Greetings from Mississippi

I'VE HAD TO TAKE OUT SOME INFORMATION, BUT THAT IS BECAUSE OF SOMETHING CALLED OPSEC - OPERATIONAL SECURITY. IT IS NOT A BIG PROBLEM. THEY DIDN'T TELL US WHAT WE COULD AND COULDN'T SAY UNTIL A FEW DAYS AFTER THEY TOLD US WHAT OUR NEW MISSION ENTITLED.

Well, it has been a hot and extremely humid 2 1/2 weeks, and I have finally found where I can access some Internet! As Sarah has mentioned in other posts, I suffered from heat cramps and dehydration, even though I was eating all my meals and drinking plenty of fluids. My Minnesota blood was not ready for this heat where you sweat all the time. Then, because the humidity is so high, it doesn't cool you off, so what does your body do? Sweat some more! I basically ran out of salt from sweating so much, then, no matter how much water I drank, I wouldn't have been able to retain it because my salt was gone. Now I have bronchitis, which I have 5 different medicines to take, all of them seemingly at different times throughout the day. I was on bed rest today, and will be on bed rest tomorrow. I then can't do any extraneous activities for 2 more days after that.
As for our mission update, Sarah got the gist of it out there. Once we deploy to Iraq, we will be deploying in a Battalion (which is comprised up of multiple Companies). My Company will not be with the rest of the Battalion, we will be separated from them where it will be our company, and a bunch of "high speed individuals". From there we will be conducting Tower security, and checkpoints in and out of the base. Security is so tight that if your not supposed to be on the base, you will not be let on for any reason. Aside from the duties we have to do on base, we will also be required to do things off base including vehicle convoys (mounted patrols) and dismounted patrols (on foot) through the city, or cities, that surround the base. They have been catching a lot of the IED's (Improvise Explosive Devices or Roadside Bombs) as they are set up on the road and they are able to disarm and destroys these before they are used on convoys.
The Urban part of our mission is 'eerie', as my Platoon Sergeant called it. When we do foot patrols through the city, we do not have the advantage, and he said you can feel it. While he was there, he had to assist the soldiers that were there in clearing an abandoned multi-level, multi-room building where small arms fire (pistols, rifles, etc.) had been reported to be coming from. Having to clear a small, one story 3 room building is hard enough, but a multi level building? That takes a ton of coordination and troops. It is also not uncommon for our base to receive small arms fire on a fairly steady basis.
I say all this, not to scare people, but to show people that what our mission has changed to is not going to be easy. I say this because it gives people the opportunity to pray for more specific things, and to understand what will be going on while I am over there. I also ask that people pray for the mental health of all our soldiers, as there is now a high probability that soldiers will be injured while we are there, and that can take a huge psychological toll on a person. Not that there wasn't a risk of that before, but being on a base that receives small arms fire from buildings that we have to clear increases that risk.
I hope to send out an email updating things for everyone, but right now my personal computer is dead, and it contains all my contacts. Thanks everyone for your continuing prayers and support as Sarah and I go through this difficult step in life.

I'VE HAD TO TAKE OUT SOME INFORMATION, BUT THAT IS BECAUSE OF SOMETHING CALLED OPSEC - OPERATIONAL SECURITY. IT IS NOT A BIG PROBLEM. THEY DIDN'T TELL US WHAT WE COULD AND COULDN'T SAY UNTIL A FEW DAYS AFTER THEY TOLD US WHAT OUR NEW MISSION ENTITLED.