I hear what you're saying Finloq but it's a sad fact of life that bullsh.........., er... ah, yes....., bullshine does baffle brains. There won't be many passing out parades where the crunchies haven't polished their rifle stocks with boot polish. Even the L1A1 rifle stocks were brush polished with Kiwi Brown and later, with the plastic, Kiwi Black....

At Ingleburn (correct me if I'm wrong or my memory is playing tricks again all you Australians) where the huge National Service intakes did their basic training, it was the norm for the rifle stocks to be highly polished with Kiwi dark brown. And woe betide you if it wasn't!

As Armourers, it was just one of those things that you came to accept on the basis that it wasn't doing any harm. And if the CSM's and RSM told the Armourer Sergeant quietly in the mess that it was an acceptable practice, then guess what! It WAS an acceptable practice Obviously we did them in linseed.

Just as a little aside....., as I'm wont to do occasionally, when I was in 8 RAR, the RSM called me up to his office and gave me 12 SLR bayonets and told me that he wanted wood grips put on them for the guard mounting for a visit by the Australianicon Infantry Chief of Staff from Canberra. I wandered back to the Armourers shop where Armourer Sgt Johnny Cotterell asked me what he wanted, so I told him. He huffed and puffed a bit and said that he'd see about this that and the other. But if the RSM says you do, then you do. The RSM (Lee) wasn't all bad and was obviously pleased with the result because afterwards he called me up again, opened his drawer where I again saw the 12 wood gripped bayonets, picked one up and handed it to me as a keepsake.

Where were we now......................