If they ever built any suburbs on Tatooine I’d imagine they would look a lot like this.

This morning the iconic Star Wars planet, Tatooine, was added on to Holonet for the Old Republic. Yet it seems that Tatooine isn’t the backwater planet we all know from the original trilogy. It has some sort of importance in The Old Republic era. In the created lore from Bioware the planet was of little interest until the Enron of Star Wars, Czerka Corporation, made a base to attempt to harvest the rich natural resources underneath the planets surface, but it resulted in failure. Czerka still uses the hostile planet to make their headquarters for their Secret Weapons division testing there weapons on the local natives of the planet, but still they abandoned the facility leaving behind their unknown weapons. Both the Sith and the Republic have set up bases on Tatooine to explore and plunder the Old Czerka Facilities. Seeking to obtain and master some of the old and powerful weapons that the Czerka left behind.

You can thank my uncle, David Carothers, for this little piece of geek kitsch. He gave it to me. I am the proud owner of an actual piece of Luke Skywalker’s home planet. You know, the place where he lived when he whined like a dork about power converters.

Fragment of the meteorite Tatooine

So all you other geeks out there are going to have to put that in your pipes and smoke it. I…own…Skywalker’s…planet. Or at least a chunk of it. Ha!

Praise be to Christ the King!

Exibir Álbum Completo

Não existe nenhum outro filme que eu tenha assistido mais do que a saga Guerra nas Estrelas e também eu nunca vi um vilão mais respeitado e amado do que o Darth Vader.

As fotos são excelentes, o vídeo é um verdadeiro delírio e o fundo de Requiem for a Dream é um show à parte.

Unbelievable… There’s morning fog on Tatooïne!!

… And guess what… It’s wonderfull!

Απαιτήσεις για το SW: The Force Unleashed – Gameover.gr

H LucasArts έδωσε στη δημοσιότητα τις απαιτήσεις συστήματος του Star Wars: The Force Unleashed: Ultimate Sith Edition και -όπως μπορείτε να δείτε κι εσείς παρακάτω- αυτό που προκαλεί κυρίως εντύπωση είναι τα 24 GB διαθέσιμου χώρου στο σκληρό δίσκο που απαιτεί το παιχνίδι.[next]

There are spots on earth that seem not of this earth; Chile’s Valle de la Luna, or Valley of the Moon, is one of those places.

Barren, inhospitable and brimming with bizarre, polychromatic rock formations, it’s easy to see why this unique setting gets its name. Those who didn’t know better might think the scenes on the desert planet of Tatooine…

Source:
http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/featured/atacama-inhospitable-valley-moon/16712

You may recall that Luke Skywalker’s home planet of Tatooine has two suns.  This recipe is two fried eggs inside a piece of sourdough toast, as you can see from the cookbook photo.  Well, that’s what it was supposed to be…

The recipe looked simple enough and called for only a few ingredients:

First, we cut holes in the bread.  I didn’t have a small, round cookie cutter, so I used a 1/4 c. measuring cup.  You can see that I tried to use something bigger on the first slice, and it didn’t work out.  That’s ok.  The boys, especially Jacob the Carboholic, were more than happy to gobble up the discarded slice of sourdough.

We melted the butter and put the bread in a pan, then cracked the eggs into the holes.

Jacob added some salt and pepper.  So far, so good!

Jacob got a spatula ready.  He actually thought 2 might be more useful than 1.  I told him that was nonsense — we needed only 1.

We waited until the egg whites had turned white, then I attempted to flip the bread over.  This is when disaster struck.   The egg was stuck to the bottom of the pan and the first spatula I used was too small, so I had to ask Jacob to hand me the second, larger spatula.  So much for me knowing more than my 5 year old son when it comes to cooking!  The flipping process did not go well, and we ended up with this:

At this point, we all looked at each other and decided that the twin suns would not rise this morning, and we slid them into the trash.

Skill level:  Despite the deceptively short list of ingredients, this one is not for the faint-of-heart!  If you are good at cooking fried eggs, you shouldn’t have a problem, but apparently we’ve got a bunch of egg amateurs in our house.

Outcome:  Twin sun supernova!  This one definitely did not go our way.  I think we tried to flip them too early, despite the fact that we waited much longer than the 2 minutes suggested in the recipe.  Another reason we might have gotten off track was that the recipe called for “small eggs,” and we had your typical, grocery store large eggs.  There was a lot of extra egg white, and perhaps that’s why it turned out to be so difficult to get the eggs to cook properly.  Oh well.  We had fun trying, and the boys got their first taste of sourdough bread, which they enjoyed very much.

Voici Jeremy Messersmith mais quel drôle de nom n’est-ce pas ! Actuellement chez Princess Records, Jeremy Messersmith était jusqu’à là un artiste méconnu de ma discographie. Après plusieurs écoutes de ses quelques morceaux disponibles sur son myspace, Tatooine est le titre qui m’a le plus marqué. Il a cette petite patte musicale qui vous donne la sensation d’être à l’autre bon du monde, l’envie de s’évader pour faire le vide. Bref, je vous laisse avec un extrait de Tatooine (juste un petit clic sur le petit triangle). Jeremy Messersmith est un artiste à connaitre.

Jeremy Messersmith – Tatooine

I know some of you out there instantly think … StarWars…MUST be a Nerd..
However I am a nerd so stfu.
Others of you are LOTR fans…. All I can say is. KEEP TOKIN.

StarWars Galaxies is a RICH combination of the StarWars series. Taking place right after Episode 4. This game was released around the time of the new Episode 1. In order to hype it’s release the game features alot of the same music and sound effects from the movie.

This game is more than… a game to me. It is a new experience every time I log in. I started playing this game in 2003 with a very good friend of mine Charlie Smith (who has since passed on… RIP Charlie). It brings a smile to my face that a small development team has been working on restoring the original version of the game.  www.swgemu.com .

You can torrent the client from any popular torrent site, register and play! NO CHARGE. The current StarWars Galaxies is in the NGE (New Gaming Experience)  phase.  They started to change the original game in 2005. Since then they have lost over 80% of the original player base !!!!

When it starts up you can create a character from one of several races. Have you always wanted to be a Wookie? Or maybe you want to be a Zabrak like Darth Maul! You choose!

Each player can choose to pursue several careers. Also known as Professions in game. Anything from a house maker ( yes you can own your own house, decorate and party in it),  A Bounty Hunter ( Like Boba Fett), A Marksman ( using laser riffles, pistols etc..), An exotic dancer or musician. You can even find the way of the force and unlock jedi abilities for your characters, however this is a very long and secret process. Unique to each player!

Check it out, this is on the planet Tatooine.

Mos Eisley

Mos Eisley Starport

Several players on SWGEmu have not played since the changes were made in 2005. This is a very exciting time and great socializing experience for us returning VETS.

I myself am seeking the way of the Jedi. It has taken several hours a day for the last two weeks (Lame you think…. FREGGIN AWSOME I THINK). I am still nowhere near attaining Force Sensitivity lol…

I encourage everyone that is a fan of StarWars to give this a shot. You can visit Points Of Interest from all of the movies. Makes you feel like you are there!

Onto another StarWars subject. The replacement for StarWars Galaxies has been in the works for the past two years. It is call Star Wars The Old Republic. www.swtor.com They are now accepting Beta invites. I encourage everyone to check that out even if you are not a SW fan. The game will be surpassing all current boundaries of any online game to date. PRETTY BIG DEAL.

Johnny

Hello and welcome to the second installment in PWNT, In The Face. I recently bought the Jedi Knight Collection from Steam. I already played noe of them before, but never all of them. Now I’m back and I’m gettting better every day. Here’s a video of me PWNing the guy, in the face, after he tried to run from me.

If you want you can watch my old videos on my channel that I did from ages eleven to present day. Some old ones were good. Some were bad, but some were good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOJCa-0zF8I

After a while of sitting in the alley trying to catch our breaths, Boba and I got sort of bored. And I had an idea of something we could do. Lord Vader (a friend of mine who I wasn’t too happy with at this point) had just gone to see the emperor. And that gave me a devious idea to embarrass him in front of his master. So I looked at Boba and said “Do you have a comlink on you?”

He pulled his comlink out, then looked at me and said “Why?”

“Well, I’ve always sort of wanted to prank call emperor Palpatine,” I laughed, snatching it from him.

“You know the emperor’s phone number?” Boba seemed amazed.

“Well duh,” I said. “It’s not that tough to figure out. It’s obviously 1PA-LPI-TINE.”

Boba shrugged, then said “Makes sense. So go ahead and call him.”

“No you,” I said, suddenly getting rather nervous, trying to hand him the phone.

“It was your idea!” he protested.

“You’re the man here,” I pointed out.

“Yeah well… you do it!” a pretty weak defense on his part, I must say.

“Fine, I whispered. “I will.”

I then punched in the number, and on the other end I heard it ringing. I put it on speaker so that we could both hear. I heard a crackly voice that sounded just like Emperor Palpatine say “Yes, what do you want? I’m a very busy man! This had better not be a telemarketer!”

“No,” I said, doing my best not to laugh. “This is not a telemarketer. I was just wondering if your refrigerator is running.”

“Of course my refrigerator is running!” he shouted. “I’m not the type of bum who just uses a broken refrigerator.”

Boba snorted a little bit and had to muffle his laughter with his hand.

“Well then you’d better go catch it!” I shouted into the phone and hung up.

Boba and I broke into hysterical laughter. Until…

The phone started ringing. Our eyes widened and we stared at the phone. It was the emperor, calling us back. How was I supposed to know that the richest and most powerful man in the galaxy had caller ID… okay, that probably should have occured to me, but it didn’t, so just shut up.

So I answered the comlink, putting it on speaker again. WHAT ELSE WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO?!

“You there! Little prankster! You think you’re so funny!” Palpatine shouted.

“Is this pizza parlor?” I said, ad libbing a little bit.

“What?” suddenly the emperor sounded almost as confused as Boba looked. And Boba was staring at me with a pretty quizzical look on his face.

“I’d like a large pepperoni, two family sized supremes, and one plain cheese. And if I don’t get it in thirty minutes it’s free, right?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking–” the emperor tried to say.

But I interrupted him. “Good. See you in thirty minutes.” I hung up.

Then the phone rang again. And it was the emperor. Again.

This time, I answered immediately, still not exactly sure of what I was doing. See, I have this bad habit of doing things before I’ve fully thought everything through. So I ansewred the phone, not knowing what I was going to say.

“If you keep prank calling me…” he started.

“Do you have Prince Albert in a can?” I blurted out, my eyes wide.

“Umm… yes, I believe I do,” Palpatine answered.

“You’d better let him out.” I said, then I hung up and shut the phone off, so he couldn’t call back.

Boba stared at me, eyes wide in shock.

“That was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done,” I muttered.

“That was so cool!” he shouted. “It was so funny how you just kept coming up with things to say. I think I need to have you around when I’m trying to talk Jabba into paying me more.”

I laughed nervously. “The up side to having a big mouth.”

“You’re amazing,” he informed me.

“I know,” I agreed.

“Let’s never do this again,” he said.

“Good idea.”

After I stomped out of Jabba’s, Boba grabbed my shoulder gently and said “Wanna go get some pizza and chokolate now?”

“Sure, ” I shrugged.

So he took me by the hand again and led me through the streets of whatever stupid Tatooinian town we were in. Creatures of all shapes and sizes stared at me, with my ripped, dirty clothing and all the bruises on my body. Apparently, what almost happened to me wasn’t a common occurrence around there.

Boba led me into a tame looking establishment and a waitress led us to a table. Boba didn’t even need a menu. He just told her to get us a supreme pizza and a mug of chokolate for me and some Mandalorian ale for him.

“Aren’t you a little young to be drinking?” I asked, raising my eyebrow.

“No one around here cares,” he said. “As long as I have credits, I can order anything I want.”

I sighed and shook my head. “That’s just a little bit messed up, dude.”

He grinned at me. “So where are you from? I was never told. I just got a physical description of you and was told that you were wanted alive.”

“I’m originally from Corellia, and I lived on Coruscant for a while, and now I live on Qalisto.”

“In the Highland Mountains?” he asked.

I nodded as the waitress brought the pizza over.

“And Jabba wanted you to work for him,” this time, what he said wasn’t a question. He already knew it was true.

I nodded again.

“That was a pretty cool trick you pulled back there. You know, banging Jabba against the floor.” He seemed impressed.

I just shrugged, determined to say as little as possible.

“Did you lose your voice or something?” he seemed amused now.

“No,” I muttered.

“So why aren’t you talking?” he asked.

“Just don’t feel like it, I guess,” I said.

“You’re lying.”

“I am not!” I protested. “I just don’t like talking about myself. There’s always the off chance that you’ll turn around and use some of my secrets against me.”

“Okay then,” Boba nodded. “Who’s that guy staring at you?”

Boba pointed behind me and I turned around. There was a Rodian male standing at the enterance of the restaraunt, staring intently at me. I didn’t recognize him, but he looked rather mad at me.

“I don’t know,” I said nervously.

“He has a blaster,” Boba informed me, as if I couldn’t see the guy pulling the blaster out.

He shot twice at me, and I ducked. Then Boba grabbed my arm and pulled me out a back door of the restaraunt. It didn’t escape my notice that everyone in the restaraunt was screaming. We ran through several alleys, and hopped a couple fences, then we finally stopped, panting heavily.

“You know,” I said softly, “this is why I never go to restaraunts.”

Boba and I walked through Tatooine for about an hour, when we reached a giant palace. I had no idea how I’d missed it, but obviously I had.

He seemed to think it was rather funny that I had either walked right past or right around the palace without noticing it, but then again, he doesn’t know me all that well. Sorran would have expected it.

Boba took me inside the palace, where I was brought into see  Jabba. He was only too happy to let me in when he found out that I was Queen Ardnassak. So I got into the throne room to see a giant slug. He was great big and green and he smelled really bad. Around his throne room was every female of every species imaginable, all scantily clad. If I felt exposed wearing my skirt and junk, I could only imagine how they would feel.

Jabba eyed me up and down and licked his lips like I was something to eat. I wouldn’t put it past him to eat me. He was great big and fat. He looked like he had eaten a few people in his day.

But he didn’t eat me. He growled something that I couldn’t understand.

In response to the growl, Boba shook his head and said “She came of her own free will, Jabba. I just helped her find her way to the palce. She was lost.”

“Hey!” I shouted. “Corellians can’t get lost.”

He put his finger to his lips, effectively shutting me up.

Then Jabba growled something else. This time it was directed at me, but I didn’t understand.

Boba seemed to get that I didn’t understand and said “Jabba says that you certainly are loud for a female. He wants to know if you want to have a job as a singer here. Or perhaps a slave dancer. Or maybe… you know… a… ahem…”

“No thanks, I’m not lookin’ for work,” I cut him off.

Jabba growled something again, and Boba translated. “Then why are you here?”

“I want you to stop sending bounty hunters after me,” I said.

“Why?” Boba translated another growl.

“Because I don’t want to krething work for you!” I shouted. “I’m fourteen and I have enough problems without working for you! If you continue to send bounty hunters after me, then I’m going to kill you.”

Then Jabba laughed and Boba translated that he said that I was just a silly girl, and how was I supposed to kill him.

I lifted the stupid slug with the Force and banged him against the floor several times. “That is a smaple of the power I wield. If you continue to send bounty hunters after me, you won’t just get a sample.”

Then I turned on heel and walked out, Boba trailing behind me like some sort of puppy-dog.

When I woke up, that thing that had been dragging me toward the alley was on the ground, clutching his foot and screaming. There was another man in the alley with us, and a droid was helping him up.

The man had obviously had a number done on him by the thing. His arm looked useless and as far as I could see, he had a couple of bad bruises on him. But I couldn’t see too well. Everything was fuzzy.

I brought my hand to my head as I sat up, and I realized that my hair was coated in blood. I felt my face and (surprise) there was blood on my face too. I ached all over, and I could barely move. That great big thing that had been beating on me had really messed me up.

And then I realized that the man being helped up by the droid had saved my life. I looked over at him and mouthed “Thank you.”

He seemed concerned about me, still, even though he had just gotten the crap beaten out of him for my sake. So he asked “Do you need me to take you to a med-center?”

I shook my head. “I’m fine. I’ve definitely taken worse. You’re the one who needs a med-center.”

I then reached in my purse and pulled out the blaster. I leveled it at the giant thing’s head and shot him, effectively doing what I had wanted to do since he had started walking toward me.

The man who had just saved my life stared at me in shock. I almost laughed at his expression, but managed to quell my amusement as I said “He’ll never make that mistake again. You need to leave before the authorities arrive,” I informed him, probably telling him something that he already knew.

He agreed, leaving with his beat up droid that looked kind of like a rock.

Suddenly, it hit me. A mercenary friend of mine (someone I’ve never actually “met”, but I do know) had just gotten a new droid. It was brown with dents in it and he called it Aggie.

It was my turn to stare in shock after him… HaVoC or Porter or Vance or whatever it is he’s going by now. I smiled slightly, before heading out of the marketplace and to where I hoped Jabba’s palace would be.

Have I mentioned that I’m hopeless with directions? I can walk to any place, even if I’ve never been there before, and turn around and get right back to where I started, making it impossible for me to get lost, but I cannot follow directions or read a map to save my life.

Anyway, I was still wandering around Tatooine, by MYSELF (now covered in sticky blood), trying to find Jabba’s palace. When I ran into a kid in Mandalorian armor.

When I say kid, I mean anyone under twenty-one. He had his helmet tucked under his arm and he looked to be about seventeen. He was human, that much was sure, and he had dark hair and tan skin.

And I do mean literally ran into. I wasn’t paying much attention, and I kind of walked right into him.

He looked down at me, a sneer forming on his lips, but when he looked into my eyes, his expression changed for some reason. It went from disgust at my lack of attention to… I really couldn’t tell what it was. Concern, maybe. “Are you alright, my dear?” he asked politely, offering his hand to help me up, since I had landed on my butt.

“I’m fine,” I muttered.

“You don’t look fine,” he observed, obviously taken aback by the blood on my face. He then reached underneath a chest plate on his armor and handed me one of those damp sanitary wipes you get in a box.

I raised my eyebrow. “You keep germ wipes in your armor?”

“I don’t like it when I have whole layers of sand and sweat on my face. I wipe it off.” His concern had obviously turned to annoyance.

I wiped off my face, and then he took another and used it to get most of the blood out of my hair. He was crouched down beside me. Then he helped me up. “Do I look better now?” I asked.

“Much,” he said.

“Why are you helping me?” his help had confused me. I really wasn’t getting it.

“Are you Ardnassak Emil?” he asked.

“Oh great!” I shouted. “A bounty hunter! I should have krething known!”

“No,” he said, putting his hand over my mouth, trying to quiet me. “Well, I am a bounty hunter, but I’m not going to take you into Jabba.”

“Funny,” I muttered. “That’s where I was headed, and I meet the one guy that won’t take me there.”

“You’re kind of cute,” he said, laughing. “Your highness,” he added as an afterthought.

“Call me Ardy,” I told him. “That’s what my friends call me.”

He nodded.

“And I am most certainly not cute!” I shouted. I keep trying to tell Sorran that, but he won’t listen.

“If you’re not cute, then what are you?” he asked, a smirk on his lips.

“Average,” I said, pursing my lips. “I’m average looking. Not pretty, not cute, not beautiful, not anything except average.”

He shrugged. “Works for me. As long as you were headed to Jabba’s palace, I could take you there.”

“I can find it!” I shouted.

“That’s funny,” he said, “because you’re going the wrong direction.”

“Who are you anyway?” I asked him.

“Boba Fett,” he took my hand in his and then kissed it.

I giggled. I couldn’t help it. I giggle when people do things like that.

“So, I can take you to the palace?” he asked me, a smile on his face.

“Sounds fun,” I agreed, nodding.

“And after we go to the palace, I can take you out to dinner?”

“I’m too young to date,” I told him, a hint of finality in my tone. “Besides, Sorran doesn’t like it when guys try to make a pass at me.”

“Who’s Sorran?” he asked.

“My general,” I smiled. “He’s a little bit older than me, and he gets really jealous.”

“It’s not a date, Ardy,” he rolled his eyes. “We can go to a cantina and get you some chokolate and pizza.”

I thought about that for a second. “And you won’t let any huge guys beat me up and drag me into an alley by my hair?”

“Nope,” he said, suddenly getting why I was bloody.

“Sounds good,” I said, nodding. “Do you have a vibroblade I can borrow?”

He handed me a vibroblade, and I took it and cut a slits up the sides of my skirt, making it much easier for me to walk.

I don’t have what anyone would call a girlish walk. I swagger like a man, and that skirt restricted my movements.

Boba laughed as he watched me ruin my clothing. Then he took me by the hand, explaining to me that if people thought that I was with him, then they would probably respect his “claim” and leave me alone. Plus he had a wicked looking blaster and he figured that anyone who tried to beat me up would think about that blaster first.

The walk to Jabba’s palace wasn’t nearly as lonely, tedious, and frightening when I had someone to walk with.

Sorran and I went to Tatooine today. It was a last minute thing that we decided to do only five minutes before we left. (And you can bet your butt that I didn’t use taxpayer’s dollars for the fuel!) I had some business to sort out with one Jabba the Hutt. He has been rather insistent that I work for him as a bounty hunter. So insistent, in fact, that he has been sending bounty hunters after me to bring me to him.

So I have to go kill him.

It’s not exactly a pity. He’s a Hutt. Give me a break. They’re slimy and gross. They’re like giant slugs. And I’m not grossed out easily. Not to mention the way he dehumanizes females of all species by dressing them in metal bikinis and parading them around in his palace.

So I boarded my ship, the Devil’s Master, and had Sorran fly me to Tatooine.

I hate Tatooine. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. I hate all the sand and I hate the terrible people that live there. And what I hated the most was the fact that Sorran insisted I go in disguise, so as not to be recognized by Jabba’s many bounty hunters.

My looks are rather distinctive. How many pale, freckled girls with thick, shoulder-length, brown hair and blue eyes with green flecks do you know? Okay, how many of those girls live on Tatooine? Pale people don’t live on Tatooine. It’s a fact of life. Not to mention the fact that I dress in jeans and a t-shirt, always, and carry my lightsaber with me.

So Sorran put me in a black skirt that fell to my knees and a gold tank-top and a pair of black high-heels with gold buckles (have I mentioned the fact that I’m rather clumsy? How did he expect me to walk in high-heels?). And he made me carry a gold and black purse. AND he wouldn’t let me carry my lightsaber with me. I had a blaster in my purse.

To make matters worse, I made him stay on the ship. I told him that I didn’t want anyone taking my ship, and that he had better damn well stay and guard it.

So to recap, I was definitely not dressed to fight, and I didn’t have my lightsaber, since my clothing was skin tight. I just had a blaster in the stupid purse Sorran made me carry. Why do I let Sorran boss me around so much anyway? I’m the queen and he’s the general. There is a definite break in the chain of command when the general is ordering the queen around.

I thought things were as bad as they could get. I was wandering around Tatooine all by myself, dressed more provocatively than I’ve ever been dressed in my life, and I was getting sand down my bra. It’s impossible not to with all the damn sand on that planet! How in the Force am I supposed to focus when I have to scratch at my chest constantly because the sand itches so much.

I think Tatooine was created purposely for the torture of women. That’s juts my theory though. I have a lot of theories about things being created for the torture of women (men, for example, and how they won’t ask for directions EVER or read instruction manuals).

Anyway, just as I was thinking things couldn’t get any worse, I figured out that I was krething lost. I didn’t know where I was (it was some sort of marketplace), but I did know that there weren’t too many people around, and that if I was anywhere near Jabba’s palace, not only would there be a lot more people around, but I’d also be able to hear that catchy little theme he always has his band playing.

I suddenly wished that I had listened to Sorran and packed a map in my stupid purse along with my vibroblade and my blaster.

**FLASHBACK**

“Pfft! Stop worrying, Sorran! I was born on Corellia, which makes me a Corellian. And Corellian’s can’t get lost. You know that as well as I do. I don’t need to take the stupid map.”

“But, Ardy…”

“No but’s. I don’t need a map. That’s final.”

**END FLASHBACK**

Yeah, I definitely should have listened to Sorran.

And then I found that as I had been lost in my flashback, I had completely failed to notice a HUGE male biped walking toward me with a menacing grin on his face.

He looked relatively human, except bigger than any human I’ve ever seen before. Even bigger than the Qalistians that I rule, if that was possible.

As he got close to me, I managed to swallow the fear that had risen in me and smile. “Hi, I think I’m lost. Could you help me?” I asked, even though what I really wanted to do was shoot him on the spot.

“Oh, I can definitely help you,” he told me evilly.

I reached for the zipper on my purse, but he punched me in the nose, hard. I gasped and my hands went to my nose, and then he punched me in the stomach, causing me to double over in pain.

Let’s get one thing straight. I am by no means helpless. I could and would have beaten him. Except that he was a lot bigger than me, and I couldn’t seem to get a grasp on the Force with most of my body’s blood supply leaking out of my nose, nor could I seem to remember how to punch or kick or anything. I think some of my brains were leaking out my nose with my blood or something, or I probably would have been able to fight him.

While I was preoccupied trying not to throw up, he kicked me in the back of my knees, causing them to buckle and I fell to the ground.

Then, he grabbed me by the hair. I shrieked with the pain as he jerked me toward an alley by my hair. It didn’t help at all that the pain was causing me to writhe about, making him jerk on my hair even more.

All of a sudden, my pain disappeared as one chilling thought entered my mind:

“He’s going to rape me.”

Then a second, less chilling, much more sarcastic thought entered my mind. One that I think every krething time I get into danger:

“I’ll live. And if don’t, I’ll die. And then I won’t have to worry about it anymore.”

And then a sharp, hard blow to my head caused me to lose consciousness.

Desert cities, for a generation raised on dreams of Tatooine anyway, are far from a new idea, George Lucas’s sand planet drifted in on a dust clouds left behind by Frank Herbert’s Dune. Before that, authors such as Ray Bradbury and Kim Stanley Robinson mined the sands of Mars to create early environmental allegories that predicted Earth’s demise.

Lately, moreover, the fears of science fiction writers have given way to massive commercial enterprises on a scale that retains the capacity to dazzle. Desert cities from Dubai to Nevada continue to capture the imagination, perhaps because they appeal to both the something-out-of-nothing pioneer spirit and those with a desire to build eco-oasis for after the flood. Only today China announces its China-Vegas a 100 sq km “New World Resort City” in Inner Mongolia, although one presupposes that it will be the former model that will be constructed.

The picture above (via bldg) is from an exhibition entitled Out of Water | innovative technologies in arid climates at the University of Toronto and designed by Matsys, a design studio in San Francisco. Its founder, Andrew Kudless, regards the desert city as a new urban prototype. Here’s why:

“Although this science fiction novel sounded alien in 1965, the concept of a water-poor world is quickly becoming a reality, especially in the American Southwest. Lured by cheap land and the promise of endless water via the powerful Colorado River, millions have made this area their home. However, the Colorado River has been desiccated by both heavy agricultural use and global warming to the point that it now ends in an intermittent trickle in Baja California. Towns that once relied on the river for water have increasingly begun to create underground water banks for use in emergency drought conditions. However, as droughts are becoming more frequent and severe, these water banks will become more than simply emergency precautions.”

Sietch Nevada projects waterbanking as the fundamental factor in future urban infrastructure in the American Southwest. Sietch Nevada is an urban prototype that makes the storage, use, and collection of water essential to the form and performance of urban life. Inverting the stereotypical Southwest urban patterns of dispersed programs open to the sky, the Sietch is a dense, underground community. A network of storage canals is covered with undulating residential and commercial structures. These canals connect the city with vast aquifers deep underground and provide transportation as well as agricultural irrigation. The caverns brim with dense, urban life: an underground Venice. Cellular in form, these structures constitute a new neighborhood typology that mediates between the subterranean urban network and the surface level activities of water harvesting, energy generation, and urban agriculture and aquaculture. However, the Sietch is also a bunker-like fortress preparing for the inevitable wars over water in the region.

So, it’s been a while since I last posted on this thing, but I’m back with a vengeance… a little late on some of this stuff, but I promise I got some goodies coming up, including a poll. Wow!! A poll!!

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Why you little!!!

So, this is almost a month late, but considering this has been practically the only game I’ve been playing lately, and since I’ve become obsessed with getting all the Achievements for it, figured I should give it a review.

Licensed video games are a sordid affair. By that, I mean that 99.9% of the time they suck balls. In my experience the only ones that are worthwhile brandish either the Star Wars or Lord of the Rings moniker, and even those are pretty hit or miss. So I wasn’t all that excited for Batman: Arkham Asylum, despite my love for the character. The Caped Crusader is without a doubt, the greatest super hero of all time, and Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies. But in previews and magazine articles, Arkham Asylum just looked weak. A Batman beat ‘em up game? Seems a little obvious. And while it was fun, even the preview I played at Comic-Con failed to impress. It wasn’t until the demo was released on Xbox Live that I knew this was a must-have.

The game does a great job of balancing the styles of the comics, the original animated series, and Nolan’s two “realistic” Batman films. The character designs seem like they came from a Grant Morrison-era graphic novel, most of the voices were provided by the cast of The Animated Series, including Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as the Joker, and the music sounds very Hans Zimmer-esque. Arkham Asylum excels for many reasons, but chiefly I think it’s a great game because it isn’t connected to any other Batman media- it’s an entirely standalone experience, complete with an original story that rivals any Batman tale you’ve read or seen before. Above all, it allows you to fill the role of Batman like never before. I had only ever played one Batman game prior to this- 2001’s Batman Vengeance for the Gamecube, which was based on The New Batman Adventures, the follow-up to The Animated Series. It was decent, and while more cartoony, it still had a pretty dark story that began with the Joker faking his own death. But it fell short on almost all accounts, and you never really felt like you were the Dark Knight.

Arkham Asylum puts you in his shoes, and everything from how he glides with his cape, grapples, and fights multiple enemies at once, is spot on. There’s also a host of gadgets, most of which are used in stealth sequences, which I found to be the most enjoyable part of the game. The “freeflow” combat as they call it, is probably more addictive though, and it’s a very eloquent fighting system. Batman really only has a couple moves, and only one “attack” button, but the game rewards you for stringing together multiple moves and constantly blocking enemy attacks. An instant takedown move allows you to break enemies’ limbs, and there’s also the option to toss them across the room like ragdolls. It’s all very kickass, and the game has a ton of re-playability. Like I said, I’ve been playing this almost non-stop since August 25th, and god knows how many hours I’ve put in. Too many I imagine.

So far the biggest surprise in gaming for me. This is well worth $59.99, and will be a treat for Batman, fighting, stealth, and action fans alike. Buy it. NOW.

SCORE: 9.8

F.E.A.R. 2: Reborn DLC

XBOX 360, Rated M for Mature. Available via download from Xbox Live.

Released at the beginning of September, Reborn is a five-mission expansion to F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin, downloadable via Xbox Live and assumedly, PSN. In case you didn’t know, F.E.A.R. is a series of highly successful FPS/survival horror hybrids- think The Ring plus The Matrix, because slowmo is a big part of the game. Reborn puts you in the shoes of what is usually the primary enemy in the game- a “Replicant” (basically a clone soldier) called Foxtrot 813. F.E.A.R. 2 was essentially F.E.A.R. 1 with better graphics and more gore, so I wasn’t exactly frothing at the mouth for Reborn. But for approximately $9.99 (800 Microsoft Points) it’s totally worth it, at least if you’re into the series. Nothing that new, and Foxtrot 813 plays exactly the same as every other character in F.E.A.R., but it’s nice to get into that powered armor one more time and blow security guards into little red globules.

SCORE: 7.2

Star Wars The Force Unleashed: Tatooine DLC

XBOX 360, Rated T for Teen. Available via download from Xbox Live.

The second of three bonus missions for the latest Star Wars console outing, this DLC is set in an alternate universe where Vader’s apprentice and the game’s protagonist, Starkiller has killed him (one of the possible endings of the original game) and has taken his place as Emperor Palpatine’s servant. Palpatine sends him to Tatooine to hunt down C-3PO and R2-D2 after their escape at the beginning of A New Hope, which pitches the player into encounters with iconic characters like Jabba the Hutt and his Rancor, Boba Fett, and ultimately, Obi-Wan Kenobi himself. Also priced at 800 MP, this felt like a much better deal than Reborn, even though it probably provides you with even fewer hours of gameplay. It’s just a really good idea, and is executed very nicely. All your favorite Tatooine moments are represented, even Jabba’s droid torture room. While it is slightly disturbing to be the evil, twisted bad guy, it was still satisfying to annihilate Boba Fett, Obi-Wan, and Obi-Wan’s spirit. “More powerful than you could ever imagine” my ass.

SCORE: 8.1

I do have a complaint, but it’s unrelated to the DLC. Being the stingy bastard that he is, George Lucas and Lucasarts have decided to make the third bonus mission, which takes place on Hoth and allows you to fight and kill Luke Skywalker once and for all, available exclusively on the upcoming rerelease of the game, called the Ultimate Sith Edition. Well you know what? I already own the fucking game, man. And I want to play the Hoth mission. But I’m not about to sell my copy back at a tenth of the price and then shell out $39.99 to play one extra fucking mission. So fuck you.

WET Demo

XBOX 360. Single Player demo, available for download via Xbox Live.

I wasn’t that interested in this game until I started watching some behind the scenes videos on IGN and learned a few important facts:

1) This is billed as a grindhouse-styled third person actioner. Basically, if Quentin Tarantino made a videogame, this would be it.
2) Eliza Dushku voices the main character, a badass sword-swinging, gun-toting chick named Rubi.
3) There’s lots of slow motion.

Once I understood these facts I got excited. And I was even more excited when I found the demo on Xbox Live one lonely, drunken night. Unfortunately, the demo did not meet any of my expectations, and was a bit of letdown. I’m not ruling this one out completely yet- I’ll wait to see what the critics say before I make my decision. But the demo was pretty lackluster. For starters, I’m fucking sick of slowmo. Why does EVERY game feel it needs to employ some kind of slowmo feature? Max Payne came out eight years ago, people, let’s try something different. It wouldn’t be that big a deal if it was used well, but in WET it seemed kind of arbitrary. It doesn’t really add anything to the gameplay, it just makes it look cooler and makes it easier to blow away dumbass AI enemies who, by the way, can take about a dozen rounds to the head, neck and chest, before going down.

Trailers and previews for the game make it seem like there’s almost too many moves for Rubi to do, and granted, I only played a fraction (I hope) of the full game. But even after a few minutes I felt like it was getting redundant. You pretty much either slide on your knees, leap through the air, or wall-run while blasting your guns, and if you get too close, you press X and automatically kill a baddie with an unblockable sword swing. There’s other acrobatic moves- swinging on poles, sliding down ladders- but none seemed particularly useful. Not to mention that the swordplay seems like an afterthought- all you do is press one button, and that’s it. Not much variety there.

Two aspects of the game I was really looking forward to also failed to impress. First, there’s the “bloodlust” mode, which is activated when Rubi gets an enemy’s blood all over her face. The world changes to a stylized red, black and white, much like a graphic novel, and Rubi is rendered virtually invincible. While it looks cool, it’s more or less pointless. It makes what seems like a pretty easy game even easier. Then there’s the much talked-about car chase sequence, what should be the coup de grace for the game. It’s cool and well choreographed- definitely the highlight of the demo. But it was just as overly simple as the rest of the package. All you do is blast infinitely respawnable baddies as they drive around you in sedans, then press a button when a prompt is given to you on screen, which activates a cut scene where Rubi does something badass. Only it’s the computer doing it, not you, so it kind of takes all the fun out of it.

I’ll have to see what critics like IGN and Game Informer say when WET hits shelves this Tuesday, but it’s looking like I might save myself six Hamiltons and take a pass on this one. The question is though, whether or not I want to buy this monstrosity:

I was sort of morally opposed to ODST, simply because it felt like an overpriced expansion pack. I was also kind of sick of Halo. But the more I read about it, coupled with Microsoft’s always ingenious marketing campaign (can someone make a Halo movie? Pleeaaase?), the more I became intrigued. I’m interested mainly because you are no longer playing as Master Chief, who’s so powerful he’s kind of like a superhero. Now you’re just a regular dude, which means this will probably be a more intense experience, and more akin to other FPS’s. When MC takes on a Brute, it’s no problem, because he’s seven feet tall. When a drop trooper encounters one… well… imagine facing a nasty, eight foot-tall monster with a gun that shoots needles. Yeah. That’s what I thought.

A new single-player level for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is available today for Xbox 360 owners through Xbox LIVE Marketplace and for PlayStation 3 owners through the PlayStation Network.

check out this goldmine of rare STAR WARS pics!  I wish I could whip out a photo of me one day and say  ”Yo, check out this picture of me riding a DEWBACK on TATOOINE! (actually Tunisia)

She “seems to” walk on the moon…

And she’s laughing…

“ALWAYS.”

Embora eu seja uma manteiga derretida de primeira, poucas vezes me recordo de ter chorado ao assistir algum filme ou ao ler um livro. Das exceções, recordo-me de ter enchido os olhos de lágrimas ao assistir a última cena do episódio 3 do Star Wars, na qual o Obi-Wan Kenobi chega a Tatooine e entrega o bebê Luke para o Owen e a Beru e começa a tocar a trilha da trilogia original (sim, eu sou um fiasco). E também, principalmente, quando li o capítulo “A História do Príncipe”, do sétimo livro da série, Harry Potter e as Relíquias da Morte.

Sim...eu chorei vendo isso, droga! =p

É fato que Severo Snape sempre foi meu personagem preferido da série, que sempre achei injusta a maneira como julgavam o pobre professor de poções, e que sempre acreditei que (ei! tem spoiler aqui para quem não leu o livro….PERAÍ! O que tu tá fazendo que ainda não leu o último livro?) o assassinato de Dumbledore nada mais era do que um acordo entre eles.

Mas foi feia a coisa. Nunca esperei a minha reação ao ler o capítulo mais aguardado por mim, a redenção de Severo Snape. Eu terminei de ler soluçando.

Desde que li o primeiro livro da série, aos 14 anos, fui cativada pelas roupas negras esvoaçantes e o sarcasmo do senhor Snape. Sempre fazendo o certo, mas mantendo a fama de mau. Sempre recriminando Harry por algo, mas salvando sua pele. Mas afinal… Aquele que recrimina uma criança não é quem se importa  com sua formação de caráter? Nesse aspecto sempre vi Snape como um figura paterna para Harry, em oposição ao pai bondoso e conivente (Dumbledore) e ao arremedo de padrinho Sirius Black, que trata Harry como se fosse o Tiago/James.

Com o passar da série percebemos que Snape era um menino impopular em Hogwarts e sofria discriminação do grupo dos “caras pop” que consistia no atleta imbecil (James), o bonitão metido a besta (Sirius), o intelectual omisso (Lupin) e o idiota baba-ovo (Pettigrew) (que fique bem claro: tenho profunda simpatia pelo Sirius e pelo Lupin, mas eles como estudantes eram uns idiotas. Em breve o post: Sirius Black e a síndrome de Peter Pan).

Snape's worst memory.

Snape era nerd! Branquelo, magriço, com o cabelo ensebado (seria grunge?), cdf e discriminado pelos populares. Não tem como não se identificar e ter simpatia pelo cara!

Mas então, temos esse personagem que comeu o pão que o diabo amassou com o rabo no tempo de estudante, um passado um tanto duvidoso (já que foi comensal da morte) e a confiança do maior e mais idôneo (ou nem tanto) bruxo do mundo mágico, Alvo Dumbledore. Será que ninguém se perguntou porque diabos Dumbledore confiava tanto nele?

Snape assumiu seu papel, e o cumpriu de forma impecável. Ninguém pode questionar a sua lealdade até o seu final, com sua derradeira e estúpida morte. Ainda assim, conseguiu preservar a dignidade de sua história para a única pessoa para quem interessava saber a verdade: Harry. E aí vem o soco na boca do estômago.

Minha mente mirabolante sempre me disse que Sev era APAIXONADO pela Lílian/Lilly, mãe do Harry. Era o único motivo pelo qual se justificava toda aquela proteção em relação ao guri, mesmo que aparentemente ele o detestasse. Óbvio: quem é que iria gostar que o filho do amor da tua vida se tornasse igual à criatura que tu mais detesta no mundo, e que casualmente é a mesma pessoa que a roubou de ti?

Dispensa comentários.

Enfim, Snape revelou a verdade a Harry, e seu amor por Lilly. O que eu nunca imaginei é que esse amor fosse tão antigo, desde a infância. Snape amou Lilly desde a primeira vez que a viu, muito antes de Hogwarts. Como fiquei feliz de saber que a ruiva se tornou a melhor amiga dele, que Snape, afinal, era um menino normal e tinha amigos. Que era feliz. Assim como fiquei feliz ao ler a parte em que Lilly o defende das provocações de James e Sirius no trem. Imaginei-os como uma dupla dinâmica, inseparável. Quer dizer, até que as casas os separassem.

Umas das coisas que sempre questionei desde que levantei a remota possibilidade da paixonite por Lilly, era se o  sentimento de Snape era retribuido. De fato, os dois eram muito amigos, e próximos. Lilly era meiga e inteligente, não suportava injustiças, senão não teria defendido o “Snivellus” e enfrentado James e companhia. Mas o que diabos ela viu no raio do jogadorzinho de quadribol cabeça-oca?(mistérios femininos…até parece que ela ficou com o James apenas para ferir o Sev =P)

Fico pensando…se apenas a amizade de Lilly bastasse e se Snape não tivesse se unido aos alunos da Sonserina, se não tivesse chegado ao extremo de chamar sua melhor amiga de sangue ruim, se Lilly não tivesse se decepcionado tanto com ele (e tivesse desculpadoo Snape  depois do plantão que ele fez na porta dos dormitórios da Grifinória)… não teríamos como personagem principal da série um menino magro e pálido de olhos verdes como os da mãe e cabelos negros e oleosos chamado Harry Snape?

E aí, será...?

Gosto de imaginar essa possibilidade. =D

By Ju Galak

Camp Virginia aka Tatooine

Note: This is installment eight of my series “Going to War” which chronicles my deployment to Iraq working with our advisers to the Iraqi Army and Security Forces in Al Anbar Province.  To see the others in the series go to “categories: and click on the “Tour in Iraq” link.

We flew from Leipzig to Kuwait.  Flying into Kuwait in mid- afternoon is an interesting sight.  The azure waters of the Northern Arabian, or the Persian Gulf, the terminology depends on who your Ally is, hug the coast where Kuwait City, a sits ensconced at the tip of the Gulf.  The azure waters and the almost overwhelming sand that predominate this area of the world stand in stark contrast.  The city itself, full of modern luxury hotels, home of business and oil conglomerates and resorts for those who can afford them, seems a foreign intrusion.  The brightness of the sun reflecting off of the concrete of the tarmac was nearly blinding to us and I was very thankful for my sunglasses.   The aircraft taxied to its position and as the door opened the heat rushed in.  We deplaned and walked single file in the searing heat with our covers removed to a line of white tour buses of various Asian and European manufactures.  Drivers, guest workers from India, Pakistan or elsewhere on the sub-continent or eastern Africa sat in them or stood beside them smoking or talking with one another.  Our bags were moved to waiting tractor trailers and a small shaded area was close by where liter bottles of drinking water and MREs were available for any who wanted one.

We were loaded onto the buses for the trip to our in processing station where our ID cards were scanned and we officially entered the theater.  If you have never ridden on a tour bus manufactured in a country us than the United States they are not quite designed for people of our more fully shaped asses and longer legs.  This means that unless you are short and twig like that you will be rather cozy with the person sitting next to you, especially if they are well fed.  Thankfully Nelson and I were together as usual and since neither of us are terribly large, though I might be referred to as “stocky” and we watched in almost horrified fascination as rather some rather large folks squeezed in together.  Since we were pretty hot and sticky and previous busloads of rather stinky people had left their stench on the seats before us, the odor in the buses was rather strong and vibrant.  Unfortunately my allergy medicine cocktail of Allegra and Flonase allows me to smell the stink.  15 years ago I would have not noticed the smell because of what were then severe allergic symptoms when exposed to things like…. let’s say…dust.   Lots of that in the desert, and there is plenty of dust in Kuwait.  But this time for me there was no escaping the smell.  It took a couple of hours going at what seemed to be an ungodly slow pace to get to what is known as Camp Virginia, a place which bears little resemblance to any locale in its namesake, save for the McDonald’s sign which lit the food court area since it was now night.   Tents with plywood floors were our quarters and large air conditioning units on each end of the tent were used to try to cool it down.  We got our gear off of the baggage trucks and did the “Sea Bag Drag” of our gear into our tents.  This was no easy task, we all had three sea bags or their equivalent all packed with a deployment’s worth of gear.  One thing about going to war as opposed to flying commercial is that you are often the baggage crew as well as your own “Skycap.”  The smaller and older you are the bigger more painful the load seems.  I was in better shape than many of my fellow sailors because of consecutive tours with the Marines and EOD, but three  massive bags, a 3 day pack and case for the computer that I had been issued by EOD for the trip combined with the heat and the effects of our extended trip to get across the pond had kicked my ass.

Camp Virginia

The time we spent in Kuwait accomplished a number of things.  It allowed us to get acclimatized to the region. It also was a place where we completed various administrative and training evolutions including a couple of days on a place in the middle of the fricking desert called the Buehring Range complex and specifically an inhospitable site known as the Udari Range..   I think that Buerhring  is named for an Army Soldier killed during the war.  I’m sure that he was a gallant soldier, but the Navy does far better in naming things for our heroes, we name ships after them, or nice buildings, not a hellhole in the desert.  I do hope that the Army will decide to name something nice for him someday.  It kind of remeinds me of the movie The Green Berets where one of John Wayne’s sergeants asks for a latrie, or “privvy” to be named after him.

Udari  is a live fire range where more advanced weapons skills are taught as well as convoy procedures and IED drills which are as realistic as you can get outside of hte real thing.  It also forces you to realize that danger is not far off, Weapons are carried at all times, security forces man checkpoints, guard posts and patrol the area, buses and convoys are escorted by armed vehicles.  Despite the creature comforts provided on Tatooine by the US Government it is still both a harsh and inhospitable place as well as a dangerous place.  The MREs, heated by the oven like heat were more tasty than usual, a culinary delight if you may.  We only had a couple of heat related casualties while there and lost a Air Force sergeant to renal failure for which he was evactuated to the States, but apart from that the training was uneventful.

Udari Range August 2007, about the time I went through

I am convinced that Buerhing and Camp Virginia are actually not on this earth and that they are actually the planet Tatooine, the home of Luke Skywalker and his trusty droids R2D2 and C3PO.  I have seldom seen a more desolate and God forsaken place on earth, even in New Jersey.  Thus somehow we must pass through some interspatial portal while driving from Kuwait City to Virginia and Buerhing, possibly like a “wormhole” in Star Trek.   Temperatures while we were there were 130 degrees plus in the heat of the day and the lows were in the cool 90’s.  It was so hot that the air bubbles in my Nike 180’s melted and lost their bounce, becoming compleely flat.  Likewise the glue on my Blackhawk boots melted and the soul began to separate from the boot.  Thankfully it took a while for it to get really bad and my e-mail to Blackhawk netting me a new pair of boots with their apologies once I arrived in Iraq.  I wrote Nike but got no response.  Everywhere one looks there is nothing but heat and sand.  Yes, you can see the heat.  I am not making this up.  As on Tatooine, Camp Virginia hosts a remarkably diverse transient population from numerous countries.   Some of these are from former Soviet Republics such as Georgia.  There was a Georgian Brigade processing through on its way to Iraq that was like a hoard of Jawas.  2,500 Georgian soldiers including female troops who we were informed served as ‘comfort women” for the Georgian men were everywhere, the Post Exchange, Chow Hall, or as the Army calls it the DFAC as well as the gym, the MWR computer room and food court.  Of course I do not begrudge any ally a meal, a bed and a place to stay but the Georgians descended like locusts.  If you got to the PX after them it was empty. Nelson and I would almost race the 500 meters to the Chow Hall to get in line ahead of the Georgians.  They were amazing; they filled their plates higher than Bluto Blutarsky (John Belushi) in the movie Animal House.  Breakfast was especially amusing from my point of view.  They would have eggs, bacon, sausage, grits, topped with pancakes and waffles covered in syrup and two to three donuts stacked on top.  All of this on one plate.  I am sure that when these soldiers returned home to Georgia that its obesity rates spiked in a rather remarkable manner.  The lady that ran the internet café constantly chased them off of porn sites, even the women.  In addition to the Georgians we had Brits and Aussies, Poles, South Koreans, Brazilians and a number of other nation’s soldiers passing through on their way to various places in the Middle East, but it was the Georgians that I remember most.

The other two chaplains, Kyle and Rick and I ensured that spiritual and emotional needs were met during the stay, for me this was usually with sailors who would pull me aside informally just to talk or ask for prayer or advice.  There is something about the final stage of a journey into a combat zone that pulls at you as you think about what might be faced on the other side.  Since most places in Iraq were still pretty sporty with huge numbers of attacks and many personnel killed or wounded, even in supposedly “safe” areas.  Kyle and Rick would remain in Kuwait to run the Warrior Transition program while Nelson and I loaded our gear prepared for our flight into Iraq.

Padre Steve at the Udari Range

Eventually we competed a very good cycle of training at Buerhring and Virginia and once again loaded our gear on trucks, made accountability checks, got our signed copies of our orders and headed off to a joint Kuwaiti and US Air Force Base for our flight to Baghdad.