tower rants

"I’m on a tower guard rotation this week, definitely my most despised duty while I’m here. It is comprised of 12 hours of non stop boredom sitting in a guard tower pulling security from sunset to sunrise. My highlight of each night is when it’s time for our midnight chow meal, the best meal of the day when a different set of cooks come into the kitchen and make the meals from scratch other than just reheating schlop. Being at a smaller FOB compared to the bigger bases like the one at Bagram, we still have a chow hall run by army personnel instead of KBR contractors, which makes a huge difference in the quality of food.
Other than the exciting midnight chow, we pass the time by watching the Geminid meteor shower going on around this time of year through our night vision goggles, which is easy to see even with out the optics because of the zero light policy of our base at night and lack of street lights on the dirt roads and mud huts of rural Afghanistan. With adding in this week to the slow week before, I feel like I’m getting a slight case of cabin fever from not leaving the base for this long…I’m glad I’m not a Fobbit that never gets to leave or I would go nuts."
All Expenses Paid Afghan Vacation