Semi-Joint

Five weeks down, five weeks to go with the Joint Forces Staff College course. Still enjoying it. Though August seems to be filled with exercise after exercise, each with "Purple" in the title to express how joint it is: Purple Guardian, Purple Warrior, etc. Someone found out that I play guitar and another classmate plays piano, so it was suggested we get together and play a tune in class someday. "Instead of an exercise?" I asked. "Purple...Skit Day?" "How about 'Purple Jam'?" Mickey offered.
That one was much better.
Scuttlebutt around the hooches and hallways is that we do more as a group outside of class than other seminars, too, so it's good we get along. Despite the standard group dynamic needling of those who do/say something dorkish.

Thursday we took two Gov't vans to Langley AFB, about thirty minutes away, to get a briefing from a Captain from the 27th Fighter Squadron, a unit that flies one of the first operational flocks of F-22A Raptors. Though most aircraft had been moved to another location due to runway repair, we were able to see a couple in a hangar with some panels removed and doors opened, crawling around on the floor, up into the cockpit, checking out all the neat curves and angles that contribute to its stealthiness. It's an incredible-looking plane. If you can actually see it.

Why Freud Wouldn't Have Worked on CNN

For whatever reason, when I turn my television on, no matter what I was watching when I turned it off the night before, Channel 8 (CNN) appears. Strangely, I've heard the exact same thing the last three mornings as the box hummed to life: "...and rockets continue to rain down on Haifa..."

But since we do "current events" first thing in class every morning, I try to stay ...uh... current. I even watched a Wolf Blitzer interview with former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanhooray last night, and in class today I was relaying some of the more salient points of the conflict in Lebanon. Serious, pointed, fingers folded when not stressing a point, I orated William Jennings Bryan-like, striking the right solemn tone, until someone pointed out that I had actually said:

"...and yet the Hezbollah are hiding their missiles among the Lesbian people."

Daddy Digs Up a Stone

I made good time driving up to Woodbridge Friday afternoon, but more importantly, I made GREAT mileage (over 37.5 mpg!) so the Hybrid seems to be warming up to its raison d'etre. Thirty-eight seconds after walking in the house, however, a terrific storm hit our house, so my gas-nuzzling news was superseded by the news that half a tree split open in our back yard.

Ryan turned 9 months old Friday, too, and as Ainsley had been with him for all but twelve seconds of those nine months, she took advantage of my rare presence and hit the grocery store while Ryan and I made funny noises into each others' bellies. I also turned on SportsCenter since we were in Guy Mode. During one of the commercials, Ryan started slapping one hand on top of his opposite fist, so I asked him if he was actually clapping, so I clapped some, and he clapped back. So cool! He's clapping! He's got rhythm! Who could ask for anything more? Grandad had been after him for some time to get with the self-promoting percussive program.
I called Ainsley at the store to ask how long he'd been clapping, but then it occurred to me that she may not know that he was.
"Did you know your son is clapping?"
"He is?"
"A-ha."
"What were you doing to get him to clap?"
"...I turned on the television."
"A-ha."

Next week I'll turn on my laptop to see if I can get him to crawl.

But I was finally able to see something first! A daddy-sonny moment! His first clap! And he's clapping to beat the band now. Ainsley's nickname for him already is "monkey monkey monkey", so now all he needs is a small fez and some small cymbals.

Saturday we had a few friends over for lunch before tackling the downed limb with My Favorite Outside Toy (the chainsaw). Unfortunately, as I was cleaning up, I noticed another huge limb split fifty feet off the ground, so we'll have to call in some professionals. Or bears.

Sunday we finally cleaned out enough of the garage from my Dayton move that Ainsley could park her car back in there, and then noticed Griffin was licking his foot more than a non-cat usually does. Turns out he had a swollen infected gross toe (Ainsley took him to the vet today, who said he'd split or broke his toenail from the base, so it would either fall off or grow out). Our beloved pets.

After singing some Metallica to Ryan to get him asleep, I drove back to Norfolk around 8:45, expecting an 11:30 arrival, until I hit crappy annoying communist traffic near a tunnel they were spray-cleaning. It took me an hour and a half to go a mile and a half. I crawled into bed at quarter to two this morning.

So good night.

Useless Trivia

As of today, I have been in the Air Force for 5000 days.

Teeed

Here are some things that piss me off.

• Leave my curtains alone. I loved I say again and I say I say again because that's how an Army LTC talks in my class parenthesis he also says however comma parenthesis LOVED walking back into my VOQ here the first afternoon to discover that the curtains were kept closed during the day. Everywhere else I've stayed, the cleaning crew comes in and makes the bed and opens up all the curtains, which I've had to immediately close. Unfortunately, it seems we've got someone new now, and the curtains were opened today. It's bad enough I'm having a battle with the Colonel downstairs about where we would communally like to keep the A/C set for our Hooch, but now I've got the sun beaming in? Great.
• I am a Human Being! With Presence! Do not discount that! Huzzah for whoever won the Nobel Prize for Plumbing and invented the automatic urinal flushers (heaven forfend that we would have to actually touch a lever ourselves), but it does little good for one's self-worth when one of them goes off when it is being utilized by your favorite Air Force Major. "I'M STILL HERE!!" I yell at it, to no avail.
• Residual Ass Matter. My chair in our seminar is right up front, near the instructor's computer (and one of only four available to us as students). Inevitably, I return from a break or lunch to find someone has pulled my chair over to said computer, disregarding any R.A.M. and leftover heat magmathematry readings that remain upon their departure. Think sitting on a warm public toilet seat. I don't need that kind of comfort. I'm not even looking forward to using my heated seats in my Ford Escape. But at least that's artificial heat, not some steaming, dug-in, buttoxical, humid, living, inescapable, carbon-based warmth. Most of the other students who sit up front are aware of the R.A.M issues, though are more helpful with the acronyms than anything else, like when Navy Commander Miller sat in it. "Now it's "N.A.M. -- Navy Ass Matter!" "Or J.A.M. -- Joint Ass Matter." Meanwhile, I stand patiently by until they are done, then rock the chair to and fro, spinning it a few times, trying to aerate Mr. Bad Heat away.
• Navy Funding. At Wright-Patterson AFB this winter, the gym stopped handing out towels to its patrons. Too many were getting lost ("stolen"), the Commander said, plus, due to funding issues throughout the military what with the Global War on Terrorism and all, everyone had to make sacrifices and cuts. So we had to bring our own towels. No big deal. Only I show up at Norfolk and the gym has towels up the wazoo! Also, AF and Army bases went to contract gate security years ago, but here? Two military guards at every gate. Not that it helps when they don't speak English:

"Can you tell me where the fitness center is?"

"Feetnas Centa?"

"Yes, the 'gym'? I was told it was down by the McDonald's or something?"

"...ees it by the pier?"

"...You know, I've never been here before."

"...Okay. If you go down and take a right and go to the pier it's by the McDonald's."

"...great."

The cool thing was that even though these were the wrong directions, down by the pier were a number of different Navy ships, to include a couple aircraft carriers. Now, if you've ever seen one, it's impressive. Seeing two side by side, however, is something altogether different. Especially with the sun setting behind them. I doubt visiting soldiers and sailors get the same awestruck feeling by seeing a couple Air Force aircraft lined up on a AF base's runway.

But we have great bowling alleys.

I say again.

Great Dismal Holiday

Well, never mind Ryan getting that surfing scholarship to the University of Hawaii.

Giving the Ford Escape a break from driving up and down the eastern seaboard every weekend, I stayed in No'fo'k to await my lovely wife and robust son for a couple days away from the house and critters. Although the other two guys in my hoochnanny were going to be gone, the bed here isn't much bigger than a wide-esque single, and I just didn't think the two of them would be comfortable here. Fortunately, we received a gracious offer from the Parkers, who live nearby in the town of Chesapeake (next to the Great Dismal Swamp), to shack up at their place while they were out of town. And frankly, they owed us after their son tried to turn my boy into a Ryan Kebab.

The first night was a little rough for Ryan, since he was in a strange place with a strange man pretending to be his occasional Daddy, and even though I tried the usual 'walk-up-and-down-the-stairs' technique to sea-sick him to sleep, he kept looking around him in shock and horror, crying as if to say, "What stairs are THESE? Are you taking me to HELL? I HATE YOU! MOMMMMMMMAA!!"
Still wish I had the magic touch to get him to calm down, unlike the Midas Mammaries of Mama-san, but I still think it's cool that he's so attached to her* (not literally). It's like an on and off switch, passing him between the two of us.

*not literally.**
** well, sometimes.

Saturday we drove east until we could drive east no longer, with a sand dune sitting in front of us in the parking lot on Dam Neck Naval Air Station. The JFSC social events lady had told us students about this relatively secluded military beach, so I thought it would be worth a shot, rather than cramming into an ultra-crowded spot with ultra-expensive parking on Virginia Beach a few miles up the coast.
We found a choice spot twenty yards from the surf, lathered each other up with sunscreen, and I carefully tip-toed into the waves with Ryan in my arms.
71-degree water my Aunt Patricia.
It was cold.
Very un-Tampa like.
Ainsley suggested we just let him step in some wet sand first, which he found rather odd and curious, but suddenly an evil wave rushed in and crashed through his ankles.
Well, hello, World War III siren.

His legs turned into armadillos as he curled his toes and feet as far away from the beach as possible, screaming at whoever was holding him that he was NOT pleased with the going concern.
So he hung out on Mommy's lap or the beach towel the rest of the morning, while I took a few dips in the surf, the weightlessness of it all feeling nice on my back, the heatlessness of it not.
Still, a relaxing day, not too hot in mostly overcast skies, and Ainsley even spotted a small school of dolphins bounding their way down the coastline, so that was pretty cool.
We packed everything up around lunch and drove up to Virginia Beach to find a place to eat and souvenier shop; the strip one block west of the beach looking like every other stretch of beachfront Americana I've ever been to. Having seen the mushroom-patch of umbrellas, we were doubly glad to have spent the morning in relative Naval seclusion.

Sunday we drove back up to Norfolk and checked out the Nauticus, a naval musuem that lets folks tour the decks of the USS Wisconsin, a battleship built for WWII but also used in Desert Storm (and still kept in tip-top 'reserve' condition should it be needed for military service today).

The two of them left around 5 to get home, running into some terrible I-95 traffic along the way. Not fun for a single parent to drive with a screaming child through all that. So we're looking at picking up hitchikers for the ride up next time.

Itchy knee, son. She go.

Started the morning in the MacArthur Auditorium (the blue bedroom, they call it) for a Terrorism/Insurgency lecture from an Undersecretary of Secretary of Defense for Policy. Not bad. But our seminars have to sit in chronological order from the front for all these lectures, and since we are #1, we have to sit in the first open row (actually the second row of chairs). They're cramped seats and rough to sit in for 90-120 minutes straight, so this morning I sat WAY the heck over in Leningrad on the left so I could stretch my long legs out to the side. Much better.

Had a Top Secret lecture on Measures and Signals Intelligence, which I hadn't seen since my days in Colorado Springs. Then I went to downtown Norfolk with Commander Shepard and Army MAJ Walmsley to the MacArthur (notice a trend) Memorial archives to work on our paper. We've decided to write about how the DoD dealt with civilian handover/interagency issues during the Korean War and see if there are any parallels with Iraq.

The story goes that the mayor of Norfolk went to Douglas MacArthur in the early 60s and told him that if his Library/Archives were sent to West Point or the Pentagon, they'd just get lost, but if he built it in Norfolk, it'd be the biggest thing in the area. The General's eyes got big, and he agreed.

The three of us poured through boxes of Archive materials, documents from the War Department, telegrams, letters, and other personal correspondence from the late 40s and early 50s. Once, it took a while to occur to me that what I was holding was a small letter signed by Dwight Eisenhower. The original! Touched by him. And today, me. Bizarre.

We had another group dinner out tonight, with about 15 of us going to an Italian restaurant near the base. Our Japanese student brought his wife, while she practiced her English and Brent Hashimoto practiced his Japanese. Meanwhile, the Marine told us about all the different...well, all the, period, really...countries in the Pacific he's been to, and the dozens of languages he sort of speaks. He did manage to teach a few of us how to count to five in Japanese (this blog entry's title, phonetically). So let's recap my military education: so far this year I've learned how to drive a bus and order a handful of melon balls should I find myself in Tokyo.
Boffo.

Religious Moly, it's July

Apologize for the long gaposis in memory licking. Internet connectivity has been sparse and I have been surprisingly busy at school here. I have to read a 300-page book by the end of August, a group of three of us have to write a 10-page paper, and we have almost nightly reading assignments. Some say it's only work if you do it, but since I really want to learn this schtoof, I've been trying to stay on top of it. So it's been up till midnights. Again.

Still glad that I'm close enough that I can drive home on the weekends, though. I got home for Ainsley's birthday on June 30th, as did her parents. She had an ottoman overflowing with gifts, and enjoyed some wine, and I'm sure her son went to sleep eventually.

As an extendo-present, her parents babysat and gave us a chance to go on a date the next day, so we enjoyed "Cars" at the movies and a quick meal before getting home to a son who had behaved as calm and collected as Chernobyl. *sigh*

On July 2nd we learned our friends the Parkers were in town so we invited them over for dinner; they have two boys, 5ish and 2+. We were glad Ryan had some playmates, until after dinner but before dessert, Ryan and Ben were sitting together in the living room and Ryan started crying very loudly. I noticed Ben had a fork in his hand, so I jokingly asked Ben, "What, did you poke Ryan with the fork?"
"Yeah," said Ben.
Oh my.
Kids are fun. Ryan had four little tine-shaped dots on his face for a few hours, but otherwise was just fine.

The dogs are still skittish around fireworks (except for Sir Griffin the Oblivious) so we didn't have any plans to go anywhere for the 4th. I still like sticking around the homestead since it's been such a rarity for me this year. Plus I had to leave around 8 to get home for school Wednesday morning.

Still doing the basic joint military definition thing, setting the tone for the rest of the class. We got to practice what we loint by taking a by-god field trip to Yorktown, not forty minutes up the road. I hadn't been there in 20 years, on a summer vacation with the 'rents and Will Deaver (Williamsburg and Busch Gardens included) but I didn't remember a thing. In order to discuss Operational Art and the military application of the battle, our instructor wanted some of us to role-play as the main protagonists (Washington, Cornwallis, de Grasse, Lafeyette) in order to discuss their particular perspective of the battle. I volunteered to play the Comte de Rochambeau, who had planned the Yorktown invasion with Washington outside NYC. I just enjoyed saying his full name in French, "Bon Jour! Je suis Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau!" I even sang La Marsaillese in the visitor's center theater before the movie started. Much to the confusion of the rest of the tourists in the room, I'm sure. At lunch, I was even expected to stay in character.
Lt Col Hanson: "How does Rochambeau feel about the menu?"
"Ptui!"
Commander Beauchamp: "What are you going to have to drink? Beer?"
"I weel just av a glass of meltid cheez-uh."

I seem to be have garnered a reputation as somewhat of a cut-up. I really don't know why. But I was pleased when the class voted for one of my four suggested slogans for the back of our softball T-shirts. ("Even Jointness Fall From Tree." It's a long story.)

Sadly, that's about the best thing about our softball team. We got beat this afternoon by a bunch of 45-year-old colonel-types, 13-2. But hey we had beer afterwards so huzzah.

The last bit of news is that we are down to a two-car family again. My cousins Christine and Jennifer flew in from Chicago Sunday, as I had offered to give the former my Thunderbird that I was going to give to charity anyway and hey she needed a car and she's family. I love my new car and don't have a bit of bitterswattleness for the T-bird; I feel great that someone I love will be driving it until it rots. It's just weird to think back on it. 143,000 miles. I bought it when I was 24. It's been in Canada, Turkey, Seattle, Atlanta, Hollywood, the top of Pikes Peak, and the Applebee's in Des Moines. And, as Ainsley reminds me, it got me from Dayton to Woodbridge with three hours to spare for the birth of my son.

It was a very very good car.
With a GREAT horn.

I am not toasting your sausage.

My wife says the cutest things.

She also was helping out our son with his toy tool play set hodge podge set the other day; it has balls and buttons and slots and cups and buckets and it makes noise, and we were given some other tools to go with it -- a hammer, a screwdriver, a wrench, some bolts and screws. Ryan likes to chew on them and bang them together in random ways, but Ainsley decided to help him out with the proper cosmic order of things with, really, the quote of the year:


"Ryan, don't wrench your nut bucket."


And you know, that's sage advice for any young man.