Only a week and a half left. March 20th is the day that a lot of us have been waiting for for a long time, and about 10 weeks ago I thought that it would never come. Fortunately for me my family is going to be coming out here for graduation and a little Easter weekend. Hopefully my battalion will be kind enough to give us that weekend off, but I wouldn't put it outside the realm of possibility that we'll be working straight through.

We're having a quasi-bachelor party next weekend for Clay in San Diego. Nothing like rolling St. Patty's Day, a pre-deployment send off and a bachelor party all into one giant Gas Lamp District extravaganza.