Easy Assembly

Dumb Stuff

Sun, 08 Feb 2009 07:11:02 GMT

Well... i recently got in trouble for trying to get out of my unit. I cant imagine why when i have officers calling me retarted to my face for no reason. f*%# this unit. i want out. ANYWAY, i also got in trouble for getting a speeding ticket. The army doesnt think that paying for the ticket and my insurance going up is punishment enough so they added a punishment; i had to stand outside at 7 in the morning where i got the ticket in 2 degree weather with a sign saying the speed limit for a week. Its this kind of dumb shit that makes me want so badly to be out of the army.

While I was out there people i knew would drive by. While i was out there to pass the time on wed and thurs i counted the reactions i got. On wed i got 11 laughs, 16 waves and 1 salute. On thurs i got 19 laughs, 14 waves and a honk.

I cant wait to get out of the army...

Mission from God

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 18:48:10 GMT

OK, before you guys get disappointed after reading half of this im gunna tell you up front: this has nothing to do with saving lives.

also: its kinda long.

So last night i had a mission from god. I hate to say it, but ive been out here a while and i have strayed from god. I didnt think he was in iraq. All this pain and killing for what? plus both sides think that god is on their side. So either god is a double agent... OR god doesnt have a side. he only protects those on either side that are righteous. My job is to save lives. There are some iraqis who dont want to hurt anyone. of course, i wasnt thinking this at the time. i was merely thinking how i havent felt Gods presence in a long time, and about how much sense it makes for him to not even be in this country. Then some stuff happened i wont get into and i was in a very bad place. I was so filled with anger and jealousy and hate that i became numb. just like i do every time i feel like i am forgetting who i am or when i feel alone i reach for the greatest gift i have ever gotten: An engraved bible with messages and passages written on note cards that was given to me by YAG in 2005. I keep it with me everywhere i go. and when i travel, it travels with me.

The messages inside remind me of all the people that care about me, and they really help me remember who i am. Well evidently God saw the place i was in and he found me. Yup. God found me in iraq.

I have been pretty much spending all my time away from my living area for a number of reasons and spending all my time at the MWR (a place with movies and books and activities) so that i could just zone out and pass the remaining couple weeks left alone. WELL... last night i was going to watch a movie in the theater they have here, but decided instead (seemingly for no reason) to go back to the compound and just go to sleep (angry again). I still dont know why. something just told me, or maybe i was tired, doesnt matter. the point is: as i was walking back to my area i walked through a field, and by "field" i mean "large area of sand and rocks", and i heard music. I followed it to see where it was coming from and it led me to the chapel.

i had never been in the chapel here before and decided i could use some happy faces to cheer me up. I had no idea how effective it was. The people there that preached had so much energy, and i felt myself get lifted and all that anger i had inside of me was replaced with joy. I couldnt explain it. I had no reason to be happy, i still dont, but there i was, and am, filled with happiness. Well all it was last night was like a choir practice for this mornings service. so after a couple songs i just met everyone in there. they were welcoming, of course, and invited me to come worship with them the next day, which i did.

well as i was meeting them i talked to their drummer and told him he had a lot of talent, which he did, and he told me too bad he doesnt get to use it the next day cuz a piece of the drum set broke and he needed two nuts for a bolt to fix it. Well i work with helicopters, so i got boxes of nuts of all sizes so i took the bolt from him and said ill see what i can do by tomorrow. It took me a good 30 minutes of searching, but i managed to find 2 nuts that fit it.

So God found me in iraq just when i needed him to the most, and it also happened to be when they needed me too. Completely reaffirmed my faith, and now i am a church goer again.

15 days until i leave iraq.

for you mom

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 05:47:56 GMT

well mom. no need to worry. i am now updating my livejournal. hahaha. i had a couple posts before this one, but they were for my eyes only. so thats why it looks like i havnt updated it in a few weeks. anyway, the weather is right around 120 constantly now. so its going to be nice and refreshing coming to MI in september. i got the corbetts throwing me a BBQ, and i got my mom taking me to the olive garden as soon as i get off the plane. so its looking like its gunna be a pretty good R&R.

on another good note one of my really good friends from high school found me on myspace! Rachel m-effing Jones! hahahaha. me and this chick used to play street hockey together, hang out and party together, and just basically be really good friends. some stuff happened in her family that caused her to have to move and get a new phone and stuff. so i lost track of her, but all that is over now! she found me. shes got a baby boy now, and he is cute as can be. and im pretty excited to see her again when i go home and play with her baby. me and this chick used to cause quite a bit of shenanigans together. as an example, one time we played street hockey in the puring rain in my high school parking lot. adam was there too and i forget who the 4th was. but we played for hours. there was a huge puddle in the middle of our area and it kept tripping us up. it was the best game of street hockey i have ever played. of course, the next day none of our wheels would spin b/c they were just rusted in place. hahaha. we we all had to get new bearings, which i stole from work for all of us. hahahahaha. well... actually just for me and adam. i think rachel bought new ones before i saw her again, either that or she just didnt want 'em. i forget, but the good part of the story is the hockey int he rain anyway. hahahaha

anway, ill write more later and stuff about out here. i just wanted a quick post about my excitement for R&R. also, i just wanted my mom to know im not dead. (shes a worrier) hahaha.

craziest day so far, by far

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 21:48:09 GMT

this is a really long post, but just so you guys know, it is totally worth it to read. this is a crazy story. here goes:

ok, so it started at 1500 yesterday we got the call for an urgen 9 line with 5 pts, all litter, and all urgent/urgent surg. well we get out there and we sit on the pad with blades turning for 50 minutes before we get clearence to launch due to weather. we tried to contact the people to tell them to get ground evaced, but it took them 30 minutes to call the ground guys because they were waiting on us. well they finally did, and we took off right when the ground people were getting to the gate with the patients on board.

(back to the waiting) while we were sitting there, it started out as 5 litter patients, but the longer we sat there the more and more casualties there were, such that by the time we took off we had to pick up 6 people and a dead guy and that was after the ground people brought 8 casualties in before we took off! so we go, but we were given the wrong grid coordinates, so we go to the wrong place and do a couple circles before we get the right ones. so we get out there and grab the casualties and fly back to the CSH. we get back here and we have maybe 5 minutes after we shut down and they tell us to get ready to go back out there to take the people from our CSH to a better CSH. well... the whole debate was they needed to get to one of two other places, and they were either going to get them to either of these places from where we are, or from a different base that we would take the patients to. so we did a whole lot of scrambling to find out where we were going IF we were going anywhere. we pretty much went back and forth between two places we could have taken them, but the COL was trying to not let us go! well we assume we are gunna get clearance to go so we go to the CSH and load 6 patients on 2 aircraft with 2 flight docs plus our overnight bags cuz we were probably getting stranded wherever we went to 'cuz of weather.

the whole issue why we HAD to go right away was that there was a pt we picked up with a head injury, and if he didnt get to a level 1 care facility fast, he was going to die. not , “he might die" he was dying, and we had to get him somewhere FAST to stop it, but no one would let us, so we sat on the CSH pad for about 10 minutes waiting to go. this was after we spent an additional hour sitting on our pad AGAIN waiting to go get the patients from the CSH. Within that hour they had said we werent going and we shut down twice but both times before the blades stopped spinning we had to start back up!

well anyway, back to the CSH pad… we decided to go get topped off at the fuel point 'cuz it was assumed clearance was coming any time, and we wanted plenty of fuel in case we had to go around some weather. so we top off and sit at the fuel point for about 10 minutes before they call us back and tell us that the one local national patient we have on board (litter pt mind you) was a "suspected enemy" so we had to go back to the CSH to unload him! well between the fuel point and the CSH pad the order turned into "unload everybody" we couldnt believe our ears! so we land, me and my crew chief search the guy (who was wearing a hospital gown, and basically naked, and strapped to a litter) and we say hes good, and that we can go, but they still wanted us to unload everyone because an air force UH-60 was gunna take them somewhere instead. so we unload the people and fly back to med parking and shutdown. we felt like total shit that the air force had to come bail us out, plus we looked like ass holes in front of everyone at the CSH, not to mention a bunch of sissies or cowards.

well we have just enough time to take our gear off and we get another call that the air force people turned around, so we had to take the people again! so we started back up, but this time we said "where are we going? b/c we are fucking GOING so we went back to the CSH, loaded the people up and left to our original destination… FINALLY!

well when we got there we unloaded the people without issue. i was in the CSH there helping out and waiting for the flight docs to grab all their equipment, when my crew broke all 4 helicopter blades by hitting a cement wall! so we were stuck for the night while they replaced the blades. by that point i was so exhausted and tired that i just crashed out.

the good news is everyone made it to where we were going alive. there would have been more good new too because my g/f was supposed to be where i went, but she procrastinated, and didnt go when she was supposed to. despite my nagging for her to go as soon as possable. so i didnt get to see her. it was a one in a million coincidence that we were both supposed to be there, but i guess ill just have to wait until december to see her as originally planed. oh well.

god telling me to be a veterinarian?

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:33:54 GMT

well, as people may or may not know my true calling was to be a veterinarian, but due to circumstances i decided to be a people doctor instead. its not a bad gig, but its not what i REALLY wanted. WELL yesterday i had a mission to go pick up this pt who was having trouble breathing. when i got there he was fine, but we were medevacing him anyway just to get checked out. he was pretty well behaved, and he was muzzled. oh, did i mention he was a dog? im a medic in iraq, and fate still gives me an animal to treat. that does it. screw the circumstances. i wanna be a vet! sorry people, but i was ment to save animals!

missed out

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 18:02:31 GMT

I'm so bummed out about this morning. We got a call at 0245 in the morning for a mission. We got out to the aircraft and started it up, but right in the middle of the starting we got a call that it is closer to a different base, so we passed it along to them. We come inside thinking, “man, what a wakeup call!” then I find out that the mission was supposed to be a POI in the desert where the marines blew up a building, so you know the injuries were cool, AND they were still having a firefight… talk about missing out.. oh well… better luck next time... hahahaha

crying myself to sleep...

Fri, 23 May 2008 10:04:14 GMT

Well it has just come to my attention through facebook that my friend from high school is selling 2, thats right not just one but 2, tickets to game 2 of the detroit red wings stanley cup finals at the joe luis arena. I would pay any price and do any favor for these tickets, but oh no! wait just a minute, THE #%$& ARMY HAS ME IN THIS &#$% COUNTRY THAT I &$%* DONT WANNA BE IN AND I COULDA #$%&* GONE TO THE #$%&* @#*&% #$% @#$#% RED WINGS GAME INSTEAD OF @#$% *%$#$!!!! I COULD @#$% %$#*@ THE PRESIDENT IN HIS @#$%*& @$#%* STUPID %$#@* %$#$% %$@#* FACE!!! ALL B/C OF HIS @$#%&* OIL!!! AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!

.........

(woooo sahhhhh)

.........

other then that my relationship with liz is going great. i cant wait to see her again, and i sure do hope the red wings wing the stanley cup this year. go wings!

(@#$*&% bush....)

Awesome mission!

Tue, 13 May 2008 23:20:21 GMT

Well, i am leaving Tal Afar tomorrow, but it looks like i got to go out with a bang! we had a mission to pick up some EPWs from the middle of the desert. It was 3 guys who just got messed up real bad, but they were stable, and one guy who was all kinds of messed up. he had a bullet go through his chest., and his left femur was fractured. Well when they brought him in he was still bleeding out his back. the medic who patched him up put a Hem Con dressing over the wound, but he did it wrong. so the bleeding wasnt controlled at all, and even if he wasnt bleeding out, he was still bleeding internally. well unlike at the other team sites where we just drop the guys off and fly away, the place we took the guys was right next to our company area. so after we unloaded the patients i got to stay and help work on the guy. I was the only medic there with the skills to get an IV into this guy. The arms were unobtainable b/c they were zip tied behind his back. So after the other medics tried sticking him like 20 times i found a vein in his ankle and got a line in. I thought i missed though, and i took it out, but it turned out i hit it, but he didnt have a pulse in his limbs at that point due to loss of blood. so i should have left it in, but i didnt think of that. Oops!

well anyway, i got some pretty cool pictures that i will have to put in the next post, as i am not currently using my computer at the moment. But after that little episode we decided to just use a FAST1, which i have never seen used in real life. Ive used it on dummies before, and ive used the little training one, but the real thing is freakin cool! Its basically a way to get an IV, but instead of going into a vein it goes directly into the bone, which makes it not so much an IV (inter venous), but rather an IO (inter osseus). The FAST1 is a ring of 6 fairly large needles with one spring loaded needle in the center that pops out and jabs into the patients sternum for an IO line. The pt wasnt too comfortable when we did it, but i didnt care b/c 1. we were saving his life so tough, 2. this guy is responsible for planting an IED a couple months ago that killed 3 US troops, and 3. we had just givin him some drugs so he wont feel anything in a minute anyway.

After that we just did some other pretty neat medical stuff like foley catheter to check urine, trached him b/c he lost concisness and gave him a chest tube to drain the fluid building up in his pleural space. All in all it was pretty awesome, and i think thats a fine note to leave on.

again with the new girl?

Wed, 07 May 2008 20:45:34 GMT

Yup, i am again writing about this new girl. cant help it. shes amazing. my mind wont let me think of anything else. (unless im on a mission) SO... she has a blog, which is funny b/c she makes fun of me for having a livejournal (a little hypocrisy never hurt anyone), well in this blog of hers she wrote about me and about how she has no idea how to describe her feeling for me. Which is not to say that she doesnt know how she feels about me, its just WAY too soon to drop anything as heavy as the L-bomb, but we like each other too much to just say "like". so its a rather inexressible middle ground which english cant help us name. she says it a bit more eloquently, but that is a real basic summary. However, only half of her post was about the shortcomings of the english language (damn Deconstruction theory!) ANYWAY, the other half was a rant about how awesome i am. Ive never actually had a female make me feel as cool as she does by doing this. Ive had girl tell me im pretty cool and all that, but even with Devin it still always just seemed like they were saying it because i was their boyfriend. this girl, the way she writes it, and even how se says it sometimes, is so honest that it makes me feel as though i am something special when compared to the average guy. My humility will keep me from assuming this is true, but my self esteem is definitely boosted from low to average.

but its not just the things she says that makes me believe her. the simple fact that i am even dating this girl is evidence that maybe i am cooler then i let myself think i am. By this i mean that a female this amazing could have any guy she wants in the first place. then factor in that we are in iraq. she could have any couple guys she wanted if she wanted. she isnt even just a really cool chick, shes pretty damn smokin hot as well. but despite all the "talent" she is surrounded by, and all the hundreds of guys that have already tried to get with this girl, she chose me. and not only as she chose me, but she is completely smitten by me in like 2 weeks. I couldnt even pretend that im not the coolest MF-er around.

Of course, trials are always placed in front of a prize that is worth it. I have 7 more days to be around her, and then 6 long months before i will get to see her again. In that time i have to hope that the impression ive made on her in the 3 weeks ive spent with her will be enough for her to still want to be with me after that time. I have faith that she will, but i also had faith in my last 3 girlfriends, all of which cheated on me.... sooooooooo..... i HOPE so, but in order to protect myself im going to wait to give her my whole heart until it happens.

Ive said it before, and ill say it again: im not sexist, but a guy can only be cheated on so many times before he stops trusting females.

New Girl

Fri, 02 May 2008 13:07:34 GMT

Well the last post was about breaking up with Devin. I should be thinking that females are bad news, and taking some time off from relationships. HOWEVER, as far as Im concerned me and Devin broke up before i left. We were trying to pick up the pieces of our relationship, but someone wise pointed out what i already knew to be true: you really cant do that over the phone or online. there was too much bad stuff that happened (she still maintains her position that she didnt cheat) to mend it from across the planet. That in mind it really means ive been single for the past 7 months. Of course im an honest guy so i didnt have any "relations" while i was out here b/c i was "with" her. so in reality i have been single for 7 months, and i havent been in a relationship for 7 months. So it comes as no surprise that when another female came along i was mentally and emotionally available.

Well that female came along, and she is amazing. She not only laughs at all my dumb jokes, but she makes the same kind of dumb jokes. we make each other laugh all the time. it is just amazing to hang out with her. she is so chill, and she is really easy to talk to. and i think one of the best things about her is how she is a chick that can hang out with the guys, but she is still really feminine. and so far (and hopefully forever) she doesnt like ot play games. She is really independent, and it is not vital to her self esteem that i tell her how amazing she is ALL the time. she has yet to dig for a compliment. it is nice to be with a woman who is mature enough to stand on her own. I could go on and on about this chick, but i think the point has been made. She is stable mentally, she is funny, she is fun to be with, and she is mature. So far nothing bad to say about this girl at all. (not saying i expect there will be, im just saying that as of now there is nothing)

well we decided to give a relationship a try. we werent going to at first. we were just gunna be friends, but friends dont really spend hours a day on the "phone" together. and friends dont really get excited to see each other every day. so we sort of developed slight feelings for each other. so as i said we decided to start a relationship together to see where it would go. Since then we have developed more feelings for each other, and i definitely forsee this being a pretty long and amazing relationship. and i know my mom is reading this, and i know what she is thinking, and dont worry moms, we are taking things very slow.

other then that Tal Affar is still awesome. no missions have come down yet, so thats why i havent posted in awhile. but its ok. i was REALLY getting sick of the dumb shit on Speicher, so this is a really conveniently timed vacation for me, and i just so happened to have met an amazing female while im on this little vacation.

break up

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:14:44 GMT

Well... i was given advice by my boys Roach and Brown Heart that i should not have gotten back together with Devin after what had happened. Well i didnt listen, and they are my boy so they didnt make waves and accepted it and didnt think bad about her at all, but it turnes out that they were right. We broke up a couple days ago, and i think it was a long time coming. It was good while it lasted, but there was absolutely NO trust at all in the relationship after that. and Im on the other side of the planet, and that is no way to mend a broken relationship. so it ended. and we are both doing relatively well. i do not say this for pity from anybody. I know i shouldnt have gotten back together with her. I knew it at the time i think, but i did anyway. whoops-i-daisy.

other then that i am in Tal Affar now and it is pretty much the coolest place to be in iraq for a flight medic. Well, for anyone really im sure. Not too much going on up here. Its almost as though the people in northern iraq dont hate us quite as much as they do in middle or southern Iraq. There hasnt been a medevac mission since i got here a week or so ago, and the only flights ive done so far is one pt transfer for an eye doctor appt, and a bunch of training flights. thats all. so nothing cool to report on the casualty front.

There is a female out here that is pretty freakin awesome, but i will write more on that later.

There is some good news that my D-town homies will appreciate: They have been playing the Stanley Cup playoffs out here, so i have been able to watch all the red wings games since the playoffs began. I am indescribably happy about that. I watched game 1 against Colorado with an avalanche fan. so it felt pretty good to be the winner of that little confrontation. It was good to have someone to talk hockey with again though. Next year though i am going to do whatever it takes to go to a playoff game.

It has been a little while since i called my mom, and she sent me an e-mail saying i better call soon or she will hurt me. hahaha.

Other then that i still hate the desert, and i cant wait to come home and play hockey every day for 2 weeks.

nothing exciting yet

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 19:35:28 GMT

Well i was supposed to go to another base for a few weeks to cover for a guy going on leave, but as luck would have it a massive sand storm moved in and we cant fly anywhere. so i am stuck here for a couple days. The sand is so bad that even with my door closed i still have a layer of sand covering everything in my room. it sucks. so i have to cover all my electronics. and when i go outside i have to wear goggles or sand will blow in my eyes. If you open your mouth while outside then you will have a layer of mud in your mouth, which tastes gross. The farthest I can see, even with goggles, is about 30 yards. so needless to say i have yet another awesome reason to hate this country, and ask the big question on everyones mind: Who would live in this country? And they have been living here for generations too! what kind of guy would stop walking in such a horrible place, and then settle there and start a family? these people have some dumb ancestors, and they never left either! well, whatever floats their boat i guess, but i will be sure to never come back here again. unless im unfortunate enough to get ordered back here. which i would fight kicking and screaming the whole way. and hopefully get out of it. once is enough, ESPECIALLY for 15 months. dick chaney is... well... i guess his name pretty much says it all. anyway, im just ranting at this point.

theory of relativity

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 19:43:05 GMT

well einstein had a theory that everything is relative. he meant motion and all that physics crap, but people ever since have expanded that theory to just about every aspect, and now my supporting proof:

i got in trouble the other day b/c some officer wanted to be a sarcastic dick head for no real reason. so i responded, to which he retorted with, "Im a captain, and you're a specialist! what dont you get?!" well he told my NCO, and my NCO had to yell at me because thats his job. so his exact words to me were, "you are an excellent medic, but you are a terrible soldier." he went on to tell me other stuff, but that was the phrase that really stuck with me, and the reason was b/c the way he said it was obvious that i really did not interpret it the way i was supposed to.

in his mind he was trying to motivate me to improve my "soldiering skills" but what my mind heard was, "you are great at saving lives, but you suck when it comes to being a mindless puppet or a slave." so what i took as the biggest compliment of my life, he meant as i need to improve myself. well it was just further proof in my mind that i really dont belong in the army. hopefully i wont be re-deployed before i can get out.

boredome

Tue, 01 Apr 2008 19:18:38 GMT

well this journal was originally intended as a way to help me remember some of the stuff i did over here when i got home and stuff, but i know that people read it too from time to time. like my mom and aunt and whoever else cares to check how im doing. so i am just writing to keep you all who read this at bay. all i have done in the past 2 weeks is transfer people with kidney stones from one place to another. nothing cool or exciting has happened in 2 weeks, and i am bored out of my mind. im just counting down the months until i get to come home for 2 weeks. COME ON AUGUST!!!

another day at the office

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 21:19:24 GMT

well this actually happened a couple day ago, but i havent had time to write it in here yet. this was the night after my last post:

we get a call to transfer 2 people with eye injuries to another CSH. well the CSH is 30 minutes away and about 10 minutes out we intercept another call. an EPW and an Iraqi Army MP were shot and need to be medevaced right away. since we were int he area we went and got them. well ordinarily the trail aircraft would have picked them up, like they did in the previous post, but since we flew so much that day we decided to go with a DART team aircraft (another flight company aircraft without medics) so on this particular mission i was the only medic between both aircraft. so we put the eye people on the other aircraft since they didnt need any attention. we were basically a taxi ride to another CSH for them, and we put the GSW casualties on my aircraft.

well the MP was shot in the stomach, and he was packaged pretty good. so i just monitored his pulse the whole ride to ensure first of all that he had one, and second of all that it wasnt rapid or slow or non-rhythmic. the EPW was sedated b/c he was combative and he kept messing with his leg wound. so when they loaded him up i noticed he had a Combitube installed with a BVM already attached. (a tube was shoved down his throat and a balloon was attached to it so i could squeeze it to make air go into his lungs.) so the first 5 minutes were nice. he was out cold and i was bagging him. well his SpO2 was dropping to i had to attempt to hyperventilate him in order to bring it back up. well after the 5-10 minutes of nice calm unconscious guy, he started to wake up.

the first thing he did when he started coming to was choke on the combi-tube and puke all over the place. (this is the point it would have sucked to be the MP b/c the puke started dripping on his head after a minute or two, but i wasnt too concerned because 1. it wasnt going to hurt him, and 2. i hate MPs) So i had to take out the tube and suction the puke out of his mouth before he choked on it. well he started resisting me. nothing major b/c he was tied down to the litter, but he kept moving his head and resisting me. so i had to lay my elbow on the guys head so i could suction his mouth so he didnt choke on his nasty smelling puke and die.

by the way, all of this happened at 0100 am. so it is dark as hell, and all i got is a blue light, and my night vision goggles. well i finally get the guy breathing clearly, and he loses his radial pulse. his carotid pulse was still present, and we were in the process of landing, so i couldnt do anything about that other then turn him over quickly to the CSH folk.

well he was alive when he got off my aircraft, so i did my job. but what a night.

busy busy busy...

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 20:15:43 GMT

well today i held a patients leg... next to him... in a trash bag full of ice... that was the 5th mission i had today before lunch.

the first mission was crazy! it was interrupted by mission #2, and here's how: we had to transport a doctor who lost his legs back to where he lived. (local national) and on the way we overheard a radio call that an IED went off. we hovered near the location waiting to see if there were casualties, and there was. a guy had shrapnel wounds to his left leg and arm. so we picked him up and came back to our base. the guy on my aircraft, the original transfer, was quite confused when we landed after a 45 minute flight and he was right back where we picked him up. but after re-fueling we picked him back up and took him where he needed to go. that was technically mission #3...

Mission #4 was some lady that for no apparent reason gained 20lbs in a week in her arms and legs. im almost certain of 2 things: 1) it wasnt ALL in her arms and legs. and 2) its called BCS. broken condom syndrome. hope she has a book of names and doesnt smoke...

And now we get to mission #5. we get a call for another IED blast. i dont know what the pt is, but he is an urgent surgical, so i know its bad. well i run into the aid station and the only thing i can see in between a crowd of medics working on this guy is a huge sloppy piece of lasagna. then it occurs to me as i round the table, that it is actually his left knee. they hadnt wrapped it yet, but there is good news! (sort of) the tourniquet was put on it time. all the medics there pushed was 1 L of normal saline. no hextend or lactated ringers, and he had a distal pulse!!! that means he hadnt lost that much blood at all! his SpO2 was at 100% and they only had him on O2 via nasal cannula at 4 Lpm. so they wrapped the stump, and while they were doing that this guy called me to the side and held of a hefty bag. he asked me what i wanted to do with it. i thought initially it was his clothes and his belongings, as he was on the stretcher naked so as to facilitate the medical procedures. i asked him what it was anyway, you know out of reflex, and he told me it was the guys leg. so i told him to put tat bag in another bag, and to put it on the aircraft where the guy couldnt see it. b/c i dont think a person with no leg wants to see the bag holding his once mighty bipedal attachment. and the reason for the other bag was b/c i didnt want leg goo to get all in my aircraft. (im going to hell for that one...)

well at this point they had only given the guy 5 mg of morphine, and he was asking the lord to take him through the obvious pain. so the doc there pushed another 5 mg and they finished up wrapping the guys leg. we rushed him to the CSH and when we got there the first thing this guy asked the doc was, "hey, i was told you guys could give me something to put me to sleep." evidently 10 mg of morphine isnt quite enough to trick the brain into thinking getting your leg blown off doesnt hurt. hhhhmmmmm.....

well that was mission #5. Mission #6 and 7 arent quite as interesting as that. so i wont go into them, but allow me to estimate my total flight time today: 6.5 hrs. im pretty damn tired as it turns out.

flying blind

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 19:34:36 GMT

so i had another routine transfere to another CSH. it was a guy with chemical burns to his hands and face. but on the way back we got stuck in a sand storm. so instead of flying around it and landing somewhere else, we decided to fly into it so we could sleep in our beds, and we still had to get a pt that we were bringing back to our base to the CSH there. It was also 2100 and moonless. so all i can see out my window was brown. the pilots had only their instruments to go on, and the tower had us fly in circles so that they could give clearance to an UNMANNED aircraft! so evidently a robot is more important to the tower then 2 aircraft with 11 people in them. thats messed up. but obviously we landed alright and things are ok. but i gotta say that flying with absolutely no visuals is not something i would like ot experience again.

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 19:21:54 GMT

it has been so slow lately. the weather started getting warm and we got a bunch of missions of gun shot wounds and IED victims, but for the last 2 weeks all ive flown are routine transfers to another CSH and blood transfers. which is good that people arent getting hurt, but its bad for me. oh well. guess i cant complain too much about not being busy. at least i can catch up on my house episodes. awesome show... ssssooooooooo booooorrreeeddddddd.......

today it is (if anyone reads this)

Tue, 19 Feb 2008 18:06:53 GMT

well CNN is airing the story they did on my company. and i am in it. so if anyone reads this today then you should keep CNN on the TV so that you dont miss it. but if you miss it, then you can watch it on you tube courtesy of my brother:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVwXFxktDLE

by the way i was the medic on the mission at the end with the 11 yr old boy. it is the one i talk about in my earlier posting. so theres my 5 seconds of fame. awesome!

bad day...

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:21:29 GMT

well life in medevac has been fun so far, but i had a really bad mission the other day. the kind that no one likes to hear about. i had to medevac an 11 year old boy who had a gun shot wound to the head. he has hardly stable, but he was alive when we got him to the hospital. it looked as though he was going to survive, but it will be imposable for him to retain all his brain functions. so it is only sort of good news.

it is always a tragedy when a child gets pulled into an ugly conflict of adults. it occurred to me the other day that i dont even really care when people get injured when they are adults. U.S. troops sign up knowing what they are getting into, and the people over here are too ignorant to stop blowing themselves and us up, so they have whatever injuries they get coming as far as im concerned, but children shouldnt have to suffer. in any case, at least the child was alive when i dropped him off, so odds are he will be fine. its just a bad day...

WORLD-WIDE BITCHES!!

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 17:44:59 GMT

Well, this weekend was certainly filled with excitement for me. i was interviewed by CNN!!!! they asked me some questions about my job as a flight medic, and they got a bunch of footage of me walking around and stuff, and they also got some footage of me in action. they went with us on missions, and three came down while they were here. and i was the medic on 2 of those missions. so they got some footage of me loading a pt onto the aircraft, and unloading the pt. i dont know when they are going to air it, but they assured us that they would let us know when it is to air in advance so we can tell all our peoples back home. Awesome!

the 2 missions they filmed me doing were at night, and the other mission was in the day, so if it is at night and the medic is wearing night vision goggels on his forehead then it is me. Awesome!

D-bag

Sat, 02 Feb 2008 20:27:22 GMT

(im really just venting here. this has nothing to do with saving lives, or anything exciting that i have done. so really there is no need to read this entry unless you just wanna know what sorts of things im griping about these days, or just really wanna know whats on my mind.)

well devin has started talking to her ex b/f again. and since hes her ex b/f that means i already dont like him. but she wants to know when hes gonna come see her again. so automatically now i really dont like him. plus hes never made an effort to get to know me, so its not like my opinion really reflects on his character, i just recognize him as a threat and so i dont like him. which is understandable im sure. but beyond that there are just things that every time some form of contact is made, which is mostly indirect such as things i overhear him say. well this time the thing that makes me dislike him as a person as opposed to just as a threat is that he is that type of d-bag that most people want to just punch in the teeth.

there is a certain type of d-bag (and they are fairly predominent in the military unfortunately) that think it will get them vagina if they talk about how much of a killer they are. (this is why stupid people shouldnt listen to rap.) he sends my g/f an e-mail about how his unit murdered puppies. (*sarcasm*wow, what a macho guy. i can totally see how females would want to sex this guy up*sarcasm*) well devin writes back and tells him how much of an ass that makes him. so his immediate response (paraphrased) is: "well I didnt. my unit did. i was gunna, but i didnt have any bullets left. so i didnt."

i can not express how stupid people can be. like this stupid scrawny ass kid in line in the PX (who by the way has a desk job and never goes outside of base) tried flexing his bravado by telling the chick he was hitting on (or at least trying to hit on) that we should just "kill all these muslims" (were his exact words) "b/c blah blah blah im a moron and i dont know what im talking about." (the closest thing to his exact words that i can recall) WELL unbeknown to him the NCO that i came with that was standing right behind him is muslim. so he proceedes to tear this dumb kid a new @$$ hole. meanwhile im standing 3 feet away trying my hardest to disguise my laughter over the look on this kids face as he gets made a complete fool of in front of his little female friend. well after that this kid was so afraid of my NCO that on the way out the kid hid behind a trash can as my NCO walked past him, which again prompted quite a hearty laugh from myself.

well anyways, thats the type of d-bag moron that devins ex b/f is, and at this point i have no desire what so ever to meet this kid. my opinion of him is already pretty set in stone at this point, and i hate to say it b/c im really not this kind of b/f at all, but if she does see him it will probably prompt a pretty big fight between us. not a relationship ending fight or anything, but there will definitely be some turbulence for a while. plus the kid has already expressed a desire to get back with devin, while i was dating her, and with full knowledge that i was dating her. so im NOT saying that i wouldnt save his life if i saw him wounded on the battlefield b/c a patient is a patient and i will save any life i can, but what i will say is that once i stabilize him i might not have any morphine to use.

an odd day...

Sun, 27 Jan 2008 20:13:33 GMT

well today was an odd day. we get to the CSH to do a routine transfer of 2 ambulatory patients, and the CSH says that they have a litter patient as well. so i take him even though im on chase, and wasnt supposed to take a patient. well we are about 5 minutes outside our base and the CSH calls us on the radio telling us that the patient i took was supposed to go somewhere else. so we have to turn around to take the guy back to the CSH. well before we knew that i looked over the guy. his paperwork said he had a DVT in his leg, and the CSH had already administered an anticoagulant. so i took his SpO2 sat and it was 91% and his pulse was at 95 so i put the guy on O2. i had the unit medical officer on board with me and he started asking me a bunch of questions to test my knowledge on DVT. i sort of knew some stuff, but the first question he asked me was, "what are some things we really need to monitor on a DVT patient?" i didnt really know what he was getting at, so i said, "his B/P to make sure hes not actively bleeding somewhere?"

well i was partially correct b/c with anticoagulants on board if he was bleeding then he wasnt gonna stop. so i was sort of right, but he was looking for the monitoring of SpO2 and heart rate. which i had already done. he just thought it was funny that i did exactaly the right thing, without even really knowing it.

so then we get to the other CSH where we are dropping off the people and they give us people to come back with, which is not an uncommon thing, but they thought they were gonna be slick and tell us when we got back that the patients need to go somewhere else. a somewhere else that we would have taken them if we knew, but to a place that we dont usually go. well they told us much too late so the patients are now at the wrong spot and there isnt anything we can do about it. so the other CSH messed up too.

and on top of all these people screwing up i find out that a soldier died the other day by getting electrocuted while taking a shower. evidently the grounding wire coming from the bathroom got disconnected and he touched the shower head, and that was all she wrote. which just goes to show you that when its your time its your time. it doesnt matter if your on the front line or back home in america. just get the most out of every minute you have while you're alive.

i love saving lives!!

Mon, 21 Jan 2008 20:48:13 GMT

well i am quickly earning the nickname as the "P.O.I. magnet". P.O.I. stands for Point Of Injury. thats when we fly out to where injured guy is and bring him to CSH. well it seems that every time im in first up shift we get a couple. people will go for weeks without getting a POI mission, but i have yet to go 1 1st up cycle without getting at least 1. well this one was something else. i had 5 patients! 2 were urgent litter patients, and 3 were ambulatory, which just means they could walk and sit in a seat, but they were probably still in some pain.

well the 2 litter patients were all i concerned myself with on the aircraft because they pretty much needed constant monitoring. the one had bandages on his head and was bleeding through them. but the medic on the ground still decided to insert an NPA in him to secure an airway. which is the exact WRONG thing to do. airways are important to secure, but not at the cost of brain damage! the other guy had no obvious signs on injury, but he wasnt conscious. i had to cut the guys coat off to try and get vitals and feel for a pulse. i had to put both patients on O2 as soon as i could, and both were breathing pretty shallow. at least they were breathing though, so i didnt need to use the BVM. i had an OPA on standby, and the king LT was ready as well. i could use either b/c both patients kept randomly regaining momentary consciousness, and if they had a tube or something down their throats then they would vomit, and that would just complicate things. then i would have to suction them before they choked on their own puke. so all i could do was constantly recheck for breathing and pulse in the peripheries.

well after i get back to my base i have all of 15 minutes to restock my aircraft with the replacement things from what i used, and scarf a small lunch and then we had ANOTHER mission! this was just a transport to another CSH though. so it wasnt nearly as exciting. but it was still some good times.

man i love my new job!

still no need to worry about me...

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 20:41:37 GMT

alrighty, so i have told you the cool exciting story, and i have told you the funny story. so now i am going to tell you the scary thing that happened, but before i do i would just like to reiterate that i am going to be coming home safe and sound, so there is no need to worry. besides it not REALLY scary. here goes:

sometimes i get missions just transporting patients from one hospital to another. its not always "hey go pick up this wounded guy and bring him here!" but this particular transfer was an EPW. when i picked him up i had a bad vibe right from the get go b/c the guy was strapped to a litter even though he wasnt an injured guy. but beyond that he was blindfolded and had his mouth wrapped in a cloth (that was mostly because he was suspected of having T.B. so medically speaking his mouth should be covered) and the litter straps holding him on the litter were over his arms to restrain him and his hands were handcuffed with zip-ties over his stomach. the doc told me to watch him because he kept trying to take off his blindfold, and i had 2 locked and loaded guards fly with us to watch this guy.

well the guy gave me no trouble the whole flight. he just sat there, probably asleep, but as we were flying to the other base i see like 15 rockets shooting into the air out my side of the aircraft coming from a city. i later found out that they werent rockets, they were tracer rounds, but under NVGs when the light is intensified they look like rockets or flairs. i then find out that sometimes since they cant see at night they just hear an aircraft flying overhead and they just spray bullets into the air where they think the aircraft is. so its good that i wasnt flying during the day.

so we reported the SAFIRE and went on with our day. but it was certainly an eventful night!