Expotition to the East Pole
July 2, 2008
The East Pole is mentioned often on this blog. It is the name I have given to place where I built a cabin in the Alaska Bush and visit as often as is possible. Why and expotition to the East Pole? An explanation for those who need one:
OK, here is the real quote from "Winnie-the-Pooh" (the real one)
"(Pooh) had had a tiring day. You remember how he discoverd the North Pole; well, he was so proud of this he asked Christopher Robin if there were any other Poles such that a Bear of Little Brain could discover.
“There’s a South Pole,” said Christopher Robin, “and I expect there’s an East Pole and a West Pole, though people don’t like talking about them.”
"Pooh was very excited when he heard this, and suggested they should have an expotition to discover the East Pole but Christopher Robin had thought of something else to do with Kanga, so Pooh went out to discover the East Pole himself."
That's where the name came from. When I first bought the land I had never seen it. I chose it off a map. All I knew was that it was East of the closest settlement. So when I proposed to a friend that we go find it I channeled Pooh's adventure and invited him on an expotition (Pooh's word) to the East Pole.
-- Winnie the Pooh author A. A. Milne (Did you know his brother is buried in Dillingham?)
The original art work for the books was done by E.H. Shepard
July 2, 2008
The East Pole is mentioned often on this blog. It is the name I have given to place where I built a cabin in the Alaska Bush and visit as often as is possible. Why and expotition to the East Pole? An explanation for those who need one:
OK, here is the real quote from "Winnie-the-Pooh" (the real one)
"(Pooh) had had a tiring day. You remember how he discoverd the North Pole; well, he was so proud of this he asked Christopher Robin if there were any other Poles such that a Bear of Little Brain could discover.
“There’s a South Pole,” said Christopher Robin, “and I expect there’s an East Pole and a West Pole, though people don’t like talking about them.”
"Pooh was very excited when he heard this, and suggested they should have an expotition to discover the East Pole but Christopher Robin had thought of something else to do with Kanga, so Pooh went out to discover the East Pole himself."
-- Winnie the Pooh author A. A. Milne (Did you know his brother is buried in Dillingham?)
April 1, 2018
Do these feathers make my ass look fat?
After a winter complicated by difficult weather, injury, snowmachine breakage and a solid week of working firewood, I decided to take a day off today. At the time I hadn't realized it is April Fools Day. In fact after all that April has offered a blessing.
In each of the past few years weather has forced me to leave before the end of March. But here it is April, there's plenty of snow, it gets down into the teens at night so the creeks stay frozen and that gives me at least another week and maybe two before I have to hightail it out of here.
I have a whole rack of lamb and some real baker potatoes I had brought out anticipating a visit from some friends who aren't coming after all. So that's thawed and I will feast later.
I planned to take it easy, if a chore or two came to mind and weren't too difficult I would do them at my leisure.
With hot chocolate in hand I checked and the mountain is out and in that moment was fortunate to watch an owl fly by in the valley below. Then after a tour of the Internet, I sharpened my chain saw. On a day like this that wore me out so I took a little nap.
Last night I had noticed my windows were dirty so, next I went outside and washed them, actually only the three I look out from the most. The paint was flaking off the sill of the picture window so I got the little sander and took care of that. I considered painting once the temperature went over 40, but the paint after four winters and summers of freezing and thawing was a sticky, gloppy, muddy mess, so no deal on that.
Of course there is still a lot of firewood to split, so I took a quick shot at that, filling the sled once and hauling it back to the stacks.
Interspersed between each of these chores were periods of quiet contemplation sitting in the sun watching the chickadees and not letting anything pressure me at all.
The only thing I have to do is dishes and that's no big deal.
As the chickadees flitted back and forth to the feeder I noticed a few of them are noticeably fatter than the others. At first I thought I had fed those especially well over the winter. Then I wondered if they were females developing eggs, or further, perhaps engorged like that they attract males.
The thermometer on the deck in direct sunlight went over 100 degrees. The one in the shade reads 44. Whichever it is, the day is marvelous.
So with those adventures behind me, I am about to tackle the dirty dishes.
Then it's dinner and a movie. Rack of lamb (on the Weber grill), huge baked potato, maybe some green beans and a glass of wine. Then "No country for old men." Isn't that title a beautiful paradox given the old man about to watch it deep in the Alaska forest? As far as I am concerned this country is great for old men, at least this one.
Stranger in the night
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Around 11 o'clock last night there came a knocking on my door. This is not good form in bear country even in winter. A strange, out-of-place noise on the porch, the first thing a guy grabs is a gun. So, I called through the door, "who's there?" A rather timid voice called back something like, "I am cold. Could I come in and warm up?"
I cracked the door open carefully, checked him out from head to toe, didn't see a weapon or for that matter claws and gnashing teeth, in fact I saw a human being who appeared to need some help. I had just started my going-to-bed routine and wasn't really looking for anything that could delay that downhill slide into sleep.
Nevertheless, I welcomed him in and closed the door behind him. I moved a chair close to the wood stove where he could sit and warm himself.
We chatted a little and slowly his story came out. He had gone to a nearby lake ice fishing with his cousin. At some point the cousin had gone out to the trail head on his snowmachine and left this guy to walk to the cousin's cabin in the dark in territory where he had never been before.
In the dark, the fellow missed the trail to the cabin and had walked two miles along the main trail before he saw my lights and decided to seek some shelter. At the moment I realized as I had been preparing to go to sleep, if he had come by 15 minutes later, my lights would have been turned off. My cabin is maybe a quarter mile from the trail and high on a hill so he never would have spotted it in the dark.
I had looked him over for signs of hypothermia, the temperature had dropped to about 5 degrees, but he seemed all right. At least he was suitably dressed for this journey. I put some water on to boil to make him some hot chocolate and as it was coming out that the cousin was returning at some point, I asked him if he had a flashlight. He didn't. Fortunately the moon illuminated the woods enough help a little. He said he had been using the flashlight app on his iPhone but his battery was down to 15 percent. He used some of that 15 percent to call his cousin. I had not turned off the generator yet so the cellular signal booster was still functioning and the call went through.
The cousin had made it to the trailhead and was ready to head back. I could hear the cousin arguing about things rather than figuring out how to meet. I didn't have much respect for the cousin to begin with – leaving this guy alone walking in the dark through unfamiliar terrain. The guy was trying to explain where he was and how he had missed their cabin but all the cousin did was shout insults.
The charge on his phone had probably fallen dangerously low at this point and I asked him what kind of phone it was. Perfect. I had my iPhone connected and charging and my cord fit his phone and thankful again the generator was still running, we plugged his in.
By this time the water boiled and I mixed some cocoa for him. He described where he had been and what he had passed while walking and I was able to figure out the general area of the cabin's location.
I drew him a map showing all the landmarks and where he was and the time and where he needed to go and also showed him a map on my iPad to give him a better picture of what I had drawn.
We decided the best thing for him would be to walk back down to the main trail and be on it when his cousin returned on his snowmachine and they could go on together.
I suggested he call the cousin again so we could get a time line for when he ought to be on the trail. Via texts we learned he was just starting out, so I checked the clock to get this fellow going in about half an hour.
We sat at the table and chatted while he sipped his hot chocolate and as subtly as I could I asked more questions in another attempt to ascertain any hypothermia symptoms.
It turned out he had grown up in Alaska but a few years ago he had ventured south, ending up in Southern California where he worked as a painter on movie sets.
I shared a little of my life but being wary of strangers, not too much. I kept my eye on the clock and when half an hour had passed, I gave him the map I had drawn, a cheap spare flashlight and a bottle of Ensure for some energy on the trail just in case. I had him enter my phone number into his phone in case something went wrong. By then it had reached 45 percent charged, a little better margin for him, again, just in case.
I watched him walk down the trail. When he reached the area I had been hauling firewood from with its tangle of interlocking loopy trails he followed the wrong one for a moment; it was a small loop that took him back to the main trail and gave me a little chuckle as I relaxed a bit when I felt he was safely on his way to the main trail.
I shut down all the noisemakers in the cabin so I could hear a snowmachine down on the main trail. After about 15 minutes I heard it and went out onto the porch to listen. Soon enough it stopped and then I could hear voices talking. Connected again, they drove away deeper into the woods.
I went back to my bed time routine and it was then I noticed, such a small thing, but an indication of character. With all that was going on and the worries about what was ahead, he had thought to put his cup into the sink with the other dirty dishes. I had to smile at that. It told me he was probably going to be all right.
Lost in the woods
I cracked the door open carefully, checked him out from head to toe, didn't see a weapon or for that matter claws and gnashing teeth, in fact I saw a human being who appeared to need some help. I had just started my going-to-bed routine and wasn't really looking for anything that could delay that downhill slide into sleep.
Nevertheless, I welcomed him in and closed the door behind him. I moved a chair close to the wood stove where he could sit and warm himself.
We chatted a little and slowly his story came out. He had gone to a nearby lake ice fishing with his cousin. At some point the cousin had gone out to the trail head on his snowmachine and left this guy to walk to the cousin's cabin in the dark in territory where he had never been before.
In the dark, the fellow missed the trail to the cabin and had walked two miles along the main trail before he saw my lights and decided to seek some shelter. At the moment I realized as I had been preparing to go to sleep, if he had come by 15 minutes later, my lights would have been turned off. My cabin is maybe a quarter mile from the trail and high on a hill so he never would have spotted it in the dark.
I had looked him over for signs of hypothermia, the temperature had dropped to about 5 degrees, but he seemed all right. At least he was suitably dressed for this journey. I put some water on to boil to make him some hot chocolate and as it was coming out that the cousin was returning at some point, I asked him if he had a flashlight. He didn't. Fortunately the moon illuminated the woods enough help a little. He said he had been using the flashlight app on his iPhone but his battery was down to 15 percent. He used some of that 15 percent to call his cousin. I had not turned off the generator yet so the cellular signal booster was still functioning and the call went through.
The cousin had made it to the trailhead and was ready to head back. I could hear the cousin arguing about things rather than figuring out how to meet. I didn't have much respect for the cousin to begin with – leaving this guy alone walking in the dark through unfamiliar terrain. The guy was trying to explain where he was and how he had missed their cabin but all the cousin did was shout insults.
The charge on his phone had probably fallen dangerously low at this point and I asked him what kind of phone it was. Perfect. I had my iPhone connected and charging and my cord fit his phone and thankful again the generator was still running, we plugged his in.
By this time the water boiled and I mixed some cocoa for him. He described where he had been and what he had passed while walking and I was able to figure out the general area of the cabin's location.
I drew him a map showing all the landmarks and where he was and the time and where he needed to go and also showed him a map on my iPad to give him a better picture of what I had drawn.
We decided the best thing for him would be to walk back down to the main trail and be on it when his cousin returned on his snowmachine and they could go on together.
I suggested he call the cousin again so we could get a time line for when he ought to be on the trail. Via texts we learned he was just starting out, so I checked the clock to get this fellow going in about half an hour.
We sat at the table and chatted while he sipped his hot chocolate and as subtly as I could I asked more questions in another attempt to ascertain any hypothermia symptoms.
It turned out he had grown up in Alaska but a few years ago he had ventured south, ending up in Southern California where he worked as a painter on movie sets.
I shared a little of my life but being wary of strangers, not too much. I kept my eye on the clock and when half an hour had passed, I gave him the map I had drawn, a cheap spare flashlight and a bottle of Ensure for some energy on the trail just in case. I had him enter my phone number into his phone in case something went wrong. By then it had reached 45 percent charged, a little better margin for him, again, just in case.
I watched him walk down the trail. When he reached the area I had been hauling firewood from with its tangle of interlocking loopy trails he followed the wrong one for a moment; it was a small loop that took him back to the main trail and gave me a little chuckle as I relaxed a bit when I felt he was safely on his way to the main trail.
I shut down all the noisemakers in the cabin so I could hear a snowmachine down on the main trail. After about 15 minutes I heard it and went out onto the porch to listen. Soon enough it stopped and then I could hear voices talking. Connected again, they drove away deeper into the woods.
I went back to my bed time routine and it was then I noticed, such a small thing, but an indication of character. With all that was going on and the worries about what was ahead, he had thought to put his cup into the sink with the other dirty dishes. I had to smile at that. It told me he was probably going to be all right.
Lost in the woods
You can hike Alaska trails, but can you haul?
on the right, smart ass)
It was time for an Alaska adventure anyway
That's why there's a diagonal from 4 to 5. The actual trail is between 5
and 6. That's the Knik River where I was headed in the lower right.
Thinking always produces a new plan and sure enough one popped up today. I decided carrying the unit in a buttoned up pocket might not let it receive or send a signal and I could not remember if had positioned the antenna facing in toward my body or outward. It had worked before from a backpack on the trail to the East Pole.
Robert Frost -- The road not taken
Re-entry
as compelling as loading is on the way out.
Nothing about politics
March 6, 2017
about
It's been quite a while and we have a lot to go over so we'd better get started. This is going to be mostly about the East Pole so be ready for that. I seem to be all healed from my adventure with the maul that sent me to the emergency room last time. Big whew on that one. You get to be my age and you wonder every time you get hurt if this one's going to be permanent I came in to the East Pole two days ago. I can't remember having a better trail – like a highway. Then I got farther up the trail to the cabin than ever before pulling a heavy freight sled. I was here with everything in the cabin in less than two hours. Even got the snowmachine unstuck where it had stopped. And for once I wasn't exhausted. Sometimes parts of that chore slop over into the next day.
Chickadees arrived just about the same time, so I fed birds even before I got a fire stated. It's been cold here and the indoor thermometer read zero. In two hours it had reached comfort level though not completely warmed yet. Opened the cabinet doors to thaw all the canned goods.
By midday Sunday I was moved in and living here and comfortable with it. That usually takes three days or more. Felt so good I made a real meal, roasted chicken breast, mashed potatoes and gravy and green beans. Usually it's Dinty Moore and Chef Boy R Dee for the first few days.
Had a bit of a mystery early on. A couple of days before I left last time I had tried to bring down a huge birch tree for firewood. Talking 70 or 80 feet, another one that blocked the Denali view. The problem was it didn't fall. I cut the notch on the side where I wanted it to fall and then a horizontal cut above it from the other side. I got almost halfway through and the tree leaned backward pinching the bar and chain in the cut under a couple of tons of heavy birch. I tried yanking it in a couple of directions with a come-along but it wouldn't budge. I finally had to give up. I unbolted the bar and chain from the rest of the saw and took it up the hill, hoping the tree would fall while I was gone.
Well it had fallen all right but a new snowfall buried it. A few cursory eyeball searches couldn't locate it. No visible bumps in directions I had thought it would fall. So yesterday I went down and poked around with my avalanche probe. I found it but it had fallen in quite a different direction than I had expected. As a matter of fact if you drew a line between the two expected paths, this would have made a 90-degree angle. That's the kind of situation that made logging one of the most dangerous jobs in the country. I am glad I wasn't cutting at it when it went down.
By that time it was getting late so I went back to the cabin. I did a test of my arm and tried to split one of the huge sections left over from the last tree. I did it with a small sledge hammer and a wedge and split it into halves. Those I could split more with the small maul, a sled full.
Then today I reassembled the chainsaw with new bar and chain and headed down the hill. It took two tanks full of gas but it is now all dug out and cut into sections. I brought three up and found out something wonderful. They split easily. I was just trying it out to see how they would work and didn't expect that. I was able to split all three including one of the huge ones that came from near the base of the tree. So now I am even for the trip so far, three sleds of firewood out to burn, three put on the stacks. If it's this easy I will get well ahead of it by the time I am done with this tree. Next year's firewood..
Clear and cold and I see a half moon a'risng and Venus bright off to the northwest. Temperature goes just below zero at night and then up to almost 20 during the day. Beautiful night skys with moon shadows playing down the hill. Not quite warm enough to sit on the porch with a scotch in the sun yet, but it's coming. I even learned something about my camera today that will make my pictures better. Nothing to help my view of things though.
At this writing there is a faint line of pink right on the horizon. The mountains are black shadows against a sky deep gray heading into the night. A few stars out to accompany Venus on her voyage through the night. Creedence on the stereo. Peaceful. Good to be home.
A whole new level
I am thankful we survived this flight
We spotted a dog team making way across the open snow and Crazy Horse asked if I wanted to make a picture. I said sure and he immediately put the Cessna 172 into a precipitous dive toward the musher. I snapped the picture, dropped the camera and grabbed the hand-hold overhead and held on for dear life. It was in that moment I realized I was clinging for safety to the very thing that was going to kill me and that if we were going to crash there was nothing I could do about it. Over the course of almost two weeks flying along with the race, Crazy Horse and I had several more adventures but from that day forward I had taken a fatalistic attitude toward flying and it never bothered me again. It didn't even bother me (much) during another serious flight along the Seward Peninsula a couple of years later.
1 comment: JanNovember 23, 2016 at 2:35 PM Nice. And riveting.
That time we built an official 'historic site'
table late in the night and around a campfire way off the pavement somewhere.
This one comes from the latter. It occurred on a remote beach in Alaska's Prince William Sound and led to quite a different result than any of us could have expected.
Sitting around a campfire in front of a teepee my friends used as a headquarters for kayak trips they guided in the sound we hatched the plan to build a sauna for our use over the course of a summer. It came up as a whim but as the line goes in Stan Rogers' song "Mary Ellen Carter" "with every jar that hit the bar" the idea became more of a mission.
A ready supply of lumber in the form of weathered cedar planks lay just across the bay at an abandoned cannery. We all had tools and a quick call on a radio to another friend coming out the next day produced a supply of nails and some hinges and we were on our way. A stove and pipe would have to come out later.
The next day while a couple of friends and I made several trips across the bay in my 19-foot boat hauling lumber, others drew up a design, found a level spot and cleared it in preparation for the construction
Along with the weathered cedar the old cannery produced other treasures: some metal roofing in good enough shape to cover our building and a box of the old-time square nails which we thought would give our steambath some character. Little did we know it might give it too much character.
With half a dozen people working over the course of the next day we had the structure on a solid foundation and built all the way to the roof. The next day we built a fancy door and fashioned a handle from gnarled driftwood. At that point I had to leave to go back to work and it fell to others to complete the structure.
That summer proved so busy I never did get back to see the finished project, but when I came back the following spring a bunch of us went out there and had a fine party on that beach to kick off the summer. After that, the boat work became hectic and it wasn't until August the chance arose to go back.
At the time I was carrying four Bureau of Land Management surveyors who were documenting historic sites chosen by Natives in the area under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. We visited several bays and coves over ten days until one day we pulled into that very bay where we'd built the sauna. As was my custom I asked the surveyor what was in this bay.
He was kind of excited. He said the Natives had claimed a spot in the bay were there was a foundation for an old cabin and a steambath that was still in use. He expected to have a sauna while we were there. I became immediately suspicious. He showed me a photograph and sure enough it was our sauna. I started laughing while the others looked at me curiously until one asked what was so funny.
I looked at them very seriously and said, I built that goddamed historic steambath. Yup, the Natives had come along and claimed our sauna as their own and indeed one of historic significance. The only thing historic about that building was the imprint of my skinny white ass on a bench inside. But what can you do? If we went too far into the legalities we probably had built an illegal structure to begin with; we had no legitimate claim to it. I don't know what happened to that sauna though a fellow in another port on the opposite side of the sound told me one day he had found a sauna and described the island. A welder, he worked up a fancy stove for it, but then he disappeared too.
Whether it is still there or not I have no idea and most of the people who knew about it either have died or dispersed across the globe. But sometimes I like to think of future tourists tracing the history of Prince William Sound staring into a roped-off area that protects that building which was my contribution to the Native history of the sound.
Perspectives
October 15, 2016RELATED LINKS
Oh yeah? How cold was it?
When Alaska surprises you
with 80-degree weather
When I came back I went about taking care of that and ordered a couple of lightweight pullovers and a shirt LLBean called sunsmart. I liked the shirt and on a whim one night (late night, glass of wine, credit card sort of thing) I ordered another one.
This time I read the label. What it says is this shirt has a UBF rating of 50 plus. In addition, it's cool, moisture-wicking, breathable and quick drying. You can also roll it up and stick it in a backpack and it takes up very little space and weighs almost nothing.
I haven't put them to a real test yet but so far loving them. I don't often recommend a product but I think this one's a winner. (And, no, I am not being paid to do this.)
A few things I learned in the past couple of days
Another one of those nickel quizzes
Mission accomplished
June 19, 2016
A few things I learned in the past two days
when it's an abnormal year and everything is twice as high as usual, get off the damned four-wheeler and walk around to find the trail instead of just blasting into the pucker brush. Stuck twice between the main trail and the cabin straddling tussucks and high centered on a log I should have cut out years ago. For the second one I was glad I had brought along a comealong (A thing learned on a previous trip.) (Also later I took the chainsaw downhill and turned that log into sawdust."
Even though this is Alaska, if it's going to be 80 degrees, you really should consider bringing along some sunblock.
If you are hooking up a heavy trailer on a down slope, DO NOT get between the trailer and the four-wheeler.
And, speaking of 80 degrees, I didn't have one shirt out there that isn't wool or flannel.
Don't pick up a steel tool that's been laying (lieing?) in the sun for three hours.
Thirty-year-old Bic pens don't work.
Fair sized blocks of dry ice are great. Tiny ones six inches square and half an inch thick are not.
One thing I haven't learned is how to handle photos in blogger on an iPad!
Addendum: Apparently I suffered hot sun in the past. A massive search did not turn up any sun block, but I did uncover a substantial supply of aloe burn ointment.
Five things I learned in the past two days
There goes the neighborhood
Growing up, Daniel Boone was one of my heroes, along with Davy Crockett (the real one, not the Disney version). When others played Cowboys and Indians, I played Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett. I even had an argument with an eighth grade teacher who said the cowboys were the most romantic figures in American history.
Fast forward again, about 30 years to the day I came out here a couple of years ago and looked across the arroyo at a new cabin under construction. Worse than smoke, I could see the cabin. I felt violated, now like my friend somebody was part of my problem, but of course whoever was buidling over there had a dream too so I made my peace with it and ignored it as much as I could. I decided the neighborhood was probably still all right especially considering I and probably they only come out on weekends and chances were good we woudn't come out on the same weekends.
So now here goes the part about the neighborhood going to hell. The new cabin kind of blocks the trail I usually cut up to the small lake west of the cabin. So I set out to find a trail some friends of mine use that in the past cut across the far end of the lake. I thought I had found it and headed along it but ended up in somebody's back yard. No one home. I used their trail to go back down to the main one and in time came across the trail to the new neighbor's place. I hadn't heard anything and couldn't discern any tracks so I assumed no one was there. I went up it planning to go right on by and check out the lake.
But as I passed the house I saw something on the porch that sent a chill through me. BICYCLES! Fat-tired bicycles. OMG, someone was there and, gasp, they came in on bicycles. How am I supposed to brag about living in the Bush when you can get here on a bicycle. And I was stuck. At this point the polite thing to do was stop, say hello and intruduce myself rather than ride rudely with my loud machine through their yard. I couldn't see into the house and I didn't want to shout, so I shut off the machine, waved and waited to see if anyone came out.
A young couple came out shortly. dressed from head to toe in LL Bean and REI fashions. We exchanged introductions and pleasantries and I explained what I was doing in their yard and apologized, and that was that.
I headed off and made a tour of the lake, then bushwacked a trail back to my house only to sit on the porch in the sun contemplating the intrusions of bicyclists into my wilderness.Of course they are sitting over there shaking their heads at a crazy old fart who rides a noisy, stinky snowmachine.
In the long run I guess Bob Dylan had it right: "You can be in my dream if I can be in yours," if a bit grudgingly.
Five things I've learned in the past two days
March 8, 2017
2. How to make cold water when every bit of water in the house is near boiling and you just poured two cups of it into a pile of Jell-O powder. Otherwise you have to go through your options and then take one cup of that hot water outside and pack it with snow until it's cold and then finish the job.
3. You probably shouldn't freeze Cortisone 10. It comes out all yellow and kind of oily.
4. You shouldn't leave water in a plastic pitcher when there's a possibility it could freeze. Otherwise as the ice melts it will leak through the expansion cracks, run along the counter and soak the bottoms of a box of instant mashed potatoes and a box of Honey Nut Cheerios.
5. This is a good place to watch the entire Ally McBeal series because the music is so great and if I had access to iTunes, I would be online constantly buying music. Too bad I am about to start the fifth and last season. And, here's a new contest. I have another series here to watch. Nickel to whomever can guess which one. A hint: It's a little more like Alaska than Ally.
I'll be here all month, stay tuned.
Some days the medicine doesn't work, or, why a bald guy owns a hair dryer
A memory for Throwback Thursday
2015
New Year's Eve 2015 - 2016
Then the preciptiation turned to snow and the wind picked up from the southwest, unusual for this hillside where the wind is usually gentle and comes from the southeast. The snow and wind reached blizzard status for a while as I watched and let my thoughts wander.
The other night I had dinner with some friends who have lived this way and one asked me what I do all day. I didn't have a ready answer and mumbled something about firewood. It's difficult to explain
The blizzard finally blew itself out after some pretty strong gusts. It looked like some trees might go down but I didn't hear or see any. There is that question again - yes trees make sounds when they fall whether anyone is around or not.
About then I noticed the angel's light. Not long after that the sky brightened but left the mountain shaded in clouds all day.
Time to head down the hill and split some wood. I did a couple of sleds full and hauled them one at a time up the hill. Unfortunately I couldn't take the wood directly to the pile because the snow on the roof had started to slide. Shortly after I came out in early December I had gone up on the roof and shoveled down the ridge to break that surface tension and cleared above the smoke stack so the snow would not take the pipe with it when it slid.
Each side of the roof is 392 square feet and covered by densely compacted snow at least two feet deep. That adds up to heavy. You don't want to be under the eaves when that lets go. So I had to dump the wood under the porch for the time being rather than take the chance of having a ton or two of snow land on me.
So after dozing a little more I went out and stacked the wood. I've barely scratched the surface and what I've already split is about half a cord.
For New Year's Eve dinner I had a New York strip steak, with a small can of peas. That's the first beef I have had since my medical emergency last spring, well, except for the rare 97 percent lean hamburger. So, all good.
That was probably the biggest meal I've had out here this month except for the rack of lamb at Christmas. I fought through the urge to take a nap because I had one more New Year's Eve plan.
I had set those aside for a New Year bonfire and about 10 p.m. headed down the hill to the open spot where I often burn stuff. With help from what little remained in an old can of Coleman fuel, I set myself quite a blaze for a while and as I watched, the Northern Lights came out overhead and stayed for maybe half an hour. At one time three distinct bright green bands stretched from horizon to horizon. And while the moon was behind the mountain here, its light was hitting Denali and at 11 o'clock at night, dark, you could still see the mountain almost 200 miles away.
Very few recollections came to mind from the past year despite the tranquility of the moment. Except for the aforementioned medical event, it was a pretty uneventful year. It closed out with this wonderful month at the East Pole, so that's at least a positive ending as is the fact that there is more firewood under the house now than when I arrived Dec. 1.
But there is this: With Elon Musk in the world and his succes with Space-X completing a round trip into space, I feel very safe in saying, "yeah, baby, let's go for another orbit and ride this rock around the sun one more time."
Angels' Light
Some days the medicine does work, but it took a scary moment
of the angry bluebird?
March 14, 2015
The first trip to the East Pole in winter always presents extraordinary difficulty. The cabin stands on a fairly steep hill and I seldom get up it on the first try with the snowmachine. The way it works most often is I blast through the snow until the machine gets stuck, Then I put on snowshoes, grab what I can carry and hike the rest of the way. Once I've rested a little bit and maybe started a fire, I grab a sled at the cabin and go back down the hill and put all the perishables and what else I can haul into the sled and trudge up the hill again. Often the machine gets stuck more than once.
I had to twist and squirm until my feet were downhill from the rest of my body and in time weasel around into a kneeling or hunkering position before I could stand up. That beat up my leg muscles to the point where I had to stop and rest after only ten or so steps. Thighs began to ache, calves ached, even felt weak at times wondering how many steps I had left in me. And that doesn't even begin to address how often I had to stop because I was breathing too hard and had to get that under control.
A comment from facebook: OMG, I was feeling that - the shortness of breath, the fatigue, the burning of thigh muscles. I don't know if it's bad shape or age or both. I have a hard time accepting my age....everyone is old but me....who am I kidding?
Trials and tribulations at the East Pole
Why the East Pole
My machinery is aging faster than I am
In a striking irony, it is the wars that take us to the eve of destruction that also necessitate the development of the technology to replace limbs and treat other wounds of the soldiers returning from the bloody battlefields of the world. In simpler terms, while old model snowmachines suffer for a lack of spare parts, spare parts for humans are more available than ever, and many of them have applications for the older models at least slowing the decline into obsolescence of each human body. Even with continuing development, it still might be a good idea to cosy up to the parts lady ahead of time.
A COMMENT FROM FACEBOOK: Janice Edwards Lovely meditation on life and change, Tim. Great post!
The case of the disappearing moose and other mysteries of spring
Melissa, McGonnegal and a muddy trail through an Alaska lifetime
a ballerina who decides to teach the moose, who usually
just stands around, some ballet steps.
Beck: Turn Away
In Alaska, you have to pay attention all the time
moving on.
A post for Suzy
But they can be incredibly belligerent. One year on the trail to the East Pole a group of us came upon a young moose lying down in the trail that had been packed down with deep snow on both sides of it. There were seven of us in a line back down the trail but that wasn't fazing the moose which was determined to stay where he was. They do get stressed in winter with a food source difficult to find and they do what they can to conserve their energy often preferring packed trails to slogging through deep snow. We tried everything we could think of to nudge him off the trail. I even hit him in the head with a jar of baby food but no deal. Someone else fired a gun into the air but the moose would not budge. What moved him was when a man maneuvered around behind him in the deep snow and he jumped up and ran off the trail. Finding himself in deep snow again he curved around and headed back toward the trail in the middle of the line of snowmachines. The woman in front of me stood frozen as the moose came directly toward her and I shouted and waved my arms enough that he turned away again.
The moose only went a few steps and then curved back toward the trail, this time toward me. I had my pistol out and had leveled it at him as he charged toward me, but at the last second he turned and tromped his way across the sled I was hauling behind the machine and this time went into the deep snow and trudged off a ways, lifting his knees high as they do, churning up the snow. As I was the last one in line this solved our problem and we moved on.
At least I thought the problem had been solved but there was one more issue. You see, that sled was full of Christmas presents for the holiday celebration with my wife and son at the cabin. Several items had taken a hit from his hooves as he ran across the sled. Nothing was damaged beyond repair but in subsequent years we always laughed when we pulled out a board game or jigsaw puzzle with its box broken or partly crushed to remind us of the moose who stomped Christmas.
In Alaska you have to pay attention all the time
Procrastination isn't going to beat the snowstorm
How big was it?
This one was a different matter. For one, it was huge, much bigger than the first one and situated in such a way if not cut properly it could have fallen in any direction. The first one already had a good lean in a downhill direction. This one not so much.
Now, approaching a tree that weighs tons and can fall on you, takes some planning. Where to drop it: the safest direction, but also a direction in which you have ample access for the process of bucking it up into firewood lengths. Then in this country in deep snow you have to consider footing too. You want it so your feet don't slip, but you also want to be able to get the hell out of the way quickly in case the tree doesn't go where it's supposed to.
Think about this: The logging industry usually makes the top ten list for dangerous jobs along with fishing in Alaska. There are serious injuries and deaths almost every year. And, those guys are pros; they know what they are doing. Then a neophyte like me wanders into the woods and tries to take down a huge tree based mostly on the instructions that came with the chainsaw he bought which is a little on the light side for work like this. Granted I have done it enough now I feel like I know the basics, but I am nowhere near the supposed proficiency of those professionals in the deep woods down south, the ones who suffer injuries and deaths at least at a nation-class level.
So I approached this guy very carefully. My planning paid off; the tree came down exactly where I had expected it to land.
How big a tree is it? After it came down I made a rough measurement from the stump to the highest branch I could find. It was between 60 and 70 feet tall. It was a little difficult to tell because there were gaps and a lot of upper branches ended up buried in the snow. There's also this: My 50-foot tape measure only went to 48 feet. I recalled a business law teacher I had years ago. He once counted the paper clips in a 100-count package. There were 97. He then figured how much the company saved over a year by giving consumers three fewer paper clips in each box. It was considerable. And then I wondered how much this tape-measure company saved by counting on the fact that very few people would measure out to 50 feet and cutting off two feet. Two feet of metal tape, plus printing times a couple hundred thousand sold. Again, probably a considerable amount. So I had to measure twice, estimate the gaps and came up with something taller than 60 feet.
Height, though, isn't the only measure of a tree. The diameter of the trunk at the point of the lowest cut I made was a little more than 22 inches. Probably should have measured circumference too because I can't quite get my arms around those lower ones. That doesn't matter much because I can't lift them either. This is dense wood and it is h-e-a-v-y.
So today, it is down, bucked up and stacked next to the trail at the bottom of the hill. A few rounds have been split with many more to go. I will have to split the big ones down there and bring them up in pieces. There are still some branches deep in the snow also and I might have to wait for summer to cut them. Some of the branches I have already cut up are larger than some trees I have cut in the past. So there's a long way to go yet.
Still, it's a warm feeling just having accomplished this much of the process and knowing with some confidence that I will have an adequate supply of firewood for a while. And I haven't even gotten to the point yet where Thoreau started counting for his "wood warms you twice" statement.
As my friend Joe May says, "out here a man is judged by the size of his wood pile."
There's also the joy of taking Denali pictures without those twigs in them.
To cut or not to cut
Enough of that, Mr. Captain, I tied it right
And sure enough, she had. I laughed away my embarrassment and stuffed that incident away in my arrogant captain file, hoping in the future I would remember to look before I assumed anybody needed to be taught anything ever again.
And then there was this today from Nikki herself: That is awesome! Funny, I also remember my first day on the job when I tried to tie the boat up and left it about a foot from the dock... and you looked at me like I was crazy then showed me how to put some muscle into it and get it right up to edge. I tied it perfectly every time after that... I think it was you that taught me that clove hitch! Great memories. I will share this with my parents-they'll get a kick out of it.
Don't worry, be happy, Big Mouth Billy Bass is watching out for you
Oh, what a tangled web we weave
Bush rules: break one and pay a price
I wish you were beautiful
A most fortunate encounter
When Plan B doesn't work
about 35 feet above ground.
ground are from earlier pieces whittled off the trunk.
To demonstrate the force, they lined up nine mannequins along the deck of a ship and then backed down on a line until it broke. The snap back cut the first six or seven mannequins in half, and hit the next two or three with a force estimated to be fatal. As that line on the tree reached banjo string tension I decided not to go further. At that point, I left it for a few weeks while my mind worked on Plan C.
Never underestimate the value of a nap in the problem-solving process
Waypoint 1 at the right is the cabin and Waypoint 8 at left is the trail head.
That's the Talkeetna River winding across the top. Talkeetna is to the west
(left) past the edge of the map.
All geared up but you can't get there from here
Hillbilly Hangout recipes for a new year.
Help! I've fallen and I can't get up
Katniss and the chopping block
Pole, circa 1987, holding that 16-pound maul.
Firewood and revery
JJ Watt does it too
SCHOOLED: More recently I was schooled on doing things like a girl. Mo' ne Davis is 13 years old. She is the first girl to pitch and win a Little League World Series game and also the first to pitch a shutout in that tournament. She throws a 70 mph fastball. And what does she say about that? In a quietly defiant voice she says, "That's throwing like a girl." Watch out world.
Fair and fall
A very satisfying day, indeed
Fair winds, my friend
I guess I probably got my money's worth
sporting new camo rails.
It's about that stump
Time now to give the saw a good cleaning, install the shiny new chain and get about cutting firewood.
The original problem.
Oh no, I missed our anniversary
October 15 marked forty years living in Alaska. But it will never be enough. Like August Birch-Alder says, "a real Alaskan is someone who has lived here a year longer than you have." So until you are the last one standing, you aren't one. I can deal with it. I've put in my time and I've had my adventures and to some that is an accomplishment. I like the idea of living in a place where endurance counts, someplace the vast majority of people don't want to, in this case often dissuaded by the climate. (Shhh. Our little secret.) Whenever I have to describe something about Alaska to a new person, I try to make it sound as harsh as possible, so while they will appreciate the place, they wouldn't want to live here. So many Alaskans moved here from someplace else and over the years I have discovered a good number of them wished the gates had closed once they were inside, me included. Unrealistic, of course. So, endurance counts and 40 years is a milestone. It only takes 30 to qualify for an obituary in Alaska Magazine.
Now about that meme. No matter how good the news, something will always come along to put you in your place. Turns out my birthday, which is within a few days of the Alaska anniversary, has been designated International Day of Failure. First one who says that explains a lot is off my list. To the good, science is based on failure and learning from a failure allows you to move on to bigger and better failures. So it goes.
Another November 22 rolls around
Thanksgiving
is a male and female on the feeder enjoying Thanksgiving.
Tonight I look forward to seeing Lady Gaga and the Muppets thanksgiving special. That should provide the a topping to the day to be thankful about also.
A dangerous undertaking, defining Alaska state pride
Later in the day I was chatting with another person from snow country and the subject turned to my recent surgery. I mentioned that I had a nice new scar on the side of my neck. She said it would probably shrink to almost nothing and my response was, "darn, we Alaskans are proud of our scars."
Right now the temperature is just about zero and I have to go out and split kindling so I can have a fire in the morning.
"Damn this weather," he said as he smiled looking over the huge wood pile he had split and stacked earlier in the year. Alaska pride, indeed.
Also published at Alaska Commons
It's official: Alaska and Montana have the most state pride.
Why people knock on wood
And if more moose weren't enough, we are now getting pounded by a wind storm. When I came around the curve before the bridge over the river last night, bammo a whiteout of snow blowing up from below and before I could even hit the brakes I slammed into a snowdrift big enough to almost stop the Jeep. Then I had to stop anyway because for a moment I couldn't even see the guard rail next to me.
Intermittent power outages since early this morning, to add to the fun. Already have more snow than I have seen in a whole winter since I moved to this area with more forecast over the week. And, of course, the snowblower is back at the shop while we all try to figure out why it is throwing the transmission drive belt. Temperature rose from a couple of degrees below zero when i left for work yesterday to 34 today. That means all the hard packed snow in the driveway softened up and trying to get out today I almost got stuck with the Jeep in four wheel drive with the trailer toting the snowblower attached. That is not an inviting prospect. When you get a four-wheel drive vehicle stuck it is stuck, there is no easy way out. AAA might get a call before this is done.
Soooo, been up since 7 struggling with this including having to go out in the wind to split some kindling for a fire just in case. Could I get away with telling you the wind blew some of the smaller sticks away? I didn't think so. Would have been fun to report, but it didn't happen. One of those days when it's too windy to haul rock. Still, through all of this, the birds are crowding the feeders. Along the drive this morning there was an eagle trying to buck the wind and he was pretty much standing still in the air, barely holding his own. And the drive to work, beginning with another precarious trip down the driveway still in front of me while I try to catch a quick nap.
The road into town is supposed to be clear and very driveable. Knock on wood.
A BIT OF AN UPDATE: So I wrote "knock on wood" but I didn't knock. As a result, I was able to blast out of the driveway and make it to the corner, but about 200 yards down the road I got the Jeep stuck, in four-wheel drive, in a snowdrift in the middle of the road. There's a broad flat expanse of a gravel yard that the wind was howling across only to build the drift up in the roadway. One car was already stuck and I tried to go around it, unfortunately into a deeper part of the drift. Still, I was about to make it when I saw another truck, a white one with no lights on (so easy to spot in blinding blowing snow) and I stopped, that was it, all four wheels spinning. There were a couple of people around to help the first car so I joined in, then we got mine out and off I went again heading for work.
On the way I learned later a gust of 104 mph hit across the mountains above where I was driving at the time. Again blowing drifting snow brought traffic to a complete halt in a whiteout, only this time on a six-lane 65 mph highway. Scary what was coming up behind me. But, we all got through it. Gusts so hard they moved the Jeep sideways, with that big sail area. So now, all I have to do is get home tonight. Winds are supposed to die down a couple of hours before I leave so I should be all right. Knock on wood. Now if I could just find some wood in this sanitary bland office.
Saturday morning, January 2012
9 a.m. Saturday: minus 20, severe clear, nothing but that in the forecast.
Sixty degree drop in a little more than 48 hours, yet another Alaska adventure. But, the driveway is finally cleared, birds all over the feeders, woodpecker at one, cloud of redpolls, scattered pine grosbeaks, a chickadee now and then making its wavy approach, a nuthatch waiting in the tree and one fat grouse picking the leavings off the snow on the ground.
Oh, and make it four days out of five with a moose in the road and that doesn't count the three on the way into town yesterday. Man, I wish I had knocked on wood.
It's the time now for the annual January deep cold. Leaving a trickle of water running so it activates the well pump and prevents the line from freezing. Early morning trek into the cold to plug in the car so it won't have to strain too hard to start. Early morning dish washing to trick the water heater into raising the temperature for a good shower later, and even a spare electric heater on in the bedroom. Oh global where is thy warming.
The good news is that a Russian tanker carrying fuel oil and gasoline to Nome, escorted by a U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker made landfall overnight saving the city from having to fly in fuel at outrageous prices for the winter. They pushed through 300 miles of pack ice, one night making only about five miles. Add it to Alaska lore. Farther north there are other villages running out of fuel, though, and they won't be able to be reached from the sea. It really makes me wonder if a Shell oil platform farther north has some trouble at this time of year, how any equipment gets there. Oh they have assured us nothing can go wrong.... go wrong ... go wrong.
At least a week of the cold, but you never trust a forecast that far out into the future, go with it, roll with it, ride the rock.
Epic snowfall
The photo isn't from this year. It is of our house in that town during a similar snow. When it started there was less than a foot of snow on the ground. When it stopped 36 hours later we had received 51 inches. For perspective my son was about 5 feet tall when this was taken.
What does it mean to squirrel something away
Partial answer. Anyone who has bird feeders knows the constant battle with squirrels, keeping them from stealing what you put out for birds. For the past year or so, there haven't been many around and the theory was feral cats in the neighborhood or owls or eagles got them. This winter at least one has showed up and I have caught him on a couple of the feeders and often poking around on the ground for what the birds spill. A couple of times I ran at him shouting and that seemed to keep him from trying that feeder again. But squirrels are nothing if not persistent.
Today watching out the window for a while I saw one run across the driveway until he reached the side where the snowblower had left about a foot high cut vertical wall. He disappeared into that wall and then as I kept watching he emerged from the snow 20 feet away at the base of one of the feeders. I would not have suspected squirrels tunnel into snow, but it sure looks like he did. With the snow surface as hard as it is, you have to wonder why make that tunnel when he could just as easily run across the surface. But, by the tracks it looks like he uses it quite often.
Now at times those squirrels have reached the limits of tolerance and to protect the garden one year I bought a live trap that I have never used. I haven't used it around the feeders for fear it might catch a bird, but if the squirrels bother me this year I am thinking that tunnel would be a perfect place to set it. About in the middle, dig down to the tunnel, place the trap and then put everything back the way it was. Have to put some kind of marker in the snow so I can find it again. It would be nice if I could figure some way I could see a signal if the squirrel or something else goes into it. Or, maybe just wait until an ermine catches him in that tunnel. That would take care of it.
Why all this concern over one little squirrel? When I came in from filling the feeders today, I had to write on the shopping list that I need my third 40-pound bag of sunflower seeds this winter.
FOR ALL THE PEOPLE HITTING THIS POST WANTING TO KNOW WHAT 'SQUIRREL SOMETHING AWAY" MEANS: It means to hide something away for use later, as in squirrels hiding nuts in trees to eat later in the winter.
Jerrianne wins! Actually there are four, but one of them went behind the bushes as I shot the picture so I guess he doesn't count.
A little bird beats an Iditarod dog team
It all reminded me of an experience some time ago, when a friend of mine scratched from the Iditarod fairly early in the race which left him not too far from the road system. He left the team and flew out, if I remember properly, for some medical attention.
A week or so later he asked me to go with him to bring the team out. The idea was we would drive as close as we could and then take a small team down a frozen river to the settlement where he'd left his outfit. Then he would drive his team back to the road and I would take the small team we came in with.
The trip as I recall was only about 10 miles or so by dog team and on a beautiful, bright day we made it to the settlement with no problem. My friend said he had some organizing to do and it would take some time to harness all the dogs and suggested I take the five-dog team and start back and he would catch me pretty quickly since he was driving 16 and I had only the five.
That sounded fine with me and I headed the dogs back onto the trail we had arrived by. As we moved along, the dogs were lollygagging and I let them, just moseying along figuring my friend would catch up any time and once he passed us the dogs world perk up and follow him.
The trial was pounded down from the surrounding snow which left a berm two or three feet high on each side. We were kind of traveling in a groove. Ahead I noticed a dark spot on one of the berms. The dogs saw it too. Turned out it was a little bird of some sort and on the approach of what to it probably looked like a pack of wolves it took off and flew straight down the trail, low, between the berms.
The dogs lurched into a run so fast they almost threw me off the sled. For whatever reason the bird didn't leave the trail for what I would guess was about three miles with the dogs in hot pursuit. It could have been it was flying so low between the berms it couldn't see anywhere to divert off the trail. The bird finally gained enough altitude to fly off the side of the trail and the dogs slowed down, but the run had taken some of the soup out of them and they settled into a nice easy trot the rest of the way.
We reached the parking area and I turned the sled over and tied it to the truck while they rolled in the snow and settled down. I found them some snacks and let them chew on those for a while. I was sitting on the turned-over sled sipping a Pepsi when my friend drove up with his full Iditarod team. At first he said he was glad to see me. He'd thought I had lost the trail somehow. Then he began to realize I and the five dogs had beaten his fancy 16-dog team. How did you do that, he demanded.
I never said a word about the bird. Now, this fellow was known to be very excitable so I smiled at him and very calmly told him, maybe the dogs respond to me better. He mumbled and grumbled the whole way home in the truck while I just whistled a bird song as I watched out the window.
Lost in the woods
February 2, 2012
To understand this, take it in another direction. Leon Russell has a song named "Out in the Woods." In a recording of a live performance he tells the audience the source of the chorus words, which as best as I can spell them phonetically are "dola koo tanga, dola koo tada." How an Oklahoma rocker met a Zulu would a be story in itself, but he said he did and as he was looking for words for the song he asked the man what were the words in Zulu for "lost in the woods." As Russell put it, the man looked puzzled for a moment and then said, "Zulus don't get lost in the woods. There are no words for that." In the ensuing conversation they decided on those words above which translated from the Zulu words mean "a man gone crazy." That was the best they could come up with as a metaphor for lost in the woods.
Think about this. Can you get lost in your own house, over even your yard? Most likely not. It has to do with comfort zone and knowledge. A woodsman might not recognize where he is at the moment. But he knows he is in the woods and most likely how he got there and where he needs to go if he needs to go anywhere.
Here's what one skookum Alaskan did in that circumstance. I have been talking about woodsmen, that's generic and not meant to exclude woman. This happened to a woman. During the Iditarod race she was moving along the south coast of the Seward Peninsula, which is the last 150 or so miles before Nome. Sometimes on that coast there are very few landmarks to position yourself. At one point she realized she had missed the trail and been going for some time in a wrong direction. Now, is that lost? She knew she had done it and she knew she had to get back to the trail. What did she do? I love this phrase and have used it a time or two when it fits. "I sat down and wrote it out in the snow." What she did is stop and with a finger retraced her movements drawing in the snow, where she had taken turns, that sort of thing, and eventually she figured out what she had to do and in short order found her way back to the correct trail. That's not lost, that's simply not being where you want to be at the moment. Even for someone like me who has never run that race, I know in that area the ocean is to the south of me and mountains are to the north. And to get to Nome I want the ocean on my left and the mountains on my right. That gets you heading west. You are either going to hit Nome, or if the ice is right, Kamchatka.
Stranger in a strange land: Recalling Leon Russell
A new contest
February 4, 2012
OK, this one isn't as easy. I counted 25 of them around the feeders this morning before I lost track. Anyway, how many pine grosbeaks in this photo? Thinking up what might be a suitable prize for a correct answer.
One time years ago at Alaska magazine, we accidentally used a photograph of a taxidermist's mount of two ptarmigan in a calendar. A wildlife photographer pointed out the mistake and we were suitably embarrassed. But, I wrote back to the photographer under the pseudonym Augustus Birch-Alder explaining to him that the person he wrote to was unavailable because we needed a photograph of a herd of caribou and it was getting damned hard to find 1,000 full mounts of caribou to arrange for the picture.
But we used to get a kick out of counting and then writing in the captions there are X number of something in this photo and imagining readers trying to find them all. We were always tempted to add one to the number just to get people going a little, but as far as I know it never happened.
So, how many pine grosbeaks? I told you this one isn't as easy. (And the shadow doesn't count.)
Finally made it; I think I am really Alaskan
I've always thought it came when somehow your mind relaxes to the idea and you take the country as it comes without a lot of hyperbole and amazement, even though you never totally lose your amazement at what this country offers sometimes. As an example, it is pretty much another rule that the first year or so you live here, you love to point out the extremes your are going through. Like how cold it was last night. We have all tried to impress friends and family outside with something Alaskan now and then probably inducing total boredom in those captive listeners.
When those things somehow become second nature, is when you start growing your Alaska chops. Such a thing happened yesterday.
I am in the process of moving all my accounts out of one of those bailed-out mega-banks and into a local credit union. To do that I had to call an office Outside somewhere. I have no idea where, but it didn't sound like India. (An aside: a few years ago a failed bank robbery in Kissamee, Florida, turned into a hostage situation. When police tried to contact the robbers by calling the bank they were routed to a call center in India.) Anyway the woman immediately picked up on Alaska in what she could see about me on her monitor.
She had some connection from a project she had done in college, and asked me how cold it was. I said in all honesty and not even thinking much about it, it's beautiful, sunny and about 25 degrees. "Ooh," she said. I could almost feel her shiver through the phone. At the time, I had the feeling, maybe wondering what brought the shivering on. I mean, it really was a nice day and 25 isn't that cold, perfect March weather. It took a while to realize probably where she was, 25 is pretty cold and it might feel extreme to somebody, say, in San Diego. Then I realized for maybe the first time, it didn't even occur to me to make a big deal out of it. Part of the deal with being an Alaskan is you get comfortable enough that it becomes something not to make a big deal out of, no sense impressing someone Outside with how tough you are and how extreme your environment is when at 25 degrees it's a nice day, and that's all it is.
I think I made it and it only took 39 years.
Give me my freedom for as long as I be...
"... all I ask of living is to have no chains on me" -- Blood, Sweat and Tears (does anybody remember them?)
March 2, 2012
In 1980 when I decided to dump what there was of a career and go adventuring, I knew there would be a price to pay. I decided the price would be worth it. I traded adventure while my contemporaries were slaving away in offices and factories for a time when they would be out on golf courses while I went to work on a newspaper copy desk somewhere. Copy editing is very mobile and a job not many people like doing and there was almost always employment available so I figured to end my days on a copy desk editing stories and writing headlines until I couldn't any more, happy with the memories of adventures I had experienced while I still could. In 1980 I could maybe have predicted the technological revolution that was growing at greater and greater speed if I had thought about it a little, but I could not have predicted the demise of newspapers.
When I went back to the newspaper a few years ago, the whole industry was starting to falter. It looked like it was going to be a race to see who died first, me or the newspaper.
Given the state of the American newspaper these days and given my age at the time, it looked to be a fairly even race. But after a couple of pay cuts, some furloughs and a cutback in hours it was beginning to look like I would win but it would have been a hollow victory. Maybe I should have paid more attention on those nights when there were only two of us in the newsroom of the largest newspaper in Alaska. It was looking to me like the whole industry was burning the house logs in order to stay warm. Still, I figured I'd ride it down and maybe let it outlast me but that is not going to happen now. I will be on the outside looking in as the industry continues its slide.
But, what does a guy do when he's laid off in this economy at the age of 69?
Peggy Lee used to sing the answer to that one: "if that's all there is, then keep on dancing, break out the booze, and have a ball."
It's not as bad as it seems. Despite this blow to my version of retirement, this is a good turn personally. There is time for more adventure while I am still healthy enough to get it on; all I have to do is go find some.
During the first meeting of a college psychology class way back in the 1960s the teacher asked us to go around the room with each person in turn telling something about where they hoped to go in life. Everyone took the teacher seriously and told what we hoped to be doing, where we expected our careers to take us. That was until the turn reached the hippie looking fellow over by the window. This was the 60s after all and there were such people. With a big smile on his face he said, "I am going to the Beatles concert in August." That was it, his life's ambition. Most of the people laughed and then looked expectantly but that was his life plan at the moment. For some reason that spoke to me in words that said seize the present, set achievable goals, live for now, and obviously I have never forgotten that incident. Who can really recognize what is going to turn out to be a defining moment in life?
With that said, there is a plan for this new turm. Lady Gaga is about to go on tour. As soon as the venues and dates are announced I plan to buy two tickets for a show in a city where I have never been before. And, when the time comes, I intend to go. I have learned that when you make an indefinite plan going out that far into the future, you ought to do something to make it tangible. When I eventually built my cabin at the East Pole, I was actually taking tools out of the original packaging I had bought from a list I made 10 years earlier. Along that same line, I discovered recently as far as concerts go there is an app for that. The picture you see is that app, my lighter for the show. On my iPhone.
In the meantime, I have a book demanding to be written, and, oh yeah, three short pieces on Iditarod mushers. There are at least four ocean voyages out there that are possibilities, one of them for three years. And then there is the spring offensive with the Occupy Movement.
And, I need to get going. As, the Rolling Stones sang so many years ago: "I have my freedom, but I don't have much time."
Still standing after all these years
I know, I know, the porch broke. Materials, not craft. Explanation coming.
Anchorage has had nearly a record snowfall this year. Not the kind of snow where I used to live, but significant nonetheless. A lot of snow in Anchorage also means a lot of snow at the East Pole. It took a huge snowload several years ago, according to figures by a fellow at the National Weather Service there could have been 37 tons on the roof. I doubt it was that much but it was a lot. That load moved some things but caused no real damage. Still I hadn't been there since last June so I thought I would make a quick run in and check on things. There was an ulterior motive that made it necessary but more about that later too.
The trail was a surprise. Apparently there is some work being done on the power line we go under about five miles in. Bulldozers have been over the trail recently and it looked like a four-lane highway, smooth and wide, and fast.
I was tearing along on a pace for less than half an hour to the cabin, a trip that usually takes 40 minutes to an hour. Once took three hours. Tearing along until I came upon three people stopped in the trail. I was about to wave and pass them when I saw the moose. When the snow is deep like it is, moose get on a hard packed trail and they don't want to get off it. This moose was standing perpendicular to the trail apparently staring off into the woods. But a moose's eyes are on the sides of its head so most likely it was staring straight at us, ears back, hair on the back straight up. The people said it had sort of bluff charged them once already so they were just waiting.
Also a consideration was this winter has been hard on them and they are in a weakened condition this time of year and I don't like the idea of adding to their stress. We shouted a couple of times but all it did was walk a few steps, then stop and assume the same pose. I tried firing my .44 once; that got its attention but it didn't move so we gave up on that. Then it walked off down the trail. I followed gingerly but not too closely. Pretty soon it stopped and began nibbling some twigs. Then I had an idea. We had always stopped with the snowmachines in a line one behind the other, giving the moose a view of only one which probably didn't look all that threatening.
That was when the wide trail came in handy. I suggested we bring all three next to each other and see what happens, a wider more imposing presence. We all stood up on the machines when we had moved into position. The moose took one look at that and took off trotting away from us. I was glad it was trotting and not running, not too stressed. We followed at a good distance, just enough to keep it in sight on the winding trail, being careful about blind curves and hill crests. I was in the lead when I saw the moose step off the trail and trot into the deep snow. Quickly I hit the throttle and raced past it and the others did too. The last I saw it, the moose was standing about 30 feet off the trail nibbling on some branches, so I am guessing it got away without too much stress.
That was the most eventful part of the trip. I was at the cabin10 minutes later or at least on the property. With the deep snow there was no way I was going to make it up the hill. I put on snowshoes and that was easy going given the compacted nature of the snow. Made it up without exhausting myself, happy at first just to see it still standing. Then I saw the porch. It shouldn't have broken and the fact that the whole thing didn't collapse made me think something different was going on. Sure enough, upon close examination, there was a vertical row of three large knots right where it broke, so it was a weak piece of wood and I can fix that. Might try to put a glue-laminate beam in there next summer.
The rest of the cabin was fine, the door swung open easily and all the windows slid open meaning there was no crunching pressure reaching them from above.. I shoveled some of the snow off the porch right over the break and let it go at that. I wanted to go up and shovel the roof ridge but the energy wasn't there. If you just break the tension at the ridge the rest of the snow tends to slide off sooner.
Then I found what I came for, what the trip was really all about. I have always resisted brand loyalty, but one brand sneaked in. Years ago I discovered absolutely nothing handles a headache like Excedrin. When I found out about the dose of caffeine in it, I understood why a couple in the morning always made me feel a little more mellow and more like tackling the day. Admittedly it became what I am sure is an addiction, but I seem to suffer no ill effects though I am aware of what they could be. At any rate it has been a habit for years. Then a couple of months ago came the recall. I had a pretty good supply so I wasn't too worried, but they are not back in stores yet, the company's web site says late spring or early summer and my stash slowly emptied until a couple of days ago I discovered I only had a few left with no hope of finding a substitute. That's when I remembered the huge bottle at the East Pole. I wasn't sure how much was there but figured it was worth the trip. What I found was a bottle of 250 capsules that was just about full. That much will last me between three and four months. Woo Hoo. Life is good. But, I wonder how many Excedrin addicts would drive 160 miles then take a snowmachine another 20 miles into the Alaska wilderness just to find a few pills. Probably more than you might think, given the number of posts on the Facebook page.
I did get to spend time outdoors on a sunny March day, make sure all was right at the East Pole and pretty much just be in the woods for a while. I even took a picture of my friend's cabin because she was worried about it.
One problem. I got a flash of what it might be like living there again and it looked pretty darned good. More to come on that.
It's about those overpaid, underworked teachers
March 28, 2012
Over the past year there has been an orchestrated attack on government workers, particularly those who belong to unions, people in power blaming the economic condition on the wages and benefits paid to government employees because of their unions. Union-busting is nothing new but this attack legislature by legislature is. Among those being blamed for the high costs of government are police officers, firefighters and teachers.
Teachers, those overpaid underworked educators in an education system that leaves America behind much of the world in terms of academic achievement. Of course it has to be those teachers, imagine getting a full salary for working only six hours a day and only nine months per year. Amazing that some of the most vocal critics can barely spell or form a simple declarative sentence without an error in it. And, of course if they recognize this shortcoming at all, it is going to be the fault of the schools the writer attended.
Well, over my lifetime I have known several teachers very well. Every single one of them amazed me with the amount of work they do outside the classroom, often at home late at night grading papers or planning future lessons, and then there are the continuing education requirements, advanced college courses that need to be completed within certain time frames.
This is not one of those jobs where you go home every night with a sense of closure having manufactured a completed product that day. This is a job that goes on day after day, week after week, year after year with only a vague sense of what has been accomplished. And it is a job that continually throws new situations at the teacher, new children, new problems, new regulations in a constantly fluid and changing environment, always maintaining order no matter what surprises should occur
My friend Gail ran into one of those unexpected events the other day. This is something new for this blog, I am going to let her tell her own story:
"You have not had your full share of life's excitement until you have had a moose run toward you while you are trying to get children onto a school bus!
"Yesterday was another gorgeous, sunny, warm day and the weather made it the perfect spring day. There were sixty children, mostly ages from five through ten, that are in the after school program that I teach. We had the children lined up in two groups to get on the buses, but as we walked them outside, there was a mother moose and her teenaged offspring near the school building. We got the children back into the building - a good trick in itself since the kids were trying to look at the moose. There were little kids trying to go forward and little kids trying to go back, and it was total confusion with a lot of pushing and grumbling going on. Only the people at the front knew about the moose. The rest of us were just confused at this was unusual behavior.
"The two moose were roughly forty yards away from the school bus, and the woman in charge was yelling and barking contradictory orders like a drill sergeant, her voice frantic. "Move it! Move it! No, go back! Get in the building!" Get against the wall! Get back out here! Move! Move! Move!" I was in the back of the line and had no idea what was going on, but was annoyed that she was screaming at everyone.
"Finally she decided that the moose were busy nibbling branches and were far enough away that we could load the students safely if we hurried. One bus was too close to the moose, but the one we needed was a little further away from them, directly opposite the front door of the school. We had to walk thirty little kids about twenty yards in a straight line to the bus.
"The "drill sergeant" kept frantically barking orders at the children to hurry up, and we got the kids on the bus. Just as the last two children were getting on board, the young moose put his head down and started running toward us! The "drill sergeant" and I were the only people outside the bus in his trajectory. The kids were still boarding the bus, but she grabbed me, screaming for me to get on the bus, and she pushed me. I fell on the steps, jumped up, and leaped on board. She kept pushing me and we sort of got on the bus as one unit and stood on the steps inside the door. Hahahahaha. The adrenalin was running rampant for sure!
"Meanwhile, the thirty kids on the bus started screaming at the tops of their lungs when they saw the moose coming toward the bus! We couldn't get them calmed down for what seemed like the longest time. It was pretty awful. The bus driver was on her microphone but it was impossible to hear her. Finally, the "drill sergeant" took the microphone and saved the day. Her familiar voice caught enough children's attention that they quieted. She told them to stop screaming because they were scaring the moose. She told them the moose were looking for a way to get away from the school since there weren't any woods right there to run into. She appealed to their sensitive natures, and the children quieted right down. (The fact that the moose were obviously leaving helped too.)
"The bus driver had managed to close the door as the young moose ran by us. The moose slowed his pace and looked the other way after he passed us. He wandered over to a different spot nearer the front door of the school. At the same time, the mother moose ambled over to him, and they both trotted off down the parking lot and out into the street. Whew!!
"At last the other thirty children were able to come out of the building and get into their bus to go home. It was quite an exciting afternoon!!!
"WOW! The joys of teaching..... Was that in my contract? Hmmmmm, I wonder..... (No matter. It was exciting and fun!) "
Now, was that in the job description of any overpaid, underworked government employee?
Transitions
I missed the first kiss of spring this year, that touch of warmth on your cheek the sun puts there for the first time since the previous summer. I missed it probably because it is usually felt through a car window while you are driving and my commuting ended Feb. 22, just about the time it usually happens. I knew I missed it because the other day when I was walking up the driveway I felt the sun actually burning the back of my neck. But, I think I found a better name for that phenomenon anyway. I had come across a long-forgotten song while looking for "Phaedra" the other day and it has this line in it: "like an angel's kiss in spring." Change that to an angel's kiss OF spring and there it is. OK, here's a mini quiz. Care to guess the song?
Today was definitely a spring day in Alaska. Ice all over the place, snow deep in the shade but sun blazing, temperature above 50 and everything thawing. Living as I do, I can now sleep in as late as I like and still get up and be moving in the natural morning. I say natural morning because Alaska messed up its time zones several years ago so the whole state would be functioning in the same time frame. There used to be four and Anchorage was two time zones removed from Seattle. Since the change it's now only an hour. That puts us one hour off true local noon. Add daylight saving time and it becomes two hours. So this time of year local noon, the time of day when the sun appears highest in the sky, actually occurs at 2 p.m. A mariner using Alaska daylight time would be hundreds of miles off course, given that every minute of latitude equals a nautical mile, even though time is used to delineate longitude.
So I went out at noon (MY noon) and spent several hours putzing in the yard. First I picked up debris left by the melting snow. Then I looked at the garden which is free of snow except at the extreme shaded end. I started raking out the dead leaves still there and even the leaf rake broke through the soil. Next came the hard rake and pretty soon I had the cultivator. By the time I was finished, I had half the garden broken and raked including all those road apples the horses so generously left last winter.
The surprises were, first I found small green things growing. The are probably weeds but they might be those Johnny flowers that showed up late last summer so I will let them grow for a while. But even better I found new growth on both lilac bushes, much more on the one that's getting all the sun, the one that showed no interest in growing last year. The small picture up there is one of those buds.
And I made a plan. I had good luck with tomatoes last year. I thought I might try one of those hanging upside down tomato growers. I have a good window to hang it in until it's warm enough outside and then can hang it on the outside of the very same window. We shall see how well that goes.
Winter still clings a little. I picked up all the bird feeders but one, to clean them and put them away until next winter. For one they tend to attract bears and for another it is good for the birds to have to forage when there is food for them so they don't get all dependent on the feeders. The one I left for a day or so had a number of customers. While I was working in the garden I could actually hear the flutter of their wings as they came to it. With the sun shining from the right direction I made some pictures and was able to get to within arm's length of the feeder while they were flying to it.
So, all in all a transition day heavy on the sunny side and the garden is almost half way toward being ready for planting. And Green Day is still probably at least three weeks away
The song? "Summer wine" Lee Greenwood and Nancy Sinatra
On taking that deadly catch very personally
In chatting with a friend today the subject of the television show "Deadliest Catch" came up and I told her I had done that, though not to the extreme shown on TV. My experience with king crab fishing was on a smaller scale in calmer waters, but it gave me a good deal of respect for those souls fishing the Bering Sea. I also mentioned I had a friend who died after falling off a crab boat out there and it caused a moment's pause.
Brian was the skiff man on a salmon seine boat when I met him. I never did know his last name. He was a cheerful kid, always ready with a smile, one of those people for whom being alive seemed to be pure joy. At the time I was operating a passenger vessel on regular tours to Alaska's Columbia Glacier. In season when the commercial fisherman worked along our route I'd stop to let the tourists watch a seine boat make a set. There is enough going on in a seine operation to keep people interested and in our passenger questionnaires, watching the fishing boats came in second only to whales when we saw them. The second largest tidewater glacier in North America came in third.
It only took a while to figure out which boats didn’t mind us watching and I would look for those. Brian worked on the Sirocco II which was owned and operated by a friend of mine. We did some fun things with that boat and the crew always would put on a little show for the tourists, often coming out on deck for a bow after the set was finished. Once I even put the bow on the cork line and a crew kid snagged a salmon from the net to show the passengers.
In seining, the large fishing vessel essentially pulls one end of a 900-foot net in a circle while a skiff holds and pulls on the other end, surrounding and confining the fish rather than tangling them like a gillnet does. Once the circle is closed the crew hauls the purse line closing the bottom of the net effectively holding the fish while they slowly recover the seine and haul the fish aboard. Sometimes there are more fish than the gear can lift and then a smaller brailer net is used to dip fish out of the seine.
While the net is being hauled, the skiff man goes to the opposite side of the boat, attaches to it and then pulls the main boat sideways to keep it from floating over the top of the net while it's being hauled. That was Brian’s job.
One day we stopped to watch just as they closed the seine and Brian went to attach to the far side of the seiner. We naturally stayed on the side of the boat with the net so the tourists could see the fish when the crew hauled them aboard. As is often the case, because we stopped another competing tour boat also had to stop or his passengers would feel they were missing something. As we moved with our boat, the seiner and the net I realized we were moving in more of a circle than usual and I had to power up more often to follow it and keep the seine in sight. It came to me gradually what was happening.
Brian was pulling and turning the seiner in such a way that he pulled the seine out of sight of the other boat and letting me stay with it. At one point I noticed him, big grin on his face chugging away with that jitney as he kept the net away from the competing tour boat. When they finally hauled the bag with all the fish, it was right in front of my people and on the opposite side of the boat out of sight from the other vessel. Then Brian disengaged the skiff and came around alongside waving. I walked out onto the weather deck laughing and shouted "Nice going." He just laughed and waved.
That night I six-packed Brian in our favorite watering hole and we all had a good laugh with Brian about his bright future in the tourism industry.
He lived around Blaine, Washington, and came up every year on one seiner or another to fish Prince William Sound.
Only, one season maybe three or four years later he didn't come. I asked the skipper of the Sirocco II where Brian was. All he could say was Brian fell off a crab boat in the Bering Sea the previous winter and was never found.
Deadliest catch, indeed.
When life deals you lemons ...
Only in Alaska... again
Everything's fine at the East Pole
Random thoughts on the shoulders of life
Alaska wildfire as spectator sport
Carhartt sailors
Except for the temperature and the clothing and the snow and the latitude, the time was right for one of Jimmy Buffet's classic reverent songs about sailing. As a matter of fact the subject came up. It must be fairly easy to wax poetic about a peaceful voyage in the Caribbean. Let Jimmy and his tropical shipmates face a storm north of 60, facing into a biting wind, snow catching on your eyelashes, your fingers cold and almost frozen to the wheel or tiller. Yeah, that was it, Jimmy, put on a suit of Carhartts and join us on an icy deck in the sub arctic.
But we couldn't blame him for our current discomfort. Nor could we enjoy his sailing music. But minds wander in the cockpits of the world, even in the north and we got to discussing the idea of writing a song for him about those hardy folks who sail in snowstorms. We emerged from the snowstorm and the wind picked up and we sailed home but the idea remained and over time we came to call ourselves Carhartt sailors. At one point my partner on that trip showed me some verses she had written for a song on the subject. They have disappeared somewhere, but the idea remains.
Tomorrow I am rejoining the ranks of those sailors, sailing out of Juneau, Alaska, on a 41-foot sailboat, to spend a few days or weeks sailing and fishing for silver salmon and generally enjoying the fall storms of Southeastern Alaska. It's the time of year to at least think of pulling on those Carhartts.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Kindred spirits at the opposite poles
September 17, 2012
Your hearing better be good if you're going to throw broccoli
MONDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2012
Wait, what did you say?
Boot battle joined by U.S. senator
Photo by Jerrianne Lowther
Birthdays
A woman with a chainsaw? If only
Another chainsaw plea
HMS Bounty lost off Cape Hattaras
what's wrong with this picture? (Photo from HMS Bounty facebook page)
(U.S. Coast Guard photo)
We do it for the stories we can tell
We were flying from Golovin to Nome in a Cessna 206, the pilot, two television news people and myself. For the most part we flew through a gray out; that’s like a white out only gray with some precipitation in it. Picking out landmarks from the air proved difficult in the flat light and to add to the difficulty, the pilot, good as he was had never flown Alaska’s Seward Peninsula before. He flew low attempting to follow the beach line or at least the sporadic line of exposed driftwood sticking above the snow at the high tide line. The pilot handed his chart to the fellow in the other front seat, whom I will not name because he has since reached national network exposure and recognition for news reports.
He rotated the map a couple of times, a sure sign of a person unfamiliar with navigation. To the right of a westbound airplane, there is land and some low mountains, to the left, the Bering Sea, sometimes covered with ice. There are three promontories to be passed on the way from east to west before reaching Nome. Mushers driving dog teams go up and over them, people flying airplanes go around them.
Realizing the fellow with the chart was not to be trusted and from my boating experience having some knowledge of navigation, I watched the shoreline, too, and kept track of those promontories. First came Bluff and then Topkok and we flew on westward. Visibility degenerated to virtually nothing. On the approach to Nome from the east, once the airplane passes Cape Nome, the largest and last of those promontories, the pilot has to turn toward land more to the northwest. When the fellow supposedly navigating told the pilot we had passed Cape Nome he turned to the northwest thinking he was heading for the Nome airport.
At this point I was pretty sure we had not passed Cape Nome, which is a significant mountain that rises directly out of the sea. Not wanting to correct a pilot which is a horrible breach of any kind of professional etiquette you can think of, I held my tongue hoping we would see it in time and all would be fine. However, visibility worsened still more.
The time came when I couldn’t stand it any more. I was sitting directly behind him and tapped him on the shoulder. He lifted his earphone off his ear and I told him I was pretty sure we had NOT passed Cape Nome.
He did what I have heard pilots do when given adjustments by air traffic controllers, that is perform the maneuver immediately without question. I had just barely finished the sentence when he laid the airplane almost on its side in a hard left turn heading out to sea where nothing would stand in our way.
In short order Cape Nome slid by us, it seemed reaching to touch the landing wheels. As it turned out we had been within a mile of that severe snow-covered rock face almost invisible in the gray out, and flying straight at it at a speed of about 100 miles an hour. Do the math for how long it takes an airplane to fly one mile at 100 mph. Simply, whew, that was close. If I hadn’t said something we might have flown straight into it without ever seeing it.
Not too much farther along, the city of Nome came into view and we made our landing. After I had retrieved my gear from the cargo area, I happened to catch the eye of the pilot. We stood for a moment looking into each other’s eyes, nothing said, but the understanding passing between us that we had just survived a very close call. I am not sure the other two passengers even realized it.
That was the last flight in a small airplane I ever took on the Seward Peninsula. Every one of the flights up there had involved some kind of adventure like this one and I am just as happy if I have to in the future to take a boat or a trail.
History? I'll show you some history
I was helping chaperone a field trip with my son’s fourth grade class to the history and arts museum in Anchorage. I had recently been working on a research project about sea otters in Alaska history and that had included a considerable amount of research into Aleut culture.
We came across a diorama of an Aleut village and I was sharing my knowledge of it with a small group while others wandered through the exhibits. Suddenly a girl came rushing up to me shouting, “Mr. Jones, Mr. Jones, you’re in the museum.”
My first response was “I am way too young to be in a museum.” She would not be dissuaded and grabbed my hand tugging me toward the far end of the huge display room.
“There,” she said, pointing at a floor-to-ceiling photograph that was part of a display about the Exxon Valdez oil spill. And, sure enough, in the foreground of that photo, almost floor to ceiling in all my glory, memorialized on a museum wall, I stood there looking incredibly important and ... incredibly younger (at least to me).
Frankly I was a bit shocked. I didn’t know whether to be proud or embarrassed or just feel old. I had already had to deal with my son studying “history” that happened in my lifetime, but this was worse, I was now a confirmed artifact of that very same history.
I’ve always, like my teacher friend, been curious what those kids actually thought. Did they put me in the same category with dead presidents, or did they think, wow, Chip’s dad is old? I never did get any kind of a reading.
But someday I do have a story to tell all those kids of that age a story about the Exxon Valdez and its influence on their lives.
OK quick sidebar: When there are long electrical blackouts people always notice a surge in births nine months later. Exxon Valdez was a severe disruption in the lives of many of us living at that particular ground zero of the time. We were rushing around and perhaps not always doing the right thing. In the recent past and in the years following Exxon Valdez the elementary school always had three classes at each grade level. But for the one year when children would have been conceived during the hectic turmoil of the oil spill, there were four classes. In other words there were enough spill babies to fill a whole classroom at the Valdez elementary school. How's that for being part of history?
As the Beatles and Muppets used to sing: "Letter B, Letter B, there will be an answer, Letter Beeeee.
Arches
April 13, 2011