Damn. I'm Getting Old

So as you would expect, I've stopped shaving so that my burly mountaineer's beard can provide some measure of protection against the harsh elements down here. Now that's it's growing out, I'm discovering that I have a bunch of gray hairs in my beard. What the hell?!?

Shower Counter

For those of you keeping track at home, I took my first shower in 10 days last night. And oh was it sweet...

A Real Post From the Pole

Well, the windchill is -40F, but I'm sitting inside with some tea and finally have a free minute of satellite time to sit down and write about the last week. Let’s start all the way back at last Wednesday. On Wednesday, we flew down to McMurdo, about a five hour flight from New Zealand. The flight was actually perfect—smoother than the flight across the Pacific to New Zealand was. We landed at McMurdo on the frozen sea-ice, and it was so smooth we weren’t even sure when we touched down. Here's me just after getting off the plane:



I mentioned before that there was a congressional delegation on our flight. They were mostly members of the House Science Committee and the Ways and Means Committee as well as the Deputy Director of the NSF. It’s funny how well these people get treated. They get shiny brand new bags, while ours are all faded and beat up. They don’t even have to carry their own bags (I think you can see someone picking up their bags in the photo above). They board at the last minute, and they get the nicest seats up front. They continued on to the South Pole with us, so we actually got to talk to them quite a bit. More on that below…

McMurdo was nice, but nowhere near as amazing as last time. First off, let me just get this out of the way. I didn’t see any penguins. Zero. Zilch. So there will be no penguin souvenirs. Maybe I'll be luckier on the way out. The chances are better then, since the icebreaker will have come in and cleared a channel already. So keep your fingers crossed for me. Second, the souvenir shop was closed. What the hell. I came all the way down to Antarctica and couldn’t even buy a f*ing t-shirt.

Thursday morning we left for the Pole early. There were maybe 30 people on our flight, about half of them from this congressional delegation. Most of us got a chance to shoot the shit with them. Nogg, I spent some time talking to one of your representatives from the fair state of Nebraska. There was a woman from Cali and a few stereotypically dirty congressmen from Tennessee and Louisiana.

It was funny though. A bunch of us had just been discussing how badly science fared in the recently passed budget. High energy physics (including Fermilab) got crushed, and they actually pulled the US out of an international treaty for this big fusion energy project. So a couple of us asked the congress-people about this. And none of them knew that it had even happened. I might not expect your average congressman to be up on the science news, but these people are one the science committee, for God’s sake. What are they doing with their time if they don’t even read the bills they’re passing?

Well, we found out the answer when we got down here. They were more interested in playing golf than in their two hour whirlwind tour of the Pole before they got back on the plane. The guy from Tennessee reacted to the altitude so badly (we’re at 10,000 feet after all) that he had to be put on an oxygen tank. That didn’t stop him though. He was out there, golfing away, oxygen tank and all. The medical people were actually really concerned since his oxygen tubes were starting to freeze up. Guess that explains why they couldn’t be bothered to read the science budget…

Once again, I'm staying in a Korean-War-era tent (think MASH) a few minutes walk from the main station. I had a little trouble getting acclimated to the altitude (some lightheadedness, dizziness, etc.) but I already feel better acclimated than I ever did last year. At least I can walk up the stairs. And things are actually a little bit more relaxing this year than last. I have less to do, and I know what to expect. So I think I'll be able to get my Economist side projects done without arousing the suspicion of my bosses down here.

One last photo. It may be hard to see, but there's a beautiful rainbow around the sun from floating ice crystals:

Yes Mom, I'm Still Alive

Wow. It's been a long time since I've posted. I know you've all been waiting with bated breath for my next report. It's been an eventful few days, including my flight to McMurdo and then on to the Pole (among my co-travellers was a distinguished congressional delegation. I've got much, much more to say about that...)

Unfortunately, you'll have to wait just a teeny, tiny bit longer for the full story. There have been problems with the satellite connection at Pole, so I've been without the luxury of the internet for awhile now. Fortunately, the problem seems to be fixed, and I'm in the process of transitioning to night shift, so I should once again be basking in the warm glow of the Internet soon. I'll give a more full report (with pictures) sometime tomorrow...

P.S. I just found out that I'm getting to write a five article series of diary articles for the Economist's website. Should be fun. And should be a good chance to recycle some of the material from this blog...