I Can Smell..........

George Grand

......retirement right around the corner. I am mulling over an offer from the feds. They want to pay me a $25K lump sum, and then $2k a month after taxes NOT to come to work anymore. They want me off the rolls by 30 Sep.

The best part is I can still go to the SAME PLACE, and do the SAME JOB, until what looks like 6 June 08, and get two days of pay as a Master Sergeant if I fly a 4.0 hour mission or longer. For the uninitiated, a Master Sergeant with my years of service (31) TAKES HOME a little more than $3k every two weeks. KaCHING!

Don't ever let anybody tell you the military is not well re-imbursed. When I first started as a federal employee/military member, my fed pay DWARFED my military pay. Superlative raises for the military and pittance raises for the feds over the last 25 years has totally put the shoe on the other foot.

Oh, and at age 60 (I'm almost 55), I start collecting my military pension as well as the fed pension. It should monetarily be the same or better than the fed pension. Then SS at age 62.........

My neighbor asked me what I'm going to do when I retire.

1. Grow one helluva Zappa.

2. Listen to my wife's alarm clock go off every morning.

3. MAYBE wake up with my wife, pour a cup of coffee, pull a lawn chair onto the driveway, make sure all the rest of you boys get off to work okay, and then go back to sleep for a couple hours.

nadams

Good on you, George! Glad to hear you're looking forward to it . Now you can be the one quoted in the local paper after the house down the street blows again saying, "I was jus' sittin' in ma' chair when "KABOOM", there she went!"

With as much money as you'll be still bringing in... you may not be talking about a house

Ricardo

Good stuff George. Your rum reserve will need to grow

Mike682

go for it

let me add another to the list

4. hang out at CP all day and harass the fellow polkies signed in while at work:D

PolkThug

I'd take the offer. If I didn't have a pension, I wouldn't take the offer.

cfrizz

Outstanding George! Take the retirement & enjoy!

TroyD

I'd say you are a lucky SOB (which you are) but I also know that retirement is WELL earned and deserved.

A guy who makes E-7 not once but TWICE is a guy to be reckoned with.

BD(of the 4 yrs 11 months and 1 week until eligible to retire) T's

schwarcw

Congrats George! Are you going to go for it?

You can think of me every morning as I go off to the rat race! I suspect my last day at work will be when they take me out on a stretcher into the hearse:(

Mike Reeter

Hey man,I guess what my question would be;WTF are you waiten on bra?

I'm 16 months from hangin it up myself...best of luck to ya.

George Grand

Am I going to go for it?

1. Is the pope catholic?

2. Does a chicken eat corn?

3. Does a bear **** in the woods?

Anybody in between me and the door when they formally make me that offer, is going to have size 8 1/2 bootprints up the side of their body that's facing me. PLUS, I might stab them just for laughs, with the pen I used to sign the paperwork. In the parking lot you'll find a pair of boots thrown in one direction, a flying suit thrown in the other direction, and a stupid blue hat afire on the flagpole.

If I wait any longer to do this, when I DO walk out the door, it'll be a skeleton with a flight suit on, cause my bones will have been picked completely clean.

Couple more high points.........

My wife, the former Theresa Talamonti, makes a fairly good buck, and is 8 years my junior. She has to work about another 8 years for her pension from Fox Chase Cancer Research. I wisely avoided the temptation to trade up to a McMansion a few years back when interest rates were low (McMansions are overrated anyhow, and when the housing thing settles down, you won't be able to give them away. People won't be able to afford heating them, no less buy them.). Our home will be paid off in a year. Stephie is planning on going to radiology school, and the hospital where my wife works may pick up a lot of the tab, as that's where Stephie will work after completion of said school.

The lady in the human resources office that ran all the numbers for me today asked this at the end of the session....

"By any chance do you have hearing loss, or high blood pressure as a result of your employment over the last 30 years?"

"Huh? Whatever you just said, would you say that into my good ear? And if I'm still here talking with you an hour from now, please remind me to take my blood pressure medication."

Then she gave me a number to call, cause these things MIGHT be worth another $10-20K in a lump sum payment from either the Veterans Administration or the DAV.

amulford

He's outta here...

George Grand

Antny! Stay in touch. Might be having a little get together in June (I don't know exactly when) to welcome a Texan to Jersey. Tattoos will be optional, and showing everybody your **** might be in poor form.

Fireman32

Good for you George. Congrats on a well earned retirement.

amulford

I will do that, my good man. Hey, you'll have time to stain the fence, again...

George Grand

****.

MikeC78

Congrats MSgt George!!:)

You definetly deserve it after dealing with the military as long as you did!:eek: I really don't know how you did it, I couldn't take it any longer after 5 years!

Mike

TroyD

Well, one thing, Mike....wearing a bag to work has some definite perks.

31 years is a LOOOOOOOOOOONNG time though.

BDT

George Grand

It lost its cachet and charm with me after maybe two or three years. But it HAS paid the bills, and allowed me to be a complete misfit on every continent, more times than I could ever count.

Things I learned along the way are:

1. Babes dig flying suits.

2a) You can't call colonels **** to their faces. You REALLY can't call them F*CKING **** to their faces.

2b) You can't give a colonel his flight lunch by drop-kicking it at him on the airplane.

2c) There is an endless number of things that colonels frown upon when you do it to them.

3. Making rank is never as much fun as losing rank.

TroyD

Well, you'll be able to send the penguin through the flaming hoop with impunity now...

BDT

JimBRICK

man get out and golf, golf, strip bar, golf

George Grand

F*ckin' "A" to that one Troy. Just about untouchable now.

Colonels play golf. Real men go to the BX and get dates with colonel's wives while the colonels golf. You've obviously never been military, and if you were, you weren't enlisted.

markmarc

If you get bored with golf, etc. George, I'm always searching for more writers!

MikeC78

George Grand wrote: »

Colonels play golf. Real men go to the BX and get dates with colonel's wives while the colonels golf. You've obviously never been military, and if you were, you weren't enlisted.

MillerLiteScott

Congrats George. Looking forward to meeting you this weekend.

MLS

Bill Ayotte

George Grand wrote: »

F*ckin' "A" to that one Troy. Just about untouchable now.

Colonels play golf. Real men go to the BX and get dates with colonel's wives while the colonels golf. You've obviously never been military, and if you were, you weren't enlisted.

I just sleep with LTs...Warrant officers too...:D
It really pisses off all of the single pilots to have their egos crushed when they find out I got to it before they did.....hehe.:D

hearingimpared

You're an NCO and a gentleman! May your rum rummith over!!!

wingnut4772

Congrats George! I am so envious with 16 years to go myself (sigh).

hearingimpared

George Grand wrote: »

Am I going to go for it?

1. Is the pope catholic?

2. Does a chicken eat corn?

3. Does a bear **** in the woods?

I can't believe you forgot. . . does Howdy Doody have wooden balls?

Bill Ayotte

Man, I had no idea you had 31 years in....I am fried after six.....By the way, my dad hates golf....:D

mrbigbluelight

.....and life is as it should be, when good things happen to good people.

Congratulations, you've earned it.

dorokusai

Retire now you old SOB.