Some stuff about the terrain
So I commented earlier on the general lack of grass, due to the way the boys in brown are destructive to vegetation. In a manner sure to offend all you golfers out there, the only grass I’ve seen on this installation is on the bunkers.
I missed out getting pics of all the Christmas decorations at the end of last year, but trust me there were a lot. I suppose when you work 8 hours a day and even get days off, you have time for that kind of thing. Anyways, here are a few other “we have community spirit” type things.
God bless engineer tape! (Which of course, is not tape at all…) And let’s not forget concertina wire, which plays no music. You don’t want to get trapped in that stuff, because it will eat you alive. Those lil’ cute metal barbs just RIP you flesh right on off, yes they do. Mental note: you never want to be the “sacrifice” man in a hasty breach — AKA the guy who jumps on the wire and everybody runs over the top of him.
Some poor bunker somewhere is missing a tiny piece of grass…
I need to dig up a camera and get you a more updated picture of this next one. We call it Lake Uzbek. It’s a drainage area. It was not, to my knowledge, designed as a drainage area. The water lately is all the way up to the base of the rockpiles as we have had some rain lately. Something lives deep in there…but I always bring a local with me so when the tentacles reach out they have better targets than me to grab. I don’t look, try to ignore the screaming, and just keep running.
Stood up on top of the berm and some strategically placed conexs…hmm. I must say it’s a bit disappointing to me that I have no idea how the hell to spell conex. That’s probably even wrong. It’s a term in use forever, but I don’t recall ever seeing it written down. Anyway, it’s a metal shipping / storage container. They even make good, if uninspiring, field expedient targets. It disrupts the flow of a good fire command if you don’t declare it to be something else though, like a PC or a tank. GUNNERHECONEX1500IDENTIFIEDFIREONTHEWAY (See? Just doesn’t flow so well.) The beauty of the fire command is it’s a brief lil’ conversation about something you need to destroy and YOU GET TO YELL LIKE MAD! 
I always did at least. Couldn’t hear so well inside those vehicles, and I thought it was best to be heard in any case. But it’s a neat little question and answer session followed up with payoff.
Oh. Anyways, stood on Mr. Conex and looked out at the mountains. It’s a much longer range than I first realized. It covers just about the whole horizon. You folks that have been to CO have a much better idea what that encompasses than those that haven’t. It’s hard to get a sense of just how much you can see in the distance and how far it can stretch. The visibility isn’t the greatest here generally, but it’s fairly flat and unobstructed as far as you can see….once you get over the level of the berm, that is.
I’d get a picture, but my camera is shipped back to the maker for fixin’ and I have been to laz…busy to borrow one from someone else so far.
February 12th, 2003 at 10:01 pm
From Vermont Yankee:
The conex container has been used by the military for many, many years. The original purpose was the transportation of supplies and hopefully they would not get stolen before they reached their destination. The theory being that supplies could be locked in a steel container. Unfortunately no one mentioned that they were “too secure to breach” to the native populations around the world. The Koreans in particular were adept at opening the containers, removing the supplies for the sole purpose of self-enrichment and supporting the local underground economy, and then resecuring the container after loading it with bricks or other weighty material. The whole transaction normally took no longer than 5-10 minutes, even when loaded on a railroad freight car. I won’t dare to suggest that they were organized for such activity–only fast at taking advantage of a situation.
In Vietnam, they were also used as jail cells. On most occasions, they made sure there were ventilation holes. Actually they were not very nice as most of them were placed in the open where the sun and rain contibuted to the “fantastic facilities” for jail birds and POWs.
February 13th, 2003 at 10:26 am
Commo Dave hates mice. Instead of using mousetraps, he prefers the sticky paper, where they walk on it and get trapped. Doesn’t hurt them, but they are stuck fast and can’t move. Of course, this tends to piss them off and some will still try to bite you. When he finds one, he throws them up on top of the conexs and lets them freeze to death in the winter, and they cook up fairly quickly as you hit the spring / summer / fall months. Frankly, that’s a bit coldheartedbastard for me.