Outside the embassy annex.
I’m home now! Here’s a few photos that Tell some of what I saw and experienced.
Here I am during the 10k run, not a bad way to prepare for the big feast that was coming later on.
Normally I love Thanksgiving, this year was a weird one. First off I was 8000 miles from my family and this was the first big holiday away from home. I spent the morning participating in a 10k “Fun Run,” called the Turkey Trot. Then I was off to work. That’s just not the same as watching football. After work I traveled back to the Embassy Annex area for Thanksgiving dinner.
Unfortunately it wasn’t that easy, on the way the indirect fire alarm went off. So we all offloaded our vehicle and entered the bunker nearby. I’m not really sure how many or where the rockets actually landed but spending part of my thanksgiving in a bunker was a new experience for me. I’m hoping it’s not going to be a new holiday tradition.
The all-clear sounded and we finally got to eat our holiday dinner. KBR, the government hired contractors that handle the food service, put on quite a spread. Everything you could ask for was available. I got totry a few foods that were never on the menu at home. All in all it was a good day, just allot different than any Turkey day I’ve had before.
The Backside of the Embassy Annex, Baghdad, Iraq.
I awoke this morning to chilly temperatures in my room. Not bone chilling like I would experience back home, but certainly a change to the usual weather here in Baghdad.
Winter is coming. In Massachusetts that would mean up to 4 feet of snow and 5-20 degree daily temps. What it means here is Fall like weather. High’s in the 70’s and lows down in the 40’s. Winter also brings the rainy season here in Iraq. I know in January and February it will get even colder.
I walk from my room to work in the palace and I see allot of the personnel here starting to wear their fleece coats. I suspect that when you’re used to 110 degrees, adjusting to 75-80 might take a few weeks.
So this winter will be different for me, but before you know it the temps will start to creep back into the 100’s.
This past week, I experienced a mechanical failure on my laptop that will keep me from completing any illustrations for a bit.
My process for creating art is to start traditionally, with a sketch, and then I import the drawing into the computer.
The programs I use to work are Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter.
Well, my laptops hardrive has failed and now I await a replacement. I have a PC laptop to use in the meantime but it doesn’t have any programs of note.
I normally use a Mac and have done all my blogging with Iweb. However the way the .mac accounts work seems to have a problem with the slow internet connection here. So several days ago I decided to switch over to blogger.com until I return home again.
Unfortunately the majority of this blog doesn’t have the corresponding images to go with it. I’ll correct this as soon as I get my mac up and running again.
I guess I’ll just sketch more this week.
Here I am with my boys. I took the earliest leave in my unit so I could be home for their 4th birthday.
When you deploy for a year, the Army let’s you go on a 2 week leave. Generally soldiers try to take leave midway through their tour to break up the year. I promised my boys I would be home for their birthday so that meant leave would be only after 45 days in country. Well here I am reunited with my family after a grueling 5 day trip home from Baghdad.
The first thing we did was go to Papa Ginos for a real (Non-Army) Pizza.
Strange lights in the sky…
…a plane, helicopter or visitors form another planet.
Obviously this is just the sketch; the piece will hopefully be finished at some point. Like I’ve said, I have limited free-time at the moment.
I wanted this to be my first submission to Illustration Friday, but do to the demands of my position here that was not meant to be.
There is always another Friday!
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