May 8, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
We’ve eaten our last meal here. Our bags are packed. Tomorrow we move to main post, then a week later to Honduras. Where we will quarantine for another fourteen days. Don’t be jealous. Only an elite few qualify to live this life of excitement and danger.
May 6, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
Promotions are always a positive thing in the Army. Commander’s enjoy the opportunity to promote Soldiers in front of a formation of the entire unit. It’s not a requirement, but it is tradition, and the Army is big on tradition. The orders will be read, the commander rips the velcro rank off your chest and flings it over his or her shoulder, puts the new rank on, and you are presented to the unit at your new rank. It is also traditional to give your old rank insignia to someone two ranks below your new rank, as they will hopefully soon be able to use it soon.
May 2, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
Simply because we are quarantined deep in the Chihuahuan Desert doesn’t mean we have to live like barbarians.
April 30, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
The staff here is really quite responsive to our complaints/concerns. Truly, every issue we’ve brought up has been addressed promptly.
April 28, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
This found posted on the inside of the door to one of the stalls in the latrine. Apparently First Squadron of the 3rd Stryker Cavalry Regiment (1/3 SCR) was here in February prior to the FOB being used for quarantine and me thinks they were having some fun spoofing the ubiquitous Army warnings you find posted all over.
April 27, 2020
FOB Westbrook, NM
I’ve known since last summer that I would be spending this summer in Honduras with the Army Reserves. I was supposed to have left weeks ago, but this whole global pandemic thing is cramping everyone’s style. They finally decided to move me to Texas where the original plan was to spend a week of in-processing before flying to Honduras where I would quarantine. There is an old Army adage that no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. Indeed.
March 24, 2020
Spokane, WA
My great grandfather made quite a name for himself between 1900 and his death in 1925. His factories were the largest employers in Evansville, Indiana. At one point they were the largest manufacturers of truck bodies in the world. He made gas engines and refrigerators for Sears, and leased to Sears a building for its first retail store. His accomplishments go on and on. Toward the end of his life he became quite a philanthropist, giving away three quarters of his wealth, most of which went to what is now University of Evansville.
Curiously, in all his accomplishments and no little (at least regional) fame, he seems to have never mentioned that he was born the grandson of a freed slave. He was also somewhat vague about his early adult years, other than having been in real estate and insurance in Kansas City when he was getting started. I had never much pursued that until recently. Oh, my. What a journey.
Herein, Dear Readers, I give you the story of a man my great grandfather became involved with in a highly dubious, and pretty clearly fraudulent, scheme. A man whose story is a gift as he was just one fascinating fraudster. A man named C.J. Weatherby.