Episode 0017: Military Base Life: Can you really live there?

Step into the exclusive realm of military life as we reveal the perks and practicalities that come with residing on a base. From fully-equipped gyms and serene pools to the on-base shopping convenience, our latest episode grants you VIP access to a world that mirrors a self-sufficient city. 

Just kidding. About the VIP access. I don't think any of us feel very VIP. 

But our exploration doesn't stop at material comforts – we immerse you in the vibrant community life woven into the fabric of military installations. Discover clubs and educational programs that cater to personal development and camaraderie, ensuring that the service members and their families thrive not just in duty but in spirit. With insights into the CSP Skill Bridge at the Education Center, this episode is a treasure trove for those in uniform seeking to chart their next career move. So, buckle up and join us on this journey, where we celebrate the intricate mosaic of military existence and the support structures that keep it standing strong.

I hope you make your next vacation to a Air Force Base ! 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:16

Hello, welcome back to the Joe show. What up y'all? It is a fantastic Friday. I'm feeling captastic, if you know what I mean. I got my little spurs on my stetson on it, I'm just feeling spectacular. But anyhow, thanks for coming out to the show. Thanks for checking us out.

Speaker 1: 0:35

As you know, on Fridays we try to do it for your information. So today we are going to be talking about if you are on a military installation or you are on a brand new vacation, is something on the one? I mean, it's like you're in the army of the Marines and you go to an air force base. That is a really nice new vacation city If you know what I'm talking about. But for the rest of y'all that come from the civilian world, firstly, no military base that I've really seen. I've seen eight of them. Please, please, be mindful. Yeah, none of them are probably a new vacation city and I get a lot of questions on what people think and I get a lot of questions on what is a military installation like and how do people call it a city. Before we get into that, I just want to let y'all know. Thank y'all for voting on the Instagram channels, the email feed and on the show kind of reaching out to me. So a couple things.

Speaker 1: 1:35

The giveaway next one we're going to do is going to be more closing an apparel. We're going to get some cool stuff. We're going to get some fanny packs, because summer's coming so we got to sneak our mini bottles into the concerts. Some trucker hats, because everyone loves a good trucker hat we can all wear back, slick back whatever. We're going to get some teas Definitely not hoodies. In Texas it was 100 degrees yesterday. I ain't doing hoodies, we ain't with that.

Speaker 1: 1:57

How do you get entered into this? If you stream, download, subscribe, like the show, that's one entry for each thing. If you share the show and if you have me on Instagram, you tag me Facebook, tag me Twitter, tag me LinkedIn, tag me. That will be five entries into the giveaway and with the giveaway I hope we can grill the show, as I want to update y'all. Usually I do. We are still in the top 50%, so correction, not top 50 were top 50% worldwide. We are no longer top 10 in any country, so we need to get back on that. If y'all could help me out, I'll have y'all out, please, and thank you.

Speaker 1: 2:45

Going back to what a military installation base post naval quarters is like. Well, if you knew anything about the barracks that we've talked about, they're dilapidated, their age and poor building codes and metrics. Also, they're kind of falling apart and poor planned right. Some things, though, on a military installation can be better than average, or I would on some things I would say are top tier. I really would say some things are.

Speaker 1: 3:16

All installations have some really basic need amenities. So this is like gyms, pools, libraries, education centers, health centers, shop at malls called the PX. They have grocery. There's a grocery store, sometimes two or three gas station, clothing store, military clothing store. If really someone wouldn't really need to ever leave post base store whatever, to be honest, they really wouldn't need to leave. However, you don't get everything on a base, so let's start through the basis.

Speaker 1: 3:55

Let's talk about the gyms for gyms. General average of gyms on a installation are about eight and a half. Okay, you can't do enough. Usually eight to nine gyms on every military installation. Some places have 24 hours, some places don't have 24 hours. I think it's in the best interest that gyms should be 24 hours, because you do have to scan in with your cat card or whatever ID gets you on onto a base.

Speaker 1: 4:26

Example, like there's a really nice gym I go to down here in Texas and it is only open from 5 am to 4 pm. Well, if you are in the army and you do PT and you work a normal workday, you're not leaving at 1300. You're not an SFAB, you're not a warrant, you're not in finance. Yes, you do not ever have a chance to go to the gym, and it's a really nice gym, it's a very top tier gym. Now there's another gym that's open from 05 to 10 pm. You could go, but essentially those hours outside the workday it's going to be mobbed. So is that really advantageous to go when you really can't get a quality workout in? No matter how nice the gym is, just it's going to be everybody there and everybody mobbed.

Speaker 1: 5:09

Other gyms I've gone to so this was a Air Force installation. They had a two-story gym, all brand new equipment. They had about four or five benches and it was all very, very clean, very well kept and they had, just, you know, a scan, your government ID and that gets you into the gym 24-7. That was really nice to have and it was actually really convenient. Other gyms they have them. But then, like I understand, the concern is like, well, what if someone gets hurt and there's no staff there? I mean I would hope you guys have cameras, I would hope there's some security system right and like, kind of, if you have more than one person in the gym, I don't think someone's gonna sit in there and try to walk out stealing some plates and kettlebells and barbells, like they're learning walking their barracks and with anything. Oh well, hey, we found the guy. We gotta do one inspection because they're not just not gonna hide that randomly, it's gonna be somewhere set up if, if that ever happened. So I mean I understand a risk and concern, so they tried to do the right thing.

Speaker 1: 6:08

Next coming down is we talked about the PX and shop that we mentioned. So a PX is essentially the exchange, where it's a massive mall. Every installation is a little bit different. They do have some of the basic things, like every single one has like a grunt style front store. Everyone has a game stop, everyone has like a subway and a couple little food court spots, but then the main part is just a massive Super store, if you will.

Speaker 1: 6:36

So if you need a best buy, there's essentially a best buying one. If you need to go to a T Mobile or AT&T there's one of those in there. You need some like Most basic hardware. There's like a basic hardware store inside. If you go to the one, the, the one in Germany, ramstein they have an entire furniture store inside the PX shopping store If you want to find like an old-school toys or us there and have a massive toy section, honestly bigger than any Walmart and Target. If you like gardening, they have a massive gardening center. If you want to Get into home decor, they have all this home decor. They have a jewelry section. They have a makeup section for women. They have a Victoria's Secret section for women. They have Basically like a mini storefront for American Eagle, dickies, oakley, levi's, calvin Klein, michael Kors, chanel, vogue or invoke. It's like the makeup stuff. There's another makeup brand. I can't think of Sephora. There's always a Sephora front and just all built in massively into this what you call the PX. That is usually this one location on a installation.

Speaker 1: 7:45

Then you have what they call shoppettes, which is kind of like a mini shop mall. Some will call them shop, some come malls and come shops. Generally, if you're in the service, you just call it a shop at shoppette's gonna have your snacks, your gas station kind of food. It's gonna have some hygiene stuff, like you know one. There's one here that has pillows, blankets, paper towels, light bulbs, batteries, like some some small stuff. And then pretty much every single one has like its own Liquor store on top of the liquor store called class six, where the class six which this is actually kind of cool you can order whatever alcohol you want from wherever it is in the world. They will mail it there and then you pick it up there instead of mail to your house, which I think that's actually pretty cool.

Speaker 1: 8:31

Now you can't buy in uniform till. I think it's 1600 Month Thursday and 1400 on Fridays I'm not sure like the hours on that, so I'm probably wrong but like, essentially, if you're in uniform you cannot go in there. That's kind of like a. I think that's a good idea. I think it's generally good speaking, which, with liquor stores, right, there are what called the commissaries. The commissaries are your grocery stores.

Speaker 1: 8:57

If you're in the Northeast and you shop at Wegmans, the commissary is gonna be dog shit, absolute trash compared to Wegmans. If you are Central and you go to Kroger, it I'd say it's pretty comfortable to. Kroger me generally has a decent selection, generally good selection of frozen food, pantry food, just because, let's say, someone gets deployed, just then they have to throw it out. They just could freeze it and save it. That prices are Some self prices are really good. Other things prices does it doesn't really matter. You're better off just Going to, rather, grab your store, getting the name brand thing because you trust it and you know it.

Speaker 1: 9:38

Though what it is really interesting and in a thing, this is actually a big problem with the commissaries, like, so you essentially can get on a base which means you are Part of the DoD, you're a worker for the DoD, or maybe you are visiting your son, daughter, dad, uncle, brother, cousin, whatever right. And let's say, you realize, like you know they don't have anything in their fridge Like, let me help them out. So I'm gonna go to the grocery store and get them something. Can't the commissary people I think they're volunteers, I don't know why, but they are the most strictest a holes For the easiest job in the world with their like, hey, I'm trying to get this from my son. No, you can't do that. You can't shop here, like and I think that's ridiculous like there's a lot of soldiers that do struggle with good, getting a good diet and food plan, that when a parent or relative tries to get that soldier food to supply their fridge so they can get Adequate food, adequate meal and adequate nutrition, and you just kind of shut it down. I Don't think that's right. I really think there needs to be a better plan in place For that, because I there are times, like even when I used to live in the barracks, that I wish so if someone visited me I Do, was they would buy me food, sometimes Like food to have in my fridge. I can make myself. Not just buy me like Chipotle or buy me like to go food, no, no, like I want to buy some actual food to make it home. That's something I really do wish happened for me.

Speaker 1: 11:03

Now, speaking about to go food and what kind of to go food there is. So for fast food, this is kind of like the generality that you usually get. It's going to be Popeyes, burger King, chipotle, jimmy John's and then I've seen someplace with Cudoba and Some places have like different pizza shops. However, I do generally see Domino's on every military installation. Some places have Marcos, but I've only really seen Domino's, to be honest with you. Then I've seen a couple sit-down restaurants. This includes Sam Adams, which is actually more of just a brew house and they'll have like bar snacks and one or should be like a full Sam Adams restaurant draft house, if you will.

Speaker 1: 11:46

Chilies there is a David, but well, okay, it's not call it's not David bussers, but it's like David bussers, like it has two floor arcade, a restaurant, a rock climbing wall and this is that. This is an air force base, of course. Then there's iHop, johnny Rockets, and then there's, uh, some, some installations have like small local restaurants. So, uh, for bending or Fort more has like it's called the infantry bar and it's attached to this Mexican restaurant. The Mexican restaurant is actually really good, I forgot what it's called. Then, um, for, uh, forca vases has like these little like Guam truck. It's a guam truck and then a Korean soul food truck. So it's not like a sit-down restaurant but they do set up like a little cafe area for you to go sit and eat there.

Speaker 1: 12:34

Um, then I've seen five guys and I've seen five guys on a couple installations and that's all I know off top of my head that I could find and research between like what I've, what I've experienced and seen. Um, then we pull up lists online, like all these lists say all these other places, but some of them, like example, like uh 404, kvasso, says there's a Panera, there's a Panera construction but that size has been up for a minute and there's never been a Panera there. So that's, that's something. That's like I don't know how much, how much, to believe Some of these lists. That's why I just kind of tell you what I've seen in you know my experience.

Speaker 1: 13:14

Another thing that's kind of like a myth is uh, movie theaters. So Every installation on their mwr page say they have a movie theater. I went at Fort Benning. There's a movie theater there. Then most other ones, it's kind of they had one like it has a building says movie theater but it's not actually in use anymore. It's used for like ceremonial stuff, like nco Charges, promotion ceremonies or time ceremonies, stuff like that is not actually used as a movie theater anymore. So what they do for soldiers to see the movies is there's a thing called boss and bosses like a group organization that's better opportunity for single soldiers. So what they'll do is they'll offer extremely discounted tickets for soldiers to go see a movie. They'll get a bus, they'll, you know, say hey, like tickets are five dollars and whatever, whatever, and you'll see a movie which I mean, if you don't have a car which I know a lot of lower and less the guys don't it's kind of nice, it's kind of something to do, at least it's. It's there. It's better than some other things they offer.

Speaker 1: 14:21

Then Recreation is a really big thing. On a lot of installations, at Three of the bases I've been to, there's been a golf course, a God and run hug, sorry, gun and rod club, which is kind of like a hunting club. But you do get only a certain amount of tags, just like any most state licenses, and there is like a hey, you can't shoot this animal, you can't shoot this animal, we. So there are a lot of the same legal rules that you get with hunting in civilian Republic land. There's kayak rentals. Usually some places actually have the kayaking area. I've seen rock climbing on a couple installations.

Speaker 1: 15:00

Then I've seen Bowling alleys at a lot of the installations. You know, okay, don't be wrong, it's like bowling the 1950s. They don't sell certain like you can't. You can't go there and get draft beer, draft pictures, like it was normal bowling, like a bowling league. But you can usually get a couple beers like usual bowling. Snacks like pizza, nachos, nothing crazy, but I like the fact that it's there and I like that there is things to do besides sit in your barracks room.

Speaker 1: 15:27

And then the last I think the really last really good thing that every installation has is a education center. So now I'm speaking for the army on this one. I'm, I know, on the Marine episode we talked about there's like a, an ed center, but it's not the same. So at least in the army the education centers I've seen are a place where there are civilian counselors and then they advise you on whether you want to go the college route or if you want to go the trade route. If you want to go trade, they'll help set you up, getting certifications, setting up CSP, skill bridge programs, which is career skill based programs welding, mechanics, wind farming, carpentry, truck driving.

Speaker 1: 16:11

Then academic you can name any academic college you want to go to. You get accepted to and then, when you get accepted, you meet with your. You meet one of the counselors you never really assigned one and then from there you Sit in, you go through like, hey, what's your education plan? Go through your joint service transcript is gonna have X amount of credits and even say, hey, this is probably your best opportunity at pursuing this degree. So the army has tuition assistance, which is really good. You get four thousand dollars a year which kick in before your financial aid. So the four thousand will pay for college and then your financial aid will kick in after and that there's any money left over your financial aid you pocket that money. Love that. It's actually really huge for the army. It's a great selling point for them if they really want to try helping recruiting numbers.

Speaker 1: 16:56

And I do recommend that if you are in the army you need to meet with your Education center people if you have a year left, six months left or you're gonna stay in for 20, because once you hit e7 the OML actually helps if you have a degree. You know sometimes you don't always have an opportunity to go get a EIB. You know you might only have one chance in eight years. You may not be in a unit that can send you to aerosol or Any kind of badge producing school where your best option is getting a degree. It will help. And you know, do all the other certification courses like Umo has, matt, upl, all that good stuff, do that.

Speaker 1: 17:37

But college will get you a huge advantage amongst your peers, at least in my experience, from what I've seen, most bases do have a pool. With the pools there's usually no lifeguard. How it works is you have to get a memorandum from your commander saying, hey, we have permission to swim here and do whatever we want to do, if you're doing training, if you're doing water survival or, like yours, going there on a weekend to hang out. Bases also with pools will have multiple kid centers and daycare centers. On the daycare centers they send your work to other men, elementary schools and you can bring kids to the pool. They'll have workshops for them, arts and crafts centers. The library always has a massive kids section, very like heavy on the family oriented, which I think is good if you're religious.

Speaker 1: 18:28

There's at least one massive church on a post in my experience and then there's a couple of smaller churches that you can meet at where they might be having a special kind of service or whether you're Buddhist or if you're Hindu or so it's not a very common religion like Islam or Christianity here, or I think Protestants like another big one. Pretty much they'll have like special areas where they'll be conducting worship and, you know, follow your religious practice at that building at whatever time they think the most soldiers for that religion can go to. Obviously they will give you a grant, like they'll give you. Like, hey, if you're gonna go to religious services, go to your thing, you're good. That's another big thing I think the army is really good on is like being very accepting of multitude of religions. So on on To.

Speaker 1: 19:24

To wrap this up here, if you thought you're at your next vacation city, obviously you weren't. However, if you are thinking about joining or you are Gonna be PCSing for the first time and hit up the NWR site on every military installations Website is like a WW dot for drummil or for more dot mil, for kovosso's dot mil and get to their mwr link. Their MWR link will give you links to upcoming events, events going on who to contact, what kind of Physical fitness centers are are, what kind of recreation programs are are, and we'll get you in touch with. Like hey, if you're a single soldier going to the barracks, hey, there's like this boss program here. There's other programs you can do. If you have any question on that, there's a car mechanic on base, like someplace have firestone and mention that, but that's the thing they have.

Speaker 1: 20:16

If you are looking to get Into some sort of club. They'll have club organization things going on. They'll have, you know, your video game tournaments and the end of your set will Give you a lot of information if you want to travel I say you have a family when you go travel, leisure, looking information on like theme parks nearby, family resorts nearby, where at least you're not going somewhere. You just don't know anything. So take advantage of the resources that are around. Hope this at least can educate some people on what a military installation can offer and what it has. If you are thinking about joining, I'm not trying to recruit you, I'm just telling you what options there are here if you do join. If you are getting out, man, hey, hit up that CSP skill bridge at the Ed Center and get working on that and do something for your career getting out. Okay, I hope to catch y'all on Sunday, charlie, mike.