Finally! Made it to and through MEPS...well at least part of it. Soooo, went to my recruiter office at 4:30 waited around for a couple hours till one of the petty officers drove to the hotel. Got stuck in Atlanta traffic, talked about police, and what I should expect that night. I don't know about other MEPS stations but at the Atlanta MEPS you get to stay at a nice Double Tree Inn. Checking in consisted of going to the basement of the hotel, which sounded sketchy, and check in with a lady that the recruiter said sounded mean but was quite nice...don't know where he got the nice part. I had to sign in and show my ID to the lady as she explained all the rules to me. I checked into the room, met my roommate and we went down and got dinner. The buffet was really simple, there was bread, rice, beans, some kind of fish, lasagne, fried chicken, and different cakes. It was pretty good. There we talked about rates that we were hoping to get. Some guys overheard us and they started talking about linguistic rates and a coule others like nukes and intelligence. There was a meeting at 10pm in the MEPS check in area and it was really nice. Leather recliner chairs, a huge HD tv, and we all waited for the desk lady to explain all the rules again. My roommate was a little crazy, inappropriate, clingy, and didn't go to sleep that night and kept me up till 2:30.
Alarm cloack went off at 4am. Breakfast till 4:30 and on the bus at 5am. It wasn't too bad functioning that early in the morning. We were off to Ft. Gillem and we were split up into two groups. One group were those who were shipping out and us who were MEPing. First thing we did was watching a slide show that explained the rules of MEPS, then we checked in aka got labeled, and started the medical portion of MEPS. Blood Pressure, Eye Exam, Breathalizer, Hearing test, taking blood, signing all those medical questionaires and privacy documents was normal but took forever. I will say the head nurse was quite umm stern would be an understatement. On her defense some of the guys were extremely loud and annoying. I was interviewed by a elderly doctor about my medical history. He was fun, kept asking me questions about the history of the navy and the barbary pirates. Quite interesting. Then off for the infamous pee in a cup test...that was a fun time. The longest part was the physical. Weight, Height and then the stretches. Nothing was too difficult and the duck walk was hilarious. The women administering the test made some of the girls do the excercises a few times extra because they weren't doing them right. Then the worst part for me was the checking if I was a girl part. The actual physical was basic, what made it aweful was the doctor. She was apparently in a foul mood. She commented on every little thing. The little acne on my shoulder she fussed over, she said I ate too much chocolate (which I avoid thank you) and one tooth was crooked. Very unpleasent and harsh, but I made it through.
With all that over we were finally done. The day had started at 5:40 and those of us who were phys only the day was done just after 12pm. I called the recruiter to come pick me up at 12:30 and was picked up at 4:30...so that was fun. Over all MEPS was not too bad, just lots of waiting. Most of the employees were nice enough, but I will remember the Angry Check-in at the Hotel Lady, Angry Check-in at MEPS Lady , and Angry Nurse Lady. So yeah that was an overview of my day at MEPS.
Hooyah!
