The Traveling Pine

Packed in tight for our first C-130 flight! This past weekend we had the privilege to travel down to the country of Niger to conduct and audit and meet with one of Leah's Paying Agents along with many others stationed there. What a trip. Niger is located in the Sahel region of Africa, along the southern part of the Sahara desert. We were supposed to only spend about 24 hours there, but the flight was delayed a day, so we got a bonus day! We flew down on a C-130, our first flight on that type of aircraft. It's loud, so earplugs or headphones were definitely necessary (for the humans of course, I'm a Pineapple, I don't have ears 😋🍍). The first leg of the flight was about 4 hours, a stop for gas, then another 4-5 hour flight. Africa is huge, so traveling down there takes a long time. Especially on a "slower" aircraft like a C-130. We finally landed mid-afternoon. It's hot at that part of the day! Once we got off, we had to wait for all the cargo to be o...

It's been just over a month since we've arrived here in Germany. Overall it has gone by fairly fast. Some days are quick, some are slow. But that's like that anywhere, I suppose. We've settled into a good schedule here. Work Mon - Friday (plus an occasional Saturday or Sunday), running after work, laundry on Tuesday (since no one else does laundry on Tuesdays!), Commissary and BX trips on the weekends to stock up on whatever we need, and the most important, video chats with Ross around his lunch time, and weekend chats with Charlotte and Leah's Mom & Dad. The building where we live Work for Leah is going well. One of the main tasks she does is create documents so people can buy all sorts of things they need down in Africa. It's helping build up bases and keep them running. She also gets roped into random projects like helping someone get scheduled for a class and figuring out which work cell phones belong to who. Random tasks help fill in the downtime,...

(Cheeky the tagged speaking) After an epic battle with our furnace and the HVAC repair industry on Friday, Ross dragged me to Madison for the MidwestLAN19 party. The drive was easy, though we arrived a bit too late to attend a haunted house bus tour - boo! The whole event is held in the Madison Marriott West, where we also had a room. Decent rooms, but no fridge or microwave, which resulted in warm beer and cold soup. The beer was expectedly terrible, though the soup – a Mulligatawny by Leah the Alchemist herself – was still amazing, even cold. (Ross has enough servings of soup frozen to enjoy one per week during Leah’s absence… she’s the best J ) Grub in Madison, WI! What exactly is MWL19? Close your eyes and imagine a full sized banquet hall, with rows of tables wired up to make a massive computer network. OK, maybe not with your eyes closed, since you won’t be able to read this blog. Now, add in 500+ computer gamers from several states descending upon the unsus...

So being on a deployment usually means you have some extra free time on your hands. I (Leah), am definitely in that situation. I still have to do some laundry, a little grocery shopping, and even dishes, but nothing to the extent of at home. Since I do have that extra time I figured I should give myself some good goals to work towards. So I've picked two big ones, both of which I really started on today. 1) I enrolled in a course! I'll be working towards becoming a Certified Defense Financial Manager. Sounds pretty fancy, right? What is it? Well, according to the American Society of Military Comptrollers - the ones who administer the program: "The Certified Defense Financial Manager (CDFM), a  test-based  certification, is a very relevant and prestigious credential, even for those DoD financial managers (FMers) who have obtained the  course-based  DoD FM Certification required by the Department."  Still sounds pretty fancy, doesn't it? Or did you fall asle...

*Disclaimer - this is going to be a bit long. We did a lot in one day!* I Am Amsterdam - (We're by the M") Yesterday Leah and I went to Amsterdam! We went with RTT which is like a tour agency here on base in Germany. It was quite the long day. We made it over to the meeting point at 1am...oof. It was early! All of us, including 6 others from the same office Leah works it, loaded into a coach bus and were on our way. Our "guide" Mike said a few things before all the lights were turned off so we could all try to sleep. I say "guide" because Mike was more just there to tell us where to be at what time and deliver a few mildly funny jokes along the way rather than actually guide us anywhere. (We found out that he's actually in the Army and just does this as a side gig. I guess I wouldn't mind being paid to travel around like that!) Leah brought the pineapple blanket with and shortly after Mike's few notes, we all tried to get some sleep. In ...

NEWS FLASH: It has been established that produce which have recently gone moldy, have been RETURNING TO RIPE and committing acts of terrorific cuteness. Widespread investigations of reports at grocery stores and farmers markets have concluded that decomposing produce seem to be COMING BACK TO RIPE, and seeking human victims!

It's been 10 days since arrival in Germany. I'm not sure if it's gone by quick. Kind of. I think so! Leah has been learning more everyday about her job. A little different than back home, but many of the concepts apply, so it's not all totally new. Thank goodness! I get to hang out in the office and watch everyone come and go. Our desk is right by the door, so we see everyone. Makes it easy to get to know who's who. The guys down towards the other end of the office hosted a pancake breakfast for everyone today. They knew that Leah is a vegetarian and trying to be vegan as much as possible, so they bought the pancake mix without buttermilk and made sure they were cooked on a separate griddle from the bacon and sausage. It was very thoughtful! And the pancakes were tasty too! So, even though we're here in Germany, our job is to support the folks down in Africa. There are a lot of people here and down there doing a lot of good things for the people of Africa, the...