Sat. noon.

Dear Folks,

Received your letter the day before yesterday but this is the first chance I have had to answer. This morning we had part of our physical and our interviews, so far so good, however, I have to have a wisdom tooth pulled Mon. morning and I don’t know when I take the rest of the physical, maybe Mon. afternoon. You can imagine how I will feel then. This afternoon we have drill and parade. From what I hear we are due for M.M. (mess management which is the same as K.P.) tomorrow I was sort of hoping for a day of rest maybe I can insist upon going to church.

It sound like Karen is getting as many shots as I have geen getting. We had another one today which was for desert or valley fever, that is a new one on me. They put it right under the skin on your forearm and it feels like a wasp sting for about 10 min.

I guess you all enjoyed your 4th of July picnic, I wish I could have been there. As for the 4th here I didn’t even notice it. In fact I have been losing all track of the days, I had to ask what day this was to put it on the letter.

You should have seen some of the machines we took tests on yesterday. If you can imagine a bunch of real screwy pin-ball machines you have hit it on the head.

I haven’t heard a thing about Uncle Harold going back to Miller’s. ^[1]I don’t know who either Uncle Harold or the Miller’s are.Dad didn’t say a thing about it.

The weather here is really a change from Tempe. We use three blankets and the day haven’t been very hot yet.

It sounds like Westy ^[2]Westy Westbrook was one of Stanley’s apartment-mates when he was living in Chicago before marrying Elaine.has been through a few engagements. I guess he is getting a long needed rest. How did the wedding go and did Karen enjoy it? She is doing pretty good going to weddings at a year old.

It will be good to get to pre-flight but at the present we are restricted to an area about a block square. After this time we can go anywhere on the post which is plenty big – about like the field at Rantoul.^[3]Chanute Field in Rantoul, Illinois was an Army Technical Training site, with 25,000 students in 1943. After 42 days we start getting weekend passes which everyone is looking forward to. If we don’t wash out we get our cadet uniforms in about a week and start drawing 75 a month, however, we got 75 last month for our flying time at Tempe. Everytime you get more that 4 hrs. of flying time in a month outside of cadet training you get the extra $25.

Will have to close because we only have a short time before lunch. The food is good but not enough of it. At the present we are on field rations so you can’t expect much.

Love, Tom