July 17, 2009

A Little Navy Vocabulary

You should understand the following Navy terms by the end of this blog post:
  1. Leave
  2. Duty
  3. Stand Down
  4. Turn Over Day
Please ask questions if I haven't made it clear!

The Navy is generous about giving the service member time off upon return from deployment. It's actually an interesting part of Navy life, so I thought I would educate! There is a 4 week "stand down period" during which half of the ship gets to take vacation leave during the 1st 2 weeks and then the other half takes leave the 2nd 2 weeks. We decided this time that Dan would take vacation time during the 1st 2 weeks, so he has been home with us every day. Taking leave is just like putting in for vacation time at a civilian job.

But here's the nice perk! During the 2 weeks that he is NOT on vacation, he only has to go to the ship every 4th day for a 24-hour period. This is called his "duty" day. Normally, he serves it every 8th day (while also working normal daily hours), but during stand down time they "collapse" the duty sections so that they don't have to work at all the other 3 days. It's awesome, and my vote is that it should be the schedule all the time! [Dan is going to seriously crack up at that suggestion-obviously, no one cares about my opinion.]

Today is "turn over day". This is the day in between the 2 leave periods where the responsibilities are handed over from one half of the ship to the other half of the ship. On this day, everyone ("all hands") are required to show up to work whether they have duty or not. So alas, that's where Dan is today, and it's like a little twinge of reality starting to settle back in. The nice thing is that his duty day (the 24-hr shift) also happens to fall on today, so at least he kills two birds with one stone. Usually with our luck, he has to go to turn over day, and then go back the very next day for duty.

Okay, so did I explain those words in enough detail?

5 comments:

The Navy Christian said...

Nicely done!

Anonymous said...

Great job!!! I think it's a great schedule, you can tell the navy to call me and I'll support it! ☺ ☺

Katey said...

Very interesting! I learned something new!!! Glad you are enjoying your time with Dan home!

Stephanie Kay said...

I'd love to have that kind of schedule! Joel is back to work today after being off since Wed. afternoon. Reality around here is full of laundry and house cleaning today (not to mention the grumpy over-tired kids).

Pattie said...

I appreciate your educational posts, since my hubby is AF :) I'm spotlighting your blog in the Wives of Faith newsletter for August, so be looking for more readers :)