This past week has gone by fast!! I don’t know where to start.
The family is fine. Haylie scared the life out of Cory early one morning by screaming bloody murder and ripping him from his sleep. At about 3 in the morning she just started to scream. Cory ran in to check on her and he found out that she had a staple stuck in her foot. It was actually folded into her skin. There wasn’t a stapler in her room and the closest one is downstairs from her room. I highly doubt that she went downstairs, stapled her foot, walked back to her room and then started to scream. Even then the staple would have gone just straight into her foot without any folds. Who knows? We have theories but I won’t get into those. Kevin is doing fine. No staples found their way into his body. School for them is going well, I hear. They had their state testing this past week. I’m sure they did well.
A female got attacked here on the base I live on. She was in one of the shower trailers and the guy just barged in and assaulted her. I don’t know any of the details but there is a $3,500 reward for information leading to this guy. I’m kinda freaked out to walk to the shower trailer by myself now. I actually run now and I keep my CHU key in my hand and I lock the door the second it shuts.
My long time family cat was laid to rest yesterday. Sparky was 18 years old….pretty old for a cat. We got him when he was just a kitten. I really wish I could have been there when they took him to the vet. He had been going downhill for a while so this didn’t come as a surprise, but that doesn’t make it any less sad.
We had a Hail and Farewell BBQ on Thursday. One of my coworkers is leaving us soon and we were welcoming her replacement. It was a lot of fun. I got to see a bunch of people from my company that I haven’t seen since we got to Baghdad. One of my other coworkers, SGT Ahmed, is going on leave next week and I get to be the squad leader in his absence. I was kind of nervous when I first found out because I wasn’t sure I could do a good job, but then Cory said that if I can put up with him and take care of the kids I won’t have any problems taking care of my soldiers. He has a point. I think being a squad leader is a lot like being a mom. All I’m doing is taking care of them and making sure they are doing what they are supposed to be doing and staying out of trouble. I’m sure I’ll be fine. SGT Ahmed and I timed ourselves on our sit-ups a couple days ago. For the Army PT test we have 2 minutes to do as many sit-ups as we can. SGT Ahmed is a machine and he did 99. I only did 82. To get 100% in the sit-up event in our age bracket we have to do at least 82. So I maxed that portion of the PT test! I was so excited. I’ve never been able to do that many before. I think before a couple days ago the most I was ever able to do was 64. Now being able to max the push-ups is an entirely different matter. For my sex and age bracket I have to do at least 50 push-ups to max. On my last PT test I only did 27. That’s passing for a female but it’s nowhere near maxing, which is my goal for the next PT test which should be coming up in August. To max the run I’d have to run 2 miles in 15:48. I don’t know where I stand on that. The last time I tried to run 2 miles for time I ended up going farther than 2 miles so my time was off. I have 20:30 in which to run it in and I know I can beat that if I’m already running 2.7 miles in 22 minutes. Well, I think that’s about it for now. I love and miss everyone! Only a little over 6 more months to go!!