First day on the other side of the world

Now I sit and wait. Most of my unit is getting ready to head out, I however have to wait a couple more days. There was a select few of us that have to wait because there isn't enough room on the plane. We'll be gone soon though and be able to get into a routine and get this deployment over. So far where I'm at now is pretty nice. We have a nice view of the Himalaya's, which makes me wish I had brought my snowboard, not that I could go snowboarding. This whole base it pretty nice. The weather is about the same as Atlanta, right now it is 68. My buddy Filkins is heading out tonight, so for the next couple of days I'll be pretty bored. We have a lot of fun together. We decided on the flight over that we are going to try and do Bible studies together as often as possible. Hopefully that will go well and we will have the same schedule so we can do that. Right now it is 11:45pm and I am wide awake. I have not yet adjusted to the time difference. My sleep schedule is very random right now. I try to stay up and sleep when its night here, but I just can't stay awake that long. Tonight I probably went to sleep around 4:30pm and woke up around 10pm. Hopefully that won't take too much longer to adjust to the time difference.

traveling

The past couple days have been traveling. We left sat morning and arrived Sunday evening, or Sunday morning Georgia time. That was the longest flight I have ever been on. It was very tiring and I am extremely jet lagged now. We have roughly a 9.5 hour difference from back home. I will be at my current location for a few days before moving on to my final destination. I don't think I've ever watch as many movies in 1 day as I did on the flight over here. Well it is about 1:30 am here so I need to try and get some sleep so I can get on the right schedule.

Leave

My 4 day leave has come to an end and tonight I must return to base. As I pack up and get ready to head back I look back on all the good time I have had with Cassie and friends throughout the years. This next year will be very hard to be away from everyone but hopefully with the new friends I have made within my unit I will get through. This next year is going to be very different and probably very difficult. I will be experiencing things I never thought I would, and will be in a completely different part of the world. Friends and family, I look forward to seeing you all when I get home, you all are amazing and with your prayers I will get through this deployment safely and quickly. Thank you to all of you who have been praying for me and Cassie and thank you to all of you who will keep an eye on her while I am gone. I will miss every one of you.
Matt

Training has begun.

Finally our training had begun. Yesterday I had a drivers training course so I am now licensed to driver a hummer. It was pretty fun and I hope I get to do some more driving. Today we did some training on IED's. Tomorrow we will do some more of that and also some convoy training. At the end of the week we will be spending a few days out in the woods. I'm not sure how that will work out because we have a few people who didn't seem very excited to be going out there. Oh well, hopefully it will go quick and they won't complain to much.

First week at Fort Hood

This week has been kinda boring. We did our SRP, to make sure all our paperwork and everything is correct. I got a total of 17 shots, 15 were for smallpox and then I got a ppd test and a anthrax shot. Yesterday we got our new gear, new helmet, uniforms, etc... Tomorrow we will start are training. I'm not sure what all we will be doing but hopefully we will be a lot busier than we have. The days have been long, we get up at 4:30 and lights out is at 11.