O Bama Bama!

Just had to get it out.

So...

When a president tries to ram down a law that is deemed un-constitutional by everyone from the supreme court to the military to the nation's Legislative body to the AG to the government's own ombudsman to the First Pooch, orders his military to comply and fires the Army chief when he doesn't comply out of respect for the constitution, decides to force the unconstitutional law to a referendum (which, ironically enough, the referendum was on allowing presidents to be elected to more than is constitutionally legal) and is removed from the country by order of the Supreme Court... sorry, but who's in the wrong here?

A couple of whimsical points:

1. If Barack Obama and Hugo Chavez support they guy, chances are, you know what kind of dude we're dealing with here.

2. Obama probably had this nightmare at least once, substitute Washington for Tegucigalpa. In his nightmare, though, he didn't have a Comrade in shining armor to come rescue him. So he probably relates to the guy.

3. I've never bothered to ask a General, but one wonders... Give an American General or Admiral a genuine constitutional quandary. Then, take into consideration UCMJ. Is the flag officer more likely to act on behalf of the UCMJ, or take a stand for the Constitution, from which all (legal) basis of our government springs forth? Unfortunately, I am not so sure. Kudos to the Honduran General, who was re-instated, by the way.

Musings

I've been immensely irritated. For months I have had the unbelievable urge to write, I've thrown around and settled on a few ideas that I really want to put down on paper, of all lengths and genres. Of course, these spats of creativity usually happen when I am locked up by work or child. If only I could gather up the (whaddya call it?) without resorting to weed to get stuff going. Like right now. Have an idea, would love to run with it, and I am at work, doing all types of stuff, stressing out from work and home-related musings, and sitting here trying to piece-meal together some kind of plan for my next major life change. (Which, by the way, I give myself a pat on the back for not having a massive breakdown. Yet.) Which, by the way, is bound to be messy. Well hell... things tend to get messy here and there, although I am definitely not without blame on occasion.(Pertaining to my own admissions of wrongdoing) One of these days I'm going to learn, and hopefully it will be in time not to completely sink what is left of my relationship with a woman I love, for better and worse, and hopefully not carry over and ruin any future relationships that may hit me in the face.

I suppose for now, General Order #1 = Don't Screw Up.

We'll see how well that really works out :P

Terra Firma

So, today we leave for Ali Al Salem, and tomorrow at ass-crack thirty we fly back to the States. It's going to be a hella long week. Apparently we're supposed to fly into BWI or the nearby Air Force base. or something and spend a day or so in the vicinity receiving a barely-less-than-lethal dose of Powerpoint, followed by a plane ride from Philly/Newark to Indy, and a week of friggin' Camp Atterbury. We could, in theory, do it all in a couple days but for whatever reason it's a five day operation, and then, home.

So, what to think about going home? If anything, I know Matthew will be glad to see me. Always nice to know someone is happy, right? Things are not too good at home right now. It doesn't help that I am here, in Kuwait, where such issues cannot be resolved or talked about adequately. Phones do no good. It sucks. I miss the girl dearly. Oh well. Go home, and do something. I guess it's the price I pay for the job I do, and all of the lovely places we ply our trade. It happens to almost everyone it seems, at least once anyways. The stories that I've heard couldn't be written up in Hollywood. I guess, you can only hope it doesn't happen to you, and hope that that person waiting for you at home cares about you the same way you care about them. Where it goes, I can only hope for.

It will be nice to get away from these people though. There are good apples, and then there are fuckin' worms. Not just little green worms, but Tremors worms. Self-serving sons of bitches and Seagull Leaders, lazy old fucks who won't go anywhere, even in KUWAIT because they are scared (In case you forgot, you're a soldier you goddamned old maid)... the list just goes on. It's enough to put people out, and it's driven several of us to the point where we have seriously considered not staying in. It's just this unit, everyone says. But I think it goes deeper than that and is not doing the military any good. I can tell you this for sure, if this is what to expect out of 25B life, fuck this garbage, I'm re-classing.

Home soon. Not sure quite what to think.

Christmas Wish List

And you think I am kidding.

On the one hand, there is no one more suited to ruin the country and possibly set the stage for conservatives to wake the fuck up and realize that a pro-amnesty, pro-spending, pro-welfare, Big Government platform, among countless other things, is not going to make for a winning combination. We already have enough Democrats as it is.

On the other hand, my christmas list is very short, and packs a ridiculously big punch, at around 20 rounds a pop.

Summa Elvetica

I'm no scholar but I think this sums it up well.

Not normally being one for medieval sci-fi fantasy type literary works, I decided to go ahead and give SE a shot. I figured, hell, I've been reading VD's column since I was too young to drink alcohol, rarely am I disappointed.


The first thing I want to get out of the way is that I was actually very pleased by the read. This fact blew me away in and of itself. Not because I think VD is a subpar with the pen, mind you. I've never been able to get into modern sci-fi fantasy. Every world is the same, every main character is recycled, every one of the main character's 14 one-night stands and the eventual heroin, the Frustrated Lesbian with Whom the Hero Spent The Weekend In Bed With, is the same slender, pale-skinned raven-haired wench wearing the same Frederick's of Minas Tirith armor, and every villain violates at least five of the essential 100 Evil Overlord Tips on their way to an unneccesary demise, among other glaring fallacies and insults of intelligence. So when one ignores these 'vital' plot lines, you usually don't have a novel, you might have a cover, and it might be confused for an edition of Penthouse dated c. 953.



The read was enjoyable and well-paced the whole way through, and aside from the length of the main story, which left me quite befuddled at first, I found very little substance in the actual novel to take issue with. The world of Selenoth actually comes across as a fairly original one, even for one whose primary denizens have been helplessly dragged from one world to the next by fantasy writers everywhere for years, and the author has many possibilities and settings to expound upon should he decide to continue to set stories in this world. Even touching upon the history of the various realms and the connections between their rise and fall is refreshing, and provides a plethora of possible story settings for future works, and the interconnecting stories of some characters provides for more branching off and telling of stories.


I am particularly pleased that this is more of a character-driven story moreso than a story-driven one, at least from my perspective. This isn't a typical "slay the dragon, bang the princess" story, although there is enough action to keep one interested. For the main character it is as much an intellectual and spiritual excercise into the work of God, and a growth experience, in God as well as the ways of the world. This is an accomplishment by itself; so many novels it seems are stuck on the 'here and now,' with surprise entrances of a shady dealer or lover from a dark period of a character's past, about whom we learn little or nothing but still this person was a major contributor of EvilTM at some point in the book.

I was very pleased, overall, by the story, but for the fact that it was too short. By the author's own account it was either this or twice the length. I am more than confident that VD could have made twice the book out of it without sacrificing the story, but, as it is this was the novel he wrote, and failed to disappoint. I am looking forward to seeing more works taking place in Selenoth, as I feel he has provided himself with enough material to produce many fine stories, and I hope he will stick to the short story format that he used with the appendices at the end of the novel; I daresay I enjoyed the short stories more than the novel itself, not to take anything away from Summa Elvetica.

Little Man

is 2 today! Happy birthday little man!

I don't use this much anymore except as a portal of sorts to other websites, and that is when I can access it, which I cannot do at the office in Balad. I dunno if I'll keep it but more than likely I will just because I don't always delete things.

And someone just killed the lights.

So, I'm going on leave on Saturday. At least, hopefully on Saturday. There's no telling with the Freedom Birds. I also have a microeconomics test Thursday and need to submit withdrawal paperwork for my calculus class, and check my Army TA stuff. I'm sorta looking forward to going home. Family, mostly good, 2 weeks, mostly bad. I'll just have to try and make the best of it.

Arifjan BLOWS!!!!

If there is any one thing I am really hating about this trip (on the trivial level) it's that I don't have very many photos of the country, at least not as many as I would like. Some of the photos I took were simply for the sake of either editing practice or S+Gs, some were good though.