I've been busy, and the internet was down for a while

Well, it’s hard to believe, but I am back at Tillman. Time flies when you don’t want it to! To give a brief summary of the last month (a little more than a month, actually) I left Tillman on the 24th of July (Deeanna’s birthday, if you remember) and arrived in Bagram that night. I then spent 9 days at Bagram, which was very nice. Then we flew to Kuwait to wait for a flight to the States. Kuwait was every bit as hot as I remembered it. I remember taking a shower around midnight, and then walking to the midnight chow, which is only a 200 meter walk, and being drenched with sweat by the time I got there. From Kuwait I flew home with a large group of service members going on leave. I arrived home on the 4th, and from there it was a whirlwind of fun! We went camping, swimming, fishing (I helped all 4 kids catch a fish), to a couple of movies, restaurants, my civilian job’s summer BBQ, shopping, lagoon, had a neighborhood BBQ, played Rockband many times (we started a band called Fireball, and went on world tour. Tommy and Melanie are both pretty good on the guitar and drums, and Dasha and Justin enjoyed singing). Deeanna and I even spent a night singing hymns at our piano. Deeanna started work at her school, where she is teaching Russian, band and orchestra. The kids also started school, which was exciting for them. The last 5 days honestly felt like 1 day. I just can’t believe how fast the time went. Actually, it is a little depressing to think of just how fast it went. About the only thing wrong with the trip is the amount of money we spent! I left Utah on the 20th at 6:00 in the morning. We flew back to Kuwait, which wasn’t as hot, this time, but still plenty hot. It was a very melancholy flight, as no one was very excited to be leaving home. It was much harder this time than any other time that I’ve left, but still well worth the awesome time I had. I spent 1 night in Kuwait, and then flew on to Bagram. I got to Bagram on 22nd, and was there for 5 days. Now I’m sitting here in Tillman waiting to meet up with the rest of my team. Presnell and Jones are both gone now. Jones should be on his way home, as his deployment is over, and Presnell goes home next month. They were both really good guys, and I’m glad that I got to work with them, but I am excited to be back with the guys I did all my training with. It’ll be good to be a part of my team again. It sounds like I won’t be back on the actual job for about another 8-10 days, which means my 15 days of leave is going to take 45 days off the “work” calendar. I don’t feel too guilty, though, considering that I went almost 80 days without a break. Some people in Bagram get a couple days a week off, and they get to enjoy all the simple things of life, such as showers, restaurants, shopping, church, seeing people they know every day, TV, BYU football, and more. However, I still wouldn’t want to be stationed in Bagram. I enjoy the work I am doing, and it’s what I wanted to do when we first got word of the deployment. Anyway, I just want to say again how great it was to see everyone. Also, I should point out that our deployment is more than ½ over now. In church mission terminology, we’ve hit our hump, and are on the way down! I also want to thank everyone who has been, and continue to help Deeanna and the kids. I think Deeanna has the much harder job in this situation, but she really is doing a great job, and I’m grateful to her for it. With that, I’ll close this entry and plan on writing again when I get back to “lovely” Zerok.

Well, things have changed, but I’ll have to write more about that later. I’ll try and add an update in a couple of weeks. I am now at FOB Orgun-e, which everyone just calls OE. It is great-stores, restaurants, food, plumbing etc. We have our own rooms here, and we will now be based out of OE instead of FOB Tillman. It has all worked out quite well. I hope everything is going well wherever you’re at.
Tom