March 23rd, 2009: "A Case of the Mondays"

[Citi]

During the Gulf War there was an extended period of down time. Actually, to be truthful most of the almost eight months I spent in the Middle East would best be described as down time.

When we arrived we were one of the first military units in Saudia Arabia (I was told only the 82nd Airborne and the Ranger Battalions beat us) so it sufficed to say that basic services were not very well established.

We ate MRE's (Meals, Ready to Eat or as we called them Meals, Ready to Excrete) for weeks and weeks with no supplements to what was an extremely high protein and carbohydrate diet.

When we did finally get some fresh fruits and vegetables (it was someone in command's bright idea to stem the possibility of scurvy with locally grown produce rather than getting food from normal military channels) it was in the form of salads in little plastic bowls and some oranges.

Unfortunately, all the fruits and vegetables had been washed in local water. We had all been drinking bottled water since (Saudi Arabia being pretty much a desert and all) there was no large local source to purify. This water contained all kinds of impurities and microbes that our bodies weren't used to and the mighty military machine that was our brigade was pretty much crippled by dysentery.

I don't know if you've ever experienced dysentery but if you have then you have my sympathy. It was one of the worst experiences of my life. I couldn't get more than 50 feet from the wooden outhouses (with cut in half 50 gallon drums as receptacles) that served for toilets before turning around to go back again. I was so dehydrated I passed out twice and had to get IV fluid. The battalion aid station, in its infinite wisdom brought one bottle of Kaopectate; for a thousand men.

The only way I can describe how it felt is to reference the 1987 Martin Sheen movie "The Believers". In that movie Sheen plays a psychiatrist who runs afoul of a Voodoo cult that's into child sacrifice and has a grim interest in his son. At one point in the film, a man who has been murdered "supposedly" by Voodoo; has his stomach cut open by a coroner to reveal hundreds of healthy, writhing eels.

That's what dysentery felt like to me; like I had hundreds of writhing eels in my stomach happily munching on my intestines.

Later on, after we had mended from the illness we loved to scoot into the local towns to buy orders of chicken and rice from any restaurants we could find. It didn't matter where we went or how far off into the desert we were, it always seemed like a chicken and rice place was only a short drive away. And yes, we did on several occasions buy the chickens raw and had ourselves a cookout. It was a real treat after eating canned Army food twice a day and MRE's for every lunch for month after month.

Oh, and when I was in the Army, in case you were wondering, yes; telling someone they were doing some officer level thinking was an insult.

I don't know if it's the economy, the fact that I'm still not doing well with the job search or that my time in San Felipe is almost over but I'm in a real funk today. I hope your Monday goes better than mine.

In the mean time here is something from the land of improbability. Apparently there are thousands of women claiming to have powerful, multiple, lasting hours long orgasms during birth. There is even a documentary on the subject. As if men didn't have enough to make them feel insecure. Viagra, Extends, penis enlargement and now after all the things we do wearing ourselves out trying to keep our women happy we get to hear "the best sex I ever had was giving birth to our son and/or daughter." Jesus! How do you compete with a seven pound baby? This is the kind of shit that would give John Holmes an inferiority complex; you know, if he wasn't gay; and dead.

In these times of economic uncertainty and female equality it's becoming pretty damn hard to be a man. No one loves a strong woman more than me but ladies it might not be a bad idea to let your man feel like he's needed for more than a convenient source of genetic material every once in awhile. Have him open a jar for you or get something down off a high shelf. Throw us a frickin' bone here.

See you back here Wednesday.