Wow, nice place I have here!

So, some people would like to know more about USAA. Cool, let us discuss.

These guys have employed a lot of retired generals and colonels in the past. They spent a lot of time at the Pentagon and, in turn, didn’t want the USAA campus to turn out like that. So, while the building is massive and boasts more square footage than the Pentagon, it is laid out much better. It’s actually nine buildings that have been joined together into a long chain. The company would grow to a point and decide to build another building at the ass end of the complex. So, naturally, There was A, the oldest portion, then AB (guess it came after B was already there), then B, then C, etc….all the way down to H. As soon as they finished H, they started renovating A. So even though it’s the oldest actual building, the company has been revamping the interiors so that the whole place is still pretty legit.

Where the Pentagon has acres and acres of parking (ugh!), requiring shuttle buses to take most people from Lot ZZ232 to the building, each building at USAA has several levels of parking below the buildings and there are three separate garages that are attached to the complex. Since I was able to score an apartment with an attached garage, I don’t have to step outside when going to or from work. It’s garage to garage, baby! Ginger’s paradise!

There is a service level that runs, unimpeded, down the entire length of the complex. People do their little fitness walking things up and down it through the day. They have programs where people can log their distances and time and have friendly low-impact competitions with other employees.

For the more active employees, there are four gyms at the complex. The main fitness center in building A is open 24 hours. All day, son! I can get my kettlebells on!

Employees pay something like $24 per month to be a “member” and the gym gives us shirts, shorts and towels to use. That way, we don’t have to babysit sweaty clothes all day. The underwear and socks are up to the employee (as I would hope), but coming from the military, where it’s customary to have sweaty PTs hanging up around everyone’s work area, not having that is pretty awesome.

There are fitness trainers on site whom employees can hire for an additional fee. Otherwise, they just let us do our thing. What’s cool is that the company, being in the insurance biz, after all, wants its employees to be healthy. So, if we use the gym three times a week for the whole year, the company refunds our gym fees. Moreover, the company gives out healthy points, based on how often we buy healthy food options at the cafeterias (most employees pay for everything by scanning their ID cards…which makes buying everything from tshirts to food super easy), how often we go to the gym and if we participate in the PT tests of sorts they give every six months. If we rack up enough healthy points through the year, the company knocks off a few hundred bucks off of our insurance premiums. Monies!

They subsidize the veggie dishes at all the cafes and cafeterias (there are five or six of varying size and “fanciness”). So, healthy lunches end up crazy cheap. There is actually a very large number of veggie stands and dishes–I think because there are a lot of cultures represented at USAA who don’t normally go for intense diets of greasy fast food like we Amurikans. Since most of the cafeterias are open from 6 a.m. to 8 or 9 at night, breakfast and dinners are available. Some of the cafes even have meals-to-go for guys like me to take home more wholesome snacks than Papa Johns or whatever.

The building interiors are awesome. There are lounges and places to sit and chat everywhere. The main walkway runs through the middle of all the buildings, dividing each segment into an east and west side (west sieeeeeede!). The center of the buildings are hollow from roof to floor, with offices and spaces ringing the main square. Each of the buildings has military stuff in this grand hall area to teach employees history and heritage of the company. It’s cool because it blends into the lounges and cafes that exist. It’s not too preachy or pushy. I dig.

Pretty dope, overall.

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