It’s that time of year again: the entire BN took the day off to attend mandatory seminars. Until lunch, it was the familiar parade of lectures that boil down to “It is better for you personally and for the Army if you are not a drunken boor.” After lunch, we had an interesting tour of [...]
Human beings are not rational. I am, unfortunately, human. I may not be able to transcend my nature but I don’t have to like it.
Today I had an evening flight. I got about half an hour of day time, and one hour of night unaided. It’d be just another Saturday, except for one thing: tonight’s flight was in a Cessna 172.
It’s a funny thing, flying a small reciprocating single-engine plane after becoming used to a dual turbine helicopter. On [...]
Out and about in Songtan the other day visiting a friend from college who through pure coincidence is also currently stationed in Korea, we saw a truck open on an anonymous corner near his apartment containing lots of stage gear: lights, reflectors, etc. It generated a moment’s curiosity, as there is no nearby theatre, but [...]
At my last apartment I had a cleaning lady come by every week. It wasn’t very expensive (an Alabama advantage: cheap labor!), and it kept the place looking and smelling nice. Unfortunately, that’s just not an option here. I prefer living in a clean place, but I don’t actually sweep and mop myself nearly as [...]
Sometimes the high-security lock is so high security that it won’t open, or close, or release the key, until you get in and bang on it with a sledgehammer a few times. Once that’s done, though, it turns with a sweet, oily smoothness.
Also, I thought it was cool: for the first time since leaving Japan, my bumbling half-fluency in Japanese has been of practical use. Another pilot with a Japanese car had a malfunction in his electrical system, and I helped him by reading the hiragana labels on the circuit breakers yesterday.
It makes me smile when my [...]
The army’s schedule accommodates no man. It doesn’t matter that I signed in from leave three days ago or that I’ve been living from a duffel since the beginning of October. Today there was a mission! An important, long-planned mission which, since I’d been gone for the duration of the planning, basically required me to [...]