Not so Average Saturday Night

3/5/2006

Sundays are our days off. However, today didn't feel like a day off. Since I'm working when the satellite link is available partaking in the station social activities is difficult. What ends up happening is modifying my sleep schedule into 4 hour blocks. Yesterday there was an Australian wine tasting event. The alcohol flowed freely, there was a musical string ensemble, and plenty of cheese, crackers, and other hor' de vours. It's amazing how creative people can be down here.

Afterwards most of the crowd headed down to 'Upper Berthing' in the Dome for the 'Long and Skinny' party dedicated to the retirement of that historical place. People who had lived up there opened their mostly empty rooms and hosted drink concoctions like 'Road Dog' punch and 'Milky Milks'. I was pretty amazed at some of customization in the rooms. Orginally two people were assigned to a room. Pretty cramped quarters!


I did get time to sqeeze in reading Nicholas Johnsons's "Big Dead Place" which chronicalizes his time spent down here working for Raytheon Polar Services Corp, mostly in McMurdo. It gives quite a jaded side of what it's like working down here at the 'highest, driest, coldest, and most desolate continent'.