What Your Rank Says About You...

(This is a joke. We need more like it.)



My observations thus far on what sort of personality you will develop in response to which enlisted rank you are wearing....

E -1 : You are terrified, petrified and mortified. But this is because you are in boot camp.

E-2 : You snicker and point at the E-1s behind their back, joking about the $52.37 a month more you're earning than those stupid E-1s. But you must do so quietly, because you too are still in boot camp.

E-3: You are cocky, stupid and enjoy finally being able out hang out with the real active duty folks, even though they will send you out in the rain for coffee for the entire unit.

E-4: You have given a couple of years to this whole "Air Force" thing by now. You desire to be challenged and seek promotion to a non-commissioned officer. You know your job well, and your only enjoyment comes from making senior ranking members feel stupid for not knowing how to fill out a requisition form. You, of course, fail to realize that you are still filling out requisition forms.

E-5: Finally, a break in the clouds. You have made your big step up into the realm of NCOs! You relax, and, for the first time in years, people enjoy your company. You begin to have a little faith that your years of devotion to the Armed Services has not been in vain. You can begin to see the long term: twenty years and then retirement! Or perhaps, you might become Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force! Why not?

E-6: With this promotion returns the black clouds. You are still doing the same job, and doing it well, but now you are expected to watch over all of the little retards the Air Force put under your watchful eye. That twenty-year mark has never seemed so far away. You begin a slow decline in your general optimism. Some might even consider your "cynical" or "jaded" by this point.

E-7: The happiest time one can expect in the enlisted ranks. You have made it through E-6, and now can be considered a senior non-commissioned officer. Now, no matter if you retire tomorrow, people will regard your career as a success. Something about this single inverted chevron on your sleeve puts you at ease and allows you to joke casually with both junior and senior ranking members around you. Your children like you and you probably go through your mid-life crisis and buy a cool sports car.

E-8: If you've made it this far, the only thing you can think about is finishing the race: an E-8's preoccupation is achieving E-9. E-8s are eager to please and will take on great amounts of household chores (normally doled out by the E-9s) to make them seem like the most qualified troop come stripe-pinning time. While the E-8 has every right and ability to delegate responsibilities to his junior members, most often you horde them, making yourself look terribly important, both to those under, and above you.

E-9: The queen bees of the hive, greeted with "Good day, Chief. How are you?" by all who pass them by, the E-9 has achieved the highest rank an enlisted person could aspire to. Having learned all necessary skills in order to run the Air Force, the Chief does the only think he/she can think of: give away the chores to the E-8s. So the E-9 gets to walk around like the beloved but feared grandparent that you have as sort of a paternal protection/chaperon hanging around. One day, the E-9 decides to retire, and all of the E-8s get together and bake a cake.



...and that's the way it is.