The Dream

“I had the weirdest dream the other night,” Trueman told me.

“Yeah, what about?” I asked.

“I was in an infantry unit on some FOB in Iraq. Our QRF team had been ambushed, so I was told to grab anyone and everyone and go out there to rescue them. I went and grabbed people left and right: cooks, clerks, bath and laundry, anyone who wasn’t doing anything.

My Station Commander was sitting in his little recruiting cubicle in the center of the FOB, so I grabbed him, too. When he showed up, K-pot on and everything, his M16 was in pieces and he didn’t know how to put it together. And he had a Hefty bag of loose rounds for ammo.”

“What did you do?”

“I made him walk point.”

Pure Entertainment

Another fun hit I got through Google.

Drop-leg Drawback

People who know me know that I’m not particularly a fan of drop-leg holsters, such as the Blackhawk holster pictured on the left.

Don’t get me wrong – I definitely see the usefulness of these contraptions. I have no doubt that they are great in a lot of situations – like if your job requires you to get in and out of vehicles a lot, or you’re carrying a lot of other gear that might interfere with a regular holster, such as a belt kit, body armor, LBE or LBV.

It’s just that I personally dislike them. Maybe part of that has to do with the fact that I’m female – so taking a pee break means I have to drop by pants and anything attached to them to take a leak. Not always a pretty sight.

As my luck would have it, a friend of mine recently gave me a drop-leg holster for my M9. It’s a Blackhawk Tactical one just like the one pictured on the left, except it’s OD green. I wasn’t going to take it at first, and then Trueman said, “It’s a free holster. You’ll find a use for it.” (Men!)

Once I’d taken it apart and set it up correctly, it started to look like a pretty decent holster. Not that I have much use for a drop-leg holster in everyday life, mind you, but I can see how it would be nice at one of those live fire camping get-togethers we’ve been going to this summer, since there are no tables or benches to put down your weapons between shooting.

I have to admit, though, that the leg straps are giving me an issue. Maybe it’s because of the way I’m built, or the way females are built in general, or maybe the fact that there’s probably a bit more chub on my thighs than there should be – but it just doesn’t fit comfortably. Either the leg straps stay in place and are tight and uncomfortable, or they’re loose and keep slipping, especially with moving around, sitting down, etc.

So here’s my question to those of you who use leg holsters – how do you get them to fit comfortably? And more importantly – should I bother? I have a belt rig with a Bianchi holster for the same pistol that I could use instead, but … ya know … the Blackhawk holster is pretty cool looking.

Jake the Snake

According to Snakes of Virginia, the Rough Greensnake – also known as the Grass Snake – is a species of snake that is commonly found all over the State of Virginia. I didn’t realize that “all over Virginia” specifically included my living room … which is exactly where I found this tiny little specimen of a Rough Greensnake this morning, hanging out on the carpeting in front of the couch.

Trueman and I have three cats, so you might figure that Jake the Snake would’ve become Jake the Lunch long before I found him, but out of my three cats, only one is remotely interested in hunting, and she was sleeping on the bed with me. It’s just natural, I guess – the bed is their natural habitat until I get up to feed them. And besides, who wants a snake if you can have kibble!

My orange tabby, Maus, wanted nothing to do with the snake once the snake flipped his little forked tongue out at him. Malice was nowhere to be seen since she doesn’t usually come into the living room, and my big bad dog Abby had no interest in the snake because, well, it’s a snake and they’re not that interesting since they don’t run or bounce away.

Out of my beasties, only my Norwegian Forestcat showed any interest in Jake – and that was to eat him. Who knew that my big flufflebunny was such an evil snake-killing huntress! After prying the snake out of her jaws – “No eating the snake!” – I put him safely up on my computer.

As I type this, he’s contently sitting on the upper edge of my screen, waiting for me to put him back outside. Which I’ll do eventually, but right now I’m having fun with my little green snake friend.

Here’s your Cake

In the realm of the bizarre, I think this Google search that turned up my blog absolutely takes the cake as the weirdest thing I’ve seen yet. And I’ve seen some damn odd Google!

300 Naked Spartans

It seems like many places and many bloggers have been raving about the movie “300″, which is an adaptation of the comic book “300″, which is a fictional version of the historic Battle of Thermopylae.

At a recent house-warming party we went to, “300″ was the entertainment of choice to break in his entertainment center, newly hooked-up speakers and brand new micro-suede couch. If you have not yet seen “300″ let me spare you the experience. “300″ is a WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) movie. Look at the picture above and you’ll see exactly what you’ll get. Loads upon loads of half-naked men in capes and loads upon loads of dead bad guys.

You’re probably guessing that I didn’t like it.

Okay, there’s something to be said about a movie that starts off to our friend’s disclaimer of, “Remember, this is based on a comic book. The only historic part of this film is, well, the back story.” In a room full of historians and reenactors, this is almost never a good omen. It’s like saying, “Sure, we enjoy reenacting ancient Greece, but linen is expensive, so let’s make our costumes out of Polyester instead. And forget the hand-sewing bit, let’s make the stuff on a sewing machine. Oh, and sandals with no insoles aren’t working for me … let’s wear sneakers.”

I will say that the movie, from a visual point of view, was “pretty”. Were I to use more movie-like terminology I might call this great cinematography. The shots are set up beautifully. Some of the visual effects are really cool – particularly of the oracle floating on smoke which was actually filmed underwater to get the desired effect. The guys liked that one in particular…

The costuming end of the film … meh, not that impressive and obviously not historically accurate. Although I’d bet whoever did the costuming here also worked on the set of Stargate SG-1 because Xerxes looked an awful lot as if he’d just stepped down from a Goa’ould mothership.

Overall … not worth it unless you can see it for free, with friends, to enjoy the atmosphere. Or you just like looking at half-naked Spartans and lots ‘o blood. I hear “300″ is pretty popular among female moviegoers and watchers. I bet that’s not because of the bloody scenes.

Ode to Saturdays

Some of my older readers – that is, in length they’ve been reading, not in age – may have noticed that my biggest lament about Army Recruiting is the fact that we no longer have Weekends.

We no longer know the joy of Thank God, it’s Friday! or the many weekend events that almost always take place on a Saturday and not a Sunday – re-enactments, dog events, you name it. Almost every event in our area falls nice and square on a Saturday. And because of this, it may as well be held on a Monday or a Wednesday for all the snowball’s chance in hell we have to attend.

I want my Saturdays back!

What brought on this (renewed) old complaint is the fact that Trueman and I received a letter of invitation from our re-enactment group, for the annual get-together, camp-out, cook-out, live fire shoot that is scheduled for each summer.

The invitation teases, “bring any and all types of firearms” followed by that most wonderful disclaimer, “NO CHILDREN!” And then it goes on to be even more teasing by letting us know that “targets will include a full-size van, terrorist targets, Tannerite, etc.” and if you’ve got something you want to shoot (ahem, like that old computer that’s been driving you bonkers), bring that, too.

That does sound like on fun Saturday… but like I said above, we don’t know about our Saturdays. They may just belong to Uncle Sam or, and more likely in our case, Asshole Station Commander who’d have everyone working even if Uncle Sam said to take the day off.

The drama never ends

I’ve had a fun afternoon, I tell you.

I was sitting on my living room couch, catching up on the day’s posts on the dog forum where, apparently, I had a stroke of genius in my suggestions and advice today. Or so says a moderator who noted me to ask whether I’d been away for awhile and that she missed my posts… even though I hadn’t been away. I guess I just said nothing useful in a few days?

All of a sudden, I hear a shriek and a lot of crying outside.

That in itself is not unusual. We have a little clique of younger teenage boys, between the ages of 11 and 14, who run the neighborhood in the afternoon and like to play on the playground between my building and the next, and on the large grassy area behind our house that my sliding-glass door opens up to.

The crying continued, which is unusual. Let’s face it – what 13-year old boy wants to be seen in front of all of his buddies crying like a girl because he just skinned his knee or tripped over the sidewalk. Continued crying from a teenage boy is usually something more serious, so I stuck my head out the door.

I saw the kids standing around the boy who was crying, who was laying on the asphalt between two parked cars, holding his head, squealing. They tried to get him to stop making a fuss and get him up, which he wouldn’t. He kept crying and holding his head.

“Okay,” I thought to myself. “This looks like it might be pretty serious.” So I grabbed my cell phone, slipped on my flip-flops and headed in their general direction. As I was heading down, his buddies picked him up and carried him over to the picnic bench by the playground where I met up with them. He was still crying and holding his head, and the others were standing around with “what the hell do we do now” expressions on their faces.

As I came up on them, the oldest of the group who is usually the neighborhood bully, said, “I didn’t have anything to do with this.” That’s never a good reaction, but as the boy’s older brother immediately fessed up to being the culprit, I’ll believe him this time. Another boy said, “Great, now nobody’ll get to come out to play. My mom said, the next time someone gets hurt, we don’t get to go out to play anymore.” Boys – gotta love it!

I got the kid’s older brother to tell me what happened. Apparently, the two of them had an argument about some silly thing or another, and when they got into each other’s faces, the younger kid punched his older brother, who picked him up in some kind of bizarre wrestling move and, from what I gather, accidentally dropped him on his head. On the asphalt. Which is pretty much never a good thing.

I sent the older brother to go get his mom.

While he ran off to fetch his mom, I checked out the younger kid’s injury. He was bleeding from the back of the head ever so slightly – nothing more than an abrasion – but since he was still crying and really upset, I had him stay on the table, laying down and tried to get him to calm down so he could take some deep breaths. He was breathing, talking (well, crying anyway) and otherwise responsive so he wasn’t really what I would consider “urgent”.

His buddies, of course, were trying to be helpful while crowding around me and their injured friend. “Look, you can see part of the brain!” one exclaimed to renewed frantic sobbing of the injured kid. Another tried to calm him down by assuring him, “You’ll only be in the hospital for a couple of weeks after you have surgery to fix it!”

After just a couple of minutes, his mom ran to the scene in a house-dress with an untied belt and slippers, and her first words were, “Why can’t they ever just play without killing each other!”

I introduced myself to her, explained what the kids had told me, and told her that I thought it would be best if she took him to the hospital or called an ambulance to have him checked out since he’d been dropped on his head, although it wasn’t bleeding much. I handed her my cell phone so she could call them as she made to run off to get to her phone, at which point she said in exasperation (with the situation, I assume, not me in particular – she was very upset): “Why haven’t you called them yet?”

I said that I hadn’t called them because he’s not that badly injured (and, obviously, he was conscious with no nausea or signs of shock) and therefore I wanted to wait for her to get there so she could make the call whether she’d take him to their regular doctor, to the ER or call an ambulance.

She called 911 which frustrated her even more. Talking to a 911 operator is probably frustrating if you really don’t know what happened and don’t have the medical knowledge to asses the situation. In the end, I think, she gave the operator the impression that her child had been attacked by another child and was gushing large amounts of blood from his head.

The operator asked her to use a clean cloth to stop the bleeding and, since she was so upset, I said, “I’ll get one from my house, you stay here.” and went up to my apartment, grabbed a box of fresh sterile gauze and some gloves and headed back down. I figured it might help some of her frustration if I looked like I was well-prepared, even if he really didn’t need anything on the little abrasion on the back of his head.

It did help a little, but she was still very frustrated. The other boys were impressed by my sudden procurement of medical supplies.

“They’re always getting into each others’ hair,” the mother complained loudly to nobody in particular. “Always getting each other hurt.” With an attempt at humor to calm the situation down – I’m sure her kid felt bad enough about having brains leaking out of his head (according to his buddy) – I said, “Don’t you wish you had girls instead of boys? Pink dresses and bows and all that?” It did help a little. Apparently, she has three boys and she hadn’t grown up with brothers, so it was a surprise for her just how rough boys are with each other. The two involved in this mess were ages 11 (the one hurt) and 13 (the one who did the hurting).

She had to run off to her house when we started hearing the sirens from the ambulance because she’d sent them to her home address up the road instead of where we actually were. I tried cheering the kid up, “You’ll get to ride in an ambulance. They’re pretty cool.” And one of the boys piped in, “Yeah, I got to ride in an ambulance when I got hit by a car! They have all kinds of needles and stuff!”

Since she’d given the 911 operator the impression that there were massive amounts of bleeding and someone else had been the culprit in all this, not one but two ambulances showed up from opposite directions of the street, as did no less than two police cars.

I greeted the ambulance medics as they were getting out, and was going to give them the short run-down on their patient. Ideally, this would’ve been to the effect of, “He’s an 11 year old male who’s been dropped on his head fighting with his brother and has a minor abrasion on the back of his skull…” but I never even got word one out before they shoved me aside. I have to say that I’ve never been a fan of EMT’s when it comes to dealing with first responders of any kind because this usually seems to be their manner. At least military medics usually have the good graces to ask the combat lifesavers what they’ve already done.

So I grabbed the rest of my box of gauze and my cell phone and headed for the sidelines where I found one very confused-looking police officer who was wondering why in the world he’d been called out for this. He didn’t talk to me. He did talk to the mom when she rushed up – she’d gone to get the car so she could follow the ambulance to the hospital if necessary – and asked her what happened.

“My older boy tried some kind of Ninja Mutant Turtle-move on him, or whatever it is these boys do!” she explained. “They really need to stop this fighting all the time! I was home with my disabled child, I can’t watch them all day long!” The officer, taken back a little by this response offered to have a good talk with her older boy who was waiting in the car, and took her aside to “point him out” and to give the ambulance medics some room to work.

Since it looked like I was no longer needed, I asked the EMT who appeared to be in charge of the rest whether they needed me for anything, or whether I might leave. She said they didn’t and I could. So I did.

In the end, it looks like the ambulance medics also figured that things weren’t too serious, certainly didn’t require a trip to the hospital in an ambulance, and had the mother load up the kid (and his older brother) into the family car to take him to the doctor to get checked out to make sure he was going to be alright. If I had to take a guess, I’d say the doctor will probably clean out the abrasion on the back of his head and send him home, with instructions to Mom to keep an eye on him and bring him to the hospital if there are any changes.

I started telling Trueman the story when he got home just shortly thereafter and when I got to the part of the kid being moved to the bench by his buddies he said, “So, did you go and respond?” I said, “Yeah, of course.” And Trueman said, “Don’t do that. You’ll get sued.”

I guess in today’s day and age, he has a point. Not only do most responders not get a thank you, they get sued for trying to help on top of it. I’ll take the lack of “thank you” over getting sued any day, but quite honestly … I can’t not respond. There are already enough people who’ll just drive by an accident – or, as in the case of one of the neighbors, walk by a kid getting dropped on his head, get into his truck, and drive away without a second glance.

Layout Madness

… or, “I didn’t know you could do that with widgets.

So, I’ve been away from Blogger for awhile. There really isn’t any particular reason why – I just haven’t felt like writing. I guess after many years of blogging – I’ve kept a regular online blog in one form or another since 1998 – it was time for a bit of a break.

In large part, my long-ish absence had something to do with my layout. I’ve been wanting to change it for awhile since I’ve had the same stale old layout for the past two years, but I was stuck somewhere between not being ready to let go of the original artwork and not being able to find any images I could stand to look at for an extended period of time. And then there was the rather big matter of the New Blogger because it uses xml and widgets – two things I was completely unfamiliar with.

I finally sat down last night and spent about nine hours figuring out this layout, from the graphic to the xml and widgets. And voila … the new and improved Adventures of Mauser*Girl.

I have to say that I really like the New Blogger (now that I’ve figured it out). It’s certainly a lot easier to add and arrange widgets and to add links within those widgets. They even sort themselves alphabetically – how cool is that? Not to mention the cool Java-script drop-down archives that are easy to navigate. Oh, and the one feature I’ve always missed in Blogger – “Next” and “Previous” page links at the bottom of each page.

So, yeah, it’s a damn pain in the ass to work with, but it lets you do all sorts of neat-o things … it’s worth the trouble.

I’m pretty happy with the new color scheme. The stripes are a bit more “polished” than just plain backgrounds, and I hope I didn’t overdo it with those. The bright pink sets it off nicely.

And truth be told, that banner image is just so me. The picture is from the DVD cover of the anime “Genshiken” which is based on the manga by the same name. If I were a character in Genshiken, I’d be Ogiue Chika – she’s the girl who looks really pissed in the picture – just without the yaoi fetish.

I tested the layout in the newest version of Firefox as well as in the latest version of Internet Explorer (yuck) and it looked and worked great in both. If anyone is having compatibility issues or the site’s looking very funky for them, please let me know. I don’t know if I can do anything about it, but … you know … let me know anyway. I’ll probably just tell you to go and download Firefox already!