A new beginning

Well, this is the start of what I hope to be an ongoing journal of my new career that will start here in a few months. I've already gotten through many hurdles to get to where I am now. The only one left is to pass my racquetball and ROTC class and then i'll commission!

Some background for those of you who don't know me all that well. I joined the US Marine Corps on June 20, 2000; went to boot camp in San Diego and ended up being a KC-130 flying crew chief in the reserves. I got out and transferred to the US Air Force on Aug 21, 2006 when I contracted/enlisted in the Air Force.

I've been in ROTC for the Air Force since January 2005 and went to Field Training (AF officer "basic training") in the summer of 2006 at Maxwell AFB for a whopping 4 weeks. Upon graduation of that, I contracted/enlisted in the Air Force.

I competed for, and received a pilot slot in March of 2007 which entitles me to a chance at becoming a US Air Force pilot. I went for my flight physical a couple months later, and, after a slight hiccup, was approved by the surgeon general to continue.

I'm now at the point where I (and the rest of us that are commissioning in December) am about to find out which bases I will report to for the first year or so and when I will be there.

I will keep you updated!

EDIT to add a little more information: After I got my pilot slot, I had to set up a flight physical with the folks down at Brooks City Base in San Antonio. Let me tell ya, that is one crappy place to be. Me and my buddy were there for about 3 days while we had EVERYTHING checked out. I've had a flight physical before for the Marines, but this one was a little bit more intensive. Well, there was an issue while the flight doc was checking me out (the last thing before we left) and that started something that lasted for about 3 months. So, after going to my personal doctor several times and some waiting for word from the Surgeon General's office, it was cleared (if you want to know what it was, ask me in a comment and I'll tell you). All this occurred around the middle of this year, but everything is all good.

Also, had to apply for a secret clearance to be an officer and then a top secret clearance to be a pilot. I SHOULD have had a secret clearance from the Marine Corps, but apparently it was just pencil whipped and it turned out that I didn't have one. So did the paperwork for that and that was cleared in a short amount of time; then I applied for a TS clearance, and that took considerably longer. Bottom line, that was approved shortly before I started this journal. So now all I have to do is graduate/commission and pass IFS and i'm good to go for UPT!