SS President Polk, South Pacific

Ship pulled out around midnight and from the feel of her around 0400 she was making knots, so I surmised she was making a run through the reef in the hopes of clearing the entrance before dawn. However, when we went out on deck at 0815 (how different it looks without the planes and crates stacked all over it) we found ourselves just anchoring at the mouth of the river — scuttlebutt has it that we were ordered back (?).

Finally upped anchor and got underway again at about 1100, after seeing our last of Hubbard, with mixed feelings, i.e. — envy and delight. He talked himself into some soft liaison job ashore and most of the fellows enviedt his getting such a soft birth, concerning what an ass he is. Personally, I would rather have a fool like him back here, then it than up in the thick of it, where mistakes cost lives.

Fette, Lee, Harris, and Stewart moved into the connecting cabin next to us, which will make it nicer for them, seeing that these two cabins are the best on the ship.

Shocked the Army chaplain at the next table with our language. He moved.