My mutant power

Well, yesterday was pretty productive. After a busy morning revamping that much-discussed fire brigade communications drill, I headed to lunch and said to my boss (Al) that I was really craving a chicken fried steak. It turned out that that was what was on the menu, much to my surprise. So, instead of being able to do something cool like fly or envelop myself in flame, I have the mutant power of being able to remotely detect chicken fried (country fried, if you will) steak. Stupendous...

We did our second measurement of a meter stick's shadow at the pole at noon, which we'll continue to do until the solstice for the kids in New Mexico. It's amazing how quickly time roars by here. I guess that's probably a product of working almost 100 hours per week.

Last night there was a showing of this year's Banff Mountain Film Festival in the galley. It was the first time I'd watched any motion picture since arriving at the Pole. I'm trying to save most of that for winter, since so many people said that's a default activity that gets very old by the time the station opens for summer. The films were all quite good. I really liked one part of a mountain biking documentary that took us to Prague to watch some guys do ridiculous trials biking stunts. The festival winner flick was awesome. It was the story of a Canadian couple that rode their bikes from Ulan Bator, Mongolia through western China, Tibet, Nepal, and down through India to somewhere near Calcutta. It was great to see so much of the world vicariously via the experiences of others, but is a dangerous thing for a rolling stone like me, especially given how long I have until travel is even remotely an option.