I have breaking news, a herd of rhinoceroses have been spotted in McMurdo Station! Now, I cannot rule out that this was a mixed herd of animals (personally I suspect that giraffes, wildebeests, bison, and stegosaurs were mixed in), but I feel that the rhinoceroses were the main culprit (they are a shifty bunch). Now I do not exactly have what you would call “physical proof” of this infestation, as these were the equivalent of rhinoceros special forces (essentially ninja rhinoceroses) who evaded my best attempts to photograph them. Nevertheless, I woke up incredibly sore this morning, and clearly Occam’s Razor would suggest that the simplest solution is the most likely, therefore I think it is clear that a herd of stealth rhinoceroses (and friends) trampled me in my sleep (tap-danced on me even). Now, you might expect that I would have heard this herd (ha!), however you are overlooking two important facts: (1) Ninjas! and (2) my roommate snores like a chainsaw (thank God I don’t snore)!

(Note: The authorities here in McMurdo have repeatedly asked us to be on the lookout for invasive species down here…and rest assured I will be bringing my suspicions to the attention of the proper authorities…after I eat another donut.)

Now, encompassed within the myriad (what, they have a Thesaurus in Antarctica…in fact, it probably helped with the trampling) of other activities yesterday, we actually participated in three grueling activities that left us completely exhausted by 8 PM (and of course did not contribute to our soreness in any way, shape, or form): the picking of daisies, the carrying of bread, and the sorting of flags.

Wait, why are you laughing…I haven’t told my “jokes” yet. Okay, I’ll wait for you to stop laughing. Seriously, stop already.

Now, when I was told that pretty much all of McMurdo would be turning out to pick daisies for two hours yesterday, I was pretty excited. I figured that since this was my second trip down, I was finally going to be shown the secret entrance to the Arthur Conan Doyle esque lost world forest down here (where do you think the rhinoceroses live). Sadly, picking daisies was a euphemism, and not one of the good ones (I’ll wait for the folks from New Jersey to look that word up). Nope, it was a simply a fun way to say that we would be picking up litter (Ralph sure knows how to pull the old bait and switch with us). Now, I will say that I was impressed with how clean McMurdo was. Almost everything we picked up were small splinters of wood, or small metal bits that had fallen/broken off pallets as they were fork-lifted around (still waiting to release my “mad skills” with the forklift upon Antarctica). In fact, we didn’t find a single piece of non-work detritus in the 1.5 hours we worked (what, I’m a government worker…that’s close enough to 2 hours). Still, I challenge other folks to spend two hours cleaning up their neighborhoods (they won’t be as clean), and I think that is a testament to the reverence that most visitors here in McMurdo view this continent!

Now, after a short interlude for lunch (all that bending and stooping tired us out), we moved on to our next task for the day, the moving and sorting of bread. Now, again, my expectation was slightly off. I figured there had been some sort of mischief (I told you rhinoceroses are shifty) and a large number of loaves of bread had become unbagged and we would sorting them back into loaves, making sure each slice was in its’ proper place and loaf; basically like the world’s worst jigsaw puzzle.  Luckily I was wrong (that doesn’t happen as often as it would seem), and instead we were transferring the bread stock from one freezer to another. Simple right? Well what Ralph forgot to mention to us that the “freezer” was in fact a mill van (~1000 cu/ft shipping container; 16`x8`x8`), that was mostly full. The other thing that is underappreciated is how heavy bread is (again with the laughing…stop that). Still, beaker pride was on the line, so we put our backs into it and got the loaves out. The tortillas near the end nearly overbalanced us (tortillas are the 800 pound gorilla of the bread world), but we persevered. I do plan to try to wrangle a couple of boxes of tortillas to use as defense against future rhino attacks…it is their kryptonite.

(Note: Ralph regaled us with concrete plans to get a shipping container for his house…he assures us that not only is his wife okay with this, it was in fact her idea!)

Finally we moved on to the final task of the day…the moving and sorting of flags. Now flags are an invaluable resource down here in Antarctica. They are used to mark safe walking/driving routes, to mark hazards, to mark things in the field (we use them for meteorites), and many many other things. Thus, it is important to have a ready supply of flags handy, vetted for quality (the bamboo tends to crack over time), and sorted by size and color. Again, there was a miscommunication in what exactly we would be doing, or in this case, in the quantity we would be sorting. We found approximately Avogadro’s Number of mixed and matched flags waiting to be sorted, piled into groups of 25, roped together, taped and labeled, and then stacked/palletized. Still, we’re a stubborn bunch, and after a trifling amount of time, we had a nice neat pallet full of groups of flags of all shapes, sizes, and denominations (>2,000 by my not-so-scientific estimation).

Now, my poor attempts at humor and bellyaching aside, we actually were quite happy to help out yesterday. It was a beautiful day out (by McMurdo standards), and after a couple of days of hurry-up-and-wait joblessness, it felt good to do something that actually contributes in some small way to keeping McMurdo a fully functioning place. Plus, we really do appreciate the efforts of the contractors down here to keep us safe, supplied, and mobile, so we’re happy to help out.

In other non-bread, non-flag, non-daisy related news, we are back on the flight schedule for tomorrow. Hmmmm, maybe I should have lead with that (talk about burying the lead). We’re the back-up to the primary mission (to WAIS divide), or maybe we’re the back-up to the back-up, but still, any movement is good movement. I think part of this movement might be they want us well and gone before the contingent of DVs (what they call VIPs down here) gets here on Tuesday. A group of 10 members of the US house of representatives is coming down for to give this place a once over.

Once again, this blog has gotten away from me (it’s also getting too long), but I’d like to end by continuing with our previous “lessons learned” from previous blogs. Today we have a single lesson learned, but it is an important one.

Lesson 1: Don’t get between Devon and her celebratory pie! Now, Devon probably worked harder than anyone yesterday, and like the rest of us she felt she had earned her dessert. As you can see in the picture below, she felt she REALLY earned her dessert (she claims there was only one piece in the pie tin when she took it; I have been unable…or unwilling…to find corroboration on this point). Johnny was fairly certain she brought the pie for everyone, but the fork embedded in his arms quickly dissuaded him of this thought. We’re pretty sure Johnny will retain full use of the arm, but it was touch and go for a minute!

The mill van “full” of bread after we started the transfer. The smiles were not to last!

The cleaned out mill van after the transfer was complete. Our overseer for scale.

The workers returning in between jobs.

Flag success (behind us to the left). Ralph and I are looking for his contact lens…we’re definitely clutching at our backs in mock pain.

The pie assassin! Don’t let that smile fool you!

– Posted by Ryan Zeigler, McMurdo Station, 12/14/14

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