I found out yesterday that I'll be a line platoon leader, something I did back at C/112 in Columbus in Ohio, so I'm pretty comfortable with that. I'm actually excess at the moment, shadowing the current PL of the platoon, until he takes on an XO position in September. Which works out great since it gives me a good bit of time to get up to speed with operations here. It's also my kind of job since it means I'll get to work with demo quite a bit, which is far more interesting than moving dirt around. Chris is a PL as well, although his missions will be more of the dirt-moving variety. One benefit of what I'll be doing is that I'll get a little extra money each month as EOD pay, although I'm not personally EOD (I'll just be working with them from time to time).

Nothing much new here. Got a short haircut last night. That's about all I can say for now. I still haven't left the camp, and the camp hasn't been attacked in over a year. Oh yeah, and I finally bummed some 9mm rounds from another LT so if and when I do go off-base I'll actually have ammunition. I was getting a little annoyed running around the country without anything to defend myself but harsh language, but since so far I've flown from base to base, I wasn't sweating it too much (and besides, it's not like a 9mm is a real weapon compared to an assault rifle or machine gun or RPG, anyway). I'll probably draw an M16 from my company for when I do missions, and there's plenty of rounds available for those.

A few folks have asked me to post my shipping address. I'd love to receive anything you want to send, but I don't want to publicly post that information, so please email me directly (use the contact link here). Remember it'll take about 15 days for anything to get here, and it's going to get really hot, so things like chocolate bars or fresh fruit are probably not good ideas to send. Other packaged snacks, toys, games, books, magazines, dvds, etc would all be appreciated, and I'll share anything I don't need with the soldiers in my unit, so nothing should go to waste (assuming it makes it here intact). If you do send dvds, though, don't mention them on the package cuz I guess those get stolen in transit a lot.

Anyway, I'm fine. It's hot here but not unbearable. I've got decent living quarters and decent food and with any luck I'll be home by Valentine's Day.

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