Okie monsoons

It's been raining here pretty much every nite for the past 6 nites...we've had to cancel our nvg training due to severe weather. This area has had 20" of rain so far this year, when I hear they normally have 10 for the year. Thank goodness we finished up most of the range fire for now...
I was suppoosed to fly tonite, but that got pushed back a day because of last nites storms. There have been tornados in the area, and I hear Kansas lost a town to one lately?
Watershed management - boy I'd like to have the folks from my fisheries office down here to help write a better plan for these streams on post... There is curb and gutter, but no underground drainage to give relief to the rainfall...a half inch of rain turns these small 1" deep, 10" wide stream into a raging torrent, 3-4' deep and 40' wide. Very flashy, 5 hrs later, its back to normal. I paused once or twice on a run to see if I could find any fish in these streams before the rains began, and I have yet to see anything... Maybe I should go to the MWR(moral, welfare and recreation dept) office and see if I could sign out a stream backpack electrofishing unit to do a little science while I'm here? Nah, they'd frown on that...

More DNR notes - that bird I told you about last time, the OK state bird? Is a Scissortail flycatcher, not a swallowtail, like I said...sorry, got the name mixed up. I went to the library here to check on another bird I photo'd, a Mississippi Kite...a hawk like bird, gray in color, and not a resident here, but a spring visitor. What's cool about digital cams, is even though I zoomed in as far as I could for the pic, while it's in the camera, I can zoom in even more to chek for details...pretty cool. I'm working on a way to save the zoomed photo too...
Hey, there about 8 Canada Geese on the parade field in front of our barracks...the only ones in Oklahoma...we all know the rest live in Minnesota(oh boy!)

More army stuff? Yes, we've had our 2nd anthrax shot so far, 4 more to go in the series... It's a little pianful, leaves a small knot in your arm. The gals that give it are good...you can't even tell you've been poked, then about a minute later it starts to burn for a spell... No one's had any problems, and no one's complaining too bad. We had some chemical training in the helicopters, we all had to do a preflight inspection, startup and shutdown, and once around the traffic pattern while wearing full chem suit(over the usual body armor and flt vest), and gas mask...that's a pic of me suited up, it's not Darth Vader, it's yours truly. Apparently, some time ago in Iraq, the news reported the insurgency had xploded some chlorine gas along with an IED. So we are just taking precautions I guess.
Do you konow what a FOB is? It's a forward operating base in Iraq... There are many of them ,and we will fly lots of missions to resupply them, pick up people, equip etc. There is a new FOB built here at the north end of the reservation, and we will stay there for about 10 days. It looks just like the ones overseas. We'll get alot more training in clearing rooms and buildings, and some combative training(hand to hand one on one) as well. We also have to start our door gunner training program soon. We have a bunch of new folks that want to fly and shoot back, they will be key to our survival. So, naturally I'm out recruiting all the deer hunters I can find, anybody who got in trouble for shooting sparrows as a kid, etc. They all have to pass a lesser grade flt physical, and will have flt gear like the rest of us in the aircraft. Should be interesting.
We had some Instructors here from Ft Rucker Al, the hdqtrs for Army Aviation. They were here to tell of some of the latest tactics employed there for helicopters, and they demonstrated some new evasive manuevers we may need that are more aggressive than we're used to. Sounds like fun......Top Gun baby!!

I mentioned a while back about a large group of people like this, and always a few with colds, flu etc. Well, last week was my turn...I had a cold, just felt miserable enough to wiping the nose and blowing alot. No place to retreat to like at home, only my small twin bunk next to the door. It got better ea day, and I got to fly once too... Doing much better now. We're all still working on our running programs, I'm running about 2.4 mile each day, and still maintaining the pushups and situps...no word on a final test date.
Because we fly only nites now, we are on whats known as reverse cycle...we don't report for duty until about 2p.m. then we get back from nvg flights usually by 0200(2a.m.) Then we rest for the next day. Takes a couple days to make the switchover, so I start tomorrow, and hopefully fly fri nite(dodging storms?).
Never ceases to amaze me about the great technology we have these days... In the evenings you look outside and see at least a couple soldiers on every floor talking on cell phones to loved ones. Not to mention the others on laptops in their rooms... Everyone sharing their day with someone at home, and missing our loved ones. Thanks for the support, and I'll keep praying for everyone at home. See ya...