But I just got here!

So, I'm past the one quarter point here. Things are slow but time is passing quickly enough. In fact, time is passing so fast that I've already been told to submit my awards package for this rotation with a deadline in the next few weeks.

Maybe I'm cynical but I think it cheapens the tour award if it is requested and approved by the half-way point of the term. Granted, unless you cause a major international incident or really really screw up, you will leave my job with a Joint Service Commendation Medal. I knew that going in.

They hated the guy I replaced here and he got one. The liked his partner. He got one. I guess that ruins the suspense of whether the award will be approved.

It's in stark contrast to how the folks here rate their troops. For actual career-affecting performance reviews, they enforce the standard. They do it hard.

One guy, apparently a complete dirt bag, just got his performance review. It was a career ender specifically drafted to stunt him at his current rank because he was over-promoted in the past and is apparently a horrible troop.

Well, to make sure the point got across, one of the senior NCOs here called a buddy of his that runs the bad troops career field just to make sure he knew how much of a dirtbag this guy is.

It may sound vindictive, but really it's restorative. This bad troop was coddled for many years. He ended up in his current position because rather than fire him, his last unit took the proverbial dead squirrel and tossed it in to our yard. This had probably gone on for many years.

That's not how these guys play here. They like to solve problems and aren't shy about telling people what they really think.

Though planting rumors among the dirtbags peers to tell him not to sign his performance report may be a little over the line. If he signs it then he can later appeal to have the bad report removed from his record. If he doesn't sign it, he can't appeal and so it will weight him down for a while (history says this guy will likely earn future bad reports if his command has the guts to write them... unless he learns and fixes it). It is a little funny too.

After a series of screw ups and over all bad behavior a Senior NCO called down the office the dirtbag was working in. The dirtbag answered the phone. The Senior NCO hung up. The Senior NCO then called again. Dirt bag answered. Senior NCO hung up. Finally, the third time, the dirtbag answered the phone yet again and the Senior NCO thundered through the line: "[Dirtbag's name], put a real soldier on the phone please."

At least the dirtbag was answering the phone.

Meanwhile, while I was checking my email real fast in the MWR hooch last night and calling home, some contractor came in wearing perfume. I also saw a soldier in the chow hall looking clownish with make up. Maybe they want to feel lady like, I don't know. But, really? Really?

As for un-lady like behavior... a new female officer here has, in a few short days, discussed in detail her bowel movements, a drunken injury, and the finer points of a certain type of movie in Korea that you won't find in foreign film festivals.

Not much to say about that. Definitely nothing that can be said in this venue.

So I'll close with this... my neighbor's wife is pregnant. We've been getting regular updates and ultrasound images.

It looks like a person now.