Wood Stove

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I rebuilt a wood stove I had in storage. The only textual items on the stove is "Made in West Germany". After puzzling about how to repair the broken leg (everything from welding with tungston rod to fabricating a splice), I found a similar replacement foot. It was similar, so I ended up buying two in order to make it look and set right. It was a fun "little" project. It cost me about $150 in materials and probably took me about 8 hours. I am looking forward to getting it fired up at some point. Since it is going back into storage I am wrapping it up with as much rust inhibitor as I can. I bought some VCI paper for the effort.
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I am getting the sense of the convergence of folks going to the ice. I can sense the community coming together. It is almost October. This month marks the begining of the primary exploration season for the last 200 years. There are friendships being renewed and there is optimism to create new friendships. Through email activity you can see that it is rapidly approaching showtime for the austral summer on the ice. The show seems to start in earnest around Halloween. I am thinking about what books I will take with me. I think I will leave the books about Antarctica at home. I suspect the Mactown library is full of them. I have received my agenda for training in Denver although the dates are not set yet. I will not stop thinking about the Heroic age of exploration and the different eras of exporation in Antarctica. I suspect (next year as a matter of fact) that we are entering the next era, the era of participatory exploration. Where tourism is harnessed as part of exploration. This year It is exciting to be part of the Technological Era of exploration in Antarctica.

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