Quick Update

So I've thought more about and decided that I think the big Cairo speech was a really happy and flowery mix of strategic incoherence and flawed comparisons.

Fortunately, the Muslim world, in as much as there is a single entity that can be called "the Muslim world," knows this as well and is waiting for actions to clarify the vague fog of soaring rhetoric that descended upon them.

The non-Muslim world is probably waiting too.

I also hear we are working on ending the genocide in Darfur. That probably means high level talks but no big speeches yet. I guess we'll be leaving the engaging with Omar al-Bashir to the ICC for now.

I guess I'm just cynical because I suspect that the coming change will involve mostly polishing the turd that is the status quo.

Otherwise, things here are good. I was getting tired during my morning PT when my Marine buddy started heckling me from a spin bike. I'd be tempted to tease him about being on a bike but I bike a lot back home and he'll be retiring with just about 100% disability due to the abuse his joints and back have taken over the years in the Infantry. In any case, I was re-motivated and banged out another three sets.

During my morning briefs I am finding that sarcasm and wit help mix things up. On a particularly good day weather wise I promised no impacts to operations due to weather and said that if I was wrong they could take out my neighbor and shoot him.

He wasn't amused. Something about betting his life on the call of a weatherman made him nervous. But I got a few smiles and laughs. I was amused.

On dusty days I try to brief the color the world will appear. Just a little hazy? Brown? Orange? Martian red? Or dark dark black because you'll have to close your eyes to avoid being sandblasted...

It's a beautiful country though. Really. It's just a bad location. It's neighbor Syria only exports dust and suicide bombers.

Is it wrong that a common joke here is that Syria is so stunted in its development they the only business is the import and re-export of foreign Jihadis? And that business is nowhere near what it once was from what I read in the papers.