Standards and Grudges

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Current Location:  Al Udeid, Qatar (AUAB)

The first leg of my expedition into the desert is complete and my group has been split into four small chalks for the next leg. When I leave this place is anyone’s guess. The idiots arranging our flights should be strung up by their toes and flogged with pig entrails. The flight assigned to my chalk is going nowhere near our destination. I don’t know if they expected us to accept that or if they thought we simply wanted to ride on an airplane. Whoppie! In this case the destination is relevant. Give me time to prepare and a choice between five and I’ll be happy to go somewhere else. I hear Egypt is beautiful this time of year.

I forgot my watch and alarm clock at home. Despite my clock deficiency, time continues passing. I didn’t actually expect time to suspend until I acquired a new watch. That would have been convenient though. The universe is hardly convenient.

I lost a day during my flights here. I thought I lost more, but I came to my senses. I think it happened in Ireland. It’s difficult to be exact, I wasn’t watching it very close. I lost this morning as well. I had gone to sleep just before midnight and when I left my tent it was six in the afternoon. I slept part of that time, but mostly read and watched movies on my computer. If felt like morning when I decided to leave my tent and as expected, the sun was low in the sky. It was the wrong side of the horizon I later discovered. The sun setting when I expected it to be rising encouraged me to check the time.

I’m beginning to wonder if my watch did more than tell time. Did it somehow protect me from random fluctuations in the passage of time? It wouldn’t be the first time a watch has achieved a purpose beyond telling time. Harold Crick will confess to that. Or was that a work of fiction? I’m going to get a drink and investigate further.
…

No time for drinks you bastards. We had a meeting about our travel arrangements. They idiots split up our groups even more. My group, Balad 2, has been split into four smaller groups. One group has been combined with a portion of Balad 1, which was also cut up into smaller groups. What once was one is now fifteen separate groups. I have no hope for the next leg of my journey to proceed smoothly. If all goes according to plan I’ll be at my destination tomorrow. I don’t expect that to happen. We’re all doomed.

I need to remember to get a haircut and talk to finance tomorrow.

Current Location:  Shannon, Ireland

I’ve been surrounded by strangers for the better part of this past year. In body and mind I’ve hardly been home—not to the point that most have noticed. Single malt whisky, beer and lack of rest have successfully sedated me during my visits to the real world. I’ve been traveling further into myself and finding someone else. It could be artificially induced or simply my path. It’s difficult to say at this point. Perhaps I’m too close to the subject to make an impartial judgment. I lose another piece of my normal self with each of my frequent struggles with insomnia. Caffeine, taurine, nicotine and those awful tasting citrus energy shots keep me alert when I need to be awake. Insomnia and the dreams keep me awake when I should sleep. It perhaps does not help that I’ve been reading and rereading the writings of Hunter S. Thompson, interrupted by chapters of a Tesla biography and listening religiously to Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Joe Strummer and Nina Simone. In my mind I’m writing a new Bible. The Letters of Field Commander Cohen to Old Girlfriends and Acquaintances. The Exodus of Individual Liberty by Hunter. The Captivity of Babylon according to Joe.

Being around strangers has taught me to be less introverted, or at least appear to be something other than disinterested in the stories of their boring lives. Normal people make me sick. It’s taxing to interact with them. I suspect that some day I’ll be a hermit with perhaps a few good friends that I won’t speak to for months at a time. It is true however that I have paid more attention to the details and stories of those around me. Most can be dismissed without further thought or need to ever recall, but every so often I’m rewarded with something of interest or entertainment.

If I believed in the new age crap I’d probably tell everyone I have an old soul. I’m not an idiot though and I recognize that new age wisdom is nothing more than stupid people trying to cope with surroundings they can’t understand. The world is old and its showing its age. The world was once round. It is now flat. We are a Flat Earth Society—stagnant and stupid. When I was a child the world was full of exciting possibilities and fear. The Space Shuttle was new and amazing. Technology was advancing at an alarming rate. The Wall separated Germany. Behind the Iron Curtain there were untold Soviet secrets to fear. The excitement faded and we’re left with the fear. The Wall came down, but we have new reasons to fear the Russians. The true fear however comes from poor brown Muslims. Without fear of death they attack the West.

Thompson wrote that the American Century has come to an end. I fear he’s right. He also said that fear is just ignorance. My experience leaves me unequipped to agree or argue against. The masses are ignorant. That much is true. This is no other explanation for American Idol, 2-Hour parking limits and the irrational fear of handguns.

I’ll begin to ramble if I write much longer in this particular mood. I don’t dare expose too much of myself at this stage. I have designs for greatness (or at least to give the system a shock) and I don’t care for that to be sidetracked by media hysteria over what I once wrote on the Internets. A lawyer can save you from trial by jury. There is no hope for trial by media. You regular people give them power. You make me sick.