I finally got my new guitar. here I am playing it, I recorded 2 passes. I don't think its too bad since I've only been playing off and on for a year or so.

In 1965, the Kaiser Jeep Corporation started the production run on the M-715 series 1 1/4 ton truck. It was designed to replace the smaller dodge M-37. During the four-year production run, 20,723 M715s were made. Today there are 563 still known to be in working order. After the trucks had served their purpose, many were decommissioned during the late 70’s and early 80’s and given to government agencies. Mine ended up with the United States Forestry Service in Nebraska. From seeing police actions in Vietnam or conflicts in Korea to blazing fires in Nebraska, this truck is up for anything.

I was looking for a project vehicle, something to keep me occupied in my spare time. During my several months of looking for a M-715 for sale, I had made several friends who owned M-715s across the country. I eventually found one in Nebraska. After an extensive internal debate and a slightly external debate with my girlfriend, we boarded a one-way flight to Omaha. Mike, the current owner, picked us up at the airport three days after I asked him if it was still for sale. Everyone said I was crazy.

When I first saw my new truck, it was bigger than I had realized. I had to hop to get into it. It was the first vehicle I ever drove without power steering or power assist breaking, hell, even the windshield wipers were manual. They were levers that needed twisting to make the windshield wipers move. I never realized how much force is needed to bring three and a half tons to a complete stop. Not to mention the metal-framed seats that pushed into my spine while my foot depressed the brake pedal with all my strength or the stiff leaf suspension that made driving feel like the axles where bolted right to the frame.

The truck was covered in rust, which only slightly dulled the bright orange color with some brown, and the doors rattled when driving above 30 miles per hour. The transfer case would overheat if driven over 50 miles an hour. The speedometer maxed out at 40 miles an hour; the military’s set maximum speed for this vehicle during peacetime. However, that wasn’t a problem; it wasn’t hooked up, neither was the gas gauge. This would be a long 1,186 miles. I would learn to calculate my fuel consumption from one of the only two working gauges, the tachometer, which was strapped to the steering column by the Forestry Service. The other working gauge was the oil pressure, which set my mind to ease that the bottom of the engine hadn’t yet fallen off. The odometer read 10,306.1 miles, and still reads that today, since it as well, wasn’t hooked up, but don’t tell the Department of Motor Vehicles.

I don’t think I will ever forget the feeling of power and joy the first time I drove my M-715. I get that same feeling every time the engine fires up. It is a feeling that many people have experienced in this truck. Although the military is not forth coming with the unit deployment that my truck was assigned, I know it has experienced and seen many things. I hope to be able to keep it around for many more years, keeping history alive, once it has been fully restored.

I'm largely in favor of the war. War, in general, is a great excuse for blowing stuff up. A good war can bolster an economy and spawn a number of crappy movies and gritty reality movies based on true events. While, I'm not one of those longhaired, colorful shirt-wearing peaceniks, that make baseless claims like "don't kill people," but I do hate Saddam Hussein as much as the next red-blooded American. He's a socialist, an honorary citizen of Detroit, and has never returned any of my letters. I wanted to see him overthrown. Hell, I would have overthrown him myself if I hadn't hurt my back playing War Craft; it's a really intense game.

This war in Iraq will pay for itself in the oil that we will get out of it. While it may take time to complete, once we finish building Iraq's infrastructure, they will have a state-of-the-art efficient system that will be providing us with cheap gasoline, in thanks for all we have done for them. It will make this silly alternative fuel vehicle talk of today seem as silly as the Jetsons flying cars. All

There are so-called "experts" that talk about how the Middle East wanted to get rid of Hussein, but they didn’t want the U.S. to get involved. If you ask me, they don't know what they want. They're a bunch of uneducated, nomadic heathens, like all foreign people. I can say that, because I'm a horrible American stereotype and all my beliefs are automatically correct by merit of America having many bombs.