ArrogantBastard
01-09-11, 01:43 AM
hey, im thinking about comming back in, but, on the reserve side. any reservist out there? whas it like? whats the difference between active and IR? is it possible to work at a reserve station thru out the week? how does the 14 days of foriegn travel work?
benw2200
01-09-11, 10:23 AM
How's it going Sgt? I'm a reservist.. enlisted as reserve so I really can't offer any comparisons between reserve and active duty- the only AD experience I have is boot-soi-mos school and one deployment. For the deployment.. we got activated early last year, and I imagine it went more or less how active duty deployments go.. we had a 3 or so month workup out in Pendleton (all types of training), one month of Mojave Viper, block leave, and then Iraq. We came back, 1 month of demob (don't kill yourself classes, VA classes, turn-in, etc) and back to weekend warrior status.
Aside from getting activated, reserve is really laid back. It depends on your unit, but you may see reserve units as a bit more lax than their AD counterparts.. you have to keep in mind that in the reserves, this is everyone's part-time job, not full time. The Lances are usually working or going to school and the NCOs usually have full time jobs and whatnot. However, our staff is squared away and I have outstanding NCOs so the bullshat is kept at a minimum. With good leadership, reserve units are as disciplined as AD units, mostly because of the maturity level.
Drills are pretty chill for the most part.. we usually come in around 1700ish on Fridays for a few hours for formation, meetings, maybe a class or two. Depending on what we do, we're usually secured by 1600 on Sunday. Most drills are 3 days, but some are shorter or longer, depending on the month.. the Marine Corps Ball drill was just one day, and a few months ago we went down to Parris Island to do rifle qual, and it was a 5 day drill. Drill is boring for the most part.. really not that much different than active duty. Lot of bull. Lot of formations and waiting on the CO. Lot of hurry up and wait. Lots of skating, unless we're doing a field op or some real stuff.
I hope this sheds a little light on the reserve side of things, hopefully this helps, if you have any more questions feel free to ask.