This morning we had an early boating trip which Matt coxed as it is my maintenance week and his boat driving week. I did the normal weekly checks, finished off the boat suit maintenance and we refueled Prion. As I was refueling (in the rain!) a large male ellie came to investigate the boat unfortunately my camera was not in the right mode and I missed a good picture.

I finished off Mum’s table and it is now packed away in my p box with Dad’s chairs ready to go on the ship in two weeks time.

I am now busy making another present which at the rate it went tonight will take quite a while and will cause considerable hand cramp. This is the diamond cutter that I used in the science labs to cut the glass – it basically works like a tile saw requiring water to wet the blade.

After cutting the glass has to be ground down so the edge is smooth. This is done with wet dry paper and a lot of patience. I got through the movie The Duchess and there is still a lot to do and that is only one glass out of 5!

The rest of the week we are doing base scrub out – joy of joys! This means three days of cleaning. All the cupboards get emptied and resorted ready to receive all the coming years supplies. The carpets will be shampooed, the windows washed inside and out, the freezers defrosted cleaned and restocked the list goes on.

The world outside base moves along with my mother being on the front page of The Times supplement yesterday in an article about flying for Pan Am. At lunch time today we figured out that none of the women on base would have qualified to be a flight attendant in the 1960’s, as we are all the wrong height or weight. I am 9kg or 20lbs overweight but the right height. Sam is slightly too tall and overweight, Katie is slightly too small and overweight and Sarah is the right height but overweight. I don’t think any of us on base could be considered to be fat! They must have hired stick insects – 5’ 8’’ and 135lbs (61kg) is not exactly that healthy definantly not allowing you to have any muscle.