9-5-10 Update

There really hasn't been a whole lot going on here, which is why I haven't been adding to my blog more often. Which on one side it's a good thing but it is also a bad thing. The good thing is that we haven't had any threats since August 7, which was the beginning of Ramadan. The bad part is that we haven't done much training since Ramadan and therefore haven't had much to do during the days, making my days very long and boring. There is about 4 more days left of Ramadan and then the ANA will be off for 4 days to celebrate, basically to eat a whole lot. Were not allowed to be in PTs before 4pm so I can't spend the down time in the gym. Instead I lay around surfing the internet, reading or watching movies. I haven't watched pretty much all the movies I have and the Afghan store doesn't have any good movies to buy. I have come up with a plan to help make my days go by faster and increase my weight loss/muscle gain. Starting on the 8th I will begin my day doing the Ab Ripper from P90X. In the afternoons instead of watching movies and just laying around I will begin doing the P90X series, and still go to the gym at night. Hopefully this will help increase my weight loss because I seem to be at a plateau and don't seem to be losing anymore. I haven't weighed myself since I left Bagram and I'm not sure I want to. I kind of want to wait until I get home but I am also curious to know if I have lost anything. Another reason why I am going to begin working out so much is because at the beginning of October I will have to do a PT test. Since I just turned 27 my standards have gone down, which will help me out but I don't want to rely on that to pass. I will do the best that I can and give everything I have. I have to run 2 miles in 17:58, which I timed myself on the treadmill and did 2.6km in that time. Almost there but I have a way to go still. The course for the run will be a lot harder than the treadmill so I need to shave at least a good 5 min off of it on the treadmill.

So as far as what I am doing here with the army. We have gone down to trainging 3 days a week, when they show up. They have stopped all training on Sundays and Wednesdays for prayer. I still pull tower guard, have to fuel generators and now am going to be servicing generators and doing head count at meals. Last Wednesday the ANA were going out on a recon mission at night and I and one other soldier were selected to pull tower guard in one of the ANA towers. From 8pm until 4 am we were in the ANA tower with 4 ANA soldiers. I had gotten up at 6:30 that day but was given the day off to rest and be ready to stay up all night. Of course I didn't really rest, I was awake all day and that made it even harder to stay up. The ANA pull 72 hour shifts in their towers. They have 4 beds so that they can take turns sleeping, and they like to smoke hash while on duty, which is completely legal over here. There command frowns upon it but it is not a legal issue. Of course nothing happened and at 4 we left and went to bed.

Tomorrow is labor day, I don't think we will be getting it off since we really only work in the mornings but we will be haveing a competition. Every year the army has a soldier of the year competition and that consists of a physical course, I however will not be participating but will be watching.