Feb.19/45

Dear Mother,

I'm sitting here in front of a nice fireplace with my skipper-both writing letters. I changed my place of abode a few days ago. I used to have a room of my own quite near the mess, but got a chance to move up to his mansion (Sutton Hall it's called) in the same room as Bax. Theres also another guy with us whom I flew three trip with. We are about a mile from the mess but it's much more comfortable. The plumbing actually works up here, which is quite a thing to find in this country of the 16th century.

We had very good news today. We were given a navigator but he has only six rips to do before he's through. After that we'll have to get another one, which I don't believe will be much trouble. It will certainly feel good to get in the air once again-it's almost six weeks since I've been airborne. We were about to get another week's leave if nothing happened. We now have to do 36 trips before a tour has been completed. It used to be around 30. The weather is beginning to get a bit better so we'll be bashing them in left and right.

Johnny Cossons, the New Zealander whom I spent my leave in London with, was here up for the weekend. He is taking a bombing instructors course which he says is plenty tough. They start work at 8 A.M. so that's one course I won't be going on. Johnny will be up again around the middle of March so we're going to take him up on a flight with us.

Frank is very anxious for me to clear the table I'm writing on, and butter the toast he's making. We're just having a midnight snack before hitting the pit.

All my love,
George