Inktrails from Alaska

An Angry Town

Fairbanks is the angriest city in the USA. It's still snowing here. You should see the Facebook news feed from all my friends and acquaintences. We are mad. And as May 1st rolls around, we are madder than ever.

There won't be any Maypoles here. Instead, we are calling on all our friends with plow trucks to come over and clear our driveways. I am not making this up. Check this out.

That's my yard, except that it has snowed since then and there's more snow than ever. In fact, I'm going to go out tomorrow or the next day and make a snowman or two, since this is the heavy kind of snow. We usually get powder here, so it's one way of trying to make lemonade out of lemons. Snowmen out of snow. And then the dogs attack and destroy the snowmen with great glee. It's a zen thing.

Today it got up to 35° and the roads cleared and some even dried out. This morning it was a total goat rope with icy roads sending scores of vehicles into the ditch during the morning commute. Several hours after morning rush it was all clear, wet and driveable. I got home around 6:30 and the nightly snow began again. AGAIN.

According to the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, our local paper, this is the third coldest winter on record. Not to mention that on certain days, the cold has broken ALL records. Yippee. Whoop tee doo.

As of tomorrow, this will be our third month of March. March is when you can expect the winter to start to get wobbly, and the temperatures to fluctuate, causing wacky weather. Sometimes the roads are dry, sometimes, wet, and sometimes a bunch of black ice stops everyone cold. But it's to be expected. It's March. Breakup can be messy, muddy and even icy. But we love it because it means winter is over!

Or not. We had March, and then we had an April that was March, and now, starting tomorrow, we are having May, which is yet again March.

The whole town of Fairbanks and the folks in North Pole are all screaming UNCLE!

When this all first started some kept of up that Alaskan litany, "Well, at least it isn't forty below!"

No one is saying that now.

Even seasoned Alaskans in the Interior are beginning to feel that this is the way it will be. Forever. Until next winter when it IS forty below.

It's like when my son was almost three weeks late being born. At one point I just began to feel that it was a lie, that everyone was wrong, that I was going to be pregnant forever, uncomfortable forever and that's just how it was.

That's how this winter feels. It's never going to end. It's just going to snow every night forever.

We should be able to put our houseplants outside, to start building our gardens. Fairbanksans plant their seeds in February and plan to plant outside near the middle to end of May. We have a short, but very intense growing season because we are gaining daylight at 7 minutes per day until we have close to 24 hours daylight by June 21. Plants love this.

Now people have these leggy seedlings that are way too big for their pots...and nowhere to plant them.

I've started scanning airline tickets and I'm sure other people have, too. I thought I'd go Outside at Christmas time to get away from the darkest part of winter. Little did I know that I'd want to get away from winter in May.

This is one grumpy, angry, irritated town. If I had Xanax, I'd take it.

Caution: Dangerous Furniture!

Yesterday at Tartan Tundra Music studio, where I work giving music lessons to all and sundry, there seemed to be a definite theme: Waiting For Mom.

It was snowing and I supposed the various Moms felt less inclined to leave the warmth of JoAnne or Fred Meyer or wherever it was they were shopping. Meanwhile, back in the studio I was visiting with my students while we waited for their arrival. Which was fine, yesterday. I had enough time between students that a bit of visiting was fun. Normally it's not okay, as I have to continue to teach the next student, rather than visit. Yes, yesterday was definitely an odd day.

So the second-to-the-last student packed up her violin, and I gave her her reward for a great week of good practice. I then sat down in my office chair to do some paperwork. She asked me a question while coming through the practice room door, behind me. I turned a bit, and leaned too far, and the chair started going over! I caught myself with my hand on the floor and slammed my bare feet down to pull the chair back up.

Everything seemed fine, as I was upright again, albeit feeling stupid for falling over, so I laughed and answered her question. The next student arrived and we had a pleasant lesson.

After seeing the last student out the door, I suddenly realized my left foot felt odd. In fact, I couldn't walk on it because it felt like a ping pong ball had suddenly grown between the ball of my foot and the little toe mound. Perplexed and sore, I sat down and looked at the bottom of my foot to find a huge, black hematoma. I tried to walk and found I couldn't. Not on the bottom of my foot. I put my boot on. AAACK! No, that wasn't going to work, I could barely fit it in the boot! I immediately yanked the boot back off again. Ow.

So I put my foot up on the desk for ten minutes and called the ER to see if this was something I should go in for. I was pretty sure it wasn't. I've had a hematoma before and knew that it was a broken blood vessel that would probably take care of itself. Still, I wanted a medical opinion.

Well, you know what they say at the ER. You could have your guts hanging out, and bleeding out your ears and they'd say the same thing. "We cannot give a medical opinion over the telephone. You must decide whether you should come into the Emergency Room or not." So helpful.

Called my friend who is a nurse. No answer. Called her husband, no answer. Called a friend. No answer.

I'd just found the New Theme for the Day! The No One Will Answer The Phone theme!

By this time I figured out that I could walk with my foot tipped up on its heel. VERY gadorky! It looked even better if I crooked my back and talked like Igor.

The dogs were perplexed.

I jammed my foot into my boot (minor OW), got my backpack, and grabbed the dogs leashes. Our next hurdle was descending a huge flight of steep stairs.

I am proud to say that Ole and Sofia not only didn't pull me down the stairs, as they usually do, but they minced down every so slowly and carefully, watching me the entire time. Good dogs! They'd been with me all day and I know they desperately need a good wee.

Since I have an automatic transmission in my car, and the injured foot was the left one, I made it home without incident and got immediately in my bed with my foot elevated, iPad in hand, and watched three episodes of "Monarch of the Glen." By that time the hematoma was down to a manageable size and the day was won!

And I have learned my lesson: use caution when using dangerous furniture! Maybe I should find some kind of Office Chair Safety Seminar? Or better yet, I should give one and charge big bucks. Right?

Grumpy Alaskan

WARNING: The person writing this post is very grumpy.

Why? Because we are supposed to be entering the Break Up season (otherwise known to other, more temperate regions as Spring). For us it means that the snow starts to GO AWAY. Yes. I'm making shooing motions here.

It is snowing, and is supposed to snow some more. And some more.

The raven mating season is past. They made their water-dripping noise, and have gone on to do their own family thing. The water-dripping noise usually coincides with actual WATER DRIPPING.

It warmed up, I got one tiny icicle drip off my roof. And...nothing. Everything froze up again.

Two weeks ago I plugged in my freezer(it's outside) because we'd had about a week with above freezing temperature.

I had to plug it back in again. Grrrr. It was below zero when I got up this morning. GRRRRRR.

For a while I didn't have to plug in the car. I had to plug it in this morning. GRRR.

My whole yard is hard-packed snow, except for the new stuff falling now and I am still in winter boots and coat. I'd really like to wear my Converse but that is not going to happen any time soon unless I want to fall and break myself. And have cold feet.

I don't WANT to sweep off the damn car AGAIN.

I'm wearing sunglasses while driving to deal with snow glare...

The people in my building at work who smoke have peppered the parking area with ash that is ground into snow. So delightful.

And the yellow snow for which my dogs are partly responsible, that's just gross and I want it GONE.

Not to mention people burning all KINDS of crap: oil, coal, tires, grandpa's recliner...so that we are choking and gacking every time we go outside. Especially in town. It's the worst air EVER.

My nature is to look on the bright side and I'm fighting the urge to say, "Well it could be worse, it could be..." BUT NO! I'M GRUMPY AND BY GOLLY I GET TO BE GRUMPY!

I'm going to go to work now, and on the way I will be irked by at least ten more things that are pissing me off about this extended Winter.

So there!

Alaskan Spring: There's No Such Thing

We obsess over "Spring" as no other state in the union does because in no other state does winter last nine months. We don't really have Spring. We have Winter, Summer, and Breakup and Freezeup. There are no early crocuses for us. It's mid-March and I still have at least two feet of snow everywhere. I'm still wearing my winter boots and down jacket.

It's time for it to be over! For one thing, my fingers are starting to poke out of my little red, knit gloves with the texting fingers.

We've had a week of wind, and all the snow is off the trees now. I no longer have to go out with my hood up to avoid a big glob of snow down the back of my neck. Wind in Fairbanks is uncommon and also uncommonly nasty. Today there is yet again wind. Temperature: 1°F. Wind chill: -12°. Looks like I'll be dressing ludicrously puffy again.

It would be nice to see my front step again. And open the gate to the dog yard in both directions and more than just a little 30° swing that allows us to squeeze in and out.

All the snow and ice has melted off my car! Yay! True, there is still one glob gluing the aluminum-covered cardboard onto the front, but if I park facing the sun, that will go, too. As soon as it is regularly above 20° all the time, I can take that sucker off! Plus I can start saving on my electric bill by not having to plug in the car, too. We still aren't hitting that yet. I'm getting impatient. Everyone in Fairbanks is getting impatient. 

We have about twelve hours of light a day now! Mind you, the angle of the sun as it grazes the top of the world here means that compared to you in lower latitudes, our sun is wimpy. But for us, it's glorious!

Another Rite of Spring is having the hard pack (snow) removed from ones driveway. This will happen soon, and will result in mountains of SNIRT (mixed snow and dirt) everywhere. The dogs love this. It always turns into a huge sniff-fest, as dirt that has been under the snow for nine months is suddenly revealed.

This is from a couple years ago. I'm hoping I'll have huge piles of snirt sometime this week. Ole is doing his best to remove the hard pack from the dog yard.

When the snow goes away we get to revisit Fall, and see all the dead plants and even some of the Fall colors. The trees will be bare, and everything will be rather brownish-red. We'll be able to look into each others' yards and see all the junk the snow was covering up: cars, trucks, wrecks, garbage of all sorts, lawn furniture, toys (of all sizes) and so on.

The retreat of the snow is hard on my dogs, as they live for winter and love snow, both playing in it, on it, and through it. And peeing on it. We are approaching the season where they frantically search for a bit of snow to pee on. It takes them a while to get used to dirt again, and it is funny to watch Sofia find a tiny spot of snow and try to fit herself on it just to pee.

When the snow goes away all of Ole's fur rubbings on the fence are taken away by birds, who then build fuzzy nests.

Unfortunately, retreat of the snow also means emergence of the all the poop that has been frozen all winter. I don't want to elaborate further.

Right now people are looking up, squinting at the branches of their trees and saying, "Is that a bud?" It's not, not yet. But soon! One of the most exciting seasonal events here is Green Up. One day all the trees are bare, with tiny green buds and the next day BOING, and we have LEAVES! And once again our junk is hidden from the neighbors.

You could say that for the 6 hours that it takes for all the trees to burst into leaves, we have Spring. But once the leaves are out it's Summer, baby!

But I'm getting ahead of myself here. It still looks like this out there. Sigh.

Spring: Incoming!

Some of you may not know this, but huskies that live in cold climates hang onto their coats all winter and don't shed. Sofia has done a superlative job of not shedding this winter, something I appreciate greatly as Ole is a Shed-O-Matic dog whose goal is to cover every square inch of everything in the entire world with his hair. A little relief from shedding is much appreciated, Sofia!

However there are now over eight hours of sunlight a day and wham! Sofia is starting to shed. Soon we'll have the Fluffy Pantaloons of Spring, something I look forward to every year. Not to mention Dog Plucking Season, also great fun but only tolerated by Sofie, and if you know her, don't try it. I'm the only one allowed to pluck her.

So the very first, earliest sign of Spring has arrived! Sofia slowly turning in to Buffalo Dog!

The second sign is raven mating season, and more importantly, the fact that they are making the Water Dripping noise. Mind you, nothing is melting, nor is it scheduled to melt for at least a month (or more). But it's close, I can tell and so can the ravens.

The third sign is that I can take non-blurry action shots of the dogs with my iPhone.

This also illustrates that it's warm enough to play outside, rather than being -40. I took these pictures today and it was about 0°

We've got solar gain now, which means that some of the strength of the sun is coming back and lingering, being absorbed by the landscape. On the one hand this means the ice that covers the roads (from a rotten freezing rain episode earlier in the winter) is periodically melting on top and getting way too slickety-boo and causing the unaware and just plain stupid to drive right off the road into the ditch, or, unfortunately, into oncoming traffic.

On the other hand, it means that I could park my car with the sun shining right on the back end of it, go eat lunch and come out and take half an inch of ice off my bumper and toss it away! Yes!

My yard still looks like this, it's true. And I love the way snow is so clean and doesn't muck up the house the way dirt and especially mud does. Truth be told, we don't have Spring. We go straight from Winter into Summer. Still, I'm glad it will give way to the green summer not too long from now.

Joys of Teaching (Everything)

As a teacher, I ostensibly teach music. In reality I am a role model, and I take that very seriously. Students don't stick to music with their questions, especially the younger ones, and as my son knows, I know everything. When he was small and even as a bigger kid, he'd ask me a question and if I said "I don't know," he would then say, "Come ON, Mom! TELL me!" Because clearly, I was holding out on him. "I don't know," wasn't something he'd believe. I knew, he was sure of it. I just didn't want to tell him. That's not true, of course, but he thought it was.

Yesterday I was teaching a little, starry-eyed 5-yr-old whose attention was all over the place. She's still getting used to being in this big world. So music lessons and the sky and trees and whatever is on the wall and the dogs all have equal fascination.

She looked at my NASA calendar, which has a lovely shot of deep space on it. "What's THAT?" she breathed.

"That's space," I told her.

"What is SPACE?" she asked.

"Well," I replied, pointing at the blue sky that was slowly changing colors as the sun set, "See the blue sky?"

"Yes."

"Above the blue sky there is space! Do you see the stars at night?"

"Yes."

"The stars are in space!"

"OH!" she said. Not getting it yet, I think, but it was clearly new information for her!

We talked a little bit more about space and what is in it (the Earth, the Sun).

And then of course I had to try to redirect to the music. But it was a nice little cosmic detour!

 

New Series: One American-Made Gift A Day

Let's help jump start the economy. Can you committ to buying American-made gifts this year? ABC News reports that if each of us spent just $64 on American made goods during our holiday shopping, the result would be 200,000 new jobs.

To this end, I am posting one excellent gift per day until Christmas. One gift that is made in the USA.

Today's gift is delightful Ghiradelli hot cocoa mix. This is the real deal, folks. You will never go back to tje cheap stuff with its fake chocolate.

You use less than what is on the directions, trust me, this stuff is strong! I also add some sugar, especially if I put a spoonful in my coffee. There is very little sugar in it.

I think frosting made with this would be awesome. If you buy it for a friend, you're going to want one for yourself.

It comes in regular Chocolate flavor, and the Chocolate Mocha flavor.

Retails in Alaska for about $6. It's going to be cheaper most other places. I find mine at Safeway.

A Very Alaskan Day

I had a very Alaskan day today.

I woke up and it had been snowing all night. Good, I thought, we need more snow.

The thermometer outside read 20° above zero. Good, I thought, I don't have to plug in the car.

There were no moose in the yard so after feeding the dogs I took them out to the backyard and they played in the new snow. Nothing like new snow to make two snow dogs very happy!

I had to get ready to go down to the David Salmon Tribal Hall for the Athabascan Fiddle festival, where the kids I teach with Young Native Fiddlers were performing at 1pm. So I took a shower, all the while wondering if I had enough water in the tank...

The kids did very well at the fiddle festival! We played Boil Them Cabbage, Shortnin' Bread, Eagle Island Blues, Arkansas Traveler and other tunes. I am proud of them, especially one girl who had once flubbed a solo, and was subsequently afraid of doing another solo. Today she stepped up to the mike and did Devil's Dream just like it was the easiest thing in the world!

As I drove toward home on the Johansen Expressway, I saw that there were numerous accidents on the other side of the divider, among the cars going the other direction. I passed several clumps of people with cell phones in hand, looking dazed, worried, confused, with the cars facing every which way some with hoods up, some with smooshed fenders or doors. In fact, there were so many accidents the police finally put up flares and refused to let anyone else onto the expressway. You see, when the temperature goes from -7 to +20, the roads get slick and frosty. If you don't adjust your driving, you end up just another dork in the ditch. For the record, it looked like everyone was okay. Maybe some had bumps and bruises, possibly wet pants... I bet they slow down next time!

Left the accidents behind and kept on my way homeward.

Up the hill, down the hill, through the lowlands and back up again and as I approach the turn to my subdivision I see that I'm driving right along with a very long set of sled dogs pulling a musher and we are going to coincide right at the intersection. I slow down, stop and the musher waves me on, while two more cars come out. We all managed to drive around each other cordially, with no harm done. For once Sofia doesn't go cuckoo banananuts over the sled dogs. She watches them intently, as does Ole.

I could continue and have a Very Alaskan dinner tonight, as I have both moose meat and caribou meat and salmon in my freezer. However I'm going for the easy thing that I can eat right away: burritos!

Happy Snow Dogs and a Photo Blooper

We got snow and the dogs are happy again. Summer was way, way too wet. My dogs hate mud, I hate mud, they hate rain, and I hate rain, too. The snow makes all of us happy.

As you can see, with all the dog play, the snow has gotten mixed up with the leaves underneath. We want more snow NOW!

We all know that Sofia is gorgeous. She's so pretty. Ole is the purebred, noble and goofy Norwegian Elkhound and I love him dearly. So does Sofie. But Sofia, half Siberian, half who knows what, is so stunning that I can't help taking pictures of her, even after almost twelve years!

Sometimes when I'm taking pictures, there is that other element that walks across the background...

...and dang it!

Dance With Me!

I hereby invite you to dance with me!

Every day I am going to put on some music and dance at least fifteen minutes.

Why Dance?

Modern Overlad Paralysis

Good things come in small stages. If you want to make a positive change in your life, I have learned that feeling overwhelmed because there is just TOO MUCH that is wrong isn't going to help! Ever get paralyzed by thinking oh, I have to vacuum the floor, but first I have to move those boxes, and the laundry, and then I'd better put the laundry away first (or I'm a bad person, because good people put their laundry away right away), and the bird cage needs cleaning, and oh, that stack of books next to the bed should be put away but first I need to move the boxes in front of the bookshelf first and I REALLY ought to vacuum!

I call it orbiting. I orbit around the house trying to get stuff done but everywhere I look I get pulled in a different direction. It seems like there is something urgent in EVERY direction! And I can bustle around from room to room and at the end of two hours have gotten little to nothing done. (Yes, ADD a little!)

Of course your particular overload LOAD might not be house cleaning,it might be getting taxes done, or figuring out where to move, or managing children, or trying to figure out how to survive in general.  But no matter the source, at some point you have to TAKE A STEP. And you know what? You can only take one step at a time!

I have gained about 40 lbs over the years since I was young and in shape. Plus I'm flabby from being unable to exercise since I was anemic (and undiagnosed and untreated) for at least three years. That's also how my house got into such a mess. I could barely walk, never mind clean up.

Be that as it may, I want to lose weight and feel better about my body, which I think will help me tackle each of those items on my MASSIVE To-Do List.

The easiest way for me to lose weight is to not make a big deal out of it. And I love to dance! In the past, I have lost weight by dancing, and by golly I'm going to do it again!

Are you with me?

This is ONE step. It's not buying expensive diet food. It's not paying for a gym membership that you aren't going to use. It's doing something for yourself because it's fun and could help you feel better, and might even make you a little bit healthier.

I find that when I take one step like this it tends to snowball. I'm already making an effort to eat better. My particular body chemistry seems to do best on meat and vegetables and very few carbohydrates. So I'm slowly going in that direction again.

But YOU don't have to. You can eat whatever you want to. Whatever works for you is FINE with me!

So here's my plan: put on some music every morning before work and dance for at least fifteen minutes. I'm starting slowly, because I have asthma (and anemia) and so need to work up to longer, and faster dancing.

No matter how far back behind the eight ball you are, I bet you can take one tiny step to feeling better and happier. No mobility? Put on your favorite music and conduct it with wild arm swings! Sing along at the top of your lungs! Head bang! Whatever strikes your fancy as long as you are having fun, that's what matters.

Some of us might want to lose weight. Some of us might want to get our muscles in a little bit better tone. Some of us might just need to take a fifteen minute break once a day to do something enjoyable.

Whatever your goal is, it is perfect.

Let's Support Each Other

Let's share what music we play, and what other things we are doing to help ourselves feel happier and healthier.

We can share our successes and failures, and create a community of support. It's so much easier to deal with the feeling that Everything Is Just Too Much if you have someone to talk to about it!

I am starting a Facebook group called Dance With Me! We could all keep posting on this blog, but a Facebook group is geared toward keeping people in touch, it has better software than a blog.

Oh, and by the way, dancing is FREE!