I set a goal this year to read 24 books. I thought that if I read two books a month that should be acheivable and I would feel a sense of accomplishment about it when I finished. Well to day I have read 18 books, but I have not read a single book since I got back from R&R leave. I even took three books with me on leave and read them while I was at home, and during my traveling. Lately I have really been trying to focus on my Math class that I am almost failing. I do not remember Math being this hard. I will be happy when it is over. So happy, I will read a book just for the pure enjoyment of it. Well here is the list of books that I have read this year, most of which have been Lious L'Amour novels:

ü      1.   Birding Babylon                                                      (Jonathan Trouern-Trend)

ü      2.   One More Day                                                       (Mitch Albom)

ü      3.   Eragon                                                                   (Christopher Paolini)

ü      4.   Eldest                                                                     (Christopher Paolini)

ü      5.   Guns of the Timberlands                                         (Louis L’Amour)

ü      6.   Where the Long grass Grows                                  (Louis L’Amour)

ü      7.   The Lonesome Gods                                              (Louis L’Amour)

ü      8.   Under the Sweetwater Rim                                     (Louis L’Amour)

ü      9.   The Cherokee Trail                                                (Louis L’Amour)

ü      10. Dark Canyon                                                          (Louis L’Amour)

ü      11. North to the Rails                                                   (Louis L’Amour)

ü      12. The Five People You Meet In Heaven                    (Mitch Albom)

ü      13. Flint                                                                        (Lious L’Amour)

ü      14. Crossfire Trail                                                         (Lious L’Amour)

ü      15. To Tame A Land                                                    (Lious L’Amour)

ü      16. Utah Blaine                                                             (Lious L’Amour)

ü      17. Alice’s Adventure In Wonderland                            (Lewis Carrol)

ü      18. Through The Looking-Glass                                    (Lewis Carrol)

I read Alice's Adventure In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass because Lewis Carrol was a mathmetician and did a lot of work in the field of logic. After studying logic in my math class it gave me a lot of insight as to some of the converstaions in the books.

My next book to read is Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. I have tried several times to read this book but always have felt overwhelmed by the depth of it. This time I am going to read it slowly and write down notes while I am reading it. Hopefully this will help.

~Doug

So this is my first blog entry, and what do I write about.  I have decided for my first blog entry to create a list of the birds that I have seen in Iraq since I have been here.  Not many, I don't have the chance to run off and go where I would like to all the time to see stuff, but I have kept track of what I have seen since I got here.

Spur Winged Plover: The first time I saw this plover was at the water treatment pond.  When I found it I was so excited that I thought I would be seing a bunch of new birds, but this was the only bird I saw there that day.

Wood Pigeon: Kind of boring, but a seasonal bird here in Northern Iraq, and an interesting bird to see.

Collared Dove: The most common bird, I see them almost every day.

Spotted Little Owl: I caught sight of this tiny owl on the way to the Chow Hall one evening. It was sitting on a steel pole that is commonly used as a telephone wire pole over here, in the middle of the daylight.  I thought it was cool, and my buddy I was going to chow with offered to shoot it.

Alpine Swift: Neat little swift that showed up in the early part of the summer and nested under the eaves of some of the buildings.  I liked having them around because they ate a lot of bugs.

Blue-cheeked Bee-eater: I saw a small flock of these flying over the base as I was driving back from the PX. I wanted to pull over and stare at them, but they were gone before I could have even reacted.

Hoopoe: Commonly referred to by the soldiers at the battalion headquarters building as the zebra bird, but more than one soldier told me of its existence. After several days of stalking the headquarters building I finally noticed it flying away and over the fence.

Crested Lark: A summer visitor that showed up at the water treatment pond. They often run on the ground instead of flying, and they have a pretty identifiable call.

White Wagtail: Came up to the command post one morning. I stood outside and watched him run around for 20 minutes before he finally flew away.

Black Redstart: I noticed this bird hanging out around the command post. It took me several weeks to finally identify him.

Magpie: There are many of these birds all around, and they are nesting all the time in the few trees that abound on the base.  They are very playful and chase the collared doves around.

Hooded Crow and Carrion Crow: Mostly winter birds that abound in and around the base, usually around the trash pits and the dumpsters.

I have spotted a few other birds, mostly flycatchers, but have not been able to identify them.

I look forward to posting more new birds later.

~Doug