"Work and play"
Days on the ice: 4 weeks! (i'm now counting in weeks)

Well, it is a cold and windy day over here...about 18 knots and everyone is getting blown around. I skiied out to our satellite camp this morning (about a half-mile) and was almost knocked over by the wind while skate-skiing. If you aren't a cross-country skiier, skate-skiing is sort of like rollerblading or speed-skating on skis - you are on one leg at a time and your feet swish side-to-side.

I realized I don't have many pictures of me on this blog here since I am usually behind the camera. Here's one to show you all that I'm alive and actually do a little bit of work from time to time! Pat took this picture of me checking out the instruments in the Bally building a couple weeks ago. Directly in front of me are two instruments that measure properties of particles in the air - one measures the number and size of particles, the other measures how much the particles are absorbing light (ie. blackness of the particles). How much the particles absorb light may directly translate to a warming influence over the ice sheet - for example, imagine what happens if you splatter a bit of black dust on a white t-shirt...the shirt may be a little less reflective of the sunlight. Anyway, enough science babble.


AND, play time! Being here this long (it is going to be about 10 weeks total for me), I'm trying to pace myself a bit. I'm usually working from about 8 am - 6 pm, taking my lunch out with me to sat camp. After dinner, I usually hang out with folks for a few hours and then take a ski at 10:30 pm to do my 11 pm surface snow sample out at sat camp. Lately, I've been dragging some folks with me for my evening ski - I am definitely starting to feel the groove of skate-skiing again.

Here's a shot of playtime on Saturday night. We had two semi-sober games going on - Yahtzee in front and I was playing (pathetically) Rummy in the back. In the front of the picture, we have Jeff who is with the US Geological Survey, Kim who is the camp manager, Marge who is the cook (and was dubbed "the hammer" after creaming people in Yahtzee), Jeff who is a staff science tech, and Mike who is a grad student from U-Washington. This is around 10 pm at night...still bright outside the Big House! Sometimes we put down the shades to pretend it is dark.


And the newest activity I am about to start is being a student of Andrew (the medic) and Mike (see above picture) in martial arts. Andrew is a black belt in Wing Chun Kung Fu and Mike is a black belt in Tae Kwon Do...I'm a black belt in laying on the couch. :-) So, we've decided to do 7 am workout time, starting tomorrow. They are going to beat up on each other and I'm going to learn some self-defense moves....and maybe roll around on a yoga ball or something.

Back I go to work!