"Frank Reid" wrote in message
...
The silver lining was that I got robbed in South Africa, and
with my insurance money I bought (with the assistance of Frank Reid) a
very
comfortable pair of breathables that fit a tiny bit large, but with the
wide
belt Frank chose for me, I can 'bunch up' the excess fabric and make
them
right. Its like the difference between a pair of shoes that are a
half-size
too small, and a pair of sandals that are just perfect.

--riverman

Again, they are not kevlar waders. If I'd known you were gonna need
kevlar, I would have taken you down to Ft. Meade and had some custom
ones made up. How goes the shooting?

--

LOL. The image of me walking around in Kevlar waders during a firefight is
almost as funny as the time I field-tested my new breatables prior to the
Denmark clave by sitting in an ice-cold bathtub for a half hour. Sheesh,
newbies.

The entire coup thing left as quick as it arrived. As of midmorning Saturday
(when I woke up after finally falling asleep at dawn), the fighting was only
taking place downtown in Gombe (the diplomat district) and at the 'beach'
(the dock with Brazzaville). The government troops arrested about 15
insurgents by lunch, and the streets were completely calm by tea time. Of
course, a lot of the insurgents just blended into the crowd. Yesterday was a
completely normal day, and today its like it never happened. Kabila is
having high-level meetings with his VPs, (one of whom was probably behind
the coup) and the military and Kabila are assuring the population that
keeping the peace is their absolute highest priority. About 500 troops are
on full alert. Folks at work (we got a day off) are chatting about how
cool/exciting/scary/bizarre/typical it all was, and how it might mean that
there will be more bumps in the road in the future, but mostly how
incredibly stupid and suicidal the insurgents were to attack a city with
5000 UN troops, 10000 loyalist troops and the focus of the world on it. My
next-door neighbor, who is the senior officer in charge of all UN flights
in/out of the country assured me that my family and I wouldn't have to wait
for an official evacuation notice to get hauled out any time there was real
danger.

--riverman