Day to Day

The time is flying by. I can not believe it is the middle of December already. Not much going on except preparing for the change of command and normal day to day mission stuff. The current date for the change of command is 12 January. I suspect it will move again. I am not worried about it. I have had a good command and there comes a time to move on to something else. I will miss it. We are planning a BBQ and gift exchange for the 24th. It should be fun. Everyone is looking forward to spending the holidays at home next year, but until then we just have to work with what we have.

Catch-up

It has been a while since I have posted anything. Let's see what has happened... We went to the range again. More of the same except a little less qualifying and more pistol close quarters stuff. It has gotten chilly here. It has been in the mid 40 for lows and 70s for highs. We have gotten lots (for Iraq anyway) of rain lately. We have started sending Soldiers home for R&R. It is a little early, but someone has to fill the early slots. I will be leaving command on 5 JAN 10. At least I think that is the date. Nobody has said for sure, but that is the last day in our change of command inventory schedule. The incoming commander will need to spend the last two weeks of December and the first 3-4 days of January inventorying all of the company property, so that she can sign for everything before we change out. I will be moving to the Brigade Intelligence shop where I will be the assistant Brigade S2 (Intelligence Officer). I had a good birthday. We had a PT test that day, so I decided to do the run to determine how much time I had gained since we got here. My First Sergeant and I have been running quite a bit. I ran the 2 miles in 1240, so it has paid off. One of my goals when I got here was to get back under 13 minutes. Maybe I should shoot for 1200.

Range

All available Soldiers went to the range yesterday to shoot 9MM and our M4s. I shot expert with both weapons. 40/40 with my pistol and 38/40 with my M4. I also shot left handed with a simulated broken trigger finger (used my middle finger) and shot 36/40, but I was shorted 2 rounds in one of my magazines. I think it was more difficult to use my non-dominate eye than it was to use the other hand. Also much better since I had my eye surgery. We also did some transition and close quarters marksmanship drills. We had fun. We are trying to get to the range at least once a month while we are here, just to keep the skills sharp.

No Second Command

I got confirmation this week that I will not be taking the second command. Kind of relieved. It was going to be alot of work. Hard to explain the difference, but much different than what I am doing now. Since it is a headquarters it is the Company that all of the Brigade commander and his staff are in. I would not have really been in command of anything since all of the staff Majors run their sections and all I would have done is been responsible for their property. I also would have been held responsible for all DUIs and discipline issues once we return to the states. With a company of 240 Soldiers that have been deployed for a year there was certain to be lots of late night phone calls. It was determined that since I am so close to Major that the second command would not have been beneficial. More beneficial for me to work in an Intel job instead. I will move to the BDE intelligence office to be the assistant intelligence officer. I am trying to stay in Bravo Company until MAR or APR, But it looks like it will be more like FEB.

New Contract

Well KBR has been fired as the NTV contractor and it is being taken over by AIT. We took the truck to them and they think they may have it fixed today. We were not going to hold our breath, but the guys went to check on it today and the starter was done and they were working on the flywheel. However, we got confirmation today that all of the NTV are going to go away in a couple months. That only raises one question.... How is everyone going to get to the chow hall?! Barracudas are forbidden from taking the NTVs to chow because it is only about 400 meters from the CP (Command Post) and about 800 meters from the LSA (Life Support Area). You may or may not be surprised about just how lazy most people are. It has been raining here off and on for two days. It has made it nice and cool and also very muddy.

Contracts

We should be able to go back in the records here and find out who drafted contacts for certain things and then track them down and make them pay back all of the money their contract has wasted over its life time. Our NTV (Non-Tactical Vehicle) contract doesn't allow us to buy parts from any other source except KBR. However nobody can tell me if there is anything in the contract about speedy service. One of our Ford Expeditions has a bad starter and fly wheel. They are telling us that the parts are on order and will be here in a about a month. No telling how much they are charging for the parts. I found the same parts online for $80 and could have them here in about a week except putting those parts on would void the contract. So we will continue to spend 5 minutes getting the vehicle started until the parts are completely tore up. I do not think they will last another month.

Groundhog Day

All of the days have started to run together. PT, eat, work, eat, work, eat, meeting, sleep repeat. I know it is the weekend when football is on TV. About a month ago I was anxious to get into a routine so time would start going by fast. Well that time has arrived and time is flying by. I can not believe we are 2/3 of the way through October already. I have seen several e-mails about change of command time lines, but nothing official yet. Looks like I will leave Bravo Company in the middle of December. Stepped on a scale this morning and it said 175.