Fun with Numbers

Fun with Numbers

70……km/hr, max speed achieved on a snowmobile
32……Days since I last shaved (and I still don’t have a beard)
32…....Knots, strongest winds experienced
22….. .Days since my last shower
8……..Average number of Snickers/day consumed by camp
4……..Different languages that I can say ‘Donald Duck’ in: Anders An (Danish), Donald Duck (French, with thick accent), Kali Anka (Swedish), Donald Duck (English).
4……..pairs of long underwear top and bottoms I brought (twice as much as most everyone else. And now that I’m here, I see why they didn’t bother bringing more, it’s too cold to change clothes)
2……..number of birds I’ve seen while on the ice
2……..times a day things need to be dug out of snow drifts
1……..number of times my contacts, contact solutions, and toothpaste froze solid overnight in my tent before I learned to keep them near the heater in the kitchen weatherport
0……..number of times the sun has set for me since May 5th
-4…….Degrees C, the warmest temperature we’ve had (but it was accompanied by 27 knot winds, thus it didn’t feel like -4.
-25…...Degrees C, what seems to be the average temperature
-57…...Degrees C, the coldest windchill experienced


If I think of additional numbers that are interesting, I’ll post them.

So my (and others) off-ice departure date got moved two days back to May 31st because of cargo weight and workload. And for the past two days we’ve been in the midst of a storm, which might postpone my departure from the ice even longer. I actually don’t mind staying on the ice longer, as I’ve adjusted to the cold and the camp has developed a cozy dynamic to it. But I was looking forward to showering today (May 29th, the day I was supposed to return to the coast).

If you’re following on the http:\\neem.ku.dk site, then maybe you’ve seen that there has been lots of structures built and progress made. I now live in a red weatherport, no longer a yellow dome tent. Same roommates, but unfortunately the weatherport is much colder than my old quarters. Water bottles, boots, clothes, etc., freeze overnight (rather than drying, in the case of the clothes). I am now using a modern version of a technique passed down from my father. Pretty much anytime we’ve been camping as a family, my Dad will tell the story of a bear hunting trip to Colorado. His feet were so cold that my Grandpa placed stones from the campfire in my Dad’s sleeping bag near his feet. Well, now I place boiling water in my nalgene bottle and then place the bottle at my feet in my sleeping bag. Works like a charm, Thanks Dad! Too bad I only thought of it six days ago.

With lots of time to think while shoveling snow, I’ve stumbled upon The Empire Strikes Back. I probably haven’t seen the movie in ten years, but I now recall that part of the film occurred on an ice covered planet. Luke Skywalker must slay his strange two-legged steed and crawl inside it’s entrails to stay warm. In former times, I was appalled at the thought climbing inside the entrails of an animal to stay warm. Now, I wouldn’t mind having one of those animals. I curious to watch the film again and notice if Luke’s face (or anyone that was ‘outside’) was extremely red from the wind/cold? And where did they shoot this part of the film? On an ice sheet? Or a huge studio?

But just to be clear, I am having a great time here. It just happens that I end up typing these posts at the end of a long day. So perhaps I mention the cold or the labor a little more than I would if I wrote this up around lunch time.

I learned to drive a Flex-mobile (the large blue and orange tracked vehicles in the pictures) to groom the skiway. And related to the storm I mentioned above, I got to groom from 10pm to 3:30am (when the wind was calm and visibility relatively good, plus it’s not like the sun goes down making it so you can’t work). But while groom, I got to see a sun halo. I could probably find a decent way to explain how a sun halo forms and what it is, but instead, I’ll let you google it. Basically, it is a rainbow that encircles the sun. So that was neat to see. I also saw another bird, a lost seagull. And a commercial airplane flew overhead yesterday, some speculated it was an Oslo, Norway to Anchorage, Alaska connection. Something different, to see signs of civilization.

More to come...