Letter # 442 August 5, 1944

New Guinea
Sat eve.
Aug 5, 1944
Hello Lovely;
No letters again today and this time I'm out of letters to answer.  This will probably wander around a lot and get no-place. 
Just finished a bottle of beer.  They cooled it for us this time and boy but it tasted good.  It is quite an occasion to get a cold drink down here.
I've been working [what little we work] all this past week trying to fix up our saws so the mill can go back into production.  All were old discarded saws that the other outfit couldn't make work anymore. We've worked them with rather indifferent success. Completely reground them now and I'm hoping they will work.  I can see why army mechanics have the reputation of being able to fix most anything with a hairpin or less.   They have to.  There isn't a hardware store around the corner where they can buy new things or even parts.  Economy of man hours doesn't enter in at all.  Have more time than anything else.  Nearly everything we do would cost a fortune in labor.  Spend more time making tools to make something or do a job than it takes to do it.  Good training for a castaway or some isolated island. 
Had another ball game this afternoon.  Sure was a peach.  Wasn't even good practice for our team.  I played on the bench again, waiting for my leg to get really well again.  The game was with the officers.  The final score 21-0.  Not in favor of the officers either.  I almost felt sorry for them.  On top of the beating they got plenty of razing along with it.  Our team is shaping up pretty well now.  It will soon compare favorably with any small town team. 
Tomorrow sounds like a full day.  Ball game in the morning and swimming in the afternoon.  I'm going to go for that swimming again.  Been a couple weeks since I've been there now.  Got my weekly laundry out of the way this evening so I'll be free except for writing a letter to my sweet old wife.  I'll squeeze that in somewhere. 
Got three more Gazettes today.  Early June ones.  In one was the article about Glenden Schaffer being killed in Italy.  That's the first one from home that I really knew.  I had never been able to feature him in the army.  Apparently he was really in there in the tough spots. 
Harold Halliwill has a new baby and lots of other items of interest.  Can you imagine me reading the Gazette that closely?  I never needed to when I was home.  If I didn't get the news at the store, you always supplied it.  Now I have to read it in your letters or the paper.  There's another way I miss you, honey.  There are ever so many ways I miss you.  Never a day goes by that things come up you used to do for me and I must now do for myself or go without.     
Don't mind, very much, the things I can do for myself but the going without is hell.  You've become so very necessary to me.  I can't do anything without missing you.  According to my old convictions, that's a sad state of affairs.  I've changed and now I wouldn't have it any different.  You're my life partner and I want you by me where you belong.  Sweetest old thing ever invented.  I could eat you up.  [at least do a lot of chewing]
This letter isn't working very well tonight.  Guess I'll quit on it and see what I can do tomorrow.  I'm just not full of words tonight.   I could be very full of actions though. 
Night sweetheart, I'm loving you all the time. 
Your dough boy.
Norm.