SSG Nick Lopez makes news in Baghdad

A friend of mine that used to be in the NE Guard now in the WA Guard, SSG Nick Lopez had a piece written in a military newspaper about his mission in helping train the Iraqi police force in Baghdad. Good Job Nick!

The Dark Knight

My First Sergeant (1SG) whom I work in the same office with is a Batman-fanatic. You could talk Batman stuff with him all day. Before our deployment he got a cool Batman tattoo and thus far through the deployment his fiance' has sent him all kinds of Batman stuff from home . Well some guys from the unit helped him trick out his Hummer (the Batmobile). It's really cool... Here are some pics:

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day wasn't all that bad, just another day to put behind us. I did get to talk to Tara so of course that made my day and I got Valentine's Day packages from Tara, Mom and Dad, and the Family Readiness Group in Wayne.

The box below is from Tara - she told me I needed to explain the significance of the fortune cookie more so you didn't think she was crazy... When we got engaged in Kansas City we went to eat at one of our favorite places, PF Changs. Tara didn't eat much because she felt "ill" after I asked her to marry me! HAHA (Tara - you told me to explain...) Anyhow the following Valentine's day we went to PF Changs in Omaha for dinner and after she gave me a silver fortune cookie to remember our engagement. I brought that silver fortune cookie with me over here. Now, to the present, in the box pictured amongst all the fortune cookies there is one giant fortune cookie. At first I thought this was to eat so I didn't bother with it until I was out of the small ones. However, when I decided to take a closer look at the big one, I found it was plastic. It's actually a fortune cookie shaped magic 8-ball. So when you shake it and ask it a question, then turn it over it tells you the answer to your question!

Nebraska Flag Gift

I had a surprise today when I received my mail. Congressman Jeff Fortenberry sent a Nebraska State flag for the unit to display. I've met Congressman Fortenberry on a few occasions. I've always found him to be a guy that will tell you exactly his view regardless if he agrees with you or not. I think he has done good things thus far for us in the US Congress and I wish him luck on his re-election.

Iraqi Internet

Some of you might be wondering how I even get Internet access to update this blog. Here's the story.

Back in Ft. Riley - Our commander was approached by the commander of the unit we replaced and was asked if we wanted to buy their system. Everyone chipped in about 50 bucks to purchase the satelite system. When we got here we found that their system setup was not ideal. We decided to purchase a server to provide security, firewall, virus scanning, filtering, and caching to help use our limited bandwidth as much as possible.
We also decided to increase our bandwidth to 4Mbps down/2Mbps up. Right now the system consists of three networks all connected back into the firewall, each network has about 10 wireless access points. The system has roughly a 125 people on it.