When are you going back ?

[BobClay]

Sometimes after months at sea, you'd come home on leave and that would be the first question you heard from family, mates and enemies.

Never have figured out a super smooth answer !!

[billyboy]

Must admit to being guilty on that one Bob. First thing I would say to my older Brother when he came home from deep sea. ha ha

[Dartskipper]

Slightly less obnoxious was "How long are you home for this time?"

[Ron Stringer]

Used to get both those questions every time I came home on leave. But because I worked for Marconi I could never give an answer! Regardless of how much leave I was due, any time after the first couple of weeks I could expect to hear the telegram delivery boy's 2-stroke motor-bike coming down the lane. After the first couple of curtailed leaves, I learned to stay out of sight and get my mother to refuse to accept delivery and say I had gone camping in the Lake District, or hiking in the Alps and wouldn't be back for at least a couple of weeks.

[John Rogers]

Always a good answer was, When my money runs out.

[Richard]

My dad used to ask me that. Mainly I think because he couldn't quite get his head around the fact that I would come home two or three times a year and get several weeks off. Not really realising that I was a company man (With BP) and leave was part of my pay & conditions. He of course only got two weeks holiday a year. It seemed to puzzle him that they would fly me home from anywhere in the world for a few weeks, then fly me out somewhere else at a later date.
Dad was in the RAF, went out to Habbaniyah? Iraq in 1937, and never got home until 1943! No 6 month trips for him!

[Dartskipper]

One of my Uncles spent his war in the RAF in the desert. When he got married when the war ended, his wife suggested they have a honeymoon at the seaside because she wanted to walk on the beach. She was surprised when he told her he was sick of looking at sand.

[BobClay]

Originally Posted by Ron Stringer

Used to get both those questions every time I came home on leave. But because I worked for Marconi I could never give an answer! Regardless of how much leave I was due, any time after the first couple of weeks I could expect to hear the telegram delivery boy's 2-stroke motor-bike coming down the lane. After the first couple of curtailed leaves, I learned to stay out of sight and get my mother to refuse to accept delivery and say I had gone camping in the Lake District, or hiking in the Alps and wouldn't be back for at least a couple of weeks.

Yes that happened to me too. After my first deep sea trip as a Sparky on my own (13 months on the Weybank) I was asked by Marconi if I could make do with a couple of weeks of leave !!

I nearly coughed my lungs out in reply. (And the language was tending toward the ripe.)

[erimus]

Ok...so I wasn't at sea as a Shipbroker in Ship Management,and I was mainly based in 'The City' but I would crawl off the London 'bus in Middlesbrough at 0600 Saturday morning and walk home into Linthorpe.....
Always first question was 'when are you going back?' ....the answer was always the same,apart from Christmas, 2355 hours Sunday.

geoff

[woodend]

Had a wonderful 'local' in Greasby village called the NEW INN. Long gone now unfortunately, a very old typical pub with I suspect the original barman. As I walked in the door to bar he reached for a pint glass and poured the required ha;f of bitter for a brown over bitter with always those very words: 'Hello John when are you going back'. Always measured a good pub if the barman knew w2hat you drank after three visits.

[Naytikos]

This is slightly off-topic, but arises out of woodend's description of a good pub:

I travel back and forth between islands here quite often. When the barmaids in the departure lounge on the big island see me walk through from the security area, they have gin and orange juice poured out ready by the time I reach the bar counter. The tourists queuing up to be served can never quite figure it out.

[Varley]

You can't really be called a 'regular' until you get this service (and if you never do it's probably not a place you would want to be a regular).

[jg grant]

I got caught by the cops on my 500cc Norton with no license. Came the court appearance and the judge asked what I did and I told him I was at sea. He asked when I was going back and I said I didn't know I was on the pool. He asked when I did go how long would it be for. I said I didn't know. This seemed to get his attention and he asked me to explain. I told him I would sign two year articles which would be broken on arrival at a UK port. So I could in theory sign on for two years, do a trip to the continent and back in two weeks or I could be gone for up to two years and all dates in between. I don't know what he thought of that information but I still got a fine and a ban. Though I must say it made me aware of what a Mickey Mouse arrangement governed our early lives.