Along with the hectic chaos of getting every thing ready for deployment, I also had to learn how to input information into the computer to keep track of our aircrew flight records. In those days all the data was inserted into the computer by the use of a key punch machine that punched holes into key punch cards. I spent many, many hours transcribing all the different statistics that had to be entered. It seemed like I was living at the Communications Center. I usually accomplished this task while the aircraft was out flying its mission.
There was plenty of free time though because the weather over the target areas was not always agreeable and when the plane didn't fly we usually had a ball game scheduled on short notice with one of the other outfits. I did bring along my glove and spikes, but the bowling ball went into storage. One particular game I was on second and attempting to steal third and I could see that it was going to be close so I made a headfirst dive into the base. I was safe but I paid the price with bruised ribs. For three days it hurt to even breathe. The first night after the injury a bunch of us went to the movie theatre, I don't remember what was playing but it might as well have been a comedy because these *#*#*#*# I was with kept cracking jokes knowing how much it hurt me to laugh.
Our 179 day TDY was rapidly drawing to a close and the rumors were flying that we were going to be extended for another 30 days. This was right around Christmas time and everyone was anxious to get home as soon after Christmas as possible. My mom in Cincinnati left her tree up because I was expecting to be back the first part of January. When January arrived we found out that we had to pack everything up and move to Korat in the southern part of Thailand.
By this time our detachment had acquired numerous vehicles including the three jeeps that were being used for our operations section. I was selected to drive one of the jeeps from Udorn to Korat.
