Life in the cold

Well, here we are at the middle of our season. We got our first talk today about re-deployment, meaning they're thinking about flying us back soon. In some ways it seems like we just got here, and in others, it seems like we've been here for about 6 months! If you've ever watched 'Groundhog Day', starring Bill Murray, -you can have a glimpse of what it is like here come mid-season: you get up, go to work, have breaks, off work, sleep, repeat.... --Cori and I are still having a good time here, and we are....even thinking strongly about coming back for another round soon. For those of you wondering about Cori's world, since she doesn't post as much info as I do, I have some upcoming news......Well, maybe I'll save it for my next blog post. I will be having a 'Cori Only' blog posting on my next one in the next week, which will show many pictures of the incredible telescope they've been building down here, which is almost finished. They will be setting the 'Dish' in the next few days, and once she gets the pictures of it, I'll post it here! ---Besides that, I'm deeply involved in putting the siding on the wind-ward side of the new station, and quite frankly; if you could possibly think of having the full Antarctic experience with full exposure to all the elements it can dish,--siding is one of the greatest job markets to experience that! Cori could probably say the same about her experience. Besides those trivial tidbits, we are happy, and looking forward to seeing you all again sometime soon!

Yesterday was an exiting day here at Pole, we got to see an air drop! These aren't common round these parts, because the last time they tried, the parachutes didn't open, and all the cargo ended up smashing all over the snow! Normally, all the cargo coming into the Pole, be it construction parts, food, or mail all arrives by the c-130 cargo plane; landing, unloading, and taking off again within 20 minutes. This time, we got a big air drop by the C-17 cargo plane. These are much larger than the 130's, but they can't land at the South Pole. The reason is because of the air. It's too thin, and they wouldn't be able to take off again. So, here's what happened: The C-17 circled a few times, then came in real low, and dumped out 5 crates, all with 4 parachutes (which did open). It was real neat to see them come flying out the back with the chutes opening, and floating lightly to the ground! Afterwards, the plane came back in real low for a fly-by, and tipped its wings too us. My crew got a good view, since we were up on the roof of the station. I took a video of the drop and fly-by, but they won't upload to this page, so here's some still shots of us all watching, and the parachutes instead. We'll show you all the video when we see you all in person!

O.K., I know that we're at the South Pole, where it's always white, but that doesn't mean that we have Santa and the Elves running around us all the time. In fact, we all feel pretty far removed from the holiday season being down here. We go about our daily working routines, pretty much just focused on our one night off. So, we have to do little things to get us in the spirit. The iron workers of seasons past constructed a Christmas tree that now is annually placed out at the pole. - Blocks of snow of various shapes and sizes have been placed around the pole as well, for those artists who would like to create snow sculptures. - The main prize though, is our big 2 day weekend coming up! Christmas dinner is approaching, sign up sheets are around station so we can volunteer for potato peeling, pie baking, and one of three seatings for dinner. Being on the swing and night shifts, Cori and I have first pick for 3rd seating. Crazy antics usually ensue after the last seating, consisting of spontaneous dance parties, open mics, and dodge ball. Thus making it the best of all the seatings! Everyone on station also eagerly awaits the Christmas mail plane. The National Guard usually flies in one motherload of packages on the week before, to us stranded Polies! --We don't have much, but we make the most of what we have!

Well, sorry for being absent for so long. I hadn't realized it'd been 10 days since my last entry here. Another magical thing about being isolated is that time REALLY slows down. A lot of the days here are a mirror image of the one before if you browse over it. Once you dig in though, there are a lot of differences to each one. So, let's see, what's happened in these ten days? --- Cori had a birthday down here. We celebrated, drank some wine and danced. (It's really amazing how everbody down here will get out on a dance floor at any given time).
--We've also been having some interesting Science lectures. Down here, they do a lot of cutting edge science, as you may have guessed. A lot of stuff centers on the clean air and atmosphere down here, and how much pollution from the rest of the world ends up here; there are sciesmic studies happening, which look at how much this glacier we're sitting on moves during each year, and what effect, if any, global warming is playing into it, (yes, global warming is really happening). --These are all significant experiments happening, and they are all funded with millions of dollars behind them, but now, these are almost pale in comparison to some of the newer labs that are coming in now. Right now under construction here are telescopes that can read energy left over from the formation of our universe (the Big Bang). Essentially, they are becoming more capable of being able to "time travel". --What are they doing with this information?? Well, despite what some of you may think, we are not being experimented on down here. (Except possibly for the effects of exposure to lack of sleep and extreme cold exposure). --Right now, all this information is pretty much in its infancy, and they are reading it to see, where energy is coming from, how 'potent' it still is, after it's 4 million years of travelling, and to determine wether our universe is expanding or receding. -They're pretty sure, if not positive, it's still expanding at a phenomenal rate. --O.K.- I think that's enough of blowing my own mind, trying to explain for one night. Anyhow, that's a little in depth look at some of the stuff, that we are involved in supporting down here. At the end of this blog, I have some pictures of the brand new telescope that Cori is helping to build down here. This thing is slated to be the Einstein of Telescopes, and will be able to read energy from the Big Bang like it's never been seen before, and possibly redefine some science as we know it! Until next time...............

The cold and emptiness encompasses us. Every effort made to control the place is taken lightly by the land. In the end, it always wins. Man and woman spend millions in dollars and hours, breaking back and sweat to create what ends up being a small dent in the ice, which is then swallowed by nothing more than the wind.

In this place, you really get a chance to know people who you might not get to know back home in the states. Here, life really slows down in a lot of ways. I mean, we constantly work, every morning when I get out of bed, it feels like that's all we do. However, that is the only thing here we really have to worry about. There's always money going into the bank, all the bills are on auto-pay, there's no vehicle to maintain. So, besides work, you hang out with other humans. It's really nice to hang out in the galley after work, and still want to be around your coworkers, and enjoy their company. Normally, back home, I'm too preoccupied with wanting to check phone messages, check my pay, go home, watch a movie, or whatever, than sit down and chat. Here it's a very relaxing feeling to just sit back and visit, because....there's nothing else to do!