Guess who's coming to dinner

A little excitement around the bird feeders today. At the rate the birds are going through seed, not sure i can afford to feed a moose. Just opened my fourth 25 lb bag of black sunflower seeds this winter (and that doesn't count i don't know how many bags of the expensive chips and hearts). Wonder how many bags it takes to feed a moose. Of course if it hung around long enough there might be a payback. A funny only-in-Alaska story. Years ago a friend of mine was building a house. By the time winter came, all he had were the four concrete block walls surrounding the basement dug in the ground. Somehow a young moose got down in there and couldn't get out. My friend tried everything to get the moose out of there. Even, with a wary eye on the moose, built a ramp so it might walk out but nothing worked. In frustration he called the Department of Fish & Game, but they refused to do anything about it. Well, that seemed like a mandate. So, my friend bought some expensive feed, if i recall, it was oats and corn, but i could be wrong about that. After feeding it for about a month, well, you can guess what happened next. That was about the tenderest, most delicious moose ever put on a plate. And, though it sounds expensive to feed it, still cheaper than a charter flight to somewhere you might shoot one on a hunt. Kind of an interesting place to live where you can enjoy a beautiful animal walking through the yard, but in the same train think supper and without any guilt about it.

One time on the tour boat, a fellow from the nearby Native village went along. He hung out with me and we talked through most of the trip. When we started pushing through the brash ice in the water near the glacier, he was looking at the seals up on the burgs as much as the tourists were. One difference: Where they were oohing and aahing over the cute animals, he kept whispering "lunch.' I kept trying to shush him and he knew i was nervous about it and just kept it up, but never loud enough for anyone to hear, thankfully. One thing though, I had this trick where if i whistled a tune out the wheelhouse door, the seals would be curious and tended to stay up on the ice longer as we approached. I didn't whistle that day. While sympathetic to the need to hunt and the food source, i couldn't see teaching the hunter a new trick and making it easier for him. i doubt he would have known the right tune anyway. I had a running argument with another skipper who swore Mozart was the best music to whistle to keep the seals up on the icebergs. I found Eric Clapton's "Layla" worked best for me. Those long wailing notes seemed to mesmerize the seals

Some days I guess you just need to ramble, but how did I get from a moose around the bird feeders to whistling Clapton to seals near a glacier?