Beautiful Banana

I have had the best desserts since we've been getting fresh fruit now. I'll put a little bit of the "ice cream" in a bowl, a couple scoops of crushed oreos, and then slice up a banana, and it's so tasty. i had two desserts last night and one at lunch today. don't worry, i'm working out. i've attached a few pictures from friends' outings. i hope to get out soon myself. my roommate, who works in Fleet Ops driving a dozer, was part of a traverse to Marble Point (across the frozen McMurdo Sound) to drop off supplies and haul back waste. The dead seal and sunrise pictures are his. you can see the icebergs frozen into the ice. another friend went out to Lake Fryxell to clean the camp up after this last winter's huge storm. They needed to get it ready for science groups working out there this summer. she took a picture of a ventifact with Erebus in the background. A ventifact is any rock that's been shaped by the blowing wind that carries snow and sand. Some are huge, and some you can put in your pocket, but they're all so cool to look at. The rocks have been shaped over thousands of years. Yann Arthus-Bertrand, the author of "The Earth From Above", is on station and is getting ready to go out and take more pictures of Antarctica as part of his next book. he's already taken some near the French base, but i'm sure he'll get some amazing things here, too. last night, he gave a slide show on his work- the pictures were so awesome, and he would comment on every one; he would tell what it was, where it was, and how he got the picture, etc. it was amazing! baking bagels was awesome, and the baker will let me know when he's doing them on a Saturday night again, or when he's baking bread. brewing has not been so kind to me. the equipment is fine, but the ingredients i used were indeed OLD, and the beer tastes like dog biscuits. maybe i can still sell it, though. i ordered good stuff on line, so i'm waiting for that to come in the mail. the good beer on station is all gone, so i hope to get my ingredients soon. but i always have the Biscuit Brew to fall back on. other than that, things have been super busy for me with the field mechanics always coming in and needing stuff to take with them. so once they leave, perhaps things will settle down. my pants now have 8 patches on them, and i finally got my glasses fixed from when they got broken in Dodgeball a month and a half ago. even though i did play with goggles on, i was spectating when i got hit in the face. i'm wearing my goggles ALL the time for summer league play. and i've found a group to play Pinochle with come winter time.

take care, Phil