A benefit of living overseas is te ability to purchase and enjoy pure Havana cigars such as Cohiba, Romeo & Julietta, Upmann and Partagas. The Sligo VI Cohiba being the finest in this box followed by the Partagas No. 3 Limited Edition 2006.

The bedouins here roam across the desert as their camels, sheep and goats graze. They are a kind and gentle people and always offer up tea and camels milk when we chat with them.

Lately the weather has been getting better and the grass is slowly coming up in the desert. I hear that flowers will also bloom forming a carpet of petals for a short time. All in all a nice time to be in the country. Not too hot and not too cold.

Another day another Kuwaiti Dinar. And today I believe that equals $3.5 US. Yes shopping is weird sometimes. McDonalds meals are about 1.2 KD for a meal not super sized. To fill the gas tank on the car is about 3 KD. This is one of the things we have here that is a little different from home.

We watched the movie Blood Diamond last night. Not too bad. I kinda liked it. Another one we watched recently that I though was hilarious was Borat. The movie was a bit over the top at times but comical non-the-less. Also wacthed and really liked the movie Bobby. Believe it or not the movie buffs in us have not been out to see very many movies other than Eragon.

Attached picture is of a herder out by Abraq Range, Kuwait.

This weekend was relatively quiet. Our house guest Devin from Kwaj has departed us for Afghanistan. We have our new car port built to protect our vehicles from rain and in summer the searing sun. We have caught up on all the current Heroes episodes via iTunes downloads. All is semi restful. Heather still has class this week. She is learning more advanced computer stuff.

The weather is slowly starting to go up a little bit. During the day I do not require a jacket unless it is overcast. At night I still have to have a jacket on though to keep warm.

Sounds like the Criminals softball team is off to a good start with a win in their first game according to Steve. Let’s hope they go undefeated. Except maybe against my brothers team. Got to root for my brother.

As always keep in touch and do not be afraid to drop us a line or come and visit. My specialty for the week is slipper lobster risotto with heaps of parmesean cheese. Also desert truffles are appearing in the stores as well.

I now have the keys and she is all mine, and Heathers.

Heathers new wheels. Her other car is a Huffy. Sorry bad Kwaj humor.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

My wife is having her birthday today!!!!! Well actually tomorrow. Tomorrow, Wednesday, is our Friday here as the weekend is Thursday and Friday. For this very special occasion I am taking her to dinner with some of her friends. It should be a good time. Everyone should pester her with birthday e-mails all day long wishing her well.

Well I go in tonight to work out the paperwork on my car. Almost thought I had lost it but the other guy backed out due to personal reasons. Nothing set in stone yet. I have lots of paperwork. Wish me luck. We get Heather’s car on Thursday. Paperwork here to get a car and what not is no laughing matter and will be glad when it is done. Actually all paperwork here is labor intensive. Oh well. So is life.

Any new reports on Kwaj are welcome so drop me an e-mail.

Well the holidays are over and now its time to get back to work.

Over the weekend we watched a lot of TV. One movie we did see was A Night in the Museum with Ben Stiller and Robin Williams. Not an overly great movie but fun. Also we have been downloading, from iTunes, the Heroes TV show episodes. Really, really enjoying them thus far. One hell of a television show. Probably the best I have seen in a long time. Also we are watching on disc the television show Invasion which is pretty good.

Softball starts here fairly soon which I am excited about. I hope my body holds out. My other knee is now bothering me a little. We’ll just have to see how she handles it. Can’t wait to swing the new bat though. Have read so many reviews on it.

Weather here is still cold. Not as bad as a couple of weekends ago though. They say it will start to get real hot again in a month and a half or so. The real pain if you do not have a car cover here is when it sprinkles out and then the dust settles on the car.

One super cool thing here so far is the sunsets. They are just incredible. With the sand in the air it looks red and watching it go down over the dunes is spectacular. The moon is quite impressive here as well. Very very red at times.

The new mall here opens soon. The place is incredible in size and dwarfs any mall I have ever been to anywhere in the world. They say it will have around 30+ restaurants inside as well as every store imaginable. Should be pretty cool. Only store open there thus far is the Ikea, which they say is one of the biggest in the world. Right now they have a large mural ad wall around the whole thing that is like a kilometer in length. They have asked for Guinness World Records to list it as the largest ad wall mural ever.

I have been experimenting with recipes lately now that I have some better stores at my disposal. The latest creation was a breakfast risotto with parmesan cheese, white cheddar cheese, bacon and served with an egg over easy on top. Super rich tasting and very filling. Give it a try.

Well that’s it for now. Take care and keep in touch everyone.

Check the Kuwait pictures site in the links to the right out. It has some extremely great photos in there. Wether you would like to see cars, animals, boats, birds......you name it. For those of you having not been to the region it is a good look at where Heather and I now reside.

COLD! COLD! COLD!

Well obviously being on Kwaj for so long has not helped me in surviving the cold. I thought the desert was suppose to be hot? Lately at night it has been around 1 degree Celsius. So I guess here we deal with the highest highs and some pretty darn low lows.

Holidays went very well. Work is going well. Nothing really to crazy to report. Is nice being able to go out to a restaurant for dinner. So far Wasabi is my favorite with Ninos coming in a close second. Ninos being a really nice Italian place on the Gulf and Wasabi a really good sushi and Japanese cuisine place.

I guess Kid Rock did an impromtu concert here at Camp Arifjan. Unfortunately I do not have my badge for that base yet. Oh well. I here Michael Jackson is coming to do a concert here as well. Oh hell no am I not going to that.

Well guess thats it for now. Happy Holidays.

Well things are still slow towards my getting the car. Paperwork is a tad bit slow here so I am still hoping she is still available when I get my civil ID. Heather has had her ID for sometime and gets her car after the Eid holidays here.

I hope this finds you all doing well and having a very merry hioliday season.

Well we are finalizing everything on our vehicles here. Just awaiting one more piece of paper from the Ministry of Defense for me. To get a loan you need a salary letter from employer stating salary and what not. Loans are based off of this and not previous history here. The bank here is putting both cars into one loan. Short term though, 2 years fixed rate. Was a fairly painless event getting this done. Received great service from the Toyota and Porsche staffs. Didn't hurt having friends like Patti and Eddy though!

Heather ended up getting the Furtuner V6 Toyota. A pretty cool SUV that is just under the Land Cruiser Prado. The thing is fully outfitted and is a 4 wheel drive. Will be nice as sometimes you need to hop a curb to get around some nucklehead or another. Attached is a picture of the car. We will post either here or on Heather's site, in a week or so, her with her new toy(ota).

Work is going well and I have numerous projects going on all at one time. I also am slowly starting to learn Arabic a bit. The basic grammar is almost exactly like English which makes the whole process that much easier. Just replace the English words with Arabic. A lot of words have religious tone to them such as to say that you are fine is to say “HAMDALA” which means Fine, or Thanks god for health.

Again a very cold day here. We received a deluge of rain the other afternoon and well into the night. The following morning many roads were flooded. Made for quite the driving experience into the office this morning.

Softball will start up after the holidays here once again. A bit too cold out for the new bat as it states not to use it below 60 degrees F. The holidays here for me will be 9 days long. I am under the local holidays where as Heather is under the American holidays. So while I am working on Christmas she will be at the spa getting all massaged and pampered.

The Hilton is just down the road from us and is a great place. It has several restaraunts to include Starbucks. We ended up at Starbucks drinkining coffee and writing our Christmas cards. The attached picture is one Heather took of me on the beach along the Persian Gulf at the Hilton.

Had a really excellent time the other night at the Kuwait Nomads Christmas Cracker. The event was black tie and included an excellent meal and dancing. This was Heathers first time to hang with Rugby folk and she seemed to enjoy it a great deal. Good times were had by all.

Prior to the nights festivities we went to the Hilton for lunch. While there we went and got our hair cut as well. I ended up getting a great facial as well. I always expected a facial to be pampering and what not but this was freaking painful. Yet it provided great results. I guess it is a fairly common guy thing to do here.

Also this night was the baby shower for some friends of ours as well so after the Cracker we headed to the shower. Enroute our cab ended up getting a flat. It didn't ruin the night at all though.

Today we ended up spending a nice quiet restfull day at the house.

The holiday seasons are upon us once again.

I have been asked by several persons what I may like for the holidays or my birthday coming up this February. The answer to this is that I usually just buy what I want. So after thinking I have come up with a brilliant idea. If you would like to do something for me then do the following.

Go to the website for the Shinta Mani located below and donate money to them in my honor. This is an OUTSTANDING organization. It is a hotel and spa located in Siem Reap, Cambodia that is an institute for the learning of the hospitality industry. They take kids off the street or from poor regions and teach them a valuable trade. They give rice to their families. Provide them with a stipend and uniforms. They assist them in finding gainful employment upon successful completion of the course. They also provide for the community in so many other ways. Check out the website to learn more.

I hope that this finds you all doing very well and that your holidays are filled with family and happiness.

www.shintamani.com

Heather and I instead of sitting in front of the television enjoyed many podcasts off of iTunes last night. Some of the ones that were most funny to me were the “Strong Bad E-mail” cartoons. Especially one called Techno. We also enjoyed the daily “Onion” report as well on podcast. One that is right up Patric’s alley is “Ask a Ninja”, which is a video podcast.

For the Strong Bad E-mails you can also go to www.homestarrunner.com. For ask a ninja go to hmmmmmmm guess what…………………http://askaninja.com. Steve there is a great onion post about the Marine Corp out as well right now. You should check it out.

Have a happy holidays.

Kuwait Air Force (KAF) Gazelle helicopter.

Well the winter season is fully upon us. The temperature upon my heading into work today according to the radio was a very cool 10° C and Heather has a tree and we will decorate it this week.

On Thursday, our Saturday here, we have tickets to go to the local rugby chapters annual Christmas Cracker dinner. This is a black tie affair. Heather and I went out with our good friends the Patti and Eddy Cars and purchased appropriate attire for this function. Heather has a stunning new dress and shoes and I have a nice Tuxedo for the gala. Should be a good time to be had by all. Will be fun to see folks normally known for hard hitting on the pitch in their finest singing rugby songs while in black tie.

Also I have just got my new softball bat and glove in and am dieing to get onto the field. I hear Steve after years has now purchased a new glove and bat. Actually we may have the same bat. I have just picked up the 27.5 ounce Mayhem Jeff Hall edition. I was looking at others but the Dubai tourney is very ASA strict so all bats must comply with the 2004 ASA ruling. The glove is a SSK and only has 4 fingers. The pinky and the finger next to it share a finger in the glove. We’ll see how it works after she is broken in.

For those interested and having not seen them please click on the link to Heather’s website and view the pictures of our villa here in Kuwait. Reservations are still available so call now for a real heck of a deal. Spare room has a king size bed and a full bathroom and tub.

Hope this finds all of you, our friends, having an enjoyable time where ever you may be. Happy Holidays!

And now for the new restaraunt review for Mahboulla, Kuwait.

WASABI is now open and I have already been there 3 times. They have a huge menu. The staff is excellent. The food is superb. You have several seating options: normal tables, tepanyaki (cooking in front of you on the grill) and a couple private rooms for you and your friends to take off your shoes and enjoy the food. The ambiance is best at night as the lighting is very nice although should be enjoyed no matter what the time of day.

RUBY TUESDAY is also open next door. After hearing from several folks that the meat is often under cooked and needing to be sent back we ventured there none the less. Yes indeed we had an individual with a steak in dire need of a little more flame. Service though I thought was good. Time from drink order to reception was very good. And the pasta I ordered was enjoyable. Over all not bad just reccomend until you hear further to stay away from red meat.

Down the street it appears a Duncan Donuts is going in. Not a place I am rushing towards nor do I think I will be going there at all as I am just not that big of a donut fan but if it is your cup of tea then looks like you are in luck. Although if donuts are your thing maybe you should try Mr. Baker or one of the many other very nice pastry shops in the area.