the past few weeks were chaotic...doing administrative stuff...awards, evaluations and such, kept me busy adminstratively that i was on the fence on whether or not to take my little R/R to Qatar as i did last time i was here. i know what to expect, so i didn't feel the NEED to go...it is just another army base in another arabic country...but i won't be working, so i decided to take the painful process of getting there and back, via military aircraft..and, as i expected, totally painful....the flight left at 0215..arrived at qatar on c17 at 0330, then a long wait to get off the plane...as i was freezing by the way, then another LONGER wait in the freezing cold tent in the hanger..then the painful wait at the gate to get onto the base..Yikes.

i started with a 2 mile swim, because the pool is nice. then a lot of hanging out and planning at tour the next day, to the inland sea picnic, which included a long ride to the sand dunes which we traveled in a suv to the beach where we hung out and yes, i swam. jumped in and took off...scaring the tour guides cuz they had no idea where i went! the arabian sea was somewhat clear, but no sea life, except a dead sting ray.

i also went on the doha city tour which was a lotta fun, and went to a few malls--which i don't really care for, but the villagio is just like the venitian in vegas, so that is cool, especially with all the men in man dresses running around...too funny.

i did get quite a few swims in here and there, and a 3 miler straight on sunday to see if i could do it...how boring in a pool.

then the horrific flight home! YUCK. battle rattle on cuz we are stopping in iraq...after a 16 hour ordeal, i made it back yesterday and slept the day away...

NOW, it is time to pack up..my relief, and good friend susan is coming to take MY PLACE, NEXT WEEK! do you think they would let me go home with the first wave...not on your life. so, after i turn over my job, and home and everything else, i will be a transient, living out of a suitcase till mid feb...doesn't that sound like a great way to finish up the deployment????
the only good thing, other than being homeless and jobless--my name is on the list to go cover for a PA in qatar for 2 weeks in january...sounds too good to be true--just waiting to hear the verdict, if not...i will be living in open bay transient berthing out of a suitcase and working in a TMC down at AJ--at least i can swim.....

now that the weather is cooling off dramatically, yes, i am wearing sweatshirts/pants and my black fleece coat..noa said we should get together one night and cook smore's....
the problem, getting marshmallows....i mentioned it to the post office guy, who lives out in town, and "poof" i had 5 huge bags of marshmallows on my desk the next day.
since we live next door to the fire department, we got a permit and a fire pit, and sat night we had a raging fire, roasted marshmallows and at smore's. i sat by the fire, while the guys either played volleyball or threw the football around....
a rather nice way to celebrate a holiday weekend.
i think we will try to do this more frequently...definitely new years!

another deployed thanksgiving for me!
unfortunately i had a lot of work to do and spent most of the day in the clinic.

i did get the opportunity to serve the troops in the dining facility which was fun, but they canned us after 30 minutes cuz we were toooo slow. we ate as a group, my staff--the ones that stayed behind as all the girls went to a spa/dinner at the hilton.
the dining facility was decorated like you would not believe...they made a life size crocodile out of pine apples...very creative stuff they did with food.

the best part of the day, was the swim i did that afternoon... 2 miles and tried to work off that turkey. nothing like mom's.

so today, i did my ritual wed/fri routine if i am not bothered by leadership demands...and escorted my PT Tech to the other camp (with the pool) and while he sees patients..i SWIM! i try and go 1-2 times a week, some days more some days less.

after getting back today, i was eating lunch and i see conrad ..a seal/physician assistant that i work with in hawaii...who deployed about a month before i did...HE IS MY HOOKUP IN QATAR, so i asked him what is his deal...apparently he is off to do some black ops stuff and won't be in qatar when i go there!! darn..my plans are foiled.

anyway, it was great catching up with him and it looks like we are going to be getting home around the same date whenever that is...he is a swimmer and a paddler as well..and in qatar he swims every day!! drat.

he gave me a name of someone to look up when i get to qatar...the key in getting out in town...so hopefully i can follow through on that.

it is soooo fun to see familiar faces!

i can't believe it...i am living the same situation i did last time i was here..OK, not the same situation, but similar.

I found out i have a replacement..my dear good friend susan is coming to take over my clinic! yippee! a name and it is someone i know, even better.

the downer...she is coming NEXT month--COOL, right. Perhaps because she is coming here, they would send me home with the first group.

NOPE! they are moving my happy a-- down to the big camp to work there for a month before i leave.....do ya think that burns me up or what.

now if they would let me set up MY SMART clinic...then I would be all about staying...hhhhmmm.

i figure i need to start keeping up with my blogg as so many interesting little things happen and i brush them aside, but they do warrent a bit of publicity. i thought i would try and describe my staff....and what i am learning about them, and from them...cuz we are just one big dysfunctional family after all.

I mean, where else in the Navy do you LIVE in the boxes/trailers with everyone you work with...use the same unisex portopotty down the road when nature calls in the middle of the night--you just NEVER know who you are going to bump into at 2 AM. plus, you get to use the same showers for all the permanent party members on base..which is a healthy jaunt to hike to from my living spaces.

crazy! good thing the clinic is a nice hard structure, as they call it, not a building cuz it can disappear when this base disappears...just like my last one! navistar is NOTHING, just sand. you can't even tell that there was anything there at all.
so, my new plan is to describe the characters that are in my life for the time being.....

i have to say, i had the opportunity to swim yesterday! and TODAY! i went to the big camp to get my hair done by a flamboyant filipino gay man---my hair looks like it was done by just that type of fellow....but beggers can't be choosers, and if is all i got, then i gotta do it. i can't wait to see heather back in hawaii, she is going to be dumbfounded.

another patient from hawaii tagged me yesterday...in the dining facility, she tapped me on the shoulder, i was shocked to see her as she had a bad bad back, but she said she was doing great and is off to iraq....it is tooo funny the people i meet and see in this short experience here....

so i managed to get an in with the marines on camp here and got a ticket to the marine corps ball...i also got my good friend at the other camp and her chief one, so we had big plans for sat night. the ball was at the us embassy, so how cool is that. only drawback, we had to be in uniform..DRAT.

so, they came by picked me up and we headed down in our desert cammies and combat boots to the embassy. we attempted to to get dolled up in the car...as you can see tons of makeup and packing heat...now who wouldn't want me to be thier date?

we were able to have a cocktail if we wanted, so i went for the red wine....which was ok. the guests were dressed beautifully, and i was styling in my combat boots! at least my feet were happy.

the dinner was spectacular and it was a great fun time. the token marines came by for photo shoots...

again, the world is tooooo small. as i was chatting with a man from finland and his wife, a member of the consolate came by and we were introduced. long story short: he knows my oldest brother extremely well, graduated from west point with him! in addition, the one navy admiral, supply corps is an avid swimmer and we have too many people and races in common....what a trip.

all in all it was a great opportunity and a break from the base, and feel almost human again. what a treat!

since annie was passing through, and ann is at the next camp up the road, we had a mini pearl harbor reuinion!

i was having a busy day, but annie and ann had a good time catching up and we got a picture taken in my trauma bay.

not anything like our world in honolulu! but it is great to have home in common.

annie is going back after 9 months in iraq...ann and i still have a few months left, but this is a joke compared to iraq

the other pic is when rose conway, another hawaii MSC officer passed through...it is just like meeting up with family!

yep! i am still alive and not doing much blogging lately, so i figure i should capture the last month....since my last notes, i have had some interesting and fun things going on...which is hard to believe here in the isolated desert. but here it goes:

october has flown by so incredibly fast...i had another friend pass through from my command rose conway..she is on her way to iraq. it was great to spend time and hang out with her as she was here for a good number of days..kind of nice to catch me up on the stuff going on back at pearl harbor. traveled down to arifjan for meetings the first week of sep..spent the night and do my swimming thing which is such a treat, but NOW, i have a new scheme, that i don't have to travel the lond distance to that camp...my PT tech has been going to the next camp over every wed and fri since we got here, he HAS to have someone go with him, as no one can travel solo. it occureed to me, that I CAN GO! i drive him down, he sees his patients, i go to the pool swim, get him get back to my camp by lunch. i get my swim in and the staff likes me better cuz i am not so grumpy... so my NEWEST routine is that i swim 2-3 times a week which is the best part of this deployment so far....being in charge has its perks.

on the 11 we had a navy birthday ball..223 years old is the us navy..and it was great. my staff did such a terrific time putting it all together, i was totally amazed. my entire leadership came up for it and were quite taken by what they put together in this austere environment....and then we had a health fair a two weeks later and again, my staff did some absolutely amazing poster sessions that it would put people back home to shame. again, the leadership was up and ironically, they are having a health fair down there in a few weeks, and want to use the presentations my staff made...i said of course, as long as my staff present them too!

we also sponsored and acls (advance cardiac life support) class up here, and my boss and a few other folks cam e up and stayed and taught the class. (my corpsmen all did awsome and passed, the few that took the class, which is a hard thing to do) i actually got selected to teach the courses if i want to become an instructor, which is always a good thing.

then of course, the latest bash was the halloween party! we were invited to the other navy units halloween bash, so about 12 of us got dressed up and piled into the van (the doctor with 2 heads drove) and literally crashed thier party...it was kind of awkward at first as they were not finished with thier command hail and farewell. so it was wierd, BUT, once they finished, the games began. then we all piled back into the van to zip over to the base halloween party, but had missed the costume contest, so they were so many of us, they did another contest...i came in 4th! what a joke. (i was an indian princess)

one of my staff, who is quite gothic in nature LOVES halloween so he had a fright night movie night last night and we bought pizzas for the enlisted...we all watched halloween, the most recent one...not my scene, but it was fun hanging out with the staff.

so today, sunday, my normal routine is laundry and cleaning...but i had to get up and go cover the medical at the other clinic cuz the doctor there is now on r/r so i said i would see the patients there in the morning and then i also get to swim! always a hidden agenda.

the weather is cooling off and the rainy season is starting..my gawd, it poured and lightening and thundered so much the other night is was raining in one of the corpsmans' room. flooding was biblical...and it will get worst as i remember from my last stint here 2 years ago.

this week was quite an interesting week..lots of my staff are losing weight and working out like mad to get in shape as most guys do on deployments...load up on crazy protien diets spending lots of $$ to get the end results....i need to order stock in that stuff.

so, i have one corpsman who is originally from jamaica who has lost 40# since arriving here. BUT, he is not doing the protien craze, gym rat phase...he is eating junk and drinking "MONSTERS"...the nemesis of my clinic, which i will touch on later.

so, he starts to get concerned about his weight loss, thinking it was just cuz he had been a heavy drinker, thought it may be the lack of alcohol...but his labs proved different....600 glucose..holy smokes. diabetic big time. i am banking on type 1 which is most common in young adults...and the FP is thinking it is type 2 cuz of family history. the verdict is still out as we are waiting for the final lab that had to go to germany for the results that will tell us what his pancreas is doing...
meanwhile, the doctors (2 FP's fairly new) who are managing his care are trying to keep him here in kuwait....which, sad to say is not going to happen. A1C is greater than 14....btw. so he needs alot of work to get that down. i am waiting for the lab that tells if it is type 1 or type 2, but regardless, he has gotta go, we shouldn't be managing a diabetic out here with insulin! THE reason of the delay....he met a girl! he and the dental tech have become very special friends and he doesn't want to leave her...my docs are soft so they are dragging thier feet cuz of his personal life. i have to admit, i like having them together, cuz once he is gone, i have a feeling my dental tech is going to fall into deep depression. (when i first met her, i thought she was in the group leaving and asked is she was ready to leave and she said yes--then i realized she was staying! he has been the best thing for her on this deployment)

then corpsman number 2...whose diet consists of "now or later" sugary candy and MONSTERS--a basic bomb of caffiene and crap energy drink which on the label states limit 2 per day and he drinks minimally 4/day that we know of ends up in the hospital cuz after a morning exercise routine (calesthenics only) he was having tea colored urine and now has rhabdomylisis--when the muscle cells basically get so dehydrated and break down and excrete red muscle like fluid into the blood stream which can clog the kidneys and can be very very bad. by the way this is a totally preventable illness if you are drinking LOTS of water, like you are suppose to when you excersise..but a diet of monsters and candy don't help...he is getting tanked up and evaluated in the hospital for 3 days! he comes back today....

i hope i don't have any other funky illnesses from my staff during this deployment...

friday night after spending the entire day in AJ, we are headed back home, and while we are driving we are chatting. i am talking about my past experiences here and how on my very first drive to my old camp the car broke down and i sat in the crazy desert heat with NO water in the middle of the afternoon, totally jetlagged and miserable..only to be followed by my very next time of base when we had a flat tire and the spare was dead...sitting in the desert heat in the middle of the afternoon really is not a very enjoyable experience....so AS i am talking about this we hear an unusual sound..whomp whomp whomp...but then it goes away when the driver slows down...it doesn't FEEL like a flat...and we are in a huge 12 passenger van...

so, i say speed up and see if it happens again...next thing we know this flap of tire goes flying OFF and we hear it..so we pull over..and the tire is full of air, but the middle section of the tire is missing!

so we need to change the tire...those 3 corpsmen worked diligently and had that tire changed relatively fast for such a big vehicle...

meanwhile, we (esp me, since i went swimminng and was looking forward to mongolian bbq) were starving....dinner closes at 8 PM....we got there at 8:05! what a drag, the doors were locked....so we had subway sandwhiches at charleys....not too bad, but NOT mongolian!

when we returned to the clinic, i was labeled the albatross...hhhhmmmm, i wonder if anyone will let me in the car with them--or better yet, how many more times am i gonna sit on the side of the road in the desert of kuwait.

the one thing i forgot to mention, was the young arab who stopped to help. he was in his man dress with his white hat..and i went up to talk to him (as my guys were busy with the tire) i thought our strip of tire hit his car and was asking that and he said no, he just wanted to know if we needed help. later i thought how funny that must have been, this blond american FEMALE packing heat...i wonder what he thought.

ok, i am getting these little mini opportune times to swim, and take advantage of them every chance i get...i had to go to AJ for a leadership meeting all day....followed by a quick trip to the pool.

well, there is a camp (airforce type) relatively close to me and it has a pool...i need to get there!
my friend ann the oic of the other camp wanted to take me there for my birthday, we could swim a bit and shop a bit, cuz with the airforce everything is wonderful and nice...especially the facilities. the pic is of me and ann...she is from hawaii as well, my fellow FNP we deployed together!

so i got a quick 30 min swim in there....the pool is a tad bit longer than AJ, but NO lines, NO t's on the wall, and the lane line i swam in was SOOOO tiny i kept hitting the wall...BUT, i was in the water and doing my thing....what a great feeling.

so, this past week i swam 3 times! now, i am going to PLAN to get to the aiforce pool minimum 2 times a week if i can...a little cross training with the bike, and i should be in maintenance mode until i get home sometime in feb!

so, my birthday was coming up, holy smokes i am 45 years old, i don't feel like it..well, PARTS of my body...knees and joints do...but overall, i am feeling pretty darn great.

the biggest treat for me would be to get to go for a swim! ( not a whole lot of other things i want to do, or can do at this point as we are not allowed on any trips into kuwait during sep as it is ramadan...the holy season)

so i plan to drive down with 2 of my staff who need to go to AJ. i figured i would have lunch with my boss then hit the pool..can't ask for a better time in kuwait. (the little things in life make me happy) sarah (my boss) gave me a great wee presents and then i hit the pool..4500 meters..the least i can do or at this point the most i can do..being outta swimming shape and all.

the flu season is coming, and we need to start thinking about flu shots and possible pandemic stuff so the prev med folks planned a brief at my clinic a few days ago.

so, i hear the name of the prev med doc...danny schiau...another member of the humanitarian team in kenya that i did with UDOH 10 years ago! i told him Udoh was here a few weeks before....on his way into iraq. apparently, danny had been working with udoh helping him to become a PA.

again, it was great seeing another blast from my past and reminiscing about the african safari we went on and hanging out at the hotel/beaches in kenyan.....great memories.

the koreans have a small contigency here and have folks coming and going as well. i had met the ltcol of the koreans as he had stopped by once to have dental work done and find out who i was or whatever. unfortunately he speaks no english and has a translator with him.the koreans are great athletes and i see them at the gym all the time....

this lt col is leaving as his time is up and his replacement is coming, so i get a call that he wants to stop by the clinic and meet with me...thinking it was a formal meeting to introduce his replacement, but it wasn't.

he gave me a nice workout t-shirt and a korean coin as a token. he said he sees me at the gym as well. the new guy was coming in a few days.

i was so excited, i wore my new shirt at the gym that day.

our newest coalition forces are the mongolians....amazing looking folks with really cool names--sound russian like.

they are headed home, i think....anyway, the mongolian surgeon came by and needed some medications--simple stuff like allergy meds, and what not, so we were able to accomodate his request.

this fellow had the most FLAT affect of anyone i know...not sure if it was the language barrier or what but it was in my sense, comical.

so, he came by a few days later, needing a couple more pills...and he showed me a cute key chain with a little eskimo looking girl and he said it was for me...from mongolia. he gave me another one of a hut or typical home they live in and i gave it to noa.

noa's goal after that was to get his camera and get a picture of the mongolians at mongolian barbecue--something we have every friday night! i asked him if he did, and he said he forgot his camera..oh well. next time.

btw, i asked the mongolian doctor what they thought of mongolian bbq, and he states for them it is just meat and onions...now we know the truth.

so, sunday which happened to be my duty day was busier than i had expected....as i am in the doing my job, and annie is still hanging around cuz her flight was that eve--and we dubbed this as her "decompression stop" all the sudden the staff come running back with a marine who got his fingers sliced up pretty bad while his buddy was playing with his knife. WHY do they do that? this happend all the frickin' time, marines play with snakes, scorpians, and thier K-bars...and they get hurt while doing so.

this youngster had ONE hour till he had to leave to go into iraq. at first we looked at his fingers and the lacerations were sooooo deep i thought for sure his tendons were gone, that or circulation, something...but, after a thorough investigation everything was intact, we cleaned him up annie had him sutured sooooo fast that he was outta here within the hour...loaded him up with antibiotics and 18 stitches and sent him on his merry way.

so last friday i went to a class down at the mecca cultural awareness, so i can be aware of the arab culture. i went to it last time i was here..and it was ok then, this time it was painful as a biased agnostic syrian presented....after suffering through that, i went for a quick swim and headed back to camp virginia to learn annie lopez a collegue PA from hawaii was finally passing through on her way back to hawaii--after her 10 month deployment--it started as 6 months.

she was with the marine wing in iraq...so it was so great to visit with her and catch up and chat about her experiences of her deployment.

but the coolest thing about annie being here, is we have a hidden bond between us..we BOTH were stuck at Navistar in our past deployments! she had been there 6 months prior to me and we commiserated about it together again...tooo funny.

since i have bunk beds, she was able to get a good night sleep in my room before heading back to the mainland. i felt like school girls again!

the next day, ann uetz, another colleague NP from hawaii, who is the OIC of a busier camp came down and we had lunch together...3 of us from Hawaii in kuwait hanging out...crazy.

last night i went to dinner with noa the family practice doc...we were in our PT clothes and were going to go to the gym after eating.

as we were going to get our ID's checked at the dining facility the soldier checking cards mumbled something to us....i didn't hear what he said, but noa said to him that "she is military"--apparently he thought i was civilian....as we walked a way noa says to me "and she is the highest ranking officer on base" in a joking manner, which i thought was hysterical, cuz i never thought about it before, and as a matter of fact, it is true!!

toooo funny.

last night at 1100 pm, i get a call that there is an albanian patient that may have an appendicitis per his doctor and needs to be seen. so i get outta my comfortable bed and get to my clinic to wait for my patient to arrive as we sent the ambulance to pick him up as his tent is very far away from the clinic.

so the albanian (who speaks little english) was brought to the clinic with his doctor (who spoke english)

low and behold the guy has CLASSIC appendicitis symptoms textbook even going on for ~10 hours. he looks great, vitals signs were beautiful but rebound tenderness and when i asked him to hop up and down he did not like that. since don't have a way to measure his white count or CT capability i had to transport him down to the hospital. so by 1157 i am DONE with him and ready for him to go away--and it takes the ambulance team 2 hours before they come to transport him to AJ....which get my sufficient time to work with his officers....cuz apparently, they are leaving to go home to albania after 6 months in iraq, tomorrow. at 2 AM, me trying to coordinate the logistics for this evolution was comical. they want to know what is going to happen, when is he going to leave, and they have no contact information for anything...i told them to come back in the morning and we would know more, then.

well, i learned my patient went to the OR this around8 am or so.....the officers came back into find out what the status was with him. i explained the situation and pending how he felt, he MAY be able to fly out with the rest of them the next day.....this is when i became the albanian liaison! i was calling all over to figure out how to get him home if he is unable to fly the next day...they were really concerned as well...stating only a few flights into albania per year, and the families would be devastated if they showed up from iraq without him...etc etc.

later in the day, i called the surgeon for a status...and low and behold, he was recovering great and i was told he would be fit to fly home the next morning....so i informed my albanian contingency who were hanging out.

so, as far as i know...they all left together.

interesting what people remember about you.....and you of them.

yesterday, i ran across, yet another group of navy medical types coming OUT of iraq totally giddy cuz they are headed home. and i ran across a nurse i knew in san diego YEARS ago...and the ortho surgeon...jon lynott!

i worked with him in guam...he had to BEST condo in tumon bay as i recall..that they bought--for a pretty penny, and was a great investment.

what he remembers about me is that i am lightning in the water (we apparently did a few swim races in guam) and that i turned over the bioethics committee chairman job to him and it helped him out tremendously! he even REMEMBERED my miserable knee!! ha ha....

isn't that too funny....

Prior to leaving Hawaii for this second free trip to kuwait, i called my detailer--the person who tells me where to go in regards to the navy and duty stations, and i asked if i could EXTEND in hawaii...the answer was a big fat NO. (and this is a friend of mine)

So, at this point in my life....quality of life is important, so location is key and since there are only so many nurse practitioner billets in the navy..i am a bit limited. AND the ONLY place i want to move to after living in hawaii--which i don't want to leave anyway, is SAN DIEGO.

so, when my detailer offered me ONLY 2 positions, one being OAK HARBOR WASHINGTON (where i nearly fell outta my chair) or SAN DIEGO, teaching at the schoolhouse there, I took that one lickity split...she deterred me a bit, cuz of the promotion think, said it is not a good place to go for me if i want to make 06. i told her i really want the job, and to "pencil me in" she did it with great hesitation.

i sent her an email last week to solidify my future, where am i going if i have to leave hawaii....
and she has given me as i had hoped SAN DIEGO, where i will be teaching at the School house (teaching corpsmen to become independent duty corpsmen) I leave hawaii in june, report to san diego in july...not a whole lot of time left in hawaii when i get back, drat.

oh, well..i can always go back to hawaii....after living on islands (and kuwait) for 7 years....this should help me decide if i miss the mainland or not.

another glamourous thing about this camp is the showers...which are extremely inconveniently located several blocks from where we live.
so, my day revolves around when i plan to take a shower..cuz there are only 6 showers, and i have 9 women in my staff--and that does not include all the other women in the other units that are permanent staff at the base.
as i was gone the other day for death by meetings at camp arifjan, i learned there was a big sand dust storm here..
well, carlos had just taken a shower and was walking the several minute walk back to his room when the sand storm hit...by the time he got to his room he was covered in dust just like a powdered donut! i asked if he went back to take another shower!!

the day before the horribly painful humid hot, not wanting to walk to the dfac day...we had a totally amazing biblical thunder storm.
i hear this loud kaboom..which i thought was explosive from up the road (EOD) but it was 11 PM and woke me out of a dead sleep...then i realized it was thunder.
my room was shaking due to the noise and it poured like you would not believe. but within minutes after the rain, it is incredibly dry again...crazy, eh?
could this be global warming.....something to ponder.

so, i have to say....september is by far the hottest most humid month here as far as i am concerned and since this is my second september here in 2 years, i believe i have the credibility to back me up on my observation.

so this past week it has been crazy humid...and HOT ugggghhhh.
to give you and idea about my existence here...the DINING FACILITY (DFAC) is a healthy 1/4 mile away...walking on gravel rocks and sand...believe me this 6 minute walk can feel like near death in the heat, add on the humidity and it is absolutely insane.

2 days ago was the moste hellish walk i have EVER done as i was painfully miserable, more so than ever before. i decided to start a log and note the most painful walk back from lunch..and sep 9th is by far the most excruciating...and my staff will agree with me!

the duty crew will use the car or van to drive to the dfac...I figure the walk is good for us, but if we experience heat and humidity like that again...we are ALL driving!!

since we are the crossroads we get lots of "passerbys" medical folks coming and going in addition to the mass quantities of the units.

SO, lots of doctors, nurses, pa's and corpsmen to say the least.
and like all people who actually "see" one of your own--Navy medicine.. we BOND mutually....and the dining facility is where it all happens.

this past week a large contingency of medical are passing through..and of course we bond, talk, and do the ol' "do you know so and so" routine, or " i know you from somewhere" routine. and shocking as it may seem, i Know a lot of people, and have worked with a lot of people passing through.

so, the other day, i had a marine who crushed his hand getting ONTO the plane in california to come here--14 hours later, he comes straight to medical for his finger--he bypassed eating breakfast, so i know it is prob broken.

i get an xray--and the fracture is close to the joint, but not in the joint, so i splinted and treated as such...

forunate for me...a passerby is an orthopedic surgeon! i see him later and have him review the xray and discuss my plan--which was fine according to him.

i really like these passerby's...

one thing that keeps me entertained is the coalition folks that come through here...so far, other than Tonga, we have seen, British, Polish, Bosnia, Moldova, Korea (who live here), El Salvador, that i can think of now...a few other may have made thier way through and i haven't figured out who or where they are from.....

so, the other day there was a soccer tournement...the koreans vs el salvador, vs bosnia. apparently the bosnians played very "aggressively" against the koreans, and of course one the tournement....if flags were being played, they would have been called out ALOT

camp virginia is interesting.....it is a transition place where folks (from all over) pass through to go either into or out of theatre--i.e. middle east. my chances of seeing familiar faces is obviously increased and as i am learning, i am seeing ALOT of blasts from my navy past.

the latest and greatest is Carl Long, a PA that i worked with in guam..he like me got tagged again for his second trip over here. it is great catching up and talking about mutual people we know.

BUT, the most interesting one, so far, is LTJG Udoh.....i met him 10 years ago on the USS Harpers Ferry, i had spent a month on that ship and we went into mombasa, kenya do participate in a humanitarian mission.

so UDOH, who was Seaman Udoh at the time was part of the medical team because he is originially from Nigeria and in his country he is a doctor!! needless to say, in kenya they don't speak nigerian and vice versa, so he needed translators like the rest of us.....anyway, he basically came to the US and joined the navy without telling anyone in his family. i always wondered what became of him, and low in behold i see him in the dining facility sitting with Lt butler, the PA i work with, cuz they are classmates from physician assistant school--they both graduated last year.

so, Udoh, has gone from seaman, to personellman then became a PA. he was never allowed to be a corpsman as it was not allowed do to his prior schooling as a doctor.

so, now on his way into iraq or wherever, Udoh is studying to take his step 1 and eventually become a US doctor...it is taking him a while, but i know he will do it. talk about perseverence.
i wish him the best of luck

the temp 135 degrees! balmy...this i the back sid of my clinic with the steps leading to the toilet...it is just like a gas station, you grab a key and go outside!! note the "head" we go up the ramp to....

here are a few pics in front of the clinic...with my colleagues who are on a visit to my clinic...capt marks is my boss!

there is one with me and my LPO..a great admin resource here...

here is a pic of me and my staff minus the night shift....my commanding officer, senior enlisted and my boss were visiting, hence the weapons that they are wearing!

as i am having lunch with several member of my staff a few days ago, a female comes up to me and says hi! do you remember me? at first i thought she was a nurse i may have known, then she explains that we were in guam? we use to swim together, and told me her name.

HOLY SMOKES! she must have put on well over 20 pounds cuz i did not recognize her at first...then it clicked in my head, and i remembered her clearly...we had done a few swims in guam together. she is passing through going into iraq for the 6 month deal doing whatever...

This morning, after being woken up by my staff playing volleball outside my room 0500-i was suppose to go to the gym and did not get my big lazy butt out of bed....so i don't want to be seen by my staff, but I have to go the bathroom something fierce! so i finally succumbe and walk out in front of them all to tromp down to the lovely toilet at the end of our "pad" where we live more or less. yes, we live together, pee together, work together, and bi-golly we shower together--me and the girls that is.....

so, my morning ritual, is while i am getting ready for work ion the am...i have a hot water pot and i enjoy a lovely cup of tea in my room. then i usually get a knock on the door from jorge, ormy neighbor who is the dentist, or he knocks on mine and we take the .5 mile walk to the Dining facility for breakfast.

So, this moring, i am sitting at breakfast and i looked over and saw a blast from the past! we caught each others eye and that lightbulb of recognition came over both our faces at the same time!

It was Marty a navy commander and Dentist that deployed HERE with me in the same detachement in 2006 while i went to Navistar..HE came HERE! so he was the dentist here in virginia at the same time--i actually came by and visited him and i have some pictures from my last trip prob 2 years to the date to be honest.

we were unable to get any photos today, cuz he just got in today and is leaving in a few hours...to go into iraq.

we were both laughing about the fact that we are both on our second deployments in such a short time!!!

so, the tonga royal marines who we immunized are here for a bit....so i was told that they can sing....and that they would be singing at the gospel service on sunday. so i made a point of it to go to the service and my GOD can they sing...like angels--more like the big hearty angel like gabriel. it was amazing!

they have the coolest t-shirtst that they wear with thier uniform..i am trying to figure out a way to barter for one.....i have lots of navy t-shirts i can use....

meanwhile that was the first gospel service i have ever attended......interesting, but fun.

since this camp is a huge transition place for folks coming and going to assist with the stuff going on in iraq, we have lots of different coalition forces passing through......helping out the US, we help them out with giving them immunizations!

So now, we have got the process down pretty good running through the clinic...

we had a massive group of el salvadoreans recently--who speak no english, which is always a challenge...

and now the royal marines from TONGA! i feel ALMOST in hawaii! what a cool group of guys....no eye contact whatsoever and they have the coolest names i.e. talakihi.....big strong hardy island folk...i imagine they all paddle as well :)

after the ordeal and making it just in time for dinner...i am anxious to get the swim in that i missed cuz i spent the entire day in a hot car....but first i need to fix up my bed for the night in the main building where EVERYONE at camp cupcake stay...so i am bumping into all kinds of people....
so, i am chatting with the radiologist, some really tall fellow sees me and says "ellen" and gives me a big hug! meanwhile, i am racking my brain as how do i know him.....he is not in uniform
it turns out he is "hutch" a navy pilot that i deployed with 11 years ago....we hang out the entire time on deployment, and i remember making him go to the water park in singapore with me...he remembered the mongolian bbq that he had had for the first time that night.
we met at the pool and chatted..he is here for a few days doing evals on IED or somthing.
i told him i saw Matt one of his peers when i was in qatar my last deployment!
too funny.

so, i have to go down to camp cupcake...where the pool is....for a monthly meeting..drive down the night before dine with all the big wigs, discuss the book club--speed of trust, good book by stephen covey...and meet the next day as well.

this is a great opportunity for me to SWIM, so i don't mind going. as a matter of fact, we left with plenty of time for me to swim before dinner....unbeknownst to me...when we were 5 min from the camp, my boss. WHO HAD JUST LEFT the other camp and had coordinated with the staff at the other camp (which is close by mine) told me I was suppose to pick them up, and i said, that she was---logically, they were there, the staff had thier bags ready to go. but for some UNKNOWN reason, and poor communication, they did not give them a ride. SO my chief and i had to turn around and drive the 1 1/2 hours to go BACK and pick them up...meanwhile, the gas gage was on ZERO! i was use to my old staff and always leaving the tank full, my chief did not look and we were literally sweating it--cuz we turned the AC off to make it to our destination!!

thank goodness we did....i was having flashbacks of sitting on the side of the road stranded as that happened to me TWICE last time i was here.

the only time i seem to watch TV is while i am eating meals...this morning was truly amazing...esp the men's 400 meter swim! apparently i am not alone...everyone else has the same idea, and you can hear it in the dining facility...

today we had our first major incident-like patient...i was at my desk and i heard screaming coming down the hall and they were bringing in a civilian contractor who had a crush injury to his middle finger, it the finger was still attached, but hanging by a skin more or less.
the staff did phenomenally well, and as did the patient..in our clinic. we had him on a helo and in the cas rec (ER) in under an hour. poor fellow did lose the tip of the finger in the long run.
it was great to see the staff working as a team as we have been working so hard to clean, organize and fix up the place after inheriting a mess....

sunday morning....i actually got down to camp arifjan (aka camp cupcake) where the swimming pool is as well as the hospital and shops and LOADS of people..plus the politics that go along with big places. i need to stay and clean my living quarters as it is constantly filthy from the sand and dirt, but my chief who works for me insisted that i go with him as i am the "memo" if you are an 05 or above, you don't need a memo to get off base, so I am the memo.
so after a ride up to beuhring to pick up another chief we drove to camp cupcake..not tooo bad as i got a nice LONG swim in and felt a billion times better...plus, i bought a funky bike to cruise around my camp on..as we have no paved roads the mt bike is a bonus.
and the best thing, i got my hair done!! oh, the little things that make you feel so much better...

the Lord works in mysterious ways, isn't that the truth.
i am so lucky i am not alone this tour, i have a dentist Jorge, a PA, carlos, and a family practice doctor Noa...our little team and great people.
so, i am sitting at breakfast today with jorge and noa and we were talking about CNN, and i had mentioned that my friend sue works for CNN and we have been friends since childhood in virginia....to make a LONG story short...Noa and i went to the same high school. MT Vernon...and as the world gets smaller. Noa was mentored by my brother Harry in a youth group for 4 years!! Noa expressed the positive affect and impact that harry had on him.....
we both were absolutely amazed! i had to email harry right away.

so i am going into dinner last night and apparently it is indian food night... and you may find this hard to believe, but EVERYONE that works in the DFAC (dining facility per the army) is indian. i more or less was escorted to the indian food serving area and was recommended to "try everything" per the staff working there. you better believe it is authentic indian food!! tasty and spicey....they were so proud, i was asked on the way out how i liked it!
meanwhile...i barely made it back to the latrine as it went right through me like a cathartic!!

So i inherited a rather messed up clinic here...lovely building as it is a permanent structure.with no indoor sewage, but we have sinks to wash our hands which is a bonus. BUT the clinic itself is filthy and not organized. man do we have alot to do. and training the staff is going to take a lot of time. right now i would be very concerned if a critical patient i.e. blast or gunshot came in as everything is sloppy and staff not trained up. i am trying to figure out where to start....the 4 huge volumes of standard operating procedures amaze me....

everything is a trade off when it comes to assignments here in kuwait....camp arifjan is disneyland with the pool, people and all the ammenities of camp cupcake. the OTHER outlying clinics.....not so great, but they have better living accomodations, except.....virginia.

I am trying to figure out who i pissed off to keep sending me to the remote clinics. i have a HUGE room in a trailer to live in...but the "toilet" is about 20 meters walk OUTSIDE...and the absolutely best part of my living conditions is that the SHOWER is a healthy walk....i'd say 300 meters away....about a block. this is definitely going to take some getting use to...

although, i believe i will have INTERNET in my room, so that is a bonus....they don't have that at the camp that has rockstar berthing!

it is true, the human body can adapt to anything....i will let you know in 6 months

So, i am now the officer in charge of camp virginia troop medical clinic....i am having TOTAL flashbacks of my last deployment and the misery i had there.....the jet lag has whipped my butt and i am a walking zombie.

CAMP Virginia---way different from navistar! first of all I AM NOT ALONE!!! i have a doc and a PA and jorge the dentist are here to share the workload as well as hang out with me.

so far..and it has been 4 days...my staff of 20 plus seem awsome and the clinic is actually a real building with running water----no indoor plumbing for sewage...so going to the toilet is always a treat.

but the clinic itself has a lab, pharmacy, xray, PT, and all of the nuances of a real acute care clinic....what a treat for me!

now i made it to the transition tents....in camp arifjan...deja vu, big time. I NEVER in my wildest dreams imagine that i would ever be back here again, but NEVER say NEVER isnt' that the truth.

so, living in the tent with the other gaggle of women.....always needing a battle buddy cuz i am now in the infamous "rape zone"

i don't know if it is cuz i have 4 brothers, or what, but i seem to get along with men much better and spent most of my time traveling with the radiologist "bill", ken, chris the FP doc, Jorge, the dentist, and smattering of other guys.....i think it is cuz i dragged them to the pool or swimming with me on numerous occassions!

i spent a whopping 2.5 days in this area before they moved me up and out to my final destination: CAMP VIRGINIA

i have to say, the flight and times were much more conducive this go round EXCEPT for the 2 hour layover in colorado at midnight where we had to deplane and sit around on the pavement waiting to reboard!! the airforce definately know how to treat the navy! that was pretty miserable, needless to say.

stopped in germany, then finally kuwait....NOT near as painful as last time.....but still not the best time of my life.

we arrived bright and early in the morning....0500!

so after we do the inprocessing stuff for kuwait...i am now loaded up with 3 seabags full of " stuff" and headed to camp pendleton for the SAME training and living conditions as last deployment.....



I am trying to figure why the heck they want us living on cots and wood frame tents and limited resources...i.e. NO HOT WATER in the showers for 2 weeks, so that we can be shipped off to kuwait....the army doesn't even treat thier soldiers that bad before they deploy! at least they have indoor housing/plumbing and a bed to sleep in on their way out of country.



anyway, i had the opportunity to get a few swims in at la jolla cove!! yippee, visit with maureen, bob and thier family. PLUS attend my brother michael-CAPT SEAL type change of command ceremony in coronado the day before i left...which was great.



we had lots of free time and i was able to get to the pool and san diego a few times to do laundry at my sisters, cuz, shockingly, NO LAUNDRY services at camp pendleton!

august 4...whew! the last month has been chaotic, unsettling, frusterating and exhausting...thankfully it is OVER and NOW the fun begins! HA! HA!

i left hawaii the 6th of july RED EYE to get to LAX with Ken the optometrist from my command... i rented a car to travel to port hueneme for the week long INPROCESSING process...basically to redo everything we had already done to deploy. Needless to say, my knee which is a mess and has been for the past 20 some years is looking really bad, especially on xray. SOOOO, I am deemed non-deployable. since i have been to kuwait, actually just returned last year...the EMF and CENTCOM surgeon are willing to provide me a medical waiver for my knee. so i am cleared for deployment..next stop.....CAMP PENDLETON....back to the miserable existance of 2 years ago!

the best part of this ordeal, was getting sat off to visit jeanne in santa monica go out for a fabulous lunch with my brother michael and his wife and daughter.

although i was glad to be cleared for deployment....that total knee replacement is not toooo far off in my future...and i am hoping this knee lasts at least 1-2 more years.