ASVAB

So I went up to MEPS (Military Entrance Processing Station) on monday, came home today (tuesday) having failed. I'll leave that as a cliff hanger while I get to why I failed. I arrived monday afternoon and proceeded to being entered into their system (photo, index-fingerprinting) etc, then proceeded to take the ASVAB. Honestly it was easier than most tests I had in college. There are a couple parts of it that I was scratching my head on at first, but in the end I got it all figured out fairly well, time wasn't even an issue for me once, most of the sections I got done in half the allotted time. The coding section was something that worried me as I heard about it before I went up to MEPS, but honestly I enjoyed it, it wasn't bad at all. Overall I would say more than 75% of the test dealt with things that interested me in one way or other. As you might imagine I did fairly well on it. 94. (99 is the highest possible, after 80 most all jobs are open to applicants regarding ASVAB job reqs').

I got my results, called my recruiter (who when I told him my score was super excited and told everyone in the recruiting offic how well I did, funnily enough he predicted my ASVAB scores from how I had done on the Pre-ASVAB that I'd takena week or two prior). Then I took the shuttle to the hotel, waited for a semi-pointless meeting (they tell you to be nice, behave at the hotel as well as MEPS and give a run down of what to expect, aka play a DVD). By the end of the DVD I'd heard everything said in it 3-4 times previously so nothing new was being covered.

I woke up earlier in the morning than the wake-up call (which never came oddly...), got ready and went to MEPS. by the by, I am leaving out meals and exercise from this, I Did in fact eat while I was there last night and today, as well as exercising while I was up there. lol I arrived there (with close to 35 others, 2 of us going into Navy while most of the others going Army with a few going marines) and began "processing". I went in and check-marked boxes on two pages (this is After having waited for 30-45 minutes for someone to come in and do this for us), got my blood pressure taken (I was apparently nervous as they had to do it twice because the first time my pressure was too high and relaxing Did help, though I was nervous the Entire time) did the forms then began the fun parts. My hearing test went very well, I expected my right ear to be my bad ear but it turns out my left ear was worse, both ears however still have very sharp hearing (I have the tests to prove it!, well, MEPS does...lol). Next was the blood drawing, the lady looked at my left arm, after 2 minutes couldn't get a vein to appear she asked me "do you have deep veins?" (I'm sitting there thinking, "Gee lady, if I was an RN I'd be able to answer that but I'm a photographer, what ISO do you usually shoot at during an indoor sports game?") and I tell her I'm right handed so my right arm is stronger and has bigger veins. So, she went for the right arm and got it the first time without digging. She had asked if I had an issue with needles, I told her "as long as you're putting that -> end in and not that end => in then I'm fine (the needle to fill the vial is 3x bigger than the needle that goes in your arm) she chuckled and said "if I was putting that in I'd have a problem".

Then was the vision test. I pulled out having 20/20 still, and my depth perception turned out well. I got lost on the last line of the last section and lost my focus completely but pulled it back together and did fine. Then was the urine test. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have to pee in front of someone else. "no pressure" right? lol...... yeah... Anyway, got that taken care of. Then I had to wait for the physical, I ended up being one of the last 2 to get it done but did fine on it. I didn't get to meet with a Navy Liason though because I still needed to get taped. For my height their info says I should weigh no more than 176.... I haven't weighed that little since high school (8 years ago). The other option is to have less than 25% body fat. I measured in at 28%. At then end of RTC (recruit training command) it has to be below 22% (given the amount of exercise you do there it's not so much a problem to work down 3% while you're there, but were I to try to work off 6% while there could prove problematic which is why they do it how they do). I did go to the Navy Liason office and speak with a couple people there about career options, possibilities of getting in May. Depending on what career I choose will determine when I can go in to RTC, but I get to back in on April 27th to see if I've "cut the fat". It's really more like I need to get my waist size down and possibly build my neck up a little. The bigger the neck the less your waist affects you...... So, yeah, I failed cause I was too fat...lol but I'm already working on getting that. I've dropped from 220 to 218 already. I need to drop down to closer to 200. Honestly I wouldn't mind getting to what I was at in high school, but I don't think that will be as likely to happen until the end part of RTC at the absolute soonest. Weight wise at least.

So, April 27th I'll go in, sleep in a hotel the night of, the 28th I'll go in and get weighed and taped, assuming I'm within 25% I'll speak with a Navy Liason and pick my career and shipping (to RTC) date. I did test well enough to do Nuclear reactor positions. Fortunately with those they're in higher demand, have a $40,000 sign on bonus and to extend another 3 years after the initial 6 (6 required minimum) they give you another $120,000 bonus. Unfortunately only two types of ships in the Navy have nuclear reactors so my ship choice is limited leaving "A" school (2 YEARS of "A" school mind you, hence the 6 year minimum commitment) I would have the choice between two types, Modern AirCraft Carriers, and Subs (medium subs don't have Nukes onboard but have nuclear based propulsion and tend to travel to the "cool ports" where as large subs carry nuclear ordinance as well as skipping a large number of "cool ports" due to their massive size. Oddly enough an AirCraft Carrier Battle-group contains 2 subs (typically), so regardless of choosing Sub or Carrier I'd be next to one anyway. I'm still leaning toward Journalism Photography or News Media, but depending on how things fall I may go for the Nuke training anyway.