Through the Looking Glass

Merry Christmas you filthy animals! And a happy new year.
-Home Alone 2

hehe. On that note..i'd like to wish everyone who reads this a merry Christmas. It's not going to be much of one for me..but we get seafood and real steak! That's DEFINITELY something to look forward to. We'realmost to the middle east..as you guys know. And crap..i don't think this is going to be much of a blog. Meh..ah well. At least I got to say it! Have a merry Christmas everyone!

Hey everyone! I know I haven't been blogging much. But I just haven't found anything to blog about lately. We're going to spend some liberty time in Dubai (in the Middle East) for a few days. And then we're going to Kuwait for a few weeks. And then we're going back to Dubai for a few days. I think from there we're going to either Australia or Thailand.We'll see what happens.

Either way, we leave Kuwait in the beginning of February and start heading home! Man. It's going to go by so quickly. I can see Trina waiting for me and her dad at the pier right now! Hehe. I'm really excited to have him on the ship with me. There's going to be classes and stuff for them I think. I was looking at last year's pictures and that's what it looked like.

Man..I've been really antsy lately. I don't know what's going on. Maybe it's because I'm heading home sooner than expected? I'm not sure. But in a month, this deployment will be halfway over. It's crazy eh? It seems like yesterday Trina was crying on me as I left to get on this big grey and cold-looking ship.That poor girl. I know she's hanging in there. That's pretty much all she can do really. I wish I could clone myself temporarily to help keep her company while I'm gone. Or maybe make her a robot or something. Something to keep her occupied you know?

How are things with all of you?I hope they're going well this holiday season. There's a little something missing for Trina, but that little something's coming home in a few months. I hope you all have a merry Christmas. And there will be more souvenirs on the way!:)

Hey guys. How are you all? Just left Singapore this morning. And I got souveniers for my family! I was going to get something for my friend, Larry. But Trina wouldn't let me. I'll send all the souveniers for Trina and she'll send them out to whoever they go to. The post office would only give me one box. So you know..no multiple packages going everywhere. Singapore was beautiful. I wish Trina was there to see it.She likes Asian woman and thinks they're cute too. So she would've gone crazy. Hehe. and now we're off to a liberty port in the middle east! And then we do our thing in Kuwait for a few weeks..and then it's off to home! Not too long now. I'll be home before trina even realizes I was gone. Hehe. and that's all for now. I'll blog more soon.

Posted by Kevin:

Hey everyone! If trina hasn't told you already then I can tell you because now the whole world knows. So much for that secret thing that we're supposed to have eh? As we speak, personnel are off loading food and water to the people of Bangladesh. I'm not getting off ship. But other people have already. And it looks like the CO of the ship istrying to get everyone on the Tarawa the Humanitarian Service Medal. Our departments have already submitted rosters and what not. So I'll have at least a star on my Overseas Service Deployment ribbon and a new medal when I come back.

And it looks like I might be doing this again a year after I get back unless I'm doing the recruiting thing. We'll see what happens. I don't want to come back to the states and turn around a couple months later to deploy to Iraq. I've been there. And 2 months at home only isn't enough of a reason to go back. The fact is: I loveTrina. And I'd like to spend as much time with her as possible. Our goodbyes prior to me going onto the ship were heartbreaking enough. Imagine getting off the ship just to tell her I'm going to deploy in a couple months. Once I get back though, I'm going to try and look into recruiting. Or maybe try being a career retention specialist. Like I said, we'll see what happens. I'm looking out for the best interests of me and Trina. I know she wants me home. I know I want to be home with her.

Other than that, it looks like we're going to have some liberty for a few days in Singapore. Really looking forward to getting off ship because I'm kinda starting to go stir-crazy. Hehe. I'm going to go with Wood (Trina knows who he is) and we're going to go see the sights. They plan on drinking that night, but I think I'm going to go back to the ship. Never really was much of a drinker.

I've started up my gym routine. And due to all the hot spots around the ship., I've been sweating a lot. It also means I've been burning fat! I've really started to slim down some, which is good. Trina was worried that I would get fat and have a heart attack or something. Hehe. I'll probably be looking real good when I come back. (winking in Trina's direction). That's all I can think of so that's all the blogging for now. I'll blog more as soon as I can.

Here's a link to the 11th MEU homepage if some of you haven't already seen it:

http://www.usmc.mil/11thmeu/


There's a cool .pdf newsletter they do each month. Called Pacific Pride. It has lots of nice pictures and info about the unit. You can find it on the 11th MEU website.

Let's see...what else? Oh! If you're planning on any kind of a christmas package...now is the time to send that out. It seems it could take a good month to get there.


I'm glad you guys are blogging! He enjoys posting. And loves the replies too.

Love,
Trina

Well..We passed Guam this morning! I could see the little island through the fog. It was quite strange to see land after a month of seeing just water everywhere. I can't wait to get back. One month down..5 more to go! Hard to believe it's only been one month already.

Trina makes it sound like she had a fun little project for you guys for thanksgiving. I beat guitar hero 3 on medium for those of you interested in that sort of thing. I'm practicing on hard right now! I'm definitely turning into a little rock star on ship. Wait until you see me play it. Your jaws will drop and your eyes will widen in excitement! And Trina will drool and flock to me like a little rock star groupie when she sees. Mark mywords. BWAHAHAHAAH.

Other than that they've got me trying to learn FarsiArabic. I'm confused every time I learn a language I'm not really concerned about learning. I can't wait for Trina to start helping me with German when I get back. And I'm going to help her with her language when I get back as well!

Anyway. I'm just a month closer to coming home. Still don't know where we're going and how long we're going to stay there but I'll let you know just after we leave. You know. For security reasons. I'll keep everyone posted.

Just to let all of you know... i'm moderating comments because we keep getting spam from random people. So if you don't see your comment pop up instantly, it'll be there soon! I just have to approve it first.

Posted by Kevin:

Happy thanksgiving everyone! I had an alright turkey day. I had steak instead of turkey. And mashed potatoes. I'm about to get some chocolate and take a shower. You know. Comfort food. By the way, I saw my first insect on ship! It was quite strange. It was one of those tiny moth things. Don't know what they're called. But they're really really tiny.And they look like moths. It was quite interesting. Crap. This isn'tmuch of a blog. But it's all I can think about right now. It's been along day. I had to take a nap today because I was so tired today. I hope you all had a happy thanksgiving though!

Posted by Kevin:

Well guys, I'm sick. I got this chest/head cold thing that's been going around. And the word out there is there's something worse in the form of a stomach virus that I don't want. Hehe. Just glad I got the latter of the 2. Trina would probably think my sniffling is cute or something. And I got some medicine for it. I told them I just wanted the pain to go away. So they game me stuffiness medicine, congestion stuff, and cough drops. Pretty much all I need! I don't know if I'll blog again until Thanksgiving Day. But we'll see. Because what if something cool happens before then. You know? Looks we're going to pay the Corolla off within the next 2 months which is good. And Trina's one step closer to trading her Echo in for a Prius when I get back! She'll be happy about that. Well I'm going to go now. I'll blog again sometime in the near future. See you guys!

Posted by Kevin:



Well..it looked like we were going to go to Bangladesh for a few days. But the hurricanes are making that kinda impossible. We were going to provide humanitarian aid but the 22nd MEU is going to do that instead of us. Not a whole lot is going on here. Trina got me a little morale booster in the form of a MP3 player that she's loading up as we speak. Hehe. It'll be good for the gym. I'm actually starting to find stuff around the ship now. And now the ship doesn't seem so huge anymore. They switched my shifts so I work in the day now. My eyes aren't used to the light anymore. Hehe. We're still in the middle of nowhere. We just got away from Hawaii and are heading who knows where. That's about it for now. I think I'm going to try and get a phone card so I can call Trina. I'll blog more if I can think of it some other time.

Posted by Kevin:

So it's really really dark out here. There's hardly any light. And I was just outside looking at the stars. They're really really pretty when youcan actually see them. And I just put some clean clothes on..and they still smell like our detergent! I was like oh man. There's only 23 moreweeks left..if not more. Crap. That's all I can think about really.

Posted by Kevin:

So, there I was on watch last night. Playing guitar hero 3 all night long. I played so long that I didn't realize the time flew by, and in comes a fellow co-worker LCpl Wood! I was like.."GEEEZ..did that time fly by." I was like.."holy crap!" to myself. So he was jealous of all my GuitarHero song progresses. He said I would totally own him. There's some really good songs from really crappy bands on that game. "My Name Is Jonas" from weezer is on it. Haven't played it yet..but I'm going to. This song from Dragonforce is on there too. I LOVE playing it. Even though I never make it through the whole song without failing. I'm going to work on that some more tonight. Anywho. I'm going to go for now. ButI'll blog some more later. See you guys!

Posted by Kevin:

Well..took a shower today! First shower on ship! It was weird. Theydon't use normal faucets and whatnot. You have to spray yourself with a water sprayer. It's sprays kind of hard and stings a little. But it's alright. It gets me clean! So here I am squeaky clean! *sparkle* hehe That's all for now. I'm sure I'll think of something new to blog soon.

Posted by Kevin:

Well. Here I am on ship writing to my baby and everyone else reading this. Things have been weird for me so far. Trying to establish a schedule around guard and a language class they got me taking. Somehow I have to work the gym into it. Eventually I will. But you know. It’s only the beginning of the deployment. Anywho. i’m eating 3 meals a day, we’re out in the middle of the ocean, and they’re taking care of us with a troop lounge so we don’t get bored out of our skulls. Check this out..the bed I chose to sleep in is friggen awesome. I have a very bottom bed so it’s dark and quiet. I just crawl into there at the end of my day and go to sleep. Sometimes I feel like some kind of reclusive spider when I do that. It’s nice though. I crawl into my bed and the boat rocks me to sleep. Hehe. It’s great. Well, that’s all for now guys. I’ll be sure to post as much as I can.

My brother, Tyler, and his wife, Emily just had twins! Welcome to the world, Savanna and William! Can't wait to meet you!

We're bloggers!

Since our family and friends are scattered all over the country, we thought this would be a fun way to keep in touch with you.

And while Kevin is deployed, it will be a perfect way for us to document this crazy time in our lives - sort of like an on-line journal!