I was at work as a telefundraiser for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (to be fair, we only called people who’d donated in the past, but it was still more of a telemarketer than I wanted to be, so the job didn’t last long).
I called a guy and started my schpiel when he interrupted to say, “Do you know what’s going ON right now?”
I confessed that I didn’t, having been at work for a few hours by then, so he was kind enough to repeat what he was hearing on TV for a few minutes. Finally we hung up, I told my boss, and everyone was sent home.
Problem was, my SO at the time had my car, wasn’t coming for me until my shift was over, and I had no way to reach him. So my boss stayed with me, and we chatted for awhile. Finally, the SO arrived to pick me up, but ditched me again immediately to go play basketball . . .
. . . so when my friend Jason called to tell me that not only were we at war, but Stevie Ray Vaughn had just died, too :eek: , I went over to his house to drink and commiserate (sp?).
Then we fooled around (sure, I had a boyfriend, but hey, it was college . . . ).
January 17, 1990? In Jerusalem, Israel, in a neighborhood called Beit Hakerem. We (Mrs. KVS) and I had gotten little sleep over the few days before the war, what with the running around for supplies and everything. She had a cold as well, and was up very late listening to the BBC when they announced that, “Israelis were just instructed to open their gas mask packages to try the masks on and check the contents of the box.”
Of course, the scud missles started soon after, which was a whole other story. I had to shave my beard off for the mask to fit, and Mrs. KVS was freaked out becuase she had never seen me without a beard (we had only been married for 6 1/2 months at that point).
It was an administrative meeting, so we weren’t discussing international relations or anything of that sort.
Model UN clubs go to General Assemblies where hypothetical crises are debated, so we never really discussed the actual situation even when we competed.
My unit was at Khobar Towers. I was pulling guard duty at King Aziz Port - my unit’s Bradleys had just arrived and were being unloaded from the cargo ships. Shortly after the bombing started we go our first Scud alert and I was in the back of a Bradley pulling on my first real pro-suit. It was a very long night.
Several Scud alerts later I learned how to sleep with a pro-mask on and just zipped up my fart sack.