Boredom, Ice Cream, and Farewell Grafitti

While we all looked forward to the day when the new folks were in place, and we no longer had to work investigations, it has turned out to be terrifically BORING! We still go in to the office to check email, but when our replacements show up to work at around 0900, they barely disguise their impatience with us occupying THEIR desks. They've made it pretty clear that we are all superfluous at this point, so there's not much for us to do but hang out, watch videos, and eat. We all resisted the temptation to eat a lot of desserts during the past year, but now that the daily temperature averages 105 degrees, we seem to be casting aside our previous caution, and have a bowl of ice cream after lunch.  This morning, some of us returned to the "Victory Over America Palace" for some final photos, and to add the traditional farewell grafitti to the already-covered walls. I made a few additions to the Peace Sign I had drawn in honor of my cousin's birthday, and couldn't resist leaving this bit of shameless self-promotion as well. Once we turn all of this real estate back over to the Iraqi Government in a few months, no doubt they will paint over all of our "Kilroy Was Here" sentiments posthaste, but for the time being my mark remains. (Thanks to the miracle of digital photography, my tagging efforts will live on for much longer than the real grafitti!)