Thursday, June 2, 2011

Road Trip

Today was Road Trip day.  Not your average road trip, however.  We got to fly the IC (Intelligence Community) bird, a Dehavilland Dash-8 chartered exclusively for our use.  Doug (Dougie Fresh, not to be confused with the other Doug in our office, Snoop Dougie Doug)) and I had to visit our sites in Kandahar and Camp Bastion/Leatherneck, so we had reveille at 0345 for a 0415 pick-up.

There are quite a few advantages to flying the IC bird.  For starters, it has real airline seats, 30 of them, with lots of legroom, not at all like the webbing seats in a C-130, the usual mode of conveyance out here.  The bird was never more than half-full, so I was able to sprawl over two seats.  It also makes a circuit around the bases so, if you're doing quick surgical strikes, as we were, we were able to catch the aircraft before its next scheduled departure and not have to spend days on the road, waiting for flights.  We did Bagram to Kandahar to Bastion, back through Kandahar and finally back to Bagram in about 12 hours.

The downside of a road trip is that all sorts of people come out of the woodwork with shipping requests:  "Hey, I've got some hard drives that need to get to so-and-so in Kandahar, could you deliver them for me?"  So, despite the fact that we didn't carry any luggage, we were still loaded down like pack mules.  I guess that's the price to be paid for getting a break from the routine.

Totally different topic.  As I sit in my can writing this, I'm listening to the digitally re-mastered version of The Yes Album.  Got it on iTunes on the laptop.  Speakers aren't the greatest, but they'll do.  I'm stuck in prog-rock land.  Hours and hours of music on the iPod, and I keep going back to Crimson.  On the laptop, Yes keeps coming back for encores. Although I have discovered a new group, courtesy of Robert Fripp and the Crimson website.  Porcupine Tree.  Great stuff.  Power guitars with occasional vocal harmonies that remind me of old CSN.  Check them out if you get a chance.

But now, back to Yours is No Disgrace.

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