Busy Week

Whew, it’s been a busy week.  We had a dinner with the KTR building the Brigade HQ.  Those Turks treated us to an excellent meal.  We had chicken and Adana kabobs, vegetable salad, onions seasoned with a Turkish spice (sumac??), nan and an eggplant/mincemeat/yogurt dish.  If moving to Turkey involved eating like that, count me in.  The translator that works for this company spent 12 years in America as a driver, mostly in NY City.  He had some stories!!  I think my favorite was about how when he first moved there he had to find a night job while he was going to school.  He worked at a gas station in a bad part of town and quickly figured out that if you gave the cops free food, they would hang out there.  After a few weeks the manager told him that their nightly intake dropped from around $1000/night to about $40/night because all the cops were scaring the customers away.

The weather has been beautiful the last few days.  Unfortunately, the nice weather has brought the Taliban out of hiding.  I had the unfortunate privilege of witnessing the first rocket of the spring.  I think our forces must have discovered them because the next day we felt the joy of an hour long artillery barrage.

Operation Ranch COK was carried off with great success.  Our DFAC has been running short of various supplies.   One being OJ and the other ranch dressing.  After calling in some favors I was able to get both items imported from Kabul via a heavy backpack and helo mission (they said that they were already heading this way).

Fat Tuesday brought a surprise parade.  No King Cake was to be found, but there were beads and cheering.  We had a farewell dinner that night for our Area Engineer and Office Engineer.  It’s about that time when we start having a major turnover in the office.  Since I extended I get to see most of my friends off and handle the turn-over.  Lucky me.

Today we had a ribbon cutting for the FARP.  The project consisted of a C-17 runway, turn-around, and a Helo refueling point.  It was a beautiful day to hang out with the office, KTR and all the military in charge of flying and refueling the helicopters.

HOMEFRONT NEWS:

I was talking to Lily on the phone a couple of mornings ago.  During the conversation she said, “Daddy, let’s go up to my room.”  So she walked up to her room jabbering the whole time.   Once “we” were up there she put the phone on the floor (it was on speaker):  “Oh, Daddy, here’s my Daddy doll.  See there you are.  And look, here is my puppy, isn’t he pretty….” And so on.  It’s almost like I never left J

To set this story up, you have to realize that Katy is deathly afraid of reptiles.  A frog once blocked her from entering our house for 30 minutes until I heard her screams and got rid of it.-------- Christian came in the house a couple of days ago excited to tell Katy about his new pet lizard named Sammy.  He caught him in the backyard and he is the best lizard ever.  All he needed was something to keep him in.  Katy asked him where Sammy was at that point, Christian said he was right here and reached into his pocket.  He pulled out his empty hand and started to cry that Sammy was gone.  Did he get out his pocket in the backyard or in the house???  Nobody knew (that was a restless night for Katy).  I was talking to Christian on the phone the next day and he was telling me about Sammy.  In the background I heard Sera calmly say, “Umm, Mommy, I think I found Sammy.”  What I heard next could have come from a horror movie.  There was screaming, chairs being moved/knocked down, ushering of kids out of the room (Christian wanted to chase and capture Sammy) and the frantic search for a bowl or pot to cover Sammy.  Eventually  a neighbor was called in to capture Sammy and take him outside.  Did Christian learn his lesson, only time will tell.