[image ALT: Much of my site will be useless to you if you've got the images turned off!]
mail:
Bill Thayer

[image ALT: Cliccare qui per una pagina di aiuto in Italiano.]
Italiano

[Link to a series of help pages]
Help
[Link to the next level up]
Up
[Link to my homepage]
Home
previous:

[image ALT: link to previous section]
January 17

This webpage reproduces a section of
The Collected Works
of Ducrot Pepys

by
Ronan C. Grady

Newburgh, N. Y., 1943

The text is in the public domain.

This page has been carefully proofread
and I believe it to be free of errors.
If you find a mistake though,
please let me know!

next:

[image ALT: link to next section]
February 28
This site is not affiliated with the US Military Academy.

 p17  January 31, 1941 . . . .

Monday. My other wife has been reading some books about the sea lately. Now he sits around bellowing deep‑sea chanteys. If he calls me a landlubber once more I'm going to drown him in the sink. Of late the math course has branched out into metaphysics and the more obscure aspects of the Relativity Theory. They are making us take determinants. Everytime I write one down I expect to be blasted by a thunderbolt as punishment for dealing in black magic.


[image ALT: A drawing of a man lying on his stomach on the floor, his left knee bent so that his foot sticks up into the air; he wears the striped trousers of a West Point cadet, but a T‑shirt on which he has pinned a towel with the initials 'AAA', and he wears a sailor's hat; he sports a tattooed anchor on his right forearm. He is avidly reading a book, and strewn in the foreground next to him on the floor, another book titled 'Barnacle Bill', a model of a boat, and a small bowl of water with a smaller toy sailboat in it. It is a cartoon of a West Point cadet who has briefly fallen in love with a naval career.]

Tuesday. Well, it has finally been settled about the Washington trip. Our company is among those chosen. My sane wife is beside himself with joy and that ignorant fool, my other wife, is eagerly looking forward to seeing Grant's Tomb. However, there are disadvantages. The smaller upperclassmen, never pleasant, have been transformed into ravening wolves, thus making crossing the area an undertaking fraught with peril.

Wednesday. By use of Machiavellian cunning I succeeded in being an extra man this morning when they arranged teams for a race. It was the first time I have ever been a spectator at one of these debacles. All it needed was a few wild beasts thereupon about to make it look like an extra nasty day for the martyrs at the Roman Colosseum.

Thursday. Attended dancing instruction today and danced with my other wife. He is considerably hampered by his inability to distinguish between right and left. He won, however, with five out of seven falls going to him. He also tore the toes of my hop shoes off.

Friday. In tactics we are now studying the Garand.​a My sane wife got trapped in his rifle in some inexplicable manner and had to be sent to the armory so his hand could be disassembled from the gun. After tactics I went over to the Special Exercise room for the purpose of building up my muscles. I must have acquired some new ones for I now ache in a lot of places that never bothered me before.

Saturday. This afternoon we did practice parading in Washington. The first try was very bad. We went round Central Area in a sort of untidy mob formation, due mainly to the fact that some were dressing right and some left and the first-class bucks diagonally. This evening I attended the boxing meet. It is interesting to note how this sport reacts on the gentler sex. Most of the young ladies I saw down there were querulously asking why the contestants weren't bleeding more. All of this augurs ill for the success of our generation, I fear.

Sunday. We leave tonight. My wives have been cheering steadily ever since reveille.


Thayer's Note:

a The M‑1 Garand rifle, more often just referred to as the M‑1.


[image ALT: Valid HTML 4.01.]

Page updated: 16 Aug 12