Friendship Surprise

We all know the outcome of the actual Army VS Navy game…if not, Army lost.  But at least here on Kandahar, Army won!  Fantastically, I was able to get out of the office and see the win, the sun, and the camaraderie.  The referees were in great spirits and were joking around with the crowd.  There was only one bad call resulting in a Navy touchdown, but we won’t hold that against them.  They were nervous enough refereeing for a crowd with loaded weapons! 



My new friend and me cheering on the Army team!

As the Navy was losing, their tempers started flaring.  There was one guy in particular that was being overly aggressive on the field.  At one point I became so irate with this Seaman that I threatened to tackle him if he continued to misbehave on the field.  It was at this point that I realized I gained a new friend because the small female CPT next to me offered to hold my pistol while I tackled the guy.  She and I had a great time taunting the other team, cheering for Army, and telling the refs they were blind.  At one point she looked at me and said, “We need to hang out more.  Maybe your toughness will start rubbing off on me, haha.”  At another point in the game, she mentioned that “we will be best friends.  You will teach me to be tough and I will thread your eyebrows!”  Haha, what a wonderful exchange!  She works in my building as the commander of one of our Preventive Medicine units.  Now that I work days, our friendship is possible!  Yay!

Another high point to the day was that I have commenced with the psychological warfare on my boss.  We are gaining another LT and my boss has created a confusing schedule to create a third Battle CPT/NCO team.  “Original LT” and I want eight hour shifts, which is not a part of our boss’s plan.  The boss wants to keep twelve hour shifts but use the third team to give one day off a week to the other Battle teams.  It honestly is confusing and truly makes no sense.  Therefore, I wrote the eight hour shift schedule on the board a few days ago and let it simmer and soak into the boss’s brain.  Then, I casually asked the boss to explain the schedule written on the board to me, which he looked at the schedule and acknowledged the eight hour shifts but said he hadn’t written that schedule on the board.  Then I mentioned the eight hour shifts to his boss, and explained it to his boss’s boss.  They all like the idea.  We just have to get my boss fully on board.  Eight hour shifts will happen and we will have psychology to blame, I am determined!

Sunday is what we call movie day.  Since my shop is the only shop that works on Sunday, we take advantage of the quiet time and watch movies while knocking out products.  It is the one day we can focus on what we need to get done without the constant interruption of meetings or other people/shops needing something from us.  Thus far, I have had a cup of tea, three cups of coffee, and done nothing productive.  Today is going to be a good day!