Snow, Slides, Sauce

We had our first storm in quite a while -- strong winds, lots of snow, it really felt like Antarctica.  And it reminded me of our laughably dire roof leak.  You see, the SciCo office is just two trailers with some basic interior finish (featuring asbestos flooring!), and where they were joined together some thirty-odd years ago there remains a significant seam.  This becomes apparent when several inches of snow accumulate on the roof and then melt.  Peak bucket count was five, collecting at a combined rate of one gallon per hour.  Dripping is a rare sound here, so we didn't mind it the first few days.

And like that, we're off to the races.  All of a sudden, everyone realizes there's one week left to submit cargo and paperwork to make it on the yearly supply boat, a.k.a. The Vessel.  For my part, vessel preparations involve the most mundane and humbling of secretarial tasks: scheduling meetings and advancing PowerPoint slides while other people speak.  I did subtly punish one guy for delegating this task to me by waiting too long every time he paused, forcing him to repeat "Next slide, please."

In case we weren't all reaching the point in the season where we're tired all the time, there was another delivery of ice core samples last week.  SURPRISE, the plane came early, so no one but neurotic me was awake yet, and I got to interrupt people's sleep to drive loaders around in the cold at 4am.  There's yet another, the last, shipment of ice cores coming in just before The Vessel, too -- and this one is going in the super high-tech freezer building with alarms.  More on that next time.

Despite all the shit talking of my desk job, I'm very much hoping to come back and do it all again next year.  We had our redeployment (go home) meeting and turned in our travel dates, and as always, I don't want to leave.  Sure, seven weeks wandering around New Zealand will be nice, but I'll have to find my own spaghetti and grilled cheese sandwiches and navigate the world again.  I actually had the thought while walking the other day, in freezing temperatures and biting wind, amongst beeping heavy machinery, approaching a road edge crumbling into icy waters, circled by fearless ravenous birds, "At least nothing can hurt me here."  

And then I did something totally crazy and not at all in character: watched softball for four hours.  The crowd was full of creative hecklers, and someone passed out empty beer cans to chuck at the fence.  It was fun, but not in the same league (see what I did there?) as the First Annual Natalie P. Chaddock Foundation Applesauce Chugging Contest.  There, wily competitors faced off in three rounds, the fastest chuggers advancing from one tall drinking glass full, to two, to three.  That's a shocking 14, 28, and 42 fl. oz., readers -- for a combined total of well over a half-gallon.  Only one person threw up.  The winner was completely unfazed and proudly held up his bespoke WWE-style tin-can-lid belt.  What great fun will next week bring?