Bad News

Rumsfeld OKs Stryker brigade extension

By Rod Boyce
Published July 27, 2006
Posted in Local

The Defense Department and military commanders announced today that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has approved an extension in the tour of duty of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, which has been in Iraq for nearly a year and which was in the midst of having soldiers return to Alaska.

Rumsfeld, according to an announcement on the Defense Department’s Web site, has approved an extension of up to four months. The announcement made no mention of the brigade’s destination in Iraq.

“The Secretary of Defense approved a request by the Commander of Multi-National Forces-Iraq (MNF-I) to extend the deployment of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team operating in Iraq for up to 120 additional days,” the announcement said. “The Department recognizes the continued contributions of the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team and their family members. This extension reflects the continued commitment of the United States to the security of the Iraqi people.

The announcement comes as just as the 172nd’s return to Alaska was under way. Some the nearly 4,000 troops form the brigade have already returned while others were scheduled to arrive later this week and early next month.

Some of the brigade’s soldiers who recently returned to Alaska from Iraq will be sent back to Iraq, said Col. Michael Shields, the 172nd’s commander. Shields spoke Thursday from Mosul, Iraq, to a news conference that began at about 12:20 p.m. Alaska time at Fort Wainwright in Fairbanks and Fort Richardson in Anchorage.

Shields said the brigade has “left a legacy of success” in Mosul, where it has been stationed for its time in Iraq. Now, he said, “It’s time to close that chapter and open a new one.”

Shields declined, however, to answer a question about what mission the brigade will have during its extension or where it might be stationed. There has been intense speculation that the brigade will be sent to Baghdad to help curb rising violence in the city. President Bush said earlier this week that the United States would be sending additional forces to the city.

“This is a temporary measure to create a more secure environment in Iraq,” Shields said. The duration of the extension, he said, will be determined by events on the ground.

“Obviously there are financial, emotional and physical hardships associated with this,” Shields said. “There are individual and family issues associated as well.”

The brigade deployed to Iraq in August to the Nineveh province in northern Iraq.

Celebrate

Just got word a few hours ago that Justin is on his way out of Iraq and heading to Kuwait!

He should be in Alaska in a few days and will be able to give everyone a call from his new digs. It will be another month before he gets here, but just knowing he is back on this side of the pond is a huge relief.

Bon and Reese are doing phenomenal, we think Reese may be getting some tooths though, (yes I know the correct word is teeth, but I like tooths).

She has been a little more irritable and her gums have a whitish tint to them.

Big props to Daddy B, it was good to see you Saturday, and it was nice to play some hoop just like the old days.

Peace out...

Update

Not alot new going on here, back to class tonight. Mad props to Momma who started class yesterday, you are never too young to get educated...

Reese had her 6 month birthday Tuesday, which was very exciting

We are addicted to 24. Thank goodness for Netflix, we have started from the very beginning and after one disc, we want another!

We have gotten a little lazy with the photos, so I will try and get some more up in the coming days, she is growing very quickly!

t-8 days for Jum in Iraq.

Peace out...

Concert

As difficult as this may be to admit, I may have a man-crush on Tim McGraw. Bon and I had the opportunity to go and see Tim McGraw and Faith Hill last night. What makes him so cool, is that he just seems so legit, seems to be a good husband and father, and owns an arena football team. My only complaint about the concert is that Faith took up too much time with her solo act. They did some duets to open, then Faith performed for an hour, Tim for an hour, and then they rejoined for duets in the encore.

Mad props to Miss Russell, AKA Aunt Amy who stayed with the Reese last night while we went to the concert. Unfortunately she had to battle with the great protector, Chubbs. Apparently Chubbs planted herself under Reese's crib and did not take kindly to Amy getting close. She likes to hiss and growl, all show.

That's all for now...

Chillin'

- Congrats to Rhino for landing a gig in Indiana. Well deserved dawg, and the fact that you are 40 miles from Notre Dame brings a smile to my face...

- We had a great time w/Mom as she got a chance to come down and stay for a few days this week.

- The Reese is doing well, she has started some cereal and continues to grow. Although in the last week or so she has started an anti-sleep campaign. I am typing this right now at about 3:20 in the AM because she woke up and just fell back asleep. She refuses to nap during the day for longer than 10 minutes and is now waking up in the middle of the night or at 5AM. We hope this trend does not continue.

- Bon has a day of festivities scheduled with the girls so it is Reese and Daddy's day of fun. Let's see what we can get into.

- Work and school are still going extremely well, Jum should be back state-side in Alaska in about 2 and a half weeks, and NFL training camps start in a couple of weeks. Life is good...

Happy 4th!

Thank you to all the service men and women around the world.

Mad props to little bro, see you soon...

Tidbits

OK I am going to do this bullet style, lots to update

• Our excursion was awesome, big shout out to Daddy B and Aunt Krys, you are the greatest
• Reese is an awesome road warrior
• She has a new high chair as you can see in the pic, courtesy of my classmate in the MBA program who works at Evenflo. The only thing better than a nice high chair is a free high chair, and this one was both!
• I am the sports curse. Many of you know my history of being associated with losers and how when I leave them they become successful. In my sweeping commitment months ago to allign myself with teams permanently I chose the Knicks and Indians. Neither team is doing very well right now...
• We tried Berries N Cream Dr. Pepper last night, I highly recommend it.
  
• Mom is coming down to visit for a couple of days, so we are looking forward to that.
• Big shout out to my boy SBraine who has things going back in a positive direction right now, very happy for you dawg.
• Mad props to Rhino who has officially passed his board certification and is now legal to work as a chiropractor, well deserved brother!
  
• Adam Dunn got one lucky swing last night and Bob Wickman should be released

That's all for now, keep livin' the dream...

Call me Narrow-minded...

but I just do not get the whole soccer thing. I know The Godfather and Steve were very excited for it, but I have never had one smidget of interest in the sport. I guess part of it comes from the fact that it was not a sport people in Ross County grew up playing. Only two schools in the conference had varsity teams, and there was not the youth explosion of today. I will admit that soccer may be a better sport for young kids than baseball or tee-ball. At least in soccer you are running, albeit for no reason in some cases as the game ends in a tie, but I digress.

I am a firm believer against organized sports for kids at a young age, especially multiple sports. Get out and play with your friends, play games in the sandlot! I did not play organized sports until I was 10 years old and I think that worked out perfect, so thanks Mom. You see so many kids get burned out b/c they start playing soccer/tee-ball at 4 years old!

OK, enough on that tirade. We started our 3rd MBA class tonight and it was solid. I am going to enjoy learning from this instructor for 11 weeks.

I just printed out our directions to NC tomorrow night, we are extremely excited. I may blog some little snip-its while I am there, in between thunderous volleyball spikes off of Jase's melon.

Peace out...

The Rhino

I have come to realize that many people in my life have nicknames. Case in point, we spent the last couple of days with my cuz, Rhino. He was in town for a couple of interviews as he tries to decide where he will start practicing as a chiropractor.

We enjoyed some LaRosa's and Guinness before game 6 of the NBA Finals last night, it was great to see him. Mad props to D-Wade and the Heat, is it a coincidence that a team called the Heat won the title the same year Reese was born...

Bon and Reese are doing phenomenal, today was solid at work. I go back to class tomorrow night, which is exciting. I was able to maintain my 4.0 through the second class, so far so good.

We watched "Just Like Heaven" the other night, starring, Reese Witherspoon, and I would recommend it. I am usually not one for corny romantic comedies, but it was solid. Tonight we are watching "Red Eye". Evaluation on that one will be coming shortly.

Keep it real...

Unbelievable Story

OK, here's the story. It is amazing how God shows up. After my huge mistake on Friday I had come to the conclusion that we would have to cancel our trip to Daddy B's this weekend. This was devastating as I knew it was my fault and all of the responsibility fell on me.

As I was getting ready to make the call Bon said, "Let's give God Monday, if it is his will that we make the trip you will make the sale you need to earn your commission and bonus for June."

You see things were looking bleak for June, our fiscal month ends on Sunday and with newspaper deadlines I needed to get the order secured today. The morning was a flop and I had a "routine" meeting scheduled for 2PM. This was our first meeting, and I had no hope of this being the deal we needed.

But God took over, she bought not one full page ad, but 2! One on Thursday and one on Friday! Not only did this allow me to hit the bonus level, it pushed me over to receive additional compensation. Without hitting this we would have been hard-pressed to even meet our monthly bills.

Bon called out the faith doctrine again and nailed it! All the glory goes to God as we can now recover from my mistake and proceed down the road to NC...

The Face of Happiness

Happy Father's Day to all my peeps out there. The ones I know who may be checking the blog include: SBraine, The Godfather, Jase, Steve, Guido and of course, Daddy B.

God has a funny way of humbling people. Just when I think I have everything rolling and on top of stuff I get smacked in the face with a screw-up. I made a money mistake and was hit with significant penalties that have made a serious dent in the portfolio to say the least. We are now leaving it up to God to make some things happen tomorrow if it is his plan for us to still make the trip next weekend. Otherwise, we are in serious Barney. (Barney Rubble, trouble)

The Floor Jungle

That darn monkey! Straight Grabill attitude folks...

Just chillin at 3:30AM, feel like I should go grap a couple of sliders at White Castle. Reese is and will stay asleep, she is not the cause. We were so run down last night we went to bed at about 8:45 and all of a sudden about 2:45 this morning I was wide awake.

God is funny though, b/c I had missed Jum on-line for about a week, and guess who showed up on-line as I fired up the cpu.

Had an awesome meeting yesterday with a local computer store owner, his business is called Skunk-a-rific, www.skunkarific.com. He was as cool and unique as the name of the shop, I really enjoyed meeting him and learned alot while I was there. He was showing me how on Internet Explorer and Outlook there is basically programming code writen into each page. This bogs down your system and makes you an extremely easy target for hackers. The solution, Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird. I have now installed both on our laptop and will no longer be running the other two. It was very simple to do and they even have some cooler features than the Microsoft products. I love learning cool stuff, although the Godfater, (aka Brian Furnish), has been singing the praises of Mozilla for a long time. Let me just say, I would hate to be on the bad side of The Godfather, this guy knows his stuff and I'm convinced could take you out (whack you) if need be...

If you are going to drink...

Drink from a Bear's cup!

This just in, Reese is AWESOME!

Have not received word yet on my final grade for the last class. We actually get this week off, which will be nice, before we head into Managerial Accounting for 11 weeks.

Reese and I had some good bonding time tonight as Bon was doing some water aerobics at the Y.

Got a call from Rhino today, (my cousin Ryan), who is a chiropractor (spelling?) and is looking at a couple of opportunities in the 'Nati. How awesome would that be to have him here?

Not much else new, gearing up for Father's Day...

Update

(Jum is on the far left)

Let's see what has happened since the last update...

Reese had a routine Dr. visit where she had to get 4 shots! She is doing great on all of her development benchmarks and weighed in at 14 pounds, 25 inches long.

Tonight is my last class in my second course of the MBA program, we turn in our finals.

Everything else is still running like a dream, looking forward to our trip in a couple of weeks to N.C...

Oh yeah, and today from NetFlix we get "Two for the Money" with Bon and I's favorite actor, Matthew McConaghey.

There were 3 in the bed and the little one said...

Roll Over, Roll Over!

What a few days in mi casa. The Reese decided it was time to roll over, and tonight she performed the "barrell roll". (Roll over, back onto back same direction, over again same direction, she actually covered some ground with that manuever)

Everything else is awesome, Bon actually said it best yesterday, "Does it get any better than this?" We could not ask for anything more than what God has blessed us with. We have some crazy relatives, but who doesn't? When we look at our collective life together, the 3 of us, it doesn't get any better than this.

Big shout-out to John and Sally for hosting the cookout yesterday, we had a great time. Even though the Furnish family cheated to upset Bon and I in cornhole, it was fun.

This is the last week for my second MBA course. We have a take home final that I worked on for most of the day, but finally stopped when I got a brain cramp.

We are also finalizing plans to visit Daddy B and Aunt Krys in a few weeks w/Jase's posse, ROAD TRIP!

Peace out, keep livin' the dream...

The Shark

Reese has earned a new nickname, ladies and gentlemen, meet "The Shark". Reminiscent of the old UNLV coach who liked to chew on cloth, Reese has the same addiction. And the ferosity in her eyes as she attacks the lifeless rag is unparelled.

Keep your linens close, The Shark may be lurking...

Summertime

Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff said it best, "Summatime" is one of my all-time favorite songs. I can't help but turn it up when I am cruisin...

This is a pic of Mom w/The Reese at a picnic with Katie's family last weekend.

Yesterday we had the chance to hook up with Guido's clan over at Rocky Fork and give Reese the opportunity to meet one of the candidates for her arranged marriage. She was entertained by Jackson but was pretty laid back the entire time. We have not gotten her to the point where she will cut up and laugh around other people. She does it alot when it is just the 3 of us at home, it is hillarious.

Gotta go, need to "Hustle to the mall to get me a new set, yeah I got on sneaks, but I need a new pair, cause basketball courts in the summa got girlz there, the temperature's about 88..."

You know the rest, it's Summatime

Go Irish

Validation for why I became a Notre Dame fan:

Mother of Irish's young fan also dies
ENQUIRER STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

Cathy Mazurkiewicz, 46, the mother of a boy granted a dying wish to call a football play for Notre Dame, has died eight months after her son. She died Wednesday at her parents' home in Bodfish, Calif., of melanoma, said her daughter, Katrin Seymour. Her son, Montana, 10, died of brain cancer.

Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis visited Montana Mazurkiewicz in Mishawaka, outside South Bend, in September before Notre Dame played Washington. Weis asked if there were something he could do, and he agreed to let Montana call the first play against Washington. Montana called "pass right."

Weis called for a pass right on the first play of the game from scrimmage even though the Irish started on their own 1-yard line. Tight end Anthony Fasano caught the pass and leapt over a defender for a 13-yard gain.

Montana never got to see the play. He had died the day before. Cathy Mazurkiewicz said she couldn't believe Weis called the play after the Irish started with their backs to the goal line.

Mistaken Identity

It has been a few days without a Reese pic, so here you go...

Funny story last night, had the opportunity to be in the Bengal's suite last night at the Red's game. Mad props to N2 for hooking me up. After the game I was waiting on the elevator to take me down to my car. The doors open and it is packed like sardines. A lady yells, "we can't take anymore, you will have to wait!".

I reply with, "I am just one, we can make it work," which was followed by another female who shouts, "Let him on, that is Jason LaRue, the Reds catcher!"

Which is followed by a frenzy of people asking me to hook them up with Griffey and autograph request. The funny thing is, I look nothing like him, but because one lady thought so, they all went with it. Pretty hillarious, I didn't have the heart to tell them their "brush with a celebrity" was way, way off base.

Official Press Release

www.momentumcpa.com is the new web address registered for Momentum Financial and the company will be run by the 3-headed monster that is Reese, Bon and myself. I already have a mental image of a logo and flash intro to the web-site, it involves a catchy formula...

Brian has a good friend who I am going to contact about doing the web-site for us, but will probably not get really serious about it until the first of the year. While the launch of the business is just under 2 years away there is alot of prep work to iron out and the earlier you can promote yourself the better!

We (our family, Jase's family and Momma) had an awesome time with Katey's family yesterday. Jum thought it was very important that we all not meet each other for the first time at the wedding in September, so Katey organized a cookout yesterday. We had so much fun and really enjoyed meeting everyone, we have lucked out again! I am not sure what Mom did to secure 3 solid daughters-in-law with cool families, but she has pulled it off. Nice work Momma.