by John Huston

Out on the sea ice, skiing 11 hours a day, our minds wander all over the place. Tyler can hum and sing songs. I'm not so good at that. We both think about our lives in the future, activities and spending time with the people that we love and our friends back at home. And we also daydream. Daydreaming is a very effective way to pass the time and it could be quite satisfying if we are patient with our thoughts.

However, certain thoughts pop in my mind, I am sure Tyler's too but I am talking about me here, more often than others. And in particular, I can think about food and almost taste food that I don't have here at great length, sometimes hours, like today, I probably had 10 or 12 different meals around ethnic restaurants in Chicago.

Tyler and I are eating roughly 7,600 calories per day. We just finished our dinner, a wonderful pemmican stew with some curry, salt and black pepper added in. Also, with freeze dried cheddar cheese, milk, and ramen noodles, along with the lamb, chicken, and vegetable pemmican. We really like it every night and every morning. It's just fantastic food.

So, one daydream I've been having is about the Fat Boy Burger. In November, Tyler and I had the pleasure of visiting Bergans of Norway headquarters in Hokksund, Norway, outside of Oslo. And we went out to lunch with Ragnar, Rune, Jon and Terja to a little bar/pub nearby. And everyone at the table ordered something called the Fat Boy Burger and I have been salivating over this burger at length.

The Fat Boy Burger is half pound hamburger, Norwegian cheese, bacon, fried egg, mayonnaise, catsup, tomato, lettuce and I'm not sure if there's avocado on there but I'm going to put avocado on there too, and then a whole plate of French fries on the side. And I have thought a lot about that Fat Boy Burger. And I want one. So, when I get off the North Pole, I'll probably have lost 20 to 30 pounds, and I'm going to be coming for that Fat Boy Burger. So, look out.

So, there's a little window into the simple minds of the long distance skier and how we often think about our loved ones and people back home or CaringBridge and people who that wonderful organization is helping out and our sponsors and people who support us. It all means a lot but also we could caught in wonderful day dreams, that are sometimes tantalizing painful day dreams, about food and the Fat Boy Burger.

So thanks for listening. We're on our way to the pole. It's a windy day but we are happy with our progress. We're drifting east quite a bit so that should be interesting to see how that plays out and tomorrow we'll put some more miles. Good night.

Daily Expedition Data
Date: April 12, 2009
Location: N87° 34.015' W074 52.656'
Time Traveled: 11 hours
Distance Traveled: 10.5 nautical miles
Drifted 1.0 nautical miles S/SE
AM Temperature: -18°F
PM Temperature: -18°F
all day drifted E (1-1.5nm)
NW wind in AM, W/SW wind in PM, 10-12 knots with gusts
overcast with sun shining through high clouds

DAY 42 - FAT BOY BURGER