Letters From Home – Sisters Birthday

C077/K051 – Feb 21 – Apr 25, 1990

My sister's birthday is on April 1, so I was writing to her since I would not get a card. But, I do explain that to her, this must-have ben after our third week as well. I try as hard as I can to transcribe the letters as they are, but I just cannot help but fix some of the poor grammar.

Hey, Lorri 90Mar26

Well, since I can't get out to buy you a birthday card, I thought I (world) write a quick letter. Last week was really strange, inspections every day. Our sister company was beating us all week until the locker inspection. They had 14 people fail. Until then, they were leading the training group. We got a blue streamer, which means we met the standard. They did not get any streamer to put on their first comp flag.

Tomorrow is our second infantry inspection. We have to make three left turns while marching to music. The other problem is we also carry our guns and "flip" them around. Today we went out and practiced for at least three hours in THE HOT FLORIDA SUN. The weather flag went to amber for 2 of those hours. The flag lets the CC's know how much they can push us outside. Green is normal, and amber is two steps below the green.

Our sister company was out with us too, and their CC's were being mean to them. They were making them do push-ups, sit-ups, and 8 count bodybuilders. Then they had to run around the grinder with their guns. Our Cc's were making guys do push-ups and laps for messing up. I didn't have to do any.

Friday, we start workweek. Sixty of us have to work in the galley. If I work there, I'm going to be mean to the guys who just got done working there. Right now, they know we're next to work, so they're treating us rotten.

Being a recruit with a few weeks under your belt is really fun. We can make fun of the RIF's, the fresh guys. We tell them horror stories about 1-5 day and the third-week inspections. Then we say stuff like, "Hey, you dropped your billet number" and "Hey your military bearing just fell on the floor." Those are both recruit jokes you civilians might not understand.

Boot camp is starting to get fun. We've already got a radio, and most companies don't get one until their 5th week. Well, I've got to go shine my boots for the infantry inspection tomorrow. Have a great birthday, and take it easy. Bye for now. Jim

So, as we read, I was really into messing with the RIFs. I guess we all were at one point. And of course, looking forward to work week and harassing anyone we could while doing that. According to my calendar, this was written the night of our 4-1 day. We had just had our CSRE Locker Inspection. Since I did mention it, it looks like work week started on out 4-5 days, a Friday. I do remember that with the companies from PIR coming in wearing whites.

I cannot believe I wrote that letter on spiral-bound paper. That was the only one from the group to have been written as such.