Friday evening...What am I planning?

Well, it's Friday evening, and while I have the day off tomorrow as well, my plans are to go back to my room and sleep some more. Perhaps I'll actually sleep through the night tonight.

My roomie's strep test came back negative, so I feel significantly better about that. I'm feeling better physically too, though the throat still has some bite to it.

In keeping with tradition, the fire department signed up for shifts today to give the dining attendants some extra time off. These guys (DAs) have the hardest job down here. They are the ones who make sure the food gets out to us on time, that the dishes are done, and all the other jobs in the kitchen that aren't the actual cooking ones. So I did a bunch of dishes tonight. A bunch of us worked in the pot room, which is where they wash all the pots. They have a huge sprayer to get all the chunks out, and then 2 giant sinks to scrub the pots down, and rinse them. Then there is a sanitizer, which basically steams the dishes. It was pretty fun. We supposedly do it once a month, and it's nice to give the DA's some extra time off. They don't get much. One of the dispatchers whose husband is a chef here came in a took a pictures of some of us in our yellow rubber aprons and big green rubber gloves. I'll post it when I get it. Even with the gloves though, my hands are all pruny.

So yeah, that was my day. I'm heading back to my room now to chill for a bit before I actually go to sleep. The other girl on my shift who got sent home sick on Wednesday is in quaranteen. They think she has the flu, so we won't be seeing her for another 4 or 5 days. Luckily, she has no roommates right now, so it makes it easy.

Depending on how I feel tomorrow, and the weather, I might make it out to do something for once. Even if it's only to the gym...I'm starting to feel slug-like, though I haven't been eating much. I need to work out, and there's some people I promised to take bouldering.

In response to Aunt Linda's question, there is a lot to do down here for fun. I just haven't done any of it cause I've been sick and tired. Now that I'm feeling better, I plan on doing some of it. Like bowling, or hanging out at the coffee house. There's a bar that a bunch of people go to, but I don't drink much, so if I go it'll just be to hang out and chat. I was invited tonight, but I'm still so tired I think I'm going to skip it.

There's the gyms, and they have pick-up volleyball and dodgeball games all the time. There's a bunch of different hikes to go on and all kinds of excursions that they plan, once the season really gets started (right now we're kind of in transition, with people coming in and people leaving). I plan to volunteer to go out with some of the dive teams on my days off, once I get to where ever I need to go to do that. Every Thursday, weather permitting, they have shuttles out to the Kiwi base to visit. They also do movie nights at the coffee house, and other neat things like that. It's kind of like college...If you get bored, it's your own fault.

The old fire chief described McMurdo like this....It's a cross between a mining town, and a college campus. From what I've seen so far, that's the truth.