Cy's Film

(These are posts I wrote last year, but wasn't comfortable posting for various reasons (didn't want to get my ass canned!))

Feb 2008

Now I feel bad. The other day I said Border Patrol was lame. This morning I picked up the same group I wrote about earlier, now headed out to Mosul, and they were cool guys. Very down to Earth. Though in my defense, four out of five did have a mustache.

Today I'll bust on the Air Force.

WalMart shoppers of America, when you say, "I support the troops" what you really should say is something like, "I support the Army and the Marines but if I was stuck in Iraq I'd want to be in the Air Force or Navy cause they've got it a hell of a lot easier." The Army is shouldering this thing. These guys are doing 15-month deployments. In that time they get less than three weeks vacation home. Damn! Maybe you have to be here to get it, but that is a very tall order. The Marines are legit too, but they're so much smaller than the Army. The Navy isn't around too much. Their special ops guys are in the mix I guess. But the Air Force, these fools have it too easy. Their deployment is only four months long. Army: 15 months. Air Force: 4 months. It's not the same thing.

I backed the luggage truck up in the baggage yard. The Border Patrol had all their gear in the back. We needed to unload it onto a pallet for the flight. There was an Air Force sergeant standing on top of a stack of gear. "Right here guys, to Mosul!" I backed the truck up to the pallet. The Border Patrol guys talked with him a little. One of the agents looked over toward Saddam's old hangers. In front of it crews are digging a basin for drainage.

"That's nice they're doing that. It's for drainage right?" the agent asked the Air Force Sergeant. The Sergeant snatched a look. "Yeah. I don't know. We're out of here in 90 days, so it really doesn't make any difference to us."

They only got here 30 days ago.

If he were in the Army, maybe he would have said, "Yeah. I don't know, we're out of here in 420 days, sure hope mosquitoes don't breed in it cause Goddamn it, I'm here for a long long while."




	Drinking the Tigris: What I Couldn't Say 4 (These are posts I wrote last year, but wasn't comfortable posting for various reasons (didn't want to get my ass canned!)) Feb 2008 Now I feel bad. The other day I said Border Patrol was lame. This morning I picked up the same group I wrote about earlier, now headed out to Mosul, and they were cool guys. Very down to Earth. Though in my defense, four out of five did have a mustache. Today I'll bust on the Air Force. WalMart shoppers of America, when you say, "I support the troops" what you really should say is something like, "I support the Army and the Marines but if I was stuck in Iraq I'd want to be in the Air Force or Navy cause they've got it a hell of a lot easier." The Army is shouldering this thing. These guys are doing 15-month deployments. In that time they get less than three weeks vacation home. Damn! Maybe you have to be here to get it, but that is a very tall order. The Marines are legit too, but they're so much smaller than the Army. The Navy isn't around too much. Their special ops guys are in the mix I guess. But the Air Force, these fools have it too easy. Their deployment is only four months long. Army: 15 months. Air Force: 4 months. It's not the same thing. I backed the luggage truck up in the baggage yard. The Border Patrol had all their gear in the back. We needed to unload it onto a pallet for the flight. There was an Air Force sergeant standing on top of a stack of gear. "Right here guys, to Mosul!" I backed the truck up to the pallet. The Border Patrol guys talked with him a little. One of the agents looked over toward Saddam's old hangers. In front of it crews are digging a basin for drainage. "That's nice they're doing that. It's for drainage right?" the agent asked the Air Force Sergeant. The Sergeant snatched a look. "Yeah. I don't know. We're out of here in 90 days, so it really doesn't make any difference to us." They only got here 30 days ago. If he were in the Army, maybe he would have said, "Yeah. I don't know, we're out of here in 420 days, sure hope mosquitoes don't breed in it cause Goddamn it, I'm here for a long long while." Cy Kuckenbaker :: 03. 7.09 :: Permalink post a comment (If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.) Name: Email Address: URL: Remember personal info? Comments: (you may use HTML tags for style)	This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on March 7, 2009 12:23 PM. The previous post in this blog was Drinking the Tigris: What I Couldn't Say 3. The next post in this blog is Drinking the Tigris: What I Couldn't Say 5. Many more can be found on the main page or by looking through the archives.

Drinking the Tigris: What I Couldn't Say 4