The Pied Piper...

...but not in that twisted stealing children sort of way.  And not so much music as catnip.

One of the JAGs living in Dupont has recently become a foster parent for kittens.  He helps the cats adapt to live with people (in other words, he gets to play with kittens all day).   Hayden and I are frequent visitors and even got to kitty-sit over the weekend.  Here are some of the shenanigans.

clockwise from the orange cat: Bailey, Samantha, Mowat (Mo for short) and Oscar

One of our moving boxes being put to good use.

The Palace

Well I know everyone wants to see photos of where I am, so they are posted below.  Unfortunately I am pretty limited in what I can post due to operational security so most of these are the generic ones.  I will try to take some better ones that I can show people in person some time later.  

Jet lag finally wore off, but then I switched to the night shift.  Which is great because the JOC isn't as hectic and the weather isn't too hot, but I might turn in to an insomniac if I don't figure out this whole sleeping during the day thing.  Today was my first day being nocturnal and it wasn't too bad.  Thank you ambien.

This is the tent city in Kuwait.  Very exciting.  Luckily I was only here for about a day.

Below are pictures from the C-17 I flew in on.  

And this is Baghdad International Airport on the right, and the palace on the left.  There is a pretty constant haze, which is basically floating dirt.  It gets on and in everything, including your lungs.

That is all for now.  Talk to you soon.

Hello All,

Just a quick update.  I am in Baghdad.  I left Tuesday morning at 3 am, flew from Seattle Airport to Dallas, to Germany, to Kuwait.  Stayed in Kuwait for about 28 hours and arrived in Baghdad Thursday, 2000 local time.  The flights were very nice.  Commercial airlines the whole way and all officer's and high ranking NCO's had an empty seat next to them.  I watched lots of bad movies on the plane.  To name a few, Marley and Me, Valkyrie, Australia, and Rendition.   There were other movies, but I thought 8 hours was enough.  

Camp Victory is huge!  Thousands of soldiers, contractors, DOD civilians.  It is a city by itself.  My office in the Al Fawa Palace.  Incredible building, marble and gold everywhere.  Saddam was a real idiot though.  Apparently behind the marble walls is crappy wood and iron holding the thing together.  The Army Corps of Engineers says the place will collapse in the next 40 years.   

I will try and put up pictures of the area and my trailer.  Jet lag is finally setting in.  Talk to everyone soon.  

My own two backyardigans

No, not Hayden's favorite cartoon.  Just Patrick trying to teach Hayden how to play football.  Doesn't quite seem like a fair game...

We've officially moved in!

We've all made the cross-country trip using various modes of transportation, our household goods are finally here, first month's rent is paid.  It's official! 

But before we felt like true Washingtonians, we thought it would be prudent to be tourists for a weekend or two.  So we made the drive to Seattle (only 45 min!) one weekend.  

First we walked around Waterfront Park where we "oohed" and "ahhed" over the beautiful sound and the view of Olympic National Forest.  We perused the shops on Pier 55, only to buy a Boston Red Sox hat to replace Hayden's old one and a Pittsburgh Penguins hat for Katy.... like I said, we're only tourists not true residents quite yet!  One of the stores had an entire section dedicated to Twilight paraphernalia.

 

Next, we walked up through Pike Place Market.  I still can't believe the incredible flowers, fruits and vegetables for sale.  They were so perfect they looked fake.  As you can guess, Hayden most enjoyed the fish... and by enjoyed I mean he thought they were gross.

We really wanted to visit the F.A.O. Schwarz.  Patrick was imagining the NYC flagship store and well, I was thinking about that scene from BIG.   In either case, we were both a little disappointed to find a single room on a balcony of Macy's.  Hayden didn't seem to mind.  I guess to a 3 yr old, toys are toys.  

A visitor would be remiss not to see the Space Needle, so we rode the elevator all the way to the top.  Luckily, it was a clear day in the Pacific Northwest so we could see all the way to Mt. Rainier.  However, I must say the view is better from our street. 

The trip was great, right up until Hayden tripped and skinned his knee on the sidewalk.  Oh well, I guess every story doesn't need a happy ending. 

Coming Soon:  our trip to Mt. Rainier National Park