Thursday, April 19th, 2007
I sit here, staring at the paper in front of me. A humble E-mail in print, yet probably the most important I have ever received. I've no idea how many times I've read over these words, and numbers - numbers preceded by dollar signs, large enough to make employment in a war zone seem appealing.
Next month marks the start of my terminal leave, wrapping up a four-year enlistment in the United States Air Force as a 3C2X1 (Tech Controller). After spending the bulk of my enlistment at Nellis AFB, NV, it's time to get out of Las Vegas. Don't get me wrong, I like my job, and I love the field, but for the first time in my life I'm free to go just about anywhere.
Military enlistment has proven to be a double-edged sword. One can find comfort in knowing exactly when he will be able to seek new employment, and terminal leave (provided you have any) serves as a convenient transition period. The drawback is that you are obligated to serve your full enlistment term; there is no such thing as two-weeks notice in the enlisted service.
My enlistment doesn't officially end until late July, but having stockpiled 77 days of terminal leave, I'm effectively released from duty in May. Next month. Obviously, I've had my calendar marked for some time, but it's done little to quell my anxiety about the transition back into civilian life. One could argue it's easier to join the military than to get out.
With the trickle of calendar days a constant presence in the back of my mind, I consider what to do with the rest of my life. 54 days left, I should make a resume. 38, do I want to stay in Vegas? 26, do I want to leave? 19, why haven't I gotten any calls yet? What's wrong? I only have 12 days to go! Granted, the countdown was to two and half months of terminal - I had five paychecks still to come, and wouldn't have to show up for work anymore - but it was still enough to make one nervous. How long would this last?
I couldn't say when, but at some point I decided filling a contract position in Iraq would be a good idea. In addition to the copies already well in place on Dice and ClearanceJobs, I decided to apply to several well-known defense contractors. It seems this application process is merely a formality - the large majority of contract slots are filled by backchannels. It's not what you know, but who (pardon the cliche). Fortunately, there are few degrees of separation between everyone in the military, and I was able to reach a recruiter personally.
Fast forward to present. Words and numbers, which will hopefully verified tomorrow when I call this document's author. To say I have questions is an appalling understatement, yet I find myself wanting more and more to take the position. I'm still overwhelmed by the pace of it all; two E-mails and a phone call, and I'm staring at a new opportunity half a world away. Hopefully I can push this all out of my head long enough to get some sleep tonight. Tomorrow promises to be eventful.
Saturday, April 21st, 2007
The last two days have been a steady blur. Yesterday I accepted my future employer's offer, and received a large to-do list in return. In addition to the normal pre-employment requirements, by far the two most invovled tasks were obtaining a US passport, and passing a thorough medical exam.
The passport application went pretty well, which I attribute to having been adequately prepared. As instructed by my employer, applying for a passport requires:
Fortunately, my employer was able to provide an expedition service, free of charge, saving me the $30 execution. It would have been handy to know this before I purchased the money order. I now have a money order made out to the U.S. Department of State good for $30 sitting on my desk.
I managed to gather all the pertinent information and materials, and the Las Vegas City Clerk's office was extremely helpful in assembling it all into something meaningful. The whole bundle shipped out today via FedEx. We shall see how long it takes for my passport to arrive.
Today's big accomplishment was completing the mandated - and very thorough - medical examination. The entire process took about four and a half hours, more than half of which was spent waiting, reading a borrowed copy of Chuck Palahniuk's Haunted. The irony here is that I've been globally qualified to deploy by USAF standards for years, but apparently that isn't good enough for contractors. To be fair, I can see why.
With my passport application mailed, and my exam out of the way, routine paperwork is all that remains. I've received my acceptance confirmation and employment agreement, both littered with bits of information about employment overseas. It will take some time to make better sense of it all; fortunately I can breathe a little easier now that the hard stuff is out of the way.
Thursday, April 26th, 2007
The passport expediter supposedly received my passport last Monday, and claimed it would take about a week to process and send back. If this is true, I could have all my paperwork in order by next week - a very exciting prospect. In the meantime, I've been finishing my USAF outprocessing checklists (all three of them). Only a few miscellaneous items left, and my final out has been scheduled for 11 May. It still hasn't quite sunken in that I'll effectively be done with the Air Force in just two short weeks.
One of the predeployment requirements posed by my new employer is a stateside driver license valid for at least the length of my contract, so I visited a local DMV yesterday to transfer my old New Jersey license to Nevada. For some reason previosuly unknown to me, I had to take a written (computerized) driving test before they'd give me a license. This would have been great to know ahead of time, because about a third of the questions dealt with Nevada statistics and permit laws, but I still managed to pass (barely).
Recently I've taken interest in educating myself on Iraq. The CIA's World Factbook provides intriguing statistics on the country, some of which speak more to the dire condition of Iraqi society than any amount of media coverage ever could. For example, all citizens age 65 or older only comprise an estimated 3% of the total population, versus 12.6% in the US. The average life expectancy in Iraq is surprisingly high at around 69, yet the country's median age is a mere 20 years (36.6 in the US). 97% of the population is Muslim, imagine that.
Thursday, May 3rd, 2007
Tuesday was unofficially my last duty day, and it feels strange. Waking up Wednesday morning, there was an overwhelming feeling of, "now what?" I'm worried my biggest challenge until I fly out of Las Vegas will be simply keeping myself occupied. I had a full week off last winter break and I about started bouncing off the walls.
OccuMed, the medical care organization contracted by my future employer, was more than happy to help with that. Turns out the clinic I went to the other week for my pre-employment exam forgot to run some of the test, namely Hepatitus and HIV. To remedy this, I got to head across town and kill another two hours to get stuck in the arm. Fun stuff.
In preparation for my trip overseas, I saw fit to purchase a dual external hard disk enclosure for taking my data along with me. After playing around with it a bit, this thing seems pretty damned cool. A bit pricey at $150, but I'm very pleased with it; a terabyte of portable RAID-in-a-box should more than meet my needs.
My latest Newegg splurge also included a nifty new Stylus 770SW. Olympus claims this camera is waterproof, shockproof, freezeproof (wtf?), and crushproof - but nothing about sandproof. In fact, I was unable to find any camera which claimed invulnerability to sand, which makes me somewhat nervous. Friends who have been deployed stress the importance of protecting cameras (and electronic devices in general) from sand, particularly the lens. We'll see how this one fairs.
Friday, May 11th, 2007
As of 0900 today, I am officially done with outprocessing the United States Air Force. Four short years, culminating with my two and a half months of terminal leave, which start Monday. If my last duty day wasn't surreal enough, it's definitely setting in now. Technically speaking, I'm now out of work.
On the bright side, progress is being made in the way of heading toward Iraq. I received my passport yesterday, and was sure to forward verification of it and a few other items to my recruiter. I have a suspicion that the expediting service I sent my passport application to forgot about it; I called Monday and the gentleman I spoke with said it should arrive that day or the next. No luck. I called again on Wednesday, and the tracking number I got shows the package not shipping out until Tuesday. Seems like the dude dropped it in the mail as soon as we got it off the phone. No matter, it's here now, in all its vulnerable RFID glory.
Seems like all I'm waiting on to schedule a departure date now are the final results of my physical and verification of my security clearance (which should take all of two seconds). I'm not looking forward to moving all my crap into storage, but it'll be nice to know when I can start.
Tuesday, May 15th, 2007
Still no word from my recruiter regarding when I can leave. The waiting sure gets frustrating.
A bit of good news, though; I found the pants I wanted! This may seem particularly mundane, but one must understand how difficult it can be to find this particular type of pant. Specifically, pants that are identical to military-issue BDU bottoms, but tan in color with no camo print. Picked up three pairs from a local Army surplus store.
Also, I had my car appraised at CarMax (a company which I highly recommend for used car shopping). The appraisals are free, and they even offered me a bit above the Kelley Blue Book trade-in value. I've also been shopping around for storage places. It's a funny thing to imagine cramming your life into a 5x10' box, but that's essentially what I'll be doing.
Wednesday, May 16th, 2007
I just received a call from my recruiter informing me she has received all the confirmation needed to schedule a departure date. I fly out of McCarran International for Fort Benning on June 1st! My class at the CONUS Replacement Center (CRC) starts the following Saturday, and from what I understand should last three to five days.
I had hoped to leave the weekend prior, but apparently they can only schedule departures two weeks out at the earliest. No big deal but it does mean another week or so of counting seconds, and there are a lot of seconds in a week.
Also, I finally acquired good boots for my deployment. Standard Air Force-issue Belleville desert combat boots; exactly what I was looking for. It turns out that active duty military (technically this still includes myself) can make clothing purchases from the LCI store on Nellis, which is where I bought this pair. Good to know, particularly when searching for DCU-themed gear.
I feel like NASA when they get to start the countdown clock prior to a launch. T minus sixteen days and counting.
Friday, May 25th, 2007
I had hoped to receive my flight itinerary by the end of the week, but that hasn't happened. With Monday the 28th being Memorial day, my logistic window is growing very narrow. It's irritating still not knowing exactly when I fly out of Vegas, as most of the remaining preparations need to be coordinated precisely around that time.
At least I resolved one issue today, which had been bugging me for weeks. What to do about mail? I've filled out a good number of forms in the last several weeks with my current address, knowing full well I'll be gone by the end of the month. I needed a stop-gap solution until I got settled in the theatre with an APO address.
I decided to rent out a mailbox with Mailboxes, Etc. for a few months, which I can use as a temporary street address; it's not just a P. O. Box. Before I leave, I'll submit a change of address with USPS, changing my current residence to the Mailboxes, Etc address. This should ensure none of my mail ends up going to my apartment once someone else is living here (a problem which previous tenants apparently were not aware of).
Once my APO address has been established, I should be able to have all mail being held at Mailboxes, Etc. forwarded overseas. The total cost for this service was $140; $30/mo for three months, plus a $50 desposit for mail forwarding. Could be cheaper, but not bad when you consider it's only $1/day (and I've been paying twice that just for cable TV I don't watch).
Sunday, May 27th, 2007
The ball may now officially begin rolling; I received my flight/CRC itinerary yesterday afternoon. I'll be departing McCarran International at 0840 Friday, and won't get in to Atlanta until around 1800, thanks to the +3 hour time difference. I'll be taking a shuttle service from the airport to Columbus, and ultimately Ft. Benning.
My schedule seems to provide a good amount of mil-standard "hurry up and wait." I'm not sure what we'll be doing all day Saturday, as CRC briefings don't officially begin until Sunday, but the rest of time at looks like it will be spent waiting in processing lines and enduring monotonous briefings. Most briefings I've probably already had at some point in my military career, so these are sure to be doubly-boring. Of course there will be contractor- and theater-specific briefings, as well.
But that's not until next week. I still need to pack, rent a storage unit, cancel my utilities, change my address, move out of my apartment, sell my car and get to the airport first. Not neccessarily in that order.
Thursday, May 31st, 2007
I am writing this post from Tatulis' house in North Las Vegas, roughly twelve hours before my flight tomorrow morning. Today was moving day. I spent most of the last couple days packing my crap into various containers and securing a storage unit for said containers. Today, my friend and former coworker Tatulis helped me move all my crap from my apartment to my storage unit via a U-Haul truck. This occupied the majority of the day, then it was off to Carmax to sell back my '04 Hyundai Elantra. Carmax gave me a good deal, even a few hundred bucks above Blue Book trade-in value.
With nearly all my worldly possessions residing in a 5x10' storage unit, I am left with my duffel bag full of clothes and a backpack full of equipment. Having so little is a strange feeling, but more liberating than depressing. I am tired as hell but still anxious about the flight out tomorrow morning. It will be an early morning, which is good considering I'm unlikely to get much sleep tonight (if any at all).