Thursday, February 28, 1929
Outside of doing a little washing, I have spent the whole day writing. Only one ship in today and things have been rather dead. The sun shone through a haze until it clouded up this evening. There is much vying for honors of producing the worst music around here. At present an old blind man is painfully dissecting That’s My Baby and a few more of the same vintage with an accordion. The chords are all wrong, let alone the tune. When he stops, the squeaky trio in the New Café on the corner murders Copenhagen. When they tire, two bewhiskered gentlemen in the Continental Café on this corner bang away on a dilapidated mandolin and guitar. It is foul too! When one slips, the other manages to bang on some miscellaneous chord till No. 1 finds himself once more. And now to add insult to injury, the party in the next room as a gramophone—in opposition to mine.
As to finances, after a bad start this month with $32.77 and $14.90 for the first two weeks, I came out with $6.61 and $6.02 for the last two weeks respectively, making a total of $60.30 for the month. Behind at the first of the month, I am $10.24 ahead at the end. If we don’t sail till about March 24, I can increase this to near $40 by April first. To date I have spent $675.76 approximately making an average of $88.15 per month.