022808 Running weax at Balad...finally

The last few days its been warm enough that I've been running at noon. With all the sun in Iraq you'd think that people here would get quite a few sun burns but most heed advice given at orientation and wear long sleeve shirts. I do that as well as sun screen but like to run without a shirt every now and then in order to 'get a little color'. Behind the area where I live there are some old tents that are being torn down. I'm not sure what is going up in its place but from the pics you can see all the sand bags that were used. The guys tearing down the tents are not Army but foreign labor. Much/most/all of the labor done now is just contracted out to the lowest bidder. The solder of today is expected to fight the war, not peel potatoes or cook food or tear down tents. And the reason the workers are not working today is because it is Friday, their 'weekend'. And also, yes, they'll recycle the sand bags as much as possible. In the sand bags I noticed some water bottle of yellow liquid. Those would be a piss bottle. Often at night the port-o-john is just too far a walk and the next best solution is to make use of an empty water bottle. I also found a pair of workout gloves. The PX is currently sold out of workout gloves and while I could order online I was just going to wait until they restocked. Now I can just clean these up and I'll be good to go!