RSL - Day 2

The water was so clear, calm and smooth it was just like a mirror.  I like this picture that Emily took of the sky.
Here is the hobo dinner I as talking about earlier.  It sure was filling.
Here I am with Banjo at our dock.  Banjo was always a little apprehensive about getting into the canoe for our trips.
Two cute guys!
More reflections off of the water.

Red Shirt Lake - Day 1

I know Emily has written about what we've done, so I'll toss in a few pictures.  We had a little dock in-front of our cabin, and the beach was sandy which made it easy to get in and out of the canoe.  We made Hobo dinners the first night (which we really made the night before).  We even brought a little frozen hamburger meat with us that thawed by dinner time so Emily could put it into our meals.  They were pretty tasty.  Mine more than Emily's b/c I used more seasoning.  We had fun canoeing, and we even got Banjo to swim a little.  And we even managed to stay connected to the real-world.  We bought a paper in town so we could start our fires, and thought maybe we could even read a few stories.  To say that Alaska was stoked that Palin was picked as the VP is an understatement.  I would be in a state beyond shock if Barack can win up here now.

Labor Day Weekend

This past weekend we went out to Red Shirt Lake.  We'd rented a public use cabin in Nancy Lake State Recreation area.  We hiked out to the lake, which was about a 3 mile hike, and then we hopped into a canoe and canoed out to our cabin.  Banjo did surprisingly really well in the canoe.  Going our the first time we gave him a bone filled with peanut butter to keep him occupied.  He later dropped it into the lake.  

The cabin was pretty rustic.  It had "beds", which were just plywood frames and a very thin foam pad.  During the day we canoed around the lake and wondered around our cabin collecting firewood.  There really weren't a whole lot of places we could go to, because there weren't any trails or anything.  We had fun cooking on the fire though.  

At one point a porcupine wondered into our camp and Banjo pounced after it and chased it.  We kept yelling at him  and couldn't get him to come back.  Fortunately the porcupine ran up a tree without quilling the dog.  

I'll post some pictures soon.  We had such good weather.  It was great!

River Rafting Bonanza

Last Wednesday we went river rafting with a group of people from my work.  It was organized through the outdoor program at elemndorf air force base.  We rafted down Eagle River a ways and then the trip ended on Fort Richardson, where a bus was supposed to pick us up and drop us back off with our stuff at the elmendorf.  But, when we got there there was no bus in sight.  Apparently they were doing some sort of maneuver so all of the gates to the base were closed off.  We waited and waited.  And finally after getting tired of standing there wet and cold, someone called the base operator on a phone that was on the side of the road.  She told her that we were cold and if someone didn't come and get us we would run the risk of getting hypothermia.  Another twenty minutes or so two police cars, an ambulence, a fire truck and the batalian truck all came.  Apparently the switch board lady told them that there was a little kid wondering around with hypothermia.  So they called a cease fire (it turned out they were using live amunition just two kilometers away).  It ended up being a good thing that this little misunderstanding occured, because it allowed them to open up the gate for us and we were able to leave.  It turned out being a long day.  We left right after work to go rafting, and didn't get home until after 11pm.

That's not fair produce...

behold the harvest of our garden.  These peas seemed to be the only thing that grew in our garden.  It wasn't ever sunny, and it seemed impossible to keep the weeds away (it's hard when the garden patch is in the middle of a weed lot).  The one benefit of the weather this year was that we didn't really ever have to water.  Big dinner tomorrow!

Alaska State Fair

Today instead of canvassing, we decided to go to the state fair with keri and jarred.  Many Alaskans hyped it up quite a bit, but I thought it seemed rather small.  Highlights of the fair were: 1.  seeing the reknowned giant cabage (apparently there are larger ones, but the farmers aren't going to pick them until the last day so that they have longer to grow); 2.  fair food (I had an All Alaskan quesadilla, which had salmon and reindeer sausage and guacamole; and Neil and I shared a chocolate mint cookie and milk and then a blueberry funnel cake) 3.  Target is opening in AK on Oct 13 and they've been doing publicity at major events such as fur rondy and the fair.  I got a gigantic target sucker for free 4.  The most exciting part of the fair was seeing Ted Saddler!  He's this goofy looking old man who owns the Mattress Ranch.  There are three in Alaska and we just saw one in Washington.  The commercials are quite hoaky.  Ted does this weird dance, and always wears a sponge bob tie.

Happy August 21st Birthday to Me

We have been negligent lately on our blogging duties.  But I have been yearning for a new bike, and Emily said she would get me one for my birthday.  She had been looking at Craig's list for a good one, and she found a Cannondale.  We emailed the guy a few times, and we went over to check it out tonight after dinner.  I gave it a ride for a little bit, and everything seemed in good order, so we got it!  We had Bannie with us, so we went to the dog park afterwards and Emily walked around while I rode and Banjo chased me.  It was pretty cool.  Emily and I are going to go on a little bike ride this weekend, maybe over to trace a route to my work.  I'll post a picture of the bike later.

Isn't Alaska great?

So in addition to the permanent dividend fund, which is 2,100 per person this year, all Alaskan residents also get a 1,200 bonus check this year for energy costs (even though you can spend it on whatever you want).  We won't be getting any of this even though by the time the checks come out I'll have lived here for over a year.  So, basically I have to suffer through the corruption and the crappy summer weather without any incentive.  It's been interesting with all of the election commercials.  I've never heard conservative used as a positive attribute of a candidate.  The republican's newest conspiracy theory is that Vic Vickers, who is running as a republican against Ted Stevens, is actually a ploy by the democrats to tarnish Steven's good name.  Ever since the indictment came out against Stevens, he's been ahead in the polls.  This place is scary.

Canvassing

We just got back from canvassing the neighborhood.  FIrst I went out with Margaret who lives one block over from us.  We did 65 doors, which took us about 3.5 hours.  Then I recruited Neil (he's been really sick these few days) and we did another 45 or so.  Most of these people were quite excited about Obama, but the funniest was this guy who invited us into his living room and he and this lady wanted to have a discussion about Obama.  At first when he answered the door I thought that he would have been a tried and true Republican, but they ended up being pretty cool.  The place reeked of cigarette smoke and they were both sitting in their lazy boys.  It really reminded me of something out of a documentary or something.  

Now it's off to Thai food to reward our hard work.  

House Party

Last night we had our Obama house party.  It was pretty successful.  We probably had about 20 people show up, although none of the people I invited came.  I made Ellen's mint brownies, and had some veggies, pot stickers and a few other snacks.  Then after everyone hung out for a while we watched an Obama speech, and then people discussed why they had come or why they were supporting Obama.  There were a few characters, and even a Republican for Obama.

Today we're having a big canvas event.  The goal is to visit 25,000 houses across the state.  Our field organizer said that if we can accomplish this goal it is quite likely that Obama may visit Alaska!  The last pole had Obama 5% points ahead of McCain in Alaska.  Hopefully all of our hard work will pay off.

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)

A mousy treat

I am absolutely disgusted. This evening we took Banjo for a walk. When we arrived back home Banjo was munching on something, which I thought was wood. But, when I reached in to take it out I noticed it had a tail. It was a dead crunchy mouse. I scrubbed my hands with soap and water and then used a lysol wipe just to be safe. Gross!

Bird Ridge

Today we hiked up to Bird Ridge, which is just south of town. It was more like a workout than a hike. The first two miles you gain 3,400 feet in elevation. We had to keep stopping, because Neil's legs were too week. Banjo was a good hiker though. At the top there was still a few berms of snow. He went crazy and was running up and down as though he hadn't been hiking for the past 2 hours. We felt quite week, because there were a number of 70 year olds who either passed us or were on their way down. They didn't even appear as though they were hiking up the face of a mounting. It was a pretty beautiful hike though. We could look out over over Cook Inlet, and there seemed to be three bald eagles that liked to swarm over us (perhaps waiting for us to keel over so that they'd have a free meal.)

On our way home we stopped off for some Mexican food. It was pretty tasty. And we picked up some lamb puppy food for Banjo (apparently you're supposed to rotate the protein source of your dog's food every bag of food.) I also got Banjo the world's largest rawhide bone as a treat for being such a good hiker. The tag next to the bin said $6, but apparently that was for a different bone. His bone was $17. Banjo's such a spoiled puppy.

Pro Choice BBQ

Yesterday we went to a Planned Parenthood fundraiser barbecue. One of my friends from swimming is the public relations person for planned parenthood of Alaska and they're trying to start this thing where anyone can host a fundraiser barbecue. It was pretty fun. We played a little bocce ball, and met some interesting people---and all for a good cause. The state representative for our neighborhood, and this really weird nerdy guy who is running state senate. He was pretty good at bocce ball tough. I think it would be fun to do a similar thing to raise money for Obama.

Happy Solstice Birthday!

Clave always celebrates his birthday on the longest day of the year. This year we celebrated it in Alaskan style by going camping. Of course, there was no need for flashlights.

We went about 45 minutes outside of town to Lake Eklutna in the Chugach State park. Jared had gone earlier to stake us out a spot. And it was good he did so, because the camp ground was full by the time we got there. We camped next to Tracy, an old free spirit. She has a tradition of drinking and eating special brownies each year to bring in the solstice. She was pretty freindly though and regaled stories about grabbing other women's boobs at bars, and an internet friend that she made who was in a wheel chair, and would sling her bag of pee at people when she got rowdy.

Neil and I made potatoes and chilli for dinner, and I had the obligatory s'more and some peach pie that I made with the little pocket cookers over the fire. It was a lot of fun. We hung out around the fire until around 1 in the morning, and it was still quite light when we went to bed. (The first picture was taken at midnight without a flash--which is why it's a bit blurry)

THis was also Banjo's first camping trip, so he celebrated by eating all of the sticks and bark he could find (which was a lot). Then at night when we went to bed with Banjo in the tent he decided to barf all over my sleeping mat and the bottom of the tent. It was quite gross. I used Neil's shirt to clean it up, but one wasn't enough. So, I used his undershirt too. Then in the morning Banjo found the shirts and carried them over to Kari and Jared's tent as a little present.

The lake was really beautiful. We think we want to go back and go kayaking and/or biking.

Happy birthday Clave!

Haru's last day slingin' coffee

Saturday was Hannah's last day as a Starbuck's barista. Of course Emily and I had to go document the momentous event, much to Haru's shagrin. We both got carmel machiatos, hung around, and occasionally annoyed Hannah. It was great fun.

Nert Hoff

Today was Banjo's graduation day of Advanced Puppy Training. We played games with the other dogs (Banjo again was the sit-stay champ - well, co-champ). At the end we received a certificate with the handler's name on it. In this case, that name was Nert Hoff. When I first heard it, I thought Emily had played some mean trick on me while I was in Seattle. But I guess they just couldn't make out my name for some reason. The lady was real nice and offered to make me a new certificate with my REAL name, which she did. So now we have two certificates for Banjo on our fridge, one with each name. NERT!!!!