(no subject)

[dragonlady7]

So. First. Pictures, as promised.

XO Angels This is what Dawn, Amy, and Katy gave the departing XO as their gift-- they put it in a frame. Apparently this is what the other XOs called them, so they thought they'd play it up. Made some shirts with markers, borrowed some M9s, and had fun. [Ed note: Please do not Photoshop any dudes in black hoods or leashes into this picture.]

(An XO is, I believe, an Executive Officer. So, really, their boss.)

Dave and I went down to Bidwell/Elmwood to check out this joint with "Mediterranean food", because we were both jonesing hardcore for schwarmas. (Schwarmae?)
Sahara Grill, it's called. Authentic? Not so much. Buncha white boy waiters had to phone up the chef at home to find out how to brew Turkish coffee, and they still made it too weak. But, they gave it to us free. And the whole meal with a buncha appetizers and some fatoush wound up being under $30.
Now we're both totally jittery and on edge from drinking a whole damn pot of free Turkish coffee. Woo. Hee. Eegh. Yah. I need gin. Lots of gin. Or perhaps a walk. Oh yes. A walk. And then I will come back. And post about the thing with the stuff. What? Oh yes. Dave. He's psyching himself up for an Interview on Monday. For which he is a shoo-in. He's wandering around all jittery talking about VOIP and game faces. And BCMs. And Nortel. And, he's all jittery. Yeah.

I need pants. I don't think I can go for a walk in the underpants I'm wearing. Though it's tempting. Pants are overrated.

Comments

[kittyc1978.livejournal.com]

OOOH good luck Dave!!! And that is really a cute present to give to their XO, were they the only girls in their unit? exscuse me, Women...that is...

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

It's not so much that they're the only women, so much as that they're the S1, S2, and S4-- three of the important bits of the unit-- and they're all young female captains who get along very well and thus sort of travel in a pack, I think. The Army is actually quite heavily female at this point, which is why it's a bit of a problem that Congress has been making all this noise about passing a new resolution-thingie about women not being allowed in risky positions. Given that the Army is already falling well short of its recruitment needs, and is severely understaffed, taking a sizable proportion of its too-small personnell pool and restricting them from the jobs that are the hardest to fill (and, often, pay the best) is rather a severe blow.

This is seldom publicized, but the proportion of female soldiers in the Army has increased something like tenfold since the last Gulf War. It's a great career, particularly for low-income women without much hope of getting an education on their own-- one of the cashiers I liked at work recently joined up mostly for the money and the chance to get training and an education. Touchingly, she mostly was excited that she'd be able to afford to give her little daughter (born when she herself was sixteen) a top-notch education, which she herself had never had. (She was barely twenty and about the size of a matchstick.)

[kittyc1978.livejournal.com]

Wow, I had no idea that congress was trying to do that. What a set back for the women in the Military. We've been working so hard to prove that we are just as capeable in combat as men are, and now the congress goes to the whole kidd glove thing again. The Israeli army is like 45% women and those girls kick ass! I agree, it is a fabulous opportunity for a lot of people who don't have any other way of getting training and education. Congress really is a bunch of stuffed shirts and skirts sometimes.

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

It just kills me. I mean, I don't want my sister getting shot, but at least I admit that's an entirely personal and selfish bias.
What just gets me is that they're perfectly willing to get babyface boys killed (many, many, many of the combat troops are under 20) or maimed but the moment it's a girl, it's suddenly too much. HellOOO. A life's a life, and it doesn't much matter whether it's somebody's son or somebody's daughter who just got all their limbs blown off by an IED-- it's still somebody's kid either way.

[kittyc1978.livejournal.com]

I agree. Being a woman makes me and my life no more precious than someone's 18 yearold son. I think women should be able to serve any way that they prove they can.

[reverend-dave.livejournal.com]

Women + Guns = HAWT

Women + Guns + Actual military training to use them + Captain's bars = HAWTER THAN HAWT

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

Aren't they cute?

I kept laughing because Katy's so much taller than either of the other girls.

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't. Those are real guns.

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

Jeez, that's even worse.