As most of you know, I am working the night shift. I will be on nights until January 5th and then I will work days. I am thankful to be on nights right now because honestly, there are just too many people here. We are up to 1100 people on station and for me it is about 700 people too many. When I got here we were at 400. That was perfect - no waiting in line to get into the Galley, no waiting in line to get rid of your plates, no waiting to wash your hands before a meal, no waiting period. We have more than 50 Australians here waiting to fly out to Casey Station but the weather has been bad there for about a week so they are all still here. They are sleeping in the gym because there's no room in the dorms.
We have people going out from here to the South Pole and some Winter-Over Polies coming back here to go home as well. You can spot a Winter-Over Polie fairly easily - It's like they are on drugs. They are oblivious to almost everything. Some of them act like they are on crack. I tried to have a conversation with one who was a cook there over the Winter. He was like Ricochet Rabbit - he was all over...SQUIRREL! It was annoying.
We are in the time of "Just keep going and the holidays will be here soon". The flights have been able to come in and for the most part, go out. I have gotten some packages (YAY!) but not all of them. Some people have gotten to go on "Boondoggles" - trips to help science teams out in the field for a day. Really it's just free labor for those teams. I know of several people who got to fly on a Basler (a refurbished DC-3) or Twin Otter (a high winged plane) and have flown to remote locations to dig out fuel barrels for a couple of hours. We in Dispatch haven't been offered said Boondoggles. It would be kind of nice to be able to get out of "town" for a day. But rumour has it that the Rec Department is working on trips to the Ice Caves and Cape Royds (where there's a huge Adelie penguin rookery) as well as trips out to Scott Base for the Pressure Ridges. I will keep you posted on that and if I get to go to any of those places, I will post pictures!
Last night at about 2100 I hiked out to Hut Point and "Roll Cage Mary" or the Our Lady of the Snows Shrine a memorial to Richard Thomas Williams, a Seabee who died during the initial construction of McMurdo Station when his D-8 tractor fell through the ice. I also got to see several Weddell seals lounging on the ice. Enjoy the pictures!
