Blast Furnace

I've been working on the blast furnace again. Man, is that cool! I mean, the job itself is really freaking cold, but it's interesting. I've poked my head in through the top of the blast furnace, and been, well, not impressed, because it's just a big pipe. But today I stood in the middle of the hearth area, which is at the bottom, where all the molten pig iron flows from the furnace into the bottle cars. It's weird to think that the area gets hot enough to melt iron. I don't know, I just love my job. How many other people can ever say that they've stood in the center of a blast furnace?