First married quarter was a caravan on Findhorn caravan site during winter, I was at that time on the NMSU night shift working fuel tanks and when I got home had to stay cold until all my clothes had been washed and the fuel smell gone before turning on gas appliances for eating and heating.
Second wile at RAF Kinloss was an Army married quarter that was temporary used by the ARF as the army had deployed, learnt the difference between gloss white paint and eggshell after repairing the damage our dog had done and ended up painting all the white woodwork so it matched.
RAF Luqa quarters were quite nice flats, but the problem there was they kept charging each occupant the same amount for the same issues as if it had been their fault, one guy came up with an answer on march out by throwing carpets, mattresses and a fridge into the flat lobby, did not go down to well with the management.
Stanton married quarters, which served RAF Honington/Marham had squares of carpet and underlay that left a band of lino around the edge of the bedrooms, I was told on march in that the carpet and underlay were to be cleaned/vacuumed and lino polished when I leave. On march out having done as required said barrack warden lifted carpet and underlay and stated I would be charged for the cleaning of floor etc as there was a very fine dust layer, I had a mop and bucket and vacuum cleaner ready so politely told him that I would prove a point that I would not be paying any charges. Re-did the process and had him check before laying carpet/underlay back down and then proceeded to walk all over it a few times and asked him to check again, and sure enough there was the same dust layer, not happy that they were not going to get money of me like they had with every other occupant, I also mentioned that I would be passing that on to the next occupant and my mates in the other quarters.
RAF Marham had a WO who would put on white gloves and would rub his fingers over door tops and into extractor fan grills and would charge you for any dust/dirt he found.
RAF Gutersloh the families officer thanked my wife and myself for presenting a lovely quarter though he noted that some of the electrical sockets had some dust in them, I asked if he actually thought that my wife and I would stick our fingers in with a cloth to clean them out, or remove the socket to clean it, he agreed that that would probably be a bad idea.
RAF St Athan we turned up for the march in and found our removals wagon sat on the roadside, they did give some excuse as to why they were a day early, anyway the WO was not best pleased. It became apparent that the young lad marching out had not really grasped what was required and the place needed a better clean, especially the cooker, WO was not happy and said that if our removals people were not there he would of cancelled the march out/in until it was sorted, but told me to turn up at the families office the next day. When I turned up he handed me £50 and told me to use it on cleaning materials to get the place sorted and to have a treat with the wife for the inconvenience.
The ringing of mattress stains and initialling them was quite prevalent at a lot of quarters, but one airman thought he was being clever when it came to tables that were marked as he counted all the marks and scratches and got the barrack warden to note the amount, on march out the marks were counted and occupant was charged accordingly for the extra ones, I don’t think he would do that again.
I used to think that after handing over a pristine MQ that the next families office were told and we would be given a less than pristine quarter knowing that they would get it sorted by us. These are the most memorable ones but there were others.