In the antarctican galley and maybe in antarctica in general, there are pet names for everything. The ice cream machine is named frosty boy, the pot room sanitizer is named slim and the dish machine, where you run all the dishes after washing them, is named bertha.
There are several DA's (dining assistants or lunch ladies as I like to call us) that are assigned to different tasks throughout the day. My last task of the day yesterday was the dish room behind bertha. My friends, Lesley and Metro, where spraying down dishes in the front of bertha and Me and my buddy Chris where catching the dishes in the back of Bertha and putting them away, including the silverware. We have to put silverware in these small white holey buckets on a rack and bring them through bertha three times. it is the responsibility of those in the back of Bertha to do the sorting. Anyways, I was bringing up knives for their last run through bertha and there was a lot going on up front. Lesley took the rack from me and all the knives fell and one of them landed in the gear of bertha and got all kinds of stuck. Apparently, I had used the wrong rack to put the holey buckets in. We stopped the machine and I realized that I killed Bertha. We got a lead lunch lady, we had to call special forces, and the dishes just kept stacking up. While we were diagnosing the problem, my eyes started welling up with tears and i quickly went to the bathroom. At that moment, I realized I probably killed Bertha and would get fired...in the next moment I realized that it was too expensive to fire me so I was stuck here in antarctica being a lunch lady (which made me cry harder)...and then I thought I could quit and work at a domestic violence shelter in Auckland, NZ. My old supervisor has a friend that is a director of a Domestic Violence agency in Auckland and I thought that if worse comes to worse i can beg my old supervisor to beg her friend to hire me. Lucas could stay in Antarctica and we'd meet up when it was over...This was comforting to me...I splashed water on my face and opened the door. In the hallway was Lesley who could tell I was crying. She came over and gave me a hug and I told her my plan and she said that I was supposed to be here (in antarctica) -- Anyways, after waiting with baited breath, bertha got fixed. A few of us stayed later and knocked out all the dishes...I went home (back to my dorm) and told my friend, Kendra, who was sick and missed all of it...she could tell that I was upset and asked me what was wrong... very seriously I told her that I killed Bertha and she started laughing hysterically. Her laughter attracted, Eli, and DA from last year that
made light of the situation, too... Anyways, I can tell I'm still decompressing from my old job...and that I miss being a social worker...and that all the change of the last few months is catching up with me. Lucas is amazing as always. Solid and sweet and happy. He's so present with his life; always accepting the "what is" of a situation and being okay with it. It's really great and grounding.
I am going to nurture my fragile sense of happiness; knowing that I will be doing what I love (social work) for the rest of my life if I want to --and if it took being a lunch lady in antarctica to bring the point home, then so be it. Love and miss all of you...alex
Friday, October 31, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
I drove the forklift around campus and up and down this great big hill today. Spent most all of the day re-arranging big boxes in this big warehouse. We might start working outside by the end of the week.
Spent yesterday evening playing Euchre with buddies while waiting for Alex to get off work. So much fun.
Our friend Katie did a PowerPoint presentation on her off-season travels to Southern Africa. My favorite picture was of some type of monkey riding on the back of some type of deer/antelope animal.
Alex woke up early this morning to go to a driver training. I haven't seen her since breakfast.
She's chosen an excellent Halloween costume for the weekend festivities.
Spent yesterday evening playing Euchre with buddies while waiting for Alex to get off work. So much fun.
Our friend Katie did a PowerPoint presentation on her off-season travels to Southern Africa. My favorite picture was of some type of monkey riding on the back of some type of deer/antelope animal.
Alex woke up early this morning to go to a driver training. I haven't seen her since breakfast.
She's chosen an excellent Halloween costume for the weekend festivities.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Monday, October 27, 2008
We set up our fly trap in the office today. It was a mix of balsamic vinegar, banana peel, and Dr. Pepper. We had about 20 flies by close of business today. Big hopes for the overnight catch.
Lucas
Lucas
Sunday, October 26, 2008
knitting in the lounge
Hi everybody-- hope everyone is doing well. Lucas has been writing in the blog and commenting about fruit flies while I've been learning how to "cast-on" Grandma Obringer's yarn onto knitting needles. As some of you know, this is my Antarctic dream--knitting in warm clothes and drinking warm drinks all of which is coming true today.
Tomorrow, Lucas and I will have been in Antarctica for two whole weeks.
Antarctica has it's own incredibly strange sense of both time and place. A few days ago, while walking home from skua ( a skua is a scavenger bird in the Antarctic region as well as a funky free "thrift store" where you can get anything from clothes to VHS movies about the turkey federation), the wind was blowing so hard that it created this cloud of snow crystals--when the sun hit the ice crystals they looked like phosphorescent light in the ocean at night, except it was in the atmosphere at ten p.m... In-between the buildings, the mountains glowed pink and gold in the distance with the wind picking up snow-- a sand storm/snow storm-- a frozen desert--I finally understood what that means. It was really cool to see and experience a remnant of the ice age-- and at the same time, there is a reason why homo-sapiens only have small colonies on this continent-- it's too harsh, not really for us, and we probably shouldn't be here. I don't think I've ever felt so unwanted by nature before-- and I've never felt my mammal-ness; my homosapien-ness so much.
Today we went for a hike (I did leave inside)--Gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous....and so so cold. Lucas had ice crystals in his beard and our water froze...the frozen ocean had these super cool ice waves...like miniature plate tectonics in action.
Being a lunch lady is getting better. I'm still decompressing from doing crisis work and have to remind myself still that messing something up is not the end of the world-- that I am in fact, a lunch lady. I'm not a great lunch lady, either, which has been a little hard on the ego... I've tried to bring lots of awareness into my day and notice my thoughts and how other people affect me and making sure I let it go. it's really not worth it. I had one of the lead lunch ladies try to tell me how to cut tin foil in a more efficient way to place on large cookie sheets. The long and the short of it is that I had found the fastest way, but he had to try his way (which I already tried)--I just sat back at watched him. Again, this is my biggest problem and I'm really enjoying it--
I really like my coworkers-- they're fun and crazy and sometimes, I laugh so hard at what we're doing and where we are and how ridiculous it all is that it makes it all worth while. When in my life am I ever going to be a lunch lady again in Antarctica???? never!
being married is way more fun and way more different than I ever thought. I love knowing that I can fall more and more in love with Lucas everyday and I don't ever have to think practically about my feelings...I can just feel them and be madly in love because it's okay--we're married!! it's nice to make plans for the future without having to have any hard "where is this going" talks--I just love it! All my love to everyone! Alex
Tomorrow, Lucas and I will have been in Antarctica for two whole weeks.
Antarctica has it's own incredibly strange sense of both time and place. A few days ago, while walking home from skua ( a skua is a scavenger bird in the Antarctic region as well as a funky free "thrift store" where you can get anything from clothes to VHS movies about the turkey federation), the wind was blowing so hard that it created this cloud of snow crystals--when the sun hit the ice crystals they looked like phosphorescent light in the ocean at night, except it was in the atmosphere at ten p.m... In-between the buildings, the mountains glowed pink and gold in the distance with the wind picking up snow-- a sand storm/snow storm-- a frozen desert--I finally understood what that means. It was really cool to see and experience a remnant of the ice age-- and at the same time, there is a reason why homo-sapiens only have small colonies on this continent-- it's too harsh, not really for us, and we probably shouldn't be here. I don't think I've ever felt so unwanted by nature before-- and I've never felt my mammal-ness; my homosapien-ness so much.
Today we went for a hike (I did leave inside)--Gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous....and so so cold. Lucas had ice crystals in his beard and our water froze...the frozen ocean had these super cool ice waves...like miniature plate tectonics in action.
Being a lunch lady is getting better. I'm still decompressing from doing crisis work and have to remind myself still that messing something up is not the end of the world-- that I am in fact, a lunch lady. I'm not a great lunch lady, either, which has been a little hard on the ego... I've tried to bring lots of awareness into my day and notice my thoughts and how other people affect me and making sure I let it go. it's really not worth it. I had one of the lead lunch ladies try to tell me how to cut tin foil in a more efficient way to place on large cookie sheets. The long and the short of it is that I had found the fastest way, but he had to try his way (which I already tried)--I just sat back at watched him. Again, this is my biggest problem and I'm really enjoying it--
I really like my coworkers-- they're fun and crazy and sometimes, I laugh so hard at what we're doing and where we are and how ridiculous it all is that it makes it all worth while. When in my life am I ever going to be a lunch lady again in Antarctica???? never!
being married is way more fun and way more different than I ever thought. I love knowing that I can fall more and more in love with Lucas everyday and I don't ever have to think practically about my feelings...I can just feel them and be madly in love because it's okay--we're married!! it's nice to make plans for the future without having to have any hard "where is this going" talks--I just love it! All my love to everyone! Alex
Friday, October 24, 2008
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Pets are not allowed here, neither are plants or children. The only animals we will see are penguins, seals, a few types of birds and (possibly) whales. There are no insects either. Occasionally a few bugs make it in with the fresh fruits and veggies, but they can't live outside (and we go through the freshies pretty quickly), so they don't last long.
I am assigned to work in building 121. Building 121 is an electrical supply warehouse upstairs (where I work) and beverage storage downstairs (and the band room). All the soda and beer in cans and bottles on campus is stored on the ground floor of building 121. At some point over the winter, a number of beer bottles were broke/cracked/leaked or something and created a big puddle.
So I'm not exactly sure how, but a whole lot of fruit flies found this puddle and are living in our building. I killed two flies yesterday!
As I understand, the plan is to lower the temperature in the building to the point where it kills the flies, but not so cold as to freeze the soda and beer.
I am assigned to work in building 121. Building 121 is an electrical supply warehouse upstairs (where I work) and beverage storage downstairs (and the band room). All the soda and beer in cans and bottles on campus is stored on the ground floor of building 121. At some point over the winter, a number of beer bottles were broke/cracked/leaked or something and created a big puddle.
So I'm not exactly sure how, but a whole lot of fruit flies found this puddle and are living in our building. I killed two flies yesterday!
As I understand, the plan is to lower the temperature in the building to the point where it kills the flies, but not so cold as to freeze the soda and beer.
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