Saturday, January 31, 2009

Groundhog Day

It's been a while since I last blogged. I've been extremely busy, but the reason is mostly because nothing new or interesting has been going on lately. Actually, it has been just like the Bill Murray movie, "Groundhog Day." I wake up at the same time every morning (6:50am) without an alarm clock. My body just gets up. I hop out of bed, grab clean clothes and my shower bag, and head over to the shower trailer. I use the same shower stall each morning, take a shower for maybe 5 minutes, then I use the same sink each morning to shave. The same people are in there at the same times each morning, and we usually say the same things to each other every morning. The conversation is usually something along the lines of "how's it going?" and "Today's the fourth Monday this week (Thursday)."
That's about it.


I'm staying busy with work, and I have plenty of time to run...getting in about 30 miles per week right now. I get a lot more sleep than I would back home too, but I miss Meredith and the kids a lot. Aside from work, I am keeping busy planning for our PCS move to Japan in June. I think we're all looking forward to the adventure of Sasebo. I just need to finish this "adventure" first!

I promise to load some pictures of some of my favorite runs around here, and different things we're doing to maintain sanity in the long days and constant work pace. Thanks for reading about me, I'd love to know who's checking in. My email is travismortimer@gmail.com

And by the way, you should check out Meredith's new blog layout. It looks like a scrapbook page and is really nice. Not to mention the pictures of the kids she manages to get are absolutely adorable. I love you all.

Thursday, January 8, 2009

Outside the Wire

I went on a little trip o n Monday "Outside the Wire," meaning off the base or outside the protective wire. I had to go to Haditha Dam for an inspection of a fence project for the Iraqi Ministry of Irrigation, Ministry of Electricity, and the Iraqi Army. The project was for an Iraqi company to install a 6 mile long security fence around the Haditha Dam area.
I have included a few photos of the trip to show some of the highlights. This is my view from the back seat. We had a private security firm provide transportation to/from the job sites. We ride in heavily armored Toyota Land cruisers. It's not quite as safe as a tactical vehicle, but we are also a much smaller target and less annoying presence to the Iraqi folks in these vehicles, and they're alot more comfortable than a tactical vehicle.
From the back seat, you can see my partner, Bob. he's an Engineer with the Army Corps of Engineers. You can see the view from inside is limited. The black circle is the little armored port hole for us to shoot out of if needed. The ballistic glass is several inches thick.
This is the view going into the Iraqi Camp Haditha. US forces recently turned over all responsibilities to the Iraqi Army and they now run this camp entirely. We waited 45 minutes to meet with the ranking officer of the camp, an Iraqi Major, because he was still sleeping when we got there at 10am. We conducted our inspection while he "gathered himself".
The whole area had a lot of men just standing around watching traffic drive by. Unemployment is very high in this region of Iraq (Al Anbar Province). Unfortunately, all this lingering around makes everyone look suspicious to us.
This was a really neat monument we passed near the Haditha area. The region is proud of their power generation at the Dam. It is nice to see civic pride every now and then, even if it is Saddam propaganda.
A view of the Haditha Dam as we approach. Nothing special here. It's a HUGE dam of about 5 miles long and about 40 meters high, but the water depth on the other side is only a few meters. Most of the pictures are taken from inside the vehicle because the security team was hyper sensative to the threat. I didn't feel threatened, but we had to stay inside the armor unless necessary to get out. It's just precaution...I know my wife appreciates it, but I didn't feel the need to stay so hunkered down. We only received a couple rounds of small arms fire the whole trip...just kidding about that last one!
Driving through the face of the dam on ground level, downstream side.
The view from afar. Even with a big shallow lake of water, it's still the desert out here.
We inspected the fence and found plenty of problems, and we met with the Major at the camp. The whole thing was not a big deal, but fun to get off the base for a while. I didn't get any pictures of the meeting only because it would be inappropriate to shoot photos while negotiating things, and also because appearing in photos with Americans can make Iraqis more of a target.
Here's a nice shot of the drive back to the base. Some one's front porch where they're skinning and butchering a cow. There were lots of houses like this where people were out front killing goats or sheep.
We stopped to check on a construction site of a school house in Baghdadi, the little town outside the base here (not to be confused with Baghdad).
A typical small roadside mosque in Baghdadi.
Houses along the road.
Sheep herding along the route. It was pretty common to see flocks of sheep running around with a little goat herder/ shepherd type of person. It was always obvious that the shepherds were very concerned about their sheep getting run over by the trucks! You could see the worry in their eyes every time we drove by a flock.
The trip ended without incident, and I will get more pictures of interesting stuff next time I go out. I'm hoping to go to the hospital project, or another school project, where I can mingle with local folks. There's a lot of good work going on here. I'm glad to be a part of it.

Thursday, January 1, 2009

No Photographs Allowed

Today is New Year's Day. For the most part it was quiet because we were on somewhat of a "holiday routine." I started my day off by sleeping in until 7am, and stayed in bed until 8. It was NICE!!! I got 10 hours of sleep...who says deployment is rough?
So I took my time getting around, went for a run to start the year off right, and a cold wind started blowing in. The wind kept coming, and by noon the temperature dropped 20 degrees and we had a dust storm on us. It wasn't a full blown storm, but extremely dusty with less than 1/4 mile visibility. It was an "orange out" kind of day. I didn't get any pictures today but figured I'd show you some of the things I'm probably not supposed to show you.
A photo of an area on base.
This is the kind of day we had once the dust cloud came in. Just another day at the south side dump. I'm almost finished with a project building two trash incinerators that will mitigate this open pit burning. Not popular, probably shouldn't have shown you that.
Here we have a photo of an abandoned MIG. They are everywhere, littering the base as a reminder of the base's former occupants.
An Iraqi toilet. Pretty nasty only because there's no pee-trap to keep the sewer gases from coming out of the sewer. It's just an old-timey squat hole. The hose is an advance on the traditional alternatives. There are some buildings that still have the old toilets. All my projects include updating to "western style" toilets. By "western" we mean they come with a 10 gallon hat and bottle of BBQ sauce!
I really miss everyone, and I enjoy hearing from you all. Feel free to drop me an email at travismortimer@gmail.com if you get the chance. I'll have more photos coming soon. Happy New Year, and I can't wait to come home.

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