WRITE A THANK YOU NOTE TO A SOLDIER IN IRAQ THIS MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND

5-29-04 | patriciaruth

[patriciaruth]

Please support our troops this Memorial Day weekend by writing a note or letter to a soldier. They will be sent to Balad and Mosul in care packages that should arrive by the Fourth of July.

You can get my address by FReepmail and send a hand written letter or thank you card to me and I will put it in the next box or manilla envelop going to Iraq,
or you can FReepmail me a note or letter and I will print it out and put it in the Fourth of July packages.

Also, if you have any used books or movies or magazines that you enjoyed, you can mail those also to me to be included in the packages. If you use book/movie/magazine rate, they may arrive too late for this wave, but they will go in a future package.

Monetary donations for care packages are also always gladly accepted.

Finally, I'd appreciate suggestions of good books, movies that could go in the future. I've just subscribed for Sports Illustrated, Road and Track, Men's Health, American Heritage, and U.S. News and World Report so I can send them regularly (until my introductory offer runs out....) I get the women's NRA mag and AUSA and Army regularly now.

Last year and this year, these are the packages we have sent to Baghdad, Balad, and Mosul.

BALAD
Magazines: People, Men's Health, Army mag, NRA mag, latest women's NRA one on training puppies, and an AUSA one,Sports Illustrated, AUSA, Decision
Books: Clancy's Without Remorse; L'Amour's Last of the Breed; Koonz's Icebound; Wister's The Virginian; Heinlein's Glory Road; a biography of Washington, the Indispensible Man, Bill O'Reilly's Those Who Trespass, Random Harvest by James Hilton, Goodbye Darkness (WWII in Pacific memoir)
Movies: DVD's Seabiscuit; Mystery Alaska; Gettysburg; Open Range; Last Action Hero; Stand and Deliver; Fifth Element; Glory; Shanghai Knights; Die Another Day; We Were Soldiers; Last of the Mohicans; Antwone Fisher; Windtalkers; October Sky, Enemy at the Gates, Gladiator, Young Frankenstein, Ghost, Moulin Rouge; and VHS Die Hard, Witness, Baby Boom
Misc: 2 disposable cameras, 2 phone cards with 120 minutes, 4 envelops with 4 sheets paper, pens, envelops, note pad, pkg 2 small flashlights Card games: poker chips, 4 decks of playing cards, Skipbo
Snacks: 2 boxes Wheat Thins, 2 boxes of brownies, can Lays potato chips, box Cheezits individual size 2 starburst, 2 pistachio nuts, Snickers, Kitkat, Reese's Peanut butter cups, 2 fig newtons, 2 chips ahoy, 2 vanilla cream cookies, 3 berry Skittles, 1 tropical Skittles, 2 pack sugarfree spearmint gum, 2 bread sticks/cheese, 2 cheese and peanut butter crackers, 3 long smoked deli jerked sausage, 6 American cheese sticks with jerked beef sausage, 4 lemonade Crystal Lite cups, 4 raspberry Crystal Lite cups, humungus decorated chocolate rocky road Easter egg, 2 bags Reese's peanut butter cups; bag Jelly Belly; bag regular jelly beans; bag mixed hard candy, bag candy corn; 3 cans mixed nuts, 2 cans pringles potato chips
Toiletries: lip balm, 4 wet wipes, 3 Kleenex, toothbrush, toothpaste, 3 bottles 45SPF sunscreen, Sunscreen Shade SPF45, 2 chapstick SPF30, hand sanitizer, Charmin t.p., Old Spice aftershave[Post office thought it was an IED due to alcohol content and had me remove it], indulgence items for female soldier: tampons, facial cleaning wipes, night moisturizing face cream, manicure set, nail file, cuticle cream, nail hardening and repair kit, bar mild soap Jergens

MOSUL
VHS recording of Pres. Bush talk and Jay Leno monologue at WH Correspondent's dinner 5/1/04.
15 DVD movies: Gettysburg; Glory; We Were Soldiers; Die Another Day; Tears of the Sun, Galaxy Quest, Total Recall; Second Hand Lions; Independence Day; Last of the Mohicans; Shanghai Noon; Along Came a Spider; Open Range; Signs; Moscow on the Hudson. VHS: Fletch
Books: On War (Clausewitz), Tunnel in the Sky (Heinlein), Tactics of Mistake (Dickson), Scrabble dictionary.
Games: Tin of poker cards, chips and dice; travel Scrabble in case with pencil
Toys: Radioshack radio control racer (yellow wheelies jeep) and batteries; 2 Liquidator supersoakers; 250 water balloons
Snacks: 1 bag mixed hard candy; 2 bags Tootsie pops; 1 bag Lifesavers assorted flavors; Reese's peanut butter cups (double wrapped in Ziplocks); 12 packs Juicy Fruit gum; 2 cups raspberry Crystal Lite drink mix; 1 can deluxe mixed nuts Magazines: AUSA's Army on WWII memorial; Truckers
Toiletriesone each for recipient: bandaids; foot powder; fungal cream; deodorant; hand sanitizer; Charmin t.p.; wet wipes; floss; toothpaste/toothbrush; shaving cream; Q-tips; Kleenex; chapstick SPF30; sunscreen SPF45
Misc: 6 envelops with 2 sheets writing paper in each; 2 retractable ballpoint pens

BAGHDAD
The 4 Valentine care packages that went out 1-16-04 contained 26 movies, 14 paperback books, 6 decks of cards, a Frizzbee, 4 thingees of Crystal Lite mix, 45 sewing needles and 2 spools of thread, 23 notepads of paper (50 ct each), 600 envelopes, 47 packages of Bic pens (11 to a pack), 4 calendars, magazines (3 Army, 2 NRA, Star with Mel Gibson cover, Time with Saddam capture, a Schwarzenegger bio in pictures), 15 packs of gum, 6 each personal care items: travel size Kleenex, wet wipes, toilet paper, hand sanitizing gel, mouthwash, toothbrush, toothpaste, comb, shampoo, shaving cream, disposable razors, dental floss, lotion, Q-tips, deodorant, chapstick SPF15, baby powder, 8 mild soaps, special wrapped 6 tampons, 6 small leatherette bag to carry travel toiletries. 2 boxes of bandaids. 1 small package of M&M's. And over 300 Valentines. 5 packages of Hershey's kisses (~670), 5 bags and 5 boxes with 506 lollypops (300 Tootsie Pops, 96 Charm bubblegum cherry and berry pops, and 108 Charm Valentine cherry suckers.
Movies are DVD: Gov. Schwarzenegger in Total Recall and The 6th Day, Crichton's Andromeda Strain, Antonio Banderas in Mask of Zorro, Kurt Russell in Stargate, Finding Nemo, Heinlein's Starship Troopers, Star Wars II, Tim Allen in Galaxy Quest, The Matrix, Samuel L. Jackson in Shaft, Harrison Ford in Air Force One, Will Smith in Independence Day, Tom Berenger in Last of the Dogmen, October Sky, Carl Sagan's Contact. VHS movies are Bruce Willis in Die Hard, the Sixth Sense, and Unbreakable; Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park III, Morgan Freeman in Along Came a Spider, Good Will Hunting, Mel Gibson in What Women Want, Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet, Casablanca. [Movies previously sent to Baghdad are Die Another Day, Collateral Damage, True Lies, Windtalkers, We Were Soldiers, Lawrence of Arabia, Last of the Mohicans, Return to Me, The Rookie, Antwone Fisher, Shanghai Knights, Tears of the Sun, Sum of All Fears, Panic Room, Ghostbusters, Frequency, Remember the Titans, Forever Young, Predator, Men in Black, The Great Escape.]

Books are Crichton's Timeline, Clancy's Without Remorse and Sum of All Fears, L'Amour's Last of the Breed, Heinlein's Starship Troopers and Double Star, Larry Bond's Red Phoenix, Stephen Horn's Law of Gravity, Don Coldsmith's Runestone, T.E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash, Olson Scott Card's Postwatch and Enchantment, Zane Gray's Riders of the Purple Sage. [Books previously sent to Baghdad are Ice Station Zebra, Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, That Hideous Strength, Manifold Time, Manifold Space, The Pilgrimage, No Different Flesh, Glory Road, Tunnel in the Sky, Ender's Game, The Virginian.]

June2003 personal care items sent to Baghdad: 3 bottles sunblock 45 10 each travel size, gum, eyedrops, wet wipes, toilet paper, pens, small notepads, SPF45 chapstick, Kleenex, 3 magazines, music CD Have you Forgotten, music tape, q-tips in a baggie, box of Ziplock baggies, Box Cheezit crackers.

So far In the next boxes:
Mosul: Book's: Clancy's Without Remorse, Sun Tzu's Art of War, Goodbye Darkness (WWII Pacific memoir), Olson Scott Card's Enchantment, Heinlein's Starship Troopers, 50 Pocket constitutions (at cost by Vetscor
Movies: Fifth Element, Count of Monte Cristo, True Lies, Starship Troopers

Balad: Book's: Nevil Shute's Pied Piper and A Town Like Alice, 50 Pocket constitutions
Movies: Last of the Dogmen, Moscow on the Hudson
Envelops, Writing Pads
President Bush Address to the Nation on Iraq 5/24/04 recorded on VHS

[patriciaruth]

Secret's out. I used my time machine to go to the post office.;-)

[Peach]

Thank you for all your efforts on behalf of our beloved troops.

[asgardshill]

Excellent. Take a bow (hell, take several) for all the hard work you're putting into this. I thank you.

[patriciaruth]

You're sending a huge DVD selection! Take a bow yourself!

And some FReepers are dropping off some goodies at my house this weekend, and MJY1288 has agreed to accept a couple boxes from a FReeper near him, and several others are packing boxes and mailing checks.

Even churchillbuff who is against the war in Iraq is going to pack up some popcorn and movies and take them to an Army recruiter, as he doesn't trust me. LOL!

And Sleepless in Seattle just arrived in the mail, just after I sealed the box to Bagram with a so-so chick flick with Sandra Bullock and Ben Affleck. But then Sleepless in Seattle is one of the gold standard chick flicks.

I love it when things are moving like this.

You still haven't told me if you are a shill for the asgard.

[patriciaruth]

For everyone's information, Peach is a premiere writer of troop support letters and cards.

Take a bow, Peach, some of yours were in the manilla envelop to Balad.

[diamond6]

How does one go about sending food to our soldiers? Do we have to our nearest millitary base?

[asgardshill]

As for the DVDs, writing a check doesn't take a lot of work. Coordinating their distribution, shaking the trees for other donations and stuff, keeping up on customs and postal regulations, lugging the stuff down to the post office, and making sure it all goes right is keeping a lot of balls in the air. I repeat - take a bow.

You still haven't told me if you are a shill for the asgard.

That would be the Asgard charge d'affaires for the Mid-Southern Region of the United States of America nation-state, thank you very much ;)

Its cool working for omnipotent beings - you ALWAYS know you're going to get paid.

[patriciaruth]

LOL!

[patriciaruth]

I can accept commercially wrapped food with good shelf like, no pork products, no homebaked goods.

You might get information from an army recruiter in your area, or I can direct you to some other troop support projects if you don't want to get involved with ours.

I have to go now and spend time with my hubby.

Be back much later!

[Mo1]

You've been busy ... thanks for the update

[Peach]

(((Pat)))

It is you who does all the really hard work and it is deeply appreciated by me and especially by the soldiers.

[Give2theTroops]

I would love to get involved and send more care packages to the troops. Please let me know if we can help you out here in Connecticut! Please feel free to visit our website: www.Give2TheTroops.org

God Bless ands much love,
Andi Grant
(wife of Sgt. Brian Grant, USMC).

[noodler]

I have to absolutely love you because you did something good.I and many may be sitting around thinking about appropriate gifts or tapes and You are OUT THERE DOING IT!

[ZOTnot]

I would like to 'adopt' a soldier. However, your post suggests this happened for Memorial Day in May. Is the offer still 'active?'

Also I heard somehow that adopting a soldier for corresponding was no longer possible. Is this true? Allegedly, they had all been 'taken.' If I might still 'adopt' please tell me how to do so.

[patriciaruth]

ping

[thurobred2]

I have many friends that are wishing to send Christmas Cards and pre-paid phone cards to our Troops. They will be forwarding it all to me. Is there an APO address that I can use to forward these to Iraq or Afghanistan by Christmas?

Thank you!
Tari