McMurdo Station

 Today on Jeopardy, a clue popped up that's common on Jeopardy about McMurdo Station, which is commonly associated with Antartica. There's this weird fantasy among the travel crowd of putting Antartica on the bucket list, some sort of completist necessity of going to all the continents in the world, and checking Antartica off the list. My local library even has an "Antartica" feature section like they do for February Black History Month or June LGBTQ month, laying out all the books they have about Antartica. One of the most common places to go is McMurdo Station, a research station operated by the US Antarctic Program, and the island has around 1,500 people. I paused right there when I read about it. 1500 is NOT a lot of people, it's about how many people are in my neighborhood Costco at any one time on the weekends, and I do NOT want to be stuck on a deserted island with just the amount of people that could fit inside a Costco. Just getting there sounds like a pain: first you have to get to one of the New Zealand cities Whitechurch or Auckland, and then take another flight in a special airplane, and land on something called a "Pegasus field" because of the icy conditions. I looked at pictures: it's like looking at one of those run-down houses on Zillow; doesn't really hook your attention, and who knows depending on when you go whether the days will be all light or all dark. 

The other areas to go in Antartica are a little more aesthetically pleasing, but just as difficult logistically: go by cruise ship through the glaciers and then other camping activities. You'd have to start at the southern tip of South America, Ushuaia, then go through the Falkland Islands and down south through teh Southern Shetland Islands towards "areas that few people have ever gone to!" is the ad that I saw making it sound like a good season. Perhaps there's a good reason very few people have gone there: it's not for people. My skin just does not agree with ultra-cold weather: it gets dry, itchy, and tingly, and peels off more than it usually peels. MJ and I just went to Seattle in the winter and I already had difficulty with 40 degree days (actually a really nice weekend in Seattle, sunny but cold) and I didn't want to shower because the shower room was pretty cold. That's the thing they never advertise about cold areas: that brief 2-3 seconds after you step out of the hot shower and have to adjust to the cold temperature outside. Never have I ever liked that feeling. Also, I feel like my body preserves heat during the winter like storing blubber and fat to stay warm, so I naturally weigh more. And what about checking my cell phone? Not just getting no service or WiFi in Antartica, but taking my bare hand out to swipe on the phone feels like it'd be torture. I already constantly stuff my hands into pockets during 20 degree days, imagine when it's negative temperature! No, sir, I believe Antartica will be one of those places I will only go if it's the last place on Earth that's safe to inhabit. 

Which brings me to all the space exploration and finding the next home on Mars or some other planet: Neil deGrasse Tyson has a great point about trying to live on other planets: If we have the technology to build a civilization on another planet, then we should have the technology also to rebuild everything here on Earth to make it habitable again if and when we've messed up Earth long enough that humans have to move. What is this fantasy about going to Mars? It sounds cool, it's never been done before, it's fantasized in the movie The Martian, but even if they figured out the basic problems of oxygen, food, how to get around, how to reproduce in space (how does sex even work up there without gravity?) why would anyone ever sign up to go? My skin feels dry just thinking about it.