But I'm getting ahead of myself. First was our transit back. The Warrior Transition Program in Kuwait was seamless. Check out the sign that welcomed us. :)
On our appointed day, we lugged our (now much lighter!) loads through customs. Customs was very, very thorough, and of course, as luck would have it, the air conditioning was out in the customs building, so we sweated our way through that evolution. :) We had one last dining facility meal and then it was time to head to the airport to wait... and wait... and wait some more. Eventually we all piled on to our "Freedom Flight" and headed to Germany for our layover.
We picked up a lot of kids and families as space-available passengers in Germany, but we were all pleasantly surprised with how well the last leg of the flight went. To be honest, I don't remember much of it - I think I slept through most of it. :) We landed at BWI and most people scattered to find their next flight, but quite a few of us had long layovers to wait through. My fellow JAGs Brandon and Jeff and I made the most of the time, enjoying our first "adult" beverage in about eight months.
I did manage to catch a slightly earlier flight than I had been scheduled for, so I arrived in Providence at about 8:30 at night. Of course Adrian was there, but so were our friends Jeff and Sara (and I'm not sure how I didn't get Jeff in the picture - sorry about that Jeff!) but isn't Sara's sign awesome? It hung in our window at the house for about 3 weeks - unfortunately had to take it down for our open house.
We immediately drove up to Providence to get my first "real" meal - Indian food at the Bombay Club. YUM!!! In the weeks since I think I've checked off almost all of my "want to do when I get back" activities and then some. Lots of good food, good company, and some fun activities. :)So that's about it for my little blog - I hope you've enjoyed keeping up with the adventure. I've pretty much settled back into "real life" although house preparation has been taking up the lion's share of our time. I start my prospective Executive Officer course next week, and then I'll be heading out to Washington ahead of Adrian, and of course all of that is coming up much faster than I feel ready for. :) I'm really, really glad I went to Afghanistan, and I think our presence there is making a difference. I had the opportunity to work with some fantastic people over there, learned a lot about working in a joint environment (now I'm sure I don't belong in the Army!), and have some great experiences to share. Thanks to everyone who supported me during the deployment - through care packages, tons of emails, and lots of good thoughts and prayers sent my way. It was all very much appreciated - but at the same time, I'm really glad to be back!!!
Posts
