This isn't quite right. It wasn't flying hours that he made up, it was "drills" and "points". Drills are "inactive duty" training periods of 4 hours. You get 1 point for each drill, or each day of active duty, plus 15 points for "participation". There is a minimum number required per year. Most unit assigned guardsmen or reservists, who use the same system, do 48 drills (1 weekend/month traditionally) plus 14-16 days (two weeks) active duty for training, each year.However not that many points are required to remain in good standing. Individual reservists only do 24 drills and 12-14 days active duty, and with the 15 gratis points, just make the minimum of 50 points, unless they do extra "no pay" drills, or other point gaining activities, such as taking correspondence courses of various types. The points are used not only for retention, but also for figuring "good years" for retirement and for calculating the amount of retired pay for reservists. They basically take the total points accurred, divide that by the total number of days of active duty a person with the same years of service would have if they served it all on active duty, and then multiply the ratio by the amount of retired that "all active duty" person with the same service (years) and pay grade would have.
He wouldn't have been checked out in whatever aircraft type the AL ANG was flying, unless it was fortuitously the same type as his Texas ANG unit flew, the F-102, which it wasn't. The AL ANG was a reconissance unit, flying the RF-84 Thunderflash (although about that time they transitioned to the RF-4C) while Bushs TX ANG unit was and is a fighter/interceptor unit, flying at that time the F-102 Delta Dagger, (about that time they became a transition training unit, training ANG pilots from various states to fly the F-102 and F-101 aircraft)