Rednecks, Lebanon, and Geography

Sorry for the delay in new posts, I've just been busy trying to find SOMEBODY to join the Guard. Apparently MEPS still can't hold me down because my girl that was DQed had her waiver approved today! I was very excited when I heard that. She'll be going to MEPS on Friday - now I just have to find 2 more people to enlist....

Rednecks

Over the weekend I went out with a few of my friends in town, one who is a DJ. He had a gig in a bar that is out in the middle of nowhere but told me I'd have a great time. I drove out there expecting to have a good time with my friends - I was never prepared for what awaited me when I walked into the bar on that fateful night.....

Rednecks, lots and lots of rednecks. Seriously, I was the ONLY one in the bar, with the exception of my DJ friend, who wasn't wearing some form of hunting camouflage. There was this really annoying guy who couldn't dance wearing some weird cammo pants and a bright blue shirt with it! When you looked at their clothes, then you looked at my clothes, it was very easy to tell that I was NOT one of them. They apparently noticed too.

After I said hi to my friend, I decided to go get myself a 'Dew from the bar. I walked up there and suddenly there were 4 kids aged 12 to 15 blocking my way. First I thought it was weird that these kids were in the bar in the first place. I mean seriously, it's 10 at night, you shouldn't be in a bar! So these kids are blocking my way and I politely say "Excuse me boys". All they did was simultaneously put their spitters to their mouths and sloppily spit into them and gave me a look of "Who do you think you are.... City Boy!" (Say that in your best redneck accent). These kids, I swear, had about half a tin of chew in their mouths EACH! They didn't move and I was seriously concerned that these kids were going to start some trouble - then one of their Dad's stepped in.

It was funny actually. He slapped one in the back of the head and said, "Damn-it boys! Get out of this gentleman's way!" (again, with the accent). I thanked him and got my 'Dew. The father of the boys asked me why I didn't get a "real drink". I explained that I didn't drink and he said, "Never trust a man who doesn't drink, that's what my daddy always told me." Then he turned his back to me. I was a little disappointed because I was hoping that he'd be my ambassador to the other rednecks in the place.

Needless to say, I felt a little out of place the whole night, but in the end had a good time. After they all got a few good drinks in them, they didn't seem to mind. The only other time I thought there was going to be trouble was when I was dancing with some girls, and some guys sporting the usual Carhart jackets stepped in and totally pushed me away from the girls. I got the point and sat down. There were a few fights that night - every time one started somebody grabbed them and pushed them outside - eventually both of them would come limping back in and get even more drunk....

Lebanon

I was going through my traffic reports the other day and was curious to see where the people who visit my blog live. Take a look of this screen shot:

The 38 people from England kind of surprised me, but then again I talked a lot about the foiled terror plot over there so that made sense after all.

Why the 3 people from Alberta Canada have been visiting me I don't know, maybe it's because of my LTC White video.....

1 person from Australia! That was kind of cool to see - no idea why they're visiting but I'll pretend it's one of the Australian soldiers I trained with in Hawaii one year.

Now the weird one - Beyrouth LEBANON!!!!! Is Hezbollah looking at my blog trying to gain intel?! Did I talk about a relative of theirs when I talked about foiled terror plots or the 11 Egyptian students who went missing a few months ago? Am I an inspiration to the Lebanese - showing them the true value of Freedom, Democracy, and Freedom of Speech? Or am I helping fuel the flames of international jihad? Maybe they're looking at my blog saying "Look, they hate us because we're Middle Eastern. We must kill them before they kill us...."

What's my point in all this? This I am trying to show all the other Milbloggers out there that the enemy IS looking at your blog. Any opsec you put into your blog WILL fall into enemy hands. I know you want your mom to know what's going on - but you have to be careful of what you put on the internet. Everybody else can see it and that means the terrorists too! You must know that the lives of your brothers and sisters in arms lies in YOUR words - do you want to live the rest of your life knowing that somebody died because of something you put on a blog???

On a side note, I looked at my traffic today and noticed some new countries looking at my blog. 1st I noticed that I've had two hits from Ireland. I can only assume that it is my good friend Mark and his girlfriend Denise - Welcome to my blog!!! 2nd I noticed somebody from Greece visited my blog. Welcome to you too! And 3rd, I noticed that one of my visitors from Alberta Canada returned - I apparently I have a few more readers now..... Is my count up to 7?

Geography

Not to long ago I was driving to the northern part of my area to deliver school supplies when I passed something that I didn't know about. I passed the Laurentian Divide. I had no idea what this thing was so I knew I would do some research on it when I got home. I learned that this is the place in Minnesota where the rivers start flowing north! I remembered something about this from when I was in grade school - but this couldn't be so close to home could it?

A week later I had some privates making up drill and we were just BSing when I brought up the Laurentian Divide - they had no idea what I was talking about. I didn't think it was possible for somebody to live this close to an amazing piece of geography and not know what it was, let alone never visit it. So I did what anyone would do - I grabbed 4 MREs, put them in the car and took a trip up there for lunch.

It was kind of neat for me, but at the same time disappointing. It was neat for me because I'm a nerd and was amazed that this was abut 30-45 min away from my office. Who knew that so much great American geography is so close - I mean the Mississippi River is all but a few blocks from my office, and the Laurentian Divide is not much further away. It was disappointing in the fact that there are no rivers at the Laurentian Divide! Basically it's what's left of a 16,000-year-old mountain range - anything water that falls on the north side flows to the north to Hudson Bay, anything that falls on the south side flows to the south to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi.

Here's what I found on the web about it:

Glaciers - mammoth, moving, prehistoric sheets of ice one mile thick - crossed through what is now Minnesota at least four times. A huge sheet of ice known as the Wisconsin Glacier covered much of Minnesota 16,000 years ago. What was once a mountain range eroded, creating hills and thousands of waterways.

On the north side of this site, the divide directs the waters to empty into Hudson Bay and on to the Arctic Ocean. On the south, water flows into the Mississippi River and eventually into the Gulf of Mexico. In other words, two drops of rain, each one falling to opposite sides, will end up on opposite sides of the North American continent.

A few pictures for you:
This one is from the web

This one I took with my cell phone - I really need to buy a digital camera!

In the end it was a really good trip in my opinion. I thought it was neat to see the divide and it was a really good opportunity to talk with my soldiers and catch up with what's going on in their lives - that is something I wish I had the opportunity to do a little more.

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Well, that's it for now - I would also like to welcome my Mom to my blog - HI MOM! She and many other family members have probably seen my blog by the time I've written this... Welcome all - sorry for a lot of the swearing in my posts, I'll try and swear less from now on now that I know my mom is reading....

-Guardsman