ALL THESE TERMS AND ACRONYMS
There are entire websites dedicated to military acronyms and lingo. It is a testament to the Army's never ending quest toward a language comprised solely of acronyms and entirely devoid of actual words. I found an excel sheet online of between 6,000 and 7,000 acronyms and terms, just to give you an idea. I'm not going to go through those, and I have a LOT left to learn myself! You should look some up though...a lot of them are clever and funny, though a number of them use some conglommerate of phonetic alphabet words to curse without cursing. If you are new to the Army, or are a civilian trying to get a handle on basics, here are a few of the first and most common terms I learned:
Rack out: Go to sleep. "I'm in my rack" is also acceptable. So, you rack out by getting in it. Is it a noun? Is it a verb? I THOUGHT A RACK WAS A SHELF! Nope. Welcome to the Army.
*note: it seems this term originated from the Navy, in which case the beds likely were pretty much shelves. Still sounds weird though.
Zero dark thirty: Really, really early.
Mandatory fun: Events you have to go to that are parties, picnics, or otherwise forced fun.
Charlie Mike: Continue mission.
OPSEC: Operational Security. So, for example, sharing the dates of your service member's comings and goings and certain deployment details online is a no-go as it could compromise security. Depending on what it is, standards may be more strict or more acceptable. If your service member is deployed and they have a change of mission, being sent to another country, you probably won't even be notified until they get to the location as the spouse.
Gun: You thought you at least had this one down, right?? Nope. It refers specifically to artillery. Apparently "gun" is not an acceptable enough term for the military to encompass all firearms like it is for the rest of the population. A pistol is not a gun, a rifle is not a gun. They are simply weapons or small arms. I still say gun to refer to regular firearms...the mark of a civilian? Still a good one to know - it can be confusing when you thought you knew what was being talked about and then you are corrected that no, it's not a gun. Suddenly in your mind the conversation makes no sense, unless you know that your concept of "gun" is not the same as theirs in some settings.
PCS: A Permanent Change of Station is about as permanent as a snowflake brought indoors. For active duty members, a PCS (move) may happen every 2-3 years.
MOS: Military Occupational Specialty. Basically your job in the military. For every MOS, there is a code corresponding to it. For instance, my husband is 11B (read 11 Bravo, just like Company C is Charlie Company), which is an Infantryman. All 11's are infantry, and the letter denotes something within that category such as infantryman, indirect fire infantryman, etc. A combat engineer is 12B. If someone asks what your MOS is, they want to know what area in the military your work falls under.
ETS: Expiration Term of Service. If you are ETSing, you are getting out. If you want to stay in and your ETS date is coming up, you will need to re-enlist at that time.
FRG: Family Readiness Group. The FRG leader is often the captain's wife but can be someone else too. I was asked if I would be willing to be FRG leader, since the captain isn't married, but luckily there is another woman that has been the leader for 3 deployments and will be able to do it this time around too as it turns out. The FRG leader works with the commander to disseminate information to the spouses, often does wellness checks during deployment, plans yellow ribbon events, and other things. What exactly FRGs look like, how often they meet, and other variables depend on the FRG leader and also largely depends on the expectations and vision of the commander the FRG works with. It's trickier when you're in the National Guard because everybody lives so much further from each other than when living on post or near one for active duty members.
AT: Annual Training. Guard members have AT once a year (a name that makes sense!) and it usually lasts 2 weeks, unless it is before a deployment in which case it will probably be 3.
PT: Physical training. Not to be confused with physical therapy, or any other civilian "PT" acronym.
Various training acronyms, like WLC and ALC: Warrior Leadership Course and Advanced Leader Course. WLC is required for promotion to Sergeant, and ALC is required for promotion from Staff Sergeant to Sergeant First Class.
Premob: Premobilization training. This is training that happens before a deployment. For example, they may train for a month or three somewhere in the country immediately before an overseas deployment.
The day premob starts and the day your soldier actually goes anywhere for premob are not necessarily the same day. So, let's say hypothetically that you are a rather plan-oriented person and you ask to confirm what day premob starts and he says a day that is earlier than you thought. You might have a mini panic attack because he is coming home from a training the SAME DAY premob starts, before you realize that date means absolutely nothing to you practically. It's just the official date on the paperwork...the day he leaves is TBA sometime within a couple days of the date on the paperwork. In this hypothetical situation, it is imperative that you clarify and define your terms when communicating, or you may end up with significant levels of hypothetical confusion and frustration.
There are lots of uniform patterns. For example:
ACUs: Army Combat Uniform
UCP: a rather unfortunate acronym standing for Universal Camouflage Pattern - same as ACUs.
Multicam: Not the same as ACUs. There are different color versions of multicam, and I hear there are more horizontal patterns in multicam wheras ACUs have more vertical. Or something to that effect. Whatever - ACUs mostly just look like randomly placed enlarged pixels to me, but I guess I see it.
Scorpion: Another uniform pattern...
When a new uniform is issued, if you're enlisted, you'll get it for free eventually. If you're super excited about it you can pay to get it early.
Wilco: Will comply. Like "roger," because there isn't exactly a "wilnoco" option. Also a fun thing to send back to your husband to throw him off when he messages you proposing something like going to the movies or eating frozen pizza tonight.
Retrograde to the rear: Retreat. It means retreat.
At ease: It doesn't mean go about your business, or relax. It is a command at which the soldier stands with feet shoulder width apart and hands behind his back. I'm pretty green myself, but not knowing this one may make you look a little silly.
"A rock or something": the infamous instructions on an MRE to lean it against something so that it is at an incline. This is so that when you pour water into the MRE and heat it, nothing spills. There is a diagram with the MRE leaning against an object literally labeled, "rock or something."
MRE (Meal, Ready-to-Eat): Generally crappy meals in a bag. There may be a couple exceptions - I hear the stews aren't too bad. You know how astronauts have horribly tasting, totally dehydrated food requiring little to no preparation? It's like that, but not.
Salute: Okay, so it's not a term, but the way you probably do it in charades and the way they do it in movies half the time is wrong. Your right arm should be at a 90 degree angle to your body and your hand be at a cant slanted downward somewhat. The tips of your fingers should be at the edge of your eyebrow, unless you're wearing a cap, in which case they should be at the bill of the cap.
Found yourself using the phonetic alphabet on the phone yet? "No...ERIN, spelled the GIRL way, because I'm a GIRL! Echo, Romeo, India, November!" ...I have.