And More Family in the News

My oldest daughter has played 227 minutes as goalkeeper on the Juniata College women's soccer team this season without letting in a single goal. Her game last Saturday was a 2-0 shutout against a team in a higher ranked conference. She was named player of the week here and Landmark Conference Defensive Player of the Week (Story below) And this is the game story.

Auster-Gussman and Albert named Landmark Players of the Week

(Posted on September 15, 2008)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Juniata College sophomore keeper Lauren Auster-Gussman (Lancaster, Pa./Lancaster Country Day) has been named Landmark Conference Women's Soccer Defensive Player of the Week, and senior middle hitter Erin Albert (Philipsburg, Pa./Philipsburg-Osceola) earned Landmark Conference Women's Volleyball Player of the Week, when weekly conference honors were announced on Monday.

Albert helped the Eagles earn a pair of wins over nationally ranked foes while improving to 7-0 with three victories at this weekend's Teri Clemens Invitational, hosted by Washington University in St. Louis, Mo. Albert amassed 33 kills over 11 sets with a .286 hitting percentage, with a high of 13 kills in a three-set win over Bethel University (Minn.). She also recorded 11 kills in the four-set victory against Wisconsin-Whitewater. For the week, Albert also tallied 10 blocks, eight digs, and four aces.

The Eagle women's volleyball team opens Landmark Conference play this Saturday, Sept. 20, with a conference round-robin weekend at Susquehanna University.
Auster-Gussman stretched her shutout streak to 225 minutes this season while leading the Eagles to a 2-0 win over Gettysburg College. Auster-Gussman recorded seven saves to lead the Eagles to the win over Gettysburg; she has not allowed a goal since the 88th minute of a 5-0 loss at home to Dickinson College on Oct. 4, 2007, a span of 279:59 minutes.

The win over the Bullets, who entered the contest ranked 10th in the adidas/NSCAA Middle Atlantic Region poll, improved Juniata's record to 4-0-0 for the season while giving the Eagles their first win over a regionally ranked opponent.

This week, Juniata will host Lycoming College on Tuesday, Sept. 16, at 4:30 p.m. at Winton Hill Field, followed by a road contest at Penn State-Altoona on Saturday, Sept. 20.

My Wife in the NY Times Magazine

Today's New York Times magazine is the Campus Issue. Beginning on page 88 is a section on professors with style. My wife, Annalisa Crannell, is on page 90. They dressed her in $5000 worth of designer clothes including $2500 Gucci boots which did not show in the shot they used. The irony of this is that my wife has not bought any new clothes in this millennium. She only gets clothes from her friends and yard sales. She even considers Goodwill stores overpriced. The clothes she was wearing may have have cost more than all the clothes she has bought in her life.

No Pushups for Two Weeks

I went to the doctor last night. I have tendonitis in my right shoulder and right wrist and the doctor said rest would fix it--maybe. So I will skip the pushups and pullups for the rest of this week and go to physical therapy next week. PT helps the injury heal faster. I also am taking it easy because I don't want to go to the Live Fire Shoot House having any trouble holding a weapon.

So now I am adding my right arm to the balancing act I go though with running--I try to run far enough and fast enough to do well on the APFT but have to back off when my knees and ankles start to hurt. 20-year-olds can beat the crap out of themselves, get a good night's sleep and completely recover. Those of us who are chronologically enhanced have to be a lot more careful.

Got my Helmet!!!

Today I woke up and drove back to Fort Indiantown Gap to go to the supply office with our supply clerk to get a helmet. I got a brand-new extra-large kevlar helmet. As it turns out it feels big, but our supply sergeant says the XL fits right and the large sits too high on my head--I wear a size 7 1/2 hat. The supply clerk put i some extra pads, so it should be fine. It certainly fits better than the old-style helmet I was borrowing.

Recovery Training Today

This afternoon I had my first session of Recovery Team training. The recovery teams will use M984E1 HEMMT vehicles to go and rescue broken down and wrecked vehicles. The training was tough and realistic. The instructor handed me the operator's manual and said he would be back in a half hour and I should be ready to set up the M984E1 and go recovery a Humvee. My training partner and I set up the boom and tow chains. Lucky for me, the guy who was tested with me is a fan of "Wrecked" on SpeedTV. He knew how to set up for the recovery.

After the set up, we drove a couple of miles to a dirt road in the trees where the Humvee was off the side of the road. I drove. He guided me in. We had to reposition the M984 once, but got the Humvee chained on the first try and pulled it back to the motor pool. I don't know if I will be on the actual recovery team when we are deployed, but I learned a lot about rescuing vehicles today.

Who's Reading Blogs?

When I first created this blog, it was a simply to give friends and family updates on the weird stuff that happens to a 55-year-old guy who re-enlists in the Army. All of my family and many of my friends live in the eastern half of the US. Add in Belgium, France, Germany, Singapore and the UK and you have got most all of my friends locations.

A couple of months ago I added Site Meter to my blog just to see was looking at the blog. Since I don't get a lot comments I started to wonder if Meredith Gould, my sister, and Burt Friggin' Hoovis were my main reader base. I checked site meter when I woke this morning the first four locations that came up were
Adelaide, Australia
Jakarta Indonesia
Wurzburg, Germany
Taipei, Taiwan
The next 20 on the list were from the US, but mostly form the West Coast. On top of that, a couple of days ago 80 people visited my blog.
It got me wondering 'Who are these people?' But I guess America is nothing if it is not a nation of odd characters. I don't suppose there are any 50-year-old bloggers in the Russian or Iranian armies. Actually, I doubt there are any bloggers at all.

Helmet Tomorrow--Maybe

I have been back in the Army just short of 13 months. Most things are going well, but I still don't have a helmet. I have a lot of other field gear, including every authorized piece of long underwear, but no helmet. One of the squad leaders in my unit loaned me a helmet for annual training, but it doesn't quite fit.

So tomorrow I am leaving New York at 7 am after a late dinner meeting, going to Philadelphia for a couple of hours, taking a train to Lancaster, then driving another 40 miles to Fort Indiantown Gap because our supply sergeant said if I show up in person, he can take me to the folks that issue field gear and I can finally get an Extra Large Kevlar Helmet after 13 months on back order.

I am not sure how much use I will get out of my high tech long underwear in Iraq, but I am betting that helmet will be handy to have.