8/12/43
Thurs-7PM-PWT
Dear Mom,
Your last letter read three days after you wrote it and [I] enjoyed very much. The one before that took 7 days because you forgot to put “Hea. Co”, so try to get the address complete. I had one from Madeline today, written July 14. She had failed to put “323rd-1NF”, so it took that long to check up on it. The airmail letters get home in 3 days usually and sometimes four. “3 cent mail” takes from 5 to 8 days!! My Graphic ordinarily gets here 9 to 11 days late, but it’s still news to me!! Week before last’s never did come.
I haven’t done much the past 10 days but go to “drivers’ school”, and that is mostly “nothing,” just a series of lectures that we have to go to in this broiling hot sun- it’s pretty uncomfortable and the sweat fairly runs off without effort! Yesterday PM I got to drive about “15 minutes”, the first time we’ve driven at all! In fact, it got so dull and tiresome to us and the officers that are teaching, they called it off until next week when they said we would start over and get some vehicles for us to drive. They’ve had all of them tied up for inspections and repairs, but thought they could get them by next week and give us some “driving experience”!
I played
ball early yesterday AM and late in the PM, so I am pretty sore today. Also,
had a few exercises this AM. We have a Chinaman here
that is Hawaiian, that is teaching us Ju Jitsu as the Japs know it. He
is an experienced Radioman, the reason he’s here. He was there when
It’s gotten pretty HOT again, I’ll say around 110°, but not nearly as hot as 2 wks. ago. Hope it at least doesn’t get any hotter!! We went from mountain time to Pacific yesterday and are working a little longer- 8 good hours per day. We get up at 5:15 AM, just before daylight, eat at 5:30, work from 6:30 to 11:30, eat dinner at 12, rest to 2 PM and then work until 5 PM, retreat at 5:45, eat at 6 PM. And then we usually have a ball game or boxing until 8 PM- the rest of the night is “ours”!
We have to work 8 hours on Saturday too, so they get us out at 2:30 AM and hike until 5:15 and then work until dinner. That gives us the afternoon off, which is usually disturbed by a ball game. We also have a game scheduled for Sunday at 3 PM! Those who have cars or rides can get weekend passes, otherwise, the “3 day passes” that we enjoyed so much are no more. We hear that after our “13 weeks training” is over, we get a “5 day furlough”, so if I do get one I’m going to see the sights out here. All this, including the long hours, dressing up for retreat, wearing full uniform all the time, (leggings included), no more passes, etc., etc., can be blamed on General Liar who is our “big shot” again! When we got out of the 2nd army we thought we were through with him, and now we find that he is out here!!! We aren’t even allowed to go without shirts anymore except during athletics. But that’s the army: if they ever did anything to build up your morale instead of tearing it down, they’d think they had ruined a “good” soldier!!
Well, I guess by the time this arrives the glorious camp will have ended very successfully. I saw you all enjoyed it and hope you got to go along. Did Sno. ever come down? It’s a pity Martha didn’t want to come along. Did they have good luck? I’m sure Ester caught at least “one” fish and maybe killed a squirrel?! Also, imagine the kids took a swim or two?
Glad to hear the crops are growing so nicely. Hope the hay comes out soon.
The sun
sets behind a mountain here and is really a beautiful site, though personally,
I’ll take the one in
Looks like the boys and Bombers are still doing nicely on the “fronts”, so hope they can finish up without “our” help.
Hoping to hear from you soon-
Love
Rus