Obamafied!

On Saturday Neil and I went to camp Obama--a 6 hour training to become volunteer coordinators for our house district.  Tonight we had our first weekly meeting to discuss what our plan of attack is.  Having never volunteered for a campaign before, this whole thing seems very exciting.  True to my apparent calling in life I'm the district data manager, which I don't really know what all is in involved, but I think it deals with all of the data generated from making phone calls, canvasing, etc.  Go BO!

Chi-Town

As promised here are a few pictures from my walk around the city.  It was pretty hot and muggy there (in the 90s), but it was a nice change from the rain and mid-50s that we've been having all summer.  Apparently Segways are in.  Along lake Michigan they had a little pedestrian street that reminded me a lot of Alki.  If I would have walked a ways further I think I would have stumbled upon Oprah's studio.  It was fun to be in a city again.

27 hours later

27 hours after I left the conference venue in Chicago I finally arrived home.  Due to some bad winds at O'Hare (aka O'Hell) my flight to San Francisco was delayed by over 2 hours.  We spend about an hour of that time sitting on the tarmac waiting in a long line of planes to get the okay for lift off.  All I can say about the woman sitting next to me (or should I say on me) was that imagine two picnic caliber watermelons.  We couldn't put down the arm rest between us, because her watermelon sized chest blocked it.  

Of course once I got into San Francisco I missed my connecting flight to Anchorage.  The United Airway (UNITED SUCKS) guy literally laughed at me when I asked whether he couldn't find a sooner flight than 4 pm the following day (20 hours after I was supposed to have left).  "Is there some reason you want to get back to Anchorage?  Wouldn't you rather sleep in in San Francisco?"  But I prevailed and got a flight out the next morning at 6 am to Seattle with a connecting flight to Anchorage.  

I'll post some of my pictures from the windy city later.   

Emily the Traveling Hobo

I dropped my wife off at the airport last night so she could take the Red-Eye to Chicago for her Maternal and Child Health Retreat in Chicago.  Since she left at 8:00 PM she arrived at Chicago at 5am.  But she couldn't check into her dorm until noon.  So she grabbed some breakfast, checked out a gigantic Target, read at Starbuck's for an hour, and took a little nap at the park (hence the hobo reference).  

Once Emily checked into her dorm and took a little nap, she was refreshed enough to go out some more.  She went to a bookstore and read another book for a while.  She eventually went to buy the book.  But when she presented the clerk with her Alaskan Driver's License to get her tax-free status on, the lady copped her a huge attitude.  They argued back and forth for a bit, and since the clerk was so rude and ignorant, Emily finally just ended up paying the sales tax.  Still angered by the ordeal Emily didn't read her book for a while.

My day was less exciting.  The coolest part of my day was that I was given notice of my interview time on Monday for the DNA casework position that I applied for.  I grilled up some Costco sausages for dinner and now I'm just watching the All-Star game (in extra innings as I type).

Hiking weekend

This weekend we were hiking fools.  On Friday after dinner we decided to hike up flattop.  That's one of the nice things about living in a place that never gets dark...until the winter.  The last time we tried hiking up flattop we turned around about halfway up, because it was still covered in snow.  This time we made it all the way up.  It was pretty perilous.  The last 200 feet was more like rock climbing.  Banjo managed to keep right up with us.  This one point when we were descending, Banjo started slipped.  It was funny, because instead of trying to regain his footing he decided to run around barking like a possessed dog.  

On Saturday after swimming we packed up a lunch and hit the trails once again.  This hike was out to Hidden Lake.  But we never made it that far.  It was a really pretty hike that first followed along the powerlines, and then crossed a river and went into this big valley.  As we continued up into the mountains there were still quite a few pockets of snow.  A few times we lost the trail and had to sort of wander through the bushes.  At one point we had to cross back over the river.  There was one area that was covered with snow.  Banjo was able to make it over okay, but apparently I"m a lot heavier than Banjo (about 2xs to be exact).  So, I fell right into the river and walked around with water swishing out of my feet.  At one point we saw this woman from my work off in the distance (I could tell it was her, because of her distinguishably loud voice).  We took a detour to avoid saying hello.  

Happy Birthday Ruta

Today is my mom's birthday.  To commemorate this momentous event here are a few pictures from our time in Anchorage last week before the rest of the fam came up.  On Wednesday, grandma, mom and I started off the day with a trip to flattop.  We didn't actually hike the mountain, a noted dangerous hike with rock climbing at the top (Neil, Banjo and I did this last Friday).  Instead we toured around a little loop that has a look out over the city.  We also saw a mama and baby moose on our way up.

After flattop we went to the Native Cultural Center.  It was a really interesting museum.  When you walk in they had this gathering place where we listened to a story teller, watched some kids demonstrate events for the Native cultural olympics.  Games included: kicking a little stuffed seal hanging in the air while still keeping one hand on the ground.  In another game you had to see how far you could jump from a kneeling position.  Later that night I tried demonstrating the games, but they were a lot harder than they looked.  Apparently the games were created during the winter months for people to keep entertained and to keep in shape for hunting once the snow melted.  We also saw traditional dances from Southeast Alaska.  Then we toured these replica houses from all of the different groups.  Did you know that igloos aren't actually made of solid ice?  They're actually built with wood and grass.  They appear to be made of snow, because of all the snow that accumulates on them during the winter.  The houses have a really small entry to protect people from the polar bears.  For the purposes of the display they had a larger enterance, but they offered to let anyone who wanted to tray and exit the igloo the traditional way.  (Grandma tried, and quickly learned that it was a tunnel the whole way.  My mom had to pick up her other leg and push it through, because it wasn't moving.)

We learned more about the Alaska Native cultures the next day when we went to the museum of art and history.  Did you know that they would save their urine (because of its high concentration of amonia) and use it as a cleanser?

We also got a tour of the Alaska crime lab from Neil.  My mom knew a bunch of the key phrases, because of her extensive CSI watching.

Until next time

Today for the gang's last day in Anchorage we went out on a moose hunt.  Hannah really wanted a picture of a "live" moose, so we went to Kincaid park in West Anchorage.  It is a pretty big wooded park that has a really large trail system.  On our drive in we saw 4 different moose from the car, but while we were walking around the trails we didn't happen upon any (which is probably a good thing, since Banjo seems to like to bark and growl at them).  As grandma will report, we walked about 10 miles up and down, up and down, up and down the hills (probably more like 1.5 miles).  

Afterwards, I took everyone to one of our favorite pizza spots, Moose's Tooth.  We got 2 large pizzas that we were able to split so we had 4 different kinds: BBQ salmon; chicken, spinach and roasted garlic; southwest chicken; and chipotle steak.  Mmmm...

Later in the day we went to an Ulu factory.  Ulus are these knives that were originally used by Natives to filet and cut salmon.  It was pretty hokey.  

Right before everyone left for the airport, my dad decided he wanted to try and fix the toilet, which sometimes doesn't flush.  In the process he managed to flush one of the pieces down the toilet.  Since it was ten minutes before we had to go to the airport, we were left to repair the damage after they left.  Thanks Clave.

Just For the Halibut

At $15 per pound we got about $1,300 worth of halibut.  The experience, priceless.  We had a lot of fun.  We were quite worried about getting sea sick & took dramamine before we left.  The dramamine made us pretty sleepy.  Whenever we were motoring to the next location, we were all asleep.  The water was like glass & the weather was pretty decent.  We got our limit of two each.  We released a number of smaller ones.  Smaller being I would guess less than 15 pounds.  The biggest one was about 28 pounds, although I thought my last one was going to be huge.  The fish took the line out of the reel & was moving me around the boat.  My arms were getting tired & I was about ready to ask for help.  When the fish came up, it was about the same size as the others, but apparently it was good entertainment.  As you can see from Emily struggling to lift the fish, they were pretty heavy, although they were no where near the record of over 300 pounds.  Although, Jacob who lifts weights didn't seem to have any problem.  Tomorrow is our last day.  We are planning on going on a hike in the city.  We may do it again next year.  Guest contributor:  Calvin.

Born On the 4th of July

Being in Homer did not stop Neil from celebrating his birthday in the traditional way.  If you thought the Friday Harbor parade was small time, you haven't seen Homer's.  One of the highlights was the belly dancers and the people walking their dogs.  At one time I thought 28 was pretty old.  Now I'm twice as old as Neil.  We went clam digging at Ninilchik.  Nilnilchik is a Russian word, but I forget what it means.  There were several Russian villages in the area.  As you can see we got a lot of clams.  The last time Neil went in Washington, he didn't get any.  He made up for it this time.  We had clams for dinner & clam jook for breakfast.  We froze the rest and are bringing them home.  There were blue lupines everywhere.  Tonight we are staying in the lupine room in a B&B called fireweed.

There's No Place Like Home(r)

No, we really didn't come to Alaska just for the halibut.  Ruth & Grandma came up last Tuesday.  Emily took off work & showed them some of the sights, including Flatop Mt. where they saw a moose & the museums.  The rest of us came up on July 3.  The first picture is Portage Lake.  Last winter we took a picture at the same location.  Hannah thought the trailer hitch balls were interesting.  We saw those in Soldatna, where we had lunch.  Our place in Homer, Jenny Lane Cottage was perfect.  It was located on a cliff above Kachemak bay, as you can see from the picture of Jacob climbing up.  One evening while we were walking on the beach about a mile from the cottage, Jacob & Neil decided to climb back up the cliff.  The rest of us got back & we were wondering where they were.  It was starting to get a little dark around 11:30 & some of us were getting a little worried & went out looking for them.  Turns out they couldn't find the rope & walked about a mile past our place.  (To be continued)