'sup. Congrats from an Army 11B (same job you do). The real military really isn't that bad. It's much more laid back than basic. Doubly so since I'm part of USAREUR and triply so since I'm mechanized. MECHANIZED!
Don't worry about Iraq too much. It sucks because it's Iraq, but it doesn't have the intentional, carefully constructed suck that they throw at you in basic training. You'll be busy and sometimes getting shot at and blown up. But when you have down time it's your down time. You can go to the PX (if your FOB has one...), use the Internet, or whatever.
Each deployment gets more tolerable. All the guys that were here during OIF II tell stories about working 18 hours a day, sleeping under trucks, wearing gear all the time, etc. I sat next to one of our OIF II veterans on the bus ride to Camp Buehring, Kuwait and the whole time he was commenting how new stuff had been put in and people were walking around in PTs and stuff. The infrastructure is getting built up on the FOBs too. Our FOB is small and fairly crappy, but it has an MWR, a smallish PX, a Green Beans coffee (those things are everywhere), and Internet in the buildings. *shrug*
Good luck w/ School of Infantry and welcome to the military. Enjoy it and don't let it go to your head. That's my advice. A smallish percentage of soldiers (and Marines, I expect) think that because they are in the military, esp Infantry, that they are better than other soldiers/other branches/civilians. We're all part of the same military and the same country. But if you role off the FOB, that does make you special, damn it. (Sorry, it's an inside joke).
P.S. The Marines do have the best dress uniform, hands down.
