Dear Kay,
Well, how are you. I got a letter from Y yesterday and I’ve already answered it. She seems to be enjoying herself. I’ll bet you wish you could have been home on the holidays too.
There isn’t much I can write about nowadays. Our training is continuing on a larger unit basis and we get a lot of hikes. On a 15 mile forced march lately, Hal told me that the majority of his company fell out. We happened to be leading the march so our company didn’t lose a man.
It’s still cold here but not too bad just about now. Nights are still pretty bad though. I guess I’ll never get used to cold. It’s hard to say which is worse, heat or cold.
We went down to see a show tonight and damn but we found out that we’d already seen it. Gung Ho, it was.
I don’t know why but tonight I’m at a loss as to what to write about.
We use coal heaters in our hutments but a regimental order says that we must keep at least half of the flaps up so the cold air just keeps coming [sic] in, result, everybody’s gathered around the stoves during leisure hours. The stoves pipes always get clogged up with soot and the fires get pretty weak. At first, we used to take the pipes down and clean them thoroughly, then we tried sending somebody on the roof and have them drop blocks of coal down the pipe and that did the trick. But now, we just get a blank cartridge, seal the end of it, throw it into the fire, wait a minute, and bang. The explosion clears the pipe but a lot of soot flies down on us no matter how we do it.
By the way, I don’t think I told you but I have you named as the beneficiary in my government insurance policy for 10 grand. I named you because both Mom and Dad are aliens, plus the fact that they do not know English. Also, you’ll be informed in case of my being a casualty, that is, if we get overseas. I’m one of the fellows expecting a change of address in the near future, I hope.
Love
Stan
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