Time really does start moving faster the older you get. As a kid I remember the time from Halloween to Christmas to be an eternity. Halloween was the first celebration starting the holiday season, in my book. Then you had to endure Thanksgiving which was just a day for the older members of the family to get together and chat while dragging their kids along. Then it seemed like time stopped while we waited for Christmas.
Now Halloween is barely over and Christmas is here!
I started this a week ago so now the new year 2009 is here! I keep busy with little things and that just makes time fly. This last week since Christmas has been really cold. The last three days have been -15F or colder for the over day high temp. Last nights low was -33F and we are the lucky ones around here. Down the road a couple of miles it hasn't been above -30F for 3 days. We've already burned all the wood I had stock piled. As soon as it warms a little I'll have to go out and cut down some of the dead trees around our place. I'm glad I had the furnace guy here in October. It is a comfort to know the furnace is working when it is so cold out.
Tomorrow Mary and I are going to look at new hybrid cars. Both of our cars have 150K miles on them and are starting to act up a little. Mary's family from Finland is coming over next summer and we are going to need 2 cars to get everybody around so we decided to trade the Golf in on either a Toyota Prius or Honda Civic Hybrid. We don't drive very much any more but both the Golf and Forester have broken down this winter when we needed them so it just makes sense to me to get one reliable car. There are quite a few Priuses around Willow and everybody I have talked to seems pleased with them. Most of the driving we do is less then 5 miles one way. We do go to Wasilla about once a week and that is about 60 miles round trip.
I think Mary is going to pick up a new sewing machine tomorrow too. She does an awful lot of sewing and has worn out or broken 2 machines since she stopped working. I told her a few years ago to get the best sewing machine she thought she needed but shen has never taken me up on on. Now she has a sewing buddy and they both work on the same project some times so when Mary's sewing machine craps out now it effects both of them.
We had a bit of a situation come up over Christmas. Normally we call my mom when us Alaskans get together on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day so we all get to talk with her. This year things were kind of different so I first tried calling on Christmas Eve and didn't get any answer. We tried a few times on Christmas and still no answer. We thought maybe Tom had taken her to his new farm to celebrate out there so we tried calling Tom and couldn't connect with him. So we decided to wait until Monday and if we couldn't get through we would go straight to the boss, Nancy. Monday we called and got through to Ma and of course she said she hadn't been anywhere and then told us all about her new kitten. Tom finally emailed me and gave me his new contact information and a little info on his new farm. The place sounds really neat. It was built in 1878 and he has 8 horses on it. Last I heard he only had 2 horses. It is located very close to the ski area that I learned to downhill ski at about 45 years ago. Anyhow Tom said that my uncle John had taken Ma for Christmas.
Well, I have to bundle up and go put the goats to bed. I close the barn up a little early when its so cold because the heater in the shop is just barely keeping the temp stable and with the door open for the goats it has to work that much hardy because their pen cools down so much. So off I go into the -28F night air.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Thanksgiving is over.
It's hard to believe that over a week has gone by since I started the last entry. Something came up and I had to leave. Since then we have enjoyed a great Thanksgiving dinner prepared by Brad. This is the first year that Brad's dad was missing. He moved to Montana a few months back and I did not even get a chance to ask about him. Brad's mom and her new hubby Rob were there. I had not seen Sue or Rob since Brad and Maija got married last fall.
Winter is really setting in this year. We are just lucky the price of oil has gone down a bit from what it was this past spring. So far we have had 2 snaps below zero and about a foot of snow. I've been supplementing our heat with our wood stove but it is a real bear of a stove. I think I found one problem that was keeping it from burning very well but it still burns way too much wood for the amount of heat it puts out. We only heat the house to 64 during the day and 62 at night so when we are sitting around watching a movie in the evening it gets pretty chilly. We still do not have enough snow for good snowmobiling out back. I checked it out this afternoon and found the lakes are covered with overflow and the snow is not deep enough to cushion the rocks that you tend to hit in the trails. Overflow is a real problem because slushy ice will build up on the snowmobile to the point where it can not move. It catches you by surprise because the condition happens even at subzero temperatures, like today.
Mary got into an exercise group and a quilting group this fall. She put herself on a diet last summer and dropped quite a few pounds. She had been walking to the post office at least once a week during the summer but when the cold came she stopped walking outside and started using the treadmill. She got tired of that pretty fast so when they started a new exercise group she joined. She has made some new friends and one of them has a husband that is kind of like me so we get together once a week or so to play cards. The couple mush dogs like most Willow residents. They use the old dogs that other mushers don't want anymore. They have about 12 mushing dogs and then 5 dogs that live in the house with them.
I plan on updating the blog more frequently during the winter. I just finished updating the operating system on my main desktop computer and will probably update the webserver in the coming week. I do plan on revising the website again because the remote webcam in the goat barn just didn't work.
So time to fix some supper and feed the animals. More later.
Winter is really setting in this year. We are just lucky the price of oil has gone down a bit from what it was this past spring. So far we have had 2 snaps below zero and about a foot of snow. I've been supplementing our heat with our wood stove but it is a real bear of a stove. I think I found one problem that was keeping it from burning very well but it still burns way too much wood for the amount of heat it puts out. We only heat the house to 64 during the day and 62 at night so when we are sitting around watching a movie in the evening it gets pretty chilly. We still do not have enough snow for good snowmobiling out back. I checked it out this afternoon and found the lakes are covered with overflow and the snow is not deep enough to cushion the rocks that you tend to hit in the trails. Overflow is a real problem because slushy ice will build up on the snowmobile to the point where it can not move. It catches you by surprise because the condition happens even at subzero temperatures, like today.
Mary got into an exercise group and a quilting group this fall. She put herself on a diet last summer and dropped quite a few pounds. She had been walking to the post office at least once a week during the summer but when the cold came she stopped walking outside and started using the treadmill. She got tired of that pretty fast so when they started a new exercise group she joined. She has made some new friends and one of them has a husband that is kind of like me so we get together once a week or so to play cards. The couple mush dogs like most Willow residents. They use the old dogs that other mushers don't want anymore. They have about 12 mushing dogs and then 5 dogs that live in the house with them.
I plan on updating the blog more frequently during the winter. I just finished updating the operating system on my main desktop computer and will probably update the webserver in the coming week. I do plan on revising the website again because the remote webcam in the goat barn just didn't work.
So time to fix some supper and feed the animals. More later.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
The election is over and for a change my team won. I'm proud to be an Obama supporter and just hope he doesn't let the nation down like so many other elected officials do. I truly think he is a different kind of man and so far in his choices he has proved to be just that. I know, republicans thought G.W. Bush was their savior in 2000 and look how that turned out. The ONLY good thing about Bush is that he has set the bar so low for the next president that I think even I could do a better job. Obama just needs to keep doing what he has done so well during his campaign.
Through out the campaign season I have been amazed at how low our press system has sunk. We don't seem to have real reporters anymore. The people that report the news now seem to only parrot what the candidate's pr people want out. It seems like no matter what the evidence says pr people make up their own spin. No matter how illogical the evidence or obviously wrong, the press reports what the candidate or official wants. There are a lot of non professional blogs on the internet that point these things out but they are often times pretty slanted too.
I have to go.
Through out the campaign season I have been amazed at how low our press system has sunk. We don't seem to have real reporters anymore. The people that report the news now seem to only parrot what the candidate's pr people want out. It seems like no matter what the evidence says pr people make up their own spin. No matter how illogical the evidence or obviously wrong, the press reports what the candidate or official wants. There are a lot of non professional blogs on the internet that point these things out but they are often times pretty slanted too.
I have to go.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Gonna be a Coooooold winter.
It's only October 28 and we are already below 0F! I'm not looking forward to the rest of this winter if this is any kind of an indication of what is to come. Fuel prices may be going down in the rest of the country but not in Alaska. I filled up our heating oil tanks 2 weeks ago at $3.87 a gallon. We only heat our house to 64F during the day and 62F at night which isn't as bad as it sounds but it does get a little chilly in the evening. I supplement the heat in the evening and night with our wood stove but the wood I have got absolutely soaked in the rain this fall and it is really hard to get it going.
Now on to the political front. Mary and I both think Sarah Palin is a whack-job. In our opinion she is an extremist in her beliefs and she tries to force those beliefs on to the people around her. Can you believe she charges the state to stay in her own home in Wasilla? The state didn't ask her to stay in Wasilla she is living there for her own convenience. The state is providing and maintaining the governor's mansion in Juneau. She chose to live in Wasilla and work in Anchorage. She lives in the same world as George Bush where they are king/queen and can do no wrong. Hopefully now that her rise in the national spot light has exposed many of her failings she will be deposed when she returns home.
Ted Stevens is another crook that finally got what he deserves. I was actually on the receiving end of his pork in the FAA. A project that I worked on would never have gotten off the ground if he hadn't continued to throw millions of dollars at it. I tried to report the mismanagement a couple times but never got anywhere. The project itself was a good idea but there was no or very poor oversight and money was being wasted. I moved to Alaska in 1981 and was told then that Ted was the one that could get stuff for Alaska. I know he and Don Young saved the Flight Service Stations up here. Trouble was they never really got the extra funding needed to keep them going so the FAA had to budget for them but didn't get the money to do it.
So anyhow, this house has become rather political. Mary actively supports Obama by going to meetings and rallies. She has also volunteered to be a poll watcher on November 4. She was and still is a Hillary Clinton girl but feels she has to help get Obama elected or there won't be any country left. I have contributed to the Democrats also but have not actively gone out campaigning. We were pleasantly surprised that in this blood red state where even convicted felons can run as Republicans and actually have a chance to win that there are quite a few Democrats in the Willow area.
Now on to more pleasant news. After years of asking Mary finally got a kitten. It was supposed to be a cat for the barn but if this cat ever sees the barn I will be surprised. One of these days I'll update the website with some pictures of it. Which brings up another subject. You may have noticed that live webcam on our website hasn't updated since August. I've had problems with the wireless connection between the barn and the house and have basically given up on trying to keep it going. When I update the page next time I'll probably just have a camera shooting out our window in the back room. I hope to get that done in the next month or so so keep checking back.
Mary's sister Pike and her 2 kids and grand kids are planning on visiting us next summer. the thing kind of snowballed but we are already getting excited.
Well I have work to do in the shop so I'll sign off now. Don't forget to vote next Tuesday!
Now on to the political front. Mary and I both think Sarah Palin is a whack-job. In our opinion she is an extremist in her beliefs and she tries to force those beliefs on to the people around her. Can you believe she charges the state to stay in her own home in Wasilla? The state didn't ask her to stay in Wasilla she is living there for her own convenience. The state is providing and maintaining the governor's mansion in Juneau. She chose to live in Wasilla and work in Anchorage. She lives in the same world as George Bush where they are king/queen and can do no wrong. Hopefully now that her rise in the national spot light has exposed many of her failings she will be deposed when she returns home.
Ted Stevens is another crook that finally got what he deserves. I was actually on the receiving end of his pork in the FAA. A project that I worked on would never have gotten off the ground if he hadn't continued to throw millions of dollars at it. I tried to report the mismanagement a couple times but never got anywhere. The project itself was a good idea but there was no or very poor oversight and money was being wasted. I moved to Alaska in 1981 and was told then that Ted was the one that could get stuff for Alaska. I know he and Don Young saved the Flight Service Stations up here. Trouble was they never really got the extra funding needed to keep them going so the FAA had to budget for them but didn't get the money to do it.
So anyhow, this house has become rather political. Mary actively supports Obama by going to meetings and rallies. She has also volunteered to be a poll watcher on November 4. She was and still is a Hillary Clinton girl but feels she has to help get Obama elected or there won't be any country left. I have contributed to the Democrats also but have not actively gone out campaigning. We were pleasantly surprised that in this blood red state where even convicted felons can run as Republicans and actually have a chance to win that there are quite a few Democrats in the Willow area.
Now on to more pleasant news. After years of asking Mary finally got a kitten. It was supposed to be a cat for the barn but if this cat ever sees the barn I will be surprised. One of these days I'll update the website with some pictures of it. Which brings up another subject. You may have noticed that live webcam on our website hasn't updated since August. I've had problems with the wireless connection between the barn and the house and have basically given up on trying to keep it going. When I update the page next time I'll probably just have a camera shooting out our window in the back room. I hope to get that done in the next month or so so keep checking back.
Mary's sister Pike and her 2 kids and grand kids are planning on visiting us next summer. the thing kind of snowballed but we are already getting excited.
Well I have work to do in the shop so I'll sign off now. Don't forget to vote next Tuesday!
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
The end of summer?
September 10 and the leaves are mostly gold around here now. It wasn't much of a summer. Only a few days above 70F and a lot of rain. We did manage to get the deck built and I almost have the house painting done. I just have a little trim left to do and I hope there is enough nice fall days to do it.
Mary finally got the kitten she has wanted ever since we moved to Willow. He is a little gray monster called Earl Grey. He was 8 weeks old when Mary brought him home and I guess he is about 3 months old now. He is a little under weight, according to the veterinarian, but healthy and active. The dogs all get along with him pretty well. He and Daisey play quite a bit together. Susi and Misty tolerate having him around and Grizz just ignores him. He was gotten under the pretense of us needing a cat to keep the mice down in the shop with the goats but I doubt Mary will ever even let him go outside.
Mary and I have both been pretty upset with all this Sarah Palin BS. We are both kind of liberal in the first place and Palin is about as conservative as you can get. What bothers us the most is the way the republicans have put her on a pedestal proclaiming she is a woman who has been able to do it all. Admittedly she has done a lot, but most of what she has done has been wrong, at least in my opinion. She is just like any other republican that professes to be doing the job for the good of the country when actually they are just in it to get out of it what they can for themselves. Can you believe she actually charged the state to live in her own house in Wasilla. It wasn't because the state requested she live in Wasilla but she just didn't want to move her family to Juneau. She's just a crook like Ted Stevens, Don Young and Frank Murkowski an she is running a campaign about change and reform. Bull Dickie! Mary and I have actually talked about moving to Canada if the republicans win the White House again. Neither one of us can believe how close the race is. The Democrats should have been able to put Homer Simpson up as a candidate and won in a landslide with all the damage the republicans have done over the past 8 years. Apparently I give the voting public too much credit. Enough about politics.
Mary's sister Pike ( that is pronounced like pee kay) has decided to come over next summer with her family. Actually it was Esko's wife Camilla that thought it would be fun to go visit aunt Mary in Alaska and they asked Pike to come along. Then Esko's sister Ellu heard about it and asked if she and her mate could come along too so we are going to have a full house next summer.
OK, so I've updated for the month but now I have to go clean the car so Mary and I can go out tonight. Maija got us some tickets to a the Prairie Home companion show so we have to go into Anchorage tonight. Our cars are all full of dog hair so I have to get at least one cleaned up so we look nice tonight.
Mary finally got the kitten she has wanted ever since we moved to Willow. He is a little gray monster called Earl Grey. He was 8 weeks old when Mary brought him home and I guess he is about 3 months old now. He is a little under weight, according to the veterinarian, but healthy and active. The dogs all get along with him pretty well. He and Daisey play quite a bit together. Susi and Misty tolerate having him around and Grizz just ignores him. He was gotten under the pretense of us needing a cat to keep the mice down in the shop with the goats but I doubt Mary will ever even let him go outside.
Mary and I have both been pretty upset with all this Sarah Palin BS. We are both kind of liberal in the first place and Palin is about as conservative as you can get. What bothers us the most is the way the republicans have put her on a pedestal proclaiming she is a woman who has been able to do it all. Admittedly she has done a lot, but most of what she has done has been wrong, at least in my opinion. She is just like any other republican that professes to be doing the job for the good of the country when actually they are just in it to get out of it what they can for themselves. Can you believe she actually charged the state to live in her own house in Wasilla. It wasn't because the state requested she live in Wasilla but she just didn't want to move her family to Juneau. She's just a crook like Ted Stevens, Don Young and Frank Murkowski an she is running a campaign about change and reform. Bull Dickie! Mary and I have actually talked about moving to Canada if the republicans win the White House again. Neither one of us can believe how close the race is. The Democrats should have been able to put Homer Simpson up as a candidate and won in a landslide with all the damage the republicans have done over the past 8 years. Apparently I give the voting public too much credit. Enough about politics.
Mary's sister Pike ( that is pronounced like pee kay) has decided to come over next summer with her family. Actually it was Esko's wife Camilla that thought it would be fun to go visit aunt Mary in Alaska and they asked Pike to come along. Then Esko's sister Ellu heard about it and asked if she and her mate could come along too so we are going to have a full house next summer.
OK, so I've updated for the month but now I have to go clean the car so Mary and I can go out tonight. Maija got us some tickets to a the Prairie Home companion show so we have to go into Anchorage tonight. Our cars are all full of dog hair so I have to get at least one cleaned up so we look nice tonight.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Been busy
Since my last entry on July 28 I have been busy. I am still trying to work in house painting between rainy spells, without much luck. I'm still only about half done with the house. I had Brad and Scott scheduled to be here on August 8th to help me replace the big deck on the front of the house. Before they got here I had to demolish the old deck that wasn't built any where near building standards and was rotting badly. I got the old deck down by myself and with Scott's help got the basic structure ready for Brad. With Brad's knowledge of deck building we got the basic structure up on Friday. On Saturday we woke up to a drenching rain. We waited till midmorning to see if the rain would let up but when it didn't we finished the deck in the rain. It was a steady soaking rain that just didn't let up. We got most of it done with the exception of some trimming that required the saw up on top of the deck so it couldn't be done in the rain. I got the trim work done Sunday before it started raining again and then Monday I had to get the lawn mowed since there was a break in the rain.
While all this was going on I had downloaded service pack 1 for Windows Vista around August 5 and tried installing it then. It didn't work so on the 9th when Vista prompted me to install the service pack I decided to go ahead with it. I only keep Vista on my laptop so I can use Windows when needed, which isn't very often since Linux has become much more Windows friendly. After a few hours of installing and rebooting I noticed my wireless connection was screwy in Windows. So I booted into Linux and my wireless was completely gone. So back to Vista to check the internet for solutions and the wireless was dead in Vista also. I went to one of my other computers and found that HP recommended not installing service pack 1 but if you had they had some bug fixes and one was for the wireless. So I hooked up a network cable to my laptop and found the networking completely dead for both wired and wireless in Windows and Linux. I finally got wired networking working on my laptop but still no wireless. I ended up ordering an adapter for my laptop so I can use my wireless plugin cards to get some wireless back. I can't believe computer manufacturers don't take Microsoft to court for ruining their products.
The latest thing to happen around here is that Mary went to the store the other day for groceries and came home with a kitten. It's a light gray cat with white around it's mouth and a couple of it's paws. We named it Earl Gray like the tea. The little guy holds his own with the dogs who either ignore its presence or want to mother it.
One last thing. For those that visit Bleatinghearts.homelinux.com the goats webcam has been offline for a while because of connectivity problems. Once I get some free time I plan on getting the link back up.
While all this was going on I had downloaded service pack 1 for Windows Vista around August 5 and tried installing it then. It didn't work so on the 9th when Vista prompted me to install the service pack I decided to go ahead with it. I only keep Vista on my laptop so I can use Windows when needed, which isn't very often since Linux has become much more Windows friendly. After a few hours of installing and rebooting I noticed my wireless connection was screwy in Windows. So I booted into Linux and my wireless was completely gone. So back to Vista to check the internet for solutions and the wireless was dead in Vista also. I went to one of my other computers and found that HP recommended not installing service pack 1 but if you had they had some bug fixes and one was for the wireless. So I hooked up a network cable to my laptop and found the networking completely dead for both wired and wireless in Windows and Linux. I finally got wired networking working on my laptop but still no wireless. I ended up ordering an adapter for my laptop so I can use my wireless plugin cards to get some wireless back. I can't believe computer manufacturers don't take Microsoft to court for ruining their products.
The latest thing to happen around here is that Mary went to the store the other day for groceries and came home with a kitten. It's a light gray cat with white around it's mouth and a couple of it's paws. We named it Earl Gray like the tea. The little guy holds his own with the dogs who either ignore its presence or want to mother it.
One last thing. For those that visit Bleatinghearts.homelinux.com the goats webcam has been offline for a while because of connectivity problems. Once I get some free time I plan on getting the link back up.
Monday, July 28, 2008
The summer that wasn't
It's the last few days of July and we still have only hit 70 degrees a couple of times. The last couple of weeks we haven't even gotten to 60 degrees. The one really nice thing is the forest fire danger has been in the low to moderate levels all summer which helps for good nights sleep when fireworks have been going off all day.
We got a good start on painting the house before the last rainy spell started. I have the last third of the north side to finish and that will bring us to half way. I does look nice. I just hope we get enough breaks in the weather for me to finish it.
Next weekend Scott is going to come up on his vacation to help prepare for replacing our front deck. Then the next weekend Brad is going to join us to do the actual construction. The current deck is not built correctly and is not safe. The railing is rotting and the decking is just plywood with the supports spaced way too far apart. The support posts are starting to rot out because they didn't use pressure treated wood. So pretty much the whole thing has to come down. Brad has a lot of experience building decks so he is in charge of the job.
I started berry picking yesterday. Things are a little late because of the cool, wet summer. Cloud berries should be pretty much done by now but they are just starting to ripen. I got a nice bucket of black currant berries and there are probably another bucket full left in the patch. Mary got a nice basket full of red currants that we had for desert last night. Looks like there will be a good crop of high bush cranberries in August but it looks like the lack of sun has dampened the blueberry crop.
A week ago I came down with some kind of bug that kept me in bed for almost the whole week. I don't know what it was. I am pretty sure it wasn't a cold or flu since I didn't cough and sneeze and my stomach wasn't upset, too much, so I don't think it was the flu. Whatever it was kept me in bed all week. Mary even had to take care of the goats. Every time I felt good enough to do something I would end up back in bed shivering. Luckily it rained almost all week so there wasn't much that could be done outside. So now I have to quit writing this and get to work on outside stuff before it starts raining again.
We got a good start on painting the house before the last rainy spell started. I have the last third of the north side to finish and that will bring us to half way. I does look nice. I just hope we get enough breaks in the weather for me to finish it.
Next weekend Scott is going to come up on his vacation to help prepare for replacing our front deck. Then the next weekend Brad is going to join us to do the actual construction. The current deck is not built correctly and is not safe. The railing is rotting and the decking is just plywood with the supports spaced way too far apart. The support posts are starting to rot out because they didn't use pressure treated wood. So pretty much the whole thing has to come down. Brad has a lot of experience building decks so he is in charge of the job.
I started berry picking yesterday. Things are a little late because of the cool, wet summer. Cloud berries should be pretty much done by now but they are just starting to ripen. I got a nice bucket of black currant berries and there are probably another bucket full left in the patch. Mary got a nice basket full of red currants that we had for desert last night. Looks like there will be a good crop of high bush cranberries in August but it looks like the lack of sun has dampened the blueberry crop.
A week ago I came down with some kind of bug that kept me in bed for almost the whole week. I don't know what it was. I am pretty sure it wasn't a cold or flu since I didn't cough and sneeze and my stomach wasn't upset, too much, so I don't think it was the flu. Whatever it was kept me in bed all week. Mary even had to take care of the goats. Every time I felt good enough to do something I would end up back in bed shivering. Luckily it rained almost all week so there wasn't much that could be done outside. So now I have to quit writing this and get to work on outside stuff before it starts raining again.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Up to speed
I haven't posted anything for a while so since it is drizzling out, again, I figured today is as good of time to update as any.
So, since my last post I have been getting a lot of use out of the new chainsaw. I've been clearing the buffer around the house of brush so in the event of forest fire it is a little easier to protect the house. Mary also started a new garden area on the old goat pen so taking down the willow around that area helps get a little sun on the plants and reduces the number of mosquitoes around the garden.
On the 5th of July Brad and Maija threw a deck warming party on their new deck at the cabin. The weather was perfect and the bugs were well mannered, for the most part. I got a chance to walk around the property and was surprised how dry the lot had become. When mary and I first bought the cabin in 1990 the lower half of it was so wet you could hardly walk on it. By 1995 that area was covered with 2 to 3 foot high birch trees. By 2000 the lower part of the lot was so overgrown with 12 to 15 foot tall birch trees that you couldn't walk down to or even see the lake. One good thing about all the trees is that it makes the cabin almost invisible. Since we pretty much stopped using the cabin when we moved to Willow that feature helped to keep intruders from doing any damage to the property. Now that Brad is up there almost every weekend he has started thinning the birch so the lake was actually visible, a little, from the deck.
I haven't gotten as far on the house painting as I had hoped but I do have all the windows scraped, sanded and primed and I have washed the whole outside of the house so we are just about ready to start painting.
This summer has been kind of cool and damp but we have finally started eating things out of our gardens. Mary has supplied swiss chard and some herbs from her garden. We have eaten spinach and radishes from my garden.
So, since my last post I have been getting a lot of use out of the new chainsaw. I've been clearing the buffer around the house of brush so in the event of forest fire it is a little easier to protect the house. Mary also started a new garden area on the old goat pen so taking down the willow around that area helps get a little sun on the plants and reduces the number of mosquitoes around the garden.
On the 5th of July Brad and Maija threw a deck warming party on their new deck at the cabin. The weather was perfect and the bugs were well mannered, for the most part. I got a chance to walk around the property and was surprised how dry the lot had become. When mary and I first bought the cabin in 1990 the lower half of it was so wet you could hardly walk on it. By 1995 that area was covered with 2 to 3 foot high birch trees. By 2000 the lower part of the lot was so overgrown with 12 to 15 foot tall birch trees that you couldn't walk down to or even see the lake. One good thing about all the trees is that it makes the cabin almost invisible. Since we pretty much stopped using the cabin when we moved to Willow that feature helped to keep intruders from doing any damage to the property. Now that Brad is up there almost every weekend he has started thinning the birch so the lake was actually visible, a little, from the deck.
I haven't gotten as far on the house painting as I had hoped but I do have all the windows scraped, sanded and primed and I have washed the whole outside of the house so we are just about ready to start painting.
This summer has been kind of cool and damp but we have finally started eating things out of our gardens. Mary has supplied swiss chard and some herbs from her garden. We have eaten spinach and radishes from my garden.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Busy Week
It has been a busy week. I started painting the house last week so then it started to rain. This early in the summer I figure I don't have to paint in the rain so didn't get much done. Wednesday was the Alaska Dogs Gone Wild summer solstice flyball tournament and since Maija and Scott were both competing we had to make time for that. I went on Wednesday and Mary went Thursday. Maija was running Zoom who was having a kind of bad day the day I was there, and Scott was running a borrowed dog since his Sweet Pea isn't ready for competition yet. Thursday after Mary left to watch flyball I was getting my painting things out when the telephone guy shows up to bury our line. We have been on a temporary line for about 3 months now so now that things have thawed out they were supposed to bury the line. The work order they gave the guy was not very well planned out. They had him going through a swamp to get to the phone box and that just wont work. So we spent a couple hours walking around in the woods to find an alternate way. Finally he called the engineer and told him to come out and look the options over and come up with a workable plan. Friday I went up to Brad and Maija's cabin to help Brad build the new deck to replace the one we tore down the previous weekend. We worked steady through the day except for a break Brad needed for a telecon he had to dial into for work, and got all the support work done. I was going to go up again Saturday but I wanted to wait until Scott got to our place so he could help me take a couple trees down that had been bent by heavy snow and were threatening the house. I got things mixed up because I thought he told me he had to work Saturday and would be up early in the afternoon. In fact he was at the flyball tourney until 4 o'clock so I wasted most of the day. I had pulled the chainsaw out and got it running and took one of the trees down before the saw stopped again. Around 5 I decided Scott wasn't coming so I figured out how to take the other tree down by myself without hitting the house and got my little electric chainsaw that is about 25 years old and took the tree down. That saw was ok to take the tree down with but since the chain oiler doesn't work I have to squirt oil on the chain after every cut so it doesn't over heat. For bucking up 2 60 foot trees the saw just wasn't going to work so I decided I would get a new GOOD chainsaw after doing a little research. I had been checking the weather up at Talkeetna on and off all day and it was pretty rainy so I figured Brad probably hadn't been able to get much done on the deck so I could go up Sunday to help him finish up and talk to him about chainsaws since he had just bought one. So Sunday I spent a couple hours laying decking and getting a hands on demo of Brad's chainsaw. The dealer is just down the road from the cabin so I stopped on the way home and bought a brand new Stihl chainsaw. It wasn't the model I had decided on because they were out of them but it was the next bigger model and wasn't much more expensive. I got it home and spent about an hour trying to get it started because I flooded the engine. Once I got it going it went through those trees I had cut down on Saturday like a hot knife in butter.
I plan on posting some pictures from flyball but I have to mow the grass before it starts raining again. Later.....
I plan on posting some pictures from flyball but I have to mow the grass before it starts raining again. Later.....
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Midsummer's night.
Well, it's officially summer but you sure couldn't tell it by the weather around Willow. Our average temperature around here is 10 degrees F below the normal average. Normally this time of year here is warm and dry. Almost every year since we first bought the cabin near Talkeetna by this time in June we would be praying for rain because the fire danger was so high. It was around this time of year in 1992 that fireworks started a forest fire that burned from Wasilla to just south of our house here in Willow. We didn't live here then but we had just bought the cabin in Talkeetna so I did keep an eye on it and had to drive through choking smoke one weekend to get to the cabin. Yesterday I noticed the Forest Service sign indicating fire danger around Willow was low. This is the first time I remember it being low in June.
Speaking of the cabin in Talkeetna. Since Mary and I moved to Willow we decided to sell it because it just didn't make sense to own a cabin in the wood when you live in the woods. Maija and Brad bought it from us last year and Brad has been working really hard to fix it up. Mary and I didn't use it much at all the last 5 years we owned it so it got really run down. So far Brad has it sided, new windows installed and insulation installed. Last weekend I went up to help him demolish the deck since it was getting pretty rickety. The whole deck was just a rotten mess. We barely even had to use tools to tear it down. I'll go up again this Friday to help him get the new one started. He wants to get it done by the Forth of July. The way he works, no problem.
My house painting is not coming along quite as good. I did get all the windows scraped down to bare wood but the sanding is taking for ever. It's a good thing I started when I did. Maybe I'll get it done before the snow flies this fall.
This week is Scott's and Maija's dog week. They belong to Alaska Dogs Gone Wild fly-ball club. Maija runs a couple of her dogs and Scott trains his Sweat-Pea but she doesn't compete yet. He is going to run a dog, a Jack Russell terrier height setter, owned by one of the club's members that can't be there the first couple of days. It is fun to watch the dogs having fun running the course. Some of the owners take it a little serious but all in all it's a good time. This is their third annual Summer Solstice competition with teams from the Lower 48 competing against the Anchorage club. Since this is all non-professional the teams from the Lower 48 usually don't have a full team so the Anchorage club fills in for them. I'll probably go down tomorrow and watch and Mary will go down Thursday.
Time to go to work.....
Speaking of the cabin in Talkeetna. Since Mary and I moved to Willow we decided to sell it because it just didn't make sense to own a cabin in the wood when you live in the woods. Maija and Brad bought it from us last year and Brad has been working really hard to fix it up. Mary and I didn't use it much at all the last 5 years we owned it so it got really run down. So far Brad has it sided, new windows installed and insulation installed. Last weekend I went up to help him demolish the deck since it was getting pretty rickety. The whole deck was just a rotten mess. We barely even had to use tools to tear it down. I'll go up again this Friday to help him get the new one started. He wants to get it done by the Forth of July. The way he works, no problem.
My house painting is not coming along quite as good. I did get all the windows scraped down to bare wood but the sanding is taking for ever. It's a good thing I started when I did. Maybe I'll get it done before the snow flies this fall.
This week is Scott's and Maija's dog week. They belong to Alaska Dogs Gone Wild fly-ball club. Maija runs a couple of her dogs and Scott trains his Sweat-Pea but she doesn't compete yet. He is going to run a dog, a Jack Russell terrier height setter, owned by one of the club's members that can't be there the first couple of days. It is fun to watch the dogs having fun running the course. Some of the owners take it a little serious but all in all it's a good time. This is their third annual Summer Solstice competition with teams from the Lower 48 competing against the Anchorage club. Since this is all non-professional the teams from the Lower 48 usually don't have a full team so the Anchorage club fills in for them. I'll probably go down tomorrow and watch and Mary will go down Thursday.
Time to go to work.....
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Been Busy
I can't believe how much time has passed since my last blog entry. I guess I've been keeping busy enough not to have time to sit around on the computer so much. I probably wouldn't have checked in today either because I have lots of stuff planned for today, but I got an email from a friend who had received an email from me when I got mixed up with that REUNION.COM outfit. This friend was a little confused because the email address was different from the one she had on file for me. She said she started signing up for a reunion.com membership but then decided not to until she heard from me directly. She is way smarter then me. I just plowed right through and sent all those emails.
Let me make it completely clear. DO NOT SIGN UP WITH REUNION.COM ON MY ACCOUNT. I believe they are a big scam outfit. I canceled my membership the same day I took it out so even if you did sign up with them looking for me I wont be there. I think most peoples email providers filtered those emails from me as spam since most of them were rejected and sent back to my email which then handled the rejects as spam.
Now to bring everything up to date.
I went out and bought the house paint yesterday so you know what I will be doing the rest of this summer. We will be painting the house to match the color of the shop. I can't think of anything I hate to do more then paint. When we lived in Pierre I started painting our old house. The color that Mary had made up was a waaaaaay too bright of a blue. I got maybe a quarter of the house painted with it and gave up. A few months went by and I just couldn't finish painting. I hated the way it looked and it was really hard to paint because it was cedar shingles so it had to be painted with brushes. Finally a friend of mine got so tired of seeing the partially painted house that he showed up one day with his own brush and said if I would do the parts that had to be reached by latter he would do the rest. We painted the hole thing in the hideous blue as an undercoat and then painted it again in a dark brown, which was about the only color we could find that would cover the blue. I think I inherited my hate of painting from my dad. All the other houses that were built on Garfield avenue in 1949-50 were sided with wood that had to be painted about every 5 years. My mom knew my dad hated painting so they held out for stucco so all that ever had to be painted was the trim. They had aluminum widows install shortly after the Anderson window company opened and not to long after I left home they had the rest of the trim replaced with aluminum trim. The garage was still wood sided. The builder didn't have enough stucco when he built it so they just had it sided with cheap wood siding. That stuff never would hold paint. I painted that damn garage almost every other summer from about 6th grade on. Even after moving to Alaska I the FAA sent me and the kids home to Minneapolis every other year as part of my contract for working in Alaska. It would be 100 degrees out and I would be out painting the garage. I think I painted it once more after my dad died in 1990 and then Ma had it sided with aluminum siding so all I had to do was paint the garage door when I went home. Now even that has been replaced with aluminum. So this summer I will be spending with a roller in my hand. Our house is sided with what is called T-1-11 which is what most houses that people with middle class income is sided with. It is basically a sheet of plywood with a finished surface on one side. Our houses previous owner had just had the house painted before we bought it so the paint is in pretty good shape still. The trim around the windows is starting to peel but the paint on the siding is still sound.
Normally on Sunday morning I get up and watch Meet the Press from 7 to 8 AM. This morning they had a tribute to Tim Russert, the moderator, since he died of a heart attack Friday. His death really got me thinking again to live life like each day is your last. Tim had just had a complete physical the end of April that included a stress cardiogram and the doctor had pronounced him completely healthy. He was being treated for high blood pressure and high cholesterol, just like me, but they had them under control. He had just turned 58 like my sister when she died and a close childhood friend of mine. Susie smoked and drank too much so she really wasn't a surprise and Bob had a disease that had been treated for years that finally took him so he really wasn't a surprise either. But to hear of someone that you watch on TV every week die like that is kind of scary. This mornings tribute to him was very tasteful and I'm glad I got to see it.
Time to start my chores for today. I promised Mary I would get her bike ready for her. It has been sitting under the deck since we moved up here and the chain was rusted solid so you couldn't even peddle the bike. The tires are completely shot too so I have to replace them also. I've just about got fixed so she wont have any excuses now.
Let me make it completely clear. DO NOT SIGN UP WITH REUNION.COM ON MY ACCOUNT. I believe they are a big scam outfit. I canceled my membership the same day I took it out so even if you did sign up with them looking for me I wont be there. I think most peoples email providers filtered those emails from me as spam since most of them were rejected and sent back to my email which then handled the rejects as spam.
Now to bring everything up to date.
I went out and bought the house paint yesterday so you know what I will be doing the rest of this summer. We will be painting the house to match the color of the shop. I can't think of anything I hate to do more then paint. When we lived in Pierre I started painting our old house. The color that Mary had made up was a waaaaaay too bright of a blue. I got maybe a quarter of the house painted with it and gave up. A few months went by and I just couldn't finish painting. I hated the way it looked and it was really hard to paint because it was cedar shingles so it had to be painted with brushes. Finally a friend of mine got so tired of seeing the partially painted house that he showed up one day with his own brush and said if I would do the parts that had to be reached by latter he would do the rest. We painted the hole thing in the hideous blue as an undercoat and then painted it again in a dark brown, which was about the only color we could find that would cover the blue. I think I inherited my hate of painting from my dad. All the other houses that were built on Garfield avenue in 1949-50 were sided with wood that had to be painted about every 5 years. My mom knew my dad hated painting so they held out for stucco so all that ever had to be painted was the trim. They had aluminum widows install shortly after the Anderson window company opened and not to long after I left home they had the rest of the trim replaced with aluminum trim. The garage was still wood sided. The builder didn't have enough stucco when he built it so they just had it sided with cheap wood siding. That stuff never would hold paint. I painted that damn garage almost every other summer from about 6th grade on. Even after moving to Alaska I the FAA sent me and the kids home to Minneapolis every other year as part of my contract for working in Alaska. It would be 100 degrees out and I would be out painting the garage. I think I painted it once more after my dad died in 1990 and then Ma had it sided with aluminum siding so all I had to do was paint the garage door when I went home. Now even that has been replaced with aluminum. So this summer I will be spending with a roller in my hand. Our house is sided with what is called T-1-11 which is what most houses that people with middle class income is sided with. It is basically a sheet of plywood with a finished surface on one side. Our houses previous owner had just had the house painted before we bought it so the paint is in pretty good shape still. The trim around the windows is starting to peel but the paint on the siding is still sound.
Normally on Sunday morning I get up and watch Meet the Press from 7 to 8 AM. This morning they had a tribute to Tim Russert, the moderator, since he died of a heart attack Friday. His death really got me thinking again to live life like each day is your last. Tim had just had a complete physical the end of April that included a stress cardiogram and the doctor had pronounced him completely healthy. He was being treated for high blood pressure and high cholesterol, just like me, but they had them under control. He had just turned 58 like my sister when she died and a close childhood friend of mine. Susie smoked and drank too much so she really wasn't a surprise and Bob had a disease that had been treated for years that finally took him so he really wasn't a surprise either. But to hear of someone that you watch on TV every week die like that is kind of scary. This mornings tribute to him was very tasteful and I'm glad I got to see it.
Time to start my chores for today. I promised Mary I would get her bike ready for her. It has been sitting under the deck since we moved up here and the chain was rusted solid so you couldn't even peddle the bike. The tires are completely shot too so I have to replace them also. I've just about got fixed so she wont have any excuses now.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Dumb!
I got a message yesterday from an old work buddy with a web address of www.reunion.com/name of person. I had just recently been thinking of that person so I type the address of the link ( never click links I don't know about ) and it took me to the web site with the name and age of the person I was interested in but then said I had to create a login to continue. So I did. It takes your name and then suggests if you have a hotmail, yahoo, gmail or AOL account to use the box and sign in to that account and you will be verified immediately. I didn't think it through very well. I never should have put my username and password into somebody else's site. We all make mistakes though. Anyhow I was then signed on to reunion.com but still couldn't really look at anything unless I upgraded to a premium membership. So I logged off and went on about other business. A few hours later I came back in and log on to my hotmail account and that's when I knew I had screwed up. My mailbox was full of rejected emails.
As soon as I realized that the rejects were all from my hotmail account I knew what had happened and deleted my membership/profile information at reunion.com and changed my account information at hotmail. I also sent a nasty note back to reunion.com basically saying THEY SUCK! Some of the addresses that got mail from me were FAA addresses I had for when I was on the road and needed to contact people before the FAA got their webmail working. I'm sure the message I received was generated the same way that the one that I generated was and that person didn't realize that everyone they had ever corresponded with was going to get an email. What a chicken shit outfit.
I have to go and clean more rejected messages in my hotmail box.
As soon as I realized that the rejects were all from my hotmail account I knew what had happened and deleted my membership/profile information at reunion.com and changed my account information at hotmail. I also sent a nasty note back to reunion.com basically saying THEY SUCK! Some of the addresses that got mail from me were FAA addresses I had for when I was on the road and needed to contact people before the FAA got their webmail working. I'm sure the message I received was generated the same way that the one that I generated was and that person didn't realize that everyone they had ever corresponded with was going to get an email. What a chicken shit outfit.
I have to go and clean more rejected messages in my hotmail box.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
good bye spring
It's hard to believe it's already the last day of May. Seems like I was plowing snow just a few days ago. Summer has come in with a vengeance. The trees are fully leafed out so we can't see the mountains anymore and the mosquitoes are breeding fiercely. I have 2 mosquito magnet machines sucking in the little critters. You don't realize how well they work until you step into the woods out of their range. Also, as soon as they run out of propane the mosquitoes start moving back in. That was one pleasant surprise this spring. The price of propane is about the same as last year. It costs $20 to refill a 20 pound bottle. I was really afraid with the rise in oil cost that I wouldn't be able to afford the mosquito magnets. So far so good on them. The cost of gas and diesel is outrageous, though. $4.16 a gallon for gas and $4.79 a gallon for diesel. I only have to fill the diesel Golf up every other month now but what worries me is that the diesel price is usually within pennies of heating oil cost and there isn't much left I can cut back on that. I did install new storm doors for the front and back doors so that should help keep the draft out a little. They sure make it nice in the summer because now we can leave the doors open for light and air. This house at least had screens on the windows when we moved in. The house we lived in for 20 years in Eagle River didn't even have window screens. Of course the mosquitoes were no where near as bad down there.
Got to go work in the yard....
Got to go work in the yard....
Thursday, May 22, 2008
It's summer!
Okay, technically it is still spring but up here if you wait for official summer it's almost over when it gets here. I say today is summer because the last pile of snow in our yard has finally vanished. We had our first thunderstorm of the season 2 nights ago. There was one flash of lightning and a clap of thunder and it was over. It did rain for about 30 minutes and there was some pea sized hail in the rain. It made everything smell really good. You couldn't even smell the goat yard for a while.
Today is absolutely beautiful! It's about 60 degrees with just a slight breeze. Mary and I finished raking the front yard, mostly to get the winter's collection of dog poop up, and I did a little painting around the front door. I got 2 storm doors for our front door and downstairs door and after installing I could see how shabby the front door had become. It makes a big difference to be able to leave the doors open. Not only is the light better but the ventilation is much better.
I also got my digital to analog converter boxes yesterday. Since we can't get cable TV up here we only have access to over the air TV. February 17, 2009 is the cut off for analog TV and I only had one TV that was capable of receiving digital signals. I got my 2 government coupons and ordered the boxes from an online outfit. They work really good and were simple to setup.
Time to feed the goats and take the dogs for their afternoon walk.
Today is absolutely beautiful! It's about 60 degrees with just a slight breeze. Mary and I finished raking the front yard, mostly to get the winter's collection of dog poop up, and I did a little painting around the front door. I got 2 storm doors for our front door and downstairs door and after installing I could see how shabby the front door had become. It makes a big difference to be able to leave the doors open. Not only is the light better but the ventilation is much better.
I also got my digital to analog converter boxes yesterday. Since we can't get cable TV up here we only have access to over the air TV. February 17, 2009 is the cut off for analog TV and I only had one TV that was capable of receiving digital signals. I got my 2 government coupons and ordered the boxes from an online outfit. They work really good and were simple to setup.
Time to feed the goats and take the dogs for their afternoon walk.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Old friends.
Occasionally I stick a name from my past into the Google or Yahoo search engines to see if anyone I know is now famous. I get lucky on occasion and get to see a little of the life of people that helped shape my life. Last night I entered Edie Parish, who is the woman who talked me into putting in my application to be an Automation Specialist for the FAA. I talked her into applying for the same job and we both ended up getting selected. She also helped me with my studying at FSDPS school. She took great notes and would share them with me. So as long as I stayed awake in class I could put it all together and learn. She also helped me after I got the job because our manager needed to send someone to TAL programing school and since I had shown the most interest in learning the job in general he decided I should be the one. Trouble was that I had spent all my time actually working on the Tandem computer and messing around with the software and hadn't even started the prerequisite correspondence course. Edie had finished the course but she couldn't fly and also had to take care of her husband who was recovering from a bout of pancreatic cancer. So she tutored me so I could meet the requirements. The course was suppose to take like 3 months to finish and I had less then a month but with Edie's help I made it. I had to go in on a weekend to take the final test and didn't even receive the results until I had already started the class in OKC.
Edie was bound for bigger things than just an automation specialist so she was promoted to supervisor at Juneau AFSS less then 2 years after we opened the FSDPS. She went on to numerous other jobs in the Alaska Region and then moved to Washington D.C. to work at FAA headquarters. She had some mid level management positions at headquarters while I was still working but now she is a director of one of the divisions and acting director of another. That's like just below the FAA Administrator. The picture that accompanied the article about Edie reminded me how funny it is that as men age they go gray and many go bald. With women it seems they all go blond as Edie has.
This morning I put the name of my old FSS chief in Google. I actually was going to do it last night but got distracted after finding the information on Edie. So this morning I put Jack Mitchell Pierre, SD in Google and found this information on not only Jack Mitchell but the doctor, Dr. Lindbloom, that delivered both of our kids in Pierre. Jack and his wife Jo were a big help to Mary and me when we first got to Pierre. Mary had come with me to Flight Service school in Oklahoma City for 4 months. She was pregnant with Maija but wasn't due until the end of November. We got to Pierre on November 2 after driving all the way from Oklahoma City to Bismarck, ND so I could check out of that facility and then drive back down to Pierre. The weather was horrible on the way down to Pierre. Wet sloppy snow that would build up in the wheel wells on the car so I would have to stop and kick it out so I could turn the wheel just to steer. We got into Pierre late in the afternoon and Jack and Jo had us over for dinner which was lucky because we found out that Jo worked for Dr. Lindbloom who was the only doctor in Pierre that did babies. That night we went back to the Holiday Inn that we had just checked in to and went to bed. Around midnight Mary woke me up to tell me her water had broke. I had the hotel desk call the hospital so I could find out what to do. ( this was in the days before 911 service ) The lady on the phone had no idea what to tell me but she finally said to come on down to the hospital and she would call Dr. Lindbloom to check Mary out. Mary was in labor but not very far along. She ended up in the labor room for almost 3 days and Dr. Lindbloom was getting ready to do a cesarean when Maija finally decided to finish what she had started and came out. Jack gave me a lot of breaks that first month so I could get settled in. My mom came and helped me get an old house, that Jack had helped me find, cleaned up for Mary and Maija when they came home from the hospital. The payback came that Christmas Eve when the controller that was suppose to work the mid-shift called in sick. I wasn't even checked out but Jack told me my certification would be done the first business day after Christmas. So that is how I got my first check out.
It was kind of fun to see these 2 guys that played a pretty big role in Mary's and my life when we were first getting started. Jack looks pretty much the same as he did when he showed up at our door in Eagle River in the 90's. And Dr. Lindbloom looks just like I remember him only a little older. Doc Lindbloom not only delivered the kids but he was their doctor, Mary's doctor and since he was the flight surgeon for Pierre, he was my doctor.
So far I haven't found any of my old friends that have really become famous or really rich. But I have found quite a few old friends.
Edie was bound for bigger things than just an automation specialist so she was promoted to supervisor at Juneau AFSS less then 2 years after we opened the FSDPS. She went on to numerous other jobs in the Alaska Region and then moved to Washington D.C. to work at FAA headquarters. She had some mid level management positions at headquarters while I was still working but now she is a director of one of the divisions and acting director of another. That's like just below the FAA Administrator. The picture that accompanied the article about Edie reminded me how funny it is that as men age they go gray and many go bald. With women it seems they all go blond as Edie has.
This morning I put the name of my old FSS chief in Google. I actually was going to do it last night but got distracted after finding the information on Edie. So this morning I put Jack Mitchell Pierre, SD in Google and found this information on not only Jack Mitchell but the doctor, Dr. Lindbloom, that delivered both of our kids in Pierre. Jack and his wife Jo were a big help to Mary and me when we first got to Pierre. Mary had come with me to Flight Service school in Oklahoma City for 4 months. She was pregnant with Maija but wasn't due until the end of November. We got to Pierre on November 2 after driving all the way from Oklahoma City to Bismarck, ND so I could check out of that facility and then drive back down to Pierre. The weather was horrible on the way down to Pierre. Wet sloppy snow that would build up in the wheel wells on the car so I would have to stop and kick it out so I could turn the wheel just to steer. We got into Pierre late in the afternoon and Jack and Jo had us over for dinner which was lucky because we found out that Jo worked for Dr. Lindbloom who was the only doctor in Pierre that did babies. That night we went back to the Holiday Inn that we had just checked in to and went to bed. Around midnight Mary woke me up to tell me her water had broke. I had the hotel desk call the hospital so I could find out what to do. ( this was in the days before 911 service ) The lady on the phone had no idea what to tell me but she finally said to come on down to the hospital and she would call Dr. Lindbloom to check Mary out. Mary was in labor but not very far along. She ended up in the labor room for almost 3 days and Dr. Lindbloom was getting ready to do a cesarean when Maija finally decided to finish what she had started and came out. Jack gave me a lot of breaks that first month so I could get settled in. My mom came and helped me get an old house, that Jack had helped me find, cleaned up for Mary and Maija when they came home from the hospital. The payback came that Christmas Eve when the controller that was suppose to work the mid-shift called in sick. I wasn't even checked out but Jack told me my certification would be done the first business day after Christmas. So that is how I got my first check out.
It was kind of fun to see these 2 guys that played a pretty big role in Mary's and my life when we were first getting started. Jack looks pretty much the same as he did when he showed up at our door in Eagle River in the 90's. And Dr. Lindbloom looks just like I remember him only a little older. Doc Lindbloom not only delivered the kids but he was their doctor, Mary's doctor and since he was the flight surgeon for Pierre, he was my doctor.
So far I haven't found any of my old friends that have really become famous or really rich. But I have found quite a few old friends.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Happy Birthday Susie!
This would have been my sister Susie's sixty second birthday but she checked out early. I'm not sure why but she seemed to do everything she could to cut her life short like smoking like a chimney and drinking like a fish. If anything she had a better shot at having a good life then either my brother Tom or me because she was the first born so had first dibs on things like going to college. She was actually a pretty good student in high school, unlike us 2 boys. She did start at UofM but I don't think she even finished 2 full years. She had a big beautiful wedding and married a really nice guy. Within 3 years she had thrown it all away to be with a guy that had one ambition. To be the worlds oldest hippie. While Tom and I were growing up in the 70s and 80s, Susie stayed just like she was. When I would talk to her about changing her life, and we did have some heated discussions about it, she would say she wasn't hurting anyone so just leave her alone. She may not have physically hurt anyone like her husband did to her, but she really hurt her mother by dieing so young. Hopefully she is in a better place now.
I did some tweaking on the web page this past week. I just uploaded the files this morning so I hope it works. I fixed some formating errors I discovered and added a reference to Alaska time below the webcam picture. I also changed the overnight picture to a goodnight picture instead of leaving the last webcam picture up all night.
Spring is really exploding around here. The birch and poplar trees all have their new baby leafs, and even the grass is greening up. I checked Nancy Lake yesterday and it still is mostly ice but there is a lot of open water around the edge, so it wont be long.
I just discovered a mistake on the web page so I have to go fix it.....Later
I did some tweaking on the web page this past week. I just uploaded the files this morning so I hope it works. I fixed some formating errors I discovered and added a reference to Alaska time below the webcam picture. I also changed the overnight picture to a goodnight picture instead of leaving the last webcam picture up all night.
Spring is really exploding around here. The birch and poplar trees all have their new baby leafs, and even the grass is greening up. I checked Nancy Lake yesterday and it still is mostly ice but there is a lot of open water around the edge, so it wont be long.
I just discovered a mistake on the web page so I have to go fix it.....Later
Friday, May 16, 2008
Short summer.
A week ago we were warming into the 60s during the day and only cooling to the 40s at night. Since last weekend we are only warming to the low 50s during the day and to just above freezing at night. The lakes are still frozen around here, although they are just covered with slush ice which is to thick to run a boat through but to thin to walk on. The first crop of mosquitoes had just started to hatch. They are the ones that hatch from the puddles caused by snow melting and are easy to swat because they come out when it's so cool out that they have to wear parkas. Anyhow, they even retreated to their little igloos to wait for the real summer. I turned the furnace off the last week of April trying to save some of that liquid gold the furnace burns for next fall when it really starts to get cold. Let me tell you it has been really hard not to turn it back on especially in the evening when we are just sitting watching TV. We have plenty of sweaters though so we've been able to avoid that, so far. It is supposed to warm into the 60s again this weekend. I sure hope so because we still have snow piles in the yard.
Speaking of TV watching. It is really getting sad what is being broadcast now. There are a few shows we both enjoy watching, CSI and Law and Order are 2 that come to mind, but mostly it's just junk. I don't like any of those "reality" shows. We only get NBC, ABC and PBS reliably up here. Some days FOX and a couple independent stations are available and during the winter CBS is clear. We used to watch a lot of PBS but for the last couple years they only broadcast a national feed from Washington since they say they don't have money for any local programming. So we have turned to Netflix for our evening entertainment. One of our favorite selections from Netflix is the BBC series "All Creatures Great and Small" a series about a veterinary practice in England in the late 30s to early 40s. Mary got me the first season DVDs last year for my birthday and I got hooked. Since then we've watched 4 more seasons plus two specials. I probably should have been a veterinary but it requires a lot of schooling and me and schools never hit it off very well because I never learned how to study. Maybe in my next life. Mary has bought me a few other British comedy series that we watch over and over. Like "Good Neighbors" and "Keeping up Appearances". I also have the first 4 years of "M.A.S.H" on DVD and I'll pop one of them in when I'm alone.
We get movies from Netflix also, and have seen some really good movies that didn't make it very well in the US, like "Evening". We have also sat through quite a few dogs. So far there have been only 2 that we could not watch. One was "Clock Work Orange" and I forget the name of the other one but it was supposed to be pretty good and we just could not sit through the whole thing. Now that the weather is getting nicer and the sun is staying up later we will spend less time in the house watching TV and movies and more time outside.
Time to go outside and do something, so more later.....maybe
Speaking of TV watching. It is really getting sad what is being broadcast now. There are a few shows we both enjoy watching, CSI and Law and Order are 2 that come to mind, but mostly it's just junk. I don't like any of those "reality" shows. We only get NBC, ABC and PBS reliably up here. Some days FOX and a couple independent stations are available and during the winter CBS is clear. We used to watch a lot of PBS but for the last couple years they only broadcast a national feed from Washington since they say they don't have money for any local programming. So we have turned to Netflix for our evening entertainment. One of our favorite selections from Netflix is the BBC series "All Creatures Great and Small" a series about a veterinary practice in England in the late 30s to early 40s. Mary got me the first season DVDs last year for my birthday and I got hooked. Since then we've watched 4 more seasons plus two specials. I probably should have been a veterinary but it requires a lot of schooling and me and schools never hit it off very well because I never learned how to study. Maybe in my next life. Mary has bought me a few other British comedy series that we watch over and over. Like "Good Neighbors" and "Keeping up Appearances". I also have the first 4 years of "M.A.S.H" on DVD and I'll pop one of them in when I'm alone.
We get movies from Netflix also, and have seen some really good movies that didn't make it very well in the US, like "Evening". We have also sat through quite a few dogs. So far there have been only 2 that we could not watch. One was "Clock Work Orange" and I forget the name of the other one but it was supposed to be pretty good and we just could not sit through the whole thing. Now that the weather is getting nicer and the sun is staying up later we will spend less time in the house watching TV and movies and more time outside.
Time to go outside and do something, so more later.....maybe
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Smoking
I just finished reading Scott's blog about smoking and realize Mary and I did a really good job teaching our kids just how disgusting a habit smoking is. Being a long time smoker who just happens to not have smoked for almost 18 years now I think I am qualified to comment.
I started smoking in grade school and by the time I graduated 8th grade I always had a pack of cigarettes available and they were usually non-filtered Pall-Mall or Camels. You have to realize that at that time, 1950s and early '60's, the only warnings you heard were that smoking would stunt your growth and turn your fingers yellow. When I graduated 8th grade I was 6'1" tall but only weighed around 90 pounds so I disproved that smoking stunted your growth. I did have yellow fingers though and was proud of it. Neither of my parents smoked cigarettes and they really didn't say much about me smoking. I didn't even have to hide my smoking from them, however I couldn't smoke in the house in front of them. My dad smoked an occasional pipe and cigars so the smell of smoke was already in the house so I didn't have to worry about that. When I got to high school I was on the swim team and decided it might be a good idea to quit for the season. I locked myself in a closet with a carton of Camels for about 6 hours and smoked until I was so sick of cigarettes, almost the whole carton, I couldn't stand the sight or smell of them, for about 6 months. By then swimming season was over and the nice weather of summer was coming and I was outside most of the time, so who was to know I was smoking again. In sophomore year of high school I developed chronic bronchitis and instead of the doctor ordering me to stop smoking he merely suggested I cut back and prescribed some cough syrup made of alcohol and codeine. Anyhow, I didn't try to quit again until I started Army basic training. The first 2 weeks the drill sergeants wouldn't allow us to smoke during duty hours and we were too busy cleaning things during off-duty hours to smoke. After the first 2 weeks they said if we had them we could smoke them and since this was the first privilege we got I had to smoke. As a private I only made $30 a month take home so I had to learn to role my own because I couldn't afford real cigarettes. The cigarettes that came in our C rations were packed before the Korean War. I had one pack with 1948 stamped on it. The cigarettes in C rations were in a little 4 pack and were so dry that if you did try to smoke them they burned so fast you could burn your lips. The thing the Army did to help smokers was give them ration cards for cartons of cigarettes from the PX. With the card a carton of 10 packs cost $.50 and we were allowed 3 cartons a month. I only knew a couple guys that didn't smoke in the Army and they would give me their ration cards so I could use their cigarette ration to help pay my apartment rent. My apartment cost $50.00 a month plus 2 cartons of Marlboro to the land lady. I could also give them as gifts to the Germans because American cigarettes were highly desirable.
When I got out of the Army and started working for the FAA smoking on position was allowed and I can only think of a couple people that I worked with that didn't smoke. This was the early '70s and reports that smoking was linked to heart disease and lung cancer were just starting to be argued. Even when the Surgeon General came out and said there was absolute proof that cigarettes caused cancer I thought of it more like, "Ya, just like they stunted my growth!". (I was now 6'4" and weighed 150 pounds) so Mary and I have 2 kids and she smoked through both pregnancies. We both smoked in the house and car with the kids so there were dirty smelly ash trays all over and lots and lots of second hand smoke for them to breath. We lived in Pierre, South Dakota and Granny and Grandpa were an 8 hour car trip away in Minneapolis. I did quit for around 6 weeks with hypnotism but I couldn't afford the follow-up so I tried one cigarette that someone had left at work and within a couple weeks I was back up to a pack a day. When we moved to Alaska in 1981 we drove 8 hours a day for 10 days in February. It was too cold out to even crack a window. Secondhand smoke was just starting to be an issue but I thought it was just people whining. The kids aversion therapy went on through the '80s. I did try stopping around 1986 using the new nicotine gum that was out by prescription only, but since the doctor that prescribed it didn't realize that it had to be used along with a smoking cessation program I just ended up chewing a lot of gum along with smoking a few cigarettes.
By now the proof that second hand smoke was as bad as first hand was pretty obvious so the FAA wouldn't allow smoking on position anymore. They gave us a little room in the back with big fans on 2 walls and allowed us 1 smoke break an hour. By 1990 I was smoking 21/2 to 3 packs a day. In 1987 I had been diagnosed with the beginnings of emphysema and was even prescribed an inhaler but I didn't really notice anything health wise because the doctor said I had over developed lungs and more lung capacity then most people. I attribute that to when I was a kid I would spend a lot of time under water because I didn't float since I really was just skin and bones. I finally quit smoking in July of 1990 when I was in Oklahoma City going to Automation Specialist school for the FAA. I used to take a walk during my study breaks and one day it was over 100 degrees and during my walk I couldn't get my breath. That was the first time I had noticed any trouble with my health. (the bronchitis had in high school disappeared when an Army medic said I couldn't have my alcohol/codeine cough syrup anymore, but that's another story) I saw an add on TV for a hypnotherapist so I decided to give that a try again. I swore to myself though that even if it didn't work I wouldn't smoke until I had gone the same number of days that her therapy cost that I would have spent if I was still smoking, which I think came out to about a month. The minute I got out of her office and got in my rental car to go home I wanted a cigarette but I stayed true to my vow and didn't smoke. I nearly killed some Mormons that came to my room preaching that weekend, but I didn't smoke. When I had free time I would go for long walks. When I woke up in the middle of the night wanting a cigarette I would get dressed and walk until I didn't want to smoke anymore. I got stopped once at 3am by the Oklahoma highway patrol looking for a white male who had just broke into a liquor store. When they asked what I was doing out at that time I told them I was trying to kick the smoking habit and they let me go. By the time I got back from Oklahoma City I was walking around a lake that was 12 miles around twice a week. I was pretty much over the worst of my withdrawals by the time I got home to Alaska. Mary was considerate enough not to smoke around me even though she still smoked for quite a while after me. I really hate the smell of smoking now and can not stand the smell of stale ash trays. At work they designated the door that was closest to my office as the smoking area so there were nasty ash trays on both sides of the door. It was probably to my benefit though, because I ended up parking about as far away from my office as possible and had to walk the extra distance all the time ato avoid the smell.
I still have not smoked since that day in Oklahoma but I still get an urge every now and then. I now understand though that I am a smoker that just isn't smoking at the present time and if I take even a puff I'll be back to where I left off in no time.
Scott mentioned in his blog that someone needs to come up with a pill for smokers. I don't think that would work. They already have nicotine gum that you can get without prescription and patches that are programed to ween you off nicotine but people keep smoking. Somehow young people have to be taught how bad smoking is for you and how disgusting it is to non-smokers. Young people also need to understand that once you start it is really, really hard to quit for good. If people start and then stop they need to realize no matter how long its been they are still smokers and as soon as they have one puff they will be an active smoker again.
Well this went on much longer then I hd planned. They say blogging is good for you mentally and I do feel better so more later....
UPDATE:
After posting and reading this post I realized I lost my track, again.
What I was getting at was that during World War II and until the 60s smoking was an acceptable social activity. I am pretty sure nobody thought, lets pack cigarettes in the GIs rations so they get hooked on them, get cancer and die young. Then we wont have to pay them Social Security or Veterans Benefits as long. I'm pretty sure they put them in their rations because a lot of people smoked and those that didn't could give theirs to their buddies that did. They also put fruit cocktail packed in high fructose corn syrup, milk chocolate and some kind of bread pudding that I remember using as a hockey puck in the rations we got and those items have been found to be bad for you now too. Except for the bread pudding unless it hit somebody in the head. The Red Cross, Salvation Army and a lot of missions handed out donuts to GIs during WWII, so maybe fat vets should sue them.
I just read that the current 30 something generation has a shorter life expectancy then the Greatest Generation because of increased smoking and stress. I suppose someone will claim the government didn't do enough to keep them from smoking. I suppose we could push for laws to protect us from anything that isn't good for us because we're to stupid be responsible for our own health. But then they would probably want to take my coffee away and probably even ice cream.
FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS!
I started smoking in grade school and by the time I graduated 8th grade I always had a pack of cigarettes available and they were usually non-filtered Pall-Mall or Camels. You have to realize that at that time, 1950s and early '60's, the only warnings you heard were that smoking would stunt your growth and turn your fingers yellow. When I graduated 8th grade I was 6'1" tall but only weighed around 90 pounds so I disproved that smoking stunted your growth. I did have yellow fingers though and was proud of it. Neither of my parents smoked cigarettes and they really didn't say much about me smoking. I didn't even have to hide my smoking from them, however I couldn't smoke in the house in front of them. My dad smoked an occasional pipe and cigars so the smell of smoke was already in the house so I didn't have to worry about that. When I got to high school I was on the swim team and decided it might be a good idea to quit for the season. I locked myself in a closet with a carton of Camels for about 6 hours and smoked until I was so sick of cigarettes, almost the whole carton, I couldn't stand the sight or smell of them, for about 6 months. By then swimming season was over and the nice weather of summer was coming and I was outside most of the time, so who was to know I was smoking again. In sophomore year of high school I developed chronic bronchitis and instead of the doctor ordering me to stop smoking he merely suggested I cut back and prescribed some cough syrup made of alcohol and codeine. Anyhow, I didn't try to quit again until I started Army basic training. The first 2 weeks the drill sergeants wouldn't allow us to smoke during duty hours and we were too busy cleaning things during off-duty hours to smoke. After the first 2 weeks they said if we had them we could smoke them and since this was the first privilege we got I had to smoke. As a private I only made $30 a month take home so I had to learn to role my own because I couldn't afford real cigarettes. The cigarettes that came in our C rations were packed before the Korean War. I had one pack with 1948 stamped on it. The cigarettes in C rations were in a little 4 pack and were so dry that if you did try to smoke them they burned so fast you could burn your lips. The thing the Army did to help smokers was give them ration cards for cartons of cigarettes from the PX. With the card a carton of 10 packs cost $.50 and we were allowed 3 cartons a month. I only knew a couple guys that didn't smoke in the Army and they would give me their ration cards so I could use their cigarette ration to help pay my apartment rent. My apartment cost $50.00 a month plus 2 cartons of Marlboro to the land lady. I could also give them as gifts to the Germans because American cigarettes were highly desirable.
When I got out of the Army and started working for the FAA smoking on position was allowed and I can only think of a couple people that I worked with that didn't smoke. This was the early '70s and reports that smoking was linked to heart disease and lung cancer were just starting to be argued. Even when the Surgeon General came out and said there was absolute proof that cigarettes caused cancer I thought of it more like, "Ya, just like they stunted my growth!". (I was now 6'4" and weighed 150 pounds) so Mary and I have 2 kids and she smoked through both pregnancies. We both smoked in the house and car with the kids so there were dirty smelly ash trays all over and lots and lots of second hand smoke for them to breath. We lived in Pierre, South Dakota and Granny and Grandpa were an 8 hour car trip away in Minneapolis. I did quit for around 6 weeks with hypnotism but I couldn't afford the follow-up so I tried one cigarette that someone had left at work and within a couple weeks I was back up to a pack a day. When we moved to Alaska in 1981 we drove 8 hours a day for 10 days in February. It was too cold out to even crack a window. Secondhand smoke was just starting to be an issue but I thought it was just people whining. The kids aversion therapy went on through the '80s. I did try stopping around 1986 using the new nicotine gum that was out by prescription only, but since the doctor that prescribed it didn't realize that it had to be used along with a smoking cessation program I just ended up chewing a lot of gum along with smoking a few cigarettes.
By now the proof that second hand smoke was as bad as first hand was pretty obvious so the FAA wouldn't allow smoking on position anymore. They gave us a little room in the back with big fans on 2 walls and allowed us 1 smoke break an hour. By 1990 I was smoking 21/2 to 3 packs a day. In 1987 I had been diagnosed with the beginnings of emphysema and was even prescribed an inhaler but I didn't really notice anything health wise because the doctor said I had over developed lungs and more lung capacity then most people. I attribute that to when I was a kid I would spend a lot of time under water because I didn't float since I really was just skin and bones. I finally quit smoking in July of 1990 when I was in Oklahoma City going to Automation Specialist school for the FAA. I used to take a walk during my study breaks and one day it was over 100 degrees and during my walk I couldn't get my breath. That was the first time I had noticed any trouble with my health. (the bronchitis had in high school disappeared when an Army medic said I couldn't have my alcohol/codeine cough syrup anymore, but that's another story) I saw an add on TV for a hypnotherapist so I decided to give that a try again. I swore to myself though that even if it didn't work I wouldn't smoke until I had gone the same number of days that her therapy cost that I would have spent if I was still smoking, which I think came out to about a month. The minute I got out of her office and got in my rental car to go home I wanted a cigarette but I stayed true to my vow and didn't smoke. I nearly killed some Mormons that came to my room preaching that weekend, but I didn't smoke. When I had free time I would go for long walks. When I woke up in the middle of the night wanting a cigarette I would get dressed and walk until I didn't want to smoke anymore. I got stopped once at 3am by the Oklahoma highway patrol looking for a white male who had just broke into a liquor store. When they asked what I was doing out at that time I told them I was trying to kick the smoking habit and they let me go. By the time I got back from Oklahoma City I was walking around a lake that was 12 miles around twice a week. I was pretty much over the worst of my withdrawals by the time I got home to Alaska. Mary was considerate enough not to smoke around me even though she still smoked for quite a while after me. I really hate the smell of smoking now and can not stand the smell of stale ash trays. At work they designated the door that was closest to my office as the smoking area so there were nasty ash trays on both sides of the door. It was probably to my benefit though, because I ended up parking about as far away from my office as possible and had to walk the extra distance all the time ato avoid the smell.
I still have not smoked since that day in Oklahoma but I still get an urge every now and then. I now understand though that I am a smoker that just isn't smoking at the present time and if I take even a puff I'll be back to where I left off in no time.
Scott mentioned in his blog that someone needs to come up with a pill for smokers. I don't think that would work. They already have nicotine gum that you can get without prescription and patches that are programed to ween you off nicotine but people keep smoking. Somehow young people have to be taught how bad smoking is for you and how disgusting it is to non-smokers. Young people also need to understand that once you start it is really, really hard to quit for good. If people start and then stop they need to realize no matter how long its been they are still smokers and as soon as they have one puff they will be an active smoker again.
Well this went on much longer then I hd planned. They say blogging is good for you mentally and I do feel better so more later....
UPDATE:
After posting and reading this post I realized I lost my track, again.
What I was getting at was that during World War II and until the 60s smoking was an acceptable social activity. I am pretty sure nobody thought, lets pack cigarettes in the GIs rations so they get hooked on them, get cancer and die young. Then we wont have to pay them Social Security or Veterans Benefits as long. I'm pretty sure they put them in their rations because a lot of people smoked and those that didn't could give theirs to their buddies that did. They also put fruit cocktail packed in high fructose corn syrup, milk chocolate and some kind of bread pudding that I remember using as a hockey puck in the rations we got and those items have been found to be bad for you now too. Except for the bread pudding unless it hit somebody in the head. The Red Cross, Salvation Army and a lot of missions handed out donuts to GIs during WWII, so maybe fat vets should sue them.
I just read that the current 30 something generation has a shorter life expectancy then the Greatest Generation because of increased smoking and stress. I suppose someone will claim the government didn't do enough to keep them from smoking. I suppose we could push for laws to protect us from anything that isn't good for us because we're to stupid be responsible for our own health. But then they would probably want to take my coffee away and probably even ice cream.
FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS!
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
New Web page
Well I've done it. I converted the webpage to international standards using style sheets. This standard has been around for almost 10 years but because of the different browsers that are used it took quite a while for it to take hold. Now there are basically 3 main browsers out there: Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Apple's Safari. There are a few others that hold very minor place in the browser world but all of them, except for Microsoft's IE, follow the standards set out by ISO for web pages. I primarily work with Firefox in Linux OS and get everything to work in that. Then I convert it to work in Internet Explorer. The styles and commands I used were documented to work for both IE and Firefox but when I checked out the site using Mary's Windows XP computer with Internet Explorer 7 installed I found that the documentation was wrong. The page looks great in Firefox and Opera but visit it with IE5 or IE6 and the opening page shifts to the left. IE7 holds the positions correctly but one of the slide out menus doesn't display. I checked the scripts to make sure I had them in the correct places and everything seems to be alright. It's just Microsoft trying to force their way on us and I wont have it. I sure don't understand how they are allowed to market a browser that doesn't meet standards this long after the standards were agreed to. Anyhow, it's up and I like it. Maybe the next time I upload a page I'll add a remark to use anything but Internet Explorer.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
A third of the year gone.
It is amazing to me how fast time passes. It seems like such a short time ago we were up celebrating Christmas with Maija, Brad and Scott at the cabin. Now it has warmed up and most of the snow is gone. The mosquitoes have returned and the Sandhill Cranes are circling overhead. A lot of waterfowl have returned but they have to settle for puddles right now because the lakes are still frozen. Now that it has warmed up and we can have the windows open during the day the traffic noise is way more noticeable. Motorcycles seem to be making up an awful lot of it so far this year. With gas going for $3.70 just down the road I guess those are the only vehicles people can afford to pleasure ride on. I know Mary anhttp://localhost/test.htmld I were kind of planning a trip to the Lower 48 this summer but have canceled those plans because of the price of gas.
Fishing season is just around the corner. Once the lakes open up the trout will be really hungry. I'll have to get the boat ready to use a little more this year then I did last. At least this year it isn't all full of leaves and stuff from having to leave it outside like I did the winter before last. I made a nice place for it in the shop and it looks like it held air in it all winter. I went out quite often while Mary was gone to Finland but once she got home I hardly went out at all. Nancy Lake is supposed to have a good population of Northern Pike and being a Minnesota boy I would love to find where they live in that lake.
Enough for now. More later.
Fishing season is just around the corner. Once the lakes open up the trout will be really hungry. I'll have to get the boat ready to use a little more this year then I did last. At least this year it isn't all full of leaves and stuff from having to leave it outside like I did the winter before last. I made a nice place for it in the shop and it looks like it held air in it all winter. I went out quite often while Mary was gone to Finland but once she got home I hardly went out at all. Nancy Lake is supposed to have a good population of Northern Pike and being a Minnesota boy I would love to find where they live in that lake.
Enough for now. More later.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Let's try again.
I spent the day working with the telephone company, again, trying to fix our telephone line. Since last weekend our internet connection has been so bad we could hardly use the internet. I called last week because there was so much noise on the line we couldn't use the phone to talk on. Today when I called the person on the other end could finally hear the noise and sent a technician out with some test gear. He found and intermittent ground somewhere on the line and decided to run another temporary line to replace the one that had been spliced twice to fix where the goats had chewed through it. I had just walked the most direct route through the woods from the box that the line ties in to the phone network at to the house in anticipation of him having to do that so I knew we could make it. When we ran the first temporary line a little more then a month ago the snow was still over waist deep so we followed my snowmobile trail. Todays route was about half as long as the first time. Hopefully this will keep us on line until they get here this summer to put in the new permanent line.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Bottled Water
I just finished reading Scott's April 30th blog where he is continuing a discussion about glass bottles and bottled water. Last week the news media made a big stink about one of the chemicals used to make plastic bottles and how it can cause cancer. Apparently there is enough proof of the cancer link that Canada has banned bottles made with it. That chemical is a real problem for plastic bottles. Scott started the topic because since the snow is going fast he has been able to use the trails by his house to walk with his dog Sweet Pea. He mentioned all the broken glass that is a danger to Sweet Pea's bare feet which is a valid point and would be solved by people using unbreakable plastic bottles. The real problem though is people littering. Glass or plastic, it doesn't belong on the trail. It has always amazed me to hear all these people talk about the environment and saving the animals yet somebody must be throwing those bottles, cans, cigarettes, mattresses, plastic bags, car bodies , etc etc . I get so mad when I see people flipping cigarettes out their car windows not only for how dumb it is because it could cause a fire but also because those things mount up. Our property runs for about a quarter mile along the Parks Highway and each spring I go out and pick up trash along it. Bottles, plastic and glass, and cans are mostly what I get but there are piles of cigarette butts all along the bike path and highway. We are smothering ourselves in garbage and killing our planet at the same time. Even properly disposed of plastic causes problems because the chemicals used to make them leach out into the land and then into the water. At least when glass is properly disposed of it breaks up in the landfill and just keeps breaking into smaller and smaller pieces to the point where it just becomes sand-like. The solution? One: get rid of people. No people equals no unnatural pollution. Okay, that will never fly so the only real solution is to educate people on the harm they are doing to their environment and that THEIR garbage does count. When I visit Finland I see how educating the people really works. They recycle and compost everything and they seem to try to avoid plastic as much as possible. When they go grocery shopping they take their own bags made of either cloth or heavy reusable plastic. If you need more bags you buy reusable bags at the checkout. Most soft drinks and beer come in cans or glass bottles that get recycled. I don't think there is a refund involved, they just do it. There is still litter along the road but nothing like here. You never see a grocery cart in the ditch because to use one you have to pay the equivalent of a quarter to unlock it but you get that back when you return it. I've seen them change from using things that were made out of wood or wood by products because it supported their forest industries, to people who use glass and metal for everything now. They still have wooden stuff but not for everyday things. We aren't very good about no plastic and recycling up here. There is very little recycling in Alaska at all and what is available is only in Anchorage and Wasilla/Palmer area. Willow landfill transfer point tried collecting recyclables for a while but now they only pick up aluminum cans. Mary stopped buying bottled water since we got a water filter and we do save our good plastic bags for Scott to use as doggy poop bags but that's about it. Each summer Mary has tried starting compost piles but they don't seem to get going very good up here.
Since Mary just got back from her monthly supply trip with about 36 plastic bags I better stop talking about recycling since it makes me feel like a hypocrite.
Since Mary just got back from her monthly supply trip with about 36 plastic bags I better stop talking about recycling since it makes me feel like a hypocrite.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Internet
Love it! Hate it!
We've had a lot of phone problems over the last few months and it really points out some of the weak spots in our new technology. We depend more and more on being connected to the internet for everything from staying up to date on the news to shopping. When the internet is down it is more annoying to me then if the television is broken. This last weekend we lost phone service because of the snow storm. So using my cell phone I called in the trouble reporting that our line was dead. They confirmed it was dead and said someone would get on it. Late Saturday afternoon I noticed we had a dial tone but still no internet. I figured they were working on it so I didn't call again. Sunday morning we still didn't have internet so I tried to call but the line was so bad I couldn't get through. Then it mysteriously cleared up so I report that our DSL had been out since the phone went out on Saturday. They hadn't been told of an outage but would look into it. First she tells me to reboot the modem so she can see it connect but when I do she says she can't see the modem. Finally she says she is updating something and boom, we have internet again. While we were without internet it was easy to see how dependent we have become on it. We don't even get a newspaper anymore because I can read most of it online plus I can read out of town newspapers too. I use the online TV listings provided by Zap2it.com to plan our evening TV viewing and to schedule my homemade DVR for HDTV. This blog can only be updated when I am on the network and both Mary and I have started using GoogleDoc for some things. She does a lot of volunteer work for LibraVox.org which is a nonprofit outfit that is putting public domain books into mp3 files for people who want to listen to books, for one reason or another, instead of reading them themselves. Once again though you have to have the internet to up and down load the files and since she coordinates who is reading what she needs her email to communicate with people from around the world. In this country internet providers boast about their 4 and 8mbps (megabit per second) premium connections. In countries like Japan and many European countries they have 100mbps connections and they cost a fraction of what the best connections in this country cost. On one of my Linux forums a guy was telling how he pays $79.00 a month for a 4mbps connection in New York and when he goes to Europe, which he does quite often, he gets a 70mbps connection for about $10.00 per month. I pay almost $70.00 a month for a measly 768kbps connection that has a 10 gigabyte per month limit. Up here there is only one broadband solution through MTA telephone company. I could use satellite but that is very unreliable up here due to weather and how low on the horizon the satellites are and pretty expensive too.
I was reading an article by John Dvorac who is kind of a guru of the PC world and he was commenting on it doesn't matter if you have a 10 gigabit connection, the way the internet is designed if you are trying to pull something off a server that only has a 512kbps connection that is a fast as it is going to come down. Also the more popular the site the more connections it has to handle and the slower it can handle them. That's why when watching YouTube sometimes it stops every few seconds. So I just hope that before all the news papers stop publishing paper copy and TV stations stop broadcasting over the air signals that someone upgrades the internet backbone so we all aren't sitting watching those little spinning timers that show up on YouTube all the time waiting for the clip to get buffered.
Time to go to the post office and drop off our last Netflix. Later....
We've had a lot of phone problems over the last few months and it really points out some of the weak spots in our new technology. We depend more and more on being connected to the internet for everything from staying up to date on the news to shopping. When the internet is down it is more annoying to me then if the television is broken. This last weekend we lost phone service because of the snow storm. So using my cell phone I called in the trouble reporting that our line was dead. They confirmed it was dead and said someone would get on it. Late Saturday afternoon I noticed we had a dial tone but still no internet. I figured they were working on it so I didn't call again. Sunday morning we still didn't have internet so I tried to call but the line was so bad I couldn't get through. Then it mysteriously cleared up so I report that our DSL had been out since the phone went out on Saturday. They hadn't been told of an outage but would look into it. First she tells me to reboot the modem so she can see it connect but when I do she says she can't see the modem. Finally she says she is updating something and boom, we have internet again. While we were without internet it was easy to see how dependent we have become on it. We don't even get a newspaper anymore because I can read most of it online plus I can read out of town newspapers too. I use the online TV listings provided by Zap2it.com to plan our evening TV viewing and to schedule my homemade DVR for HDTV. This blog can only be updated when I am on the network and both Mary and I have started using GoogleDoc for some things. She does a lot of volunteer work for LibraVox.org which is a nonprofit outfit that is putting public domain books into mp3 files for people who want to listen to books, for one reason or another, instead of reading them themselves. Once again though you have to have the internet to up and down load the files and since she coordinates who is reading what she needs her email to communicate with people from around the world. In this country internet providers boast about their 4 and 8mbps (megabit per second) premium connections. In countries like Japan and many European countries they have 100mbps connections and they cost a fraction of what the best connections in this country cost. On one of my Linux forums a guy was telling how he pays $79.00 a month for a 4mbps connection in New York and when he goes to Europe, which he does quite often, he gets a 70mbps connection for about $10.00 per month. I pay almost $70.00 a month for a measly 768kbps connection that has a 10 gigabyte per month limit. Up here there is only one broadband solution through MTA telephone company. I could use satellite but that is very unreliable up here due to weather and how low on the horizon the satellites are and pretty expensive too.
I was reading an article by John Dvorac who is kind of a guru of the PC world and he was commenting on it doesn't matter if you have a 10 gigabit connection, the way the internet is designed if you are trying to pull something off a server that only has a 512kbps connection that is a fast as it is going to come down. Also the more popular the site the more connections it has to handle and the slower it can handle them. That's why when watching YouTube sometimes it stops every few seconds. So I just hope that before all the news papers stop publishing paper copy and TV stations stop broadcasting over the air signals that someone upgrades the internet backbone so we all aren't sitting watching those little spinning timers that show up on YouTube all the time waiting for the clip to get buffered.
Time to go to the post office and drop off our last Netflix. Later....
Sunday, April 27, 2008
I think this will work
GoogleDocs is pretty cool. It allows me to create blog entries a couple different ways. First I had to create a new blog at blogger.com but then I can either use it's interface or GoogleDocs to create entries.
Boy! what a mess all that snow made around here. Temperatures today are in the mid 40s and that snow is melting really fast. There is mud all over so now the dogs are not very happy. None of them like getting their feet wet and they like mud even less, but since they have to go out to poop they have to get their feet wet. They do try and keep to the snow but that get pretty hard. They goats stay on a board that is in front of their door so they don't get their feet wet. Speaking of the goats. Friday while working on the web page I checked the webcam and noticed they had figured out how to open the door to the barn. By the time I got over there Ellu had got up on the straw bail and was eating straight out of the grain bag. Everything had been investigated and there was trash all over. I got them back in their pen and saw one of them had actually figured out how to undo the lock on the door. I quickly came up with a remedy by attaching a rope to one of the doors so that even if they get the lock open again the door wont open. In the few minutes it took me to clean up the mess they had made, Kapu figured out the knot I had made and had untied the door. Back to the drawing board and finally I have it so they can't get out. I think. I'm sure they will be happy when spring finally arrives and they can use the rest of their outside pen and also get out and browse a little.
Lunch time so off I go. Now that it is a little easier to post I will probably add things more often.
Boy! what a mess all that snow made around here. Temperatures today are in the mid 40s and that snow is melting really fast. There is mud all over so now the dogs are not very happy. None of them like getting their feet wet and they like mud even less, but since they have to go out to poop they have to get their feet wet. They do try and keep to the snow but that get pretty hard. They goats stay on a board that is in front of their door so they don't get their feet wet. Speaking of the goats. Friday while working on the web page I checked the webcam and noticed they had figured out how to open the door to the barn. By the time I got over there Ellu had got up on the straw bail and was eating straight out of the grain bag. Everything had been investigated and there was trash all over. I got them back in their pen and saw one of them had actually figured out how to undo the lock on the door. I quickly came up with a remedy by attaching a rope to one of the doors so that even if they get the lock open again the door wont open. In the few minutes it took me to clean up the mess they had made, Kapu figured out the knot I had made and had untied the door. Back to the drawing board and finally I have it so they can't get out. I think. I'm sure they will be happy when spring finally arrives and they can use the rest of their outside pen and also get out and browse a little.
Lunch time so off I go. Now that it is a little easier to post I will probably add things more often.
Now using Google Doc
Well today I signed up with Google doc to see if this would be a quicker way of making entries in my blog. This way if it works the way I think it does Mary will be able to make entries if she wants although before when she could make entries she only made very few. I guess I spoke too early about spring coming the other day. Friday, April 25, we got 7 inches of snow with another 2 inches on Saturday. Anchorage got even more. Poor Scott was snowed in and all he had left to eat in his house was Romin Noodles. This is getting ridiculous. Mary's sister in Finland is talking about all the stuff that is starting to grow in her garden and we still cant even see the garden. This year instead of us wasting time on a vegetable garden we are going to plant berry bushes down where we used to try and grow vegetables and Mary will grow her herbs up by the front door. The one nice thing about the late spring snow is that the forest around our house will be much safer from fires for a while.
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