Moment of the Week

 The Garden

 9

He was a little bummed that it wasn't a toy. 

Despite this look he changed his mind and really likes them.  His old sleep shirts were pretty small.

I don't have a photo of something else that happened this week.  We started reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid.  It was the weekly gift on week 3.  I have a feeling Nate has read through a bunch of it already because whenever we get close to a good part he starts laughing in excitement like he knows what is coming.  Afterwards I always put it back on his dresser, but the next night it's always been moved, and finally he told me that after we read he goes back through it looking at the little drawings again.  I love his enthusiasm.  

The Tame Part of Our Wild Day

After we went through Bear Country USA I asked Nate if he wanted to stop at Reptile Gardens.  It was a gorgeous day and I didn't want to go home yet.  So we went.

We really like stopping to visit Darwin the kookaburra. When we were there last week with Jackie and Cody Darwin wasn't out.  Today he was.  He laughed with us. 

Then we walked around.

Saw some lizards

And some snakes.

Then we went to the bird show.  We hadn't been before and we both really liked it.  Then it started pouring rain and I thought we should head home and get Bonnie inside since I had left her in the kennel.  

It was a fun afternoon. I love living here, and I love how much there is to do between Memorial Day and Labor Day.  

Come visit.  We can take you to see some bears and gators and presidents. 

Overactive Amygdala

I have one.

Seriously.

When we were in Yellowstone I would fall fast asleep from exhaustion then wake up two hours later in a huge panic attack and stay awake all night listening for things that might kill me.... I mean us.  Actually my amygdala is pretty much just focused on me... and the saber-tooth tiger that it fears might be at Walmart, waiting to kill me.  My brain knows it's just the dirty bathrooms that I get nervous about, but my amygdala goes on reacting like it's a prehistoric threat.  

Why I thought I should go to a drive through wildlife park?  I can't remember.  Maybe it was the great price the homeschooling group got.  I will not drive through a wild animal park ever again.  I might ride in the car if my caveman Dave is driving.  But I was stressed.

First we saw nice wild animals.  

Elk, reindeer, wolves, mule deer.  

Then we entered the bears area.

There were a lot of bears.  

Most were napping.

 This one was not.

And a woman in that impala had her window down and she had her arms out taking photos.

 Between this photo...

 ...and this photo I did not breath.

Between flight or flight, I was 1000% ready to flight out of there.  

Then I made myself enjoy the rest of the drive and the many many more bears.  

But when we got to the exit of the bear area there was a problem.

The two brown bears were not the main issue.  

The black bear was pacing

I waited and waited.  After several minutes I took a video.

After a long time I finally did squeeze through while the bear was on the far end.  

I was scared and she came really close to my car.  

After a while my BP came back down and I saw a prong horn.  

I have never been so happy to see a deer!

Nate had a great time.

We walked around the enclosures and had lunch.

It was a fun morning, but I'm sure I will pass on that experience for awhile.  

For two dollars it was totally worth it though.

First Grade

I can't believe it is over already, and looking back we had lots of fun!  I love this kid and I love that his dad is part of his education so often.  

Weeks 6 and 7

 

Hello everyone!!  It's been a couple of weeks since I last blogged, so I thought I should update everyone on what's new with me, or should I say what hasn't changed with me.  As I said in my last blog, I feel like Bill Murray in Groundhogs Day.  But there has been some changes, I switched to the night shift so I am working 1800 to 0600 ish.  The benefit of this is that Teresa Nate and I are all on the same sleep schedule so that makes catching them on Skype a lot easier.

 . 

Speaking of Teresa and Nate, they sent me supplies to include pictures and some letters.  Thanks Babe, the Breakfast Biscuits were delicious, I would recommend them to anyone.  On the other hand, you may skip those Cheeseburger Goldfish.

 



Our Church, thanks to Miss Lori the Children's Minister, sent me 4 huge boxes. 

 

This is what was all in there, it even had some delicious home made Hershey Kiss Drop Cookies.  They did not last long.  I love my Church!

 

I did find some extra activities to do, BINGO!  I won 25 Bucks.

It's Official, they call this the "fighting season".  The time that the snow has melted in the mountain passes and the rains slow.  The Taliban apparently are warm weather fighters.  There has been a lot more activity around base, the Helicopters are constantly flying recon missions.  I thought it appropriate to get a tour of one of them.  I would like to introduce you to the AH-64, also known as the Apache.  This particular one is a member of the 101st AirBorne.  Some of you may recognize that unit as the one from Band Of Brothers movie series.  Well they since graduated from jumping out of airplanes to flying these awesome things.

 

Well, till next time, you all take care and thank you everyone for your letters of support and care packages.  We really appreciate it.  Oh yeah, Have a great memorial Day weekend, I was just notified of this yesterday by Teresa, No wonder I had such a hard time contacting people back in the states on Friday.



Moment of the Week

Touristing

 8

Eric Church

A Touristy Event

We had a few days with the visiting Beckers.  We wanted to show them around some of our favorite places in South Dakota.

 We hung around at the park

We spent a rainy day at Reptile Gardens

Visited the Badlands

and Wall Drug.

We also went to Mt. Rushmore and drove through Needles Highway.  

It was a fun filled few days.

It's always fun to play tourist around here.

Having the Beckers visit was super fun for Nate and I. 

Balance

There isn't much of it during a deployment.

I just got a sweet note in the mail and it said, "I admire your strength".  

The irony that this card arrived today wasn't lost on me.  

The truth is I cry a lot.  

Because I can't do everything I want to do, or even what I need to do.   

And when things go wrong, it feels like I have a mountain to climb to get things 'right' again. 

Today I cleaned up a lot of dog shit from my carpets. 

I wanted to scream.

 I did.

Then I cried.

I wanted to murder the offending canine.

I didn't.

After the shit was cleaned the puppy came in with an epic level of muddy feet.

I cried

I wanted to murder her.

I didn't.

I gave her a bath.

I had not had coffee yet.

Or breakfast.

So I showered, made coffee, had breakfast, then ran to the store for more carpet cleaning supplies.

Then I mowed my yard.

There is no balance.  I fake it.

I take an adorable photo of the puppy....and share that instead.

Moment of the Week

7

Dave requested that I show what Nate opened in the weekly package. 

I terrible bout of winter weather

 Two days after the snow storm

 First Grade is FINISHED.

Moment of the Week

enjoying the yard work

and the pretty things before some spring snow

6

Weeks 3, 4 and 5!

I am sorry that this post is a little overdue, and I mean a lot overdue.  I meant to post it last week but somebody on base cut our Fiber Line and knocked out our internet for a few days, so I decided to wait until Sunday to post this.  I am going to try my best to not let more than two weeks go by between posts from now on.

Just a quick update on me, everything is going fine.  I have gotten into a good routine and now everyday is starting to run into the others.  Life pretty much is work, eat, sleep, rinse and repeat.  It seems like last deployment seemed to take a lot longer to get to this point, but it's probably attributed to me doing the same job here as I do at home.

Our 3rd week came with a surprise as this guy showed up for a special concert.

Mr. Honkytonk Badonkadonk himself.

It was a great show and really weird attending a concert in combat gear and everyone is carrying guns.

I also received a lot of great packages.  Somehow, everyone must know that my favorite snack food is sour gummy worms and sour patch kids.  But the other snacks were well received too. 

 Teresa sent me some much needed supplies to include bedding.  We have to turn our laundry in and it takes 3 days or more to get it back, so I asked for some sheets but this time cotton.  Now apparently I am a sheet snob for asking for comfy cotton sheets instead of poly blend.  But they are great and I can handle the name calling for a nice nights sleep.  She also packaged up my favorite quilt.  I am the luckiest man in the world for having a wife that tolerates my loyalty for the Lions, secretly, I think she enables it too.  Oh yeah, those mint chocolate chip cookies are amazing, you need to try them.

 I got some goodies from the Becker Family that also included some very colorful and somewhat questionable thank you cards from Jackie's class.  I think some of the kids really don't like bad guys!!

 Dad and Ruthann sent me some popcorn, turns out, we have a microwave and it was delicious.  Thank you

 Cindy sent some ammo, she must have seen a pic of me with my guns hanging on the wall.  These were great as later that day we arranged an assault on the office next to ours.  we pretty much kicked their butts due to the superior firepower we had.  Earlier this week, another gun showed up but I didn't take a picture.  Thank you Cindy!

Here is one of Sandy and Sean's two packages.  I apparently forgot to take a pic of the first one but it had a lot of candy in it and a coloring from Ina, she did a fantastic job.  The Michigan Tattoos are now all over my computer and Nerf guns thanks to my co-workers, I guess that's what I get for leaving them on my desk overnight, but I think they will stay.

Thank you everyone for the care packages, it is always an exciting thing to have one in the mail room and to open it up.  And yes, I may have gained a few pounds while I've been here, like close to 10, but you all know that I could use it.  And NO, I did not eat all of this food by myself, I have been sharing with the others in my office.