Day 0 1/12/10 Tues MEPS
Get a wakeup call at 04:45, not bad. I actually was able to sleep a little but whenever the heater would kick on I would start roasting so I kick some covers off. Then the heater would turn off so then I would get all cold. I never could find the happy medium. I was close with sticking the one foot out but later that would prove useless.
Anyways, wake up, grab a quick breakfast, then roll call in the lobby, then load up on the bus and hauled to MEPS. This place sucks, there is no other way to describe this place. There is a lot of waiting and doing nothing. Plus a lot of the civilians that work here treat everyone like garbage. But it is a necessary evil if you want to enlist. This if my 5th time at MEPS too, very poopy. The 1st time was for the ASVAB, that wasn’t too bad. The 2nd was for my physical, which I failed my urine test because of too much protein. 3rd time was to urinate in a cup again. 4th time was to ship, but because I sprained my ankle the week before I did not ship. 5th time is now. So here I am waiting till like 1300 or 1400 to take a bus back to the hotel. If anyone is ever thinking about joining the military, come to MEPS. Granted basic training will be worse, but this is a good introductory taste.
So we got here about 05:55 and had to weigh and height measured. I am 68.5” and weigh 195. I had to be taped which means I weigh too much for my height. Had my neck and waist measured which results in 22% body fat. 26% is the limit. Once that was all done it is sit and wait time.
At 10:00 we had lunch. At lunch, there is some disgruntled fat guy standing behind a counter giving out sandwiches. You can tell this guy doesn’t want to be here but he can’t get any other job so he does this and makes probably $8 an hour and takes out his frustration on us by yelling, “FIND YOR NAME ON THE LIST AND SIGN IT!” Then he asks you, “turkey, ham, roast beef?...mayonnaise?” And he talks so quick that you can’t understand him, “lettucetomatoespicklesgreenpepperscucumbers?” “Yes,” is what I answer. He definitely is not happy.
There is this nurse guy who works here. He is probably 6’ and weighs 350-400 lbs. just a big fatty. He has the bi jelly front that hangs down to his knees, pretty nasty. Anyways, a bunch of us are in line in this hallway and he needs to get through the door, which he can’t cause he’s a fatty, so he yells, “make a hole!” Yup, make a hole indeed. In fact let’s make another doorway for you tubby.
Then later as I’m sitting, waiting, again he walks across the room with peoples’ medical records in one hand and a candy bar in the other. Then he starts flipping through the records. Nice. Gets chocolate on those papers. Pretty sweet seeing stuff like that.
So now it’s 11:25 and I am waiting. UGH! Oh well, I should probably be enjoying it while I can. Once basic comes it will be non-stop go. And we do have TV’s here and arcade games to keep us entertained. I know reception won’t have that. Plus we will have to stand. So enjoy the couches while I can I guess.
Well it’s 12:15, still sitting in the same spot. I went to the bathroom to take a leak and while I was ther I checked my cell phone for messages. We are not allowed to use them while we are here, but they can’t see me when I am in the latrine. My roommate last night told me how he made the mistake of pullig his cell phone out and then promptly got his butt chewed. So here I sit, bored, watching “the George Lopez Show” Lou Diamond Philis is a guest on the show today. Very bored right now I am.
I move back to the ARNG Liason office where some other guys are watching Ultimate Knockouts on Spike. Much better than that crap on the other TV.
I am maybe back there for 30 minutes when we get the call to leave MEPS with our flight info. They hand us this brown manila envelope stuffed full of stuff and tell us not to loose this otherwise we will be stuck in reception for 6-8 weeks while they make another one. I am guessing it has all our personnel info inside. I will be holding on to this envelope very tightly.
We take a cab back to the hotel and arrive just before 14:00. We are given the freedom to leave but have to be back by 20:00 for another meeting thing. I text Russ to see if he can come hang out, pick me up and go somewhere. Not till 17:00 he says cause he is working. So in the mean time I play Call of Duty 4 again where I proceed to beat the living crap outta the other guys. Pretty fun it is.
Russ shows up at 17:30 and we head to the Gateway and eat at Costa Vida. Good stuff. We walk around for a bit and talk before he takes me back. It was nice to do that. Especially considering the punk stood me up on Sunday for family dinner. That last dinner together with the fam.
Back at the hotel I am watching TV till 20:00, go to the meeting to arrange travel to the airport. My flight doesn’t leave till 08:30 the next day, which equals sleep in time for about 45 minutes. After the meeting a couple more games, back to the room, watching some TV. Talk to Nate, Virg, and Amy again. Then off to bed
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Life at Basic
DAY 1 (1/11/10):
Two hours before reporting to the hotel I received a call from my NCO's wanting to know why I wasn't at drill on Sat, Sun. I did not attend and didn't let anyone know either. My reason for not going well, is cause I didn't want to since I was leaving for Basic. It's a piss poor excuse, but that's the reason. I was informed that I was technically AWOL and it's a criminal offense and that I could loose a rank and in general it's not fun. Part of me suspected that not going to drill was a big NO-No, but I was more worried about getting stuff at home done. Error in judgement on my part.
Amy has dropped me off now and I'm sitting in my room with my roomie for the night. He is swearing in tomorrow. He seems like a good kid. No complaints. But then again I will only be in the same room as him for a night.
There isn't a whole lot to do at the hotel. We have a briefing at 20:00 and that's about it. The hotel does a game room with an Xbox so some of us went and played Call of Duty 4. It's funny how a lot of these guys will talk about how they play online with there friends and how they have a clan and blah blah blah, but once we get playing, I freaking mop the floor with them. It's definitely a fun feeling.
Pretty much that was the evening. We played video games, had a quick brief meeting, watched some TV, bought a chocolate milk and granola bar for $4, called Amy and went to bed. Fun!
Two hours before reporting to the hotel I received a call from my NCO's wanting to know why I wasn't at drill on Sat, Sun. I did not attend and didn't let anyone know either. My reason for not going well, is cause I didn't want to since I was leaving for Basic. It's a piss poor excuse, but that's the reason. I was informed that I was technically AWOL and it's a criminal offense and that I could loose a rank and in general it's not fun. Part of me suspected that not going to drill was a big NO-No, but I was more worried about getting stuff at home done. Error in judgement on my part.
Amy has dropped me off now and I'm sitting in my room with my roomie for the night. He is swearing in tomorrow. He seems like a good kid. No complaints. But then again I will only be in the same room as him for a night.
There isn't a whole lot to do at the hotel. We have a briefing at 20:00 and that's about it. The hotel does a game room with an Xbox so some of us went and played Call of Duty 4. It's funny how a lot of these guys will talk about how they play online with there friends and how they have a clan and blah blah blah, but once we get playing, I freaking mop the floor with them. It's definitely a fun feeling.
Pretty much that was the evening. We played video games, had a quick brief meeting, watched some TV, bought a chocolate milk and granola bar for $4, called Amy and went to bed. Fun!
Saturday, January 23, 2010
ADDRESS AT BASIC
SPC VINCE DILWORTH
F CO 1-13TH INFANTRY REGT
1ST PLT "RUFF RIDERS"
FORT JACKSON, SC 29207
F CO 1-13TH INFANTRY REGT
1ST PLT "RUFF RIDERS"
FORT JACKSON, SC 29207
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Basic Training - Round Two
On the 11th of January I will head to the hotel in preparation for basic training, again. The first time around back in October I sprained my ankle a week before shipping which prevented me from attending basic training. I had to get a doctors approval before a new ship date was secured for me. Now that it is upon me, I kind of have this nervous excitement going on. Part of it is "Am I really doing this?" sort of a thing. I feel like I will do fine. I have attended several drills here with the Recruitment Sustainment Program and have learned a lot. I have been doing some conditioning, but not as much as I should in all honesty. Running will be my weak point, which I have been doing, but still feel like I will suck at it. Oh well, guess we will see what happens.
While I am at basic, I am going to try and keep a daily journal and send home weekly updates to Amy who in turn will post them here on my blog. That will give friends and family something to read about. Should be fun to read. Amy is going to be one of my main points of contact, so if anyone wants to write me while I am at basic, get a hold of her. And please write!! I imagine it will be like a mission somewhat, where getting letters from friends and family is the greatest thing. Here is her number: 801-616-7437. Well, thats about it for now. Gotta get to bed so I can get up early and get a few more things done before I report to the hotel tomorrow afternoon. Wish me luck. See you all and hear from you all in 10 weeks.
While I am at basic, I am going to try and keep a daily journal and send home weekly updates to Amy who in turn will post them here on my blog. That will give friends and family something to read about. Should be fun to read. Amy is going to be one of my main points of contact, so if anyone wants to write me while I am at basic, get a hold of her. And please write!! I imagine it will be like a mission somewhat, where getting letters from friends and family is the greatest thing. Here is her number: 801-616-7437. Well, thats about it for now. Gotta get to bed so I can get up early and get a few more things done before I report to the hotel tomorrow afternoon. Wish me luck. See you all and hear from you all in 10 weeks.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
My MEPS experience
Tuesday July 14th I had my physical for the Army National Guard. It was an interesting experience to say the least. I had to arrive at the early hour of 05:45am at the Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS for my physical. Why so early I do not know. From what other people have told me and the investigating on my own, it is cause in the military there is a lot of "hurry up wait" time. So perhaps arriving this early is so there will be plenty of that.
I arrived a little early thinking the earlier the better so as to get through quicker, well it didnt matter how early someone got there, they didnt open the doors till 06:00am. As I stood outside there were a dozen or so other people waiting to get in. How can this physical possibly take all day with a dozen people? My recruiter told me that I should expect to get out of there around 2pm or so. Well, next thing I know a charter bus pulls in and dumps off about 40-50 more people. Ah, so this is why it takes forever. These are the out of towners who fly in from wherever on Uncle Sams dime. I guess this SLC office is the closest MEPS facility for several states.
Before we head in we had are scanned with a metal detector since it is a federal building. Once inside I head to my liasion office and get my nametag with the last four of my social and a bar code to be scanned like meat at a grocery store. I am one of the first ones at the front desk to scan my finger print to start the processing. I am instructed to have a seat and this is where I think "hurry up and wait" time. Another guy sits down next to me and we start talking. He is from Vegas and looking to join the Air Force. We were probably talking five minutes when our names were called and shuffled into a meeting room. We sat and waited as the medical person found a person from each branch of the military to bring in. He told us that they like to get at least one group of people out of here by 09:30am. Fine by me, I already dont want to be here till 2pm.
In this room we go over our paperwork and fix any errors to our name and fill out questionarres. Lucky me they spelled my last name wrong on everything. They spelled it "Dillworth", not "Dilworth". There is only one "L" in my last name. Is it really that hard to comprehend. So now i have to cross out my last name, initial it, write the date, and then write the correct spelling. Also in this room we have our blood pressure and pulse taken, and also take a breathalizer. My BP was a little elevated, but I blame that on the face I only slept two hours the night before and have been up since 01:30am! After all this is done we proceed to the hearing test.
We are coralled into the hearing room, take our tests, and then recieve a simple eye exam and a test to determine if we can tell the differnce between colors. My vision is 20/20 in both eyes :-) Once that is done I have a quick visit with one of the doctors to go over some of my injuries I have had in the past. I had to record the time I cracked my wrist playing baseball when I was 10 or 12. I also had to document the time I had stitches in my lip due to a flashlight smashing me in the mouth. I also have seasonal alergies and a birthmark on my left calf, which is approx 1"x.5". They are pretty thourough.
Now that is done comes blood work. They draw my blood, no biggie, I am ok with needles. I have donated plasma plenty of times so needles are pretty much my friends. After blood comes the urine test. It is a observed urine test, which means someone has to watch me take it to make sure I dont cheat. They allow three of us at a time in the bathroom each with our own urinal. We are to fill the cup half way up, finish our business, step back with the cup in hand and dont ever turn our backs to the witness, otherwise we have to throw out that urine. One guy had stage fright, so he had to come back later, lol. Well my urine failed for too much protein, which means I have to come back sometime after 48 hours to tinkle again. Too much protein?? WTF??
Now comes the fun part. We are sent to a private room, about nine of us in all for the funky walking tests and then the bung hole and private area check. Once we are in there we are required to strip down to our undies, height and weight checked, ears checked (which I have deep wax in my ears apparently), and do several flexibility and balance manuvers. It was somewhat weird, a bunch of half naked guys squatting, walking while squatting, rotating arms, kicking legs, etc etc. After that we go into a seperate room one by one and checked for hernia and spread our butt cheeks. I am guessing on the butt cheek spread the doc is looking for hemroids. Thats the only think I can think of. Either way I am glad it is over.
I dress and head out. I have a different doc review all my paperwork and he makes sure I get my ears cleaned. If it wasn't for this, I would of been out by 10:00am. But nope, I have this stuff squirted in my ears and have to wait like 20 minutes. Since I am waiting I go to lunch, which was at 10:00am. I head back to the medical area and this chick is assigned to me to clean my ears. By this time it is probably 10:20ish. Well this device they use to clean your ears is jammed in your ear hole and sprays water while sucking at the same time. I am told I will feel dizzy during this as well. Sure enough once it starts the room starts spinning, kind of a weird feeling but it passes after several moments. Well this went on for probably about 15 minutes, in my one ear. I guess I had a lot of wax in there or perhaps this chick was a numbskull, I am going with the later. She was not gentle thats for sure. She was cramming things in and out of my ear, I was on the verge of saying "screw it" to the whole thing because of this wench. Anyways, my right ear is done, on to the left. Towards the end of this ear I really started feeling woozy which was causing me to feel sick also. LAter I find out only warm water should be used, this broad was using cold!! And cold water causes wooziness and sickness!! What a stupid girl, I could of slapped her stupid. After sitting still for about five minutes I am finally able to process out. Sure I have to come back but at least I am out of there. The rest of the kids there are probably good till 2pm or longer, suckers!!
I think I was one of the oldest guys there. Everyone single one of these kids were right out of high school or around the very early age of 20. One guy I met was 30, so I still had him beat by one year. All in all though there wasn't a whole lot of waiting for me. It was nice being in the expedited group. I am told I will have go through this physical again when I ship out to basic, awesome. That first week at basic will be a lot of hurry up and wait. Can't wait.
I arrived a little early thinking the earlier the better so as to get through quicker, well it didnt matter how early someone got there, they didnt open the doors till 06:00am. As I stood outside there were a dozen or so other people waiting to get in. How can this physical possibly take all day with a dozen people? My recruiter told me that I should expect to get out of there around 2pm or so. Well, next thing I know a charter bus pulls in and dumps off about 40-50 more people. Ah, so this is why it takes forever. These are the out of towners who fly in from wherever on Uncle Sams dime. I guess this SLC office is the closest MEPS facility for several states.
Before we head in we had are scanned with a metal detector since it is a federal building. Once inside I head to my liasion office and get my nametag with the last four of my social and a bar code to be scanned like meat at a grocery store. I am one of the first ones at the front desk to scan my finger print to start the processing. I am instructed to have a seat and this is where I think "hurry up and wait" time. Another guy sits down next to me and we start talking. He is from Vegas and looking to join the Air Force. We were probably talking five minutes when our names were called and shuffled into a meeting room. We sat and waited as the medical person found a person from each branch of the military to bring in. He told us that they like to get at least one group of people out of here by 09:30am. Fine by me, I already dont want to be here till 2pm.
In this room we go over our paperwork and fix any errors to our name and fill out questionarres. Lucky me they spelled my last name wrong on everything. They spelled it "Dillworth", not "Dilworth". There is only one "L" in my last name. Is it really that hard to comprehend. So now i have to cross out my last name, initial it, write the date, and then write the correct spelling. Also in this room we have our blood pressure and pulse taken, and also take a breathalizer. My BP was a little elevated, but I blame that on the face I only slept two hours the night before and have been up since 01:30am! After all this is done we proceed to the hearing test.
We are coralled into the hearing room, take our tests, and then recieve a simple eye exam and a test to determine if we can tell the differnce between colors. My vision is 20/20 in both eyes :-) Once that is done I have a quick visit with one of the doctors to go over some of my injuries I have had in the past. I had to record the time I cracked my wrist playing baseball when I was 10 or 12. I also had to document the time I had stitches in my lip due to a flashlight smashing me in the mouth. I also have seasonal alergies and a birthmark on my left calf, which is approx 1"x.5". They are pretty thourough.
Now that is done comes blood work. They draw my blood, no biggie, I am ok with needles. I have donated plasma plenty of times so needles are pretty much my friends. After blood comes the urine test. It is a observed urine test, which means someone has to watch me take it to make sure I dont cheat. They allow three of us at a time in the bathroom each with our own urinal. We are to fill the cup half way up, finish our business, step back with the cup in hand and dont ever turn our backs to the witness, otherwise we have to throw out that urine. One guy had stage fright, so he had to come back later, lol. Well my urine failed for too much protein, which means I have to come back sometime after 48 hours to tinkle again. Too much protein?? WTF??
Now comes the fun part. We are sent to a private room, about nine of us in all for the funky walking tests and then the bung hole and private area check. Once we are in there we are required to strip down to our undies, height and weight checked, ears checked (which I have deep wax in my ears apparently), and do several flexibility and balance manuvers. It was somewhat weird, a bunch of half naked guys squatting, walking while squatting, rotating arms, kicking legs, etc etc. After that we go into a seperate room one by one and checked for hernia and spread our butt cheeks. I am guessing on the butt cheek spread the doc is looking for hemroids. Thats the only think I can think of. Either way I am glad it is over.
I dress and head out. I have a different doc review all my paperwork and he makes sure I get my ears cleaned. If it wasn't for this, I would of been out by 10:00am. But nope, I have this stuff squirted in my ears and have to wait like 20 minutes. Since I am waiting I go to lunch, which was at 10:00am. I head back to the medical area and this chick is assigned to me to clean my ears. By this time it is probably 10:20ish. Well this device they use to clean your ears is jammed in your ear hole and sprays water while sucking at the same time. I am told I will feel dizzy during this as well. Sure enough once it starts the room starts spinning, kind of a weird feeling but it passes after several moments. Well this went on for probably about 15 minutes, in my one ear. I guess I had a lot of wax in there or perhaps this chick was a numbskull, I am going with the later. She was not gentle thats for sure. She was cramming things in and out of my ear, I was on the verge of saying "screw it" to the whole thing because of this wench. Anyways, my right ear is done, on to the left. Towards the end of this ear I really started feeling woozy which was causing me to feel sick also. LAter I find out only warm water should be used, this broad was using cold!! And cold water causes wooziness and sickness!! What a stupid girl, I could of slapped her stupid. After sitting still for about five minutes I am finally able to process out. Sure I have to come back but at least I am out of there. The rest of the kids there are probably good till 2pm or longer, suckers!!
I think I was one of the oldest guys there. Everyone single one of these kids were right out of high school or around the very early age of 20. One guy I met was 30, so I still had him beat by one year. All in all though there wasn't a whole lot of waiting for me. It was nice being in the expedited group. I am told I will have go through this physical again when I ship out to basic, awesome. That first week at basic will be a lot of hurry up and wait. Can't wait.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
MEPS
On Monday the 13th of July I go in for my physical for the Army National Guard, can't wait. Actually, it will probably be good for me to get a physical. Whether it is from the government or a private doc, either way I will know if there is anything wrong with me. Right now I weight about 193ish. As far as I know the max weight for my height is 189. I doubt that will deter me from eligibility, either way I have started running. Its funny how all it takes is a little run to make you realize how out of shape you are. Anyways, I am hovering around 193 so we will see what happens. I still have a few more days to run and hopefully drop at least two pounds or so. I am going to write about my experience there as much as possible and then copy over to my blog. I read some guys blog about his experience with MEPS and Basic, it was pretty neat. He wrote as often as he could and mailed the letters home and had someone copy over to his blog. I like that idea and think I will give it a try. Anyways, Monday should be tons'o'fun
Thursday, May 28, 2009
National Guard
Lately I have been tossing around the idea of joining a reserve unit of the military, more specifically the National Guard. Joining the military has been something I have been curious about. Back when I was 19, I almost joined the Army, but I did not. I never really thought much about it since then till my sister joined the National Guard. That was quite a shock seeing my sister join the military. That kind of got me thinking but I felt like I had too much going on in a civilian life to up and join. As time went on I started work at Micron and then transferred to IM Flash Technologies where a bunch of ex-military and reserves worked. I saw how they incorporate this into their lives and a lot of the benefits of being a part of the service. Well now my curiosity is in full swing.
I talked with a National Guard recruiter earlier this week and I am pretty sure I will be enlisting, as an officer. A lot of peoples reactions have been, "you are going to get a one-way ticket to Iraq-Afghanistain". Sure that might be true, but in all honesty, I dont think that worries me to much. I think what worries me the most, when I do enlist as an officerand complete the neccessary schooling, I will be in charge of leading men. I will be the boss. That is a little more nerve racking than being deployed.
I also feel like I am at a point in my life where things have kind of stagnated. I go to work, I go home, the weekend comes, I do whatever on the weekend and then back to work. I almost feel like I need to get out of my comfort zone. Sure I have big plans coming up in the near future. My girlfriend Amy and I are planning on getting married, that will change the comfort zone a bit. I guess its this feeling of "what if" that I dont want nagging me. Plus there are other benefits; extra money, discounts, insurance, excitment, partiotism, help pay off student loans, and more. I think the big thing is I get to keep my job now and get additional training from the military.
So lots to think about. Something that I have been contemplating for a little while now. Will keep this updated if it acutally happens.
I talked with a National Guard recruiter earlier this week and I am pretty sure I will be enlisting, as an officer. A lot of peoples reactions have been, "you are going to get a one-way ticket to Iraq-Afghanistain". Sure that might be true, but in all honesty, I dont think that worries me to much. I think what worries me the most, when I do enlist as an officerand complete the neccessary schooling, I will be in charge of leading men. I will be the boss. That is a little more nerve racking than being deployed.
I also feel like I am at a point in my life where things have kind of stagnated. I go to work, I go home, the weekend comes, I do whatever on the weekend and then back to work. I almost feel like I need to get out of my comfort zone. Sure I have big plans coming up in the near future. My girlfriend Amy and I are planning on getting married, that will change the comfort zone a bit. I guess its this feeling of "what if" that I dont want nagging me. Plus there are other benefits; extra money, discounts, insurance, excitment, partiotism, help pay off student loans, and more. I think the big thing is I get to keep my job now and get additional training from the military.
So lots to think about. Something that I have been contemplating for a little while now. Will keep this updated if it acutally happens.
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