Inktrails from Alaska

Fairbanks Weather Report

From the National Weather Service....

AKZ222-281400-MIDDLE TANANA VALLEY-INCLUDING...FAIRBANKS...FORT WAINWRIGHT...EIELSON AFB...ESTER...NORTH POLE...MOOSE CREEK...TWO RIVERS...FOX...CHATANIKA...CHENAHOT SPRINGS...SOURDOUGH CAMP251 PM AKDT

TUE APR 27 2010.TONIGHT...PARTLY CLOUDY IN THE EVENING...MOSQUITOES APPEAR...THEN MOSTLY CLEAR. LOWS 35 TO 40. EAST WINDS TO 10 MPH

..WEDNESDAY...MOSTLY SUNNY. HIGHS 60 TO 65. LIGHT WINDS...BLOWING MOSQUITOES THROUGHOUT THE DAY

WEDNESDAY NIGHT...MOSTLY CLOUDY. LOWS 35 TO 45. LIGHT WINDS. MOSQUITOES CONTINUING TONIGHT THROUGH THURSDAY MORNING AND CONTINUING UNTIL SEPTEMBER....

Alaskans! Stop the Daylight "Savings" Time Madness!

This first Monday of DST I'm now getting up in the dark. I've been there. Done that. Am tired of it. I've had enough dark, thank you very much. All winter I've been getting up in the dark. I don't need to sacrifice my daylight for Daylight "Savings" Time.

The benefits of DST are often said to save energy and money. Not in Alaska. It's cold. I have to start my car up (after plugging in in for at least a few hours) when it is cold, before the day warms up, which wastes energy, big time. I have to turn on lights to see what I'm doing. Instead of being a big boon, it's a big pain in the ass.

Light is coming back at a rate of 7 minutes per day. By June 21st we'll have nearly 24 hours of daylight. We don't need DST. It doesn't make sense here.

During the winter it gets dark, and we lose light until we have only around 2 1/2 hours of official daylight a a day. Changing the time isn't going to make the sun shine longer.

Some small group of business people feel disadvantaged because of our time zone, and want DST to make their contacts with the Lower 48 work better with their schedules. Look folks, we all live in this time zone. Grow up. If you need to call the East Coast by a certain time then you get up and make sure you call them by the required time. If you can't deal with that, then maybe you need to move back to the Lower 48. 

When I have had to call Ireland I get up early and make the call. That's an eight hour difference. I'm sure you folks can handle a four hour difference.

When DST was invented there was no internet. Communications now are cheap and easily accomplished even with most cell phones. There is no reason for every citizen of Alaska to suffer because some business person can't get it together to call Outside at the right time.

I urge everyone to call their representatives and ask them to stop this madness. Watch this space for a petition.

Marijuana a "Performance-enchancing" Drug? Get Real!

Iditarod Launches Drug Testing of Mushers

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Every human competitor now running the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race will be tested for alcohol and illegal drugs on the trail for the first time in the history of the 1,100-mile race - a change defending champion Lance Mackey believes is directed at him.

"I know for a fact," said the three-time winner.

Mackey, who has been open about using medical marijuana on the trail, on Tuesday was among the early front-runners in the race, which began with 71 teams Sunday in Willow. (Please click on the link to read the whole article.)

Mackey Seeks 4th Win in Iditarod Sled Dog Race

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Both knees are shot, injected with synthetic cartilage until he can have surgery next summer. His right arm is still healing from a major operation to fix a staph infection. He continues to deal with other side effects of cancer. (Please click link above to read entire article.)

If anyone has a use for medical marijuana it's Lance Mackey. He's a certified, card-carrying user of the same, and with good reason: he's a cancer survivor. If it were me with all the physical issues he has right now, I'd be home eating popcorn and watching movies. But Mackey is a doer, not a watcher. Even though he is allowed to take his cancer pills, which contain the active ingredient in marijuana, he isn't going to. He says he can't take the chance. I agree.There would be no way for the drug testers to distinguish between the pills and actual marijuana use, even though it's legal for Mackey to use marijuana.

From what I can tell the Iditarod is one mean, nasty, cut-throat race, where people lie and connive to get others thrown out of the race. I've seen it in years previous and I'm sure we'll see it again. Four mushers have complained that Mackey's use of marijuana gives him an edge. Right. Marijuana, it just makes you super strong and fearless, able to stay awake for hours on end, right? Yeah, right. You can go for extended periods of punishing physical activity with marijuana, right? It's laughable!

How many people do you know who use marijuana so they can sleep at night? So that they can deal with the nausea caused by cancer drugs? How about ADD people who self-medicate with marijuana so that they can stop being so hyper?

How many people know guys who still live in their parents' basement and smoke dope and watch video games in between shifts at the nearest convenience store? I mean honestly, marijuana is the most NON-performance-enhancing drug of them all! It's the most non-motivating, pro-layabout drug. Come on, Iditarod folks, this is a joke.

The rules for the Iditarod state that mushers will be tested for illegal drugs. But Mackey's use of marijuana is legal.

The whole thing just stinks. And I applaud Lance Mackey for being an incredibly persistent person who is rolling with the punches with so much more amiability than I would have in his circumstances.

Summer Fashion In Fairbanks

It's raining ash. Ash is covering all my vehicles, and everything exposed to the outdoors. In addition there are massive quantities of particulate that are microscopic. Forest fires are now surrounding Fairbanks, though so far we aren't in any danger. Hope it stays that way.

Meanwhile the smoke is so think you can see it billow. Visibility is less than a quarter mile, possibly less than an eighth of a mile.

My clothes smell like smoke. So do my instruments. Everything smells like smoke now. I ate some smoked salmon just now and said to myself, "What am I DOING?"

Other than the first snow, which arrives in October, there appears to be no end in site. I get to look like a Martian for quiet some time yet. Oh, and if I look bleary, it's because I couldn't sleep because it was 85° in the house again, and of course opening windows was impossible with it raining ash.

Fairbanks News-Miner article on the fires surrounding us: Crews Protect  Subdivision

Fire information for Alaska: Incident Information

A Rock and a Hard Place

The air is bad. As in "extremely unhealthy" as characterized by those at the Scientific Air Quality Office, whoever they may be (I think it's the borough). That's just one step below hazardous. No one is supposed to go do things outside, and people with asthma and other problems aren't supposed to go outside if they can possibly help it at all.

Not an easy thing to do, when summer is waning and there is still a lot to do to get ready for winter. People are madly working away at their construction projects. Truck drivers and heavy equipment operators are busy, busy, busy all working outside.

My problem is that I can't open windows to cool off my house. I'm not supposed to breathe that air, but being 85° in the house isn't conducive to good sleep either. But it's not just my lungs I have to worry about, it's Buddy Bird, too. An Amazon parrot can't handle forest fire smoke, even less so than I can! So even if I could handle opening a window, and say, then running the air cleaner on HIGH afterward, I'd kill my bird, or at least make him seriously ill. At least as a creature of the jungle he doesn't mind the high temperature.

The dogs and I are too hot, though. What's odd is that the humidity is very high for Alaska, between 40 and 70 per cent. I want to know who sent this Michigan weather, seriously! Yes, I know it's not 90 squared, but it's roughly 70 squared and that's bad enough!

So here I am, trapped inside while the cool air is outside, but too toxic to breathe.

I hope this forest fire smoke goes away soon, though I don't have much hope of that. It may go like this until first snowfall, God forbid!

This Cracks Me Up

The Elevation of Pettiness: Sarah Palin

http://ow.ly/hmDZ

Yes, and double yes.

Breaking News: Palin to Resign as Governor

http://ow.ly/gsTX

KTUU in Anchorage is reporting that at a news conference, Sarah Palin stated she will resign as governor at the end of the month.

She's still fighting many charges of ethics violations, and I'm sure she's running from that..straight to campaigning for the White House! Ambitious as ever, but not very smart.

Alaska will be better off without her. Let's see what kind of a job Parnell will do.  I am not holding my breath.

Come and Listen

I'll be playing at Alaskaland Gazebo on Friday, June 26, from 7—8pm.  If it rains I'll be in the big, round building somewhere, probably in the Bear Gallery, but check, around and look for signs, or ask at the Fairbank Arts Association office, which is right there on the ground floor. There will be a sign at the Gazebo as to where I've gone.

I figure it will rain. It has so far, two out of three times. I was playing earlier in the afternoon for the last couple of weeks but will only play for the Gazebo Nights hour tomorrow.

It's free, so please do come by and enjoy!

This is why I don't eat sushi with raw fish

http://blogs.chicagoreader.com/food/2009/06/11/sushi-tapeworms/

Seems to me that I have heard of folks ordering a diet solution on the internet (GUARANTEED RESULTS-You WILL LOSE WEIGHT!!) and unknowingly ended up with tapeworms. The creepiness factor is enormous.

When I went to school at UC Davis, which at the time was the only vet school in California, I would sneak into vet lecture classes. One class on parasites was enough for me to say "Never again!" to  raw fish. You really don't want to see the slides I saw.