Proud Highway:Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman by Hunter S. Thompson Read Free Book Online

sap is rising and my regret is manifest. Ah, how women can get on one’s nerves.
    I got quite a kick out of your social plight in the fair city of my birth: as I remember her, Sarah McNeil is about as pleasing to the average eye as a wart-hog with Bright’s disease. On the whole though, you seem to be managing quite well. I’d appreciate a few impressions of Old Eli, if you can find enough time to send a letter to me in my desolation.
    As I’m writing this with Porter Bibb 4 in mind as well as you, I’ll request that you see that he peruses it and writes me a line or so. By the way, am I right in assuming that Richard 5 is up there also? If so, give him my most poetic regards and inform him that the life of a dedicated scholar is indeed thorny and that it would really be best to become a Jewish pawnbroker. Speaking of pawnbrokers, I was forced to pawn my $133 typewriter recently for the meager sum of $13 … ah, fortune and fame, where art thou?
    I fear that lack of paper and time necessitates my closing, so I’ll keep with the mode of the times and say, au revoir my friend, until we meet again.
    Hunter
    TO VIRGINIA THOMPSON :
    Virginia Thompson, a Louisville librarian, shared her son’s reverence for American literature. Hunter regularly wrote her newsy letters.
    September 29, 1956
Eglin AFB
Fort Walton Beach, Florida
    Dear Mom,
    Usual apologies for not writing sooner, also usual excuses. Anyway, I appreciate your letters and all the clippings. Please continue.
    Hurricane Flossie was nothing but a troublesome scare; however, word has it that another one is brewing somewhere in the Gulf: nothing definite yet. In any case, don’t worry; these things are nothing but big winds that give everyone a chance to play here for a while. Flossie caused me to have to work all night Tuesday, without a wink of sleep until 3:30 Wednesday afternoon. This job has its drawbacks …
    I covered the Annual Sports Banquet last night and my first football game today. These people just seem to think nothing of sending me on things which are completely new to me. I didn’t even know what I was going to last night; my recollection of the CAC 6 banquets saved me from total confusion. Incidentally, every CAC banquet I’ve been to has been better planned and more enjoyable than this one. (My typing has deteriorated alarmingly; I’m getting worse each day.) At the last moment, the toast-master found that he didn’t have a seat at the head table; and, being a sergeant, had to give way to the Colonels, Majors, etc. who had taken all the seats; and sit down amidst the mob … unusual, at best.
    This afternoon I discovered that, not only am I the only man on the base to write sports; but in addition to my title as sports editor, I am also head statistician for all sports, publicity man for all athletics on the base, and potential radio announcer. All this, combined with college classes two nights a week, keeps me pretty well occupied. But, when all is said and done, I wouldn’t want to do anything else (Air Force–wise, that is). At present, I have the best deal I could have, considering my rank, age, experience, etc.
    Incidentally, I thought I had explained that the courses I am taking are regular college courses with FSU. By January, I will have amassed the imposing total of 6 hours. By June, 12 hours; and further on into the night, I hope. By the end of the next month, I will know if my job is going to be permanent. My career field waiver should come back about that time, and I can only hope that it is not rejected: my chances are fair, I would say. I don’t remember any other questions you asked, and the letter is at the barracks; I’ll try to dash off a short note if I missed anything very important.
    Some of the copy on this week’s page is pretty poor. As I said, I stayed up all Tuesday night doing it, and towards the wee hours of the morning, I became pretty