Uncle Sam's my boss again!

No, I didn't re-enlist or get a commission as an officer. I am now a civilian in the employ of the US Navy.

Basically the JFCOM folks I was supporting as a contractor loved what I was doing and didn't want to lose me so they offered to transition my contractor position to a GS position. So what does that mean? Well, the pay is about the same and the Thrift Savings Plan has a little better match than I was getting, but the primary reason is that as a contractor I was getting a total of 19 days/year for general leave (vacation + sick) and only 9 holidays/year. Now as a GS, my 11 years prior active duty service counts toward leave calculation (because I didn't retire). So I start out with 20 days/year annual leave + 13 days/year sick leave and 10 federal holidays and every base down day/extra day given to the military. 14+ extra days a year off is worth it I think.

Basically the only thing that has changed @ work is the source of my paycheck...oh, and the fact that I get to go to more meetings now since I can officially represent the gov't. They don't know what they have done...