Transitioning

12-26-11

Led a tour to scott hut and we shared a thermos of hot cocoa out at hut point watching the seals. After the tour we headed over to the coffee shop to play some scrabble.

12-27-11

Since Christmas, the temps have crept up to above freezing and today was the hottest day yet at 37 degrees. On my drive back from Pegasus when I got into mactown, I had one of the trailer attachments break from all the bouncing.

We tried to play volleyball today, but when we got to the gym it was flooded from all the snow melt. We tried to mop and broom the water out, but it was hopeless b/c too much metl water was still coming in. So instead we played a few rounds of lightning on the dry end of the court and then Jarod, Elisha, Mel, and I headed over to Gallaghers for some swing dancing. We've been wanting to go, but it's always at the same time as volleyball, so it was a good excuse to go. You should see those Montana boys swing dance.

12-28-11

Saw 6 cute little Adelie penguins out at the airfield this afternoon.

Today ended up being a little bit of a rough day and a roller coaster of emotions. Starting next week I'll be on nights along with an INCREDIBLY awesome crew. Shuttles Jerod, Elisha, Mel, and Aunt Karen will all be transitioning over with me. Jerod, Elisha, Mel, and me are all very close and we roll almost everywhere and do almost everything together. It's the best little group. Then throw in Aunt Karen (shuttle shafer, that lady who owns the farm and works in manhattan, who is in her lower 60's) who we love and is tons of fun and we knew we'd have the best night crew. We were all getting totally stoked for nightshift and for the transition (4 days off to acclimatize to nights) and right before my last run of the day, we had found out our transition schedule. We were all very pysched and we had fun activities like pickle ball tournaments, hikes, skis, and snowboarding planned to help us stay away late at night as we transitioned. So on my drive I was blaring my music and singing and not caring what the passengers thought of my singing. But when I got back to the office Sharona needed to talk to me. She told me that Elisha's grandfather had passed away (something Elisha had strangely enough mentioned at lunch that her grandfather was sick and he might pass at any time) and that it was a bit up in the air as to what was going to happen. It's a little late in the year to give her the 3 weeks leave that Adrain got when his father passed away, so if she were to go, then she would't be coming back. She was going to look into seeing about just getting a 10 day leave, but the Denver office was closed so she needed to wait until tomorrow. Plus flights have been cancelled the last 3 days due to weather and they won't be flying over the new year's holiday, so it's uncertain as to when the next flight out will be. I can tell she really wants to stay, but at the same time she wants to be there for her family, and I know she is struggling with it.
Anyways, in a selfish way, we were all sad too b/c she wouldn't be joining us on the transition. So we had a bit of a melancholy first transition night. Mel and I played the normal night league pickle ball and basketball and then I hung out with Cassa in the office for a while before going to Midrats (the night shift lunch). Went to the coffee shop and hung out with Jerod and Monica. Mel and I then took a hike. I ended up going to bed about 4am and slept in until noon. A good start at the transition, but if wasn't full of the happiness and excitement we had been expecting.

12-29-11
Found out Elisha got her leave approved, so she will be out for a while, leaving on Jan 2nd. It's too bad b/c it means she won't be transitioning with us. Didn't do too much today. Went up to shuttle ops to chat with Elisha and see how things were going with her. Hung out for a little bit at the conrner bar and then Elisha and I went on our last skate ski together for a while, which was sad b/c she's my favorite ski partner since she can keep up. It was super windy for the first mile and we had trouble going forward, but then the wind changed direction and was behind us. It was awesome! It felt like downhill skiing as we were going so fast and it was so easy. After the ski Jerod, Mel, Elisha, and I played some trivial pursuit at the coffee shop until Elisha had to go to bed since she wasn't transitioning. Then we spent the rest of the transition night playing ping pong, eating at midrats, hiking out to hut point to watch the seals struggling to go from the water to the ice, and then just hanging out with our pals at shuttle ops.

12-30-11

Went to bed at 430am but was only able to sleep in until 9 b/c of noise in my room and things on my mind.
We had an awesome evening though. A big group of ATO'ers did the hike up to Castle Rock (Shuttle Mel, Shuttle Jerod, Shuttle Elisha, Cargo Monica, Cargo Scheflo, Cargo Dave, Cargo Margo, and Shuttle Nate). B/c we are shuttle drivers, we got to take out a van, even though the rest of the base is closed so that we could drive right up to the ski hill and thus get more runs it. It was an unbelievably gorgeous night with no wind and quite warm. Mel and I brought snowboards and we did a couple of sweet runs on the kiwi ski hill, which I like to call the Skiwi hill. We had something special happen, but I can't mention it in a public blog, though if you ask I will tell you by email. I'll just say that it involved Jules (so Lael, you probably know what it is anyways), which of course means it was totally sweet. The rest of the crew used various methods of sleds to toboggan down in full laughing style: cafeteria trays, frisbees, and cargo magic carpets. At the top of castle rock, we soaked in the view and sun and had a full pulls of whiskey. The wind was so calm that we even through the frisbee around a bit.
After we got back to the bottom of the skiwi hill we raced back to base to make it by 1am to get food at midrats. We then spent the rest of the night (til 5am) playing some fun pictionary telephone games that Elisha showed us.