November 10, 2006 11:34 pm by Ray Moser.

Hi Folks.  It’s been an entire month since I’ve been put on Active Duty.  So far, the Army has stuck lots of needles into me, told me about big spiders and snakes, and have spun tales of great diseases to be wary of.   Seriously, we all passed the medical.

 Next, we spent some time on primary marksmanship, and then qualified on the range.  We day qualified, then fired our weapons with our gas masks on and then qualified night firing.  This really isn’t easy.  I have no idea how all the bad guys do drive-bys at night.

Another thing the army wants us to do is learn how to live in tents, so to do that, they sent us out into the field for 9 days.  Imagine this, it’s colder than hell, no hot showers and the heater craps out in the middle of the night.  Thankfully, one of the guys from Chicago went to Clothing sales with me and I bought a bunch of under-armor clothing and this is exactly how I kept warm. 

 Of course, in-between all of this, we received equipment issue, got up to date on Military law, rules of engagement and Afghan culture.  

 In early November, the lot of us traveled to Ft. Gordon for some training needed prior to going out of country.  We expect to finish this training prior to Thanksgiving and then take a few days to go home and see our families at Thanksgiving.  We do not anticipate any more time off from training to see our families, so at least I plan to make the best of it.

The rules here at Ft. Gordon are a little relaxed and we are allowed to go off post unlike Ft. Dix.  However, we still are not allowed to inbibe in Alcohol.  Not that it matters for me.   Most people know that I am an avid drinker of micro-brewed beers and I do not plan to see any until Thanksgiving.  To get off post even for a little bit is a nicety in my opinion.

 I have to leave now because my laundry is almost finished and Carlos Mencio (on TV) is too funny and keeping my concentration level to a minimum.

 Peace to all. 

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October 7, 2006 11:35 pm by Ray Moser.

I spent the last week wondering what I would do during my last “free” weekend home. Technically, this isn’t my last weekend home since I will be here next weekend, but next weekend is Friday the 13th, reporting day! You would think that it would be any other day, but it’s just not so. I kind of feel like the dead guy who wants to live just a little bit longer, to take care of a few more things, or to say that special word to that special person.

But, I digress. This Saturday, I spent some good time with my family. We went to a huge community garage sale in a wealthy, gated community. It was here that I picked up several Tom Clancy books and a genuine US Army duffle bag. My wife, on the other hand, went wild with baby stuff. Our daughter is definitely spoiled rotten.

Then, in the afternoon, I installed the surround sound system that has been sitting in the corner for the last few years. I found out that it is so old, that it is not compatible with the TV, DVD player or anything else that I had. I purchased a new Sony DVD player that upscales the signal to 1080i (High-Definition) and it was also incompatible with the Audio/Visual system. So, I trotted back to Circuit City and bought a Sony A/V system (6.1 channel). I’m not an audiophile and I hate remotes, so this makes an interesting partnership. The TV remote is kind of stupid. I have to plug-in codes to make it operate the DVD player. The DVD remote can control the TV out of the box and the Sony A/V remote will work the DVD player. A big confusing circle jerk. I guess if you have the A/V stereo remote in your hand, you’ll win. This took almost all day.

Who has time on the weekends to do this kind of stuff? With one weekend a month for the reserves, that leaves me a total of six days a month with my family (on four weekends per month). Remember, in my civilian job, I travel and am away from home, so I try not to use my weekend time to make home repairs.

Tomorrow, we will pack up everything and see how it fits. Then, I will pack up most of my stuff and put it in the attic to keep it out of the way and so that I can find it when I return.

The only things left to do is sort out what goes on the plane with me and what will get shipped in the connex container.

I have just about all of my loose personal ends finished thanks to the generosity of my Boss and my Company because they both gave me the time I needed to really take care of everything.

If I get everything packed, perform the storage ritual for my motorcycle and get the garage cleaned up, then I’ll do some flying before I leave. My goal is to break 100 hours before I leave. I have a little over 95 flight hours now.

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August 17, 2006 4:58 pm by Ray Moser.

I’ve heard that we will be going to Bagram Airbase to support some of the operations. I don’t have any specific details, but this is the location that I pinpointed early on in my analysis of Army Ops in Afghanistan. I guess I haven’t lost all of my skills yet.

I’ve enclosed a few pics.

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