Dear mom and Dad,
Well I want to thank you all for all your letters that I have been so slow in answering lately. Also I hope Mom had a real great birthday. I hope you got my gift by now, and I also hope it got through the mails OK, since it was very breakable. Also Dad might be interested in some of the Stars @ Stripes I wrapped them in, and also a copy of the notorious "Over-Seas Weekly"with an article on Bamberg in it and also my commanding officer, Col DeRamus.
Boy, I was really sorry to hear about the dry well. I really thought you would hit water. That sure is a lot of money to spend for a hole in the ground. Mom wrote me about the different options you have open to you, and of the ones she mentioned, the one that sounded best to me was to secure permanent water rights from the guy next door, if he would let you. It seems like buying the whole house and land just for the water (unless you really wanted it for other reasons) would be kind of extravagant and drilling another hole, with at best a 50-50 chance of hitting water seems like too much of a gamble at the price. If you did secure his water rights you could always drop them at some later date if you wanted to try another hole and hit water, couldn't you? Or you could maybe buy the house at a later date when it was financially easier. As far as me buying it with you; that sounds like a real good deal, but right now I just don't have the funds available, mainly because of unexpected auto repairs which kind of set me back and when I do get my funds built up again I feel that it would be best for me to hang on to it for Education. after the Army, especially if it happens to be med school. If I did have enough money that I could spare, I would do it, because I can see the advantages of investing in land, especially at my age. Well I will move on to other things.
The picture that mom sent of the three Burrows family fiddlers was very good. also I was very happy to get the house plan and I looked at them very carefully. Is that the exact plan you will be using? If so, it looks very good.
Mom kept referring to the fact that I had said I was bored in my job at the officers club. I guess I did say that, but it was a bad choice of words on my part. I want to clear that up now, so you won't misunderstand. I was never bored in the usual meaning of the word. For the whole 9 months that I worked in clubs I worked an average of 12-14 hours a day and usually 7 days a week, and was always kept busy. And during the time that I did have off I was never bored, because there are so many interesting places to go and see here in Germany and I have made use of my free time over here to get as much exposure to the people and place of Germany as possible and have enjoyed that part of my time here tremendously! But those times were far and few between and until I started this new job I hadn't had one full day off for over two months. So bored wasn't the right word, but the job just wasn't too productive or in my opinion, worthwhile or important. So I hope you understand that I wasn't satisfied with that type of work, but I wasn't really bored either.
Well I like my new job so far. I know you're interested in it, but if I go into all the details right now it will take 3 or 4 more pages, so I'm going to stop this letter right now because it's getting real late and I have to get up early tomorrow. Instead of putting this letter aside and finishing it later like I sometimes do, I want to get it in the mail tomorrow, because it's been so long since I last wrote, I'm sorry to say. I promise though that I will sit down tomorrow night and start another one and fill you in on all the things I left out in this one...So until then.....
