29 July 21st /44 Okanagan Mission;
B.C.
My dear Tony
Many thanks for your good wishes on my birthday. I am not surprised you lose track of the date, if all days are much alike. The only reasons I ever know it, is because every Thursday I write it down in a book with the number of people who attended the sewing [?] meeting and I count from that. 2 letters from you since I last wrote. [RAS440705, RAS440708] They have altered the rule for cigs. again and only allow 300 at a time and not more than 1000 a month, so you should get 300 for 3 weeks and then miss a week. If you don’t think that will see you through let me know and we will do the 4th week in Mary’s [Stubbs] name. We had all the Meadows to supper on Wed. Luke Ethel Jock Bobo and Rex! It was our hottest day 100° on the verandah in the afternoon but clouded over later and Mary had just set the table when a thunder storm broke in all its glory. We just got it shifted before the water began to pour through the verandah roof just where it had been. They had been coming in the truck but as it continued to rain Daddy had to fetch them. After supper we were sitting around talking and eating cherries when all the lights went out about 10 p.m. and we had another downpour with very fancy lightening. We sat in the dark for nearly an hour and then they thought they had better go home grope [?] their way to bed. About 5 min. after they left the lights blazed on again, which made it a good deal easier to clear up than by the light of a torch and the one emergency oil lamp. The dinner table had got back under the drip but we had not worried as there was not much on it but empty plates. I had forgotten the sugar basin and the biggest leak went plunk into that and completely dissolved the last of our pre-war lumps!!
Today was our 35th wedding anniversary, I took a sip of Pop’s rye and wished him the same again, but he thought that would be rather over-doing it as by that time he would be 97 and I, 94! What a pity they did not manage to get ?????, yesterday. I wonder how much truth there is in these stories of uprisings and mutinies. We are all going to Kathleen Hall’s wedding next Monday. The ceremony is to be in Mrs Hall’s garden as the groom has been divorced and the church frowns on that and the Bishop would not permit his underlings to officiate. He is a F/O in the RCAF and the padre from his station is coming along to tie the knot. Gifford Thomson came home on leave today from Summerside. You dont [sic] seem to get many meals in a day if you prefer bed to breakfast and have cut out tea. I hope that had the desired effect on the other meals. You seem to have your hectic interludes even if there is a certain sameness about your days. I look forward to the time when you will be able to tell us all about it. Alfie Johns is getting on well and expects to be back on the job pretty soon. Peter [Mallam] was still in England just after D. Day. Found another corpse in the chicken yard this morning, we dont [sic] know what steps to take as we cant [sic] make up minds what is doing it—hawk skunk or weasel—In each case the head is entirely gone, bones and all and part of the body eaten.
With best love from
Mother
I decorated my jellied soup for the party with green pease and a strip of carrot thus: . . . _ Fell very flat! No comment. Suppose none of them knew morse.