The first thing you need to keep in mind is that for the most part, personal communication is a valuable commodity in Afghanistan. The country is vastly rural, far moreso than Iraq is. Due to this, depending on the area a soldier is in, they may not get the same things another soldier will have at another FOB. For example, large bases, such as Firebase Phoenix, Jalalabad, Bagram, and Kandahar Airfields have pretty well-developed infrastructure. Places like these were hooked up with wifi and other means of communication. I wasn’t at any of those bases, and was relying heavily on the computer lab provided by the military on my FOB when writing this blog. For the most part, the military is good at keeping soldiers provided with a computer lab, but there are FOBs that don’t have them.

Personal phones are available for purchase at major FOBs or bazaars if soldiers are allowed to visit them. Roshan isn’t exactly the best phone company in the world, but it’s definitely great if you need to speak with family. SPAWARE also provides DSN (Data Source Name) phones that can be used to call family, provided you have an open account with them, but like every other option out there, this is not universal. Some bases are either too remote or too dangerous to support non-military communications. For the most part, there should be some way for a soldier to contact home, but don’t be surprised if you don’t hear from them for some time.

As for mail? As far as I could tell, this was universal for any base that wasn’t a major place (Bagram, Jalalabad, Shank, Kandahar, Phoenix, etc.) could receive mail, but not send any out. I personally received mail probably once a month or two months, but that’s because the Air Force unit in charge of my task force’s mail route was lazy and rarely picked up mail. I encourage you to send care packages as often as possible, because that might actually make or break various hygiene issues, and the military is notorious for losing mail.

We’re currently in the biggest base in Afghanistan, prepping to leave. I remembered something vital as soon as the bulk of these guys started coming in: I hate my unit. Drama City, USA. Oh, how I didn’t miss you.

I’ve been really sexually frustrated lately. I’m having wood pop whenever someone walks by, male or female, and it’s really not conducive to me doing my job out here, especially when I get so horny I just wanna rub against my rifle until I come.

Yes, you’re reading this. Get over it.

Now I’m in a huge, 150-man tent, and although I haqve a jack shack set up, it’s still sort of risky to beat my meat right now.

Send me porn.

Oh, I also spent my Christmas in a bunker. I really hope yours was more enjoyable.

It is cold. Like, unbelievably fucking cold right now. There’s no urban centers within a few hundred miles from where I am, and I’m at an elevation that exceeds several thousand feet. I’m from the desert, and to make things better, a desert CITY. A rather large one, with a nice, warm blanket of pollution over it.

Global Warming, what’s taking so long?

I have about a month or so before I start RIP, the process that will make sure that the incoming team is prepared for us to leave. It’s been a very enlightening, but overall boring year. I hope you guys were entertained. Any questions, just put them in the question box.

My FOB just keeps getting more and more awesome.

Recently a midget got work here on the base. Coincidentally(?), one of the civilians shipped a human-sized hamster ball over here. Shortly after this happened, he found out about the midget. He now wants there to put the midget in the ball, take it to the flight line, and have two Kiowa Warrior helicopters play pong with the midget as the ball.

I’ve been starting to feel pretty lonely lately. I mean, lately I’ve been hanging out with more people than I usually would. My relationships with a few people have moved from friendly work environment to actual friends. I feel like I’m a part of something, but that’s not what’s getting me. If you haven’t guessed from previous posts because you’re stupid, I’m single.

While people gripe about Jody and their cheating whore husbands/wives/girlfriends, boyfriends, I can’t help but envy the fact that they have them. At the end of the day, if it’s available to them, they can sit down and talk to their significant other and relieve some of the stress they’re experiencing. They know that the person they’re talking to probably cares about them more than the average friend. That if they’re the right person, they can have a future together. They can make a family if they don’t already have one. That if things are going well, that there’s someone waiting for them when they get home. That there’s something worth going home to.

The single soldier doesn’t have that. I want children. I want a significant other. We’re in a point in time where someone saying “thank you for your service” doesn’t mean what it did in World War II, Korea, or even Vietnam. Especially when phrases like the one mentioned above come with a single caveat: “But….”. As in “I appreciate that you defend our country, but what you chose to do as a soldier means diddly squat to me and I think all of you are insane baby killers that probably can’t function in the real world.” Okay, probably a bit on the extreme side, but you get my point, right?

I want to find that person who, at the end of the day, didn’t bond with me because we’ve got each other’s 6. Doesn’t associate with me because we share elements of the same chain of command. I want to be able to talk to someone and have them see me, not Sergeant So and So, or Private Snuffy, or Lieutenant Cantleadforshit.

So yeah, this may be sappy, you may call me a pussy or whatever. But I personally think the risk of having that special someone being a cheating skank while out here is better than having nothing at all. Because at the end of the day, when you’re tired and trying to find a reason to get up the next morning, you can think about your lady, your man, your kids, and that in a year, you’ll see them again.

What do I have?

I just stumbled across this article today. If you don’t like, you can kindly go fuck off.

A lover of literature, Jeff always brings a collection of William Wordsworth. He flips the pages to “Expostulation and Reply.” He sits on the marble stone commemorating his son and reads aloud. Lori sits on the ground nearby.

He gets to the last verse and chokes up:

“Then ask not wherefore, here, alone,
Conversing as I may,
I sit upon this old grey stone,
And dream my time away.”

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/07/02/gay.soldier.andrew.wilfahrt/index.html

So you always hear about the retarded shit soldiers do when bored. I haven’t run into anything beyond someone singing off key in the shower, or the wonderful game called “manhunt”. And no, I will not tell you what that is.

Today I heard probably the best thing ever.

I suffered a heat stroke about two years ago, and since then I’ve been susceptible to the maladies that come with heat-related stress. This most recent bout has been headaches. So I was heading to the TMC (troop medical center) to see if I could score some Tylenol or something, when I heard a conversation on the other side of the door that made me stop. At the time I had no clue why this made me freeze up so, but as the conversation went on, I figured it out.

Nurse: So how’s PVT So and So doing?

Doctor: Last I checked, he’s doing fine. His burns are healing up pretty well, according to the doctors down at (name of major base nearby)

Nurse: I forgot to ask, but where did he get burned?

Doctor: The pelvic area. Some second and third degree burns that had to get taken care of.

Nurse: Oh, shit. Was the convoy under attack?

Doctor: Nope. Someone dared him to light his pubes on fire and the little shit actually did it.

At this point I was doing everything I could not to burst into tears laughing. I know the dude in question, and this sounds exactly like something he’d do.

The U.S. Military. We r so smrt

The All-American hero.