[April 26/45]
#2 CARU
C.A.O.

Dear Mom:

Well here I am again this time I have a little more news.

Last week I was up for my reboard as I told you the outcome of that was that my category is a notch lower. I had hoped to get down a little lower than it is but the M.O. thought otherwise. The way things stand now it is too low to go to the field and too high to go home.

Now I am in "G" Battery which is the one for category personnel. So to keep me out of mischief "G" attached me to "B" Battery, the one that trains the drivers. Just what they are going to do with me I am not sure. They are talking again of sending me on a "D.M." course on the 10th of May.

In the mean time they are keeping me busy laying a lawn outside the Battery office. It is a heck of a job as there are a couple of acres to cover. There is a crew of eight out cutting sod and two of us laying it. We are sure kept hopping. It would not be so bad if all the sods were all the same size. Some are about 6-8" thick others about 1". The some of them are a foot wide, others anywhere up to two feet. All this adds up to a lot of trimming for us.

Sunday I was up to Bookham again to see Pegg. The baby is doing fine. By the way did I tell you her name is Anne.

This time I walked into a birthday party for the 16 year old girl at the place Pegg is staying at. I had a can of peaches that you had sent me and had brought them along. I was sure glad I had as Pegg had one that she had gotten from Uncle Charley and one didn't go very far. You just don't get any of that stuff in the stores now. By the way do you have much trouble getting canned fruit?

Gee! You should have seen those kids go after those peaches. They had put them in custard to stretch them a little more. Some of the younger ones I don't think had had them before as they didn't know what they were.

Well I think Gordon has made a grand choice of a wife. From what I have seen of her I don't think she will have any trouble getting along at home. There are a few things she will find strange. The big thing will be the fact that there are no fireplaces in the way they are over here. Another thing is the little cramped kitchens most of the homes have here.

She had a letter last week asking her to fill in a form to go home. It is too bad that Gordon is not around to help her out as she doesn't feel very sure as to what time she wants to leave. She also needs the address of the place she is to stay. The only one she knows is Uncle Charley's so she is going to give that.

All the rush is because they want to get the wives home as soon as possible so the ships will be released for the east. They say that they don't know when they will get them home if they don't go soon.

The next time that I am up I will take my camera and get a couple of pictures. I was going to take it last Sunday but it was cloudy when I left.

Box 29 arrived the other day, the graham wafers were sure swell. The Steero cubes arrived the same day, they come in handy for a hot drink at night. We don't bother much with that now that the weather is warming up but I can still use them.

You may wonder how come I am using this paper. [Lined paper was used which was unusual, most of the letters are on plain paper or Armed Forces Air Letters.] The reason is I am too lazy to go over to the writing room to get some other. This comes out of a scribbler I had in my pack. Well I can't think of anything else right now so I will close for now.

Love
Ted