2/6/13
Last Sunday was the McMurdo softball tournament. This was one of my favorite events last year, and it was again this year. Last year was quite warm (30's and sunny) where as this year was quite cold, gray, and windy, which made it more Antarcticesque.
The game this year was played down by the ice pier, which was actually a pretty cool place to play it. I was on the ATO/Michael Davis team. Michael Davis is one of the base characters who heads up SciCo (science cargo). One of the best parts of the game is the fans and the hecklers who show no mercy as especially as the games wear on and more and more alcohol are consumed. Because everyone knows everyone, the heckling gets pretty creative. The heckling towards me was pretty tame. People often call me Science Guy around here, so a lot of the heckling was geared towards telling me to use my science knowledge to determine the best way to hit a homerun or something like that. Other people, whose names will go unmentioned, who have more of reputations for getting around on base (no pun intended) had more interesting heckles. For example one such lady, when she would take a ball while up to bat, the crowd would say stuff like, "she sure knows what a ball looks like" or "she won't be swinging at the next, as she knows balls come in pairs" or "I never saw a ball before that she could pass up". This particular gal did go on to moon the crowd. Of course one of my favorite things (from last year too) was everytime there was a bad call or a player that acted cocky or did something to get the crowd riled up, or sometimes just for the heck of it, all the people in the bleachers behind homeplate would throw an empty beer can at the chain fence backstop. Then in Antarctic Treaty McMurdo fasion, someone would run down, collect them all and pass them out. Apparently by the later games (I was still playing) Mitch and Elisha had tied string to their beer can so they could throw it and then reel it back in.
My team was pretty good and we played really well together. We won our first game against the VMF (vehicle maintenance facility) and then won the playoff game against the BFC (the McMurdo equivalent of REI. the group that supplies all the scientists with their outdoor needs), who at first looked to be the team to beat. We then won the championship game quite handily against Supply (the team Elisha was on)
As it was played down by the icepier, there was a big outfield, which favours people who can run. If you are fast and can get a ball past the outfield, you can get an inside the park homerun (there was no fence, so no true homeruns could be hit). I was the leadoff hitter for my team and ended up with 5 homeruns and 2 triples. My best perhaps being my leadoff homerun to start the game against the BFC (the team everyone had winning it) in which the catcher blocked my way to the plate as I was sprinting home. I tried to avoid them, but was going too fast so I knocked them a bit and then had to do a fast first dive to touch home plate. It sort of sent the tone to how our team would play that game. But defense is what I like to try to be the best at and what I take the most pride in, and my best moment was running down a deep fly ball to left center and making a leaping and diving catch on a ball that would have been a 3 run homerun for the BFC otherwise. I played left center, the area most of the big swingers hit to, and I was able to use my speed to not let any balls get past me (save for one hit by Elisha, that I may have let go through my legs) and thus not give up any of those big plays that can hurt you so bad.
In other news, the Russian Icebreaker arrived to base yesterday and is currently working on breaking up the ice so that the Nathaniel B. Palmer research vessel and the tanker and cargo vessel can come in. Hopefully with the broken up ice, whales will soon be arriving.
As we had such a warm season, the snow runway out at Pegasus is still too soft to land the big C-17 plane. What this means as we have had no fresh fruits or vegetables since mid December. We have also really had no package mail. As of today, the runway could still not be certified for the weight of the plane. This could pose a potential problems as the little LC-130's with skis that they have been using are too small to bring and take all the necessary cargo as well as all the people going home. Plus their contract is over on Feb 15th. Because of this, there have been plenty rumours flying as the McMurdo rumour mill is always spinning. There have been talks that if the C-17 isn't able to come down this February that people will be put on the cargo vessel to go home. Or that some people will have to redeploy early or stay for the winter. The one that is the best and that I would love to see come to fruition is that we would all get sent home on a cruise ship. This would be amazing because it would be a week to 10 days on a cruise ship hanging out, relaxing, getting paid, and partying with nothing else to do with all of our friends. I couldn't think of a much better scenario. Of course all these are rumours and we will just have to see how things pan out. I do hope the 17 isn't able to arrive just so we can see what kind of mass confusion and problems arrise.
I went to the dentist on Monday. It's kind of a fun experience to go here bc there is just a dentist and no hygeniest, so the patient gets to play hygeniest and do the water spray and suction thing. The dentist here is also Dr. Bob. His normal practice is in Colorado Springs and he's a very interesting guy bc he's travelled all over with dentistry. Doing stuff in Russia, Africa, South America and other places. He's an aquaintance outside of work, so I've heard a lot of his stories. He runs the ping pong club here and does a lot of the sports events, and he speaks a bit of Russian, so he likes to talk to Elisha in Russian. Interestingly, I found out at my appt that he went to undergrad and then dental school at Florida. He said he really liked Gainesville and stayed active doing cycling and sailing and windsurfing and even camping in northern florida, so that gives me some hope for Florida. Interestingly, he majored in Zoology as an undergrad and told me about some cool experiences he had with it from chasing down gators in swamps to going to Kenya, but that he saw how much the zoology grad students struggled with finding jobs and that the job market wasn't very good, so he decided to go with Dentistry and then just keep zoology as an interest and passion on the side. Which is definitely why I often consider physical therapy....
Last Sunday was the McMurdo softball tournament. This was one of my favorite events last year, and it was again this year. Last year was quite warm (30's and sunny) where as this year was quite cold, gray, and windy, which made it more Antarcticesque.
The game this year was played down by the ice pier, which was actually a pretty cool place to play it. I was on the ATO/Michael Davis team. Michael Davis is one of the base characters who heads up SciCo (science cargo). One of the best parts of the game is the fans and the hecklers who show no mercy as especially as the games wear on and more and more alcohol are consumed. Because everyone knows everyone, the heckling gets pretty creative. The heckling towards me was pretty tame. People often call me Science Guy around here, so a lot of the heckling was geared towards telling me to use my science knowledge to determine the best way to hit a homerun or something like that. Other people, whose names will go unmentioned, who have more of reputations for getting around on base (no pun intended) had more interesting heckles. For example one such lady, when she would take a ball while up to bat, the crowd would say stuff like, "she sure knows what a ball looks like" or "she won't be swinging at the next, as she knows balls come in pairs" or "I never saw a ball before that she could pass up". This particular gal did go on to moon the crowd. Of course one of my favorite things (from last year too) was everytime there was a bad call or a player that acted cocky or did something to get the crowd riled up, or sometimes just for the heck of it, all the people in the bleachers behind homeplate would throw an empty beer can at the chain fence backstop. Then in Antarctic Treaty McMurdo fasion, someone would run down, collect them all and pass them out. Apparently by the later games (I was still playing) Mitch and Elisha had tied string to their beer can so they could throw it and then reel it back in.
My team was pretty good and we played really well together. We won our first game against the VMF (vehicle maintenance facility) and then won the playoff game against the BFC (the McMurdo equivalent of REI. the group that supplies all the scientists with their outdoor needs), who at first looked to be the team to beat. We then won the championship game quite handily against Supply (the team Elisha was on)
As it was played down by the icepier, there was a big outfield, which favours people who can run. If you are fast and can get a ball past the outfield, you can get an inside the park homerun (there was no fence, so no true homeruns could be hit). I was the leadoff hitter for my team and ended up with 5 homeruns and 2 triples. My best perhaps being my leadoff homerun to start the game against the BFC (the team everyone had winning it) in which the catcher blocked my way to the plate as I was sprinting home. I tried to avoid them, but was going too fast so I knocked them a bit and then had to do a fast first dive to touch home plate. It sort of sent the tone to how our team would play that game. But defense is what I like to try to be the best at and what I take the most pride in, and my best moment was running down a deep fly ball to left center and making a leaping and diving catch on a ball that would have been a 3 run homerun for the BFC otherwise. I played left center, the area most of the big swingers hit to, and I was able to use my speed to not let any balls get past me (save for one hit by Elisha, that I may have let go through my legs) and thus not give up any of those big plays that can hurt you so bad.
In other news, the Russian Icebreaker arrived to base yesterday and is currently working on breaking up the ice so that the Nathaniel B. Palmer research vessel and the tanker and cargo vessel can come in. Hopefully with the broken up ice, whales will soon be arriving.
As we had such a warm season, the snow runway out at Pegasus is still too soft to land the big C-17 plane. What this means as we have had no fresh fruits or vegetables since mid December. We have also really had no package mail. As of today, the runway could still not be certified for the weight of the plane. This could pose a potential problems as the little LC-130's with skis that they have been using are too small to bring and take all the necessary cargo as well as all the people going home. Plus their contract is over on Feb 15th. Because of this, there have been plenty rumours flying as the McMurdo rumour mill is always spinning. There have been talks that if the C-17 isn't able to come down this February that people will be put on the cargo vessel to go home. Or that some people will have to redeploy early or stay for the winter. The one that is the best and that I would love to see come to fruition is that we would all get sent home on a cruise ship. This would be amazing because it would be a week to 10 days on a cruise ship hanging out, relaxing, getting paid, and partying with nothing else to do with all of our friends. I couldn't think of a much better scenario. Of course all these are rumours and we will just have to see how things pan out. I do hope the 17 isn't able to arrive just so we can see what kind of mass confusion and problems arrise.
I went to the dentist on Monday. It's kind of a fun experience to go here bc there is just a dentist and no hygeniest, so the patient gets to play hygeniest and do the water spray and suction thing. The dentist here is also Dr. Bob. His normal practice is in Colorado Springs and he's a very interesting guy bc he's travelled all over with dentistry. Doing stuff in Russia, Africa, South America and other places. He's an aquaintance outside of work, so I've heard a lot of his stories. He runs the ping pong club here and does a lot of the sports events, and he speaks a bit of Russian, so he likes to talk to Elisha in Russian. Interestingly, I found out at my appt that he went to undergrad and then dental school at Florida. He said he really liked Gainesville and stayed active doing cycling and sailing and windsurfing and even camping in northern florida, so that gives me some hope for Florida. Interestingly, he majored in Zoology as an undergrad and told me about some cool experiences he had with it from chasing down gators in swamps to going to Kenya, but that he saw how much the zoology grad students struggled with finding jobs and that the job market wasn't very good, so he decided to go with Dentistry and then just keep zoology as an interest and passion on the side. Which is definitely why I often consider physical therapy....
2-09-13
The Nathaniel B Palmer arrived on station today following the channel that the Russian Icebreaker has made. Still no C-17, but rumors are flying that it will land on Monday.
Last night I volunteered to do a Pegasus shuttle run out to the airport to help my ice mom Shuttle Jen out as night shift shuttles has been struggling with low staff. I took Elisha along, and the nightshift coined it date night for Shuttle Guy. I had a lot of fun. It was nice to get out there and drive on the ice. It’s beautiful on the drive to Pegasus, and last night Erebus and Ross Island
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| room with a view |
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| my desk |
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| softball game at the pier |
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| Russian Icebreaker |
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| coach Michael Davis on the left |
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