The Little Things

“Well, there seems to be slightly more ‘missing’ from the right side than the left”. Said with a slightly sheepish look on Hazel's face.

“What exactly do you mean by missing?” I said. This was while I was sitting in the laundry, where we had been for the past hour or so.

One of the few things I didn’t think about before I left for the Sub Antarctic was how I was going to get a haircut. I have a fair amount of hair (albeit short) and if it is not cut at fairly regular intervals my impression of a shaggy Puli dog gets to be rather too good.

Puli dog - or is it Ella?

 It turns out that there are four ways of getting a hair cut on the island: 1. Don’t (not an option), 2. Shave your head before arriving and let it grow till you leave (also not an option), 3. Get an extremely expensive haircut on one of the very few cruise ships that have that facility (not an option in winter when there are no cruise ships), 4. Persuade someone on base that it would be a good idea to try cutting my hair. Somehow I managed to con Hazel into the idea that cutting my hair would be a new and interesting thing to do. She has regretted this ever since. The main cry when she starts cutting is: “Oh dear God I had forgotten quite how much ridiculous hair you have”. Usually by this stage she has cut slightly too much for her to just leave it because, as she says, she does have to look at me. This was the 4^th time that I have managed to con her into cutting my hair and, as we both decided, definitely the last. She has done a remarkably good job every time and I now look vaguely human again (any lack of humanity is not due to the hair cut). The only thing wrong with this arrangement on my side is that for the next week I have to endure her looking very carefully and critically at her handiwork every time she sees me. This time I seem to have passed muster rather quicker than before.

I finished my last blog expressing the hope that my time in the engine bay may have been coming to an end. Unfortunately for both Erny and myself this does not seem to be the case. We have been struggling with problems with the damn port engine of Pipit for a week and a half now and both of us are getting rather fed up. Neither of us have any idea what the trouble could be and both wish ardently that it would just bloody start working. Anyway, moving swiftly on……

Having a hair cut is one of the little things that you never think would be an issue till it is. One of the little things that I did worry about was running out of things. Due to wise ordering of food by the previous doc and some excellent bargaining and deal making by Hazel, our food stores looks extremely healthy, much healthier than they did when we arrived at any rate. Therefore running out of food has never been an issue. Running out of drink has been more of a concern. This season we had rather more visiting scientists and other teams than anticipated. This meant that our bond (drink store) did get rather depleted by the middle of winter,  necessitating an extra order from the Falklands which was gratefully received a couple of months ago. However we seem to currently only have one bottle of tonic on the entire island which could be slightly tricky since gin has not yet run out. I intend to attempt to have some brought in on HMS Richmond when she arrives for another visit next week.

One thing that was NOT a little thing that we very nearly ran out of was loo roll. Now the previous BC (base commander) made a careful calculation of usage, number of sheets per person per day etc, but again we had rather more visiting scientists and others than anticipated. Loo roll is NOT repeat NOT something you want to run out of, that would not be a little thing, that would be a rather major event. Luckily, again, we managed to get resupplied from the Falklands a few months ago and we unloaded a rather large stack to audible sighs of relief.

As you can see it is the little things on base that matter, not the seemingly big things such as having to provide the boatshed to act as a helicopter hanger. Those things are fine, but run out of tonic and loo roll and things could get ‘interesting’. It is also the little things that one misses from home: fresh milk, rather than having to make up milk from powder and water before making a cup of tea; sleeping in a real bed rather than a bunk bed; having fresh fruit and vegetables at your finger tips; having a dog to rest his chin on your foot when you have cold feet (how do they always know?);

 not having to do scrubout on a Friday at 1530.

Other than sit and think about the little things this week, and when I have not been in an engine bay, I have been busy taking Pat and Sarah on holiday to Sorling. Unfortunately we couldn’t pick them up again due to inclement weather but luckily Sorling is stuffed full of spare food so they are happy. I also took Jo out to three ships conducting transhipping in the bay (this was a surprise as we thought all transhipping had finished). When we went out the anemometer reading was well within limits and the conditions in the cove were fine so we were very happy to go out. As soon as we reached the ships conditions had changed and I had to make the decision that not only was I not happy to put Jo on the pilot ladder, I was not actually very happy to go near the pilot ladder at all. In the end we hid round the back of the three ships in a nice calm lee while Jo did some quick signing of documents that were then put in a dry bag and hauled up the stern of one of the ships on a line that the crewman seemed determined to throw at my head. We were all quite happy to return to base after that.

On Thursday we had Big Base Scrubout which was basically a spring clean. We cleaned behind fridges, along skirting boards, I scrubbed doors etc. The base now looks sparkling and ready for the season ahead.

Today Hazel, Micky and I went towards Glacier Col for a rather windy walk. We found that the ice cave had collapsed over the winter which was a surprise but otherwise it was a lovely walk. 

Ice cave before

 

Ice cave after

We hope to be able to nip out and collect Pat and Sarah tomorrow morning, unfortunately this will necessitate us leaving base at 0630 which seems to be the calmest time at the moment. 

Local traffic hazard