I'm referring to the "don't ask, dont't tell 2 policy, in the US military. So, gays and lesbians are now allowed to come out, and do so without any worry of repercussions, this is a good thing... a very good thing. However, in my mind they are still been singled out from every other man and woman that will proudly serve their country, and because of this, I feel they will not be readily accepted by their battle buddies, despite us now being in the 21st century.
How they are being singled out? Their life partners are not afforded the same courtesy and respect as "conventional" couples are. They are not entitled to benefits, medical, commissary and BX priviledges ( not that they are missing out there), housing or any kind of support should their partner lose their life in the line of duty. I'm sorry Mr. Obama, but this is worng! Just because many states in America do not recognise same sex marriage (and again I'd like to point out we are living in the 21c), does not mean they are any less of a couple than different sex marriages. In fact, if you'd done your homework, you'd realise that same sex couples are more faithful, have more surplus money to spend, after investments, and are less likely to cause to property damage.
I wish there were a way you could explain to this Army wife, why my friends same sex partner, who has been in this "Army" game as long as I have, is not entitled to the same level of respect as I am. And please, how will you handle things the day the CAO have to tell them about the loss of their loved one?
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Saturday, January 8, 2011
I need to start building an Ark
After weeks of snow, and I'm talking "In the bleak midwinter" here folks; snow upon snow, the rains have come. In the space of 24 hours all the snow we've accumulated since November 2010 has vanished. I'm talking about 2-6 inches everyday bar 3, that I can remember... that's one heck of a lot of snow. What makes me talk about the weather, well apart from it being the British thing to do, is I am going somewhere with all this.
In our little village of one road, we have a creek/brook. Usually a very unprepossessing little thing, that does what all good brooks should do, burble. Whatever ! I was out in the yard this morning, and couldn't understand why I could hear a strong wind blowing. Wrong ! All the snow melting is running in to the brook, and along with the rain, that joker is rising, and rising fast. Not normally seen from the balcony outside my bedroom, it is now visible in all it's glory, and has risen about 10 inches, just today.
Obviously this is something the German neighbours and emergency services are taking seriously, as they are patrolling the road that runs next to the creek, and the volunteer fire department were frantically stuffing sandbags, when I walked past them earlier. I am, however, not seeing any building going on.
That neatly brought me back to my ark. I have my wood situation solved. In a village where everyone seems to have a wood burning stove in their homes, there are plenty of wood piles that I can pillage my supplies from. Hubbs has more than enough nails in his toolbox, and for waterproofing I was thinking along the lines of duct tape. After all it is like the force, it has a light side and a dark side and holds the empire together, on this premise I figured it would be good caulking for my ark, and I could take any left over spools of it with me for emergency repairs. My biggest problem in all this, is the animal situation. I have two dogs, but again this isn't ideal, with them both being ex-males, and I honestly can't see any of the other villagers letting me float to safety with their animals. If anything, I can see them hunting me down with pitchforks and burning torches as the ark takes shape, seeing as the weather we've had since we moved here, has been the worse they've experienced in 10 years. Hope you are seeing their vision behind this.
Another problem is propulsion. I really don't want to be reliant on a petrol engine, as when the flood comes I can't see there being many fill up points that will still be above the water-line. So that leaves me with sail power, another good use for my queen sized duvet covers, and california king bed sheet, or crafting some oars form the wood piles for Hubby to use. If I go with the oar thought, I'm going to have to scale down the size of the ark to make it easily movable for Hubbs. I wouldn't want him to put his back out as we navigate the highways and byways of Europe, as I can't be rowing and checking the ark for leaks with my duct tape.
So as I sit here, sharing my emergencies preparations for the first flood since Noah, I am also surfing the next, and there are no reasonable sized ark plans out there ! How is a girl supposed to be prepared when I can't get a basic plan.
Oh well, I guess if the worse comes to the worse, we can always break lose the bath tub and sail away on that.
Until next time, happy bailing !!
In our little village of one road, we have a creek/brook. Usually a very unprepossessing little thing, that does what all good brooks should do, burble. Whatever ! I was out in the yard this morning, and couldn't understand why I could hear a strong wind blowing. Wrong ! All the snow melting is running in to the brook, and along with the rain, that joker is rising, and rising fast. Not normally seen from the balcony outside my bedroom, it is now visible in all it's glory, and has risen about 10 inches, just today.
Obviously this is something the German neighbours and emergency services are taking seriously, as they are patrolling the road that runs next to the creek, and the volunteer fire department were frantically stuffing sandbags, when I walked past them earlier. I am, however, not seeing any building going on.
That neatly brought me back to my ark. I have my wood situation solved. In a village where everyone seems to have a wood burning stove in their homes, there are plenty of wood piles that I can pillage my supplies from. Hubbs has more than enough nails in his toolbox, and for waterproofing I was thinking along the lines of duct tape. After all it is like the force, it has a light side and a dark side and holds the empire together, on this premise I figured it would be good caulking for my ark, and I could take any left over spools of it with me for emergency repairs. My biggest problem in all this, is the animal situation. I have two dogs, but again this isn't ideal, with them both being ex-males, and I honestly can't see any of the other villagers letting me float to safety with their animals. If anything, I can see them hunting me down with pitchforks and burning torches as the ark takes shape, seeing as the weather we've had since we moved here, has been the worse they've experienced in 10 years. Hope you are seeing their vision behind this.
Another problem is propulsion. I really don't want to be reliant on a petrol engine, as when the flood comes I can't see there being many fill up points that will still be above the water-line. So that leaves me with sail power, another good use for my queen sized duvet covers, and california king bed sheet, or crafting some oars form the wood piles for Hubby to use. If I go with the oar thought, I'm going to have to scale down the size of the ark to make it easily movable for Hubbs. I wouldn't want him to put his back out as we navigate the highways and byways of Europe, as I can't be rowing and checking the ark for leaks with my duct tape.
So as I sit here, sharing my emergencies preparations for the first flood since Noah, I am also surfing the next, and there are no reasonable sized ark plans out there ! How is a girl supposed to be prepared when I can't get a basic plan.
Oh well, I guess if the worse comes to the worse, we can always break lose the bath tub and sail away on that.
Until next time, happy bailing !!
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Will the insanity never end...
Christmas is officially over in our house. The tree is down and back in it's box; the decorations, minus the few that I broke in the process, are in their plastic storage tubs and the house is clean. I realized this was the last Christmas we'd be spending in Germany, so this prompted the repacking of above boxes, ready for our overseas move in a few months, and the decision I was not going struggle back up the attic ladder, with boxes that weigh more than a small child.
Housework done, I settled down to study for upcoming exams, only to be seriously distracted by a stain on my extremely large and unruly (as in too big to handle) hessian rug. I love having company at any time, but come on people, if you spill something either admit to it or clean it up yourself, don't rub it into the rug with your shoe. Having dogs, this then acts as it's own little black hole, sucking any and all dog hairs that come into it's orbit, firmly into the centre where it will take a small nuclear explosion to remove it. I swear when I find the culprit (who I'm fairly sure I know the identity of already), I may be tempted to set off said explosion in their area, and leave someone else to clean up the resulting mess.
Stain suitably beaten into submission, I settled back down to my studies again. when will I learn that once interrupted, the flow will never be restored. I was then confronted with the Mystery of the Missing Shoes. no, not a new Agatha Christie novel that has just been unearthed, but somewhere between Frankfurt airport and her home, my MIL has succeeded in losing not one, but two, pairs of shoes, that were last seen firmly packed into her checked baggage. Of course, I am expected to drop anything of any importance to myself, and hunt those bad boys down... so the search continues for something I know isn't in this home !
I'm going to give the studying one last shot before I go to bed, as Hubbs has announced he needs to kill things on Call of Duty, I'm pretty sure this time I might get past the same section, I've read several times over the course of the day. Headphones will go on, if the phone rings I'm not here and all the shoes and stains in the world can go find someone else to pester.
I need a holiday to recover, or some way to retain my sanity (what little I have) in this totally insane world I live in.
Housework done, I settled down to study for upcoming exams, only to be seriously distracted by a stain on my extremely large and unruly (as in too big to handle) hessian rug. I love having company at any time, but come on people, if you spill something either admit to it or clean it up yourself, don't rub it into the rug with your shoe. Having dogs, this then acts as it's own little black hole, sucking any and all dog hairs that come into it's orbit, firmly into the centre where it will take a small nuclear explosion to remove it. I swear when I find the culprit (who I'm fairly sure I know the identity of already), I may be tempted to set off said explosion in their area, and leave someone else to clean up the resulting mess.
Stain suitably beaten into submission, I settled back down to my studies again. when will I learn that once interrupted, the flow will never be restored. I was then confronted with the Mystery of the Missing Shoes. no, not a new Agatha Christie novel that has just been unearthed, but somewhere between Frankfurt airport and her home, my MIL has succeeded in losing not one, but two, pairs of shoes, that were last seen firmly packed into her checked baggage. Of course, I am expected to drop anything of any importance to myself, and hunt those bad boys down... so the search continues for something I know isn't in this home !
I'm going to give the studying one last shot before I go to bed, as Hubbs has announced he needs to kill things on Call of Duty, I'm pretty sure this time I might get past the same section, I've read several times over the course of the day. Headphones will go on, if the phone rings I'm not here and all the shoes and stains in the world can go find someone else to pester.
I need a holiday to recover, or some way to retain my sanity (what little I have) in this totally insane world I live in.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
And in the beginning...
Yes, I know a slightly blasphemous start to my blog, but after all it's my blog, and I'll start it how I like.
Christmas in our household was a somewhat muted affair. After being married for 10 years, my Mother-in-Law, finally decided to spend Christmas with her son... or should I say, I entertained her for the whole 15 days she was here, while it appeared to me that her son had suddenly developed the talents shown in the movie "The Illusionist". what baffles me here is, when did he have the time to go to class to learn all this slight of hand, er body, stuff, and why wasn't I invited. Needless to say, like many of us women out there, I now need a long holiday somewhere to get over the holidays.
We are currently in Germany, and have been since '08, and I've enjoyed every minute of it, including the oodles of snow we get, and watching Hubby dig us out, while drinking my hot steamy coffee; but I guess you get the picture! However, and sadly, this is our last winter here as we are being shunted off to who knows where by the Army in the summer. There is a lot of truth in the phrase "Home is where the Army send us", all we do know is it will be back in the US, and Hubbs can finally stop whining about the slow internet we get in our little village. Which also means, that I can blog or surf while he plays his COD, without him demanding to know "what are you doing on that thing, you're sucking my bandwidth". I could make a comment about sucking things, but until we get to know each other better, I'll restrain myself.
School starts back up for me again tomorrow... yay (and no that's not an enthusiastic yay), I do my classes via webinar to the US on my laptop... but I guess you all can see where this is going, if you've read the above paragraph !
So why am I writing a blog? Well, we've all been told at some point or another that we should write a book, well I have several times by my dearest friend and my Hubby, and looking back over the things that have happened so far in my "career" as an Army Wife, I decided they might be noteworthy and give someone out there a chuckle, even if it is at my bad spelling and grammar. BTW, I'm English, so I don't want to hear any comments on my spelling the word "centre" wrong, if indeed I ever do use it and my use of U when any Americans reading don't deem it worthy to be included in a word such as armour!
Like most things people start, it all hinges on Monday. why poor old Monday pulled the short straw on being the day everybody chooses to start new things is beyond me, and will remain forever one of those little mysteries we mull over, when the bottom of an alcoholic beverage has been reached several times over. Today being Monday, I am, for once in my life, going to follow the herd and start something new on this day. I personally, and usually like, to choose one of the lesser frequented days like Wednesday or Thursday; how many times have you heard anyone say... "oh I'm going to start going to the gym on Thursday", or "Wednesday is the first day of my new diet"; it's always a Bank Holiday Monday, not any other day of the week. The Germans have the right idea, if a holiday falls mid week, or any day through the week for that fact, they have the day off work, no fuss, no mess... day off, done!
One last paragraph "Thank God" I hear you cry, before I click publish and submit this to the whims of the internet: There probably won't be something exciting and bizarre worth blogging about, going on every day, so don't expect scribblings everyday; Hubby will be referred to as just that, or Hubbs, in my posts for obvious reasons to any Military folk out there and, finally, any persons mentioned on here may exist in my realm, but will have their names changed or be given nicknames to prevent their being pestered about this. Anyone I am likely to mention in my blog, will most likely be reading it anyway, but I just wanted to put it out there. Lastly, if you do feel the need to leave a comment, please keep the language as clean as possible, as I do have a couple of youngsters that will be reading this, in turn I will try to keep mine in the realms of things you would say in the company of your Grandma.
So here goes, I'm about to publish the first in, I hope, many postings of various kinds. I hope you enjoy :)
Christmas in our household was a somewhat muted affair. After being married for 10 years, my Mother-in-Law, finally decided to spend Christmas with her son... or should I say, I entertained her for the whole 15 days she was here, while it appeared to me that her son had suddenly developed the talents shown in the movie "The Illusionist". what baffles me here is, when did he have the time to go to class to learn all this slight of hand, er body, stuff, and why wasn't I invited. Needless to say, like many of us women out there, I now need a long holiday somewhere to get over the holidays.
We are currently in Germany, and have been since '08, and I've enjoyed every minute of it, including the oodles of snow we get, and watching Hubby dig us out, while drinking my hot steamy coffee; but I guess you get the picture! However, and sadly, this is our last winter here as we are being shunted off to who knows where by the Army in the summer. There is a lot of truth in the phrase "Home is where the Army send us", all we do know is it will be back in the US, and Hubbs can finally stop whining about the slow internet we get in our little village. Which also means, that I can blog or surf while he plays his COD, without him demanding to know "what are you doing on that thing, you're sucking my bandwidth". I could make a comment about sucking things, but until we get to know each other better, I'll restrain myself.
School starts back up for me again tomorrow... yay (and no that's not an enthusiastic yay), I do my classes via webinar to the US on my laptop... but I guess you all can see where this is going, if you've read the above paragraph !
So why am I writing a blog? Well, we've all been told at some point or another that we should write a book, well I have several times by my dearest friend and my Hubby, and looking back over the things that have happened so far in my "career" as an Army Wife, I decided they might be noteworthy and give someone out there a chuckle, even if it is at my bad spelling and grammar. BTW, I'm English, so I don't want to hear any comments on my spelling the word "centre" wrong, if indeed I ever do use it and my use of U when any Americans reading don't deem it worthy to be included in a word such as armour!
Like most things people start, it all hinges on Monday. why poor old Monday pulled the short straw on being the day everybody chooses to start new things is beyond me, and will remain forever one of those little mysteries we mull over, when the bottom of an alcoholic beverage has been reached several times over. Today being Monday, I am, for once in my life, going to follow the herd and start something new on this day. I personally, and usually like, to choose one of the lesser frequented days like Wednesday or Thursday; how many times have you heard anyone say... "oh I'm going to start going to the gym on Thursday", or "Wednesday is the first day of my new diet"; it's always a Bank Holiday Monday, not any other day of the week. The Germans have the right idea, if a holiday falls mid week, or any day through the week for that fact, they have the day off work, no fuss, no mess... day off, done!
One last paragraph "Thank God" I hear you cry, before I click publish and submit this to the whims of the internet: There probably won't be something exciting and bizarre worth blogging about, going on every day, so don't expect scribblings everyday; Hubby will be referred to as just that, or Hubbs, in my posts for obvious reasons to any Military folk out there and, finally, any persons mentioned on here may exist in my realm, but will have their names changed or be given nicknames to prevent their being pestered about this. Anyone I am likely to mention in my blog, will most likely be reading it anyway, but I just wanted to put it out there. Lastly, if you do feel the need to leave a comment, please keep the language as clean as possible, as I do have a couple of youngsters that will be reading this, in turn I will try to keep mine in the realms of things you would say in the company of your Grandma.
So here goes, I'm about to publish the first in, I hope, many postings of various kinds. I hope you enjoy :)
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