Summer Days

Well summer is starting to roll in and the days are getting hotter, longer, and more polluted. However since are camp is located outside of Kabul a good ways we don’t have all the pollution the city does, pretty happy about that. So with the summer here that means people start going on their 2 week R&R and we have one soldier already back in the commonwealth and once he comes back another goes and that will continue throughout the summer and fall, mine is at the end of august as long as the world doesn’t end first. The one good thing about R&R is the army will pay for your flight anywhere you want to go in the world and back! I have decided to take my talents to Bradley Int Airport! But I was thinking about it, people were saying they are going to Ireland and Australia, I mean ya its nice and you save a plane ticket but the commonwealth is good enough for me.  Enough about me I’ll tell ya about what’s been going on here the last few weeks! We recently got bomb and drug dogs and they are pretty good at what they do, that is all I can say! They can smell everything and won’t go near you if you smell bad it’s pretty funny.  I am trying to get in good with the handlers so that I can get a chance to wear the marshmallow suit and get chased down by a dog I think that would be sweet, others not so much! Well I have some sad news about Old Blue, the tires are all completely bald, and when I say that I mean there’s no rubber tread at all and is not drivable and it just sits there, a 40,000 dollar paperweight. Now we have to use Humvees that don’t work half the time. But nick it’s a Humvee it must be better than old blue! No, no its not. We have a few Humvees here all are also not street worthy and technically we need to have 2 people in there to operate it, however I tend to break that rule, a lot. But hey if the camp needs water and we only have me to get in the Humvee to esquorte water trucks in, I’m going to do it by myself!  On a different note we just renovated our BDOC office and it’s really nice now, however since you need a minimum of a secret security clearance to get into the office I can’t talk about what we did so some other day, but it’s really really nice! Hahaha so I asked them if we could have a day off on our birthdays and it would be greatly appreciated but they just laughed and said no, no days off, so will stay on out 24/7 shifts. The army however really does love it when you have a birthday, there is so many army traditions when your birthday comes around it is really a special time! (Very sarcastic) I let you think about that. Let’s just say my 21^st birthday was during annual training last year, everyone in the company knew it was my birthday and 49 people had lined up outside my room to tell me so!  I’m tired I’m going to go sleep. I know this wasn’t much, I’ll write more later.

Old Blue

Yes I’m back don’t worry I am here to fill your head with about 3-6 mins of information that you don’t really need but want to hear about!  So the current time is 2:20 am and I am still on the night shift its great. I start to say that with a little bit of sarcasm now.  don’t get me wrong I still like working the night shift because I have no captains or master sargents in my ear 24/7 so it’s nice but I am missing my dinner meal and are little shoppet that’s open during the day and the latest Blackhorse Gossip. It’s funny you would think getting away from Westside I wouldn’t hear any more gossip and I didn’t for like the first 3 weeks but then you get to know people, people from other countries, the sweet kitchen staff and the people within the mayor cell (us) and then comes the gossip.  I usually work till 10 am right now and lunch is at 11:30 so I don’t want to miss that so I hang out for a bit go to lunch pass out by 12:30 and wake up late but hey what can ya do. So we have an up armored NTV (non tactical vehicle) like a Chevy suburban but with a lot of armor, that’s not what we have but an example. Any way on our NTV is a driver side door that does not close and weighs about 400 LBS and when in the rare case that you get it to close it will not re open without help from the outside or crawling over to the passenger side and getting out that way, and when in the case that you have to wear full body armor that sucks, a lot. I know I had to do it today. The vehicle is falling apart. The brush guard in the front should not even be there is serves no purpose it’s bolted on in about 3 pieces. The radio works but only have 1 speaker that works and if you’re lucky you might hear AFN (armed forces network) the 4 wheel drive doesn’t work and there is not one smooth part to the vehicle anywhere, we call it “old Blue” “blue” “pos” or “dents” but alas, we have figured a way to open the driver door when it is closed, either you have to open the rear driver side door and the front door opens for some reason. Or you can do my preferred method, with your right boot and you facing away from the vehicle, raise leg up and perform the heel kick to the center of the door, leaving boot imprint on the door and door will open! As you can see that is what we are dealing with here at Camp Blackhorse, while Camp Phoenix has upwards of 15 new vehicles, and they are asking us why we need just one more when our truck is “fine” hahah as you can see we are the red headed step child of the KBC. But hey we have more important things to do like make me fire marshal and draw up every building on this base and label where all the fire extinguishers are located and do it all on paint, yes Microsoft paint because we’re that cool. But hey yes sir is all I say and carry on.  Oh hey also just because Bin Laden is dead doesn’t mean we go home just in case you were wondering because I know one of you out there was.  Moving on I think I have made a mistake about my address to some people so here it is to clarify any mistakes made by yours truly:

Nick Latino

Camp Blackhorse

26^th MEB

APO AE 09320

Good? Ok thought so that’s what it is so if you want to send money or gold I will be more than willing to accept the Gift, and notice I say gift so it you try to take me to judge Judy I  have it in writing that I was a gift, not a loan or anything like that. Also people have been asking me what I want or need here so I’ll try and give you some ideas, now by no mean do you have to get me any of this, these are just some ideas to get your mind going if you do feel the need to send me anything:  candy, qtips, Oreos, (double stuffed) stuff to mix in bottled water, anything Boston sports related. Pictures, magazines, disposable camera, notebook, money, money, cash, greenbacks, legal tender notes. (but really dont send money, i dont need it or have a use for it)

Combat Pach cermony and random things

the lucky strike

getting the combat patch

in traffic, thought this was supposed to be a back road?

on the C-17

Well it has been a while since