My wife and kids just got a package from me: three kids' books and a DVD of me reading them! "How," you may ask, "did you manage that?" Well, it's thanks to a dedicated group of people with hearts bent on serving our troops called USO - the United Service Organizations. USO has been around since just before World War II, and boosts troop morale by sending care packages, sponsoring celebrity visits to the AOR, providing military lounges in airports and on bases, and the United Through Reading Program.

At the USO office here at Balad, I can select a book for each of my kids, sit down and read it into a video camera that burns a 20-minute mini-DVD, and USO will mail it and the books to them! That's incredible! When they got
the first one, my kids watched it over and over, with little A pointing and saying "Mama, mama" whenever he saw me. I guess his parent vocabulary has shrunk to only include Mama right now. I've since gone and recorded again for them. Thank you, USO! (And I'm sure your donations to this nonprofit org would be appreciated.)

In other news, it's been quiet for a few days here. About a week ago we had a three-day surge of patients I told some of you about. We were filled to overflowing, with 45 patients in 40 "beds" on the ward. (We put five kids in one room on cots, with some dads to supervise). That surge was partially due to AQI (al Qaeda Iraq)'s wrath at some families not relinquishing their sons to join the terrorist group. To retaliate against the families, they blew up their house: women, children, and all. Fortunately, out of this harm and misery al Qaeda is just making enemies of Iraqis, whose "Sons of Iraq" or "Awakening Councils" are spurning violence.

I've included a picture of my living quarters, my "hooch", to show why I spend very little time there: it's depressing. I mean, it's clean and it's mine, so it's adequate. Sleeping there at night can be challenging, too. Every half hour or hour, you're jarred out of your slumber by the deafening roar of what seems like the world coming to an end, but what is really two F-16s taking off from the nearby runway. At night you can see the conical fire from their afterburners. Then the night quiets down again, only to be awakened again by the "DUK DUK DUK DUK" of two Blackhawk helicopters coming in to land at the hospital helipad. Then you wait for the call on your phone: "15 casualties, come in, we need you". And if that call doesn't come in a few minutes, you drift back off to sleep.

And that's where I'm going now...to sleep.