Mid-Rats

Late Evening View of the Ice Runway

So I've changed shifts to Mid-Rats, meaning I'm working from 10pm to 8am six days a week. It's officially the night shift here, but we call it Mid rats (Midnight Rotations). I will be a Mid-ratter till the end of the season so no changing from AM to PM and I will have a set day off each week. A routine I can count on - YESSS!!! I had to give up my shift at the video rental, I was only able to do two till I transitioned, but they were fun and worth the experience (Not Video City by any means - think only 200 DVDs and VHS's still being rented - I thought VHS's were out of fashion, but not here). I still get to keep my library shift which is nice and most evening activities I can participate in now since I'm waking up when most are starting.

Now the "transition" that I talk about is you are given two days to flip your schedule around to night time. Mind you I've already done this once with the 12 hour time change in New Zealand, and now I must do it again. On Monday I made it a whole 26 hours awake, but boy that last hour was intense. Eyes heavy, feeling like I've been drugged, can't focus, fumbling. I was volunteering at the library that day and that last hour was killer. By the time I was done, I was so happy to go the dispatcher at the firehouse (I had to return the key to the library there) nearly jumped out of his seat as I shouted with joy "I get to go to sleep now."

View of the Ice Runway Later Evening View

I slept till six that evening and then hung around haunting the halls trying to find distractions that kept me out of the room so I wouldn't wake up my other roommates. Oh one of my roommates (I have three) is also a mid-ratter so we have the same shift which makes it kind of cool. Literally there is someone in our room all the time sleeping. I'm working on perfecting my ninja silent skills, but right now I'm a lumbering moose that knocks into everything and then loudly says "SHHHHHHHHH" to myself. - There is room for improvement.

Day two was a little more crazy, sleeping, waking, wondering what day and time it was. I'm going from no one being around when I wake up (8 am - Community hours here start at 7:30 so everyone is at work) to tons of people milling the halls having been off since 7 or 7:30pm. Kind of a shock when you wake up in the morning to people fully dressed, walking briskly by and discussing dinner. My breakfast is actually Mid-rats meal at 12:30pm or a snack to start my shift at 9:30pm. My night is people's mornings, and my day is their night. Strange when you go to greet them or when you stumble into the bathroom half asleep while they've just come in from being at a party. There are people literally sleeping around the clock here, as well as working.

By my third day, and actual shift, I was feeling confused and frustrated with not having a set routine. My body was still arguing that being up in the am was wrong and that I needed to sleep then. Once I got work going it wasn't as hard to move through the day and I started getting the hang of breakfast for dinner. Having it light out all the time helped, and when you reason that 11am is the same as 11pm just in the relative sense things become a whole lot easier. Although even now it is hard to go to bed and wake up on the same day. And when it comes to planning things, forget it, you really can miscommunicate.

Oh I also have a special role as a Mid-ratter. I'm the field lunch/flight lunch preparer. AKA - Sandwich Lady. I prepare all the sack and box lunches for the field camps that go out, the flight crews, any labor or science force that will be unable to make a meal. So far I've made a personal record of of 125 sandwiches in one day. I've just started so I'm kind of slow, but I'm working on speeding up the process. I'm loving the assigned task, being left alone to get it done, and really just slipping into the sandwich slap and seal mode. So far no big mess ups. I always double count the lunches to make sure everyone has one that needs one, but I know one day I'll forget and some poor soul will look around at those eating, the icy wind nipping at his neck and with a forlorn expression wonder, "where is mine?" I pity that poor soul and apologize now for having forgotten them. I tried I really did.

This is my special task on Mid-rats and I'm enjoying it greatly. Subway, you've got nothing on me and by the time I leave I want to be a meat, cheese, bread slapping machine!