Today we made some Spätzle with Schnitzel for lunch. Cooking for 50 people always has its challenges. Luckily, Robert knew how to make Spätzle and Frances, one of our cooks, knew how to be organized enough to be ready on time. So everything went well and we had a great lunch.

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In case you want to give it a go, here is the recipe:

• For 4 persons

  500g flour, or about 2 1/2 cups
  approximately 250ml/1 cup water
  5 eggs
  1 t salt
  2 large onions
  300g/1 1/2 cups grated Emmenthaler cheese
  50g butter (or your preferred oil for frying)

• Sift the flour and mix with the eggs, salt and water. The dough
  shouldn’t be too sticky.

• Cut onion into rings and saute in butter (German method) or olive
  oil (a healthier alternative) until golden. If you’re very efficient
  or if you have a second pair of hands to help, you can do this
  concurrently while you boil the Spaetzle.

• Boil some salted water. With your Spaetzlehobel, Spaetzlebrett or
  any other ingenious method you’ve thought of, consign portions of
  Spaetzle into the pot. They’re done when they float to the top, so
  whip them up and chuck them into a dish. Periodically strew cheese
  and pepper to taste on the layers of Spaetzle ; the hot noodles
  will melt the cheese and turn everything into a yummy mass. When
  all the dough is finished and your kitchen is in an absolute mess,
  finish off the Spaetzle layers with the remaining cheese and the
  golden onions.

Yesterday I took a walk out to Spoolhenge. It is one of the few local attractions.

The main axis of Spoolhenge is aligned northeast-southwest, and while early research assumed this was an inaccurate alignment on summer solstice horizon sunrise, a far more credible interpretation is that standing on the right hand side of the Heel Spool and looking between the upright pillars of the grand trilithon the monument offers an accurate alignment on the winter solstice sunset. In short, this is how we accurately determine the seasons down here. So I went out to check, and sure enough, the sun is about to set and it will get dark soon.

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Some people insists, that these are just a bunch of spools, waiting to be sent back to McMurdo.

My hoster has been nice enough to move me to a faster server. When I tried to update the DNS entries with my domain name provider in Germany, I found out that he had disappeared without a trace. I talked to a really nice fellow in Germany who was unfortunate enough to get the guys old fax number as a phone number. He told me that he has received hundreds of calls but didn’t know anything about the other guys whereabouts. Amazing how nice he was after being bombarded by all these phone calls.

After trolling through old email headers, I could identify the company which the how broke company was a reseller for. I called them up and they have been incredibly helpful. They have changed the DNS entry for me and set things in motion to transfer the domain to a different provider. Nice to see that good customer service still exists.

Hopefully, the domain transfer will go without a hitch.

Today I woke up to find my window covered in snow. We are having 20 plus knots winds. It is really bad for CMB observations, but it is a lot of fun to be outside.

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The Station is preparing for winter and the Summer Camp is closing down. Today we got the official word that we can use all the remaining water in the Ice Palace. The last plane left a little earlier than anticipated. So I guess there was some extra water.

Normally we follow the “Two minute showers twice a week” rule. So this sounded too good to be true. I made the track out to Summer Camp at two in the morning and took a loooooong shower. Probably the longest shower in South Pole history. Well, maybe not counting Jerry Nielsen.

The Ice Palace is a strange place. It looks like a campground bathroom combined with an industrial site. It does have big windows. So I could sit inside after my shower and stare at the frozen landscape outside. Minus 55° and not a soul to be seen. Very relaxing.

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