Back at McMurdo, home-sweet-home-away-from-home
Trip Start
Oct 01, 2003
1
41
43
Trip End
Jul 29, 2008
McMurdo Station,
Antarctica
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
It's been awhile since I've had any entries so I'll try to catch up on everything that's happened since we left the States. Let's see...we arrived back at McMurdo right around October 1st. People kept asking us in surprise "what are you two doing back here???" I guess I'd made it pretty darn clear that we weren't coming back after our third winter in a row. That happens though-everyone here knows, never-say-never. And also to NEVER totally get rid of your stuff stored down here-I had to resend and recollect all sorts of things to make our room more comfortable this time (sheets, comforter, humidifier, hobby stuff, clothes).
Ron is working as a Materialsperson in the Heavy Shop (handling automotive and heavy equipment parts). I'm working on the MET team. MET stands for MAPCON Editing Team, and basically we do tedious data entry all day
mcmurdo station from hut point
. I really like my job, it's busy and I'm learning a lot of really cool geeky MAPCON things. MAPCON is a DOS-based program that's used down here to track all the materials on station. It's not the easiest program to use but I seem to have a knack for it, so it's a good job-match for me.One of the new things that both Ron and I are doing this year is working as Bowling Alley Pinsetters. The bowling alley down here is so old that the pins need to be set up manually and that's what we do. We wear long, brightly-colored striped socks (so that no one accidentally hucks a ball at us) and jump up and down for 2-3 hours setting up pins. It's monotonous and physically tiring, but we make good tips-and it's cool too...now we can put "Pinsetter in Antarctica" on our resumes, haha.
The weather is finally warming up and seems to be around 25 degrees or so most days. There is lots of melting ice and snow, turning into mud. The ice runway has already been torn down. I still haven't gotten out cross-country skiing and I still haven't seen any penguins. Hopefully they'll be trotting into town any day now. I have seen skuas but have managed to not be attacked for my food yet.
We've switched over to austral summers and so far I prefer it
me at hut point
. The seasons match up perfectly with summer in the states, there's lots to do and the weather is nice. Although as far as "lots to do" goes, I've become kind of a hermit. I really enjoy just staying home and watching episode-after-episode of LOST. I did do a Travelogue presentation a couple weeks ago and did a talk and showed slides of our Stewart Island Trek that we did last year at this time. I also sold photo cards at the Arts and Crafts show-I made enough to buy a couple of pairs of really cute earrings so I'd call it a success. Thanksgiving was good-I was on my own because Ron has been at the South Pole (see next entry). I had an early dinner with friends-the galley does an excellent job on the holidays. The one let down is how fast you're shuffled out of the dining hall. You have exactly 1.5 hours to get your food, consume it and get out so that the next shift can come in an get have their turns.
The season is halfway through and flying by-we'd better get started on our travel plans for after-ice!
V
