Yeah, sure I'll take a look at that.......
I love my job.......which is damned weird. Go figure, you spend four or five years (out of six) hating the Army, get out, get forced to come back in, and I'm having a blast. I was definitely in the wrong MOS before.
Despite no car, no tv, no life, no wife, I'm having a great time. Not the least of which is my job working in instrument repair. I'm doing simple mechanical type work all day, I get to listen to great music, and I'm working with an E-9, so nobody just walks in and starts dumping a load o' crap in my lap.
But even better, I get to jack with the people that come in. Fresh, raw, unadultrated privates, (pun as intentional as it is old....). These are the kind of guys you send to get a box of grid squares, a bottle of headlight fluid, a prick E-8. In other words, perfect.
For me to poop on!
And I'm working in there with no top and a denim apron on, so they automatically assume I'm an NCO, and jump to parade rest when I'm talking. Heh heh heh. Not that I would ever abuse that kind of power. Right...............
This week I've prepped about 15 new French horns, and 4 Sousafones for issue. It involves.....dissasembling, cleaning and degreasing tubes, tube slides, rotors, and rotor chambers, reoiling and reassembling all of the same, engraving horns and bells, laquering, marking cases, and a buttload of paperwork.
Even better, nobody knows I don't know what I'm doing, so they bring me things to fix. And I do! "Oh sure, I'll take a look at that...." To be fair, I'm not crazy, if it's beyond me, I'll pass it along. But I can straighten (or remove) a mouthpiece, rethread screw holes, restring rotors, buff out burrs, what have ya with the best of them. You wouldn't believe some of the abuses people put their instruments through.
My other great joy in life is my blender. I've lost scary weight, so right now I've no fear of sucking down tons of smoothies and bread with blender made hummis. If you've never had hummis, do so. Now. I know where you live. I was taught how to make hummis by a Kurdish contractor on our last mission at my old unit, and I've become permenantly addicted.
NBS's slightly jacked up (my recipe jacked up, not the contractor) Kurdish contractor hummis recipe is as follows. Take two cans o' garbanzo beans (chickpeas) and dump into a blender along with about two thirds of the can juices. Blend. Add about an inch or so of olive oil, (of blender space) two or three spoonfuls of tahini, and a few squirts of lemon juice. Add salt to taste. Hell, add everything to taste.
Blend it again. Taste too strong? You put too much tahini in. Jackass. Tahini is a very strong sesame seed paste. You can sometimes find it at an exotic/asian foods store, or sometimes at the local H.E.B. It's the biggest pain in the rear ingredient to find, so if you can't, then put in a little sesame seed oil instead. It's not the same, but it'll work.
You can also add in a little basil, and/or some rosemary, and some sun dried (or not) roma tomatoes go well with it too. I like to sprinkle just a little bit of paprika over the top. Dip some french bread or pieces of fresh rolls in and eat up. Mmmmm. It's like an orgasm in my mouth......erm, well not that, eww. But you know what I mean.
Gotta run, (not literally for once) I'm heading to the base theater to stay up entirely too late watch a double feature (and pigging out on dr. pepper and godiva chocolate, screw it. I'm down enough weight to eat what I want for a day.) and then get up at three to pull phone watch at the IET barracks.
Love you guys, try the hummis,
NBS