Well at least THAT'S over with

Just more or less finished our move to our new house. For those of you playing along at home, following our year in an apartment, we found a great house here in Anchorage, bought it with a minimum of travail and are settled for good.

These, of course, are famous last words. A good percentage of the time when we buy a house I think "This is the house they're going to carry me out of in a pine box." But then the taxes are get outrageous or the neighborhood goes to heck or something, and we're off again. However, at risk of feeling pretty silly in a few years, I think this is the house we're going to settle in.

I hope so anyway. As my last post may have indicated, I am pretty sick of moving. I don't know what I resented more, my own book-owning habit, or the need to get several thousand cardboard boxes to haul them across town. As it turns out, you don't really need to box everything up. You can simply haul it out in armloads and pack loose items in the back of your car. You will look like a rube, or an Oaky fleeing the approaching dustbowl, but if you don't care about that, you are free to proceed as you see fit. And we don't care, so we largely took the box-free approach.

Anyway, the house. It is a good size for two people who like to have a little room and a lot of books. It has a tiki room-compatible space, which is important. It has a washer and drier, which matters more than I would ever have thought it would - I just spent the last year fighting like a savage for the use of my apartment complex's 2 washers and driers. Best of all, here is the view out of our living/tiki/dining room windows...

and that's one of the reasons we moved to Alaska!

One more time

Boxes...surrounding me...cardboard...tape...
no escape
The Horror!

What goes around comes around

Especially when that thing is called "moving day".
Well, here we are, around a year from when this crazy adventure started. And, as at that point, we are in the process of moving. And, as at that point, I am hating to move. Fortunately, this move will be of a much smaller magnitude - across town rather than across the continent.
But still, there's the finding boxes and the putting things in boxes and the change of address cards...
AAAAIIIIIIIEEEEE
Ok. I'm better now.
So this is an opportune time to look back and evaluate the year. What have we learned, how do we feel about our decision to move here, what would we say to others contemplating the same move?
Well, we've learned not to step into a really dangerous looking "stream" of glacier runoff water. We have learned that polar bears are not as cute and cuddly as people think they are. We have learned that shipping to Alaska is ungodly expensive. We have learned that in this past year we have only really scratched the surface of Alaska, and there is a lifetime's worth of new things to see and do here. We have learned a lot more about geology now that it is so much more in action in the world immediately around us.
How do we feel about our decision? Pretty darn good. About halfway through the year we began to lament that we had signed a year lease on our apartment - we were ready to make the move permanent. The one thing that is hanging over our heads is that the PA house has still not sold. It is a considerable burden, but we are managing it. We'll be a lot happier if ( no, WHEN) it sells.
What advice would we give others planning to make this same move? Well, other people should probably do a bit more research than we did. Possibly come up here to visit and actually see the place before packing up all their stuff and moving here. If you are a real sunshine fan, the winters might get to you. Residents of the south might have a harder time with it than we did. We are happy with being here, but we have seen a lot of people going after just a year or so. Some of those are military families, who move wherever they are posted, but some come up here for other reasons, then just don't like it. Although we didn't heed this advice, look before you leap.
But Alaska really is a wonderful place - come here, you won't be sorry!
Now I guess I really should go pack some boxes.

The Tide is High...no, Wait, it's low

Every once in a while, something happens to remind me that that big bunch of water surrounding my new home city is, in fact, the ocean. Now, I am aware of this fact on an intellectual level. But really, it's just one of those things I am kind of getting used to. Since we're on an inlet, and I can see the other side of that inlet, it kind of fits in my mental landscape like just a big river or something.
However, the gulls have returned to Anchorage with a vengeance. We didn't see them at all this fall or winter (at least I didn't), and now they are all over the place, as ubiquitous as ravens and magpies. It was news to me that they-the seagulls-are migratory, but I guess they are. They are kind of neat to see, although I am told they fight my beloved ravens for territory. I guess there aren't enough discarded french fries in this town for the both of them. Or something. (I say that because I usually see these majestic creatures either in dumpsters or in fast food parking lots going after discarded food.) Every time I see one or hear them, I think "Now what in the heck is seagull doing this far from...Oh, yeah. That's the ocean right over there!" I have thought it enough in the past couple of weeks, though, that it's starting to sink in.
The other thing that recently happened is that I acquired a tide chart book. I did not intentionally acquire this item, it just sort of happened. As I was checking out at the liquor store in Fred Meyer's, right there at the cash register was a big stack of tide chart booklets! They were free, and since I am a sucker for free things to read, I absent mindedly picked one up. They kid working the register, sensing my nautical soul, then tried to sell me a bottle of Sailor Jerry's, which I declined. Anyway, the tide charts. Although I was aware of the existence of such things, I had never seen one before. It took a little while until I figured out what the little fish symbols were and why some figures were in blue and so forth. However, with a little study and a few hints from more seasoned Anchorites (Anchorigians?) I am pretty confident that I have it figured out now. Now that I have one, I am seeing the darn things all over the place. Were they always around and I just didn't see them, or are the new ones out for this year? Well, now I know, so I guess there you have it. The most exciting aspect of this new discovery is that now we have a reasonable chance of catching a bore tide, which is a much-talked-about event up here. A bore tide, as near as I can figure it, is a tide with such a big difference between the high tide and the low tide that there is a big picturesque wave when it happens. How big and how pictureque, I don't yet know. As soon as I catch one, I'll report back - stay tuned!

New Nickname for Jane

There's a bit of backstory involved in this one. My(Jane's) brother has a podcast radio show called Bunch of Dorks. In the past, he and his fellow dorks have struggled to come up with a radio nickname for me, so as to not reveal my secret identity. They have come up with a few I didn't like, and a few that were too awkward for them to say when they were drunk (which is sometimes the case when they are doing their show). So, in an effort to come up with a name that will work for both me and them, they have posted a quiz on their show blog and are asking for votes. http://www.bunchofdorks.com/ Mow is my brother, for those of you playing along at home.
I should point out that the option to say you are just looking for Internet Porn is not one I support, but you should vote your conscience!
While you are there, if you enjoy offbeat humor, stick around and listen to a show or two! Be aware that the Bunch of Dorks podcasts contain some adult content and language. It's not Tarantino level, but I wouldn't listen with any little kids or nuns or other sensitive persons within earshot.

Anchorage Cleans Up

I saw something today that I had never seen before in my life. Anchorage actually washes their sidewalks (via heavy equipment, true, but still)!
As I wrote earlier, we are in the time of year known as "the breakup". The snow melts and all the ick it was hiding becomes visible, and all the grit that got spread on the roads is all just laying there, looking grim. The general citizenry does a lot to clean this up on their own, and businesses clean up their parking lots and sidewalks and so. We have seen a LOT of this tidy-up activity going on. Our apartment complex had guys in to rake all the leaves and sticks and stuff from the yards, my work had guys cleaning up the sidewalks and drives, and Art's company does a clean-up day where the whole company spends half a day picking up along a road somewhere in town. So there seems to be a fair amount of civic pride involved in the clean up effort.
However, the sidewalk cleanup was on an entirely different level than this. First a big truck drove down the street spraying water on the sidewalks. Then came the sweepers. I don't really know what these things are called, but I suspect they are the same things that are used in winter to clear snow off the sidewalks. They look kind of like a forklift or a mini-steamroller. However, in this instance, instead of a solid roller out in front, it had a wire brush in the same roller shape. The brush was sweeping off the dirt, but it also seemed to be sweeping up debris as it went! A couple of us walked up the street for coffee a little later, and it looked much nicer.
It is really interesting to see this sort of civic effort to keep the city looking nice. None of the cities we lived in in PA would have expended city funds for this kind of effort, although they surely could have. It takes streets that look kind of grimy and grim to looking much brighter and spring-ier. Looking good, Anchorage!

Moose Encounters

Well, we have been seeing a LOT of moose around lately. I understand from long-timers that this is the baby-having time in the moose year. The little newborns are supposed to be something to see, so we're keeping a lookout!

The first sighting was from my work - incidentally the same location where I had my first moose sighting, so that's one full circle made as my first year here comes to a close!

This is the youngster of the Momma and Kid duo that we see relatively often hanging around where I work. He meandered around and snacked on some foliage for awhile. Then he came to rest at the spot on the road where the smokers at work have to go stand to smoke. He stood there for quite awhile, peacefully hanging out and the smokers were starting to worry because they needed to go smoke. No one wanted to approach the little guy because Momma was somewhere around. Finally our biggest, loudest smoker went outside and yelled at him to "Git on back to Momma!" and he (the moose) ran away. Which is nothing to be ashamed of - we all run away when this particular person yells. :)

The next sighting came a couple of days later. Art and I were out with a coworker and her husband to hear a lecture on the Expanded Mind at UAA (!), and when we came out of the library...

This one was hanging around outside, again snacking on foliage. We kept a respectful distance, but didn't hang around too long - she was standing between us and and some post-lecture pie! We waited a few minutes, and she wandered across the sidewalk to get a drink, after which we judged it safe to cross. She kept an eye on us as we went past, but we didn't make any sudden moves or do anything that we thought might upset a large ruminant. And everything turned out fine.

You really do want to pet them and give them names and leave food out in your yard so they keep coming around. Oh, I don't do any of those thing, and I won't, because it would be wildly irresponsible. Also, I'm not trying to anthropomorphize them or pretend they are anything other than large, wild animals that are not to be trifled with. But the neat thing about moose is that they really don't seem to want naything other than lots of plant matter to eat and to be left alone. I suppose the best thing we can do for them is not harsh their mellow.

Earthquake!

Well, as those of you playing along from out of state may or may not know, this past Tuesday we had an earthquake! It was 4.6 or 4.7 (news reports varied) and originated roughly between here and Wasilla. I had felt slight shakes before a couple of times, but this was much more considerable in force.
It hit while we were at work, and shook us around pretty good. Later, I heard from a few people that they were scared, but I and everyone in my office found it kind of exhilarating. A second after we stopped shaking, one coworker actually let out an Anchorage cheer (Woooo!). This was kind of interesting to experience. I remember a couple of years ago, when I was still in Pa and my cousin Amie was living here (her husband is in the Army). I read on CNN that they had had an earthquake - I think it was a 2 or 3 pointer - and I sent her a panicky email checking on their safety. She responded with polite puzzlement, then said something along the lines of "Oh, yeah. I think I did feel a little shake."
When you have no experience with this type of phenomenon, you have no concept of what it really is like. At that point, I heard 3 point earthquake and pictured my loved ones trapped in the rubble of their home, bleeding into the phone as they tried desparately to get through to Emergency Services. When you are here, and you have the experience, you think to yourself. OK, 4.7. Woop!

Breaking up is hard to get through

Well, this is the time of year known informally as The Breakup. This is because of the general warming trend going on, which causes the ice and snow that has been building up since last October to...yes, you guessed it!... break up.
To put it bluntly, it is not a very pretty time of year. The fresh clean coat of snow we have been seeing every day is not appearing anymore. Or at least its gotten infrequent. That means all the cinders and dirt, as well as all the general garbage that's been buring under all that clean sparkly snow is starting to show. As is the fact that our apartment building neighbors have not been taking their dogs all the way to the dog peeing area that is fenced off at the end of the common area. Instead they have been just walking right off the front stoop and letting them pee away. They were counting on the yellow snow to get covered up, but not anymore! So that's kind of icky.
Now, on the plus side, we have well over 13 hours of daylight now, and it is regularly over 32F. That may not sound like much, and relatively speaking it isn't. But we are starting to walk around with just hoodies or sweaters on, and we are plenty warm. It's all what you get used to. After my brother and sister-in-law and parents moved to Florida, they would come back to PA in the height of summer and be shivering and freezing. And we'd be like "What? It's 70!" and they would say "I'm freezing! I need a sweater!"and so on. And then I'd go to Florida and be prostrate from the heat. "I'm dying!" I would say, "It's like being on the surface of the sun, only with 150% humidity! It's so hot!" and they would say "What? It's 103. This is nothing!" and so on. So anyway, I guess my point is, we're acclimated pretty well to local temperatures. It got up to the mid 30's, and I thought "what a nice balmy day!"
Also on the plus side, the inches-thick layers of ice are breaking up and melting away, so you are driving on actual asphalt some of the time, which is a welcome development.

New in the news

We haven't been doing much exciting, just going on with daily life - so here are some general Alaskan updates:

-Mt. Redoubt has been quiet this week in general. Apparently it is building up another lava dome, which will probably collapse and start another round of ash-spewing eruptions. The last time this happened, it went on for around 6 months. There's nothing saying that will happen this time, but that's what happened last time. For the most part, everyone just sort of gets on with their lives. Last Saturday, for example, there was light ashfall on Anchorage. How did the population deal with it? A lot of people went to the carwash the next day. A couple of people kept masks or their scarves over their faces if they were out walking around.

- Art and I went to see (and more to the point, hear) Chuck Klosterman speak at the University of Alaska Anchorage. I was a bit nervous about going to see him, though, because Art has not enjoyed his work overly much and also because whenever I actually see a famous person being themselves, they are always horrible people. I have never been in any kind of proximity to a public figure and liked them at all at the end of the experience. For the most part, I can't even watch them being interviewed. However, Chuck did a great job, and I actually like him more now than I did before I heard him speak. Art likes him better now, too. Anyway, the reason I am bringing this up is that he (CK) was commenting on getting to Anchorage, and said "I have never had plans of mine affected by, you know, pumice."

-Ted Stevens is exonerated! It turns out there was an interview with a star witness against him who had an earlier interview that totally contradicted everything he said in court. Somehow the prosecution sort of, I guess, forgot they had that, and the defense never got it. Details and play by play available, as always, on ADN. I'm glad Ted is cleared, and I hope we vote him back in next time. For those of you playing along at home, he was a very senior senator, and the state of Alaska lost a LOT of pull when he was railroaded out of office. Lying Feds!

-Spring is not here yet, but it's sure starting to look like it. We have something over 13 hours of daylight now. You can see patches of pavement poking through the deep layers of ice in parking lots. Now, I have been warned that this is not spring. In fact, this promise of spring is what suposedly pushed people over the edge. I personally feel fine - another month or so of winter is fine with me. We'll see how I feel this time next year, but I feel fine now!

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.

Mt Redoubt - Kind of a disappointment

So if you read the news, you may have heard that our old friend Mt Slacker finally erupted. Of course if you blinked, you may well have missed it. This is because it was pretty underwhelming as far as volcanic eruptions go. Oh, it blew a bunch of ash and steam impressively high into the atmosphere, and some places to the north got some ash, and some planes got cancelled, but that was pretty much it. It even happened at night, so as far as I know, no one even got good pictures of it. Other than some flights getting cancelled, most people in Anchorage never even missed a beat.
This was damn disappointing. Now, don't get me wrong - I'm really glad no one got hurt and there wasn't any major property damage. But I was hoping to get to see an eruption and possibly get a day off work. But no such luck on either count. There were even some pretty spectacular pictures of the volcano that erupted underwater elsewhere on our burnin' Ring of Fire, but not our volcano. Let me reiterate that - the other volcano erupted UNDER WATER. Under THE OCEAN. And still it looked cooler than our volcano. Because you could see it.
Sigh.
After the months of buildup and stern warnings and safety directives from the Red Cross and the Volcano Observatory and FEMA, it finally erupts, and ... then the next day the local newspaper has a little column on it, which is quickly superceded by news about the AAU's women's basketball team and a reflection on the 20th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. It was such an anticlimax that on Monday afternoon, I got a text message from my parents asking if I was all right, and it took me 10 minutes of puzzled frowning at my phone to get why they were asking me that. Now I understand the "Whatever" attitude that long-term Alaskans have when talking about their eruptions! And they do literally say that. You say to them, "Oh my God! That volcano is really unstable! It's going to erupt!" and they look at you for a minute, and then say, "Whatever." It was pretty amazing to me a week ago, but now I too say "Whatever."
However, I know it is unfair of me to whine. When you're dealing with volcanos, it's better to have too little excitement than to have too much!

Fur Rondy - What Have We Learned

Well, now that we are a week out from the dizzying madness of Fur Rondy, it is time for a look back. What have we learned? How has it changed us? More to the point, are we going to do this again next year, and if so, what are we going to do differently. Those who do not make notes about history are doomed to repeat it. Or something.
Anyway, we definitely had a good time, and agree that it will definitely be part of our calendar next year. That said - we will be skipping some of the things we did this year, and making more of an effort to get to some things we missed this year. Also - and I must point out that I was warned about this - we will probably not take the whole week off again. When I told people we were doing that, they looked at me like I was crazy and said something along the lines of "The whole week?! You don't need the whole week for Rondy!" At the time I thought, well, we're new! We haven't been here forever! You don't know! Those people were right. There really wasn't so much to do during the week between the weekends. Now, on a personal level, we were really ready for a week off. But it didn't need to be Rondy week.

What will we make a point of getting to next year?

• Snowshoe softball. We missed the various games for an array of reasons, and now I'm sorry we didn't make the effort. It is famed as quite the hootenanny, and next year we'll make it!
• Gold Rush days. This involved various comical reenactments of the gold rush days of Alaska. There are all kinds of colorful stories about this time, and reenactors are always comedy gold.

What will we pass on next year?

• The carnival. This is a novelty for the kids, and while the weirdness of it is absolutely enchanting -been there and done that.
• Meet the World in Anchorage. Again, this is pretty much for the kids. I'm glad we went once - it was really eye opening to see what a widely multi-cultural place we live it. It made me strangely proud to be here and part of this melting pot. But again - been there, done that.

What have we learned?

• Timing is more important that most people think it is.
• People running around with reindeers is absolutely hilarious, if you can stand the boredom between heats.
• Start times are kind of flexible around here.

There are a few things we wish the Rondy organizers would do a little differently next year. Maybe spread things out a bit more. Have a few organized activities during the week. But maybe it is perfect the way it is. It was a lot of fun, and we had a blast. We laughed, we cried, it became a part of us. But it sure was cold to do so much standing around!

Picture Votes

OK, we will be leaving the picture of Anchorage in place. Thanks to those of you who voted for sharing your opinion!

Iditarod End!

Well, the Iditarod ended yesterday around noon Alaska time - it was a little later than the odds makers initially supposed. There has been a bit of interesting weather along the trail. Lance Mackey achieved his three-peat and handily won the race. With this victory, he achieves what only a few others have ever done. Add that to the fact that people who know the man have told me he is a genuinely nice man and a real Cinderella story, and you have sports story gold! Again, I point interested parties toward ADN's coverage - the know details and stats I don't have the first idea of. But for the moderately interested, the above summary should give you enough information. Amaze your friends!

Random updates

The hours of daylight are pretty long now, pretty close to the 12 hour mark. So the "long dark" is pretty safely behind us! It continues to warm up (relatively) and has been hovering around the balmy 32 F mark for the past couple of days. We have been throwing open the windows for a half hour or so both here at home and at work, just to get the "fresh spring air" in and let a little of the winter funk out. Of course, this is a bit deceiving, and is apparently a part of why people just kind of snap around this time of year sometimes. It feels like spring is on its way, and indeed it is...but not any time too soon. We can expect pretty good piles of snow throughout March and April, and sometimes even into May. So this isn't spring yet! We really aren't minding, though. We are pretty well acclimated, I think. I was walking around outside today a couple of times with my coat hanging open, and didn't feel cold at all.
Also, saw a moose at work again yesterday - and everyone in the room stopped and came to the window to watch him! They're really kind of cute, in a goofy way.

Iditarod update

Well, as near as I can tell it, there are three drop-outs at this point in the race, and the leaders of the pack are coming up to about the halfway point between Willow and Nome. There haven't been any wild surprises this year so far, but there's plenty of time for that to change! Keep checking ADN for updates - the coverage they have is phenomenal!

New in the News

The Iditarod is, of course, the big news today, with progress reports coming in steadily from the checkpoints. Lance Mackey, a two time winner looking for a three-peat, is currently in the lead, but that is generally conceded not to mean much at this point. This thing is around 1,100 miles long. For a comprehensive look at the situation, sports fans would be well-advised to check out ADN's coverage. I have to say, I don't generally read Craig Medred's column - he covers sports and/or nature or something along those lines. However, he is writing some really beautiful columns on this race - informational and yet also inspirational at times. Check it out!


At work today we were talking about who had gone to see the start of the race, and where we had gone to see it. One coworker had the best story, hands down. She and her husband flew up in a private plane to Willow to watch the real start, and in fact flew over the trail for a bit following the teams after they left the starting line. I was instantly envious! She also reported seeing people with snowmobiles sort of following along with the action as well. Maybe next year!

First, a Question

Art and I have been debating changing the picture at the top of the blog. On the one hand, it is a beautiful view, but on the other hand, it's been up there for quite a while. Use the Poll on the right to register your opinion!

Iditarod pictures!

We chose to avoid all the hoopla of the starting line downtown, and from the report in ADN, we're glad we did. We kind of used up all our tolerance for packed crowds over the last week. The vantage point we did have was great! We got to see about 10 teams go by - there were generally only 5 minutes or so between teams.

We do not know enough about the race to know who all these driver are - I meant to cross reference to the leader board on ADN, but it's been a kind of busy day. I may get around to it in the next day or so, and if so, I'll update this page.

And here they go! After this stretch, the drivers rode a pedestrian bridge over Tudor Road, giving casual drivers-by a chance to see them on their way.

The real actual start of the race is tomorrow at 2 pm at Willow, a bit north of here. I was looking at CNN this afternoon, and was interested to see no mention of the Iditarod at all. It's a funny contrast, because the news here is basically all about it. I am finding it strangely compelling - I didn't expect it to be so interesting, but it really is. All the drivers are fascinating people, as you might expect, and there are countless background stories - how supplies get to the teams on the route, the training routine, the gear, and all the other nuances you wouldn't think about unless you were here where it is so prevalent. If you have an interest, use the links for the Iditarod and ADN to get your fix. :)