If it seems like I've been obsessed with the weather lately, you aren't far wrong. Most everyone I know is checking the weather on the internet, the TV, and the phone on a daily basis. We want to know when the smoke is going away. We want to know if we are going to have ANY summer without smoke! The answer is: doesn't look like it.
The forest fires continue to burn. The Boundary Fire is up to 380,000 acres consumed now. I am not in any danger here, not to worry. Danger from fire, that is, but I went to Home Despot and bought a P100 respirator mask a couple of days ago, because my lungs need a break from the smoke. It works extremely well! It's just like breathing fresh, cool air!
I don't wear it while I am teaching lessons, though. Little kids would pee their pants if I opened the door and they saw this THING that used to be their teacher but now looks like some kind of giant insect.
The building I work in is just like a cardboard box with a bunch of holes poked in it, as far as keeping smoke out. Heck, I have one window that rattles around and the other window? It FELL OUT during a storm a couple months ago and there's just some plastic over it (that I stapled into place so no children would fall out the window). This summer it's been hottern' heckola up there on the second floor, and when you come into a 12 x 10 room and see smoke hanging in it, getting a respirator seems like a very reasonable thing to do.
Several of my friends have already stated that they are ready for winter, in fact, can't wait for winter. Why? Because 1) no smoke, 2) no tourists, and 3) roads are way smoother.
I agree with 1 and 3, but the tourists don't bother me. Alaska is so big that if I go out of my general area up here, I become a tourist myself! Plus, it's easy to have a generous attitude toward visitors because I don't have to deal with them on a daily basis, and they often do amusing and cute things. For instance, I have seen Japanese couples cadging shoppers in Fred Meyer into taking their pictures inside the store. Yes, come to Alaska! See the northern lights! See exotic Fred Meyer! (Fred Meyer is a grocery/department store, kind of like KMart but a whole lot more expensive and with a real grocery store.)
Yesterday it rained for an hour just in the area around my house. It must have been because I was trying so hard to make it rain. Shocking as that sounds, considering how much I hate rain, I wish it would rain more and put out the forest fires. I got it to rain yesterday by putting all the cardboard boxes that I still need for moving out in the front yard. I also left my truck windows rolled down. I draw the line at washing the truck, though. It's hopeless to wash a vehicle up here. It's going to get bugsmacked and dusted right away and be dirty by the time I get into town anyway. Oh, yeah, Scott hung his laundry out to dry, too. That's probably what put it over the edge. It just HAD to rain, then!
As I write I'm staring out the window at dark, gray cloud cover. It's been that way all night so far, but no rain yet. I'm still not going to go wash the truck. I have a couple more boxes I could throw outside, though...
