Indeed, the way the CS love their rank equivalencies is fairly touching. Always good to leave pay chits lying around and whinge about pay rises in front of them, always put them back in their place.
Suppose the thing that annoyed me most was the way there was no equivalent to the SNCOs where I worked, and all the basic admin staff thought themselves equivalent to junior officers. The Chf Techs were particularly good at leaving their pay chits lying around for just this reason!
As for saluting ladies, I am fairly old fashioned and tend to use it as a formal greeting for any lady, no matter the rank of her partner. Remember even saluting mum as I met her outside the Cranditz church on grad day... Bit sad really, but there you are!