South Pole Pictures!

The LC-130 Hercules sleigh ride to the South Pole! Negative forty degrees...




The South Pole sits at an elevation of 9,301 feet on top of approximately a 2 mile thick sheet of ice that is moving toward Africa at the rate of about 30 feet per year.

"The new South Pole station, designed by Ferraro Choi and Associates, is an engineering marvel. To avoid the fate of the two previous stations, the 60,000-sq.-ft. structure (which Polies call the El Station) stands 12 ft. above the surface on 36 columns. When drifts threaten to engulf the station, workers will use 100-ton hydraulic jacks to raise the structure by two full stories (one story about every 15 years), extending its life expectancy until 2050." -Popular Mechanics


That is some expensive siding.




Growth Room in the new South Pole station building.




The old South Pole dome... being retrograded?




Inside the dome it's just being used for storage... I guess it used to have buildings inside for a gym and housing... besides other stuff.




This is where all our tax dollars are going... South Pole signage.




Three hour ride back home... This here is Mike trying to make the perfect scarf.

As if things couldn't get any better...

I'm flying to the South Pole tomorrow! How lucky can one person be?!? I am getting to go on what is called a boondoggle. Boondoggles are a kind of fun excursion/vacation to go see and do things that are usually outside the normal scope of a persons job down here. (And let's face it... the scope of my job is usually inside a cubicle in cubicle land.) I'm pretty dang excited!

To be sure, pictures will be following soon!

The McMurdo Crud

So far I've been avoiding contracting the crud or the flu. My roommate on the other hand has been sick for about two weeks in total since we've gotten down here. Either I've been super lucky, or I have an amazing immune system. I prefer to think the latter, but have a sneaking suspicion that I could be wrong.

The first wave of the flu hit the beginning of the season, the end of October/beginning of November. With all the new people coming down from the states to start off the summer, they brought with them all sorts of yuckies, and since it's like a giant petri-dish down here (the self serve galley, and public use computers...) of course everyone got sick. Medical tried to prevent the spread by quarantining people to their rooms, but since we all get to share rooms with one to five people, of course roommates got sick... and so on and so forth.

This next wave of sickness came in, they say, from New Zealand a couple of weeks ago, which of course wasn't included in the round of vaccines that they offered to us down here at the beginning of the season. This news didn't upset me in the least, as I didn’t get the vaccine since I nearly pass out at the thought of needles.

My poor roommate, Jared (you all might know him as being an old friend of mine from Moscow) was quarantined to our room. He apparently was supposed to have me pick up meals for him, but he didn't tell me this because he was afraid I'd bring him jello, oatmeal and toast for his meals... He has no faith in me when it comes to feeding him apparently. It would have been nice to know, however, that I was in a confined space with a contagious person. I would've slept in the lounge to avoid getting sick.

Well, Jared returned to work about four days ago, and I thought I was home free, but alas... I woke up with a nagging feeling in my head that my health was heading south. The feeling hasn't left yet today... Only tomorrow will tell if the inevitable has finally caught up with me.

No pressure...

Well, since many people have been asking for my address... Here it is again:

Dawn Abbott, RPSC
McMurdo Station
PSC 469, Box 700
APO AP 96599-1035

Be aware that if you feel like mailing a package (! ;) styrofoam is a banned substance in Antarctica. Thanks! Flat mail (any envelope, even the big letter sized ones) comes in on all flights coming on to the ice, so it comes fairly quickly, but packages are low priority and can take over a month to arrive here... But it being summer the weather isn't holding up inbound flights like it was earlier, so it may get here in a few weeks!

Keep in mind that I'm probably leaving the ice around February 11th... If I'm not here to recieve it, it'll just get returned to you... eventually.

Random Pictures

This is Larry, my Operations boss, all dressed up for a Santa flight out to the field camps to spread some holiday cheer.


Here is Icestock 2007. Bands, chili cook off, Sawbucks Coffee, snow, hoola-hoops, good times.

Sawbucks. Aren't the carpenters clever? They served coffee and hot chocolate to keep us warm. Mmmmmmmm

One of the bands... 70's and funk. The best band that performed... although I did miss the bluegrass band when I went home to take a nap... they're dang good too!

Five Year Plan

I love Yogi Tea. Besides it being one of the better boxed teas, it has those fun little thought provoking sayings on the paper tags attached to the tea bags. Each one is like opening a fortune cookie. But this is even better than a fortune cookie since the tea is actaully yummy (fortune cookies are kind of stale and gross...). So, today's morning Yogi Tea saying of the day is: The only tool you need is kindness. I don't know how true that is if you're trying to build a house. But a nice moto to live by none-the-less.

I just got out of the Operations supervisors meeting. I sit in with my boss, Larry (who, by the way, is from Couer d'Alene) and listen to what's been happening in the Operations departments for the last week. All the fun, juicy information that the general public doesn't hear right away gets discussed... like how people loose fingers... or how power poles fall down, or who gets to fly home early or to the Pole and what-not. I know it doesn't necessarily sound super exciting, but you need to bear in mind that I am in Antarctica... and we don't have a whole lot of news to entertain us. Oooo! I just got the scoop from the cubicle land network! There was a skirmish at the Pole involving two boys fighting over a girl... not me, mind you. One was med-evaced to NZ and the other... who knows. Ahhhh, what a soap opera.

So, yesterday was Boxing Day. What is Boxing Day? (Aha! I just looked it up in wikipedia... You should take a gander if you don't know.) I just needed something to say to people who I had been emailing 'Merry Christmas!'... It's kind of a let down to have a holiday over. At least we have New Years day coming up soon. Yay! Another two day weekend! Unfortunately, we don't actually get New Year's day off. I suspect that there will be many a tired worker about town on the 1st day of 2008. Be careful to look both ways before crossing the road, or you may get mowed down by a delta or a dozer...

One thing that I like to do every five years... (I started this six years ago) is to write a five year plan, what I want to accomplish, where I want to be, etc, etc. Last year my five year plan came to an end and I had been planning on writing a new five year plan to figure out what direction I wanted my life to go in. Well... I got distracted. I still haven't written it, and now that a year of my life is past without a plan, I'm wondering where all my efforts in life are heading. My last five year plan included finishing my undergrad degree, having a pick-up, Airstream, and chainsaw. Check, check, check, check (borrowed from pops). Although having things (such as vehicles and what-not) isn't necessarily a goal, it's what having these things will afford me. This year of not being within a plan, I've tried to stay focused and move towards a goal... though I haven't stayed on any particular schedule.

Now that I'm thinking about it, here's what my next five year plan might include: continuing to convert my Airstream into an espresso stand and start up business somewhere, find a body of water to live on/near, learn how to weld, become proficient at throwing pots on a wheel (purchace a wheel and kiln), and return to practicing yoga... and maybe getting a boat... like a sea kayak and or a sail boat... or a raft... or all three. I'd also like to get my Vinny Van (Vicent the Turtle Bus) up and running again. He makes a cozy home for life on the road, especially now that I've up and gutted my Airstream.

Speak the truth...

this is what my Yogi Tea of the afternoon says. The truth is, that today I feel a bit like a zombie. After going to the Waste Barn and listening to some amazing acoustic music, I felt compelled to avoid bed for three more hours till two in the morning... not doing anything but curling up in a chair drifting in and out of sleep in the lounge with Rush Hour 2 and 3 playing. It's a good thing that today I don't have much for mental needs happening, just answering the phone and finding people to go move things around town with heavy equipment. Easy enough.

It doesn't feel like today is only two days before Christmas. I don't ususally have much for hopes in the way of holidays, but I had some fleeting thoughts that this Christmas might include a bit of romance, but alas, there is not much to be found in McMurdo these days. I should say, this is not the reason that I came down to the ice, but it does seem to be a omnipresent theme down here and it is hard not to get sucked in with the rest of the population vortex.

So there it is. It's muddy, windy, and yes, dusty too. A storm just blew in... the skies are over cast, two fat seals are hanging out on the ice pier. I have one hopeful Christmas present hiding on the top of my closet behind a curtain waiting to be opened on Christmas day... I must confess, especially since I have the title of my post 'speak the truth', that I did receive another gift in the mail from one of my wonderful lawn customers... and I already opened it (thank you Skinners!). So, I started my Christmas cheer a little early. Now I have Christmas socks to wear for the big day! Oh! and now that I think about it, I did recieve a cubicle calendar from my aunt and uncle in Virginia of beautiful pictures of Washington DC. I am going to have to go visit them someday...

Thank you for all your warm thoughts and care packages. I feel loved.