Haiti and Haitians

I know that most of you all have seen the devastation that has recently happened to Haiti. When I watched the news, I am at first incredibly sad that it happened to one of the poorest and hardest luck countries on the earth, and then I have flashbacks to my second big deployment and my 9 or so months in Haiti.  Even then  I could tell that the country had very little going for it:  No roads, no economy, no phones, no police, no government, not a lot to wake up in the morning for.  After those deployments I never complained about taxes, the seemingly in-effectiveness of our government or anything state related.  I just thanked my lucky stars I was born in the US and not Haiti.  

If you have the where-with-all and inclination, I would ask that you go to:

http://www.redcross.org/ 

and donate some money towards their Haitian relief effort.  

Honestly, Haitians don't have much going for them:  They live in a dirt poor country with no natural resources, no trees, no cool jungles or reefs to attract tourists and money, their neighboring countries hate them, their government is in-effective, their local leaders are probably crooks, if one of them somehow rises up and scratches out a living, other folks reach up to drag him down or take advantage of him.  

So when something like the earthquake happens, they need all the help they can get.  Most of the folks I worked with down there thought the world of the US and Americans, it saddens me greatly to see them suffer even more.  Our country is so vast and rich when compared to the rest of the world that if something like the earthquake happened here, other states would pitch in (I want to say "like during Katrina .  . . " but that might not be a good example), our government would dip into the magic deficit coffers and come up with some dough, and folks could just drive on over and help out.  Not in Haiti.  Everything is hard there, so cough up a few bucks and feel good that your donation helped out someone who really needs it.  

Thanks.

Diving in Roatan

Dad, Mark, Wade and I spent the last week of 2009 and first week of 2010 diving in Roatan, Honduras. This was the third holiday time that we spent together and it was pretty good. This was also the second time that I got to use my Olympus camera underwater (my Australia trip was the first time), I was kind of ticked off because the white balance was so hard to set and didn't set everytime I thought it was, but the up close pictures using a flash were pretty good. I posted a pile of the keepers to the Picasa Web page and the link is in the normal spot - - upper right hand corner of the blog page.

The trip to Roatan was pretty un-eventful, outside of the late gate changes and crowds of people travelling over the holidays. The plane was chock full, even the middle rows, somehow Mark and Dad ended up in first class, and they made sure to update Wade and I about the food selection and service they received.

The diving was pretty standard CocoView diving: Dive site in the morning on the reef somewhere, drop off dive on Newman's wall, dive site on the reef somewhere in the afternoon, drop off on CocoView Wall somewhere. We hit all of the normal spots - - Carib Point, Mary's Place, Calvin's Crack, Mr. Bud, etc. and got to head out to the West End on the new boat (see the pictures to the right). The new boat had mixed reviews: It was very fast, so trips to the West End or other areas were very fast, but it was VERY uncomfortable in anything but calm seas and the diving additions (ladders, seats, freshwater tanks, etc.) left a lot to be desired. The old, tried and true diving boats were very comfortable in comparison.

I gotta say, the diving has been getting better and better everytime we go down there - - the Reef Conservancy is working out. Ten years ago if you saw a seahorse or a spotted drum during your week of diving, it was a GREAT week of diving. Nowadays you expect to see several of each during the week. The soft coral has improved a great deal, as has the black coral (If my white balance would have worked, there was some pretty spectacular black coral at Mary's Place, sigh).

Wade and I did about 20 dives over the week, Mark and Dad did a few less because they were working on projects. We saw all of the standard stuff: Great soft coral, tons of eels (at least one a day), 5 sea horses (yellow, pink, brown and orange), a few spotted drums, even a soapfish which dad got very excited over. I also saw some interesting arrow crabs and fireworms for the first time. All in all, it was some good diving. We checked everything off of the standard Roatan fish list, except the Whale Shark: Spotted Drum, Sea Horses, turtles (I have some pretty good video of a big old turtle, I will figure out how to post it here one of these days), eels, sting rays, and a shark.



Hmmm, turns out alls you have to do is push a button . . . White balance is way off, but you get the idea.

Oh, wait, here is another one of a smaller turtle, munching on some green stuff (it would be green if the white balance was good, honest):



One of the great additions to the house was cable TV - - we got to watch all of the bowl games we could watch, including the Huskers domination of the hapless Arizona Wildcats. Great game if you were a Husker fan, I am glad the defensive starters wanted to stay in to preserve the shut out at the end of the game, great way for them to go out and show the rest of the team how things should be done at Nebraska. For the second year in a row, I am looking forward to the next season.

We also had to play the family card game, I really don't like the game that much, but managed to win one of the games and almost won a second game. I don't know why folks think it is so hard . . .

Upon my return, I found out that I would be moving to Washington DC and taking a job at the Pentagon on the Joint Staff. I wasn't surprised, I had been told it was going to happen, but I was waiting for confirmation on the job. This meant I had to leave Aberdeen and my job here, kind of sad, because the folks here are super nice and good to work with.

Couple of notes:

Fantasy Football update: Wade won the family tournament. He beat me by about 236 points, and 5 spots, he was 9th and I was 14th. I chalk this up to being deployed during the critical draft and pre-season time frame, I will do much better next year. Couple of interesting points: I have 3 top 5 finishes, he has only 2, and I have won the whole shebang once. He has finished with a higher annual average, but, so have the Houston Texans when compared to the Oakland Raiders, and of course the Texans have never won the Super Bowl.