Skype me? No, Skype you!

I have developed a series of phantom maladies. I went to the doctor, who, upon thorough examination, informed me that there is nothing medically wrong with me. I am just sad. I suppose I was wrong to assume that the mind will feel sadness before the body does, but as I am up – functioning, laughing, working, cleaning, shopping, writing – I have proven myself wrong. Last Tuesday and again this Sunday I was plagued with headache and congestion. Tuesday I also had a sore throat. This weekend I had vertigo. Today I have pain in my lower back and it seems I have developed Restless Leg Syndrome. I’m fine, but I’m not fine, apparently.


Today my health took a serious turn. For the better. Corey had told me on Saturday that he wasn’t sure if they were leaving for Iraq on Monday or Wednesday, but I was not expecting to hear from him for several days. The vertigo started when I got off the phone with him on Saturday, not knowing when I would talk to him again but figuring it wouldn’t be until he got into another country. And then, and then, AND THEN….

My new friend and fellow sufferer Rhonda called me at 1:30 AM. When I answered, she blurted “Corey is online! He’s in Iraq, and he told me not to call and wake you, but I am anyway!” I flew out of bed, through the dark to the living room. At 1:30 in the morning, my sleep mask is on my forehead, my hair is falling out of the ponytail I put at the top of my head, and I’m in one of my favorite white cotton nightgowns. This is no time to be concerned with appearances. Corey is 7,100 miles away and I am about to LOOK at him.

I got to Skype my husband for 45 minutes this morning. He was in his room at the camp in Iraq, with horribly ugly paneled walls and new sheets that, judging from the photo and the source, are of a low thread count. I got to talk to him and watch him laugh, and make faces at me, and scratch his head and look around….We did it again this morning, at 7:15 AM, and I have to say that early morning Skyping is better that Skyping in the middle of the night.

I have felt better today than I have since weeks before he left. Seeing him home when we know he’s about to leave again can put a damper on the joy of being around him. It’s hard not to feel like that. But he’s there, and he’s settled, and this is how we’ll be for the next eight months. Despite being awake for over an hour in the middle of the night, I feel rested and happy. Transition is over. He’s “home.” For his home the rest of the year, anyway.

Skype is the best thing ever invented for the in love and alone. You can use Skype to call another computer with Skype. You can use Skype on your computer to call any phone number in the United States, and it just sounds like being on a car phone. He has a phone number, so you can call him and he’ll answer if he’s online. If he’s not online, a lovely British woman will let you leave him a voicemail.

I think about wives during WWI and WWII, when you had to write a letter with pens and paper and wait many weeks for your honey to receive it, and many, many weeks to get a response. I have violent thoughts when I see people being affectionate with each other, but at least I know where he is and what it looks like.

The one and ONLY negative thing that happened to me today is that I came home from work to Murphy having resumed the tearing-up of the carpet he stopped months ago. I mean, it’s a rental. I’m definitely not going to get my $700 deposit back, PLUS they may charge me for having to lay all new carpet down in the bedroom. I walked him this morning AND at lunch and the little asshole damaged shit that doesn’t belong to us.

Also, I spoke to the anti-Tony in Customer Service today. I called a credit card company that is totally in the wrong, and the anti-Tony asked me to fax him my power of attorney and the bill I received and they would clear it up and call me back. I asked him what I was supposed to do next and he said “have an enjoyable evening.” How lovely!

I would also like to issue this warning. Please don’t ask me if I’m going to the Mayor’s office, because I’m not. Please don’t ask me what I’m going to do next, because I’m working on it. And for God’s sake, if you put a tongue click or an “Aw” in there to express your pity for me, I will roundhouse you in the head.

Here’s a picture Corey posted on Facebook. I don’t know what he’s doing, but I do know that that plate down there is supposed to protect the wa-hoo from bullets and shrapnel.

........

My attorney has advised me to come over this counter and whip your ass

Remember yesterday's run-in with That Woman at the credit union? That Woman assured me that no transactions were pending on the account. However, en route to work this morning, I received a courtesy call from the credit union this morning, informing me that the account was several hundred dollars overdrawn. Imagine my extreme delight. There are ample dollars in the savings account attached to the checking account that they will not give me access to.

I went back today, but I did not go see her. I asked to see a Member Services Representative, who turned out to be a very sweet little guy named Tim. Tim took my paperwork to his supervisor, a.k.a. The Big Gun, who came back in after a few minutes with that damn piece of paper That Woman gave me yesterday, the one that tells you what your Power of Attorney should say, specifically mentioning the credit union fourteen times. I told her not to give me that piece of paper, I already had one.

The Big Gun gave me the same instructions that the woman yesterday did. I pointed out to her that a credit union is defined by law as a financial institution, and therefore my power of attorney did too cover my banking for my husband here. She told me their attorney would look at it but he would probably need it to be redone.

I asked The Big Gun how, exactly, she expected that to occur, since my husband was deployed, currently in Kuwait (it is convenient here for me to lead her to believe that I am in less contact with him than I actually am) with camels and sand. She said they have, in the past, spoken to deployed soldiers concerning their bank accounts. She was certain that my POA would not be approved by the attorney, and they would need to speak to my husband to authorize me on his account, or he would have to sign and notarize a new POA.

I have confirmed statements like that to be my trigger. When I am told that someone needs to speak to my husband, it only reminds me how unaccessible he is, and how unbelievably sad I am, and they leave me with no choice but to commence a complete meltdown where I stand. And so, I first said "I'm going to need your name" and started crying. Under advisement from my attorney, I then told her that three things would soon happen: 

1. I would find a judge to compel them to honor THIS power of attorney.
2. I would remove my family's business from this financial institution.
3. I would sue this insitution, and name her in the suit.

I requested that she make a copy of my power of attorney so that it could be returned to me and I could leave. She left. Poor Tim was left in the room with me as I sat crying. He asked a couple questions about the deployment, very sweet, and told me to thank my husband for him, then told me he was going to check on the The Big Gun. When he came back, he said that The Big Gun was trying to get in touch with the attorney, and would I like to wait. I said I intended to, and thanked him.

Poor Tim was left in that room with me for a good 20 minutes before The Big Gun said that she was not able to get in touch with Credit Union Attorney, and I decided to return to work, but not before I got the attorney's name and phone number. Here's where this story gets very amusing.

Turns out my attorney/father knows this attorney. But he isn't just acquainted with him by virtue of practicing the same profession in the same area of law in the same state. B-E-T-T-E-R! My attorney/father FISHES with the credit union's attorney. So he called, and when he couldn't get him, he called all their friends, and assured me that sooner or later, he would track him down and get this matter cleared up post haste. After a couple hours, my father's friend Five called me at work and gave me the attorney's number, but he had already called him and explained the situation and the attorney was waiting on my call.

When I called him, his secretary put me right through to him. He got on the phone laughing, because only Stick Wilson would have his daughter storming into banks threatening to sue people. (In defense of my dad, he doesn't sue people willy nilly. The only time he's sued anyone for me was when I was in college and Corey and I were moving out of an apartment, which was robbed while the property's cleaning people were there. So we used the property company and got a little money.) Credit Union Attorney was approving my power of attorney and I was free to bank on my husband's behalf in this particular institution.

Poor Tim called me late this afternoon to let me know that my power of attorney had been approved and I could get the deposit issue cleared up at any branch the next morning. I wanted to say "damn right it's been approved" but I sweetly thanked him for being thorough, and hung up the phone.

On a less-triumphant-for-me note, I am really dreading the dismantling of the staff of the Office of the Lt. Governor. Early on, before the election, I got some good advice to think about what I wanted my next job to look like at, or to which type or organization I would like to contribute next. It’s hard to think, when you’ve only ever worked for SOMEONE, shifting your focus and your career to serve SOMETHING. It’s so impersonal. More on this later.

Someone also posted this picture of Corey on their Facebook page today, and while I love looking at him, my eyes burn with tears when I look at him, in full battle rattle and surrounded by sand. I have to look hard, underneath all that shit, to find MY Corey, who only wears sneakers, oversized jeans, band t-shirts and Red Sox baseball caps, and does things like wrestle small children, play video games and hold my hand in public. (By the way, baby, Tim Gunn told Oprah that men over 25 should NEVER be caught in baggy jeans with holes and heavy distressing. By 30, jeans should be a dark wash, with a tailored fit, and sneakers are just for exercising. If you’ll go ahead and come home, though, you can wear what you want and I’ll tell Tim Gunn to get f***ed.)

That's his driver Moore in the middle and his gunner Corey Hatfield on the right.

...

You wanna piece of me?!

My assault on Tony in Customer Service continued today.

Without giving too much information to establish identity, let's just say that I have an aquaintance in my professional life who is particularly difficult, being constantly sky-high on some powertrip, loving to appear more knowledgeable than anyone else (conveniently me) and spending the majority of her time trying to make other people look bad. I learned a long time ago that information from this acquaintance should come with a grain of salt, and on the occasions when I review where her opinion comes from, I delight in finding a way for me to be right, and her to be, in fact, a big wrong pompous ass.

The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away though, because I did not have such success in my banking endeavors this afternoon. Did y'all know there is some federal law that means my credit union will only allow me to move money out of savings via online banking six times per month? I forgot about this. I move almost all of Corey's money in to his savings account on payday and then put in his checking account as needed. Today I reached my limit, so I went to the credit union with my power of attorney to move money from Corey's savings to Corey's checking.

Teller Lady takes my window slip, driver's license and POA to someone who allegedly knows more about this shit than she does.  That Woman comes over to me and tells me that they need the original POA so that they can verify the copy that they will make and give to their staff attorney for review and approval. Reasonable and sensible. That Woman then tells me that my POA is written wrong, and in order to get approval from her staff attorney, it will need to be re-done. As is, it states that I am allowed to conduct transactions with Corey's bank or financial institution. Credit unions are not banks, but they are financial institutions, which is why my attorney put that language in there. That Woman, being in no way trained to bind me to her legal opinion, said that since it does not say "credit union" in it, it must be re-done. She either needs me to do a new POA, signed by my deployed husband, or needs to be able to reach my deployed husband on the phone to authorize my use of his account.

I am learning that is what puts me over the edge. I lean my head into the teller window, where That Woman also has Teller Lady and Some Random Observer in the area with her, and begin to cry. I am stunned, and stammer at her how she would like for that to occur, since my husband is in Kuwait, making very few phone calls and mailing nothing. Not only is "credit union" covered in this POA as a "financial institution" (generic, yes?) but the last paragraph of the POA says that Corey gives me the authority to do whatever the hell I want with all of his shit, including anything and everything not expressly stated in the provisions of the POA. I refrain from using expletives with That Woman, but I am sure they were implied. I assure her that I will be back tomorrow with the original, and will wait for her staff attorney to review it, in case my attorney needs to clear this matter up with him directly over the phone.

My attorney is livid. He wishes I would've climbed over the counter to "slap the shit out of her." I am a Blue Star wife and this is no way for me to be treated. I am to go back over there tomorrow, with the original, and ask her for her supervisor AND her staff attorney. If That Woman gives me shit, I am to get her full name so that I may name her in a suit I am under advisement to file against the institution. If the staff attorney gives me shit, I am to call my attorney. He is in court all day tomorrow, but I am to call the judge's office and have them get a message to him, so that he can ask for a recess and call the staff attorney to hand him his ass. A girl can always depend on her daddy, yes?

Remember the Boo Boo Bitch from the other day? She was back patrolling the common areas this evening when I got home from work. Murphy squatted to tinkle and she again, yelled at me to pick it up, and I assured her that if my dog was going to eliminate today, I would certainly dispose of it properly. She went back in her house, and Murphy took a big shadoobie, which I pick up and tied in a little fresh scented baggie. Boo Boo Bitch had two bags of garbage I'm assuming she intends to take back to the dumpster tonight, so I set my shadoobie baggie on top of her garbage, and Murphy and I pranced inside.

Yesterday I woke up with a sore throat and congested head, and my doctor told me there was nothing wrong with me, I was just sad. I would be suprised at this, except that I developed asthma at church camp one summer to avoid playing games that involved running. So I could sit in my apartment and be irate at the Boo Boo Bitch and That Woman from the credit union, or I could disrespect them on my blog, which is way funnier and certainly therapeutic.

I've always said that if I can't make something funny, I won't survive it. I am able to find the humor in all the sad, inconvenient, and rude occurrences in life. I can't think of anything I've ever gone through that I didn't soon make fun of myself for. From whichever side of my family I got my sense of humor from, I have never been more grateful for it than I am right now.

I am also very pleased to report that Corey has called home the last two days. The more soldiers arrive at the camp in Kuwait, the worse the internet signal gets, so he really hasn't been able to do any email or Facebook. He walks with his buddies to the phone center and calls home. Hopefully we won't endure this for too much longer before he'll be set up with internet in his room in some other part of Far Far Away, and we'll be able to talk all the time! For now, he's hot, and he's homesick, and he forgot how much he hates the desert, but he's fine.

Expect me to report back on my return to the credit union tomorrow morning.  

Woman on the verge, or in the middle of, a slow meltdown

I need to get a sandwich board. It should say “Beware” on the front and “My husband is deployed” on the back. This would be my disclaimer that I am in no way responsible for verbally and emotionally assaulting you if I think you’re giving me shit.

Take, for example, Tony in Customer Service. It came to my attention that Corey and I owed money to the Louisiana Department of Revenue. I called to pay the bill, and provided the routing number and account number to Corey’s checking account, which is the one with all the dinero in it, on account of he’s not spending anything and I’m doing a little retail therapy these days. When Tony in Customer Service asked me what the name on the account was, and I told him “Corey D. Allbritton” he expressed concern over the fact that I wasn’t listed on the account. I explained to him that my husband was deployed and his power of attorney allowed me to conduct bank transactions on his behalf. Tony in Customer Service should’ve said “Okay, ma’am” and processed the damn payment, but noooooooooooooooooooooooo.

We went several rounds of “you’re not listed on the account so we can’t process the payment” and “my husband is deployed and I have power of attorney to use his accounts while he’s gone.” It was call and response for a couple minutes. THEN Tony in Customer Service had the gall to tell me he could not process the payment without speaking to my husband. (It is important to note here that this occurred the day before my birthday, when Corey had left on a jet plane bound for Kuwait that very morning.) Tony in Customer Service should not have said that. He got:

“I DON’T KNOW WHY YOU ARE NOT LISTENING TO ME WHEN I TELL YOU THAT MY HUSBAND IS DEPLOYED AND HE IS OVERSEAS AND I CANNOT GET HIM ON THE PHONE TO TELL YOU IT’S OKAY FOR HIS WIFE TO ACCESS HIS MONEY. THAT IS WHAT DEPLOYED MEANS. I NEED YOU TO SPEAK TO YOUR MANAGER OR SUPERVISOR BECAUSE I CANNOT BE THE ONLY PERSON WHO HAS EVER CALLED THE LOUISIANA DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE TO PAY A BILL OWED BY A DEPLOYED SOLDIER!!!”

Tony in Customer Service had the good sense to do as he was told and once I faxed him the power of attorney, he was eager to process my payment and part ways with me.

Yesterday, I took Murphy outside when I got home from work to do his business. Murphy was neutered early, so he does not lift his leg to make potty. He squats. So this heifer who was putting her baby in its car seat yells at me that I better pick that up. I told her it was Number One, and therefore there was nothing for me to collect.

She then proceeds to yell at me about “y’alls dogs” who “boo boo” in the grass where her children play and she’s seen my dog out there…and I tell her that she can’t see this grass from her house and she’s never seen my dog do Number Two in the grass right there (he does, and I have little baggies and usually pick it up, but she can’t see that from her windows.)

She tells me again that I better pick that up, and at this point Murphy has finished his tinkle and has commenced barking his little head off at her and pulling on his leash. My response to her was “HE’S PEEING” in one of those screams that hurts your throat, and she closed the door to her Jeep and drove off. I’m going wait until her Jeep is gone and let Murphy drop a deuce in the grass in front of her door and leave it there.

The point is that I am dealing with my feelings right now, which I’m not that great at anyway and there are lots of deep feelings to be processed this month. When Corey was at Camp Shelby, I could call him 14 times a day and send him 52 texts a day. It’s training for Corey to go over there and run successful convoys, but it’s also weaning the families from their soldiers. There is no adequate preparation for your husband going to a foreign country, thousands and thousands of miles away, with no way for you to get in touch with him. This. Is. Awful. I have a lot of strength and I am comfortable being on my own, but I am so empty and desperate to talk to him. He is amused that I clutch my phone at almost all times, and the two times he's called, it's been between 1 and 1:30 PM, which is 10 or 10:30 PM for him. When that time passes with no call, I have 15 minutes of total sadness and crushing disappointment.

So, to Tony in Customer Service and the Boo Boo Bitch who lives in the next building, you resist me at your own peril. I am exploring any and all means of dealing with my feelings, and screaming at you for being A Person Who Gives Me Difficulties may be just the therapy I need.

It's the whole fish, Charlie Brown

I mourned the loss of my 20s on Thursday and Friday. On Saturday, Cydney and I dropped Murphy off at day care and went hauling east to New Orleans for some rejuvenation and pampering. I got a 90-minute Swedish massage, which was the best I've ever had (Spa Isbell on Magazine Street) and a facial. I have no age spots or early signs of sun damage. My skin is in need of a lot of nourishment, however.

You're not pretty when you leave the spa, so it's a good thing we decided to get a hotel room and shower, because we were slick, oily messes when we left there. They rub your head with oil on their hands during the massage and use lotions and potions on your hairline and neck during the facial. We ate lunch at Slice on St. Charles - best pizza in New Orleans no doubt and went to the Sheraton to get ready for dinner at Commander's Palace.

The best part about Commander's is how you're greeted when you go to your table. All of the waiters line the wall and say either "Good evening," "Welcome," or "Happy Birthday" as you walk by.

I just realized that my dad's tie does not photograph well. His shirt is a peach oxford that we bought him for his birthday, and the tie is peach, salmon and rust. He told Justin he looked like a smoothie.

I don't typically photograph food, but this was just too bizarre not to preserve. So, Justin ordered a whole fish, served over boudin. I've seen a whole fish, fried with the bones and the head and the tail. But...

This bastard is SITTING upright on the plate, bent like it was dropped in the deep fryer mid-swim. I mean, I looked at it in alarm for several minutes before I could begin my food.

My birthday meal is always the same, regardless of the restaurant. A filet mignon, cooked medium, with some kind of potato (in this case, French potato puree) and Bearnaise sauce.

My parents brought down a strawberry shortcake from Whole Foods. I was feeling festive, so I wore the hat.

My dad likes cosmopolitans, and he says it takes a man who's very comfortable with himself to drink a cosmo and look like a smoothie. Our waiter even made sure Dad understood what color it was before he brought it out to him.

Damn, that tie really does not photograph well.

For my birthday, my parents got me a new beautiful Kate Spade purse.

Corey bought me a print of the Baton Rouge riverfront from 1938 painted by a local artist (and he'll be finding out about this gift when he reads this post!)

And I am giving myself a DNA genetic profile from Ancestry.com. They send you the kit to do the mouth swab, and they test your DNA for differently ethnicities and map it all for you. They'll even give you the names of profiled people you're matched with!

COREY UPDATE: He has arrived safely in Kuwait. They are sleeping on cots in big tents, 60 soldiers to a tent. Somehow, you can buy an internet card that miraculously provides you with spotty internet connection in the big tent, so he is able to email and Facebook in Kuwait. We haven't Skyped yet. He has to walk 3/4 of a mile to the phone center. Don't think it's too primitive though. He's had Chinese food from a restaurant and Philly cheese steaks from another restaurant this weekend. We won't have a mailing address for him until he gets to his permanent home, and that could be a couple days to a couple weeks. He's supposed to be posting on the blog, but I'll wait until he gets permanent before I nag him about that.

Tiger Day Slideshow, Volume One

Most of these pictures were done by a professional photographer, Bernie Saul that we brought on to take pictures that day. She is the photographer we hire for most of our events and she was generous enough to donate her time to photograph this event. There will be another collection of photos coming from a different source, but I won't delay this slideshow waiting on that.

Bernie got some really great moment of soldiers with their families. More to come.
....

A Welcome Prospect?

When we were in college, Emily and I had rules that governed how we should be dealt with by others. Boy-types, I’m thinking. #1 If I’m not happy, you’re not happy. #2 Everything is Someone Else’s fault. (This is not a generic someone else. This is Someone In Particular that we wouldn’t be friends with if the world was flooded in piss and they lived in a tree.) #3 Don’t ever f*** up my holiday – Christmas, Thanksgiving, my birthday, Memorial Day, Arbor Day…any of them, even if we only celebrate them by sleeping late and/or skipping school.

So in leading up to this day, on the occasion of my 30th birthday, I have known for quite a while that Corey would be involuntarily violating Rule #3. In fact, I knew that not only would he not be here for my 30th birthday, the odds were that he would be en route to a foreign country in the Middle East, and therefore unable to call my on my birthday. Y’all know in previous years I have commenced celebrating my birthday the day after Cydney’s, which is March 4, and extended the festivities until at least one week post-birthdate. One year I had five birthday dinners.

Up until now, I have been consumed with hating my 30th birthday. I haven’t been looking forward to it at any point during my 20’s, but being married yet alone for 30…that’s just crap. He’s supposed to be here for the milestones, dammit. I even shed tears at midnight while my sister prepared to set my slice of cake on fire with 31 candles. He was able to call from Germany at about 12:30 AM to wish me Happy Birthday, and this morning I woke up feeling completely different than I did when I went to bed. It’s not so bad. One zillion Facebook comments, e-mails and text messages from friends and family will really lift a girl’s spirits.

So I Googled “turning 30” this morning, to see what commiseration was posted for my handy reference today, and instead I found something genius. Someone has published statistics about turning 30 that I will now copy, repeat and comment upon based on my own wisdom and amusing insight.

The average person has had 7.5 jobs by the age of 30. I have had seven different employers, so I’m going to count that as jobs, instead of counting positions as jobs. The last position you held per employee is the one that counts on your resume, so why not apply that to this statistic. My best job was the one where I got paid a big salary to be unemployed. It was like unemployment benefits without the red tape. Oh, and I didn’t count any of my babysitting gigs as jobs.

At age 30, you're older than 42 percent of Americans. Well, ain’t that a bitch. And so is the person who came up with that statistic. Why can’t there be a statistic that says the percentage of people I am younger than? Assholes.

You're 26 percent less likely to make a New Year's resolution in your 30s... but if you do make one, you're 26 percent more likely to stick to it. I made a lot of resolutions in my 20s. And failed to keep a lot of resolutions in my 20s. One year I resolved to get out of a bad relationship by my 25th birthday, and I did. I don’t think I’ve resolved to do anything since then.

One out of 33 men and one out of 25 women are virgins at age 30. Who would be honest about this question on any survey?

81 percent of women and 71 percent of men have been married by age 30 (and 16 percent of each have been divorced). I got married at 28. Corey was 30 when he got divorced and married for the second time. He gets a 100A+ on that statistic.

Eighty-three percent of people are in significant debt by their early 30s. Their median income is $55,000, but their median debt is $26,500. My debt is waaaay higher than that, thanks to student loans for the Masters Degree I’m not convinced I’ll ever use. All it really does it make me feel better than people for a second, then bad about myself for feeling better than anyone, and maybe a little but ridiculous for spending all that money. I just made payment one of 300 in March. 300 monthly payments. Calculate how many years that is, and then send me your condolences.

At 6:26 PM on my 30th birthday, I don’t hate it. I’m not going to remember this as a painful or miserable day. Saturday is spa day and a very fancy dinner with my family, and that’s an amazing commemoration. And thank you Baby Jesus for allowing my husband to call me from Luxembourg just after midnight to tell me Happy Birthday before he continued his travels. I have not heard from him since. It’s 3:30 AM where he is, so I’m in no way upset with him. But not knowing where in the world, literally, he is, what he’s doing and having no way to get in touch with him is the most desperate feeling. I just realized this may be the debilitating part of being an Army wife: the silence. Because when it’s quiet like this, that’s all you hear.

That’s not what today is about, though. Today is a milestone, and I may be spending it feeling a little alone and a lot empty, but I feel this way because in my 30th year, I am married to someone I hate to be without. So maybe 30 is the age where you look at your life and ask whether you’re on the right track. I said in 2007 that I wanted to buy myself a little two bedroom cottage in the garden district for my 30th birthday. I am currently renting a three-bedroom townhouse and I won’t be buying anything until I’m at least 31. I’m married to the only person who was meant for me, and it’s wonderful to feel so much pain in love. I have satisfactory disposable income. I’m a stepmother to two boys who think I’m not wicked. I have good relationships with my family and high-quality friends. I’m incredibly healthy. That feels on track to me.

525,600 Miles...Practically

Yeah, so by noon today, SSG Allbritton will be en route to a foreign land. I found out over the weekend when he was leaving, and the anxiety has been mounting since then. This is my attempt to figure out why.

1. It's 7,177 miles away. Approximately.
2. It's unsafe. Camp Shelby was practice. I have been assured by Corey and people who work with him that he is exceptional at what he does. Iraq isn't as dangerous these days as, say, Afghanistan. But it is an underdeveloped, violent country and to NOT acknowledge the possibility that something could happen to him is just foolish.
3. That means that something bad is probably going to happen to somebody. I hope I don't know them. Or their families.
4. Erin is sick and I may be making an involuntary career change, neither of which I am comfortable with or inspired to face without my partner.
5. I turn 30 tomorrow. Corey will be on an airplane. Or in the desert without a phone.
6. It's the little things. Daily interactions make our days and nights and moods. Every day you come home and there's someone waiting for you there who wants to hear about a scandalous conversation you had over lunch or why you were commended for a job well done or why you laughed so hard you peed. So we will miss all the little daily experiences you have, to share with each other, that combine to make whatever kind of year your have. We won't be able to witness each other. (That's from a movie, about getting married to be a witness to someone's life.)
7. I spent a lot of time without him once, and I was happy for a lot of it and lost for some of it, and there's injustice in the world that I have to go without him again.

But I am very proud of him. I waited for so many years for Corey to become a good partner, and he finally did, and it's because he found a purpose. Well, he actually found two - the military and fatherhood. This year was destined to be a hard year for us, even without deployment, and his attempts to keep me from feeling like I'm doing this all alone are constant, and often successful. Even the dog is depressed. He's usually sitting up in his kennel waiting for me to bust his ass out in the morning, but this morning he was laying down, face on the pad. I'm certain he was moping.

I won't see him for six months and that is a paralyzing reality that I'm today really understanding the magnitude of. It's been an idea before now. It's the reality. So how do you keep somebody close to you when they're 7,177 miles away? How do you minimize the distance? How do you not reunite as strangers? This is an adventure I blindly agreed to on 11.22.08, but I will never for a single second be sorry for it. He's been all there was for me since I was 15 years old. Years of estrangement didn't stop that. Neither will this inconvenient deployment.

It will be a while before I have an address for him. But when I do, I'll post it, as well as what you can and should send to him, and what you cannot send him.

Measure in love. Buckle up I love you. See you in September.
.....

Tiger Day photos

So first we started with Corey and JJ in our VIP section. JJ didn't have family there, so I had Corey call him over. He was all about taking pictures with pretty ladies, and Corey and I were all about accommodating him.

Turns out Corey had several comrades who didn't have family at Tiger Day. My grandmother was fond of the phrase "if there's room in your heart, there's room in your home." Not that the Parade Grounds at Camp Shelby was my home, but the VIP area kind of was, for the day, so we expanded the group.

Corey's gunner, Corey Hatfield, is the beaming yound man actually holding one of the Honeybees around the waist. We want to make Corey Hatfield VERY happy, since he's responsible for shooting any and all threats to Corey Allbritton. My Corey's roommate in Iraq will be Brian Dedon, who is behind the Honeybee that Corey Hatfield is embracing.

Y'all know Corey loves the heavy metal. There's a Baton Rouge band called Meriwether, and Corey would say they weren't heavy, but I say they are. Upon the request and recommendation of my husband, Meriwether was invited to perform at the concert. They were the soldier's favorite, second only to the Saintsations. The guys in the band were extremely grateful to Corey for getting them there, and they signed CDs and drumsticks for all the soldiers.

Miss Louisiana was also a trooper. She stayed the entire time, from 10 AM to 4:30 PM, taking pictures and speaking and singing. When Cami took this picture, she told her the wind was doing wonders for her hair.

This is my favorite.

All of these pictures were taken by Cami Geisman, a gal of many talents, including blogging about food at http://partyonmypalate.wordpress.com/.

None of us got pictures with James Carville and Mary Matalin, who are really cool, down to Earth people who seemed more excited to have been invited to Tiger Day than we were to have them, if that's possible. Corey got to eat jambalaya lunch at a table with Mitch and his wife Cheryl and James and Mary. I didn't get a picture of that either.

But I did get a picture of Team OLG, who spearheaded this event with me. Rowdy's in the LSU pullover, Cami's the one who smiles like she's on the beach, and Kia wears sunglasses. All the time. Practically.

We had another photographer there, but I don't have her pictures yet. She'll have more of the ceremony and such, so I'll get those up soon. My favorites of the ones that Cami took can be found here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2646395&id=23424020&l=6afc567195

Dad, this could be the best day of my life...

We took these on New Year's Eve, which was a few days before Corey left. They all wore plaid shirts to dinner.

And we have to throw one picture of our schmoopie in here. He wanted a picture with Dad before he left!

When Corey was home on his four-day pass this past week, we surprised the boys at the bus stop and took them to dinner that night at our favorite Mexican restaurant, which Jake claims has the freshest burgers anywhere.

We kept the boys out of school for two of those days, and treated Landen to lunch at Chuck E. Cheese, where the pizza isn't terrible. 100 tokens = two plastic roaches, a snake, two Tootsie Rolls and something else I don't even remember and I'm sure no one could find if they were asked. They have this machine there where you recline on these benches and watch a roller coaster on a big screen in front of you, and the benches tilt and vibrate with the coaster. It's not dangerous in any way. However, when we put Landen on it, he made such a frigging commotion. You would think we'd put him on the Tower of Terror.

We asked Jake if he wanted to get on it, and his face clearly communicated a hell-to-the-no.

Tiger Brigade, Sir! Who Dat!

I don't have the words. But I'm going to try. What the Office of the Lt. Governor gave successfully to the soldiers and families of the 256th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Louisiana National Guard yesterday was truly astounding.

In 2004, when the 256th IBCT was deployed to Iraq the first time, the Lt. Governor hosted a send-off concert for the troops at Fort Hood, Texas. When the brigade was put on alert last year, we asked the Lt. Governor if we could host another concert, and he enthusiastically said yes, had the preliminary conversations with the LANG and set the wheels in motion. When he put me in charge of this project, it was an event for the soldiers, 3500 of them. The decision was made to invite families, and the numbers grew...7,000...8,000...10,000...13,000. We had to make a lot of changes to accommodate the growing numbers. We raised money. We solicited donations. People were as generous as you'd expect them to be for such a cause.

The families started coming at 6 AM. The soldiers started rehearsing at 6 AM. At 10 AM, 7,000 family members crowded the stands for the official casing and farewell ceremony, which included speeches, a pass in review and a perfectly-timed flyover. At 11:30, we started serving food. The Jambalaya Krewe out of Lafayette cooked jambalaya for 13,000 people. They browned sausage in pots that sat in jacuzzi tubs and were pulled by large trailers. It was a phenomenal operation. At 12:30, we started a concert that featured Amanda Shaw, Meriwether, Trombone Shorty and David St. Romain. We also had the Saintsations, the Honeybees and Miss Louisiana. Check out our unit Facebook fan page for all the coverage, including video: www.facebook.com/HHC256BSTB. You don't have to sign up for Facebook to see it.

If you're hosting an event for a planned 13,000 people, you'd expect a massive team of people to pull this off. Our office, which led the event, had a team of five people. We worked on this for almost a year. We did it during some major initiatives the department executes every fall. We did this while our boss successfully ran for Mayor of New Orleans. We did this while preparing for the transition of a new Lt. Governor. We worked with an amazing production company and two PR contractors who donated their time and experience, and you'll see on the FB page, generated impressive coverage. The leaders that the National Guard and Camp Shelby assigned us were capable and accommodating. We requested the moon from them and they pulled it down and handed it to us.

I'm such a mix of emotions this weekend. I am so honored that my office had the faith in me to give me this project to manage. I'm grateful to the team of people that made this a flawless event. I'm elated that we gave 3,500 soldiers the opportunity to have fun with their friends and family and each other before they are physically and emotionally challenged this year. I am sad, because this is my last project with my colleagues and friends in the Office of the Lt. Governor. I feel blessed, because this took a lot of my attention from Corey and the boys during Corey's pass, and they never complained about it. He has been nothing but encouraging and supportive. And I am grieving, because Friday night was my last night to spend with Corey until September. More on that later.

I'll post pictures later in the week, once we get them downloaded from the various cameras. Please go read some of the clips and watch some of the videos. You won't understand the magnitude of Tiger Day until you do.