timbslim

I went to my first regimental ball last Friday night. It was a formal affair. I had to wear my dress blues. You can see the pictures to clarify. You can also see that I busted out with my dance moves after the dinner was over. As most of you can imagine, I can work a dance floor. By work, I mean that I can sweat profusely. I didn’t do too bad a job. The picture you will see of me is me doing the “electric slide.” Yes I said that I was doing the “electric slide.” I did a couple other dances and dance moves that I am not sure exist. I made up some of them. It was a pretty fun event. For those of you who are familiar with it, there was a grog bowl. It would take to long to explain. Just ask someone or google it. It is a tradition. The Chief of Chaplains was at the formal. He spoke. He is a General. He is also Southern Baptist. When I left the dance floor, I realized that he was standing there watching. Not my finest moment. I went over to him, sweat dripping, literal...

It was about 82 degrees on a fairly breezy evening around 10:30pm. The weather had blessed us with the first relief in some time since I have been here. One hundred nineteen of us were scattered along the edge of the woods. We were awaiting our orders for a mock, night infiltration of a city. I have to say that I was not scared, but certainly anxious. I was worn to a nub. It had been a long week. We were told to get into formation and insert our earplugs. We marched down into a trench with concrete walls on each side. We then awaited the order to go. This is where it really gets cool. At the signal, we scaled the trench wall and began a 100-meter high crawl to the end. A high crawl means that you are on your belly with your head looking forward. We climbed under live fire as well as random explosions. We also climbed under a couple of barbed wire obstacles. It was pretty sweet. This was the culmination of a long 3-day field training event. We began our field training o...

Why Are My Lungs on Fire? I was about 5 years old riding down the road with my dad, and sister. My dad had borrowed a car from a college student. I don’t remember exactly why we borrowed the car. But, we did. This college student, Pam, evidently was quite prepared for a potential attacker. This would become evident soon. We were in a bit of a hurry. So, my dad was driving at a greater than normal speed. This becomes a factor later in the story. We were driving down this particular two lane road to the airport to pick up some preacher. I don’t know who. At this point, I spotted a small container. I evidently couldn’t read well. All I recognized was that the word began with a “P.” I can still see it today. I reached for the container and picked it up. I interpreted the word that began with a “P” to be Perfume. Immediately, I recounted that my dad didn’t like strong perfume. This conclusion lead me to the next logical and near fatal action. In my mind I envisioned my da...

Well, I am in good Ol’ Fort Jackson, SC. Some of you may be surprised to here this. I am not sure where you have been if this comes as a surprise. Either way, I am here. I got here last Saturday, June 07, 2008. It has been one long week. The mornings have been early. The nights have been short. But, I have been getting some sleep. I’ve been getting my usual 5 or six hours. They just come at a different time of the day than they did prior to being in the Army. The Army life is certainly one of production. It is a large system made up of many subsystems. Quite frankly, it works well. There are times of waiting and wondering what is next. However, it seems to come together well. For such a large system, the result is productivity and action. I have said “Hua” more than I have ever heard it in my entire life. “Hooah” is word that is used in the affirmative. It is a word used when one agrees with what is being said or sometimes done. It means “yes,” “ok,” or that one agr...

I am sitting in an Individual and Family Therapy class. I am listening to a girl take part in an mock counseling session. I wish I wasn't bound by confidentiality so that I could tell you about this session. Basically, a church person is suffering from wanting to control someone else. That sounds familiar doesn't it? I am bored out of my mind. I started going though my pictures. I found this picture of me floating around on the Sea of Galilee. Sure beats being in this class. I have to say that being on the Sea of Galilee beat being here, beats being a lot of places. You probably know what I mean when I say that being somewhere else in our minds is a great way to steal away from the muck of the daily grind. Like me, you may have certain places that almost nothing else gets to you. Those places for me are running in the morning, riding my bike through the woods of Monte Sano, skiing down any Western or European ski slopes, and floating on the Sea of Galilee. There are...

April 3, 2008/Thursday 9:54am (Jerusalem) I am on my fifth trip to Israel. I have seen almost every nook and cranny of this country. I am now becoming so familiar with the layout that I have a sense of direction and an awareness of the layout. It is pretty cool. I find myself knowing which road to take and how to get to certain places. But today, I gained new knowledge. Today we headed West and South of Jerusalem. We started out at Bet Shemesh. We climbed up to the Tel of Bet Shemesh. A Tel is a mound of layers of a city that has been built and rebuilt. Basically, old cities have been conquered and rebuilt. After each battle, the city is leveled and another is built on top of the rubble. This produces a layering effect. This is a simple explanation of a Tel. Standing on top of Tel Bet Shemesh, you can see Samson’s community, Zorah, on one side and Delilah’s community, Timnah, on the other. Just down the road, literally, is where the Valley of Elah where David killed Golia...

April 2, 2008/Wednesday 9:32pm (Jerusalem) The day started with a wonderful laugh. My mother told me a great story about my daddy. First, it is important to understand how our hotel rooms are laid out. The shower and sink are in a separate room from the toilet. It has a room to itself. About 5:30am daddy got up to go to the bathroom. He decided to be real quiet so as not to wake up my mother. He stumbled across the dark hotel room. Instead of turning on the light he backed into the bathroom. So, he used his foot to gauge the distance from the door to the toilet. There was a slight problem. He wasn’t in the room with the toilet. He backed in and proceeded to sit down. This is when he fell in the floor. Mother woke up listening to him laughing while sitting in the bathroom floor. That is a great way to start the day. Since I posted last, we have seen a ton of stuff. We have covered a lot of territory. We arrived in Jerusalem on March 29. There is no way to describe a t...

March 28,2008/Friday I had Turkish coffee twice today. I may very well be up for the next 6 weeks straight. It is like drinking heavy mud with a coffee flavor. You only get about an ounce of it. Let me help you understand why one ounce of Turkish coffee is enough. If you were to take that ounce of coffee and add about 6 ounces of water you would have the equivalent of molten lava with a coffee flavor. Maybe if you added a gallon of water you might actually say that is taste almost like regular coffee. After drinking it your teeth are clothed for winter; it’s like each tooth has its own fur coat. If a British person drank Turkish coffee he or she would immediately need dental work. This does not apply to the wonderful and charming British people who I know personally. They are great and have beautiful teeth. Really, their teeth are like fine porcelain handcrafted by God. Anyway, Turkish coffee is stout if you have missed my point. Tonight I sat in the home of some Jewish fo...

Greetings from Israel! I am in Tiberias. I am having trouble posting to my normal blogspot at timbslim.blogspot.com. So, I have pasted it into this e-mail. I'll try to get the blog up soon. Otherwise I will e-mail it to you. I must first tell you about our stop in Paris. We planned to ride into downtown Paris due to the fact that we had about 7 hours between flights. I want to go ahead and go on record to say that driving from the airport (which takes 45 minutes) into Paris to tour the city is not, I repeat, not a good idea. I will attempt to convey all of the reasons for this. Remember we were on a bus. I think our most obvious obstacle was the fact that when we got off the plane, we were immediately forced to interact with French people. This in and off itself is a recipe for disaster. Might I add that French people don’t make a whole lot of effort to speak good English. It could be because their heads are so far up their own butts that even their ears are covered. ...

James Bond was always one of my heroes growing up. I absolutely love all the movies. I actually own the DVD’s to quite a few of them. Unlike most Bond fans, Roger Moore is my favorite, not Sean Connery. I think Pierce Brosnen did a bang up job as well. Some of you don’t know who James Bond is; shame on you. Please don’t quit reading this blog because I am exposing my fanatical James Bond allegiance. There is a greater meaning here. Hang Tight. The affinity for James Bond movies is a symptom of what seems like an insatiable desire for adventure. I have always been like that. I love adventure. I have always loved doing things that others think are ridiculous, whether it be jumping out of trees onto a trampoline, jumping from cliffs into the ocean, jumping out of planes, or being in places in the Middle East where bombs have been dropped. It gets my adrenaline going. There is nothing like adrenaline coursing through your veins. Sometimes you get that taste of iron in your m...

Welcome back to the world of Tim. It’s not that exciting. Well, maybe it is. I guess if you get out much, my life is a pretty good one through which to live vicariously. So, for all you homebodies, I am going to try to share some nuggets from my world. Maybe it will brighten your days. Maybe it will piss you off. I am quite certain that both are possible if you simply apply yourself. Some words to catch you up: A lot has happened since I last wrote in June. I took a quick trip up to Milwaukee. Wes Sanderson and I drove a U-Haul to Milwaukee to deliver Tyler’s furniture and stuff. He moved there in September I believe. I don’t remember the exact dates. It was a cool trip. We went to a Brewer’s game. We also went to a few microbreweries. We traveled down to Chicago. We circled Wrigley Field several time but never went into the game. We couldn’t find tickets cheap enough for Wes, not that Wes is cheap (in case he is reading this). I think it became a dual for him. We ...