Sit Rep (That's Situation Report For Those Of You What Don't Read Tom Clancy Books)

3/15/07, 1400 Hours. Corporal Noll arrived at the rendezvous point codename "The FratCave." We reviewed our plan of attack and decided to do some research on the enemy's movements by procuring a historical document of their battalion codename "300." However, it turns out our enemy codename "The Spartans" pretty much faded into obscurity in the following centuries of the Battle of Thermopylae...So technically, a victory for our boys! Following the glorious news, we were engaged by the company Crane, Poole & Schmidt (codename "Boston Legal"). Much to my surprise, they were an entertaining unit and as far as this old war dog is concerned a welcome addition to my regiment. Later began "Operation: Make Dinner" which would go down in recorded history as the Battle of Stromboli. Many men lost their lives, but our objective was successfully achieved nonetheless.

3/16/07, 2230 Hours. After a long day of inactivity on the frontline, Corporal Noll and I decided to infiltrate a function codename "Enchantment Under The Sea Dance." The music was loud and the regulars were restless. Throughout the night one of the regulars, codename "Dickless Fuckwit" nearly got to find out what it would've been like to swallow his front teeth. Another suspected hostile turned out to be a false alarm and spent the remainder of the evening wining, dining and engaging in heavy petting with a stuffed amphibian. At one point I was asked to participate in a time travel experiment with two of the female regulars, but their temporal displacement devices seemed to be broken at the time. Nonetheless, we got the intel we needed and made with a hasty retreat not much later.

3/17/07, 0930 Hours. I rose from my barracks to find Corporal Noll already downing the company's alcohol like all the meaning had left the world and the only sense he coud find resided at the bottom of each bottle. Not much later, we were invaded by a sleeper cell of scouts who seemed only to be armed with lights, sounds and camera equipment. I negotiated a treaty as quickly as I could in which Corporal Noll was allowed to retain his viewing schedule of codename "VH1 Classic" so long as the volume was kept to an acceptable low. The sleeper cell extricated within a few hours and all was back to normal, allowing Corporal Noll, Private Cribley and myself to prepare for codename "Operation: Shamrock N' Roll (All Night Long And Party Every Day Tripper Gore Verbinski)."

3/17/07, 1030 Hours. The stage was set, the curtains drawn and the music begun for what might possibly be Corporal Noll and I's last hurrah together. After a brief skirmish with a sickly young enemy soldier regarding "Operation: Remix To Ignition", the battle waged on into the night. We battled for the next three and a half hours against an unseen enemy codename "Sobriety" set to a soundtrack of blistering rock n' roll, sexually inappropriate hip-hop and Irish infused punk rock and emerged victorious on the battlefield. Private First Class Berens and Private Scott managed to keep their cool throughout the battle and helped to run interference on the enemy with a flanking maneuver codename "Fake Irish Dance" to draw the enemy's attention while Corporal Noll and I laid down a heavy supressing fire of Guinness and Jaeger Bombs. When all seemed lost, our ally the regent King Cobra charged forth with his cavalry and exterminated the enemy. An impressive victory for the allies, but many young soldiers lost their lives that fateful night and Staff Sergeant McCoy is still MIA.

3/18/07, 1300 Hours. I slowly drag myself out of the barracks to find Corporal Noll well rested from the previous night's battle and eating lunch. I engage "Operation: Make My Head Not A Splode" and the operation takes the better part of the day to successfully complete. The company of Crane, Pool & Schmidt return however to nurse our wounds with the healing medicine of laughter, much to my delight.

3/19/07, 1230 Hours. Corporal Noll and I extract Private First Class Berens from the rendezvous (codename "Parking Lot Behind The Student Union") and catch up with Staff Sergeant Mattholomew "Mamma Mia" Horn at the local Arby's. On an unrelated note, the army's C-Rations should be replaced with Arby's Melts and Jalapeno Poppers. After a lengthy intellectual discussion regarding the state of affairs within the lives of our friends and several rounds of our ridiculous knowledge of popular culture, First Class Private Berens and I return to our base of operations, codename "The Union," and Corporal Noll rides off for the long journey back to home base. After a brief encounter with Private Pardee, I attend my mandatory briefing sessions codename "Culture & Comics" and "Crime & Deviance in Film." The remainder of the evening goes off without a hitch.

3/20/07, 1400 Hours. Still no sign of Staff Sergeant McCoy. I attend my only mandatory briefing session that day codename "Popular Culture Research" and later an cast by fate into the middle of a godless rabble called the "University Film Organization." It appears to be a group of nerds who like movies and being ridiculous, but I think it may be a front for something far more sinister...Somehow, I've been elected as their second in command...I'll have to play this out and see where it takes me...Something big's on the horizon for them, something codename "48 Hour Film Festival." I can only assume it's meant to indicate a countdown to something...But to what? I hope I can find out before it's too late...

3/21/07, 1230 Hours. After successfully infiltrating a so called "University Film Organization Officer's Meeting," I receive a communique from Command Sergeant Link informing me that he and Master Sergeant Dunaway are on the premises. I excuse myself and rendezvous with them in the BTSU Ballroom on the second floor. There is an operation back home that requires my expertise and they need me there ASAP. As much as I hate to shirk my duty and risk blowing my cover as a college student, I accept the invitation and by 1630 Hours I'm on my way back to base camp in Ashley, OH. I throw myself into the task immediately, and spend the remainder of the day surfing the internet and reviewing historical documents codename "Smallville."

3/22/07, 0730 Hours. An early start to a long day. I spend the better part of it continuing surveillance on the "Smallville Project" and do my best to stay out of sight of the enemy battalion amassed here in great number. They outnumber me a paltry 117 to 1, but they know what they're doing. This could be my final stand.

3/23/07, 0745 Hours. I'm rudely shook from my slumber by an emergency communique received by Sergeant First Class Hudler. A vicious downpour has struck and the water levels are rising quickly. I perform a sweep of the facility and conclude that the stream and lake trails must be closed off immediately...I play along and carry out my marching orders, but those trails were my primary escape routes in the event of an emergency. I'll have to establish another means of extrication, and after my vehicle was mercilessly ensnared by the elements today, my escape may very well have to be on foot. What little backup I had has retreated home for the weekend, beating out the unfavorable weather conditions and leaving me to fend for myself. I'm down to two days and a wake-up, and they assured me that an evac chopper will come for me in two days at precisely 1500 Hours...But they also told me this would be an easy assignment, and everything I've seen is indicative to the contrary. I've got enough food and supplies for another week, but what comes after this battalion marches out of the territory? The next regiment could be twice as many, and they might not be as willing to give up this turf as it is a prime location to establish a base of operations. My mobile base of communications is still holding up, but I don't know for how much longer. Should anyone find this, make sure that my soldiers know I died the death of a soldier, and tell my friends and family that I love them and my only regret is that this war became more important to me than them...I realize the folly of my ways now, and should I escape I intend to spend the rest of my life making up for it. But somebody has to carry on the fight...

Sic vis pacem, para bellum...If you want peace, prepare for war.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation...Er, Spring Break

Alright fools, here's the rundown...Spring Break I got paid to sit on my duff and play online flash games, watch the Blade trilogy, The Boondocks and Smallville. Nothing exciting happened at all...I think.

So back to school...Um, my grandfather passed away this week, so that kinda sucked. That probably makes it seem like I'm marginalizing that event, but I don't really think a blog's an appropriate place to grieve/mourn and it's not something I intend to bring up in casual conversation, but now people know.

Experimental Film is still underway, but I'm gonna hold off on a Film Festival deadline for it. Instead, I'm going to take the time this project deserves and wrap shooting before the end of the semester and spend the summer editing it (when I have time) and just screen it in the Union next year and enter it to next year's Fillm Festival.

Also, I reneged on my previous statement. I'm going to work at Recreation Unlimited this summer after all for at least five of the seven weeks. I crunched some numbers and I'll be able to meet my financial obligations with no trouble and besides, it sucks trying to lock down a new job anyway.

Dan's here now and it's been pretty good times, and I've got Steve's party tomorrow night and then a spectacular celebration come Saturday at mi casa complete with appearances by several of my hometown Bro Hams...I'm stoked.

Something In The Way

Day 3. The worst has come to pass. I've doubled back over our tracks at least ten times by now, but every time I follow them back to our entry point all I find is a seemingly bottomless abyss...I know it wasn't there when we inserted the team into the drop point. What should've been a simple extraction turned into a prolonged firefight in mere seconds...The industrial zone we were infiltrating was an ambush. We were engaged immediately by an unknown number of hostiles and less than half the team survived the encounter. Myself, Private Apone, Lieutenant Dobson and Doctor Serra were the only ones who made it out alive. When we reached our target destination, we found the package had been...damaged. The hostages we were sent to retrieve were all dead, had been for some time. As near we could tell, something had caused their chests to explode from the inside, killing them almost instantly. With the exception of the hostiles we encountered earlier, we've seen no signs of life on this miserable rock. I managed to get up close and personal with one of them...They moved like humans, they looked like humans...but they were something else. Now we're stuck with no evac, no comms and we won't be declared MIA for at least five days. We're stuck here, just the four of us...but I don't think we're alone.