There isn't much hope here...

To do list: Leave for Amman early tomorrow morning; dodge bandits along the highway at Fallujah; buy cashews or pistachios for the long plane ride home tomorrow night at a little shop just down the block from our hotel.

I wasn't sure when I got here if 10 days would be enough time to do much of anything. I thought I would be wanting to stay longer. But I don't. I'm ready to come home. Life is very hard here. A little rubs off even on visiting journalists.

I've heard a lot of talk about the dangers here: we hear the gunfire every night and second-hand stories of stabbings and shootings, kidnappings and attacks on U.S. soldiers. But the biggest danger is the traffic. With no government, people here have pretty much decided that they can do whatever they want to, and that's especially true when it comes to driving.

With no traffic lights and almost no police, people drive on the wrong side of the road, they drive up the exit ramp to get onto freeways; they go at full speed the wrong direction on freeways; they stop on streets, bridges and highways; often they just abandon their cars in the middle of the road. And they all refuse to yield at intersections, so intersections become parking lots, with cars unable to go forward or back, for what seems like hours, but is probably only several minutes.

It's difficult to imagine what it's like for Iraqis who know they don't have a choice about staying or going.

A lot of people we've talked to want to leave. They say they don't see much hope. Neither do I.

Viewing the devastation

Some changes in Baghdad have been harder to get used to than others. In 1999 and in 2002, we spent many hours wandering and waiting in the halls of the Ministry of Information, where journalists are assigned their "minders." It's strange to see it bombed and burned. The shell of the building crouches like a super-sized locust shell near the banks of the Tigris river, all life is gone.

Almost all of the key government and military buildings in town are in ruins. Today we drove past the only government building that is still pristine: the oil ministry building. Someone mentioned that it was probably just a coincidence that buildings like those belonging to the Ministry of Education were either bombed and/or looted while the oil headquarters was unharmed.

We saw some of the former minders marching in protest down the middle of the street in the Mansour area, headed for the Palestine Hotel, where most journalists are holed up, and, so where most issues are raised. The ex-minders had joined ex-soldiers and other ministry of defense types to demand jobs. They want the army to be re-activated, which isn't likely to happen. But if the million or so out-of-work soldiers don't get jobs there will be a lot of trouble ahead for the U.S. soldiers in Iraq. It's always a good idea to have men who have trained with guns in some sort of job. Idle hands that have been trained to kill are the devil's workshop, or something like that.

Dan and I stayed at the Palestine Hotel in 1999 and in 2002. It was a nice hotel with a friendly staff. Today, it's an armed camp. Razor wire blocks one end of the road leading to its entrance and a couple of U.S. Army tanks guard the street at the other end. The outside of the hotel is still pock-marked from a U.S. Army tank shell that killed two journalists in a friendly-fire incident during the takeover of Baghdad.

The Petra Hotel, down the road leading north, is a much more pleasant place these days. Maybe not quite as protected -- I haven't seen any armed guards -- but the nightly crackle of gunfire isn't directed at foreign civilians anyway, yet.

Like old times, almost

Returning to Baghdad after several days on the road, and sometimes nearly off the road, was almost like coming home. OK, I know that's a stretch, but it felt really good.

We had a clean hotel room waiting with hot showers, the first with hot water since we left last Tuesday. We had dinner at Candles just around the corner from our hotel, although it had to be a quick dinner, since, by the time we got there, it was nearly 5 p.m., closing time in these days of everyone rushing to get home before nightfall because of the security problems.

And like coming home, we ran into people we hadn't seen in a long while. As we were going back to our hotel after dinner, I heard someone shouting my name from a passing car. It was a man who had helped me last year when I was in Iraq.

After we had exchanged greetings and he hopped back in his car, Dan and I walked around the corner to our hotel and there were two former "minders," the Iraqi government people who used to keep an eye on and assist foreign visitors in Iraq. There are distinct categories for minders, and these two were definitely in the good category.

Like millions of other people here, they are out of work, trying to make any connections they can to feed their families. Unlike some people, whose ministries will be up and running, hopefully sooner rather later, these two men know that their ministry, that of information, will probably never be put back to work.

A bittersweet homecoming.

Freckle-faced boys and girls

There are U.S. Marines at the Hotel Kut where we are staying in Al-Kut. A lot of them. We first discovered that there were a lot this morning when we came down for breakfast and there was no food left in the restaurant. None. Worse still, there was no coffee. The Marines were gone, but I could imagine their sergeant saying, "Let's eat up people."

Even if no one said anything remotely like that, they did eat up. There had been plenty of food the night before. The funny thing was, when we saw them later at lunch in the restaurant, most of them seemed so little. Where were they putting all that food? They also seemed very young. Freckle-faced boys and girls touring a foreign country. In desert camouflage uniforms that meshed nicely with the beige fly-specked walls. With weapons slung over the backs of their chairs, barrels facing down.

No weapons of mass destruction, certainly, but destructive enough.

Most of the Marines here are from the 4th Marines out of Washington, D.C., and most of the men and women are from points south. We keep asking if there is anyone from Washington state, but so far, we haven't found anyone here in Al-Kut.

They're all friendly enough, even if they do call you "sir." What they can't understand is why we are here in Iraq. One guy was incredulous when Dan told him that he had been here before and wanted to come back.

"You knew what this country was like and you still volunteered to come back?" he asked. His companions just shook their heads in disbelief.

My body is past its 'use by' date

If this is Saturday, then I must be in Al-Kut. I’m starting to feel like I’ve been on a one-week, 10-city tour. Actually, I have been on a one-week, 10-city tour.

We went from Seattle to Chicago; to Amman, Jordan; to Baghdad; to As Samawah; to Nasiriyah; to Az Zubayr; to Basra; to Umm Qasr; back to Basra; to Al-Kut.

The almost nonstop, nonsleep travel is starting to take its toll. Today we discovered that our satellite phone batteries and our laptop batteries were dead, coincidentally enough, at the same time that I discovered my body was past its “use by” date.

Dan asked me to cc the photo desk this afternoon while I was reporting in to the national/foreign desk and it took me five minutes to type in the right email address.

It’s nothing that a good 8 hours of sleep can’t cure, and considering what a great thing it is just to be here, doing what we do, I shouldn’t complain. But still I do.

Who turned off the lights?

The hotel generator, which is bigger than some houses I’ve seen here, has been on the blink with increasing frequency for the past two days. That not only means that the rooms get very little air-conditioning, but that there is no water. (Water for bathing. Our drinking water was trucked in from Jordan with us.)

It also means that each time the power goes off, either Dan or I have to scurry around unplugging any electronic equipment we are using. Otherwise, when the power comes back on, it could fry our electrical transformers, at least, or blow out our computers, at worst.

So we take turns charging our laptops and satellite phones in between outages.

We are still trying to figure out how we will get out of the tiny coffin of an elevator if we get trapped inside during a power outage. There doesn’t seem to be a manual door release anywhere, and no phone in the elevator.

Since neither of us speaks much Arabic, I’m not sure what we would say if there was a phone. My repertoire consists of “hello” and “thank you.” Not likely to inspire anyone to come to our rescue.

Does it sound like we are worrying too much? Or not enough?

Guards and bars all over

BASRA -- Being an ever-observant journalist, it took me two days here in Basra to realize why our hotel's ground floor was so dark. All the windows have been covered up from the outside with concrete blocks.

Things must have been pretty tough here just days ago. Like Baghdad, there are looted government buildings everywhere. But none of that is going on now. All we can verify personally is the occasional crackle of gunfire, usually at night; the around-the-clock patrols by British soldiers (and once we spotted a Polish patrol -- there is a joke here somewhere, but it escapes me right now); and what we have been told are thieves congregating around dusk. We've seen these alleged thieves flitting like bats across the highways and streets, around abandoned warehouses and factories where, again we are told, they break into the buildings and strip them of anything valuable.

I have seen buildings with nothing left but the roof and walls. Not just the desks and equipment gone, but everything -- right down to the bathroom fixtures and wiring out of the walls.

It's easy to see why our hotel still has its armed guards although, since Dan and I started going on the roof to file our stories late at night, the guards have been moved off the roof to a second-floor balcony.

And speaking of being observant, I also noticed that our hotel management, to complement the bricked in windows, has installed a heavy metal grill to reinforce the entrance. But, at least, they don't lock us in.

High-tech hell in the field

Technology for journalists may be something of an oxymoron -- or in my case, just a moron. We have a voice satellite phone and a data (photos and stories) phone. We should be in high-tech heaven. But instead, for about three nights in a row we've been up into the a.m. just trying to get our equipment to send our photos and stories.

To make matters worse, until we reached Basra in southern Iraq, I couldn't get the voice satellite phone to stay connected for more than two minutes.

Right now it's about 4 in the morning and we just sent out our day's work -- after maybe three hours of struggle with the equipment and our respective patiences. We couldn't make the data satellite phone work from our room so, after trying the hallway, the stairwell and our balcony, we headed upstairs to the roof.

As I'm writing, a young man with an AK-47 is looking over my shoulder. Luckily, he is on my side. Iraqis have started posting armed guards at stores, restaurants and hotels to scare away the thieves.

Still, it is a little unnerving, sitting in the dark, high on a roof with only the glow of the computer to light my way.

Restaurant review from 'the Boss'

Knowing that hygene conditions in Iraq could be disastrous, I packed a couple dozen energy bars (of course my version comes with chocolate). But the truth is that, if you have the money, there is good food everywhere, although everyone warns against eating anything that isn't thoroughly cooked. They also warn that even the best restaurants close at 5 p.m. for security reasons.

Dan and I found the Chicken Inn Restaurant, just about a block from our digs at the Palestine Hotel, back in 1999, and its barbecue makes it my food stop of choice in Baghdad. However, Candles restaurant, a more upscale place just around the corner from The Petra Hotel, where we now hang our hats, is a strong second choice, and its proximity to our hotel has kept us away from the Chicken Inn, which was photographer Paul Kitagaki's "Top Pick" when we came to Baghdad in 2002. I think Dan is now leaning toward Candles, too.

And speaking of hats, I had been looking for something to cover the increasingly red dome above my eyebrows since I arrived in Iraq, but I was having little luck and beginninng to think that only the women covered their heads. This morning, though, I hit paydirt. In a stall in a marketplace on the western outskirts of Baghdad I spotted a black baseball cap with the logo "Boss" emblazoned across the front.

Maybe now my head will stop burning and people will do what I tell them. Although, I may need to translate the logo first.

First dispatch

After 24 hours in Iraq, the worst thing is the curfew. The U.S. military has ordered everyone off the streets from 11 p.m. to 4:30 a.m. but, in reality, because of the increasing violence, most people stay off the streets from sunset to sunrise. It cuts a big chunk of time out of your working day.

Our hotel, however, fearful of looters and/or someone wanting to rob its guests, welded what looked like jail bars between the hallway leading to guest rooms and the lobby, which they lock at night.

Dealing with an 11-hour time difference, which means an 11-hour jet lag, I woke up in the middle of the night, Baghdad time. Instead of lying in bed listening to the dogs bark, I took a walk downstairs, not to go outside but to walk around the lobby.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered not only that the iron bars were locked, but that neither the sleepy-eyed clerk nor his burly assistant could get the key to work in the lock.

For 30 minutes they tried, resorting finally to a large hammer that they used to beat on the lock as they turned the key, freeing me to wander the lobby and wonder what would happen if there was a fire.