The gang's all here. Happy Thanksgiving from your Long-Range Planning Team! We're toasting you from Camp Victory, Iraq, where we are thankful to have one another here and all of you back home. Miss you!

(Left to right: Stu, Sabah, Nancy, Barbara, Kristy)

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The Iraqi Ground Forces Command put up this banner outside of the chow hall to thank the American servicemen and women for their service here.

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Thanksgiving in Baghdad was wonderful. I mean, we did go to work, and we are in, well, Iraq, but it was a great day nonetheless. My team here is very close, and we really did enjoy being able to spend Thanksgiving together. We're family now, and when we can't spend the holidays with loved ones back home, at least we get to share the benevolence of the season with one another.

The food in the chow hall is, I think, really delicious. Those who know me know I'm not the least bit picky, but others here agree the chow is good, too, and they're pretty trustworthy. The daily meals get pretty boring after a while, but it makes the holiday meals all the more special. As usual, I ate a lot of meat, and as per my usual Thanksgiving routine, I also loaded up on dressing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce. I must admit the sweet potato pie was DEEEEElicious, too. I definitely felt homesick for mom's famous apple pie and monkey bread, but certain sacrifices have to be made, I suppose.

Things are going quite well here, and I hope you all are safe and happy, too. Until next time.

Here we are with Santa. He showed up on this holiday to get us thinking about the next, I guess.

(Nancy, Kristy, Stu, Sabah)