Originally Posted by
muppetofthenorth
While I know what you mean by this, there another side to it. With the unit I'm attached to we got a calendar of events sent down by our Wing detailing all the things they were asking us to do, take part in, promote, assist with, etc... Of the 52 weekends in the year, 40 of them had something cadet related going on. That's before you get to the midweek sessions, the extras not planned in, and the things you want to do with your own unit. And then there's just wanting a weekend to yourself...
I don't blame fellow CFAVs for thinking about themselves a bit.
But there are still those who just want the clobber to pose around in. Them we can do without.
I was definitely in the same region as you appear to be in - possibly even the same wing given the reorganisation a few years back, and on our highly active Sqn probably had a similar level of activity through wing events or stuff we were doing for ourselves. The Sqn WO and I had very supportive partners and we reckoned that we were putting between 20 and 30 hours per week each into the Sqn. We worked that out on a unit that had basic hours of 6.30 -10.30 for staff twice a week plus weekends. Having a large, enthusiastic - and most importantly competent - team is absolutely key to support that level of activity, Wing HQ kind of knew what we were up to as they saw the paperwork (or wondered how the hell we were using so much .22 ammo) and the local AEF boss at Church Fenton knew he could call us on a Friday evening if slots were open, but this is the side of the activity that RHQ and Cranwell were by and large ignorant of. A Reg Cmdt on his first visit to a summer camp with Sqns from our wing was having dinner with a group of VRTs in the mess at Cosford and asked what they all did for jobs before they joined the cadets. That's the level of insight we sometimes had to contend with.....