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

Dear Aunty Clara,

Tuesday

It is just down right disheartening to have work pile upon work without a chance to see one's way out of the woods. Those OCS applications which have been hanging fire for some time now were even getting on Lt Hanton's nerves and he sent Edie down to say they must go out today. It is a peculiar set up having two bosses. One, the Company Commander, and the other, the Personnel Adjutant. For the last week or so most of the work has been by order of Lt Yantis with the in between times taken up by the smaller company work such as reports and lesser correspondence. However, one OCS application is a job in itself under the existing circumstances and more than one becomes a task. Nevertheless, I was in agreement with Lt Hanton in that they were kicking around for too long of a time and I did my best to squeeze them in between the rush work orders from Lt Yantis by order of Colonel Trower. But I guess it was all wasted time because one fellow had given me some misinformation and his application must be retyped. The carbon copies did not take any too well and the ideal solution would be to type three originals. This I am going to try to pound out sometime tomorrow if the rush work doesn't come smashing in. I've told you how much work we have been doing and now comes the order that we had to work up to five o'clock tonight and then come back right after supper to continue to work into the night until the job is done. Well, in this case, I am exempted because the movie machine will need running and it looks as if I am to do it because Lt Yantis is needed much more urgently down in the office whereas, if they have the time, the other clerks can pitch in to help on my work. Isn't it a mess? Even Jack Molyneaux was recalled from his day off and when someone can do that it is something.

The picture for this evening is "Reveille with Beverly" and it is supposed to be an excellent show. Before I can run it off this evening there are two bad breaks Lt Yantis was telling me about which will have to be repaired.

T/5 Hill got the mail early this morning but it seems that it was all air-mail with no V-mail in it. Nevertheless, I didn't receive any.

In a brief period after we finished eating our noon meal, Larry and I sat down in the day room and set up the chess men on the plain table without a checker board beneath. Naturally, everyone thought we were crazy and it sure does look that way to see the game going on without any of the red and black traffic lanes to follow.

Major Stelzemuller, our Executive Officer, comes from the southern part of the United States and has a rather pleasant sounding speaking voice. For a week or more it has puzzled me because he sounds so much like some announcer I have heard over the radio. Finally it came to me. He sounds like the fellow on Vox Pox or The Man on The Street Program.

Supper is now over and I have just come back to the office for a second to finish the letter, drop off the typewriter and proceed on up to the movie projection booth. All the clerks have their typewriters going like mad. They intend to finish the job before the show starts. That is a far cry from the days back in camp, when if we were told to report for work after supper, it wouldn't be until seven o'clock that they would begin assembling and it usually ended up by sending for Jack by special messenger at eight o'clock. This time it is different and they all came down at 5:30 on the dot so they can leave at 6:30. I better be rushing to the job myself right now to splice the film and rewind it for the show.

I've sorta made an agreement with the fellows to not start the show a minute before six thirty and maybe I could even wait a mite so that they all get time to walk over to the theater area.

So-long,
/s/ Roman
Roman