Letters from "home":
I got a package of letters from the Martin Luther King Elementary School in Utica, NY today. They were very nice U.S. flags that had been colored by the children. On the back of each page was a short letter. Utica, NY is (was) the hometown of the 414th Civil Affairs Battalion, my current unit. It is nice that someone from there has shared my information with one of the local elementary schools.

Pictures of Iraq:
I know that I said in an email to many of you that I would post pictures of my Iraqi adventures here. That was a failure. This is not a picture friendly blog. Anyway, if you would like to see some pictures of my playtime in the desert, they are posted at my Picasa (service by Google) site at http://picasaweb.google.com/hrunting74/IraqiAdventure .

October ended with great weather, and November has been nice. I think that the rest of the year is not worth vacationing in Baghdad. Today was cool in the pre-dawn morning and many of the soldiers I saw were wearing jackets. The rainy season will start soon. I'm not looking forward to a 30 minute walk to work in the rain and mud every day.

Election Changes:
Well, there it is folks. The Democrats have taken the House, the Senate is up for grabs, and the Sec Def has resigned. There are definitely some changes on the horizon.

Six Months in Baghdad:
I've now been in Baghdad for over six months. I think that if it were six years, I would still not fully understand more than a small portion of the complexities that make up the political and cultural landscape here. With that said, we have seen the Iraqi government take its first steps as a democratically elected entity, we have seen Al Zarqawi fall and Hussein convicted by the international community. If these things are seen as accomplishments, they must be weighed against their costs.

The better mosquito:
Nature should have developed a better mosquito by now. Natural selection should certainly have caused a mosquito that has a painless bite and leaves no itchy welt. This would be a simple mutation when compared with something like...the eight-eye visual system of spiders or the Wolf's sense of smell. A mosquito with a painless bite would definitely live longer, feed more, and have a greater chance to reproduce.

Civil Affairs Officer:

I am working as a civil affairs officer. The basic concept of my job is assisting the democratic government of Iraq to function independently by aiding them in the development of their infrastructure and local governance.