Dec. 19 (a Paul post)

December 19


It’s been forever since I wrote a journal entry. I started off doing one every day. Sadly the days just started to get monotonous, so I felt like every day was the same. And of course since I am a creature of habit I didn’t do updates when some cool stuff happened. So I figure I should fill in a few stories that have happened over the past coupe month:

--The Convoy: Now that I have made my last trip until I head home, I can now say that I had the interesting experience of doing a couple convoys. Of course until now, Jenn and no one else back home knew about it. I knew they would be worried. The first convoy I took was between two very close bases. I was told it was super safe (as safe as a convoy can be), the road was well travel by the Army, the road was watched by both bases, and there hadn’t been any activity in a long time. So they loaded me up and off we went. Even though it is a safe convoy I still was worried and not afraid to admit scared. Looking around the truck I saw not just calm, but bored faces on the soldiers. They do this all the time. I stared out the window and watched as we passed cars, bicycles, and people. All those Youtube videos if IEDs and stuff just kept playing in my head. It was only a 15 minutes ride, so about half way there I started to relax. Then I was told to hold on because there was a rough spot in the road. I could tell we were driving through the biggest pothole I’ve seen. As we rattled back and forth the soldier next to me said “yeah that was a big IED.” Apparently we were going through the hole created by a huge blast. Needless to say the pucker factor returned for the remaining part of the trip. Apparently my definition of “no activity in a long time” is not the same as their definition.

--The Cat’s Pardon: One of the services that our contractor does is Vector. This is pest and animal control. It is a serious infraction for American military members to have a pet. I’m talking about a career ending kind of infraction. One day I was walking back to my room and got stopped by an Air Force Captain and Sergeant, both female. They were telling me that the Vector had caught their cat. The Sergeant was crying. I told them it was a strey and had to be captured and put down. They then said it wasn’t a stray and I replied “then it’s a pet and that’s a General Order #1 violation and is a pretty big deal.” We discussed the dangers of rabies and other diseases (which was ironic because both of them were medical and knew all this stuff). Apparently the Polish vet on base that works with the military working dogs gave the cat shots and even spayed it. I told them it didn’t matter and the contractor was required to catch it and hand it over to be euthanized. The crying continued as I told them there was nothing I could do. A couple hours there was a knock on my door. The group included the same Captain, the Polish vet and his assistant, and the poor soldier that was responsible for doing the euthanizing. The Polish vet showed me some regulation that said “wild, native animals (ex bats, cats, etc) should be left alone. I asked how a cat with shots, that was spayed, and wearing a flee collar was supposed to be considered wild or native. We went back and forth for about 45 minutes and I finally just told them to go speak to the base’s Sergeant Major and I’ll let him decide. I figured this would end the discussion because who in their right mind would walk up to the Sergeant Major and say “I know I am violating a law that could end my career, but I really want to save this cat.” They were supposed to stop by and let me know what he said, but after a couple days I never heard from them. Issue resolved! Another day passed by and I ran into another nurse that works with them and said how sorry I was that it went down like it did. She looked confused and then said “the cat was allowed to live.” I couldn’t believe they actually asked and more so couldn’t believe the Sergeant Major actually agreed to the pardon. I ran into the Sergeant Major that night at dinner and asked him about it. I asked if their crying got to him and he looked down and said “did you know the day the cat was caught and all this went down was the Sergeant’s birthday?”