As a 28-year Army veteran, I have vast experience with "DoD travel." In the Army and most of DoD it's called Temporary Duty, acronym TDY. In the Navy, it's Temporary Additional Duty, acronym TAD. All military personel and DoD civilians try to go TDY or TAD as often as possible. It gets you out of the office and all food, lodging and transportation is paid by the government. It's a mini-vacation, usually to some fun conference. There's a word for it, it's called a "boondoggle." You can actually make money if you eat cheap.
There is another factor. Each government unit has a TDY budget. But if you don't spend it all during the fiscal year, your TDY budget will be reduced the following year. This actually happened to me at DSCP. My first year there, I was the director of a Business Unit (5 military, 17 civilians) and my BU had about (don't remember the exact number) $6,368 unspent. The following fiscal year my TDY budget was reduced by exactly $6,368. I learned my lesson the hard way - must spend every penny of TDY budget every year! TDY or die!
