BIG NEWS!

I’ve finally got orders!!! I’m being posted at Camp Casey, Korea, with the 2nd Infantry Division. Assuming the Brigade I’m going to isn’t set to deploy to the mideast, I’ll be in Korea for about 13 months (maybe longer if it turns out I like it there and choose to extend… I don’t know… I’ve never been to Korea before.)

Aside from that, Friday was a really good day for me.

Validation lanes, trauma exercises, and I got THE toughest lane they’ve got in the evaluations. Scenario is a soldier with massive trauma to the lower face & head and a partial amputation of the left hand with an associated compound fracture. All that involves treatment of a dummy. You also get a LIVE volunteer to serve as the arm you have to place the catheter in when it’s time to initiate the IV. There’s a 30-minute time limit, within which you have to treat all injuries, initiate an IV, and package the dummy for helicopter transport.

Complications on the lane I was on? The lights are turned off in the building, there’s a strobelight going, there’s a lot of smoke in the air from a stage fog machine, there’s a soundtrack of gunfire & explosions blaring in the background, and the evaluator in my lane was just a little bit psychotic… this guy likes to stand behind the person being tested and scream obscenities at them to see if he can rattle their cool.

I had the soldier on the LZ in twenty minutes, and the volunteer actually thanked me for not mangling his arm during the IV. One shot, one kill.

Uh-huh, dat’s right, We Bad. If you can get an IV stick on the first try with all that chaos around you, you know you’re gonna’ do well in this job. (Just as an FYI, the idiot who forgot to bring his Aidbag? He was a no-go on his first attempt, and if he can’t pass on Monday, he’ll be recycled. We’re all hoping that’s what will happen.)

This will be my last update for a few weeks… I’ve got the Field Exercise which overlaps next weekend, and the following weekend I’ll be packing to come home on leave.

See you on August 28th!