Folks, it has been a long one today. For the past few days, Al Asad has been one big sandstorm, which has grounded many of our planes and created some other problems. Weather was especially bad today, with the rsult being that our clinic power was out most of the day. Because of this, I ended up seeing my last fourteen patients in the 100-plus-degree heat and considerable darkness inside of our clinic. Thankfully the lights are back on now, and the little A/C unit in my can is currently cranking non-stop. It is 9:30 PM, and I just arrived back home from the clinic an hour ago. Therefore, gonna keep it short/sweet tonight, but I do have a few thoughts to share.

Packing My Mental Baggage

For two years back in the late 1980s, I was an LDS missionary—you know, the young, clean-cut guys in suit-and-tie who ride around the city on bikes. We missionaries had a term for the peculiar behavior of those among us who were nearing completion of their 24 months, and occasionally showed the signs of being mentally “home” even before they physically left the mission field. The term was “trunky,” as in “Elder Johnson is a bit trunky, and therefore was not really excited about doing that service project.” I think that the term originally came from the mental image of a missionary sitting on his already-packed trunk, waiting for the ride to the airport. We generally forgave a bit of trunkiness—after all, it’s hard not to daydream a bit about sleeping in your own bed again after being away for a couple of years. Most missionaries fought off the trunkiness pretty well, and kept their eyes focused on the work at hand as much as possible.

I hereby admit to you that I am currently a bit “trunky” about getting back to the green green grass of home (not to mention my wife and kids, the pool, the uninterrupted power grid, etc), though I think I am mostly containing my restlessness. On days in which the lights go out, the sand slaps painfully against my skin every time I walk outside, and the heat is oppressive and uncomfortable, it is easy to dream about better days to come. The other provider in my clinic right now is CPT Daphne Sims, a pediatrician out of Ft Bragg. (And you thought I was practicing outside of my specialty!) CPT Sims and I came to Iraq at the same time, and it looks like we will leave at the same time—may even be on the same “freedom flight” home. So, we are both perhaps a bit on the trunky side. We’ve been keeping each other honest, though, and putting in a solid day’s work every day. But we occasionally talk across our shared desk of the places we’ll go, and the things we’ll be doing this time next month. Our “Calgon moment” is almost invariably interrupted by a medic telling us the sad, sad story of the patient in room three, who has “this thing” on his foot (or some other Al Asad-specific malady). Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.

Becky Anundsen, the Anti-Adkins

A few weeks ago, a study came out in the New England Journal of Medicine which demonstrated fairly clearly that the food pyramid which we have been taught for decades (the one with wheat, grains, breads and cereals as the “base” of the pyramid) is all wrong. In fact, an “Adkins”-style diet consisting of very few carbs, increased protein, and moderate fat intake appears to have superior health benefits on nearly all parameters when compared with even calorie-restricted, carbohydrate-neutral diets. When I read the study, I talked to my TMC staff about it, and the end result was that about half of us have been on a low-carb diet since the beginning of July.

That is, until last Saturday.

That was the day that two boxes sent by one Becky Anundsen (”little sis” to me, “Beckles” to everyone else) arrived via the Army Post Office. As mentioned previously in these pages, Becky’s package consisted of five boxes of cookies (sugar, peanut butter, white chocolate macadamia, and pecan choco chip), and the Al Asad TMC staff have been living off of the things ever since. All of the cookies are good, but those sugar cookies are un-be-stinkin’-lievable. They have that slightly doughy taste that all good sugar cookies must have, and they just spontaneously crumble on the tongue, as if on cue. I have not been able to stay away from that particular ziploc container. Unfortunately, I do not believe that Beckles cookies qualify as “low carb.” In fact, I have it on fairly good authority (two witnesses: my tongue and my stomach) that they are not even “medium carb.” But I simply cannot stay away, and neither can my medics.

So thanks for the cookies, Becky. Trust me, they are well worth the extra few (say 20) hours I’ll have to do on the treadmill this week to negate their nefarious effects. Well worth it, indeed.