Today started even earlier than yesterday with the beeping of the power system going off around 2 am. Marcus was roused to attend to the problem, but little did he know that he would be dealing with this issue the entire day. Everyone else hauled themselves out of bed at 5 am (with power for a short amount of time) in order to attend to various EVAs. Before P.J. and I knew what was happening, the ENTIRE rest of the crew had left to go help with the NDX-1 suit demonstration, leaving us only with our visiting SUNY student Myrnal to assist in EVA prep and no power, as they needed the generator for their air compressor. We did the best we could in the dark with only one inexperienced suit tech (he was invaluable, to his credit), but somehow we made it into the airlock as the sun was rising.

We piled into the back of the truck to get to our intended destination (because we only have one ATV). Myrnal drove us near the site we scouted previously, and off we trotted in the early morning along a nice little wash. Gypsum lay thick on the ground like a blanket of fresh snow. We waddled along merrily, somehow trading our cameras for sample bags every two minutes despite the bulky gloves. The most difficult part was opening the Ziploc sample bags; I know I felt like a monkey hunched over that thing for five minutes until I managed to wrestle it open with a rock hammer.

Many interesting little rocks were collected and imaged (including the concretions that bear a striking resemblance to Martian blueberries). We found the only three trees in the entire area, quite a bit of scat, and a prolific little cryptogram colony. The temperature was entirely more tolerable than my last EVA, thank goodness! Myrnal and Amanda met us with the truck, and we ended our two and a half hour EVA with their help while the rest of the crew slept. We all soon joined them, after being quite worn out by another early day.

The remainder of the day proceeded quite sleepily and unproductively as the power cut in and out over 15 different times. Don Foutz and Marcus narrowed it down to a polarity problem and got it working for half an hour until we lost it again. Finally we unplugged EVERYTHING and resolved not to use anything that ran off the batteries, such as the water and toilet. Just after sunset, power again was turned on (and stayed on, until just now; this report is being reviewed and editted in the dark; the lights are off, but the internet works; hmmm...).

Our SUNY guests prepared us a lovely meal and "Borat" was put off for the 8th time, since the NDX-1 team requires one more early (though not quite as early as the others) morning of support.