal and such) and it kept me from going deaf from the helicopter itself.

Otherwise, been back now about two days, and going to be trying another bounce over New Years with Lil Country to supply him and get all sorts of deranged out in TQ. It’s a bitch to get to TQ, so I’m gonna try bright and early on the 29th and 30th to get out there. Hopefully It’ll work.

Mom (my mom that is) wants me to place my mailing addy up here so those of you who want to mail me some stuff, can. Those of you who WOULD mail me stuff know my ‘real handle’ and I’m not posting that, but the mailing addy is:
The Intrepid Reporter (Big Country) My real name
3Di Technology
APO AE 09344
No porn drugs or booze… Well, booze if you can get it to me LOL! Beyond that, I’ll place some more pics from outside the wire like I’ve been promising in the next posting. I’ve been busy as fuck as we all know, and that’s just how it rolls. Until then, I remain the Intrepid Reporter, Big Country.

Christmas Eve Notes

2008-12-25T00:15:00.001+03:00

OK Folks:
I promised photos from outside the wire, but I haven’t made a trip that allowed me to take said pics. Not that there’s been any danger, more of the line that A) It’s Christmas Eve and B) The only run I made out there was to hit the duty free to get a goodly supply of booze to insure I would be well lubricated through what I consider to be some insanely tough times. I’ve been trying for six plus times over the past week or so to go get with my friends at another FOB to spend the holidays with them. Seeing that my REAL family is in the states, and having a good time, I figured I’d try to get with my “Iraq Family” which consists of my best friends to include Lil Country, and get a load on with them. Like I said, tough times… one Christmas at home with a broken leg in the past 5 years… Fuck me.
Problem is, as in the States, because things are mellow, almost every single chopper flight I’ve tried to get has been cancelled due to ‘weather’ or some other such shit. Tonight, the sky is clear as a bell, but my guess is that the CW-2/4 flying the bird decided he couldn’t see Hong Kong, so therefore, no go on the flight. It was a piss me off in that I had to get ‘suited up’ in full battle rattle to include my Dragon Skinz and Plates and helmet, and since I made it a point of being there 45 minutes before the flight, I was wearing said afore-mentioned gear, minus skull bucket, as I waited, (apparently in vain,) for the helo. Not once, not twice, but six fucking times over the past week they’ve shitcanned the birds going where I wanted to go.
Eh… it’s the holiday. Let ‘em get the rest and chill mode when they can. My only piss me off is I’m stuck here, instead of with close friends, pecking out in a two finger mode this fucking report rather than winging it out to party central. Now this leads me into some interesting info I copped while hanging out on the helipad. Seems that when yer travelling in theater, you meet ALL sorts of people. Case in point, today it was the head of the U.S.O. contingent, and the head of the J.V.B. Now you all (or at least those who aren’t retarded) should know what the U.S.O. is… the J.V.B. I’ll explain to avoid the editor in the back with his goddamned questions.
The J.V.B. stands for the Joint Visitors Bureau. It’s where the celebrities and other such IMPORTANT folks come and stay at Victory and other major bases. In ’04 I met Toby Keith there in a one-on-one, and it’s where Lil Country and I got to fuck with that asshole Geraldo Rivera. (If you didn’t hear/see that one, you missed a classic ‘common man v.s. celeb’ fight so to speak) But I digress… I was on the periphery of a conversation between Ms. U.S.O. and the J.V.B. Lieutenant…
Now a lot of you back home saw the WWE (World Rassling Entertainment) show “For the Troops” that the McManns put on over here… It’s really cool that WWE comes over, and the setup and filming was done a few weeks ago. Me? I saw it, and avoided it as I was busy, and realistically, this gig was for the troops. They had ALL the major stars there and the idea was to have as many troops in the scene as possible. Unlike Kuwait where they wereWANTING my big ass to show up, this time I stayed out of the way. Let’s face it, I’m Bigger than MOST of the WWE stars. At 6’4 and 320lbs, and in pretty good shape, despite the steroid enhancement, I’d kick half of their asses, and ask for seconds LOL! Yeah… pure ego talking there. Anyways, besides hyping the Big Country stats, reality is this: I overheard the LT who’s in charge of ‘handling’ the stars. They stay at the J.V.B….and well according to the LT and these are EXACT quotes :
“They trashed the place… broke furniture… puked on the walls, the floor, all over, got drunk and wrecked their rooms. Bastards even left ammo behind… live rounds all over and other shit… they even got drunk as fuck PUBLICALLY (my aside… a big no-no… get drunk in private… don’t flaunt it) and then while fighting threw some guys into the pond!”
Now from my point of view: What a bunch of fucking assholes.
If I were in charge, the next time the WWE came here, each ‘superstar’ (read steroid enhanced asshole) would have a minder locked and loaded with a tazer to keep them in line, and if that didn’t look like it would work, a fully loaded M249 chopped and cropped Squad Automatic with orders that if these neo-primates got out of line, that they were to be shot, with all subsequent paperwork to read “accidental discharge” as the final result…. I’d even have, as “Officer in Charge” paperwork pre-filled out, with a ‘fill in the blank’ for the name of the cretin who got stupid and got shot in the process.
I mean GREAT that they come here for the line troops… STILL WHAT THE FUCK man? You come here, and act like a total asshole to everyone who is there to insure your safety? Me? Fuck… I’d be dropping them outside the wire and telling them to see if they can hitch a ride off of Route Irish. Ungrateful spoiled rotten fucking scumbags. I know ‘roids can fry the brain, but still… Pissing off heavily armed people? I’m just thinking they should be thankful that this wasn’t ’04-’05 under 3rd CORP as they would have killed these prick.
Anyways, It’s now officially Christmas, as it’s 0003 Hours, so Merry Christmas Everyone. My email has been fucked as the Norton AV I have won’t let me send shit (need to fix that) but as they say, Merry Christmas to all, the Loves of my Life, Gina, Ryan and Marissa, Mom and Dad and Hud and Amy, and never forget… I also want to include Kris, Paul, My God Daughter Mariah and Andrew, all the Rasicot Clan, as well as Broady and all the former McKesson Crew to especially include Spinelli, and Batman. Others include the people who email me and comment regularly to include Bob Owens from Confederate Yankee and FireFox down in Mass… I’ll holler after the new year. Peace and Love and God Bless
The Intrepid Reporter

Meanwhile, Back Home....

2008-12-21T19:35:00.001+03:00

A bit of a change, as things are so insanely boring here in Baghdad. This dispatch will be about home, specifically one of the unintended consequences of the housing collapse. Specifically what I saw when I was home, and how I had to deal with it. That being said, sit back as the IR has got a couple of funny ones for you.

Ok ALL of my neighbors, all the Mil folks, my marines, Air Force Para rescue kids? I’ve mentioned them previously. To whit: I had two sets of wing wipers from McDill and a Prior Service Marine Recon kid living directly across from me and around me... we had a "watch out for each other thing" going... when the housing market crashed, a lot of them moved, they either had some divorces (real “Wisteria Lane Stuff”,) or walked away like a bunch of other people.
The Bank, in its infinite wisdom, then rented them to:

1) Two redneck shit kicker white trash motherfuckers and
2) A Puerto Rican drug dealer

So needless to say, the IR/Big Country is NOT happy. Good neighbors exchanged for fucking dirtbags? GREAT! The PR drug deal was OBVIOUSLY a dealer as we had so many motherfucking cars roll up at odd hours (1am and 2am) and had people jump out, run inside for 3 to 5 minutes, and then run out and leave, usually in a rush. The rednecks? Not so bad, but see the following.

The rednecks, well, I dealt with them first, as I’m a redneck, granted one of New England Birth, so I at least, like in the movie “Airplane”: “Yes stewardess, I speak Jive!” Well, I speak Redneck, and got the street cred as one… so anyways, they presented the first opportunity to let them know just WHO runs this here piece o’ turf. Back home, my Dad was known as the Neighborhood Asshole… as in, don’t even THINK of being stupid with his property or family, OR ELSE! I found myself in a similar position.

This one night, I got out of work and Household Six had picked me up, well, I was in full ACUs as it WAS work, and I was trying to project an aura of “militarism” that the company hadn’t experienced before. Anyways, we pull into the driveway and come home to the rednecks going all out in their driveways and in the street... damned near getting out of control... I grabbed the kids, ran them in, and had Household Six grab my Beretta Nine (over strenuous objections… she sees guns, as having been raised in The Peoples Socialist Republic Of Massachusetts, as an evil thing) I told her to move the fuck out, no argument (things were getting heated) and move out while I watch things... in just 2 minutes she brought it to me, and I had her haul ass inside. I then chambered a round (which is loud) and then tucked in into the small of my back.

Amazing how the sound of a round being chambered quiets things down.

Everyone chilled when they heard the gun, and then saw the Big Fucking Dude( in ACUs mind you,) meaning ARMY or MILITARY in huge letters, thereby legitimizing me as an AUTHORITY FIGURE. I crossed the street, and man, things mellowed quick…. I settled them real quick… Like Jules “Chill that bitch out!” mode from fucking Pulp Fiction. It helped that they all are small dudes, and then they chilled, all hostility gone, and all I did was tell them point blank that “Welcome to MY neighborhood and that I would brook no shit with this Red Neck Soap Opera. If they want to kill each other in the walls of their rented house, then fine. It’s when it spills out on the street… (MY fuckin street, mind you) that it now becomes MY biddness, and that I’ll do ANYTHING to keep things happy happy joy joy on my fucking street.

Since then, they are all good with us, even offering to mow the lawns for Gina as they are working for a lawn care company. They, at least were easy. They respect what I do, and respect the fact that I’m a big ugly mercenary motherfucker. I like them truthfully… “Red Necks Gotta Stick Together” as they say… save yor Confederate money y’all… it’s gonna be worth more than the dollar soon! So to continue:

The drug dealer.
Hoo Boy…

After all this, I figured it was time to share the wealth of my wrath, so I went over the next night (seeings that I was on a roll) and told him that I didn't care how he made his money, but the cars and shit at all hours (3am and such) racing around the neighborhood was a no go.
In uniform mind you.

Completely

Full Battle Rattle... as if I had just got off the range. Sidearm and M-4 slung.

Ok this's where it gets good He acted like with typical gang banger mentality. All Spanish machismo...
I told him that I didn’t appreciate his business interfering with the neighborhood, and that he was risking his life and my family’s life with his “business.” And that I wasn’t gonna tolerate it.

"Yeah Homey? What makes me think I'm afraid?"

I told him flat out, I didn't expect him to be afraid... just aware... that I had killed before, and would do so again if needed... by way of slipping in a window at 3 or 4 in the morning, and killing every single living thing in the house, and then burning it to the ground, or burying them all in the back yard... and then I told him that if he EVEN LOOKED at my house in a hostile manner, or that if ANYTHING happened to ANYONE in my family, (to include scraped knees) that I'd not only kill him and everyone in the house, but I'd go to PR and kill EVERY SINGLE LIVING MEMBER of his family, and dig up and desecrate the graves of his entire family, burn the family homestead to the ground, and salt the earth with Morton’s Finest.
And man, that’s when he sorta cracked.

The look on his face was great, as I used Marchinko-sans "in your fucking face" close in and personal manner and pinned him to the wall using my level 4 plate to crush his ribcage. Nose-to-Nose Full-Tilt-Boogie Eyeball –to-Eyeball skull fucking. GREAT fun if you’ve ever done it.

He was scared.... I could smell it. You, if you’ve ever been “in the shit” know the smell of a man in mortal terror. I knew then that I had won.

Then next day? My Mexican Puerto Rican back yard Neighbor that I call "El Mariachi" (b/c they play mariachi music LOUDLY at their parties) he's a retired E-7 and a buddy... he comes over and tells me that he had a visit from his cousin (who knew?) who asked him if I was as bad as I seemed... he told him "Hey Vato-Loco... that Grande Gringo is the BADDEST motherfucker on the planet, former SF, killed more men than Anthrax, and don't let nuthin happen while he's not there!"

Since then, the vehicle traffic has slowed to nothing, except for HIM leaving out to do his “business” and that it also helps I posed for pictures in the front yard with the kids and weapons.
Yeah. It would seem that things at home are mellow now, but it’s still really fucked up that I have to have this scum living in my AO, and that I had to employ some extreme measures to keep things from spiraling out of control. Seeings that I can’t be there to protect them, It freaks me out.

If ANYTHING were to happen, I can see me doing a “Frank Castle” ala the Punisher… I mean really, I just keep my prayers to the “Chief Sky Pilot” AKA GOD and that he keeps the fools from doing something stupid. So far, we’re good, but what with how things are in the US right now, I’m debating on heading home when and if we see a collapse of societal norms, and right now, I’m unfortunately banking on the “when” than anything else.

Otherwise… talk with you all later. Things are D&B (dead and boring) as they say, and nadda mucho happening. The next one I’ll post pics from outside the wire as it were.

OK Baghdad 2008

2008-12-15T18:39:00.003+03:00

OK: Well, Michael Yon has left the building... Great guy, but seenings how boring thing are here, and how laid back things are here, I don't blame him so I'll take up the 'boring slack' as one would say. I have to report what I see.

Which truthfully isn't much. Beyond the kids begging treats and food, the Iraqi Parents who shoo the kids back from my truck, and the Army/Air Force/Navy troops who, to be truthful, are BORED, as there aint SHIT going on here.

OK: Bush's visit caused a bit of a 'localized uproar' in the respect that they set up "safety checkpoints" all over post... as in look at your licence, see your lease (if applicable) and make sure the vehicle isnt stolen, and other such ephmerea, but the thing that alerted me (I hadn't seen the news) that SOMEONE important was on post was that we had uparmored vehicles at every bloody corner on post, lock n' loaded so to speak, and that the guys who did the 'safety inpections' were all Sergeant Majors Or First Sergeants.

Now the guy in the corner is trying to wave me down: "So what if they wer SGMs or 1stSGTs?"

OK Poindexter: A 1st Shirt or SMAG as he's known, is an E-8 and E-9 respectively. These guys are responsible for waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than making sure some shithead contractor has his seat belted, or that his paperwork is in line... when these guys are out, running roadblocks, it means some shit is in the wind in a MAJOR way.

Such is what alerted me to the POTUS visit. I didn't actually learn of it until the late evening, but my first thought was that SOMEONE important was in town, as the same thing happened when Rumsfeld rolled thru in 04. Needless to say, I was glad this morning at oh-dark early when I literally saw Air Force One leave... Imeant life would go back to normal.

On the shoe throwing incident. I have to explain, seeing that people in the sattes doen't get what it means. To the Iraqi people, what that goombah did was MASSIVELY symbolic. The Iraqis consider the bottome of the foot, or the shoe, to be as dirty as an unwiped asshole. To them, showing the bottom of your feet is as bad an insult as you can give, and to throw one's shoes at someone, while calling them a dog, is THE ULTIMATE insult. Truthfully, if this was Saddam's Iraq, said reporter would have been taken out back and shot in the back of the head, and his wife raped, then killed, and his relatives fed into a woodchipper... its that serious an insult. The note being the footage shot of that toppling of the Saddam Statue, where the locals where beating the head with a shoe... its part of the local culture... for them/us to blow it off is a BAD move... anyways... fuck it, I'm feeling good, as I've reconnected with various Jordanian connections, so more late.

Back To Baghdad

2008-12-11T20:25:00.001+03:00

OK
Been a few weeks since I last posted, but what the hell, it's been a busy few weeks. Work continues with me putting in about 14 hours a day (I contracted 40 a week) but shit, I'm supporting Joe, and because of that I'm good. I mean it's not always about the money. (waitaminute, did I say that? There goes my 'mercenary street cred!') Currently, my gig is doing the logistical side (mainly tracking and issue) of the new VSAT terminals the Military has bought. It’s something that the Army needs, and if my small contribution helps to keep the mission up, and people alive, then hell, I can't ask for better than that. Most of the guys that we are dealing with are people who are far out on the edge of nowheresville. Essentially the idea is that we're providing Sat Equipment that allows them to communicate with higher. Any more info would be dangerous, so I'll leave it as that... Needless to say The Old IR of Note and Fame is digging being back in the thick of things, and proud of being able to help out the Joes and Joe-ettes who are on the tip of the spear.

And as I have found, that spear here is dull. Not in a bad way, but sort of from 'high use' as one would say. Meaning that I either very foolishly or very bravely (your pick here, as I know what my Mom would say) decided the other day to take a trip outside the wire. Now mind you, the areas I went to are very familiar to me, as 'back in the day' of 04 and 05 I used to roll through there regularly. Also, when me and Lil Country rolled, we'd be up armored wearing our shit, minus helmet, and carrying a vast array of insane weapons to 'repel boarders.'

Now... sheeeeeeeet... not so much. I went out, with some trepidation mind you, without so much as a sidearm or automatic weapon, and my body armor and helmet have been living on a rack in my house since I got here, despite the ONE time I >might< have needed it. Yeah... As they said in "Full Metal Jacket" something about the "Crazy Brave" or some such shit. Anyways, I digress... Yeah I rolled out ECP 5 (entry control point) and went out into the "wilds" of Route Irish. Route Irish back in 04 and 05 was so bad that the exact quote in Newsweek Magazine was "...the most dangerous section of highway in the known universe."

Now, not so much. The Iraqis have replanted all of the trees in the middle center between the highway that were uprooted after the Dirty Haj had used them to hide IEDS. The road was littered with Billboards advertising I have-no-fucking-clue what as they are all in Arabic, but the fact that every 500 meters or so a billboard was present, whereas back in the day, they would NOT have been there. It's like the country has come back to life. The walls that Saddam put up around what’s now called Camp Slayer are decorated with MAD paintings showing what appears to be the past, present and future of Iraq by the artists point of view. The thing that cracks me up the most is that in the 'future paintings' is they show a monorail like you'd see in Disney as part of the future... Wishful thinking I know, but still it shows the hope these jokers have. I'll stop next time as I now know I won't get killed out there and I'll post the pics of the paintings, provided I can... as I never know when the Dirty Haj may appear, and I'd probably feel better once I get a 'Roscoe' or two on hand... never get complacent, and as my Dad and Robert Heinlein would say "Watch out for Stobor!"

But on this trip, I rolled to BIAP. The Baghdad International Airport is now a major hub of travel here. More people coming in than going, which is a major change. Lots of 'returnees' as they call them at the guard post. My Ugandan isn't too good, but the guards english was good enough, and he told me that more and more they see the Iraqis coming back from their self imposed exile. Good on them if they can manage.

I also found the ONE bar thats around here. The "Sinbad Bar and Grill" where, contrary to General Order #1, a dude can find Heineken one liters for $6 bux USD. God Bless Consumer Demand!!!! They also have all sorts of booze, from Johnny Blue to Red, and Jack and Beam as well, and a goodly assortment of rums and even Dom if you got the geld for it. I was madly impressed. The place is vaguely reminiscent of a John LeCarr Novel, what with the CIA-NSA-CID and other types of Personal Security Detachment types roaming through, and it's located at the Baghdad International Airport Hotel and Convention center. (Please ensure you check your weapons with the concierge as no guns are allowed in the bar.) I thought the sign was a nice touch. Me, I had a beer... Only because I was driving, but DAYYYYYUM if'n that wasn't a premium beer!!! The Hotel is supposedly doubling as a whorehouse, but I didn't bother to check that side of things. I figure Mama got enough for me when I get home, and why tempt fate?

So anyways, I then rolled into Baghdad Proper. Up Route Irish, and I saw a couple of convoys doing the 'daily-daily' run in and around. My biggest problem cruising the neighborhoods was I didn't have anything to throw to the kids... kids kept running up truck EXPECTING goodies.. I ended up throwing Life Savers Big Mints and then when those ran out, cigarettes and receiving big smiles... It was so nice to see it like that... back in 04-05 they would have thrown rocks, or grenades even. Now, it's back to the "Capture of Baghdad Mode" again, and we're better for it.

Then, after, back to base, where I was welcomed to the air raid sirens. Nothing like the sound of the air raid sirens going off to pucker one's bunghole tight. Turns out "THIS IS A TEST"... wish they'd announce that BEFORE they run the siren up... instead I find myself scrambling for the armor and helmet (amazing how quick one can don 75 pounds of BS when one needs to?) only to have the All clear test message sound. Really nice of them to run it first, thereby inducing heart attack #3...

Things here besides the Army scaring the living shit out of me are good. I'm in a groove and digging it. Living in my old house has been somewhat of a nice thing, as it's not on any known trajectories for incoming (The Haj usually launch from the same areas... part of the reason we haven’t had any real incoming with the exception of that one) and I'm comfortable. Rest assured, the Intrepid Reporter is NOT complacent by any means however, case in point the scramble for the body armor. Nice to have the 'good stuff' with me this time and having all my own gear is also a smiley face. Happiness would truly be achieved if I had my Trusty Roscoe on the nightstand, but eh, who needs it? Not like The Haj are coming 'round here anymore... Hell, the Iraqi Army LIVES in my neighborhood... how the world changes eh?
But for now, after having made it back, I stil have more work do to, so I gotta cut it short, so Look for me later. Until then I remain, The Intrepid Report, Big Country

Bomber: In Memorium

2008-12-02T19:57:00.004+03:00

I got bad news last night. My faithful parter, the first dog I ever had and worked with, Bomber, was put down this past weekend. My Mother had the duty as she and my Dad have been his caretakers since his 'retirement' as a military dog and since I've been overseas. My Mom, is, of course devastated. My Dad, who is fighting cancer, is in a similar state. I sent this as part of an email that I thought I'd share, as it's probably the best way to memorialize him, and help my Mom get through this tough time:

"Bomber was a force of nature that touched all of our lives, and will be greatly missed. Please don’t go hard on yourself about having to perform that task. If anything, he himself would appreciate the love and compassion that you showed in helping him into the next phase of whatever we go to after this. He was the greatest dog that I have ever had the privilege to know and love. He would TOTALLY understand the what and whys, and as he was a ‘soldier’ in his own right as a military trained dog, I think he would appreciate the ideal that MacArthur put forth that “Old Soldiers never die, they just fade away.” You allowed him to fade away with his dignity intact, and his next phase will allow him to blossom in the hereafter, as a spirit like his can never fade, but only grow stronger. "

Requiet in Pace, Old Freind, May we meet again.

How We Won the War (the stuff the media won't tell you)

2008-12-01T19:08:00.002+03:00

Lots of people have been asking me "Big Country, how do you know we've won? I mean you got shelled the other day. What makes you so smart?"

OK: Well... to start with, it's the little things that show me that we've won.

1) The Iraqi Parliment (according to my sources) stated that the Status of Forces Agreement has been pretty much approved. Word is that despite the tantrums of the High Weirdbeard Mockretard Al Sadist, they want us here for another 3 years to insure stabilization, and that we're going to be supporting the Iraqis, rather than going it with the Coilition Forces and ourselves. The shelling that we took was a prime example of said aforementioned tantrum.

2) The Iraqis are finally starting to handle the business end of things. We have a huge number of Iraqi Troops in our area, which was unheard of not too long ago. We've helped them to stand up, and they are doing so on their own.

3) US casualties, for the most part, are finished. We're still going to lose some I'm afraid to say, but then again, we lose people all over the world. Every year we lose people in Korea on the DMZ and in other unpleasant places... We lost one guy when I was in Kuwait to a 1990s landmine for that matter...its a fact of life of the Soldier... They don't like it, I don't like it, but the reality is if we were to leave tomorrow morning, the Iraqis would still be taking care of things regardless.

4) Business and commerce is growing. I have 3 different cell phone companies to choose from... in fact of the matter, the Iraqi cell phone company Iraqna was bought out by the Kuwaiti Zain company. They know things are stable as they are investing because cell phones are THE ONLY decent means of communicxations right now, at least until the infrastructure for a regular landlines gets put in, but then again, this might not even happen, as we are in the digital age nowadays.

5) BAIP, Baghdad International Airport is flying so many damned commercial flights its insane. 24-7 we got tons of planes coming in and heading out, and going to the airport is just like back in the states, albeit in a post 911 world as the guards are armed with AK-47s. Still, in 2004-05, The airport was a shell, gutted and no one except the duty free operatiing, and that was only because it was the only source of booze in the country. Me and Lil Country have pics of us carrying our rifles in the airport, which at the time really tripped us out to be in an international airport, and here we are carry friggin AKs through like it was an everyday occurance. If I tried that shit now, I'd probably be arrested.

6) The people of Iraq, specifically the kids and parents, come up to the patrols of ours and offer thanks, much like they did in 03-04 before that retard weirdbeard started calling for Jihad. The "regular folks" don't want us to leave, as we mean stability and more importantly MONEY. We keep the wheels greased by creating jobs and keeping things rolling. Lots of my guys here have no issue running foot patrols with the Iraqis (where they play back up) and the locals are happy.

7) The supposed 'ethnic/religious cleansing' that went on is and was mostly bullshit. The problem that people don't know or realize was that it wasn't a religious ploy per se. What no one understands is that Abu Ghraib prison WAS a prison before we even got here, filled with the scum of Iraq. Saddam opened the doors and let them all out... it'd be the equivalent of letting the prison population of San Quentin loose into New York City... imagine the level of crime there would be if that happened, and there were NO cops and NO military available to quell/kill/or round up the scumbags? Thats essentially what happened, and they disguised it by wrapping themselves in the cloak of Islam, and the Mullahs were more than happy to let them do so, as it kept their hands relatively clean.

The best way to equate this is to the former Yugoslavian Republic. It took them 10 years to stop slaughtering each other, and that was with no outside assistance really. The UN is a worthless bunch of cowardly US hating fucking scum who rape children and traffic in slavery. The UN isn't hasn't and won't do anything, and its up the US to lead the way.

Our Media won't even show themselves here. It's too risky. I know that if given half a chance I'd beat the ever living shytte out of a reporter from the New York Times, and I KNOW that the troops of the line would as well. Better that the NYT realize that the fat beeeeatch has sung, and start realizing that the vets of this war are begining to outnumber their reading population.
As far as the War, Here Endeth The Lesson.

Maybe I spoke to fucking soon....

2008-11-29T09:58:00.005+03:00

The IR here again for a short update... Man... WTF is it about me and speaking my fucking mind? I must have been born brain damaged or under a fucked up sign... Here I am, Back In Baghdad, formwerly known as the Saddam-A-Go-Go, and things have been quiet.

Too quiet as it were.

Last Evening we're out having our first bar-b-que, and yes, the famous "Big Country Ribs" were being featured. Granted, I was showing off my culinary skills, and the fact that I'm out at 8 at night, bbq'in and theres nothing happening except good food, cool drinks and some cute babes rolling through, well, all was good and happy. I even commented on how absolutely quiet it's been, which of course just like in the movies, means the fucking killer/monster/whatever is about to jump out within a minute.....

BBBBBBBBBBBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!!

Followed by a long line of what appeared to be laser fire of rubies tracing across the sky... and then of course the obligatory siren, and of course, the follow on "Crump!" of the shell hitting. Yep.

We had our first Mortar attack since fucking June tonight, and it spooked me minorly… as in not the mortar round but the fucking CIWS gatling gun ripping loose… I didn’t expect that shit and damned if I didn’t jump a mile… they never had that shit in 04 and 05, so damn dude… what a surprise that shit was. I was more frightened by the defensive outgoing than the fucking incoming! LMAO!!! Go figure that its on a night I’m partying (first time since I’ve been here) that the fucking Dirty Haj lob a shell at us… fuckers…

It seems the outgoing is the one thing that the navy provides here on many bases as defensive arty as one would say.

Some mad genius decided that the Phalanx AEGIS Close In Weapons System that defends our boats from incoming missles might work when mounted on the ground... which is exactly what they did. They took 'em of decommissioned boats and put 'em on a flatbed. a 20mm Gatling cannon mounted and when the radar, if it has time to catch it, lets this fucking madman's creation Spray out a wall of lead in the direction of the incoming round. Now, a great idea, an excellent concept, but as I heard last night, it doesn't always get the incoming... in this case, judging from the 'crump' of impact, I'd say it was because it was a small mortar, probably a 60mm... no larger.

And it figures that the Dirty Haj had to do this shit on my first night of partying... go figure huh? The light show was pretty, but damn, like I said, I was moore spooked by the outgoing than the incoming. Where you figure that the mix is usually one-in-five tracer to regular round, and what I saw would put George Lucas to shame, God Bless the Navy and the mad appetite of that 20mm Monster. I'd hanker they probably with that 'squirt' of 6 second fired about 2000 rounds. Like I said... I was more spooked by the outgoing than the incoming.

The good news (thusfar) is that there was no apparent injuries and the round just was one of those "Hey assholes we're still here." harassments. I'll be happy when they go out and nuke the part of town that it was lobbed from, as it's in a direct line from my trailer, and the last thing I want is the Dirty Haj to be lobbin any more shells over my crib ya know?

Otherwise, more later.

Victory In Iraq

2008-11-23T09:51:00.003+03:00

Bob Owens and a slew of other have pretty much declared the 22nd as "Victory in Iraq" day and I couldn't agree more. It's so quiet here I overslept this morning, and I think I'll have a lazy Sunday, so check out Bob at http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/ and enjoy the fact that I'm safe, sound and realistically mellow here.

Oh Wow man.... Like WOW!

2008-11-22T21:18:00.005+03:00

OK ladies and gents of the studio viewing audience... I'm in Baghdad and my brain is somewhere in the Matrix, and I'm sure somewhere in there I went completely friggin bonkers... either that or I'm sitting in a padded cell somewhere waiting in a haze for the docs to come in and either dose me with my next med or to complete the lobotomy... I'll explain as we go...

OK... when last we left the Intrepid Reporter of Baghdad Fame, he was overwhelmed by the sights, sounds and yes, even the smells of Baghdad. To whit, 2 out of the 3 things have changed, and 1 hasn't. I'll give you a hint... back in the day, ('04 to '05) Lil Country and I used to begin the day with the following scene:
Scene One:
Setting: The cab of a Ford F250 King Cab, two contractors Big Country and Lil Country climb in and start the vehicle.
Big C, (sniffing air loudly): "Dude, did you shit?"
Lil C, (looking offended): "Naw dude, that’s just Iraq!"
END SCENE
Yes, the smells are still the same, a piquant aroma of burning plastic, trash and the heady undercurrent of urine and dried human feces... think of an open sewer, then add some 'spice' to it. Nice huh? However, it’s the ONLY thing that remains the same.

The changes here are insane. No gunfire other than the ranges, which seem to be going on almost ALL the time. I can tell a range from a gunfight as the range has nice orderly pauses in the automatic fire... time for them to reload and aim carefully for the next set of targets. The sounds of a running gunfight tends to blend together and multiple calibers can be easily distinguished... as they said in Heartbreak Ridge "That is the sound of the AK-47 assault rifle, the preferred weapon of our enemy, which makes a distinctive sound when fired at you!" Truer words have never been spoken. So anyways, the ranges are going full time, and amazingly, the Iraqi Army is ALL over the place, and not only that, they are NOT wearing baclavas.

The dork in the back wants to know what a baklava is and why would the Iraqis be wearing Greek Pastry? Sheesh it takes all fucking kinds don’t it? OK. The baclava is pretty much a ski mask ok? Difference between a ski mask and a tactical baclava is that a tactical one is usually made of nomex, which (theoretically) is fireproof, or at least extremely fire resistant and flash resistant. Important things in the soldiering biddness as it were. The importance here is the Iraqis, besides not wanting to lose their rather copious eyebrowz is that they needed to hide their identities. The fact is, back in 04 and 05, if a dude was ID’d as an Iraqi National Guard or Police working with the dirty Invading Christian American Crusaders (their words, not mine!) then not only they would be at risk, but the cowardly fucks who were part of the insurgency would go after their families, hence the need to cover up and hide their identities.

Not anymore however. All the guys I saw going out to do the dirty to the bad guys last night were wearing only Body Armor and weapons… and quite a few fucking weapons I might add. All were carrying M-4 or M-16s which shows how far they’ve come from the days of the ubiquitous AK 47. They looked professional, and truth be told, mean as fuck. Like pissed off and ready to take back and KEEP their country. I wish I could feel bad for the insurgents, but I can’t so fuck ‘em!

Other things… ah yes.. part of the reason I’m sure I’m in a padded cell somewhere… well I was staying for a short period of time (my ‘acclimatization’ as it were) out at another company’s AO. That was good until I was evicted to Camp Victory… specifically Camp Liberty. I had to go down to the ‘Mayors’ Cell’ which is sort of the control and commander for all of the trailer parks here in the base. I went in and the kindly Master SGT hooked me up with a room. The trailer in question is supposed to be close to where I’m constructing a base of operations for the new company. The key had “6-441A-B” written on it which means Pad 6, Trailer 441, room either A or B.

Pad 6 is where I used to live in 04 and 05. I wasn’t prepared however, for the shocker of a lifetime, which goes to prove that I’m either permanently insane, or I’m actually in the Matrix, inside a tube or red goo with wires up my ass, powering a super genius computer or some such shit.

441 was the EXACT SAME TRAILER AND ROOM I lived in back in 04 and 05.

I’m officially ‘blown away’ now because of this. I’m temporarily in what used to be Lil Country’s “Blue Room” until I can move back into what we used to call “The Ponderosa” come Sunday. My old room is currently being used by some of our temp help, so Sunday I move back “Home” so to speak. Tell me I’m not tripping please?

Ok, besides that, I’ll go into some more later without compromising security. Needless to say, this is the EASIEST money I’ve ever made, and the danger is FAR over rated. I’ll holler more soon, and until then, I remain, The Intrepid Reporter.

OK... Where am I again?

2008-11-17T23:09:00.003+03:00

Jesus wept. You go to sleep on an airplane that stated the destination as "Baghdad" and you wake up somewhere over the fucking rainbow...

Yepper dear readers, the Intrepid Reporter is back in Baghdad... formerly known as the "Club Saddam-A-Go-Go" and it being the favorite third world shooting gallery for Al Queda and the other refuse from the Slums of Syria and Pitfalls of Palestine... well let me tell you... things changed

A LOT.

Got me a hunch that the current IR Reports are going to be a hell of a lot more boring than my writings of yesteryear in '04 and '05. Hell, even '06 with the "Today I washed my sox and my ass during a rocket attack." being the highlights are going to seem positively electric compared to this snoozefest.

INSANELY changed doesn’t begin to describe this place. I’ve landing in Baghdad under fire before and watched random acts of anti-aircraft fire overhead as the locals would try and unsuccessfully utilize old triple a flak guns… I’ve seen Baghdad under lock and key so to speak throughout 04 and 05. NUTHIN and I do mean NUTHIN can begin to describe the change. Quick observations included the fact that the city was all lit up where it had never been before. Try standing on the runway and not having to worry about random acts of rockets, mortars and suchlike. Try no body armor seen on anyone anywhere since I’ve been here… This place is so laid back its stupid... Hell the place I'm currently dossing used to be considered "Indian Country" back in '04... as in the insurgents used to infiltrate through this very area that I'm staying in and try to ambush mo'fo's as they tooled down the hardball...

Either way, my itty bitty mind is officially stated in the condition of "Blown" and I have NO idea what tomorrow will hold. I'll do a more in depth analysis later. Until then, I'll holler atcha.

More and More Fun...

2008-11-05T05:38:00.004+03:00

Election night and man, I'm wasted... so far as it would seem from my perspective that this election is doing EXACTLY the thing that the DummycRats cried about in '04 and '00. That being that the candidate who won the 'popular election' should have been given the reins of power...

Wonder how long THAT particular bit, as my Irish Gran would call a "pile o' shytte" will last once the Obamamessiah has won the electoral but not the popular vote? Amazing how the memory hole works that way eh? Lets face it... the media will call ANYONE a sore loser who attempts to link the election to a popularity contest... either that or by dawn they'll have jiggered the tally to show the "Chosen One" won the whole shebang.

My guess is that Obama will win, unfortunately. In as much as the average brain dead college student and minorities have jumped on the band wagon... seeing the highest amount of minority turnout in history... evar as they say, well, Judging that "Guilt Ridden Libtards" and the rest of the minorities (as in minorities compared to the rest of the country) have this all sewn up. The fact is that NY and CA and some of the biggest states have what I consider a far to heavy weight in the voting block. Reality is that we should be able to cut that by 1/2 in order for it to be particularly 'fair and balanced.'

But fuck, I'm drunk and rather pleased. I bought Household 6 a new fridge today... new/used would be a better term. Shes insanely pleased as its only six months old... we bought it from freinds who decided that Florida wasn't the place for them. They moved here from Massachusetts only like six or eight months ago and are bailing...right before winter... leaving HERE for where it snows or already has snowed... Here where some broads still wear short shorts on the daily walk...

Confused?

Yeah... me too. However, the good side is I profit. As Lt. JG Nicholas Holden said in "Operation Petticoat": "In confusion, there is profit!" New fridge anyone? This also allowed me to make a small purchase for myself... tit for tat so to speak. Specifically: I bought myself a new M-4 Carbine.

Yepper... note to you guys out there with domestic issues... if you want to buy a new fishing rod/gun/bowling ball... buy her a new fridge/washer/dryer/dishwasher... after that you could buy a massage from a Chinese whore and get away with it.

So yeah, new gun, new fridge and hey fuck it, new president... either way two out of three ain't bad I suppose. The latest is that I'm out of here on Saturday Morning for Fort Benning Georgia. No fucking fun with that. I'd rather sit in the front row of a Liza Minelli concert... wait wait wait... scratch that... I'd have to self-immolate myself before that would happen. The plan stands that I'm going to be over in Baghdad on November 16th. The BEST part is I'm flying first class all the way. It's nice to have finally gotten the brass ring so to speak. I hope like hell things stay relatively stable for the next few months as I'm trying to angle this gig into a job that will allow me to go overseas and continue to come home waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more regularly for fun and games as one would say.

Anyways... enough for now... Later I'll go into how the Obama Election is helping the firearms industry...

Booze and Beer RULE!!!

2008-10-26T06:57:00.003+03:00

OK: Lately it's NOT the most sobrietious set of postings... to be clean about it, I've been fucked up from the neck up nonstop since I've been home. Booze is your friend... booze is good. The only real complaint I have is because of genetic mutation (Lots of inbreeding in the Irish side of the family tree) is that I have four, count 'em FOUR (4) fully formed and functional kidneys. They found them during my full body MRI a few years back... a bit uncommon, but not unheard of. Yep... the old IR has an extra 100K worth of organs floating around in his carcass, leastways according to my Indian friends who know about Black Market Organ Transplants. I've been told that as a white male, under the age of 40, well, lets just say my organs are worth about 50 grand a shot. Well, that might be fine n' dandy for the folks who NEED a kidney, but the 'normal route' of hijacking and "Drugging and Carving" ain't happening on my watch. Hell... I look forward to some demented asshole who thinks that they can either A) Drug Me or B) Cut out my shit while I'm still breathing. Either choice is an "E Ticket" ride to the morgue. Drugging me? HA HA HA!!! Drugging me is only going to piss me off AND get me high. And B)? Bad move. Especially since I've now officially killed more motherfuckers than Anthrax. (and that means the bio-war agent, not the 80's hair band) Who wants to party?

Me? Well I'm personally annoyed that my internal 'filtration system' is so good that it costs me double the amount in booze and bucks that it should to get me boogered, but hell, what with a "4 Barrel Carb" versus a "2 Barrel Carb" I'll take the extra like any other dude would. Besides, it means like NO hangovers thusfar. This is worth the price of admissions for now.

OK Otherwise, I've been getting prepped for the new gig and ready to deploy downrange. This Pic here posted is of me and my daughter. My Pnut as it were. Any sick fucker out there had better realize that if they even LOOK at her askance, I'll slowly roast them over an open fire for fun. (And I do mean slowly... never, ever test an insane person... it only sets new goals for us to exceed) The rifle is my Accuracy International 300 Winchester Magnum which will reduce a normal human's head to a vaporized paste with one shot.

Anyone want to dance?

It cost near as much as my pickup, but then again, a contractor needs good tools... mine just happen to kill at extreeeeeeeeeme distances and with explosive force. (300 Win. Mag. is a big fucking bullet!)

NOW Speaking of insane shit... I recently had to bag out of my 20th High School Reunion because of the new mission. I posted my lil web blog on the reunion website in hopes that some of my former classmates might find this fun and entertaining. The others, well, we'll leave that there... better not to speak of some seriously fucked up people. And, yeah, you know who you are, and you are alive STRICTLY because I have a forgiving nature.

My reason is, as I spoke earlier of my sniper training (One Shot, One Kill, Ft Benning) and propensity for long distance harm, when thinking about my reunion and High School in general, I remembered the scene from "Billy Madison." Specifically the scene with Steve Buscemi as the geek who was picked on 'way back in the day' that Billy eventually phones and apologizes to. Yeah... I totally was that kid, meaning the picked on bastard... Buscemi then crosses him "off the list" and as the movie works to the finale, Buscemi actually shoots the 'bad guy' who was on the head of the list. Thats great in fantasy... with me, I would have shot them both through the fucking casaba and felt nothing but recoil...

Me, I never made a list, but in the back of my head, particularly as I was a "geek" or an "untouchable" its a good thing I don't hold a hardcore grudge, or leastways have mellowed enough for me to NOT hold a grudge. Realistically, these days, I've found God, and my family. If I didn't have that, then it'd be a whole different world...

Keep in mind to be kind...

I drill my kids on it every day. Needless to say, I never recieved that "phone call asking for forgiveness" and realistically, I'm still bent over some of the shit I went through. The fact that our 20th reunion is now, it's brought back some memories that STILL fucking piss me off, and that that some of the fucking scumbags who were TOTAL fucking cocksmiths to me NEVER got the proper payback... well, hell... I'm still bitter, pissed off, and NOW thankful for a government who trained me to be a stone cold fucking killer... I'll leave it to G*d now... vengence being His and all that... unless I get picked to be His tool... But anyways...

Lets be thankfull that I've mellowed out in my old age AND that I can't make the reunion as I'll be 'busy' in the Middle East. As some say, Thank G*d for small favors. I hope the reunion goes well, but I'm also glad to NOT be there as I really would have trouble resisting the urge to beat the fucking shit out of certain individuals or shoot them outright because as my wife says, I lack impulse control over my base emotions.

Anyways, not to go too pyschoanalytical... High School for most people sucked, but for me, I'd rather spend four years in Guantanamo Bay as a prisoner... and I say this as a former jailer... thats how bad it was. As the Irish say (which I am) "Revenge is a Dish Best Served Cold."

Drunkblogging and Other Entertainment

2008-10-22T05:34:00.003+03:00

Aight....

I'm back... back and loaded. Locked, Cocked and Loaded with bile and ammo to spare. I'm back in the fucking God Bless America Fuck the Rest of the World United States of Fuckin' America. And if the overuse of profanity offends you, then fuck you, you shouldn't be reading this then.

Reality Check: I got out of Kuwait by doing whats called an "Executive Email Carpet Bomb." This means I sent a "Hey I'm getting fucked" email to the CEO, the CFO, the COO and every single asshole who was an Executive Vice President in the ENTIRE company. Yeah... I sent out a "Hey I'm quitting but are you aware that your dirty assed employees are doing shit that could get you put in jail?" email. That and the lines of "I'm CC'ing my Lawyer and My Brother the Special Agent at the Office of the Inspector General as well." might have had something to do with it.

Now, granted, Hud ain't part of the Department of Defense Inspector General's Office, but he IS an I.G. Special Agent (read Nazi Bastard in the Governments lingo) and by his own words "knows people" and that might have helped me out. The reason being that a Special Agent in the Orifice of The Inspector General is about as popular as a fat bitch at a Catholic Junior High School dance... someone has to dance with her, and if you don't then yer fucked. Namedropping Hud's name and position is a major help in my line of work, especially as they, my crooked assed former employers, knew that to chance having and IG look at them it to invite disaster.

So, last week on Thursday I hit the US and have been drunk since. Drunk and laid I might add. Yep. Been physically assaulting with the intent to impregnate if I had the option. Not that I have to worry about making a baby as I got chopped long ago after kinder #2, as the P'Nut shortly showed up, but trying is 90% of the fun involved.

Today I started with my new company. Got treated like Royalty too.... Mr Big Country as they were calling me... I'll fill you in on it later, but so far, so good. I'll cut this short as I'm working on Buzz Number 20 now, but I'll try to give some political views later... Lots going on, and I found out my Military Mail In Vote was propbably shitcanned... so the election shows that it's goiung to be crooked as hell, and I'll get into it later. Until then, Peace and Party Time!

Well I can't say I didn't warn 'em!

2008-10-12T15:34:00.003+03:00

Well I said in my last posting I was going to get 'stupid' on them. They really didn't quite understand that I'm a lot smarter than they give me credit for. As the Great Strategist Sun Tzu wrote: "One who knows the enemy and knows himself will not be in danger in a hundred battles." Loosely and freely interpreted, it means that by knowing the enemy and oneself, one is on solid ground tactically and strategically speaking.

Well, Stanley ASSociates has since the begining underestimated me, and thought that I'm just a "Big Ole Dumb Redneck" and not too sharp in ye old brains department. How unfortunate for them. After my rant the other night concerning the "BOHICA" (Bend Over Here It Comes Again) events of the past few days, I figured it was time to drop a grenade or two on the Higher Ups. Specifically, I did what every person thinks about doing, but rarely does.

I went online and found the Top Six Executives at Stanley ASSociates and their respective emails. I then crafted a very intelligent and pointed email and essentially threw the entire chain of command under Ye Old Bus... As in Tossed them without any benefit of any redemption except to get me the fuck out of here ASAFP. I figured that it was only fair to bitch as high as I could go, seeing that they really won't do shit for me here. I figgered that they wanted to fuck me, so it was only fair that I return the favor in spades. I emailed the CEO, CFO Executive VPs, all four of them. Suck on that fuckers!

And as they say... for my next trick: If I don't get what I want, I'm posting all them lovely email addys up here on my Blog with the intention of letting you, the Valued Readers express your contempt for these douchebags. If it works out, I'll just let it go. Escalation is such an ugly thing, but in this case, it seems to be doing JUST what I want... which is hopefully getting the hell out of here.

Now I'm Pissed

2008-10-11T18:24:00.012+03:00

OK... I come over here and work my ass off for the better part of the past two fucking years... It'll be two years January 23rd to be specific. I've been over here and only home 3 times int he past two years. Granted, one trip for three months, so the two year arguement to certain assholes, specifically Corporate Assholes type many each, doesn't count.

Well... since I fucking quit, I've now been royally fucked over. To the extent that they didn't tell me my passport was held up by the Kuwaitis, (I already covered that earlier) and NOW it would seem the company doesn't want to pay for my airfare home.

Their answer? The Freedom Bird.

Yep. They wanted me to fly out on a military plane... a chartered military plane... as in "Fly-By-Night Airlines." To the uninitiated, a favorite 'sport' of retired Air Farce Generals is to go out on retirement, and buy up aging L-1011 Tri-Stars and DC-9s and get them just airworthy enough to fly charters for the military. Omni Airlines is one prime example. Another example was Arrow Air... better known for Flight 1285 which killed 258 members of the 101st Airborne Division in Gander Newfoundland in '83 when a DC-8 they were flying decided it didn't want to fly no more and the subsequent crash wiped out nearly one Battalion of the Best Airborne Soldiers in the world... Any wonder why I don't want to fly with this? Besides the fact that the charter will be overloaded with soldiers who are headed home... The majority of them don't want to be around a 'scumbag contractor' after 18 months in the desert.

Not only that, but to add TOTAL insult to these already fucked up proceedings, usually they pick a 'detail' of soldiers AND contractors to load the belly of the plane... Yep... Old Man-You-El Labor time. I got picked once... rather conned would be a better description. My first trip over with CACI, Little Country and Me got told that if we did baggage detail we'd have the first class comfy seats for our trip as a reward. Foolishly we believed these fucking douchebags only to find out after that the plane had like 35 Colonels that took said big comfy seats as a perogative of rank. When we landed in Kuwait after flying in the cheap seats, we then had the priviledge of UNLOADING the fucking plane again. Difference was Me and Lil Country found some of the Colonel's Duffel Bags, and seperated them from the other Joes' Luggage. Needless to say after we finished peeing in the bags, we felt both much refreshed, and happier knowing that in theory we had pissed on them's who done pissed all over us, if even in absentia. Looking back, I wish I had gone with the urge to take a dump in it too, but thats neither here nor there. By the way... also: because it's a military charter flight it means no fucking booze!!!!! Is that just fucking wrong or is it just me?

Yeah... so anyways, they 'tried' to book me on this past Friday's Freedom Bird Flight. It runs every Friday. Come to find out... Oops! They missed the deadline because THEY didn't get me to resolve the Passport issue soon enough, and hey, while you're at it, wait til next week. Without pay. And by the way, we're taking back all your bonus money this pay period too... because we feel like it. Fuck you and you will like it.

Yep. They want me to wait til next week. Fucking douchebags. Fucking the new company I'm with has been WAITING on me for like ever, and this old company doesn't give a shit. I mean granted, I quit. But they have some responsibility you would think to get me home promptly right? Not a fucking chance. My next move is to either sue them if I lose this new gig, or actually, my next one is to post ALL the private information I can get online here and fuck them up. I'll leave it for now, but if they really fuck me over, I'll poist home phone number, anything and let the internet go wild on their asses. Fuck them is what I say.

And just for the record... My Current Asshole Company is;

STANLEY ASSOCIATES

so fuck them. Miserable cocksuckers. Can you believe that this company was listed as one of the Top Ten Companies to work for by Forbes Magazine? What a crock of shit. I'll try and contact Forbes Tonight and see what they say. Until my next, I'll be here.

I Loath this Place

2008-10-08T12:06:00.002+03:00

Yes... Loathing... as in Fear and Loathing... a Great Man once utilized that term to describe certain aspects of his observations. I myself find it an apt comparison to how I currently feel. The main reason is I found out exactly WHY I'm still stuck in this horrid place.

It would seem, those of you who have been 'tuned in' for the past year or so would be familiar with the issue at hand... well hell let me explain from the beginning. Back in December, Christmas Eve specifically, I got in a haymaker of a car wreck with a Kuwaiti... a real live Kuwaiti. Said accident left me with about a pound and a half of extra metal in ye olde kneecap and an extra zipper to go along with the extra assholes I carry as well. (Note to the uninitiated, shrapnel scars tend to look like a puckered asshole) Well... the accident and subsequent quarter of a million dollars worth of knee reconstruction weren't enough to cover my recovery as it were.

It seems that when my passport was turned into the Kuwaiti Minitry of Immigration, the computer lit up like a knocking shop cash register on pay day, which is exactly what it was... leastways for the fucking Kuwaitis. Seems that during my 'recovery' in the States, I was tried in absentia and found guilty of who the fuck knows what. Reason I say that is that today when I was at the Immigration office, the documentation that the broad behind the counter gave me to sign was all in Arabic with no translation. I had a 'fixer' from my sponsoring company who was with me and told me that signing it was ok, but I have my reservations. For all I know I was signing a document stating I molest Great Danes or that I was "Guilty of Driving While Being a Pork Eating Crusader-Infidel." Either way, besides me signing unknown documents in a strange and forbidden tongue, I also had to fork over KD $100 for the priviledge of getting out of this fucking country. That roughly translates to over $400 US Dollars... serious fucking greenbacks man... dinero I barely have to afford eh?

Fuck me... talk about the proverbial pound of fucking flesh. At least the bastards gave me a fucking reciept, albeit even it is in some strange arabic fucking scrawl... I really don't know what possessed me to sign and fork over the ducats, but I'll be damned if I'm going to stretch out whats already been a long overdue escape.

Once I paid off, I raced back to the work site so I could give the Admin lady the reciept and let her copy it... No way am I giving up the original... that gets held onto as long as I'm still in this goddamned desert... but shge was really nice and it would seem that everythin g is in order, so I have great hopes that I'll be able to fly this weekend and get out of this place for some much deserved R&R. That and my Roomdawg hooked me some Siddique... Yeah... Back to drinking the lighter fluid again... I mean hell... at least I can enjoy the rest of myy day off.

Oh yeah... did I meantion that all of this shit happened on my fuckin day off? Yeah... NOW it's clear why I'm so salty... anyways... More later... Til then, I remain the Disgruntled IR...

OK Something a bit different...

2008-10-05T01:42:00.007+03:00

Anyone who knows me knows I love cartoons. I grew up habitually reading the daily comic strips, the sunday funnies and had quite an extensive collection of comics. I still read these things on a regular basis... it's just now we call them "graphic novels" and other such things to justify being a grown man who reads comics. I say to hell with that. I read and still collect comics and all other assorted illustrated ephemera that goes along with them. My personal favorites however are Looney Toons and all the other Classics like Tom and Jerry and I have the DVD collections to prove it.

Now imagine my surprise when I was surfing the other day and came across an article in the Daily Mail website detailing the artistic works of one James Cauty. His gig is to 'reinvent' classic 'toons with a new story and put a new 'spin' on them. The basis of the article was how bloody violent and horrible these images were, and was cautioned as to these aspects before being able to view them in the slideshow. My reaction? It's about damned time someone did this with cartoons. Violent? Yep. Bloody? Yep. Funny? Fuck yeah! I laughed my balls off when I saw them, and figured I have to share as this is too good to let slide by. As we see from this first:

Who hasn't wanted to see that fucking Roadrunner get his? I know in all the years of watching ole Wile E. I always wanted to see that smarmy cocky "Beep Beep" Bird get his. In the pic, you see that Cauty thought the same, and the others in his show seem to show that same "Finally they got what was coming to them!" attitude.

I mean how many times did we see Daffy in "Rabbit Season" get his head blown off? I mean myself, I always liked the Daffster more than any of the other Warner Toons. I mean he's so human. Venal, Twisted, Greedy and Grasping, he's just perfect. Cauty got this one right too. Bugs got it just a bit more radically than I would have done, but hell, it's not my art. Then, this next one we can all agree was "about time" as well:

Now I know it's an MGM Cartoon, but who hasn't wanted to see that self-righteous little fucking rat get his? I know I'm thrilled with the above... the look of satisfaction captured on Tom's face is just about right too... "Yeah... thats right... who's the cat and who's the rat? Yeah... Take THAT and THAT and THAT!!!" Hee.... God... But I saved the best for last. Try this:

Yeeeeeeah!!! "Tastes Great, Less Filling!" is the title I thought when I first saw this. I mean out of ALL the Looney Toons and out of ALL the people who I've ever talked to, almost to a person did everyone say that they positively LOATHED Tweety Bird. Between his 'widdle bird' voice that sounds like fingernails on a blackboard, to his constantly fucking over Sylvester, (who only wants to eat the little yellow bastard) FINALLY in this piece does Cauty put the final nail in Tweety's coffin so to speak. Sylvester finally gets to have himself a Tweety Snack.

Now... The funniest part about this? It seems in the "Big Brother Knows Best" nightmare that England has become, the article that I read and grabbed these images from are all a "Ooh how horrible and twisted" and "..how this will damage the youths who may see it." What a load of crap. Myself? I think the work is brilliant, and if I was in a position to do so, I'd be winging it to England to see the exhibition, if not outright purchase one of these 'new classics.' I just thought I had to share. Let me know what you think.

OK... Again...When do I get to leave?

2008-10-04T03:13:00.006+03:00

October is here, and I'm still stuck in Kuwait, working a job that's worn me down to the nub. Yes Dear Readers, The Intrepid Reporter, namely me, Big Country, is still here and even more retarded than usual. When we last left me, I was in the throes of a Siddique Induced Insanity, and hoping that the hangover wouldn't kill me. Good News, Bad News. Good News: The hangover didn't kill me, and yep, the Bad News is that the hangover didn't kill me. Que Sera Sera as they say.

I've been hoping to avoid any sort of politics as of late, but what with the insanity of our Elected Overlords pushing just about any sort of law that benefits Big Biddness or their Corporate Enslavers, what without any sort of oversight, or even giving two shits about how we, the "Common Gunclingers" feel about it. I mean really, the fact that we've essentially crossed the rubicion on the Constitution... crossed it with a vengeance, and that every person I've spoken with over here in Kuwait has pretty much said the same thing: They just don't give a shit about us anymore. My Kids Grandkids are going to be paying for this one... mark my words. The fact that they have set themselves up, and their families with enough financial padding that THEY don't want or need for anything. How about the common man? HA! Good fucking luck on that one pal. Anyways... Enough on the "Corporate Theft of Our Money" i.e. "The Bailout." It's enough to get my blood pressure into the red zone, and Lord knows, I don't need that.

Other things... Well Iraq is coming up soon. Hopefully these jokers here, my own Enslavers, will get off the fucking dime and get me some plane tickets. It's amazing how when I took this job, they couldn't get me over here fast enough. I mean like ZOOOOOOM fast. As in 'blink and you'll miss it' kind of super speed... Hell Ludicrous Speed as it were...

"Prepare for Ludicrous Speed!"

Yeah... I can't resist a Mel Brooks 'insert' but hey... it is true! They got me up and out of the gate like a damned Greyhound chasing that robo-rabbit. That was fine as I needed to earn some real money as opposed to the heavily taxed crap I was earning back at Dell. I mean what good is it to earn $40K a year and then have them take over 25% of it in taxes, if not more?

THATS the main reason I contract. Overseas money means (at least until the Obamamessiah gets elected) tax free money... which in itself is the basis for another ENTIRE subject for another time. I'll leave the Obamammama rants alone for now. Anywho... Like I said... I need for someone to get off the friggin dime and get me the hell out of here so I can have some "Quality Time" with my family. This means get me out of here so I can teach my kids how to shoot and drink enough beer to melt my cortex into my neck. That and -hopefully- spend some alone time with Household Six... even if this means sending the kids to the Demon-in-Laws or outright selling them if I have to. I'm holding on, granted by my fingernails, but man is it a struggle.

The BEST news I can share is that we're finally through Ramadan. The High Holy Days of Allah and Company are over. This means that now we can go back to having some 'normalcy' around here, albeit whats normal here wouldn't pass the smell test back home. The biggest thing to me is that now the stores are open at 'normal hours.' During Ramadan, because it involves fasting from sunup to sundown, these assclowns here close every single store and restuarant in the entire friggin country from sunup til sundown. Can't risk someone not being a good Little Islamic Monkey now and tempt them with a Mickey D's Burger now can we? Nope... we got to close everything down because otherwise someone might be tempted to eat a burger. Yeah... hows that looking for wierdness? It's the same concept of them covering their women up from head to toe with the abaya. You know... the Ninja Wimmen Look.

Yeah... They do this to and I quote: "..to avoid temption and bringing and inciting lust into the hearts of men, a good Muslim Woman will wear the abaya." Yep... it's all about avoiding temptation. By covering a woman up, it keeps that dirty little slut from raising temptation in the hearts of us Good God Fearing men... Like men don't have any self control? I guess if you're a Arab male then maybe they don't have any impulse control? It would explain a LOT about them AND their leaders spouting off like a bunch of Rabid Jackals like Imadinnajacket in Iran saying some of the off the wall shit he spouts. Hmmmn... methinks I might be onto something there. More exploration of that later...

Anyways, besides me being on my usual rant, I'm pleased to say that the Burgers are Back now that this fasting crap is over, and I'm able to get some premium Mickey D's again. I'm just hoping I can get back to the States within the next week so's I can compare the burgers ya know? That's it for now, I suppose I'll have more ammunition for my next little rant. Til then, I remain, The Intrepid Reporter.

Hi Ho Its On to Iraq I Go...

2008-09-27T00:12:00.004+03:00

Fuck it. Let me start by getting that out of the way. I finally made a choice and it's Iraq. It's a case of outright retardedness on my point I know. Its a matter of straight economics. I mean what with the meltdown going on worldwide, and in the States, it's the only logical thing for me to do.

The two choices were Japan and Iraq. Most people would be like "Huh thats a no brainer!" and go with the Land of The Rising Sun and Godzilla movies. Me too normally, up until the company in question made me, as Brando said, "An offer I couldn't refuse." I mean when that much money gets flashed metaphorically speaking under one's nose, and you are first and foremost a Mercenary at Heart, then hell... Iraq here I come.

I was sorely tempted by Japan mind you... to the point now I actually have spent the past two months learning basic Japanese and think I could at least make myself, the Giant Gaijin, (thats Whiteboy for all y'all rednecks in the audience) understood at least on a basic level. The Japanese I've found from my research are very much like the French in that if you don't speak the language, you don't rate so high, albeit like the French in that only, and not in general cowardice and foul odors. My few run ins that I had with the JDF or Japanese Defense Forces were limited in my last tour in Iraq, however there was a humorous exchange of views where when I realized that the Jap LT I was speaking to understood English, (more than 70% of Japan does) but was playing dumb so's he didn't have to talk to the Giant Big Nose Gaijin... My resolution to this obvious failure of diplomacy was to start doing what most Ugly Americans do, and that start speaking in increasing volume until I was screaming in his face. (It always cracks me up that some Americans in real life do this whole 'they don't understand so I'll scream it at them and then they'll get it' thing works.) Screaming in this dudes face left me feeling pretty satisified, especially since the liver and onions I had for lunch was decently represented. Take that ya sneaky Jap! Remember Pearl Harbort and all that other crap !!!

Now, needless to say, I'm in shift/change mode now. Iraq... Fucking Iraq...

A horrid place when last I left... befouled air stinking of burning trash and the fetid stench of unwashed Dirty Hajji. An open sore of a country, Iraq represents to me how far a 'First World' Country can fall, and how fast. Now granted, its been almost 2 years since I last rolled in, but I figure it couldn't have changed too much. Supposedly the security has changed, but the first thing that I'm going to do on hitting ground (besides verify that the Duty Free at BIAP is operational) is go see my bro Slim out at 5th Group and retrieve some firepower. If anything I want to have at least my AK or at the minimum a sidearm available. What normal person goes around Baghdad unarmed? Not this Boy let me tell you. When I left Slim had stashed and cached an big ole pile of the Big Country's Firepower. It's time to retrieve that.

So anyhow... it's a good thing I resigned the other day, leastways it makes me feel better to know if the fuzz beat my door down whilst I'm writing and also getting hammered that they ain't gonna do shit to me.

"Hammered Big Country? You ain't supposed to be doing that!"

Yes yes Dear Reader... I said to hell with it... its a Day Off, and a Payday for that matter, so it was only fair that seeing that I'm on the tail end of my tour here, that I have a little one-on-one celebration with some Windex thats called Siddique. Pronounced "Sid-Deek Key" its the Kuwaiti version of Bore Cleaner... Leastways thats how its tasting... or at least thats how it tasted when my tonsils were still operational... as of now I could probably stub a lit cigar out on my tongue and not feel it. Of course, stubbing a lit butt anywhere near my mouth might result in an explosion that blows my fucking head off, so I think I'll pass on that parlor trick for now. It's a entertaining sort of buzz... the kind that leaves you wanting to either pass out, or in my case have out-of-body rushes. I'd definitely recommend it over a NyQuil Buzz, or for that matter the Dreaded "Robo" or "Deadly DM." But more to the point I'd much rather have so Beam or even some Bombay, and I'm not much of a gin drinker. My best bet is to just enjoy what I go while I got it, and roll as they say LOL! Realistically, it's the local moonshine. Seeings how my own personal attempt at still production/beverage making ended up on the ceiling and walls of my kitchen, never mind the funk of the yeast mix that gagged me out for a week, I figgered on just buying the local brand and going for it. Considering that I've been pretty much a 'good boy' in avoiding the Black Market here in Kuwait, I entrusted a colleage to 'fill my order' so to speak. I also very generously allowed him first dibs on a glass full, and when he didn't die or go blind, I figured it was cool to booze it up myself. (Remember Dear Reader, always have a guinea pig available in Third World Countries... Take that as the "IR Travel Tip O The Day")

So that'll wrap it up, sort of like me, for now. The next installment will probably be "Siddique: The Hangover That Melted My Skull" so stay tooned.

A Slow Night...

2008-09-22T23:56:00.003+03:00

...and I'm waiting on a new job. I recently got lucky... I got TWO job offers and I'm now in 'open debate mode' over which one I want to do. In a nutshell, one job takes me to "The Land of the Rising Sun," and the other takes me back to "The Land of The Living Shitstain" named Iraq. Yep. One of the gigs, the most recent offers me big money to climb back aboard a C-130 and fly my fat happy ass back up to Iraq and go back to work at The Baghdad Cafe, formerly known as The Saddam-A-Go-Go. The gig is right up my alley in Logistics and even IT, seeings that they need a geek with the ability to move and track equipment. Not a bad gig to say the least. The pay is good, but it's only for a year. The Japan Job offers a four year option, which loosely translates in contractor-speak to 'career.' That and it's not in any wide open shooting galley, although reports from up North these days tend to lean towards a more mellow atmosphere. Me, I could give a damn. Mortars, Rockets, hell... random Sniper fire... been there, done that, carry some extra shrapnel because of it. I'm not worried about the war aspect of it, but mainly the fact that since things ARE winding down and the US Army is starting to pull back a bit, I tend to worry about being caught out without a job. My main concern is that the Army, in it's infinate wisdom, decides that they don't need Contractor "X" "y" and "Z" and have cut the funding and "don't let the door hit out on the ass on the way out."

I've had that happen before. It's not pretty, and comes without warning. The Big Guy, be it a VP or some other Corporate Zombie shows up and "Hey y'all have done a bang up job! You can be proud of the work you've accomplished, but as of X day, the contract is done. Thanks for coming!" Having heard that speech once was enough thank you very mucho. The way I'm looking at it currently is that the Japan Job may not pay A LOT but it's at least with a company that has been around for like EVER, and because of the inherent instability of the contracting world, I'm tempted to stick with going to Tokyo Joe's Bar N Grill for the next 4 years. At least there I'll be able to have some new adventures with a new culture, and man... I'm sure being a 6 foot 4 inch 320 pound Gaijin is going to be plenty fodder for my IR Reports. I mean hell, when I go around here locally, the fucking Arabs freak over how big this whiteboy is... I can only imagine how the Japs are going to react if I go that route.

This however opens new levels of concern. Are the roofs going to be high enough? How about doorways? Would I be doomed to wearing a helmet in order to avoid further brain damage? Lord knows the old grey matter isn't what it used to be, and I really don't want to be trudging around in a semi-permanant stoop, but judging from all things Japanese, I'm thinking this could be a Giant in MidgetLand scenario. I mean really... walking into a doorframe is something that I've experienced only once or twice, well... ok more than that, but it's not like I PLANNED on caving in my casaba on the damned doorframe. One time I rang my bell hard enough to knock myself full out on my ass... and left me with what could be generously refered to as a 'knot' on my nugget. These are aspects I'm going to have to take into consideration. That and the food. Japan is all about seafood and other bizarre food issues, to include raw everything. I've never cottoned onto sushi, but if I go that route, I got a hunch it'll be either sushi or one extremely hardcore diet that I'll be on.

Anyways, it's a quiet night here, and I'm all about quiting this current lame ass gig, so as of tommorow, I'll drop my resignation, and hopefully make a decision on Tokyo or Baghdad int he next few weeks.

Decisions Decisions Decisions

2008-09-19T02:31:00.014+03:00

Well enough 'stuff' has happened over the past few days to take any beliefs that I might have had as to the decency or 'common good' that anyone on the Left side of the Political spectrum might have had and finished it. They pretty much made me think that at this point, it's a good thing I'm not in charge as I'd have to declare open season on quite a number of people and put a bounty on the heads of many of the 'talking heads' on the Left. Bounties that would require proof of demise. No "bring 'em back alive" allowed. Preferably skins and scalps. I mean after all, if all of us "bitter clingy gunowners" are such unmitigated murderous dirtbags as the left would portray us as, I'd say that we ought to go out and fulfill some of their mindless rants and fantasies with some good old fashioned ass-kicking reality.

Anyways... enough on that. I think that anyone with any level of brains will vote correctly, I.E. None of the Above on election day... wouldn't that be great? I mean with the exception of Palin (who I think is a total hottie) the rest of them are more of the same. Even McCain... ALL of them are fucking worthless. I just have a special place in my heart and on my rifle range for people of the Leftist Extraction. Even my Dad has been sipping the Kool Aid this year... he goes from one extreme to the next. But anyways.

"So then Big Country... just who should we be voting for?"

Glad you asked that my friend. How about Christopher Walken?

I mean hell... Why not? There's even a website that was put together a while back http://www.walken2008.com/ I mean why the hell not? Who was Ronald Reagan but a former actor? And he turned out to be one of the greatest presidents of all time. I mean hell... look at the picture... gravitas to spare man! I mean even About dot com did a review of the website and then had a poll which kind of sheds light on the electorate is feeling these days.I mean out of over 3800 people who voted (as seen on the screenshot I grabbed right below) That over 3005 of them would vote for Chris right now. Its not often you see this kind of numbers in polling. Now, granted, the polling here is about as non-scientific as you can get, but hell... lets face it. Right now the Obamamessiah and 'Mad Dog' McCain are literally neck-and-neck inthe polls, and seem to be staying that way. There's no clear cut winner as of now, and unless someone gets caught either raping or murdering (or both at the same time) the votes are going to be split pretty evenly, which is going to open a WHOLE other can o' worms when the lawyers and assorted race barons and douchebags come leaping out to play in the post election fray.

Mark my words: The post election of 2008 is going to be a racially oriented and lawyer bloodbath, if not physically, then metaphorically. The Obama folks are going to be crying (as they already have) "Racism" at every corner and use it as a blunt instrument to get the election won in their favor. It's really too bad that we can't really get Walken to be 'drafted' into the Presidency.

I've always been a fan of his dating back to one of his earliest works "The Dog of War" where he plays a mercenary who violently overthrows a small African nation. Huh... now that I think about it, how appropo that that was one of my earliest "fave movies." Just look at the line of work I'm in now!

Got Debt?

2008-09-17T00:48:00.002+03:00

Well... as the smoke begins to clear in New York City and the Wall Street folks are sitting sort of pat... everyone is still waiting to see what the latest collapse brings forth. Lehman Brothers, an investment bank of 150 + years of doing biddness is D.O.A. and along with it a HUGE chunk of money and a lot of peoples retirements as well. Now, Me, I'm not very savvy when it comes to these here eco-nomical kind of things. I do know however that even a redneck like myself sees that a Bank that survived the 1929 Collapse and subsequent Great Depression get flushed out this early on shows that things ain't quite right. I mean realistically, back in July when Bear-Sterns got wiped out I figured that it might be a good idea to keep a bit of cash on hand, and make sure that I don't have any money in ANY markets. I mean it's bad Karma when you see these defaults and essentially the begining of the Economic End so to speak. In what I'm calling "The Greater Collapse" this all is going to become waaaaaaaaaay worse before it gets better.

My prediction? I'd say that by the first week of October we'll be seeing the final fraying of the economy. My reasoning? Well, the end of the Economic/Fiscal Year. Yup. Figure that the past three quarters have been essentially ending in a flood of red ink, and that the final report card for the economy is due the last week of September to the first week of October. THIS is going to be the REAL "October Surprise" that kicks the country in the metaphysical nut sack. The amount of layoffs, bank collapses, 'ghost money' (more on that in a minute) and the unrealistic expectations that the economy could continue to run off of ever increasing consumer debt are going to boil up in a major meltdown thats going to make 1929 look like a love tap.

The 'ghost money' is the term that I use to describe just about ALL the money thats on the 'books' so to speak. I mean to give an example, My house I own in Florida we bought (foolishly) at the height of the Housing Bubble and we got it for around $240K. Now, my loan is for $240K PLUS interest. The interest itself is like 4 times the value of the loan. This, to me is 'ghost money.' It doesn't really exist UNTIL such time as I pay the bank. Until that cash is in their greedy grasping claws, they SHOULDN'T be counting it towards the values on their books. BUT... this is EXACTLY what these guys have been doing... counting my loan as if it was worth One point Two Mil and some change... they then bundled all of these loans up and sold them as 'securities'... secure my ass. Anyways, we all know what the problem is.. it's the solutions that you have to bear in mind.

I mean right now, the current two jokers running for president don't seem to understand that this is going to implode in a way that couldn't be imagined. Obama's Idea is to Tax and Regulate... more Government. Like this wasn't what we had going on to begin with? Hey... genius... it's not the 1960's anymore and Taxing the Top 25% is what Hoover tried in 1929 and 1930... and look where that got us. McCain wants to try and clean up and get rid a lot of the 'overregulation' but even then, this isn't going to stop the eventual collapse. McCain is hoping that a band aid on a sucking chest wound will take care of it. Hey Old Dude... no freakin' way man.

The fact is that the feds have been pumping insane amounts of liquidity into the markets to keep it afloat. Essentially they've been printing up more actual paper money to replace the 'ghost money' but in the process, they've devalued the dollar to the point that I'm trying to get paid in Kuwait Dinar.

My advice? Look to having a couple of months of food on hand, some good seed and a couple of good long guns on hand. I mean who knows where this carousel is going to stop? I foresee an eventual contraction of society. Nothin overly dramatic, just a period of insane unrest, figure about a year or so, and then a slow rebuild much like what went on in the mid 30's. Lots of relocation, lots of uprooting of people, and a revaluation of money and assets. My only hope is that it doesn't got full-out-Mad Max mode. THAT in a word, would suck. Me, well, lets just say that the Boy Scout Motto is in full effect in my house. Its a major part of the reason I follow this so closely, because if it DOES go into full on meltdown mode, I've got to try to get the hell out of Dodge ASAP. Which is what the majority of investors on Wall Street seem to be doing as well. Anyways... More Later.

I Need a Drink Part II

2008-09-16T04:18:00.008+03:00

OK... a couple of you emailed me asking:

"Big Country... Why don't you just have someone mail you some booze?"

Well... Valid point. A favorite way of getting illicit hootch over here, many people including myself have been the recipients of "Care Packages" of "Liquid Love" as I like to think of it. Well all fine and dandy... theres a dozen ways to ship hootch... one of my faves is the "Substitute the Scope" game, whereby the sender replaces a jug of Scope Mouth Wash with a quality Vodka dyed with the appropriate color, be it minty green to cool refreshing blue. The only problem is getting the jug that contained the scope to be mouthwash free before reloading it with Vodka. From painful first hand experience I can tell you that if the mouthwash isn't completely cleaned out, it will give the vodka a 'cool minty' aftertaste that results in a heartburn that feels like Satan himself is trying to burn his way out from your chest. It's not much fun to be having a "...double shot of Smirnoff with a maalox chaser" let me tell you. Makes for a really vicious hangover too.

Other mailing attempts have included the "Lets put Grain Alcohol in a Rubbing Alcohol Bottle!" This is good and bad in two parts. It's a perfect disguise. Perhaps a bit too perfect. So good in that no one suspects that the alcohol in the plastic jug is potable. So bad ALSO in that no one suspects that the alcohol in the plastic jug is potable. I found myself having to desperately convince my friend that I HADN'T gone around the Booze-Hound Bend and that I WASN'T drinking Isopropyl on the Rocks, with a Twist. This while the bastard was about to pour said 190 proof Hootch into the toilet "for my own good." After a prolonged wrestling match and finally after swearing on the Eternal Soul of my Mother (sorry Mom!) did he relent and let me show him the enclosed letter explaining that I needed to drink this particular jug, rather than use it to sooth my razor burn. (In reality, it could have done both!)

The real reason I'm well behaved is that as of July here in Kuwait the Local Yokels and County Mounties have gotten themselves a new toy. One that allows them to pretty much smell booze in a sealed package. This in turn led to the single largest bust in the history of the Army Support Group here and to the point they even took pictures for posterity. That and they just wanted to tease us and show how much Booze they busted. As you can see...

...I'm sure that the MP brigade on post had one hell of a party. 90 1.75 Liters of Hootch... 66 Bottles of Vodka and the rest was Jack and Jim, respectively. We're talking "Booze Baron" levels a.k.a Homer Simpson on the amounts. And this was only because of the new handy dandy XRay Toy that the military just picked up.

To give a rough approximation, according to sources, The Black Market Value of just one jug of Jack is like anywhere from 200 to 350 US Dollars. Yeah... banning it made it a real commodity on the Black Market. My guess is that this particular batch was worth around twenty grand on the low side in resale value. Needless to say, I may want to make cash, but not at the risk of getting caught. Here in Kuwait I heard that the jail cells aren't very large... just large enough for you and your cellmate to get to know each other 'intimately.' So no thanks on that.

Me, I'll wait til November when I go on R&R.

Man, I Need a Drink

2008-09-15T22:45:00.003+03:00

This was me back during my trip to Egypt last summer. Egypt, despite it's Islamic Background still maintains a bit of common sense and has legal Booze. Suffice to say you can tell by the look on my face that the only thing on my mind was getting pie-eyed toute-suite. Needless to say about 4.5 seconds after my buddy snapped this photo I was neck deep swigging from a jug of Jose Cuervo 1800 Silver Patron and well on my way to a coma.

Such which leads me into today's subject. I need a drink... dying for a drink actually. It makes me really wonder what is on the minds of the Kuwaitis maintaining this 11th Century approach to Law and Order. This country, which prides itself on its Islamic Approach to Law, (dubbed Sharia) leaves itself open to being the biggest bunch of fucking HYPOCRITES that I've ever seen.

"Hypocrites Big Country? Whatever do you mean?"

Well, let me see... for one instance that leaps to mind was the drunk ass Camel Jockey who rammed into my SUV back last Decemeber, leaving me with an extra set of screws, plates, and pins that I wasn't originally issued with. I mean it was nice and all to accessorize, but I already had a 'donation' of extra metal courtesy the Iraqi Insurgent Bastards and the Chinese mortars that they threw at me back in '04. How do I know he was a drunk Camel Jockey you ask? Well... the fact is that immeadiately AFTER the wreck, (DCJ as I'll refer to him as henceforth) DCJ's buddies rolled up in another car and like immeadiately emptied the trunk of his wrecked ride... said things being removed in question being shaped like cases of Johnny Walker and clinking like cases of Johnny Walker, and with labels that to a suspicious person might have even read "Johnny Walker" to an astute observer. According to other witnesses, even a couple of handguns were pulled out... me... I only remember the booze and remember how pissed I was that this joker had enough hootch on board to float one hell of a party. Since then, I've been told that BECAUSE he was hauling booze, literally a "rum runner" this's why I never had any further legal action taken either for me or against me.

Yeah... it seems that the reason I didn't get hauled off in front of a magistrate to answer for being an Infidel Driving Recklessly is that I got clowned by someone who was probably 'connected.' Such is life in the Hypocritical Middle East. He was probably hauling the hootch for someone 'important' and therefore, we'll just forget this ever happened ok?

Yeah. I was advised that trying to sue this POS would have meant having it judged in front of a Sharia Court... which means I'd be lucky to NOT get sued back, and never mind being found guilty of being "a Pork Eating Crusader Infidel with Intent to Defame Islam" or some other bullshit like that. Yeah... the deck is stacked against me in a major way. Such is the tear that I'm on.

Specifically, I'm thirsty as hell. I's been since I was home in July since I sipped the 'Nectar of The Gods' and I'm cranky because of it. My liver is so bored it's been taking a brewmaster correspondance course and the kidneys are getting tired of processing just water and soda. It's enough to make a guy think about taking up a hobby. Maybe smoking? Probably not. I mean hell, at least back in Iraq I had hootch. Acres of Hootch. At one point the Countries INC. had a store room liberally stocked with over 20 cases of Heineken Tall Boys and about 5 cases of mixed liquors. I mean the only thing I had to risk in buying the hootch in Baghdad was a life-endangering ride up Route Irish to the deal with the Jordanian Mafia. I mean compared to this, it was a piece of cake.

I've intentionally NOT gotten involved with the boozer scene here in Kuwait. I'll just have to suck it up until my next R&R or next job... whichever comes first.

And the Beat(ing) Goes On.

2008-09-14T22:33:00.003+03:00

Seems that no matter which way I turn, the Obamanation keeps on rolling with it's usual punches. Between Axelrod refering to the McCain campaign as the "sleaziest" in recent history, or the usual gaffs that "Slow Joe" has managed, the Obama Campaign is showing itself to be either completely fucking clueless or is trying to run what I'd say is the dirtiest campaign I've ever seen. For Axelrod to call the McCain Campaign dirty make me want to say "Pot... this is the Kettle You're......(fill in appropriate blank)........" Mind you... if I complete this phrase, then I'm deemed (or anyone who completes it according to the Obamabots) a RACIST. Never mind that it's an accurate representation of the issue... just that they want to be able to use the "New-KEWL-Lar Option" of the 'race card.'

Which is what I think they WANT the McCain Campaign to do. I mean really... making fun of McCain for not being able to use a computer? Especially when in 2 minutes of a 'Google Search' ANYONE can find a link to the story in the Boston Globe stating implicitly that

“McCain’s severe war injuries prevent him from combing his hair, typing on a keyboard, or tying his shoes.”

I mean it's either cluelessness, or a planned instigation. Part of me wants to say that this is an intentional ratcheting up of rhetoric. I mean lets face it... supposedly all of Barry's people are pros. They've been around. They also know that McCain has had a reputation for shall we say "Anger Management Issues" in the past? What if this is all a plan to slowly push him to a detonation? I mean it sort of fits with modus operandii of the Democrats these days. Push McCain into a fit of pique and make sure the cameras are rolling. I mean the amount of "Gotcha" attempts against McCain and Palin have been unreal.

From Whoopie "Cushion" Goldberg on "The View" asking if she had to worry about being a slave again. Note to Whoopie: You are a multi-millionaire comediane (not in my book mind you) who's NEVER been anyone's slave... to imply such insults all of your ancestors, never mind having insulted John McCain with a vicious attack that he couldn't possibly defend against in a public forum that BaBaWaWa then went and backed you on... Throw in "The Atlantics" photos of McCain that make him look like some 'supervillian' and man, how much more do you need? How about 'Gibson's Gaffe' against Palin by way of manipulating her interview footage, to Randi Rhodes coming out from under her rock and laying into Palin in ways that could get you sued for libel... I'm telling you. These deluded assholes have me in a burn. It's amazing how they trash out all these people because they don't agree with their opinions on how the world should be.

I mean my God... if things were TRULY as bad as these Libtards and Dummycrats are spouting, well hell... lets face it. They wouldn't be spouting it because the Secret Police would have already rounded them up, marked them AND their families for death (not a bad idea in many respects) and trucked them off to those 'secret concentration camps that exist in the deserts of Arizona'... right next to the New World Order Black Helicopter Airport and the "United Nations" Force that is here to keep order when George Bush declares himself "King George the First."

See where I'm going with this?

Irrational Liberal Hatred seems to be becoming a genuine problem, if not an actual disease. Between "Bush Derangement Syndrome" and it's offshoot, "Palin Derangement Syndrome" and with less than 52 days +/- til the election, I got a hunch it's gonna be a lot uglier a lot sooner...

It's Not Always Politics...

2008-09-14T01:15:00.007+03:00

...it's also going to be my Travelog as well. Today was (Allah Be Praised!) My one day off that I get during the week. The work schedule tends to be hectic as all hell. Six days a week, Twelve hours a day, Total Enslavement. The 12 a day sounds bad, but is way worse when you figure that I'm having to actually CLOCK 12 hours... which means prep time, washing my nasty and commute time isn't counted. The day works out to being almost 18 hours long when I'm done.

Occasionally I get to go out... like today. I went down to the harbor to take some pictures with a buddy of mine and to see what was up before the heat of the day kicked in.

All in all, not a bad place. Just HOT. Like HOT HOT. I mean so hot my feet were being baked in my sneakers hot. The soles of my Adidas are/were an inch and a half thick. This picture was taken at 830am Local... it was approximately 127 degrees Fahrenheit. I could feel my tootsies being baked by the sun-drenched concrete I was standing on. Needless to say......I found some shade with a mega-quickness. This was provided at the Mall across from the nice harbor area. The Kuwaitis have malls everywhere. Every inch of retail space in Kuwait consists on malls or Suks. Pronounced "Soo-ooks", the Suk is a leftover of "The Good Old Days" that you see in 'Arabian Nights' or even in the Market scene in 'Indiana Jones.' There's only one Suk in Fahaheel, but I prefer to hit the malls as you don't get pestered by the salesmen chasing you down the street and alley with "Verry Good Barrrgain Meesta!!"This picture here shows my good friend Brian inside the Fahaheel Suk. If you look closely in the background you can see one of the local "Ninja Wimmen" walking around in full Islam Gear. Makes for an in teresting comparison when walking around in 130 Degree heat and seeing some poor chick walking around in 100% Black heavy layered fucking snowsuits eh? As you can imagine, Women's Liberation ain't got much traction hereabouts. The main reason is...
...everywhere you go, there's a Mosque. This one is ATTACHED to the back of the Mall that we were at. How many Churches in the States can say that they are part of the Great Consumer Movement in the US? Not many I reckon.

Anyways, for fun on the way home I noticed this one place that I HAD to take a picture of. Seems that a lot of businesses get their translation done by the same guy who does it in China. The picture I have below is of a Hair Salon... But man... what a bad job at translating they did on this one...

...Yeah... "The Bland Saloon." I really want to get my hair cut there right? And whats with the picture of the guy? Is it me, or does it look like "Evil Brandon" from 'Beverly Hills 90210' or something? I mean what a pug on that face, never mind that do you really want to get yer hair cut at a place that prides itself on being "bland?" Yeah... God love it... That'll do for now.

You do Photoshop your Way...

2008-09-12T20:06:00.014+03:00

...and I'll do My Way... After all, It's the 'Chicago Way.' (hat tip to Confederate Yankee for the Quote)

Yes... it's kind of stuck in my head the way that the Obamabots been so active with using Palin's head on that skank's body with the air rifle (among others I've seen), so tonight while surfing around and reading, I realized that I had the perfect idea for both an article AND a "Photoshop Moment."

Yeah... I think it's rather appropriate seeings that this is THE exact question Barry and Co. are going to be asking over the next few weeks. The "Slamfest" that they started on Governor Palin snowballed into something that they themselves never envisioned. It's become the uncontrolable monster so to speak, in that they had hoped to control the Narrative, just like they have with Barry's story. Instead it's damaging their 'Chosen One' and causing chaos. Barry has now been, by my count, on the defensive for about a week and half, and his polling has been tanking when compared to two months ago. The concept that the Obamamites thought that they could either subtley or in most cases not-so-subtley attack a Mother of Five whos credentials equal or even exceed their candidates was preposterous on it's face.

The basic issue is that they thought that they had the "Woman's Vote" locked up by merit of being 'progressives' and 'liberal' in itself. I think the term is 'Hubris' in this instance. The presumption that "just because they have in the past" should not mean you take them (meaning the female vote) for granted. In this case Janet Jackson's song "What Have You Done For Me Lately?" comes leaping to mind, especially when dealing with a group as touchy as Women Voters.

"Big Country! You SEXIST PIG!"

Well, more like a chauvanist pig, thank you very much. My wife, Household Six even agrees that I'm one of the last "He Man Macho Men" rolling. Of course I think that its more appropriate for her to not work and be a full time mother at home while I earn the cash to run the house. I also don't separate colors when, on the rare occasion that I do laundry, and I'm happier for it. As far as Women Voters, I've been exposed to waaaaaaaaay too much of that shit when I was a child. My Mom was a big-time "League of Women Voters" activist and HUGELY into politics when I was a kid. My Dad with his rather twisted sense of humor would refer to it as the "League of Wimmen Vultures" as the majority of them weren't none too good looking. Mom was so into it that she'd draft my brother and me to help campaign for (UGH!!!) Ted Kennedy back in 1980 or something like that. She figured using us to hand out flyers and such because we were still in 'cute kid mode' that we'd have a better chance to get the vote out. Whatever. I remember that every election year my house that I grew up in became a madhouse of long haired volunteers sleeping on the floor, mass mailings and obscure rallys late into the evening. No wonder I became a Republican... and psychotic to boot.

Either way, I'd say that despite the denials of the Obamanoids, Palin's Candidacy has really fired up women everywhere. Obama had hoped to get the Hillaroid Voters to jump on his bandwagon, but because of the "Palin Gambit" (similar to a Hail Mary in football) the McCain Campaign has taken a major lead in the polls, and might be able to crest this to November if they play it smart. Because of the 'lack of class' and sexist approach that the Barryfolk took towards Governor Palin, and thereby women in general, well, frankly it can't be recalled... unlike Biden.

Which in itself is becoming a real posibility. However, if they DO recall 'Slow Joe' and attempt to re-instate Hillary, then the Obama Campaign will be finished. After all, who's to say Hillary would even be willing to be 'sloppy seconds' in a desperate attempt to mend fences? I'm sure she wouldn't. Her best move will be to sit pat, keep quiet, let Obama and his Obamanoids flounder and flop like a fish out of water for the next 5 weeks, and allow McCain to be a one-term Presidency and attempt to jump in in 2012. Joe however isn't helping matters. His best bet to stay on the ticket would be to volunteer to have a laryngectomy performed. Hopefully he won't though, as he's providing enough fodder for late night humor TV for the next generation or so.

Obama's Thin Skin

2008-09-12T03:31:00.006+03:00

Nevermind the color... it would seem that the Man Who Would Be King...er...President is a bit 'thin skinned' as it were. The Mainstream Media has done a great job of covering for him, but I realized today that he's just NOT Presidential Material.

"Why Big Country! You RACIST!"

Well, nope. I'm not. Far from it. I'm a realist. Right now has it occurred to anyone (and I know it has) that Old Barry is a bit "Over The Top" on his defensiveness and attacks on the VICE-Presidential pick? Shouldn't Ole Barry be a bit more concerned with the Presidential competition? He and his more rabid supporters have been going pretty much nonstop since the announcement and Sarah Palin's speech. It would seem that he's a bit too...shall we say obsessed? with his constant hammering and he's been revealing a bit too much of himself in a negative fashion.

Between his failure to be either gracious and/or congratulatory at the announcement of Governor Palin becoming the VP candidate, and his rather poor attacks attempting to belittle her achievements, (he only mentioned her being a mayor of a small town), he's done gone and shot himself in the foot continuously. His deployment of a squad of lawyers to Alaska to 'dig dirt' on her is just awful. If McCain did this, the media would be screaming from their ivory towers: "Hangin's too good for 'im!" Obama's inability to get past this, and his obvious sexist attitude (which the media has continually given him a pass on) is showing on all levels... and as we're seeing in the polls and in his money donations falling, this is translating to lost support.

His continual harping on how "She's just a continuation of Bush's Policies" and his near-tantrum of "But I'm the real agent for change!!!" is more suited to my 7 year old daughter throwing a fit when she doesn't get her pick for the movie on Friday night, rather than of a Presidential Nominee.

It's downright embarassing.

And the American Public has noticed.

Seven Years...

2008-09-11T19:18:00.002+03:00

OK... in keeping with the 'General Mood' of things, I'll comment for a bit on the whole '9/11' thing. Simply put: We've been at war for seven years now... a War against an Idea. An Ideological War if you will... It's not a war of conquering territory or a people, although to hear the pundits and politicians talk of it, it's all about Bin Laden or his Al Queda folks. Others propogate the idea that the War is against Iraq/Iran/or "Fill in the Blank Country of your Choice." In reality we're dealing with a War of Ideas, which when you get down to it is all a Religion is. This is that we're fighting in a battle of 'hearts and minds' so to speak. This war, while the current battles may take place in a city in Iraq or on the open plains or mountains of Afghanistan, is still basically a battle between beliefs systems.

Lets call it what it is: "My Invisible Man in the Sky is BETTER than your Invisible Man in the Sky."

I mean realistically, religion, or at least the IDEA of religion is a theoretical idea of a "higher power" that has omniscient powers and is 'in charge' of the Universe and created everything everywhere and knows everything. I'm not dogging religion per se, in as much as the concept of organized religion. Organized religion, according to my Late Great Grandfather began when the first Con Man met the First Fool. Essentially the Con Man was able to get the Fool to believe that he (the Con Man) was in communication with the "Higher Power" (usually referred to as God) and subsequently, the Fool should support/feed/pay the Con Man "because God wants you to." This leads me back to my original issue.

This war is a War of Ideas. At the current rate we're going, we're never going to stop battling these people as long as they believe that they are fighting for the "Glory of their Chosen God." The one thing we'd have to do is start thinking of this as more of a psychological war. Treat these people like cultists, rather than as enemy combatants. I'd have to say, the idea is that I think we need to look at 'deprogramming them' more than killing them on the battlefield. Not saying that we shouldn't be killing the ones who are 'far gone' that is... if they're dumb enough and violent enough to pick up an AK and go after American troops, then they get what they deserve. Its that we need to start getting them, deprogramming them, while they are young.

For instance, the Al Jazeera TV network and the West Bank television programming include a regular set of early morning kids shows. Normally not a problem, but the fact is that they use the most graphic propoganda to instill hatred of Jews and Infidels in these kids shows. In my own humble (not so much) opinion, if I were in charge, the first thing I'd do is drop a BLU-96 Fuel Air Explosive on any and all transmission stations and the TV station itself. I'd set up jammers and block any and all forms of 'hate TV' from being broadcast. These people start by programming the kids when they are too young to either know better or defend themselves against this brainwashing. Everyone wonders why, that by the age of 18, the majority of Palestinian males are clinically depressed. Well, possibly the fact that from from the time they are born they are told that Martyrdom is the best thing they can hope for, that they have no country or hope while the Infidels keep them down, and that they are subject to all these cockamamie rules that goes along with their religion. Its bad enough being an American teen with NORMAL angst, but can you imagine being a Palestinian? Where your parents' one fond hope is that you blow yourself up and take a pile of infidels with you? "Gee mom... Thanks!"

Talk about a sick fucking culture.

When I was 18, all I wanted to worry about was getting laid, that new zit on my forehead before the prom, and if I'd have enough gas money to party on the weekend. These kids are programmed from birth to be the 'new martyrs.' They haven't had the chance to realize that life has a lot more going for it than death. I mean until someone shows up with proof positive of an afterlife, I'd be really hesitant to go blowing myself to pieces.

Hell... you'd think that common sense should be breaking out at some point in that if someone came up and asked me to be a Suicide Bomber that you'd ask them "If it's so good to be a martyr, then why don't YOU go and do it?" At that point you should expect the usual hemming and hawing worthy of a politician. Not with these people. They really think that what they are doing is 'blessed' by their God, and that what they are doing is righteous.

When I was in Baghdad in 2004 at the beginning of the Insurgency.. this was when all of the 'firebrand' Mullahs (preists in Islam) were talking up taking up arms against the 'Crusaders' and 'Infidels'... One of my Iraqi friends told me that by allowing these guys to hype up the locals, the military was essentially shooting itself in the foot. His advice (which no one listened to) was to round up the Anti-American Mullahs and publically execute them in a gruesome public fashion and leave the bodies in a public display as a warning to the rest. "Leave them for the crows." he told me. A few months later when we were in what essentially was a shooting war again, I saw Mohamned as he was preparing to pull out for Jordan. "You Americans are too soft to be here." he told me. "As long as you try to treat these people as equals, you will never be able to stop them."

It comes down to that after seven years of conventional war, we need to start rethinking this. The standard "Bomb 'em into the Stone Age" doesn't really work when the bad guys already live at a Hunter-Gatherer level just outside the Neolithic. I'd say we need to try something different... because those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.

OK Theres a First Time for Everything...

2008-09-11T02:59:00.000+03:00

...and I figured after about five or so years of bullshitting around, I should actually try posting the various insane ramblings that I've been taken to writing and put them 'out there' for the general reading audience.
For those of you joining for the first time, let me introduce myself. I'm Big Country, my nom-de-guerre as it were, that was given to me by one of my old bosses back in Iraq in 2004. I've been bouncing around the Middle East since the beginning of 2004, and have had quite the number of adventures, most of which I've written in the form of outrageous and politically incorrect emails to my friends and family. One of them hung the nickname of "The Intrepid Reporter" on me, and I've used that as my signature line for my emails ever since. In a thumbnail, I'm a 38 year old prior service vet of the U.S. Army with a backround in the Airborne Infantry, Armor and Logistics. I was a member of the famed 101st Airborne Division and also a member of the First Cavalry Division. I've got some Special Ops background too, but I can't talk about that, 'cause then I'd have to kill you. I'm currently married and have two children who probably wonder who Dad is, seeings that I'm only home 3 weeks out of the year. My long-suffering Wife, Household Six, tolerates me mainly because:

A) I send a LARGE paycheck home and
B) I'm not there making messes and being in her way.

If you are offended easily or are 'faint of heart' so to speak, then you DO NOT want to continue reading this. I'm opinionated, loud, obnoxious, and generally prefer to do my writing under the influence of chemicals, be they legal or, seeings that I'm in Kuwait EVERYTHING is illegal. I'm an equal-opportunity offender. I offend EVERYONE at one point or another. My Mother says that politically, I'm to the right of Himmler, and that I swear too much, but hey, fuck it. I can't please everyone.
Currently I'm enslaved...er...employed by a "Company That Shall Remain Nameless" seeings that the chickenshit bastards would probably fire me for spilling the beans of what a fantastic rail-job they've been pulling on me AND Uncle Sam. Either way, I'm still in Kuwait and enduring the whole fucking "Religion of Peace that is Islam"

HAH!!!

Oh? Did that slip out? Oops. Yeah... I may as well get that off my chest early. I'm currently dealing with Kuwait and "The Religion of Peace" TM. It's Ramadan, and that generally means that despite being a Neo-Catholic/Christian like myself, I have to follow the 'Local Rules' that the Mullahs and every other whackadoo are currently following. For the remainder of the month, there's no Food, Water, Sex, Boozing (not thats allowed anyways), Smoking or just about any other 'normal human activity' allowed during the time from sun up, to sun down. No wonder these people are poopy so much eh? Literally, they fast from oh-dark-early in the morning til oh-dark-late in the evening. Then they throw down and pig the fuck out until they go to bed. Even though I'm NOT a member of their cult...er...religion, but because I'm in a Sharia Run country, I'm expected/told that I WILL follow the Ramadan Rules OR ELSE!
Yep. Failure to comply will get you hemmed up and put in the slam. Makes me wonder where the fucking "Freedom From Religion" folks or Micheal Newdow or those other assholes from the NAACP or whoever the hell it is who tries like hell to banish all forms of religion from public view in the US? Oh yes... thats right... if they tried their crap here, they'd be lucky to escape with their heads still attached to their bodies... anyways...
Yes, I'm here for the 'now' as they say. I have no choice seeings that I'm waiting on a new contract, one that will HOPEFULLY, like Calgon, Take Me Away... to Japan no less. Then I'll be able to Blog about my experience with the Japanese culture, and insult the hell out of it while having my adventures there.

So this will be my latest, and hopefully regular update for you all. Stay Tuned!
Until later, I remain, The Intrepid Reporter
Big Country