GPRS and your everybody's friend

CSSD-29, is currently deployed to Camp Matilda at March Air Reserve Base. There is no phone or internet here at the condemed base housing we are using as an Iraqi Villiage. But the cell phone coverage is excelent. Turn on GPRS and like magic, I am connected in the middle of this mad max like scene.

Working up for deployment

Back at the first of June, I discovered that it would be about 2 - 3 months before I actually get to Iraq. no one liked that idea. We wanted to get to the SandBox. Any delay here would just delayed the date we return home.

Now after a month on deck here in Camp Lejeune, I see how wrong I was. There is essential combat training all the Marines are getting, and 2 months is barely enough time. A normal UDP or MEU does a 6 month work up before deploying. We are a support unit made up of a mix of reserve and active duty, mission organized for the task. In two months we need to learn our strengths and weakness, sharpen our fighting skills, and understand how to perform our support roles in the deployed (read dangerous) environment.