Active duty

Our replacements have arrived, and the FOB is teeming with soldiers. The chow hall is teeming, especially lunch, the PX is teeming, the gym and Rec centers, teeming. Probably can’t say the unit, but they are active duty and a well known unit. If a civilian can name 3 or 4 Army units, this would probably be one of them.

They have lots of fancy stuff, big flat screen monitors, etc. Shipped in a bunch of leather chairs for the conference room. Our cheesy Haji chairs are now out in a junk pile. And, they managed to grab a bunch of our equipment we were shipping home. This is an issue because our unit will not get any equipment to replace it, not until the war is over. All the production goes right here. And, the folks who were paid to maintain the equipment won't have anything to maintain, so you have to wonder about how long their jobs will last.

The new unit's CONEX containers have all been deposited in a big field near the tent city. As I walked back and forth to chow, I’d always see two soldiers sitting on a cot. Smoking, chatting, reading, listening to music, watching a DVD on a portable player, just seemed to be there, killing time, different soldiers each time. I asked them if they were on guard duty and they said yes, they were guarding the CONEXs. These are steel boxes, 6 ft by 6 ft by 4 ft, with high security padlocks on the door. They were guarding against the eventuality that someone might sneak in with a fork lift and steal a container.