Hey...good to hear from you. It is totally understandable. Take your time. No need to rush into the new/old life.

The new old life is steam rollin me... it was easier in central asia... but hey the beer is cold and coffee warm. I do miss the food in Afgan though. The people are really wonderful. I don't get it under the cirumstances many of them live with but they are. I will never forget that.

-sc

I can just imagine the food. We eat crap in this country!

One more reason to be pro-immigration! I hardly eat anything but authentic foreign food. Oh you may find this interesting... I come home and the development where i live continues to suffer from petty break-ins and burgleries etc. All the residents are overly nervous and have a hair trigger on 911. We live in a very nice area and I understand the surprise of many folks but at the 'community meetings' is understandable but man they did not like what I had to say (truth hurts i guess -- I was the only one there that had any understanding of how implement effective security around a given perimeter). My points were:

- forget about the police, if these guys were owed back taxes they would have been caught long ago... don't expect anything from them
- the houses hit have a clear profile (no dog, single resident, not home often, no 'man' of the house so to speak) duh'
- my suggestion was get a noisy dog, any size any breed, alarm systems are useless -- a gun (any gun but recommended shotguns as the best option and learn how to use it)
- light up our pretty houses like a x-mass tree -- every house has plenty of showoff lights and we need them since (by design to eliminate light pollution) we have no street lights (all the break ins were daylight occurances)
- defend the 1 'maybe' 2 points of entry into the development (ideas ranging from, auto-gates, scary signs ID'n the area as PRIVATE PROPERTY, etc.)

Now i am being eyeballed evil because of my candid knowledge of firearms. One woman got up angrily interrupting me 'i dont want guns in my neighborhood' with others chanting her on. LOL, I responded, any of you chanting this concept on I have a copy of the Constitution and Bill of Rights I will be happy to stay late and go over with folks concentrating on the 2nd amendment. And I did, also carry my pocket constitution around (not that it means anything these days). At that point 'my time was up' but nobody dared tazer me.

I think my aloofness towards the whole thing pissed people off. With all I have been through and am going through I just can't get real 'excited' over all this. If my house were to be targeted while I was home (i am usually sequestered in my upstairs pimp floor) those malcontents better have brought backup (criminals usually don't nor are they particularly disciplined in any sort of combat/self defense/marksmanship or otherwise putting them at a lamentable disadvantage). But then again loud yappy dog perimeter would have to be crossed first, typically followed by a load gruff 'Shut the FUCK UP!!!' from me at the dogs 'they never listen anyway' -- that alone will send the bad guys on to the next target. Otherwise bring it on.

Crime is not something that keep me up at night.

-sc

I agree with you.

Thanks for the comment on my pictures!

He bro...I have been thinking about you. How are you?

I miss you. I hope you are doing well!