This is the 15th blog in my series "Iraq-The Story Unfolds". Wow, I didn't realize I had posted so many. For those that are not following you can go back through my blogs and see most of the different "untold" stories that I have for my deployment to Iraq. This is a much different side that you won't see on TV. Anyway this post is to talk about the weather again, seems to come up in alot of posts.
So I came back a little more than a month ago. When I got here at the beginning of October the temperatures were still lingering around the 105-115 F range. This was a little better from this summer when it ranged from 120-140 for the highs. This was a bit of relief except the wind was coming in off of the gulf which meant the humidity was also much higher. I will still say that I will take a dry 125-130 over a wet 110. I would go and take a shower, get out, dry off, and instantly be soaked once again. It was very un-pleasant.
So most of the month went by and it has dropped dramatically. Our temperatures this month dropped down to highs in the 90's or below. In fact our high Thursday is only supposed to be 79 degrees. In one month we have had a drop of about 40 degrees. It almost feels like back home. And the wind has changed again from the gulf and is now blowing down from the north so the humidity is gone. I actually think I will need to buy a blanket before I come home.
The other major change is that we finally see rain. It has not been much usually a few sprinkles during the day and a small shower after mid-night. It has been constant for the past week. This is much relief after about four to five months without any percipitation. Only one major problem with the rain. What happens when you our water over a country full of dirt and sand. Yep we now live in one major mud-puddle again. Driving around can be a pain, and now we cannot keep the office clean, but I will take it as opposed to the heat.
Well this is all I really have for this post. The focus now is on our re-deployment. Our replacement unit should be on their way sometime in the near future and my days in this country are starting to get really low. I can finally stop counting weeks and start counting days. And yes Im still singing the song "I'll be home for Christmas". That song has such a nice ring to it.
Thank you all for following
Nicholas S. Bush
(Deployed) REALTOR®
Total Auction and Realty LLC
(O) 637-8777
(C) 243-4574
First off for those of you who have been following my posts I want to apologize for such a long wait time from the last one. Things have been very hectic in the past two months. Anyway I had left the last post talking about my up-coming leave. As you can guess from the title of this blog, it was not quite what I expected.
So the days from my last post until I left got really crazy. I was placed in the administration office to help out the personnel section to cover down on other Soldiers that were on leave. This is all and good except I was still required to work my other full time job as well. This is why I say things got really hectic. Most days started around 6:30 AM and lasted up into the late evening. The only good that came of any of this was that it helped my days pass by just a bit quicker. However with my eye on the clock it still seemed to be barely moving. Finally after about three weeks of pure (well crap) my day to leave finally came. I will walk you all through the experience.
You would think that after six years of being in this country they would have the system to get Soldiers home down to an art. Well it is far from that. My unit was able to schedule my flight from my current location down to Kuwait. This is where all the leave processing is done. I arrived around 2PM and told to "transient housing" until 7:30PM. Transient housing is a fancy name for a tent. However in this case it is about 96 tents. Each tent has the capacity of about 12 Soldiers, and everytime I have been through there they are darn near full. These are reserved specifically for the Soldiers going to and from leave. Your space consists of either a top or bottom bink, no more no less. Ill let you do the math on how many are coming and going everyday.
So 7:30 rolls around and its roll call for those going on leave. We show up and they told us, thanks for coming, come back tomorrow morning. That was it, there was no information, nothing else but a time and place. The next morning we show up, sit through a binch of mandatory classes on how to act around civilians, then its off to customs. A very (and I mean VERY) thorough search through our bags and off we go to the flight line. We sit there until about 10 PM waiting on our aircraft.
One look at this aircraft and you can tell that it is defanalty contracted through the military system, (lowest bidder). The airline is called "Omni-Air International," I have never heard of it. In fact after seeing the inside and out of the plane, I believe it is only still in business from the military contract. As all 360+ of us cram inside, we realize that this aircraft must have been built for the smaller framed Arabs. Us overweight, larger framed, American's can barely fit side by side in here. Add that up to the fact that my seats recliner was broken, headset didnt work, and the TV (8) rows in front of me looked like a 1980's 15" computer monitor that barely supported color. Lastly, and what I blame the most for my failed vacation, was the fact that it did not even have ventilation. Okay maybe a few vents were hidden up in the top ceiling above the rows, but nothing you could feel at the passenger level. Keep in mind that most Soldiers at this point have been in the desert, at 120+ temperature, going on 24-48 hours without a shower or change of uniform. You could practically see the bacteria flying around in the cabin. My best definition of this place was a cess pool.
So 18 hours in the air in these conditions, I never thought Atlanta airport looked so good. It was a quick transition from Omni-Air to Delta and now on my way to Knoxville. As I arrive in the terminal of Atlanta, I am quickly on the phone making sure my wife is at the other end. A quick Im here and you would have thought someone was chasing me through the breezeway's. I exit out the security gate and finally get to see my wife for the first time in eight months. If anyone is interested my wife actually had a photographer there waiting on me. He took some great pictures and put them to music and a slide show. He did a really good job, all of my wife's friends really loved them. You can check them out at my Facebook account. I will admit that while I am over here, I do not have access to my FaceBook so my wife maintains it. You will have to request to add me as a friend, make sure to put a commment that you are from Active Rain. Search for Nicholas Bush and filter by school. Look for Southwestern Pulaski County High School. (For some reason Facebook does not want to aknowlege that I live in Knoxville Tennessee). Anyway after the photographer got plenty of pictures, I threw my wife in the car. Since I had been gone for eight months . . . . . well . . .I wont talk about the rest of that day.
Day one: The real fun begins. I woke up this morning, less than 24 hours after arriving, not feeling so good. My wife took my temperature and found it at 101.7. Not wanting anything to ruin this two weeks of bliss I actually for once agreed to go straight to the family doctor. There he ran a few tests, to include a flu swab, and everything came back negative. However he thought it was still probably the flu and due to my quick response it hasnt had enough time to come positive yet. He started me on Tami-flu, which was a good decision. To be honest I was actually feeling alot better that afternoon and still managed to steal my wife away for dinner and a movie. It was a fairly good day.
Day Two: This morning is when everything hit the fan. I woke up feeling absolutly horrible and extremely weak. I managed to drag myself to the couch and passed out shortly after. I was woke up by my wife an hour or so later, I was sweating perfusely, and my temp came up to 105.7. My wife (a nurse) said she was surprised that I did not start having febrile seizures. The funny part to this is that I had been watching Smallville on TV the night before and when I woke I was having hallucinations. I actually believed that I was Clark Kent, however thankfully I did not have enough energy to get up, or I may have tried to see if I could fly off the porch. Anyway I was talking all kinds of non-sence. My wife finally managed to get me off the couch and in the car and she took me to the ER that she works at. Several hours there and a few bags of IV fluids I was feeling a little better but it would be a few days before I was able to recover.
The next few days I was pretty much bed-ridden. My temperature was staying between 101-104. The worst part was that it was time for us to finally take that Hawaii vacation. Unfortunatly I was un-able to fly, and we had to cancel. Thankfully I had the fore-sight of getting vacation insurance and managed to only loose a few hundred, as opposed to a few thousand that I put down. The Hawaii trip was a bust, but I was still able to salve part of my vacation.
After I got better, (on or around day eight), I was finally able to go visit some friends and family. I managed to squeeze in a game of golf with my dad, and a day to "try" to teach my wife to play as well. We took our anniversary a month early and went down to Sweetwater Tennessee to a place called The Lost Sea. It was actually a nice little place to visit. I wouldnt recommend travel to the area for the attraction, but if your in the area it would be worth spending half a day to visit. You go down in a cave about two miles underground to a hidden underground lake. The tour guide takes you out on a little boat in the dark over the water. It was kinda romantic, (it would have been better without the other ten people that was with us).
Not much else happened on the trip until it was time to return to Iraq. I flew back into Atlanta where the military screened everyone to make sure that no-one was going to take any sicknesses back to Iraq. When I was screened (even to my surprise) my temp was back up to 99.6. This normally would not have stopped them from sending me but when they found out that I had just been diagnosed with the Swine Flu they sent me to some little clinic in the airport. The doctor there thought that I had developed some type of bacterial bronchitis and put me on a 48 hour hold. Thankfully I only live about five hours from the Atlanta airport so I quickly had my wife packing her things and driving down. I wasnt able to leave Atlanta, but that didnt mean it would stop her from coming down. I was able to get an extra two days to spend with her. I actually just found out that several of the wives and Soldiers in the unit are not just jealous but downright upset that I got an extra two days. This message is for them only: I would happily trade that extra 48 hours for the 7 days I spent staring at the ceiling, cross-eyed and dreuling. While I did get two extra days I still came up about 5 short.) Sorry everyone else, I had to do that.
I really dont want to get into the goodbyes as it was hard enough the first time around. Actually the funny story is that on this one depolyment this was actually our Sixth time saying goodbye to one-another. First I was told that i would be going to train in my new job at Fort Huachuca Arizona and would be going straight from there, then I was sent home after that training. Second was when I left for Fort Bennign for the Mobilization Center. Had some administrative issues there and was placed on a four day pass. This lead to the third when my wife came down and stayed with me for those days. Fourth was at the Atlanta airport when I was leaving the first time to come over. We were told we had to wait from 8am to about 2AM on our flight and she had time to come down. Fifth was on leave when I left for Atlanta as mentioned above. Then Sixth when my flight took off after the 48 hour hold in Atlanta.
Now back to that great Airline "Omni-Air". Our aircraft to get us back to Iraq was in as good of condition as the one that brought us over. As we start down the runway seomthing happend and our aircraft lost all power. We taxi'd back in and after some time they finally had us un-board. My wife was still there so we managed to grab something to eat and steal about two more hours until they were able to get another Omni-Aircraft ready for flight. This lead to our SEVENTH good-bye. You would think that by now it would be easier but I think it got harder everytime. Anyway on the second attempt the aircraft managed to get us back.
Wait, thats not the end. The process for leave still continues. We finally reach Kuwait and now it is time to get back to our duty location. THis is much harder than it seems. There were some people there that waited one-two weeks for that flight back to their location. Again this falls under my comment "You would think after six years of this they would have this down to an art." It was far from that, in fact the process of tracking the Soldiers seemed to fall through somehow as names were "magically" dropped off the rosters, and Soldiers were overlooked. In one case they even FORGOT to tell the group that a flight for a certain location was leaving and let it fly back almost empty. I will not bash on the military anymore but I will leave it with one last well-known to military. The system was as screwed up as a football bat.
Anyway my 15 days back home managed to streatch out to 31 days away from my duty location. Im back, now and just counting down the days until I get to go home. Yes I do have a date now however due to "operational security" I cannot disclose that date. However I will continue to sing the song "I'll be home for Christmas".
Thank you all for putting up with such a long post. I guess I should not wait so long between them the next time.
NICHOLAS S. BUSH
REALTOR®
TOTAL AUCTION AND REALTY LLC
KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE
OFFICE: 865-637-8777
CELL: 865243-4574
EMAIL: NBushRealtor@gmail.com
WEBSITE: www.HomeSalesEastTN.com
This is to follow on with my last blog about my tour here in Iraq. I hve decided what to do for my period of leave. If you have not been following and don't know about the military leave program, basically if you are deploying here for over 270 days you get a 15 day leave to go home and spend time with the family. I originally stated that my wife was really wanting to go to the beach and I was wanting to do nothing more than relax at the house. Understaning that there will probably be multiple people wanting to come visit, and wanting me to visit them, me and my wife decided that a get-a-way vacation would probably be best. (To my family that reads this, dont worry I'm still going to come visit).
I have made reservations to go to Hawaii. Thats right, what we originally planned to be just a simple trip to the beach to get away turned into a major trip to Kauai, Hawaii. I booked through expedia and for the exchange of price we ended up stuck on 18 hours of transit to get there, for about $400 less dollars. Im not really happy abou tthis as I will be spending about 20 hours in transit from Iraq to the States, the several days later another 18 hours to get to Hawaii and then the return trips to get back, but it will be worth it. I reserved a decent hotel "Sheraton Kauai Resort" for 5 nights, and also a rental car to get around. I really look forward to this.
My only problem now is trying to figure out what we will be doing once we get there. If there is anyone out there that is familiar with Kauai and has any recommendations let me know. I already plan on a few things, snorkeling, swimming, checking out some lagoon that is close by, but havent really had alot of time to research the area for other fun or romantic activities. Especially since this will be for our one year anniversary.
This trip will eat up about one week of my time still leaving plenty of time for my family, friends, and finally a little rest.
As always thanks to those that are supporting us over here, and I'll see you all in the next blog.
Nicholas S. Bush
Realtor®, Total Auction and Realty LLC
IJANGO Representative
Which number do you like better; 39 or 130? Well I am definatley looking forward to 39 which is how long until I get to go on leave. I get a full 15 days to spend at home, plus whatever time it takes for travel. Looking at about 20 days total. However I would definatly say that 130 would be my magic number and that is the "Estimated" amount of days I have until I get to go home. Sorry I cannot say, and sadly I dont really even know when that magic day is. However, we have been told that unless some significant event occurrs we should be home for Christmas.
So . . . 15 days til I get to go home. Time starts the midnight following our aircraft touching U.S. soil and ends the midnight prior to my return flight. I can only hope that I land at 1:00 AM and fly out at 11:00 Pm giving me just short of 17 days home. I have mixed feelings about how I want to spend time when I get home. After pulling 7 months here of 6-7 days a week and 12-14 hour days I really just want to go home, relax, keep visitors and travelling to a minimum. Another part of me wants to have some extravagant vacation. I was originally planning on taking my wife to her dream vacation in Gulf Shores Alabama. Im not quite sure why its her dream vacation, you would think it would be more like a tropical beach on a remote island in the Carrabean but thats what she wants. Anyway I was looking at vacation packages and ideas for the trip but with my leave time being variable, I did not want to make any reservations and risk loosing them and the down payment because my flight was delayed in Iraq.
My main concern with leave is all the people that want you to come visit. When I came home for leave on my last tour I had all kinds of friends and family calling and emailing asking em to come visit them, some several states away. They all wanted to see me but it was expected of me to go around to all these different places just to visit them leaving me no time to relax. Needless to say there were some angry people when I refused to travel. But we can do all that once I am back home for good. My plans right now consist of coming home and relaxing for a few days. I do want to travel back to my hometown to see my family. I plan to take one maybe two days for that. I am also talking with my dad and brother-in-law about trying to join the Masons. (I figure with all the other changes for the good in my life, (becoming a Realtor, getting married, getting ready to start a family)this may be one of the best.)) I also think I will take my wife to the beach, she is really looking forward to that Then back to relaxing before returning to this place for two-three more months.
So another 130 or so days until I get to come home. That is the true number I cam counting down towards. Home by Christmas, and hopefully never gone again. I have decided that it is time to get out of the Army. I plan to put full emphisis on my Real Estate career and do not want the distraction of going to weekend duty, or leaving for several weeks at a time to get in the way of my potential as a Realtor. I still have until August 2011 until my contract is up but they should not be able to deploy me again beofre my contract ends. I have had second thoughts about getting out but my wife is so excited that I made the decision to end my career that even the mention of staying in those last eight years seems to break her heart. Of course in her defense. The Army did take me away from her a mere three months after our marriage. This deployment is hard enough on her and I can't imagine doing this once we have a family.
So here I am, the end of July, just counting down the days. Actually its almost the end of the work day so I will go ahead and change it to 38 and 129(ish). It sounds a little better anyway.
Nicholas S. Bush
Realtor®
Total Auction and Realty
IJango Representative
My last post I had mentioned that we had finally past our half way mark. With that it seems like the time has suddenly started to fly by. I beieve that I had told you all that my biggest thing to look forward to was my Sundays, the one day that I get most of the day off. Well they seem to be coming and going faster than ever now. I believe this is because of two things, we have passed the half way mark so we are starting to talk about our re-deployment and everything that goes with it, the paperwork, supply issues, timeline. The other thing that I contribute it too is our unit finally flowing without problems. Its sad to say that it took almost six months to get here, but we are finally in our groove. I guess it is not too bad considering that the last time we had almost smoothed everything out we had to up and move from Baghdad to Basra. Also the division that we were working with left and a new one moved in, and with that came a different set of rules, a different way of organizing things, and in all actuality a new style of living. Now that we are settled in again, and we have fixed all the internet connectivity problems, electrical problems, our offices are fully functional again. There is hardly anything un-expected popping up anymore and with all this means that we now come in do our job and leave with much less stress then before. Now it seems as though nothing ever changes.
Here's the one problem with nothing ever changing. All the days seem the same. Every day (except Sunday) I get up around 0630 usually fight to sleep as long as possible, get ready and in the office by 0700. I have a daily routine that I work through, it varies very little from day to day, fill out the same paperwork, send in the same reports, create the same slide show presentations for the commander. Hardly any variation in the day. I usually either go to lunch around 12:00 and come back at 1:30 then leave at 4:30 and go to the gym. Or I go to the gym at 10:45 followed immediatly by lunch and back in the office by 1:30 and finish the day at 5:00. Dinner around 7:30 and in bed by 1030-1100. Sundays I sleep until about 0930, church at 1000, lunch at 1:00, staff meeting at 6:00 dinner at 7:30, and sleep by 1030. It very rarily changes. There is no exceptions, no variations, not even for the 4th of July.
How Ironic, I missed the 4th of July. Apparently they did have something lined up here on post. There was a country music concert put on by Artie Dean Harris and a talent show was scheduled as his opening act. I guess several of the larger units were able to attend. Especially the soldiers whose jobs are much harder than mine, going out, patrolling everyday, doing typical Army stuff. They were able to take a break and go have fun. As for me (and almost everyone in my office) it was just another day. Get out of the Office around 5:00 do laundry, get dinner, clean personal area, and go to bed. Just as every day before and after. All days come and go without a change, except another "X" on the calender and one less number on the countodwn to returning home.
Also for all that are interested I have finally got internet connection in my room; however the payments and collections suck. I cannot believe that the Army is allowing some Iraqi company to come in and rape us on these prices. The only connection that we have available to us that will allow us to access personal email, myspace, twitter, facebook is this civilian company and the packages are as follows:
$40/mo for 64 DL and 32 UL
$70/mo for 128 DL and 64 UL
$160/mo for 256 DL and 128 UL
$330/mo for 512 DL and 256 UL
I will never again complain about my internet prices back home. Anyway I signed up for the $70 plan so that I can get on all those sites, finally be able to see AR the right way as all pics are removed from it on my office internet, and get to upload pictures to put on the internet. This means that hopefully next Sunday or Wednesday I am going to try to do a wordless post with a bunch of pics of the area here. (But dont hold me to that, I will have to see if the internet will in fact allow me.
To all reading, again, thanks for your support
SGT Nicholas S. Bush
Realtor®, Total Auction and Realty
Nicholas is a licenced REALTOR working with Total Auction & Realty LLC in Knoxville, TN. If you would like to know more about the services he provides goto www.HomeSalesEastTN.com
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