How telling, and somewhat surprising that the relationships in a "mixed" IAF Squadron could be so edgy. Perhaps there was a premonition not only of coming independence, but of the bloody path that would be trodden in the getting there. It contrasts starkly with the international nature of Bomber Command's Squadrons in WWII so vividly illustrated recently by the contingents of veterans from the British Commonwealth and elsewhere, in Green Park for the BC Memorial Unveiling. A flavour of what that could entail may be gained from Michael Bentine's recollection of a wild party at a Polish squadron culminating with him (then an RAF Intelligence Officer, and English son of a Peruvian father) dancing the Mazurka with the Poles down their main runway. Clearly, or at least one has to presume, there was no flying that night!
The humdrum tasks of military life could not be better illustrated than by your description of your "knitting circle" as you and your colleagues variously knitted, purled, and slipped your way through the ball, incendiary, and tracer variants of your yarn. No doubt as in any knitting circle the conversation centred on anything but the job in hand!
It comes as rather a shock that those seemingly endless "belts" of ammo that we see the armourers feeding into the wings and turrets of wartime aircraft had to be so laboriously constructed beforehand. That is yet something else new for me, and a clear illustration of the unique value of this thread and of the education that it imparts.
As others have said, compass swinging is a rather more familiar scene, and little changed over the years. The "Compass Base" on any airfield is always a "wild and lonely place, yea ken" for it has by definition to be as little affected by external influences to the Earth's Magnetic Field as possible. A pleasant enough duty on a bright and sunny day, quite the opposite in inclement weather I fear, M'Lud.