Commander's Check-In Report

Donna Viola Reporting

Crew Physical Status: good

Time Departed/Returned from EVA: EVA # 3 11:00-12:30

Brief Narrative of Field Mission Results: collect GPS waypoints of ATV trails

EVA Data/Interpretations: as per EVA report

Engineering/Hab Maintenance: Nothing major to report.

Report Transmission Schedule: engineering, EVA #13, commander's. By 8:30pm

Plans for Tomorrow: to be decided

Inventory: inventory of dehydrated vegetables send to food study coordinators

Support Requested: none

Miscellaneous: n/a

Commander's Report

Donna Viola Reporting

Late last evening, Andie and Heidi decided to bake brownies (which we didn't eat until AFTER midnight, once non-cooking day had become cooking day) and watch Space Cowboys - which finally ended around 1:30am. Since it was such a late night, and because today is Sunday, we didn't get started especially early.

However, Heidi still wanted to continue collecting GPS waypoints for the ATV trails, so she took Andie and Sukrit out to help with the survey. By early afternoon, we started another trial run of our LAMBDA experiment - and so far, we haven't run into any problems. Fingers crossed that it stays that way!

This afternoon, we also held the First Annual MDRS Superbowl. As a compromise to the football fans of the team, who were unhappy about missing the game because of our Mars simulation, we decided to play our own game - in sim, of course! (Don't worry, it was only touch so that we would not break the spacesuits.)

In a convenient division, we ended up playing scientists vs. engineers, a perfect three-on-three. Of course, since I've been playing rugby for almost four years (and therefore have a strong psychological bias against being in front of the ball), Sukrit needed to ask how to actually play the game, and Heidi spent almost as much time collecting pretty rocks as she did playing (oh, geologists!), the scientists were an ill-fated team from the start. Nevertheless, spirits were high, traditional trash-talking was exchanged, and everyone enjoyed the game.

Tonight is looking like another relaxing evening (though I, for one, should probably spend it studying biochemistry). I can't believe we're more than halfway through our rotation already, and will be back at our respective universities by this time next week!

Engineering Report

EVA 13 Report

Sukrit Ranjan Reporting

Time: 10:30-1:00

Crew Members: Sukrit Ranjan, Andie Gilkey, Heidi Beemer, Max Fagin

Site Location:  Ridge southwest of Hab + Sundial

Transit Mode: ATV + foot

Objectives:

Part 1 (ATV): Explore ridge southwest of Hab, Ptolemy Highway (Ranjan+Gilkey+Beemer).

Part 2 (Foot): Get photos of Hab and get precise GPS coordinates of Sundial (Ranjan+Fagin).

Results: Objectives achieved.

Lessons Learned: ATVs can deal well with slopes!

Journalist Report

Sukrit Ranjan Reporting

Today was a Day of Rest on Mars. In addition to Wiggle Your Fingers at your neighbor day, the team celebrated an Earth-based athletic contest reminiscent of the games and gladiator matches of ancient Greece and Rome (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=6076613). I was intrigued to learn of these traditions, and when the rest of team LAMBDA invited me to participate in the ritual celebration I eagerly joined in. After preparing a variation on chips and dip, the team ventured out in spacesuits to play this sport. I am pleased to report that the Scientist and Aerospace teams did extremely well, crushing their opposition (in my understanding this football is like golf: you must minimize "points" scored). After this celebration of the "circuses" part of bread and circuses and replete in our victories, we retired for the evening. We are just now rising to clean up for the day and write all of our reports.

Cook's Report

Andie Gilkey Reporting

1a) Today was

-A cooking day

1b) Was today a special day celebrated at the main meal with special

food or activity?

Yes, it was pay a compliment day and national popcorn day. We celebrated by eating chili cheese spinach bacon dip and playing football in the spacesuits.

2)  List the foods served at today's main meal (usually the evening

meal), giving full names of each.

Gourmet Reserves Chicken Rotelle and Gourmet Reserves Leonardo da Fettuccine combined

3) List any main meal foods not finished by the crew (leftovers stored

for later use or discarded)  (Example:  2 servings potato soup stored;

2 servings rice burned/inedible, discarded)

- We had one serving of leftover Chicken Rotelle and Fettuccine. We also had leftover vegetables from the chili cheese dip at lunch

4)  Recipes for anything more complicated than following package

directions exactly, or rehydrating.

- To make the tortilla chips: put olive oil and salt on tortillas and bake them at 400 degrees F for 3 or 4 minutes

- To make the chili cheese spinach bacon dip: rehydrate peppers, onions, tomatoes, jalepenos, and spinach, cut 16 oz velveeta into 1/2 squares, cook bacon in the microwave and crumble, combine can of veggie chili, the cheese, the vegetables, and the bacon in a bowl and microwave :-)

5)  Comments/questions for Kim and Jean, the food study investigators

- None