Boredom before Verdun

"Dear Mum! We are now lying in shifts like the infantry in the trenches, with the French two thousand metres in front of us. It's quite boring in the long run, because lying there quietly for twenty-four hours is no fun. Every now and then, the only change is a few grenades coming in, which is all I've experienced in the last four weeks. It's a shame that we're not involved in the big field battle. The situation in front of Verdun hasn't changed by fifty metres in weeks. We're lying in a burnt-out village. Wedel and I are living in a house where you have to hold your nose. We rarely ride, almost never, because Antithesis is sick and my chestnut horse is dead; we run even less. In other words, we don't get any exercise at all. We eat less well than we used to. As you know, everything sticks to me – so now I'm as fat as a barrel. If I were to ride races again, I would probably need a few courses of treatment before I could get back to my normal weight."