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Winter isn't a season, it's a state of being.
A Winter-Over moment that I witnessed today ( Read more... ) -
Elbow-deep in a truck's butt
The truck is pulled into the bay, box removed, the package on the flatbed a baffling maze of pipes and wires and tanks and bottles. It's parked overnight and allowed to warm inside. This isn't for the truck so much as it is for me - she's going to be a lot easier to play with if my hands aren't sticking to frozen metal. She creaks and steams a bit ( Read more... ) -
Cake and grief counseling will be provided at the conclusion of the test.
I had dispatch. At the time I volunteered to take the overnight shift, it was a sacrifice, volunteering to stay up all night and let the shift sleep. At the time of the shift, however, it was having cake and eating it, then getting another slice and watching someone else get no cake at all. You feel a bit guilty because you ate someone else's cake ( Read more... ) -
The Antarcalypse
Yesterday we had a vehicle fire on the shortcut road to Pegasus Field. Not sure of the cause, but I can comfortably say that something went wrong in the engine compartment, which ignited, and both the engine and passenger compartments were lost. The truck bed and lift were saved, along with most of what the truck was hauling. The Fire Department ( Read more... ) -
Thirty-thirteenth, if you must know.
Saturday, my fourth birthday on The Ice, was spent working. It was a good shift, filled with the normal things we do - some training, some inspections, some trucks. The normal. Inspecting 155. Went into the Computer Training Room to have a look around, noticed some ceiling tiles askew, tried to slip them back into place. They were being testy, so I ( Read more... ) -
Massive portions of my brain disappear over the ocean.
The flight itself is five hours, but the changes are much more dramatic. Green and warm New Zealand transforms into cold and bleak Ice, and that's just the most obvious change. Somewhere over the ocean, as the sky grew dark and the air grew colder and colder, the cognitive bits of my brain became mist and vapor, floating away as contrails behind ( Read more... ) -
Season 8
WFY001.
Third time is the charm.
Sitting about halfway along the port side of the C-17, comfortably sandwiched between a Juan and a Paul. We're about thirty minutes outside of the wonderful city of Christchurch, and have just been given the all-clear to wander the aircraft. A line instantly forms in front of the restroom.
Contrary to previous years ( Read more... ) -
Deployment
Waiting for news. We're supposed to fly, today. Today, Friday the 13th. We're supposed to fly a night vision mission into McMurdo. Pick up at the hotel at 11 - just enough time to get to Dmitri's for lunch, and a coffee, and pack. After sleeping in, of course. It was nice to sleep in.
That is all. I'm waiting for the coffee to kick in. -
Bag of Dirt
In Christchurch again, after several non-eventful flights. I like non-eventful flights - in fact, they're my favorite flights of all. Sitting there all bored, with legs cramping from disuse, and fidgeting endlessly as I fruitlessly search for sleep, eventually giving in and watching some movie that I was never interested in seeing in the first ( Read more... ) -
Live-aboard Spleen Harvester.
Day One - First flight - Somewhere over Southeastern United States.
Deployment. If one takes the long view of that word, it means shipping out to perform a job or duty at a distant location - in my personal case, Antarctica - for an extended period of time - again, in my case, seven months for this hitch. However, if one takes the short view, it ( Read more... )