Wednesday, August 31, 2016

The little sunflower that could


I discovered this little guy a few weeks ago growing among the tentacles of the Godzilla geranium.
I have no idea how it got there, though I might have thrown a few excess seeds around after I planted some in indoor pots. A friend has suggested a bird could have dropped it. It is a little more than 2 feet tall while the ones I started in pots are almost 8 feet now. This one had to have started from a seed outdoors some time later than the ones indoors. Incidentally that geranium is more than five years old. I can't remember the first year I put it in, but it comes indoors every winter and it dies and then starts up again.
According to Dee Brown in his book "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee," when the Native Americans of the northern Great Plains first encountered white men they used to word "wasichu" to describe them. This at the time became the literal translation. However years later when the first Lakota saw the Atlantic Ocean they used the same word, "wasichu." At that time it became clear that the word did not mean white men, it meant something without end, something ongoing.
Now Native Americans are  protesting a pipeline planned to go through their reservation. Mind you these are people attempting to protect their own land and peacefully at that. Will we never stop killing, stealing land, breaking treaties with the people whose land this was before we got here? Is that part of "wasichu" as well? Somewhere this has to stop. (Note: an earlier version of this post reported the governor of North Dakota had give a shoot-to-kill order. That is not true.
September 1 and not a hint of termination dust on the mountains. We often see it as early as mid August.



People lined up overnight waitng for the first Krisp Kreme in Alaska to open. Are you kidding? No. Alaska Dispatch News photo and story.


John Dingell, in under 140 characters, says what all thinking Americans are feeling today:
My most sincere thoughts, prayers, and apologies to the people of Mexico today.
Drops mic ...


Why would anybody start a month's jury duty on Friday before a three-day weekend?


Monday, August 29, 2016

Frost, wood stoves, sequestered writers, cranes, winter stuff

I might have made better shots but as I set up when they were much closer, an ambulance went by, siren wailing.
Photo © Tom Walker
My friend, author Tom Walker,  who watches this sort of thing, reported the first frost of the year today (8/29) at his home near Denali National Park. That's around 63 degrees North Latitude. I am at about 61.5 N so a little time yet. It did get down to 42 last night, though, so it's coming, but this week we are still setting heat records during the day. Still, I can almost hear that new snowmachine in the shed rumbling in anticipation. And on the drive to town, there were the sandhill cranes in the pasture stopping on their way south.
And, look who showed up here,
almost right on schedule.

And half of that one-fifth are probably trying to write the great American novel.








              



Just about everyone I know has used one. 
This is mine freshly painted in June.


Sunday, August 28, 2016

It's hot in the Arctic, yeah too hot

Daily bag limit for Kodiak bears: six salmon, one salmon fisherman!
Photo by Fred O'Hearn on The Alaska Life













Playlist: On the anniversary of "Layla," Eric Clapton plays with the greats.

This is more than an hour long but let it play in the background while you do other stuff. Two of the greatest jamming.

In my partying days my beverage of choice was what I called "cheap writer's wine." I learned one night that most people didn't catch what I was talking about. Then one day it came up and I had to explain it and a friend who'd heard me say it for years said, "oh that's what you mean."  Yup, the wine of Ferlinghetti, Ginsberg and Kerouac. The nectar of creativity.
Now comes validation. This came up on the facebook page of Hippies from the '60s and '70s:
Right after finishing their set at New York's Forest Hills Tennis Stadium and on the same day they made their first appearance on the cover of LIFE magazine, the Beatles returned to their suite at the Hotel Delmonico to meet journalist Al Aronowitz who introduced them to his friend Bob Dylan. John Lennon asked the folk singer what he'd like to drink, and Dylan replied, "cheap wine." 
Isn't validation wonderful?




FROM NASA EARTH:Bubbles, bubbles, and more bubbles, in a steady stream. Many lakes in the boreal regions of Alaska are emitting methane, the product of decomposing organic matter left over from the Ice Age. Thawing permafrost has caused areas of land to slump and fill up with water, creating these bodies of water called thermokarst lakes. The water then exacerbates the thawing, expanding the size of the lake and producing even more methane. In the early cold season, ice covers the lakes and traps methane in large pockets just beneath the surface. 
University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists working as part of NASA’s #EarthExpedition Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) find and measure the methane gas in these pockets seep-by-seep and lake-by-lake. ABoVE combines precise methane measurements from individual lakes with satellite data that can monitor lakes like these across the Arctic, to accurately model how much methane sub-lake seeps are adding to the atmosphere. 



Valdez airport reported 79 degrees. Going on again the next day, 69 at the house here. More records the next day, 77 in Anchorage and it hit 80 here but that was in the sun.


Best entertainment news of the day: Another season of "Shameless" is coming to Netflix in September.




ICYMI: Every summer the Arctic ice cap melts down to what scientists call its "minimum" before colder weather begins to cause ice cover to increase. The first six months of 2016 have been the warmest first half of any year in our recorded history of surface temperature (which go back to 1880). Data show that the Arctic temperature increases are much bigger, relatively, than the rest of the globe. http://go.nasa.gov/2brmSnK

Hypocrites: Today sports folks interview John Carlos and Tommy Smith about their protest at the Mexico City Olympics and as almost heroic at the same time they are horrified about Colin Kaepernick. They were just as outraged at those two raising their fists at the Olympics, saying many of the same things. If you don't like my country get out. Freedom of speech is all right as long as you agree with me.




Saturday, August 27, 2016

Heat records and snowmachines and a little "Hey Jude"

All blossomed out but droopy under the weight of the rain.

One rather major step for Tim, not much for mankind. More to come.






Exotic tics seem to be establishing themselves in Alaska
                           

Setting heat records in Alaska August 27: 72 in Anchorage, 79 in Valdez and I bought a snowmachine yesterday. Timing is everything.



Friday, August 26, 2016

Now the Republicans are stuck with the name "Obamacare"

A few years ago, shortly before the last presidential election, I used the word "Obamacare" in a headline. The big boss editor changed it and chastised me because he thought it carried a negative connotation.

I disagreed because the way I had seen it being used at the time it appeared to be turning around to a positive. I supposed I wanted that to continue and in the back of my mind I thought the more it was used, the more it would grow in acceptance. There wasn't much sense in arguing the point: I wasn't going to win it.

Some time later as the program itself was going through its birthing pains and its advantages becoming exposed, I wrote on here how I thought Republicans had made a big mistake calling it Obamacare because as it became more and more accepted, they would have to live with it as a constant reminder how the president they hated so much would come to mind anytime anyone mentioned the Affordable Care Act, sort of a living, enduring memorial.

Today the term showed up in headlines a couple of times and I got a good laugh thinking how every time some Repug sees it the politician must cringe. My expectation had come true.

The congressional GOP used the word like a profanity and wasted millions of dollars trying to vote it out more than 50 times. But the hatred continues and some folks will cut off their own tails rather than admit it's a success. Take Aetna Insurance for instance. Aetna benefited tremendously from Obamacare bringing in something like $7 billion overall since the program began. Still the company plans to pull out of it blaming the president for not knuckling under to their demands to change.

That's a simplification of a complex financial accounting. healthinsurance,org has a complete explanation here.

The bottom line is the health insurance industry cares more about the bottom line than it does about actually serving people and if they can blame a hated president for their problems, more the better. Single-payer health insurance isn't too far down the road.

Meanwhile every time the name Obamacare pops up they have to cringe at the living memorial to something and someone they say they hate so much. But they still aren't letting go.

The other day a campaign flyer came from our US senator who's running for re-election. Lisa Murkowski is generally considered one of the more moderate Republicans, but to my mind she is just quieter about the more outrageous things she supports in the Senate. The flyer listed bullet points of what she thought were her positive accomplishments in office. Right there in big type she is pointing out how she is proud of voting against Obamacare. Some accomplishment, 50 votes and millions wasted but what's the end result?

The very name she and her fellow obstructionsts hate shows up on her own campaign literature, a blazing memorial to a progressive step in America from a well-liked president and nothing she can do about it. You go, Lisa. Far away, please. And the rest of us will suffer through better health care with a name that turned from a negative to a positive. It's always pleasant to be right once in a while.

Affordable health care by any other name is still Obamacare

Layla – 46 years ago today

– From the College of Rock and Roll knowledge.

On Aug. 26, 1970, The Allman Brothers Band was playing a concert at the Miami Beach Convention Center. During the same time, Eric Clapton was in Miami recording his new project Derek and the Dominos. Clapton decided to catch the ABB. After the show, Eric and Duane Allman started talking and Eric invited invited Duane to come to Criteria Studios, were he was recording at. Allman was happy just to observe, but Clapton insisted he grab his guitar and play. The sessions began that very night where they reportedly jammed until the next evening.
It stands to this day as one of the most famous collaborations in Rock and Roll history. Think "Layla"!!!!! 46 years ago today.




Me and Eric

Thursday, August 25, 2016

Sarcastic rover has an issue with Twitter and Bette Midler has one with foundations

NASA image
Best tweet of the day so far"  2 hours ago
I turned on Twitter’s “quality filter” and now I can’t see my own tweets. ☹️🤖











There's been flooding in the neighborhood again. Here's what's being done about it.


Some things in life defy politics and borders. We just had the Olympics as an example. Here is another. In case it's not common knowledge, each member of the National Hockey League championship team gets to take the Stanley Cup home for a couple of days. Evgeni Malkin of the Pittsburgh Penguins took it to Russia this week and displayed it at the Russian HockeyHall of Fame.

I've been paying into Social Security for about 60 years. Now some asshats in the neighborhood of half my age come along and want to cut it. I want to cut them.


Here's a phrase we're probably going to get tired of fairly quickly: Alt-right


Facebook and other social platforms helped distribute the message of an armed militia standoff against the feds in Oregon earlier this year. Now, it's being used by prosecutors to build a criminal case against them.








Another pretty good tweet for today: Bette Midler 
Donald Trump calls on Hillary to shut down her foundation. Meanwhile, we’re all still begging him to choose a more natural color for his.

Bryce who? Baseball MVP holds Olympic swimmer's medals while she throws out the first pitch. At this point in human progression, she's probably more famous worldwide than he is.


Cancer now kills more people than heart disease in Alaska and 21 other states

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Preventing facebook clutter one meme at a time

My friend Tom has only 10 of these left.
PM him on facbook to get one.
Best comment today so far, Rachel Maddow: Vice President Biden went to the three tiny Baltic countries today to assure them of US support. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania joined US forces in the Middle East after 9/11 under Article V of the NATO agreement. Recently though, presidential candidate Donald Trump has said the US under him might not honor that agreement and leave those countries on their own if Russia should attack them. Biden's mission when he met with leaders of the three countries was to tell them Trump didn't know what he was talking about and assure them the US would honor the agreement and come to aid the countries if needed. The whole trip was to address a mess created by Trump. Maddow's comment? "Cleanup on aisle five!"


Trump has made frequent use of his properties in his presidential bid. In July, the campaign doled out $773,000 to reimburse various Trump-owned companies for expenses. The bulk of that went to TAG Air, the company that owns Trump’s private planes.
In all, nearly $7.7 million has been paid out to Trump companies or Trump family members to cover campaign expenditures, filings show.





From Vanity Fair magazine comes a report Trump actually brought up the idea with NBC of  continuing his show "The Apprentice" from the Oval Office in the White House after he is elected.






It's about the high cost of epi pens


Several reports say Trump paid for office rent in one of his buildings out of his own pocket early in the campaign. Now that he is using donated money he quadrupled the rent. The guy is gouging his own campaign for his personal profit.




Fly boards, Dennis, pot, Olympics, KFC: another one of those news roundups




The roundup file was getting kind of long so I suppose it's time for another one.

This first one is going to take some explaining. In July a boat caught fire on a Minnesota lake and passengers abandoned it. A guy using a fly board hovered over the fire and put it out in about two minutes. Basically a guy puts his feet into boots on the apparatus. Exhaust water from a wave runner is pumped through the device and downward which lifts the rider above the surface. 


It's going on two years since Alaskans voted to legalize marijuana and there hasn't het been a single ounce of it sold legally yet. Meanwhile Colorado is funding schools and help for the homeless from taxes on pot sales. And: Oregon collects $25.5M in taxes on recreational marijuana in first 7 months of 2016

According to milklife.com, nine out of ten US Olympic athletes grew up drinking milk. Now, about that tenth athlete, what did that one drink? And how was this ever polled?

July 2016 was the hottest month on record in Anchorage, Alaska, with an average temperature of 62.7 degrees F.

Jay North who played Dennis the Menace on TV turned 65 Aug. 3. Not so menacing now, are you?

Speaking of which: Here's a stat for you: Of all the people aged 65 or older who have ever lived, more than half are alive today. Think about that one.

Jim Thorpe the famed Olympics athlete, still holds a major league baseball record – most walk-off home runs with 14.

Thanks to KFC, Fried Chicken Sunscreen is a thing that exists

So George Zimmerman was introducing himself in a restaurant by bragging he was the guy who shot and killed Trayvon Martin. Another fellow described only as "big" came over and punched him in the face. Poor George had to call 911 for police help. So far no charges against the guy who punched him. That's all from gopocalypse.com.

Given that Rio de Janeiro stands just about on the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere, the summer Olympics this year were actually staged during winter.

Pedal Forrest, pedal! Someone wearing a bushy fake beard and a red baseball cap robbed a bank in Anchorage, Alaska, and escaped on a bicycle.

The US men's Olympic volleyball team had an official team psychologist. Really? Is this a thing now?

Kenny Baker, the man under the dome of the Astromech droid R2-D2, died at the age of 81. He portrayed R2-D2 in the original six Star Wars films

All those medals awarded in the Olympics and not one for participation.

A cow moose was spotted on the beach of the Arctic Ocean. (photo by Ted Jones, no relation)

There's a street near Wasilla, Alaska, called Knick Knack Mud Shack Road. Honest. There's an elementary school at 7068.

Facebook thinks I might like a story headlined "Olympic dream crushed by penis."

According to one source Ramen, not cigarettes, is the new black-market currency in US prisons

Scotland goes a whole day on wind power alone. Portugal goes four days on renewable. In the United States a Tesla went 400 miles on a single charge.


According to Libertarian think tank the Cato Institute, Alaska ranks among the top five states for personal freedom. 

Trending on facebook: Somebody named Farrah Abraham who's listed as a reality TV star says she doesn't date black men. Why is this news? Also, for the record, I don't date black men either.

Tony Perkins, president of the anti-gay religious lobbying group the Family Research Council, who says God sends natural disasters to punish gays had his home destroyed during Louisiana "biblical" flooding in mid August.

.

Monday, August 22, 2016

Drug testing, Indian uprising and dancing the stroll


Here's how a similar program went in Florida
 a couple of years ago. It has been the same in
every state whee it's been tried but they keep doing it.
Despite similar results in other states, the North Carolina Legislature overroode the governor's veto and voted to start testing welfare recipients for drugs. Result? 0.3, that's zero point three, per cent of those in the welfare pool used drugs. Even the legislators had to agree it was a waste of money. Seven states have active programs and they all show similar results. Despite the evidence several other states have bills pending to begin testing. The results have been documented and they bring into question the cost reported in this meme for Florida. Most costs were considerably lower but the percentage of positives was about the same. They were considerably lower than the national average for drug use which is 9.4 per cent. They ranged from 0.002 to 8.3 with all but one below 1 percent.
Here's a good roundup of the testing programs nationwide.


And then there's this:



Midnight on a Sunday and all of a sudden it has to be pancakes. Imagine what it would be like if Alaska ever gets around to letting folks sell that pot we voted to legalize almost two years ago.



A meme came up today asking if anybody remembers a dance called the stroll. It showed up in my news feed because it was liked by someone I think I did the stroll with in high school. Her response: "That's funny, but I'm sure we did! "

Someone is stealing dead moose from the sides of Alaska's roads



Somewhere in the background you can hear a Red Queen shouting

This particular moose was only about 10 feet from the pavement.
This headline came up today: "Someone is stealing dead moose from the sides of Alaska's roads." Now at first glimpse it seems like a story where you ask why and go on. But, this is a deadly serious issue in Alaska as attested to by an adventure from the early 80s.

To begin with generally when a moose gets mowed down by a car, truck or train, Troopers call a charirty group and members come out to butcher the moose and pass the meat on to folks in need. But the butchers sometimes don't get there quickly enough.

One winter in the early 80s I found myself living among a group of dog mushers near Willow. Three dog lots were involved and my main chore involved a shovel.

One night we were flopped out watching television after all the chores had been completed. The phone interrupted us and one of the fellows jumped up and answered. This guy was a nervous excitable type who spoke with a thick Eastern European accent. All he spoke into the phone was: "What? Where?" Now, understand this is an excitable guy, so almost anything would have sounded like a major crisis. He pulled on his jacket and raced for the door, the word "moose" lingering in the smoke of his hasty exit.

All went quiet for almost two hours until we heard the guy's truck race back into the yard and onto the dog lot. By the time we got there all we could hear was a string of what must have been serious swearing in that Eastern European language. He had already jumped out of the truck and was kicking at something on the ground  That turned out to be a moose head and part of a neck and our friend kicked it as far as he could. Immediately the gang of puppies roaming the yard attacked and that was that, except for the story.

In between guttural thickly accented grunts of profanity this is what we discerned listening to our friend. He had arrived at the moose dead by the roadside before the charity butchers, but in dog mushing country word of mouth was faster than today's internet. Another musher pulled up at the same time and apparently quite an argument ensued.

Neither of them would give up claim to the moose nor could they arrive at a fair way to split the meat between them.

In the end the other musher hitched the hind end of the moose to his truck leaving our friend to latch onto the head. Then they drove off in opposite directions. Apparently the weak link in a moose carcass is the neck because part of that and the head were all our friend came away with. In his anger he didn't even stop to load it into his truck, just dragged it home bouncing along the road behind him.

Three of us started laughing and making bad jokes, which only infuriated him more. Our friend stormed off and we didn't see him until the next morning. 

Out in the dog lot while he was feeding he came across the head where the puppies had dragged it. He gave it one last kick and it disappeared into the woods never to be spoken of again. Until now.

Dead moose along Alaska's roadsides is serious business, but stealing might be too strong a word for the aftermath.


Sunday, August 21, 2016

From a solar eclipse to a cosmic fail, saving the world from facebook clutter



Moon’s shadow landfalls Oregon, crosses USA at 1800mph, exits SCarolina. Behold ‘Muuurica’s Eclipse.

Nothing like getting ahead of the game. Set your calendars now.









Governor of Louisiana praises President Obama’s flood response, warns Donald Trump


Sunflowers are about 7 feet tall now and there are blossoms on all of them, but so far only this one is fully open.
Best tweet of the day so far (from the Anchorage Police Department): "Three men charged with kidnapping. Serge Azede II and William Burgess are still outstanding." Even after a kidnapping, still better than others.



Best headline of the day so far: 

When Mongolian Wrestling Coaches Get Angry, They Get Naked


More people tired of Trump shenanigans







This woman has her own Olympic sport and she sure does stick the landing.

Saturday, August 20, 2016

Another effort in the campaign to keep other people's facebook pages less cluttered

I'm not much for promoting businesses but this Midas shop deserves a shoutout. Last year I had a couple of tires go flat on my four-wheeler. I took each in turn to the local Midas and both times they repaired the tires, including putting in tubes, and didn't charge me anything. At the time I thanked them and I figured in time I would take some business their way. So yesterday I took Jeep over there for a lube job. I don't think I was even there a full half-hour and again, no charge. All they said was come back when you break something. Did I go through a time warp or something?

Trump spent 49 seconds 'helping' unload toys off of a truck today.

Here's why the President didn't go to Louisiana yet

Best pun of the day so far.



Usain Bold guides a blind runner.



Thursday, August 18, 2016

If I had posted today this is what my friends would have seen

This was the NewYork City Parks Department's official response after taking down one of those
Trump statues:

‘NYC PARKS STANDS FIRMLY AGAINST ANY UNPERMITTED ERECTION IN CITY PARKS, NO MATTER HOW SMALL.’





Best headline of the day so far

Wife of top Texas anti-gay crusader divorces him to be with lesbian partner



Best news today and another round of the president's Rope A Dope campaign. Too bad the loyal opposition took that long vacation.  
President ends federal use of private, for-profit prisons



Can any of these announcers mention a previous year without saying "back in." You'd think the official citation would be Back In 1972.

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Here's what I might have liked or posted on facebook in the past 24 hours





There's some yellow showing on one of the sunflowers! Looks a little bit like that plant in "Little Shop of Horrors" doesn't it? Feed me!!!

I've noticed over the past week or so that the people who often have posted pro-Trump memes and comments in the past have gone very quiet.




A memory from three years ago:

Best headline of the day so far:

Sex pigs halt traffic after laser attack on Pokémon teens





This directly affects a dear friend of mine who has very few resources.


Why do the Olympic commentators call them automatic qualifiers? Aren't they simply qualifiers?

Best headlines ever

Naked pair fed LSD gummy worm to dog

Owners of a Noah's Ark replica file a lawsuit over rain damage

In Southcentral Alaska earthquake, damage originated in the ground, engineers say

A headline that could only be written in Alaska: At state cross country, Glacier Bears and Grizzlies sweep, Lynx repeat, Wolverines make history — and a black bear crosses the trail

Man kills self before shooting wife and daughter

Alabama governor candidate caught in lesbian sperm donation scandal

Sister hits moose on way to visit sister who hit moose.

Man caught driving stolen car filled with radioactive uranium, rattlesnake, whiskey

Man loses his testicles after attempting to smoke weed through a SCUBA tank

Church Mutual Insurance won't cover Church's flood damage because it's 'an act of God'

Homicide victims rarely talk to police

Meerkat Expert Attacked Monkey Handler Over Love Affair with Llama Keeper

GOP congressman opposes gun control because gay marriage leads to bestiality

Owner of killer bear chokes to death on sex toy

Support for legalizing pot hits all-time high

Give me all your money or my penguin will explode

How zombie worms have sex in whale bones

Crocodile steals zoo worker's lawn mower

Woman shot by oven while trying to cook waffles

Nude beach blowjob jet ski fight leads to wife's death

Woman stabs husband with squirrel for not buying beer Christmas Eve

GOPer files complaint against Democrat for telling the truth about Big Lie social posts

Man shot dead on Syracuse Street for 2nd time in 2 days

Alaska woman punches bear in face, saves dog

Johnny Rotten suffers flea bite on his penis after rescuing squirrel

Memorable quotations

The best way to know you are having an adventure is when you wish you were home talking about it." — a mechanic on the Alaska State Ferry System. Or as in my own case planning how I will be writing it on this blog.

"You can't promote principled anti-corruption without pissing off corrupt people." — George Kent

"If only the British had held on to the airports, the whole thing might have gone differently for us." — Mick Jagger

"You can do anything as long as you don't scare the horses." — a mother's favorite saying recalled by a friend

A poem is an egg with a horse inside” — anonymous fourth grader

“My children will likely turn my picture to the wall but what the hell, you only get old once." — Joe May

“Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut.” — Ernest Hemingway

When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth. Kurt Vonnegut

“If you wrote something for which someone sent you a cheque, if you cashed the cheque and it didn't bounce, and if you then paid the light bill with the money, I consider you talented.”Stephen King

The thing about ignorance is, you don't have to remain ignorant. — me again"

"It was like the aftermath of an orgasm with the wrong partner." – David Lagercrants “The Girl in the Spider’s Web.”

Why worry about dying, you aren't going to live to regret it.

Never debate with someone who gets ink by the barrel" — George Hayes, former Alaska Attorney General who died recently

My dear Mr. Frost: two roads never diverge in a yellow wood. Three roads meet there. — @Shakespeare on Twitter

Normal is how somebody else thinks you should act.

"The mark of a great shiphandler is never getting into situations that require great shiphandling," Adm. Ernest King, USN

Me: Does the restaurant have cute waitresses?

My friend Gail: All waitresses are cute when you're hungry.

I'm not a writer, but sometimes I push around words to see what happens. – Scott Berry

I realized today how many of my stories start out "years ago." What's next? Once upon a time?"

“The rivers of Alaska are strewn with the bones of men who made but one mistake” - Fred McGarry, a Nushagak Trapper

Many people hear voices when no one is there. Some of them are called mad and are shut up in rooms where they stared at walls all day. Others are called writers and they do pretty much the same thing. – Meg Chittenden

A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity. – Franz Kafka

We are all immortal until the one day we are not. – me again

If the muse is late, start without her – Peter S. Beagle

Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~Mark Twain Actually you could do the same thing with the word "really" as in "really cold."

If you are looking for an experience that will temper your vanity, this is it. There's no one to impress when you're alone on the trap line. – Michael Carey quoting his father's journal

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. – Benjamin Franklin

It’s nervous work. The state you need to write in is the state that others are paying large sums of money to get rid of. – Shirley Hazzard

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence -- Bertrand Russell

You know that I always just wanted to have a small ship to take stuff from a place that had a lot of that stuff to a place that did not have a lot of that stuff and so prosper.—Jackie Faber, “The Wake of the Lorelei Lee”

If you attack the arguer instead of the argument, you lose both

If an insurance company won’t pay for damages caused by an “act of God,” shouldn’t it then have to prove the existence of God? – I said that

I used to think getting old was about vanity—but actually it’s about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial. – Eugene O’Neill

German General to Swiss General: “You have only 500,000 men in your army; what would you do if I invaded with 1 million men?”

Swiss General: “Well, I suppose every one of my soldiers would need to fire twice.”

Writing is the only thing that when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.—Gloria Steinem

Exceed your bandwidth—sign on the wall of the maintenance shop at the West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center

One thing I do know, if you keep at it, you usually wind up getting something done.—Patricia Monaghan

Do you want to know what kind of person makes the best reporter? I’ll tell you. A borderline sociopath. Someone smart, inquisitive, stubborn, disorganized, chaotic, and in a perpetual state of simmering rage at the failings of the world.—Brett Arends

It is a very simple mind that only knows how to spell a word one way.—Andrew Jackson

3:30 is too late or too early to do anything—Rene Descartes

Everything is okay when it’s 50-below as long as everything is okay. – an Alaskan in Tom Walker’s “The Seventymile Kid”

You can have your own opinion but you can’t have your own science.—commenter arguing on a story about polar bears and global warming

He looks at three ex wives as a good start—TV police drama

Talkeetna: A friendly little drinking town with a climbing problem.—a handmade bumper sticker

“You’re either into the wall or into the show”—Marco Andretti on giving it all to qualify last at the 2011 Indy 500

Makeup is not for the faint of heart—the makeup guerrilla

“I’m going to relax in a very adult manner.”—Danica Patrick after sweating it out and qualifying half an hour before Andretti

“Asking Congress to come back is like asking a mugger to come back because he forgot your wallet.”—a roundtable participant on Fox of all places

As Republicans go further back in the conception process to define when life actually begins, I am beginning to think the eventual definition will be life begins in the beer I was drinking when I met her.—me again

Hunting is a “critical element for the long-term conservation of wood bison.”—a state department of Fish and Game official explaining why the state would not go along with a federal plan to reintroduce wood bison in Alaska because the agreement did not specifically allow hunting

Each day do something that won’t compute – anon

I can’t belive I still have to protest this shit – a sign carriend by an elderly woman at an Occupy demonstration

Life should be a little nuts or else it’s just a bunch of Thursdays strung together—Kevin Costner as Beau Burroughs in “Rumor has it”

You’re just a wanker whipping up fear —Irish President Michael D. Higgins to a tea party radio announcer

Being president doesn’t change who you are; it reveals who you are—Michelle Obama

Sports malaprops

Naked pair fed LSD gummy worm to dog

Owners of a Noah's Ark replica file a lawsuit over rain damage

In Southcentral Alaska earthquake, damage originated in the ground, engineers say

A headline that could only be written in Alaska: At state cross country, Glacier Bears and Grizzlies sweep, Lynx repeat, Wolverines make history — and a black bear crosses the trail

Man kills self before shooting wife and daughter

Alabama governor candidate caught in lesbian sperm donation scandal

Sister hits moose on way to visit sister who hit moose.

Man caught driving stolen car filled with radioactive uranium, rattlesnake, whiskey

Man loses his testicles after attempting to smoke weed through a SCUBA tank

Church Mutual Insurance won't cover Church's flood damage because it's 'an act of God'

Homicide victims rarely talk to police

Meerkat Expert Attacked Monkey Handler Over Love Affair with Llama Keeper

GOP congressman opposes gun control because gay marriage leads to bestiality

Owner of killer bear chokes to death on sex toy

Support for legalizing pot hits all-time high

Give me all your money or my penguin will explode

How zombie worms have sex in whale bones

Crocodile steals zoo worker's lawn mower

Woman shot by oven while trying to cook waffles

Nude beach blowjob jet ski fight leads to wife's death

Woman stabs husband with squirrel for not buying beer Christmas Eve

GOPer files complaint against Democrat for telling the truth about Big Lie social posts

Man shot dead on Syracuse Street for 2nd time in 2 days

Alaska woman punches bear in face, saves dog

Johnny Rotten suffers flea bite on his penis after rescuing squirrel