Kuwait

It is official. I am no longer in Iraq (and it's not an April Fool's joke either). After what was probably the worst C-130 flight in history, our group made it safely to Kuwait the other night. We are now in a staging area waiting for a scheduled plane to take us home.

The computer access at the basecamp so distant from the battle is slow at best, but it does allow me to send a note here or there to the folks back home to tell them that I am still alive. Being out of the IZ is a big relief. Although I'm still in the Middle East, I'm not in Iraq, and that is a good thing.

Not much to do here for the next few days but wait, which is one game that I think I have earned the right to go pro. Seeing as how I've waited almost a year to get home, a few more days shouldn't matter much. For now, I'll just try to catch up on some much needed sleep and get myself ready to re-integrate into the real world.

It's hard to relax knowing that there are still folks I know back in Baghdad at a time where things aren't the best. It would be easier to transition my mind to being a civilian again if I knew that the entire crew was safely out of there. They don't have long to go, but my thoughts are with them. Too bad my thoughts can't shoot down rockets.