Waikiki

The Hawaiian weather was nice, but not perfect like you see in the movies. Mostly it was sunny but about four in the afternoon the cloudless sky would become overcast and it would rain for maybe 15 or 20 minutes. The sun-rain pattern might repeat itself until sundown.

When we were on a march (and we had some 50-mile hikes with full packs on our backs) and the rains came, the order would come down to don ponchos. Usually, by the time the order got to us, we would be soaking wet and then the sun would come out and we would roast under those non-breathing ponchos. Of course the order to remove ponchos would come just as the rain resumed and the procedure would continue as a complete snafu (situation normal, all fouled up).

Another weather related problem arose the day we arrived in Hawaii. The Army apparently decided to delay our first day of basic training and trucked us to Waikiki beach to spend the day. I lived up to my nickname, Pinky, and sunburned the color of beets.

We got back to the barracks late and I stripped down and lay naked on my top bunk to alleviate as much as possible the pain I felt.

It was past lights out and one of the members of my squad hollered, “Turn the blankity-blank light out McCormick.”

The moon shining through a window reflecting off my nude, red body acted like a beacon in that room.

During that day on the beach, a bunch of us were matching pennies to while the time away and one of the “local boys” joined in. All units were required to have a least one third from Hawaii or Guam. We were called “Mainlanders” or “Haole” and the others were the local boys. We couldn’t pronounce any of their names so we called most of them “Pineapple.” I had a hot streak and everybody dropped out except one local boy. He wanted to raise the ante to nickels, then quarters but he just couldn’t win. He insisted I match him (instead of choosing to match me) and I continued to do it, time after time. Finally I said we had to quit and he wanted to go one more time, for five dollars, because he was so far behind.

I didn’t want to but he insisted so I offered again to let him choose and this time he decided to match me after going the other way for all that time. Well, you know what happened, of course. The one time he changed, it went the other way and he lost again. I could see he was getting angry and some of his friends began to grumble so I bought a case of beer with the winnings and everybody was happy.