Double Dose of Nyquil and Fudge Toffee Brownies

 Lou came home today!!Yay!! Five days seems like a long time but its really nothing compared to 60 days. I keep telling myself that. We have a stretch of 3 weeks, this one included, where he will be in the field for the entire week and arrive back to the fort Friday noonish. The week really flew by, with all the planning for the Dog-X. Nope, I still don't know what a Dog-X is. An FTX is a field-training-exercise, but I have thought and thought about the D-O-G and racked my brain for a suitable pairing of army lingo/words, all to no avail. 

Suffice it to say that it means 160 guys from Alpha Company go out into the barren wilderness/swamps for 5 days, eat MREs, don't bathe, walk for 20 miles with 80lbs on their backs, sleep on rocks and tree roots, and keep morale high by elaborating on their dream meals once they return home for the weekend. I think the average guy's dream weekend consists of "Sitting in a hot tub eating pizza, drinking beer, and detailing cold/wet/miserable times in the Army."

We wives of the 160 Alpha Company men are about 25-30 strong, not many married guys in the infantry, apparently. The wives are in the process of raising money for their spring social, hosted for the senior wives here on post. This requires money, as everything in this world does! So, in order to raise the funds we have 3 Dog-X cookouts slated- one for each Friday that the guys return to civilization. Today was the 1st and I was designated co-ordinator. Co-ordinating can be fun, at times. Like when you are trying to determine how many bottles of ketchup to purchase for 160 men, so you go to the fridge and read the "serving size" label on the back of your (non)Heintz label. Or googling "How many leaves in a head of lettuce?" in order to allow for adequate serving sizes without having enough lettuce to tile the parking lot with. In my case, googling didn't work for the lettuce because we did have 5 heads leftover. But, at least it wasn't something monumental. Anyway, as it turns out there were 10 wives who volunteered to bring food/serving dishes/drinks/etc for this meal and that made life easier, but since it was our trial run-I think I was inwardly wound up. The kind of wound up that keeps nagging in a small voice,"What if you completed underestimated these starving beasts' ability to put away hamburgers? What if volunteer with the plates doesn't show?" It all came off fairly well though and we were able to raise over 500 dollars, which was exciting!

  After we cleared the remains away, I went home and contemplated a nap. But, instead I packaged up the sliced remains of 7 onions before they could flavor the milk and cream cheese in the fridge. Then, I went grocery shopping for Lou's dinner, since in the planning and executing of this picnic meal I had left no room for his or my food in our fridge. 
The week took a toll on Lou. His lips are cracked and bleeding, his face sports a rosy windburn glow and he's scratched and bruised with fighting with briers and trees in the dark. No, he's not in the infirmary, but he has lost his voice this evening and coughed his lungs up (figuratively, for the most part).  He has a fever and a glassy look to him, which I helped to make even glassier with the double dose of Nyquil. Shocking? "And you a nurse....well,well..." Well, I know you're only supposed to give adults 30ml/2T of that stuff, but it never has the desired affect on a 6 foot tall man that it does on me. So, poor Lou came home after cleaning his weapon out in the field for 4 hours and in this order finished out his evening: shoes and socks (painfully) removed due to the enormous blisters that those 10 mile ruck marches cultivate, pitcher of ice water, backrub, bowl of fruit, vitamins, hot bath, sleep for 4 hours, Chinese supper-all that hot spiciness helps your sinuses out, dose of Nyquil and hobble back to bed for some more sleep. They didn't get a lot of sleep out there. One night from 9p-6am they spent in a 5 mile area doing night land navigation with night vision goggles. This morning they were treated to the 10 miler. There were a lot of hobbling men to be seen!
Today was exhausting. Or maybe its my writing at midnight that gives me that feeling. Some days here are filled with accomplishments. Sure, they're not earth-shattering. But, they are enjoyable and practical. My friend Cassie (pictured with boyfriend Bill and his REAL gun)

taught me my first knit stitch last week and I put it to use right away. Now Cass is a much more accomplished knitter than I am and just finished a baby bear-whose photo I will feature here sometime in the near future. But, just completing a dishcloth gave me a sense of accomplishment! I NEVER knitted anything in my life. And granted, I did unravel the thing at least 8 times in the first couple of days. Somehow instead of doing the "drop a stitch" thing I managed to add a stitch every 2 rows. So, I'd go back to count and think,"How can I have 47 stitches now when I started with 38?" It bothered me to know that even if no one else knew, I KNEW...so out it came again. But, now I'm happy to report that the last row has the identical number of stitches as the first row! Finally, I watched an internet tutorial to discover the art of binding off the last row-and managed to complete it.

Where do the fudge-toffee brownies fit into it all? Always save dessert for last, then you'll eat less and get fatter slower. Wish I took my own advice. One of the wives from Alpha, Sarah, came by last night at 10 with a stack of brownies for the meal. But, unfortunately the middle section of the pan was "too sticky to cut neatly" so she gifted me with 8 gooey sticky brownies, studded with toffee bits and chocolate chips. Me, being the self-controlled mature woman that I am promptly ate one at midnight when she left, right before going to bed. Then, I ate another one (to give me energy, haha) when I headed out to set up in the freezing cold this morning. And.....I confess, I ate my 3rd (in 24 hours) when I cleaned the kitchen tonight. That's why I always eat very little rice with my Chinese, I save the calories for something with flavor.....and dark chocolate. Enough confessions~