Briandot

Posted By merrell on December 30, 2008

God created dry land and the seas, and also vegetation.

And the Army took that vegetation and turned it into paperwork.

Today was the day that we verified all the paperwork we were supposed to do over the past few weeks, or for those who were remiss in that duty, they filled it out there. I had a pretty easy time of it. I spent the past four weeks putting a lot of effort into doing as much as possible before showing up, even if it meant duplicating forms or fulfilling requirements in more than one way. I was determined not to screw it up.

But the Army proved that either I can’t get everything right, or that I can’t read their collective bureaucratic mind. I suspect it’s the latter; I didn’t have something in the ‘Additional Remarks’ field of a form that they wanted. Who knew.

One thing I certainly didn’t like was my new CAC (Common Access Card), which serves as our universal ID card in the military. I’ve had one for a few years as a Navy civilian, and my as-then-current one was good until late 2010. They took that away from me though, because it didn’t have all the necessary privileges on it, i.e., meals, exchange, MWR, etc. Now it looks like my Army friend’s military CAC, with squiggly green lines and lots of watermarks and way more info on it than before.

I told my wife about this, and she said something we saw on a poster in the Smithsonian Museum of American History a few weeks ago:  “You’re in the Army now.”

Heh.

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Posted By merrell on December 29, 2008

As part of my deployment to Afghanistan, I need to go through the CONUS Replacement Center (CRC). This is a facility at Fort Benning in Georgia that processes non-unit related personnel going to various overseas theaters. Primarily this means contractors — and there are a huge number of them — but also DoD civilians (like myself) and military Individual Augmentees joining units already in place. It processes approximately 400 outgoing persons per week, and every group is completely full.

I left home on 26 Dec, accompanied to the airport by many tearful family members. Other than having to unpack a very full carry-on for security, it was uneventful. I arrived in Atlanta tired and smelling less than fresh, but I knew I still had some traveling in front of me. I did have a choice, I suppose; either I could get to the CRC that evening or I could get a hotel in Atlanta.

My decision was thus: if I walked to the shuttle area and the bus was still there, I’d take it to Columbus (just north of Fort Benning); if I had to wait more than 30 minutes, I’d find a place in Atlanta.

As it was, I was there about four minutes before it departed, so the timing was perfect. I shared the ride with a contractor and someone who never spoke. After we endured the rally race our driver put us through to Columbus — always 15 mph above the posted limit and occasionally veering off the road as he started to doze off — we were told that the CRC was 24/7, and that they were waiting for us. A short 15 minute ride later and we were on post.

I suppose what I went through next was not too unlike the first day at basic training. Arrive at an odd hour, get handed linens and a crappy pillow, and get assigned to a bunk. I share a room with Emmanuel, the contractor mentioned above, a young Army E-something, and Johnny the mechanic. It’s cozy.

Most of the time has been either standing in line or sitting on my ass filling out paperwork. This is Army standard processing at its best, with standard DD-forms that don’t quite match what they have up on the projector, instructors who don’t quite know how to handle anything not strictly according to regulation, and facilities probably not quite up to public health and safety code. But we’re making the best of it.

One thing I’ve noted is that the condition of most of the contractors as well as my fellow DoD civilians is appalling. Even most of the military would not easily be characterized as “in shape”, which surprised me given that they have PT tests to pass. Tomorrow is Day 3, which begins the medical screening. It’s a long day, and a day when I would imagine that many people are going to be told things they do not want to hear.

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Posted By merrell on December 24, 2008

It lives.

Roughly a year ago, I let the blog die.  I wasn’t really trying to let it die; I had plenty to talk about.  But no one was reading and I had a more to do than before, so the blog was “deprioritized”.  It was unwise to edit from work and the missus wasn’t too pleased with me blogging at home, so unless I wanted to blog-while-driving or something it just wasn’t going to happen.

But now I’ll be in a different context.  I suppose I could still be told not to blog “at work” — whatever that may mean when I’m deployed in a foreign country.  Or “at home” — when OPSEC rules might dictate that I shouldn’t.

This is an attempt to bring back my blog. The old one is archived here. This new one is certainly of a different character. It will be interesting to see how it changes over the next year. At the time of this writing I’m still in the United States, and haven’t even left for training at the CRC at Ft. Benning. (to view the link you will have to add their security certificate as an exception.

Please stay tuned — I hope to post quite a bit over the next year.

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