Cpl Roman F. Klick 36620923
Co "A", 353rd Engr Regt
A.P.O. #502, c/o Postmaster
San Francisco, California
October 8, 1943

So far today I have received no mail. We had one mail call after lunch but because so much mail came in we are going to have another one after supper.

My plans to complete my payroll today bogged down as I was unable to start it this morning. I did get at it in the afternoon and am now half way finished. Tomorrow morning should see the finishing touches to it. Then if I can get it signed quickly, I can forget about it for another month.

The picture for tonight is "Topper Returns" which we saw the first or second week after we arrived on this island. I have to bring it away up the island to that new outfit. After I finish this letter I will have to go up and rewind the thing.

Jack Molyneaux and I were figuring out the days we have been in the army and all that sort of thing. After talking so much about it I did not realize that the halfway point had passed me by unnoticed. In other words, I have now been away from home longer than the time before my furlough. We also figured that Jack hasn't been home for more than 500 days. And just to keep our courage high we agreed that the war will not last beyond July 5, 1946 which is 1001 days from today. Therefore, we wrote that figure on the desk and every day we will subtract one day as we serve out our sentence.

The place up the road did not have candy as we surmised but I am going to try to get some at this place I am going to tonight. The place up the road has a soda fountain in and we may get a taste of good old fashioned milk shakes and sundaes after all. Our own PX is going to have a coke machine within a month or two.

The studies have sort of bogged down temporarily but I hope that before the weekend is over I can get them going again on a working basis. This uneven situation at night, when you don't know from one day to the next, whether you will have to show a movie or not seriously impedes any program. I can also lay blame to my own laziness and lethargy.

The Christmas packages should be coming in soon and to hear the fellows talk, the mail clerk is going to be deluged with them. We figure they should start coming in just about a week from now which is a month since the mailing ban was lifted temporarily in the States and it should continue for about a month and a half after that.

I've just heard a good rumor and that is that the Yankees beat the Cards in the third game of the World Series. I wish they could win another one now in order to give them a better working margin. That would be something if it goes into the seventh game with each team having won three games.

When I come back to the States, I ought to have a few souvenirs of this place I could pass around. For instance, Rosana and Renee might want something from that far away place so I've decided that I will try to get hold of some paper money and coins to bring home with me.

Did I tell you that I found my GI knife again? After looking at every GI knife I could find for identifying marks, I noticed one in Jack's desk. Sure enough, that was it.

Talk about improvisation and homemade handy work, Sgt Driscoll and Edie really went at it in a big way. They have made themselves a fishing net. They put quite a few hours in it and it must be worth about $25 for the labor alone. They made it from some wire and knotted string. It will only be good for small fish such as minnows which they can use as bait. Sometimes I am tempted to go fishing and see what it is like. No doubt it is a sport ideally adapted to my nature. You know, lazy, loafing, etc. I think it could be ideal to sit by a river bank and either read or snore away the hours until the line gave a little tug. Maybe there is more to fishing, though, than just that.

So-long,
/s/ Roman
Roman