The future is now... Embrace it.

Holy shit!!!

WTF is google up to these days.

So, I am in Kuwait anxious to go home. I jump online and I googled my home town to look up the location of a concert that I'm going to. When I went up to click the hybrid map option, I saw something that I've never seen before. A button labeled 'street view' in bold letters. I clicked and it really gave me a street view. I could pivot the camera 360 degrees and "drive" camera around the city.

I drove to my house.

I was shocked. There it was, in all its majesty.
I wanted to shed a tear.

My home.

It was Christmas time. There was my mom's little reindeer on the roof and dad's expert lighting hung on the house.

My home...

ej

The fading, moonlit barbed wire...

We had a partial lunar eclipse in Iraq a few days back.

I used the scope on my rifle as a telescope.

Looking at my cosmic miracle though crosshairs...



Just beautiful.

ej

Operation "Joe Dirt"

I have a story to tell.

Due to the recent declassification of Operation Egg-Head*, I can now tell you that we as America's military, can be mistaken from time to time.

So here I am sitting at work one day when my Staff Sergent comes in and tells me that I am on the manifest for the next mission. No surprise here, so I shrug it off and continue my day as usual. Well, rumors start circulating about a possibility of chemical weapons that may have contaminated the area. The Lance Corporal underground tells of a container with chemical agent buried back in the 1990's. Later that night, I was told by my superiors to make sure that I have my gas mask easily accessible or worn on my body at all times during the mission.
I start to get nervous...

During the mission briefing, the corpsman (medic) issued us a syringe filled with atropine and 2-pam chloride. Just in case there was a chemical leak and the tank contained nerve agent. I know that the rumors were true by this point, but to what extent? Is there really a chemical spill of some sort? Our Staff Sergent then told us that we WILL be wearing our gas masks on our hip at all times. I remember seeing the pictures of what chemical and nerve agents can do to someones body. Nasty shit...

During the brief, the convoy commander gives us the complete mission details.
Sometime after the Gulf War, Saddam ordered that all the factories that produce chemical, nuclear and biological weapons be shut down due to the cease fire. But rather than properly disposing of such weapons, he instead hid massive quantities throughout Iraq.
According to the Lieutenant, this site contained one of them. After a tip-off from a local citizen, coalition forces have excavated the tank. weighing about 40,000 pounds and and holding thousands of gallons of an unknown substance. The tank was encased below a platform of reinforced concrete about 4 feet thick. He tells us that the tank is partially exposed and force protection has been built around the tank just in case of an indirect fire attack. They think that the tank is filled with concentrated mustard gas because of consistency tests. Even though the tank wasn't tapped yet, the NBC tests showed that it had the viscosity of motor oil. Saddam later doused the area in industrial cleaning solvents and pesticides. I guessing to try and cover-up. He told us that it has a fruity like smell. As long as we don't smell "toasted almonds" we're fine. That's the smell of nerve agent.
But they were not 100 percent sure...

I was getting scared. I didn't like this one bit.

So the mission lasted 4 days. I won't bore you with the mission details but during those three days we slept about 100 meters of the damn thing and we were working downwind. My gas mask never left my hip and I couldn't help but think of the structural integrity after 10+ years of sitting. We were not allowed to take pictures because it was still under wraps. Don't want the media to get a hold of this just yet. By the time that we left, I was grateful that the contents was still unknown to me. No blisters, no headaches, I was feeling fine. The "Egg" was still untapped.

Wow, here I was thinking that I actually worked this close to a real WMD.
.
.
.
Our Staff Sergent came with a small update on Operation Egg-Head a few days back.

"Yeah, about the tank..."
"It was uh..."

"Septic"

I walked away before he could finish.
I couldn't stop laughing.

ej

*(not the real mission name but it was referred to as an "egg")

I was not so far away

I just want to give myself a swift kick in the ass sometimes...

Look at me!!!
I can tap..tap...tappity-tap words of comfort.

That's all I can do from here.
What the hell am I expecting you to do? Hug the computer monitor?
Right...

And I don't even know what your voice sounds like or what you look like when you smile. Not even the little things you do to annoy the shit out of me.

I don't know what you drive, who you love, why you cry, where you read my first post or when you decided what you wanted to be when you grew up. I don't know.

These are the things you find out just by being next to someone. When your driving to grab a bite to eat.
I'll find out if which celebrity you would rather sleep with over a cold beer at the bar. I find out if you snore when you fall asleep in my truck while coming back from a weekend vacation at the lake. I'll also know what you like on your burgers or what soda you perfer.

I would know if you liked a certain movie while walking away from the theater. If you take your popcorn home or chuck it in the trash bins. Hell, you might be the kind of person that just leaves it on the chair. I don't know.

How close are you to god? Do you think there is life on other planets? Why did you get the Motorola over the Nextel?
Journey or Led Zepplin?
Did O.J. do it?
Why did you laugh when I fell down the stairs?
Would you ever want to be a porn star???

If I ran into you, I may never know.
I'd probably call you an asshole and then you would read about it in my blog later...

(By the way, this guy in the picture is not me.)

ej

I have friends. The IVAW!!!

IVAW.

Iraq Veterans Against the War.

Here I was thinking that I was a bad American for believing that the war was wrong. Little did I know that a group of real vets of the Iraq war feel the same as I do, and they have regrouped.

These individuals have organized protests and speak publicly, against the war.
And they do this in the most unorthodox but highly effective way.

They bring the war home...

The IVAW have conducted "mock" patrolling missions in Denver, Santa Monica, New York City and in Washington D.C. They call it Operation First Casualty. The eerie real patrols strike a nerve deep inside me. They perform CASEVAC's while posting perfect security and "bag, tag and drag" suspected insurgents. Oh yeah, these guy's have done this before...

The Veterans website have posted 10 reasons on why these individuals oppose the war.

1. The Iraq war is based on lies and deception.

2. The Iraq war violates international law.

3. Corporate profiteering is driving the war in Iraq.

4. Overwhelming civilian casualties are a daily occurrence in Iraq.

5. Soldiers have the right to refuse illegal war.

6. Service members are facing serious health consequences due to our Government's negligence

7. The war in Iraq is tearing our families apart.

8. The Iraq war is robbing us of funding sorely needed here at home.

9. The war dehumanizes Iraqis and denies them their right to self-determination.

10. Our military is being exhausted by repeated deployments, involuntary extensions, and activations of the Reserve and National Guard.

Facts are given along with these reasons on the website.



From its inception, IVAW has called for:
Immediate withdrawal of all occupying forces in Iraq;
Reparations for the human and structural damages Iraq has suffered, and stopping the corporate pillaging of Iraq so that their people can control their own lives and future; and
Full benefits, adequate health care (including mental health), and other supports for returning servicemen and women.


Many musical artists who also oppose the war have joined forces with the IVAW in a combined effort to show the need to bring our troops home.( Hell, I know I want to come home.)

Just know that these aren't your run-of-the-mill antiwar protesters. They have been there and done that as I have. We joined wanting to make a difference in the world. And not by making it worse.


My voice will be heard...

ej



http://www.ivaw.org/

One last mission...

Tomorrow,

I will be going on my last mission as a United States Marine.

One more chance to prove myself.

One more opportunity to make a difference.

One last risk...

ej

Need Help...

Hey,



So here's the thing...

I'm trying to get an article printed in my local newspaper. My only problem is that I really have never formally written an article before.



Back before I joined the military, the local paper ran an article on two individuals joining the U.S. military straight out of high school and our plans for the future. Yeah, I was one of them. Well, now that my four years are nearly complete, I am going to try and get them to allow me to write a follow-up on that article four years later.



This is just a rough draft of my article. Please read and give lots of advice.

I've never done this before...







"Untrue Patriot"

By Eric Juarez



4 years ago, I signed a contract that would throw me head first into a world I never knew existed. From my life as a 19 year old, proud American boy, eager to "uphold the constitution" to a burned out 23 year old, Iraqi veteran. I was never the perfect Hollywood American hero. Shortly into my career, I began to defy. I refused to follow orders and I eventually led myself down a path of anger and confusion. I questioned my devotion to the "cause" and my belonging to a controversial war. I continued to rebel and it eventually led me to be charged under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

I remember being escorted to the base brig to a outdoor enclosure to await processing. Posted on the chain link fence was a sign that would haunt me for the next few years. The sign read "Those who are not with us are against us." I felt horrible. I began to ask myself if I was behaving un-American like. I turned my back on my country by refusing to obey in the organization that upholds our freedom.

I had an awakening.

The USMC gave me the option to be discharged from the military on a bad conduct discharge which was also the court martials most likely ruling based on the charges filed against me. The JAG lawyer assigned to my case, suggested, If i wanted to stay in and finish my contract, I needed to plead guilty and convince the judge that I was still worthy in serving in Marine Corps. I fought hard. I owed the military that much. The judge sentenced me to three months military confinement, loss of 66% in deduction of pay for six months and recirculation the the United States Marine Corps at the rank of Private. I was also sentenced a one-year probation period. Any further hiccups and my time in the military would be finished, indefinitely.

The fleet took me back with much discretion. My previous unit refused to re-instate and so I was juggled from unit to unit. I refused to allow my effort to go down in vain. It didn't take long for a unit preparing for deployment to assign me to the rosters. I felt ready and I was proud again.
I was given a second chance.

Iraq is not how it seems on television. There are not hordes of infantrymen constantly engaging the enemy. Firefights are becoming less and less and IED's are becoming our biggest problem. I flew overseas with stories of "What happened this one time..." The troops talk about how much the war has changed from the initial battle for Fallujah to the present war. They would say that they were "robbed" of their war. Too many contractors doing our work for us. Too many civilians working for companies like KBR and the other corporate giants living off the war. They were sucking us dry of our pride. Our war had turned into a circus...

Our unit came back to the states suffering 3 losses during the seven month deployment. All of them, victims of roadside bombs. I was transferred to another unit along with a few others. The new unit was set do deploy in a little less then a year. Six months of training to re-deploy back to Fallujah, I was promoted back to my original rank of Lance Corporal by the time training was completed. We were ready to go back to Iraq.

Almost immediately after getting situated in Camp Fallujah, we suffered our first loss of the deployment. Four Marines had been hit my an IED outside of the city. The vehicle that they were riding in, a Humvee, was completely torn in two. From then on, the unit decided that Humvee's are no longer to be utilized for driving off base. We were only allowed to drive the military's new MRAP type vehicles due to the fact that they are better suited to deflect the blast associated with roadside bombings. During the deployment, orders were given to relocate to Ramadi. We were told that Camp Fallujah is scheduled to be Demilitarized soon. A small step to coming home for good.

I am now in Ramadi for the remainder of the deployment and will be separating from the Marine Corps in October and. I will be returning home to Odessa.

I will have reached the end of my active service and be discharged under honorable conditions. And yet I still wonder, Did I make the right decision?
I hope so.




I know its not perfect and that's why I ask for your help. I really want to send this in and not look like a jackass.
Anything helps, grammar advice, wording, phrasing, anything.

ej

Brightness Blinding

Ok...

So I got a little ahead of myself.

Hello,

My name is Eric. I'm a twenty something year-old male and I am ambitious.

I love to write. Unfortunately, I am unable to do so at press time.

I suck.

My material sucks and I have no idea what to write about.

blah, blah, blah.... I'm stuck, blah.... I'm lost, blah....

blah. jdaaoieyhudklaea. blah...

hmm...

well, I've been away and assure you that I feel like a butt.

I was trying to do the run-away thing. "When do I stop?"

well......?

What ev.

I'm just going to write anyway.

ej

P.S. I've missed you all.

Published.

It's hard to start writing again.

No one watches me write and no one literally listens.
No pressure and no worries...

I don't feel judged, Don't allow myself to become too complicated. Simplicity becomes my character. I share what I feel you should know. By "you" I mean,
The person who is intrigued.

You may know me or you may not... Doesn't matter.
Your here now and you've read.

There,

Published.


ej