Midwinter calling, day 6

2 days later

Getting hot

Early morning it is minus two degrees according to my little hiking thermometer but a clear blue sky, which means very low moisture in the air, I carefully empty and then fill the manometer thermometers with propane and seal them. Any air remaining in them will have very little water, and hopefully accumulate out by the scale and not in the high temp sensing body. They are made so the pointer rests at about 10% of the scale. Using water and ice in a vessel, I mark the 0 Celsius on all the back of the scales with a small scratched line from a knife tip. Then I use boiling water to mark 100 Celsius, and since the heat also rise and heats up the thermometers themselves quite unpleasantly hot, I suspect that the temperature error is small enough. Metal conducts heat well, especially brass, since most of it consists of copper. I improvise a clay oven around all the manometers sensing bodies, and use an oil lamp and a tiny bit of mercury to get another mark on the scale for when that boils. The scales match what I expected, so after that I clean and calculate the whole scale for each thermometer, and also a corresponding pressure scale to mark on the backside. Then I engrave each scale and fill in the lines with dark paint, and let them dry. Due to the difference in the tube spiral that create the movement before it is amplified, one only reach 350C while another reaches 800C and still havn't bottomed out. It sounds like a huge different, but the actual difference in movement at the end of the spiral tube is very small, and they are all made from the same small tube and flattened and formed on the same jig. I'm just pleased that it works, and Kari, Ciara and Caecilia who help are fascinated and happy that I'm happy. One thermometer will be installed in the oven on the modern stove, and one with a low range will become a general thermometer for the kitchen to try to use when cooking.

We also calibrate the bimetallic thermometers, but since they have a much smaller temperature range and no sensing body, we let them lie in the same space and then mark that temperature on each after they have stabilized for 10 minutes, and repeat for different temperatures. Outdoors, in the greenhouse, in the basement, high up in the steam boiler room, in the great hall and on a shelf by the ceiling in the kitchen. Then we calculate and adjust the temperature scale according to the markings.

Two of the gas cylinders hold pressure well enough. Had I thought about it before, I would have made Digraldi try to solder the bottle together before the heat-shrinking ring was put in place, or soldered by the heat the ring had. I will have to saw the ring apart and try to do it myself. But the iron bottles are actually tight enough. One does not seem to have lost any pressure at all. So I drill a hole, tap, install a valve, seal and permanently mount a manometer on the valve body. Now I'll just have to try to fill the bottle with suitable gas. Thankfully, there can be some air contamination in the gas, so I can pump out a lower pressure, and then pump in more gas.

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My improvised soldering iron and soldering station is clumsy and 'primitive', but works okay and is about 40W. Honestly, it feels good enough to have a soldering iron, and hardly the first time I use an unregulated soldering iron. In the future I might try to make a special tweezer like soldering iron to make it easier to loosen small surface-mounted components, but heating and lifting by using the fine thin stainless steel blade on the small knife from my Victorinox Swiss card Lite works well. My sambo's love my soldering iron, and they have already learned to respect its high temperature. They think it's almost as magical as something that moves. Heat enough to melt metal without any fire or flame. Just flip a switch and it gets very hot. It's probably only a matter of time before I make an electric wood-burning tool, and probably with custom tools for runes or symbols. Bodil really wants to use one, and I have a couple of extra heating elements since I didn't know how well they would work, or how fragile they are. Thermal cycling might also kill them quite fast. The highest powered one will become a high power soldering iron for larger metal works.

During the time we were away, Bodil has done a lot of work in wood, and finished building the box for a horn speaker, and oh so carefully, I manage to finish building an amplifier and the rest of the electronics. It is like a large power bank driven computer speaker in a wooden box, and the box is quite large in relation to the speaker because I wanted to try to make the bass and sound better, but the frequency curve will be 'meh' due to the design, and the power output is maybe one watt, but it works.

Sure, I have soldered simple things before here in Alfheimr, but this proves that my plans for soldering tools work well enough to build and use. Also that I can desolder and reuse more sensitive surface mounted parts from the radio without frying them, which has really worried me. Then to solder or glue the components to the brass plates and circuit board pieces and make an amplifier. I needed that confidence boost. I needed to do a more technically advanced thing than just molding metal, wood and glass. I should have built the spark gap transmitter, but it didn't happen. I started with the horn speaker because it was complicated with its audio amplifier - but not critical - and if it went to hell, I wouldn't have sacrificed the more important mosfets and transistors.

I gather Kari, Ciara, Caecilia and Jane, and proudly show my progress and after connecting my mobile to the speaker, low music is heard in my office. The sound quality is bad with even worse bass response, but it has a better low register than the phone's speaker. It's magic as usual for the others, but Jane seems to understand how advanced and difficult it was, and gives me a congratulatory hug and kiss on the cheek and is also happy. I'm relieved that she accepts me for who I am, and that my ventilation havn't made her distance herself from me. When they understand that Jane is impressed, the others become more impressed. After a while we discover Gunhild curiously looking in through the door, wondering where the music comes from.

I didn't think of that. Oops. Eh, what the hell. Might as well show them.

So I gather Alith, Bodil and Gunhild together with Kari, Ciara, Caecilia and Jane in the meeting room, close the door and give them the same introduction to my and Jane's world as a few already got. I take a couple of discreet photos with the compact camera and a new group photo of everyone gathered in and around the couch. Jane grins as she makes rabbit ears on Kari who is sitting neatly next to her, so there is another picture, and then I show the camera. I have learned to not show every picture, and downloaded and removed some from the camera, so I do it better than before.

The guards are surprised by all the pictures I've taken, especially Bodil in pictures from the first voyage to Borgarsandr. I show Jane the picture where Iselin photobombs and Jane starts laughing, and I tell her that just that made me love Iselin a little more, which Jane understands. I miss Iselin. Some of them are more shocked than others, but they understand us better. And they know that I trust them a little more, which especially Gunhild appreciates. It's tragic that Hillevi has missed this, but she will get an introduction when they return. I show my own hike, the tent, the empty bus and the first picture in front of the car. The roads, the bus and the car really interest them.

I pick up my tablet, show its camera, and play some music. I prepare to show a couple of music videos for them after Kari explained it more clearly that what they will see is not real, and in Midgård we can create and distort photos and videos however we want, which Jane confirms. I'll play Lindsey's 'Shadows' first. I've learned that it is better, and it is again effective and helps them understand that it is not real, because reality isn't black and white with text that magically appears.

'Ohne Dich' is shown after Kari, Ciara and Jane all assured them that it too is not 'real'. Alith asks what the man sings and what the lyric means, so I give them my bad interpretation of it as I can't translate every sentence. Even Jane is touched by it because Till's voice fits nicely to the subject. She's heard of Rammstein before and some of their more high tempo songs, but never really bothered listened to the lyrics - it's German, and she can 'only' speak decent French.

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There are still exclamations and cries. Gunhild was definitely not prepared, especially not with Till's bluish red foot. I pause and she explains that she had a friend that happened to. They had to chop off his leg and burn the stump. He may be alive, but he has difficulty working and making a living. After she has gathered herself, we continue to play 'Ohne Dich'. They wonder why the video does not have the same story as the song, because they think the lyric is about a man's love for a woman. So I ask how they would feel if they climbed mountains but one of them injured herself so badly that she will die, and they fulfill her last wish to reach the top to die there. Would the birds sing? Would the world be colorful? Alith doesn't understand why the skin on her arms have goosebumps like she is freezing, so I explain about Frisson. We watch the same music video again and it is a moved collection of women watching my little tablet when the video comes to an end. Alith, Kari and Ciara are the most untouched, but Alith must make an effort. Bodil just cries and is calmed by Alith who herself has a few tears.

There are discussions about mountain climbing, which basically isn't done here to just reach a peak, but they are fascinated by the equipment and what I explain about mountain climbing in Midgård and that the highest mountain peaks are above the limit where the body slowly begins to die due to thin air, and is about 8 times higher than the highest mountains in southern and southwestern norway several of them come from. In addition to the fact that it gets colder with greater weather changes the higher the mountain, the air is literally so thin and oxygen-poor that even the most fit person dies if you stay there for 24 hours, even at rest in a warm shelter and with water and food. The thin air creates moisture in the lungs, and many people die every year when mountaineering, although in different ways. High-altitude pulmonary edema can kill even at an altitude of 3000 meter, and it does not matter how fit you are, but it is possible to slowly get your body used to a higher altitude day by day, something like 300 meter or so per day. People who live at higher altitudes adapt and cope better. Over generations their bodies have literally changed to better cope, but that only helps so much.

The problem also gets worse because thin air and cold affect the body and brain. You have no strength, and every meter up is painfully exhausting. You lose appetite, get a headache and stop caring. Stop worrying about saving yourself. You just sit there in the cold and slowly die. The body doesn't work as it should, and some people think they are dying from warmth and start to take off their clothes and die of the cold faster. The air gets thinner the higher up you get, it starts to become noticeable already at 2000 meters altitude, and at 3000 meters altitude you experience that the energy just isn't there, but as soon as you rest 5 minutes you are alert again, then the energy plummets again when as the body can't get enough oxygen to the muscles. That become a bigger and bigger issue the higher up you get, and more problems are added. High mountain climbing requires training and good physique.

They really can not understand why anyone would climb such high peaks, so I use the classic answer; because the mountain is there. Some of their ancestors wondered if there was anything on the other side of the ocean. If it is possible to live in the north. What's in that huge forest? I'm not much for just climbing up on mountain tops, but I like hiking in mountains and other beautiful nature, and Jane understands. There is just something about standing on a high peak and looking out. Maybe we should take a trip to Hildifjoer next summer and try to go up on Hårteigen?

Kari thinks they should see the third video as well, so they get warnings just like before. Within Temptation's 'Memories' is good. Jane is also moved by it when she really listen the lyric, and feels more than she usually does from music videos, partly because she know she won't see many more in her life. For us those experiences and life is over. For the rest this showing have been lots of revelations and new experiences, and they talk as they start to leave.

After a few minutes, it is just me with Ciara and Caecilia curled up against me on either side and Jane sitting in the opposite couch. Plus Krosp laying in our lap, which Ciara and I pat. Cats have no tact.

"How far have you really told and shown Iselin?"

"Before she left she saw a modern Swedish crime movie, with cars, guns, helicopters, road tunnels, highways, computers, mobile phones and everything. It's taking place in Gothenburg. She was so excited and really loved it all and was so fascinated by it, even though she doesn't really understand it. It's science fiction for her, but she knows that is life in Midgård. We talked so much and she understands us better now. Then I showed her another Within Temptation music video with Wingsuits and motorized Ultra lites in it. She so wants to fly and do things like that, and she wondered if a very large kite could carry her. I've sort of limited that train of thought due to the danger. But that is why we were throwing paper airplanes the morning before she left. "

"Wow. She can actually accept and handle that knowledge?"

"Seems so, and I'm really impressed by it. Just imagine how small and simple her world was just a few months ago. Now she dreams of flying, instant communication, and all the other things. It seems that for every new thing I tell or show her, the world just becomes more magical and fantastic. She understands that Elves too will be able to make that in the future, it is just so very very hard. When she understood how I made the stone shine during that feast in Kambsnes? She loved it. Of course it was a good show, but mostly because it literally was magic on a scale they couldn't fathom. My small LED flashlight really is unbelievably high technology. A glowing filament with a dry cell would be magic enough, but its a microprocessor controlled voltage boosting circuit with a powerful small white LED, driven by a lithium battery in a titanium covered aluminium shell. Just think about all the technology required to make each part of that, and that the electronics or LED couldn't be done 30 years ago in Midgård."

"Okay, that did sound impressive. Huh ... I guess I never really saw things that way. I can only imagine how magical and wonderful it is for her."

"Iselin saw photos and pictures from Mars before she saw our modern world. Iselin have to be the first woman to know about the Pale Blue Dot and the size of the Universe and its 14 billion age, before she knew the modern world. I can't even imagine how it's like to be told what a light year is, and the expansion of the universe that makes it possible for us to see about a 93 billion light years in diameter, when you have been that uneducated. I don't know how she handles it. But she does, and seems to remember everything. "

"Oh, I've learned that! Everyone has annoyingly good memory. But, what do you mean by 'the pale blue dot'?"

So I pick up the tablet, send over the Pale Blue Dot text with bluetooth to my mobile phone which makes Jane a little depressed as I can not transfer things to her mobile so easily, then I scroll through the file list in the explorer so the pictures aren't visible and select the zoomed Cassini picture called 'The Day that Earth smiled'. The weird picture means nothing for Caecilia or Ciara, but I show it to Jane and point out Saturn and the pale blue dot. Then I read Sagan's Pale blue dot from my mobile.

I don't have Carl Sagan's emotional voice, but Jane needs to hold back the tears when I'm done. She has never thought of the Earth like that. It is logical and she knows it, but never thought of it that way, and she will never see that Earth again. Never see our world again, because it's not the same here. Jane wants to be hugged, and Caecilia moves to the side so Jane can snuggle in while she looks at the picture.

Caecilia is curious why Jane is sitting and staring at the picture in that way after I said something to her for a few minutes in a language she doesn't understand. But Caecilia is probably not ready, because even though she has seen the Globe, it has probably not really connected as it did for Asta. Only Jane, Iselin, Asta and Alith really appreciate the globes. For the rest it's just funny art. They probably don't understand what the globes show and mean, but I suspect that at least Kari is trying to avoid knowing.

Jane gathers herself and sigh: "With you ventilation a couple of days ago, which was 'Holy shit level' of insanity, especially about you casually saying facts I really did not need to know about Botox, and lets not even talk about the bloody black plague... I had to get blotto, and now this... Crap, you're dangerous being around. I need to be blotto. Again."

Jane gets up and walks away. I can only guess what blotto means, but I believe she's going to get drunk.

Again.