Hi All, this is Art. I'm already up here in Anchorage and working at my new job. Alaska is very beautiful. The mountains east of the city are constantly in view and are spectacular. I hope I never get tired of the view or take it for granted.
Being up here by myself, i'm finding, is a bit hard. I miss Jane terribly. There is a definite feeling of isolation here. It's not just because of the distance ( it took 1 day to fly here) but mostly because of the time difference. I'm 4 hours behind, so I loose all contact from about 6pm on.
There are some other peculiarities too. Right now, it's light out from about 5am till about 10pm. I'm told it makes sleeping difficult but I haven't seen that yet, I'm still a bit jet-lagged. They locals tell me there are only two seasons here; "winter" and "construction". The former is long, cold and dark, the later is marked by traffic tie-ups. The housing market is a bit goofy too. Since there are alot of transients (especially military personell) and folks who can't hack the climate, there is alot of turn-around in both the job market and in housing. Appartments are particularly hard to find now as the warm season is starting.
We decided to start with an appartment, at least for the first year, first, to see if we can hack the cold and dark of winter, second, to give us time to check out the real estate market. I've been living in a hotel since I got here and don't have time to wait for a closing anyway.
The weather has been nice. It's 30s in the morning, 50s for the highs. It's been rainy a bit but when the sun is out, it feels very warm to me, like more of it's heat gets through up here. As Jane said, we're winter-people, so I'm looking forward to living here in the 'scandanavia' of America.
There's a great deal that IS familiar here though; Wal-Mart, McDonalds, Barnes & Noble, and other signs of civilization. Really it's like any other American city.
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