I'll be speaking Wednesday before the City Club of Tacoma about my recent embed with the 81st Brigade Combat Team and other local units in Iraq. So if you’ve got any burning questions to ask, are interested about covering the war in Iraq or just want to discover how nervous I get speaking before large crowds, come to the Landmark Convention Center.

In true military style, I'll start it off with a PowerPoint presentation (mainly some of my favorite photos and a quick recap of where I went) and then open it up for questions.

Where: Landmark Convention Center, Rooftop Garden Ballroom, 47 St. Helens, Tacoma
When: Doors open at 11:30 a.m. for lunch, followed by program.
Price: $23 for members, $30 for non-members. A limited number of $5 coffee and dessert tickets are available at the door.
Register: By noon Monday by e-mailing may-20-lunch@cityclubtacoma.org

Sgt. Christopher Osborne was riding in a Stryker through Baghdad’s International Zone when his view went black.

"Man, we just got smoked!" one soldier yelled.

"Catastrophic kill," another announced over his headset. "1-2 is dead."

And if Osborne had any doubt what happened, he could just look at the computer screen, which displayed a simple message in white letters: "You are dead."

Osborne’s Stryker was again rolling through the streets of Baghdad about 30 minutes later, and the 26-year-old Lacey resident was back on the headset, communicating with others in his platoon – but not before distributing some good-natured trash-talk.

"Hey," he said, "I would’ve moved out of the way."

Welcome to Virtual Battlespace 2, a computer-based trainer soldiers from 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division are using this week at Fort Lewis to prepare for its fall deployment to Iraq.

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