I thought this would be a good opportunity to take a break from watching the progress of our turbine construction.  So, I decided to throw in an update on Mike Wallace, SkyDrill's Vice President of Business Development whom we miss greatly while he serves a second tour in Iraq with the 2-142nd Infantry Battalion of the 56th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, Texas Army National Guard.

Back in April, Mike helped organize a celebration of Tartan Day at Al Asad Air Base in western Iraq where his battalion is headquartered.  It would be an understatement to say that Mike is into celebrating his Scottish heritage.  However, I wanted to insert this blog post because (as you can see from the picture below) there are officers and soldiers serving with Mike from both Canyon (the location of our prototype) and Fort Worth (our home).

Major Terry Callis (far left, wearing Clergy Clan) from Canyon,Sergeant Major Jeff Muckleroy (second from left, Clan Grant but wearing US Army Tartan), Lieutenant Colonel Mark Burkett (center, no kilt) from Canyon, Major Mike Wallace (middle red kilt, Clan Wallace), Command Sergeant Major Travis Petty (right, no kilt) from Fort Worth.

I personally feel close to a lot of these same guys because I served with a lot of them myself from Iraq to Japan and places in between.  However, I will go ahead and let Mike speak about Tartan Day in his own words:

"Tartan Day is a National Celebration of our Scottish Ancestry.  The reason it's celebrated on April 6th is that the date coincides with the signing of the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320.  That document was an influence on our own Declaration of Independence.

As you know from being in the Army, the Equal Opportunity Office is pretty important, so every month is some sort of celebratory month; ie Black History Month, Woman's History Month, Asian American Month, etc.  As a proud Scottish-American, I figured "Hey, if everyone else gets a month, I only need one day."  My S3/Air is half-Scottish and his Mother was born and Raised in Scotland (she's a MacKay) so I ran the idea past him and it picked up steam.  Plus, any excuse to wear a kilt is good with me!

As the Battalion Executive Officer, you know I basically run the day-to-day operations of the Battalion so I was able to staff everything I needed that day (food, setup, cooking, music, signs, flags, etc).  We had just celebrated a "Texas Day BBQ" the week before with some Iraqi Army soldiers that we invited, so we knew what to do.  And, two of my welders had built an awesome smoker out of some scrap metal the week before and we wanted to put it to use again.

I had to spend about 3 weeks convincing my guys to buy some kilts, and I got about 8 of them to log on to sportkilt.com and buy a kilt in their Tartan.  Since some of them were not Scottish, they bought the official "US Army" Tartan.  (plaid)

I contacted some Scottish Societies from the txscot.com website and they got excited and sent me the Governor's Proclamation.  We started the festivities by reading some Texas Scottish facts and reading the Declaration from Perry.  Then we ate and conducted the Highland Games.

I used to do Highland Games for about 3 or 4 years, so I knew how to do the events.  From the presentation, you can see that I built a caber the day before and had a stone to toss.  We got quite a few stares as service members and contractors walked by us out there, but we had a good time.  Although no one was able to turn the caber besides me, it's still sitting here with us and many of the guys are now determined to flip it over.

All in all it was a good event.  We got to recognize our Scottish History, ate some great food and tested our strength.  Good Stuff.  And because Tartan Day is the same day as my wife Debbie's birthday, I have a reason to celebrate every year!  (I hope she reads this)"

Mike reading a proclamation from the Governor of Texas, recognizing their celebration of Scottish Heritage in Iraq

Of course, what would any celebration of Scottish Heritage be without "Feats of Strength".  According to Mike, they actually stopped traffic as soldiers tried their skill at throwing cabers and large stones.

We look forward to having Mike back with us by the end of the summer.  We know he is also watching the final construction anxiously from Iraq.  Thank you to all who serve as we head into this Memorial Day weekend!