Here's one of my soldiers manning the gunner's post. This was during one of our trips into Qayyarah.

This chair, located in the Al Faw palace was once owned by Saddam. It's a favorite spot for soldiers to get their pictures taken (can you tell?).

Believe it or not, it does rain in Iraq, as these poor soldiers found out when they tried to move this large forklift over some muddy ground.

This a friend of mine, working for EODT security. He was actually deployed with me, but retired as a Sergeant Major after coming back and starting working for EODT back in Iraq. He's striking a tough-guy pose, but he's really the nicest guy you could meet

This is a UH60 refueling. I don't recall what base this is on. They kick the passengers off while they're doing this, which is when I got this picture.

During training, we fired our weapons many times. Here I am getting in some practice firing three-round bursts for accuracy.

Me in the office. 'BDOC' stands for Base Defense Operations Center.

This Qatari was selling opportunities to hold his falcon for $5. I didn't take him up on it.

A collection of rocket launchers. Hajji will often set these up, put a rocket in it, set up some sort of timer device, and then leave the area for the rocket to fire at a later time.

We went through training on how to search a suspect and I got to play "suspect".

This is a mosque located on our FOB. No American was alloowed inside - even if you were security (like me) or an American Muslim.

While in Iraq, you get a one-week MWR trip to Qatar. On one of the trips we were allowed to take, this Qatari was selling camel rides. I didn't bother with it.

Here I am during a trip to Qayyarah to check on a water-pumping station.

Believe it or not, this is what they served for dinner one night. I think it was a case of a Turk not translating to English correctly.

This mosque, I was told, was Saddam's personal mosque near the Al Faw palace. Now, it's located on Victory Base Complex.

This is me getting the upper hand on one of the guys in my unit. We were learning search techniques for a hand-cuffed suspect.