And it just keeps going!

So now that Mt. Slacker has decided to blow, it just won't stop. Those of you who have been around volcanoes for any length of time probably find this absolutely normal. But for those of us who grew up with the Volcano as a concept, a distant mystical thing, it is all kind of unexpected. The way it seems from a distance, a volcano is either extinct or active, and if its active it quietly builds up pressure for a while (length of time can vary), and then it erupts. Then FEMA comes in and Tommy Lee Jones fixes everything, and then it's all calm again until the next cycle starts up again. And maybe some volcanoes do work that way. But not this one.
This one had rising and falling levels of seismic activity for months now (or earlier post fame). And apparently that's not unusual. Longtime Alaskans tell me the local volcanoes usually act this way. From the earliest signs to the actual eruption is often many long, roller coaster-y months. And then it just keeps on going. It erupted this morning, it erupted 2 or 3 times yesterday, and so on back through the week, starting with 5 eruptions Sunday night into Monday. Sorry, just went to AVO's website to try to fact check (it happens occasionally) and it turns out it erupted twice today - my mistake. This makes a total of a dozen eruptions this week. Anyway, around midweek I sent out messages to let loved ones know we were still fine and not having any problems, and none of them knew the thing was still erupting! And in all fairness, if we didn't live right here, we wouldn't have either. It's pretty low key, considering that it's a pretty awesome force of nature style event. Basically, the results have been:
1) the activity is melting the glacier(s?) on the volcano, which is causing lahars and pretty bad flooding near the volcano itself, which may or may not have damaged an oil terminal nearby.
2)It is messing up air travel pretty bad. Although most of the ash is not falling to the ground, it is hanging up in the air and causing all the airlines to cancel or postpone flights.

None of that is particularly telegenic, which is why it isn't all over the news outside. Well, as we Alaskan say, Whatever, volcano.