[JGarcia]

My boss has given me tons of latitude, more so than anyone else in my position because he can trust me to get it done.

Recently he had me going over the applications and resumes of people that applied to work for us. It was great to do this, but also a little saddening too.

You see I work for the gov't. The job I do is PERFECT for any combat arms guy with a head for land nav, a knowledge of GPS, and a love of adventure. But when I looked over the applicants there was not ONE veteran.

I wonder why they do not apply, and I guess it might be that they cant seem to imagine how they qualify for the job. Especially when under the "Qualifications" tab, the description typically start out with "a college degree", but they go on to say at the end of the qualifications description "or equivalent experience."

Suffice it to say that we are hiring NO ONE this year, though we could use two guys in my office right now. As three soldier dad indicated, guys like you are hard to come by and in high demand. You're just not looking in the right place.

Want to hike all day in the mountains, drive ATV's, operate boats, get hot dirty and exhausted every day? With little to no supervision, and if you can take the required classes on your own time, you can work your way up to be a GS11 or 12. When your back, feet, knees, give out and you're just not cutting it in the field anymore there is plenty of work writing legal descriptions, gathering documents, and so on.

Or you could load trucks.

Seriously, if anyone of you is looking for a career after SF or combat arms, but still want a little adventure, get into Cadastral Surveying with the US BLM. The job is a mix of investigator, logger, off road driver, boat operator, scout, engineer, inspector, and all around adventure guy. You'll start off small, but if you do the homework you can make a better than average salary.