FieryBlazingHandbasket

Circling the Drain

2011-10-11T12:44:00.004-08:00

No posting since January. Another Alaskan winter about to begin – although its been slow in arriving and is still parked somewhere outside of the ‘Banks. There is fast ice on the creeks and skiffs of ice on the rivers – as discovered as I flew east and north to a village today. ‘Dweller has been out in the vil somewhere on the coast for god knows how long….I just got back from being overseas and then promptly turned around and headed out to somewhere on the Yukon.

So…to resurrect this blog? Perhaps. Life stuff has definitely interfered with regular postings by the both of us. Weddings, aging parents, house selling, traveling: all that plus the usual activities of putting food up, cutting and hauling firewood, and maintaining the respective homesteads in the Valley. I hear that 'Dweller and her significant other put up a woodshed this summer – the chicken coop is still on hold for a future date. I didn’t do much around my place this summer as 1) it was a darn rainy and cold summer and 2) I spent a significant portion of it moving my parents out of their home for 46 years and that cleaned my clock. I wasn’t good for much else upon return to the 'Banks but sitting on the sofa watching really bad movies – and the Tudors. Arguably some more bad TV, but kudos for the costumes – a weird mix of 16^th , 17^th and 18^th century styles that worked. Well – it might have driven a costume designer or historian mad, but I loved the mix.

We are certainly girding our loins for the slouching towards Gomorrah that will be the 2012 election year, though at least Palin is on the way out – with the fizzling of her little nova as it winks out to total irrelevance audible all over the media galaxy. There is also the disappointing (but not surprising) mauling that Prop 2 took in the local election – there seems to be an overabundance of dense individuals that just don’t seem to get it – that if we don’t regulate the particulates, the EPA will – and that one way or another at some point they wont be able to fire up their outdoor wood boilers and blanket -belch their neighbors with the choking fog of smoke.

I might be able to roust 'Dweller back into the hitch of regular posting on this blog - maybe we will focus on the homey aspects of life rather than venture back into the political cesspool.

It's Been a (Persistently) Cold Winter

2011-01-23T07:18:00.008-09:00

At right, Mac the Dog models the very latest in frost bite protection

Not that I am whingeing or anything, but this winter has been cold in a stubborn sort of way. Since the Great Winter Rain of Thanksgiving, we have had very few days above - 15 , and quite a number of days in the -30 to -40 range.

I knew it was a bad time to go Outside and leave the house and critters, but circumstances were such that I had little choice (no, this was not a trip to white beaches and turquoise seas). Despite the best and valiant efforts of the neighbors who tend to my place when I travel, I returned to frozen drains and frozen dogs.

The drains, although somewhat expensive to thaw, were at least remedied within 24 hours, and I now have a fully functioning system, albeit with a cracked 2-inch pipe from washing machine to main drain, but since I live in a post 'n pad simple box - with all of its pipes insulated and accessible under the house - this is a relatively inexpensive summertime fix. In the meantime, grey water leaks out when I do laundry and harmlessly forms a glacier on the gravel pad.

The frost-bitten dog is proving to be more challenging, however. In 20+ years of having sled and other assorted dogs, all of whom have lived outside when I travel, I never had a dog get frost bite, not even on their most sensitive naughty bits.

Until now. Inexplicably, upon arrival home, I found Mac the Dog with an alarming frost- bitten patch the size of a quarter on his side: fur gone, big necrotic cratered patch. And it's been growing daily.

Well, the obvious solution is to keep the dog indoors, and yes, he is indoors as much as possible, but this is a dog that drinks water by the buckets, and needs complete (and I mean complete) privacy in order to do his business. In his simple doggie brain, this translates into: "I can barely pee on a leash, and I most certainly cannot poop on a leash." Without the freedom to bury himself deep in the woods and deep in the snow, he really cant do anything at all. He also requires at least five to ten minutes of twirling in circles before he can settle down to toilet.

Ten to 15 minutes at minus 30, with no fur over a frost-bitten patch equals more dead skin and no healing. After two days of trying to protect it with salve and such like, the quarter has grown to a fifty-cent piece. And the side of a dog is proving to be a tricky place to affix any type of bandage, medication or cold protection.

The polar-fleece dog coat? Ripped off in minutes and left in the snow somewhere.

The vet-wrap rib-cage vest over salve, cotton balls, gauze and adhesive tape? Scratched off within 30 seconds, and half ingested, before I had even returned the vet items to their box.

So, this morning, I devised the frost-bite singlet, as modeled above. First, three layers of polar fleece protecting the frost bite - affixed with duct tape to the surrounding fur - then, the T-shirt, to prevent scratching and chewing, and to provide additional warmth. I am hoping the legs of the T-shirt, and the snug fit by additional application of duct tape will prevent him from wiggling out of the garment.

He's on a half-hour trial out in the dog pen now - as the coming week has meetings and other work-related obligations that will require him to be outside (although in a dog house with lots of straw) for some portion of the day. But in the wee hours of the morning I awake with visions of out-of-control lesions eating into the ribcage of Mac the Dog.

Who would have thought that a completely frozen drain system would prove to be easier to fix than a frost-bitten dog? Yet another thing learned*.

* along with the valuable arctic plumbing fact that while a steady drip through water pipes prevents freeze-up, a steady trickle, as from a toilet tank that was stealthily running, into a drain creates freeze-up. Lo, for the price of a $2o replacement toilet valve, there went $400 in thawing costs.

On the DC Street Beat

2011-01-14T16:01:00.007-09:00

Call me stupid, but I just don't get the British reference....

...So much for any hope of a return to civil discourse

An Engineering Track They Don't Talk About at University

2010-12-19T20:04:00.014-09:00

My dad was an architect, and quite a few skyscraper office buildings in a major US city incorporate his designs and his work. So I grew up looking at buildings and wondering about those who design and build them, as well as engaging in ruminations about what our modern collection of architecture - that which does not collapse due to shoddy design and materials (think McMansions here) - will tell those who follow us. Will the buildings which survive be architectural masterpieces on par with a Chartre or a Notre Dame, or will they be Olive Trees and Micky D's?

Speaking of which, when I have been inside one I have often wondered about the architects who design fast food restaurants. Are they people who managed the technical principles of architecture, but lacked all sense of aesthetics and design, or are they those that just barely made it through school? Maybe there is a lot of money to be had in designing these plastic representations of uber-America, or maybe there is just some bizarre satisfaction gained in creating big happy face clowns and kitschy roof tops.

Along that same drift of thinking - what about people who design vibrators, such as the Wascally Wabbit (tm) (it's water proof!)?? And how that little bunny gazes adoringly at the robust penis representation. The rabbit - so often referenced in the America sexual vernacular: they screwed like bunnies, the rabbit died, Hugh and his bunnies.... It's hard not to giggle at the Wascally Wabbit; oh Elmer, how did it come to this??

It takes some calculations, not to mention a whole bunch of metal ball bearings, to get that Wascally Wabbit rotating with all the insouciance of a young Lolita twirling a hula-hoop. Not to mention that the bunny ears are designed to flitter at a high rate of speed for extra oooumph.

Behold, the evolved, engineered vibrator, behind which there must be a mechanical engineer. True, one with a sense of humor (and not much color sense - why purple? why not purple?), but an engineer none-the-less, one could imagine. Harder to imagine, though, is the career path which led to such a point. It doesn't seem likely that vibrator design is one of those things that they, well, touch upon in engineering school.

But someone has to do it. And do it with flare. Carved dildos were found in ancient Roman excavations - will Wascally Wabbit and its kin be among our artifacts found by distant descendants? If so, they will perhaps notice the persistent use of sappy happy clown faces (with a twinge of the demonic) memorialized on scales large and small - from Ronald McDonald to the happy little munchkin grinning from under his penis cap on the Wascally Wabbit...

Little Penis Man: with the weirdly truncated arms

Miller's Magical Mystery Tour

2010-12-10T08:17:00.011-09:00

Poor Joe. Looks like he is running out of straws to grasp in his efforts to prove that no, really, he did win the senatorial election. Thus, in the spirit of Christmas, I offer a few more that he might want to consider including in his lawsuit(s).

1) It's all Wikileaks' fault: Really Joe, you did get the majority of votes, but Alaska's electronic ballot boxes were commandeered by Julian Assange and his merry band of cyberpunks, who erased votes cast for you (sorta kinda like what you did with your work emails). It's all part of the vast leftist conspiracy to take over the world that you and Sarah are so valiantly battling.

2) Little green men are responsible: As those familiar with Roswell and other alien sightings will tell you, Joe, its gotta be illegal aliens - whether terrestrial or extra. Remember a couple years back, there was that weird light that was seen in the sky near Tok? It must have been a saucer full of little green men who have been in hiding ever since, and somehow used their superior technology to queer the election results. Demand a hand recount, Joe!

3) It's climate change: Don't really know how to work that one into the lawsuit, Joe, but since climate change gets blamed for everything nowadays, how could you let this one pass? And since you obviously have your own unique interpretations of the law, arguing that climate change adversely affected your senatorial chances should present no challenge at all to you.

4) It's the fluoride: We've all been told that fluoridated water strengthens teeth and helps prevent childhood cavities, but it's a front, a sham. In reality, fluoridated water is being used to brainwash us, thereby preventing many, many people from being able to fully comprehend your stellar qualifications for the senate seat. Who knew that your greatest allies in this brave battle might just turn out to be Fluoride Free Fairbanks?

5) It's Obama's fault: Enuff said.

Freezing rain has turned Fairbanks into a NO DRIVE zone

2010-11-22T10:41:00.000-09:00

How bad are the roads, you ask? So slick that a Subaru with winter tires going 15 miles per hour can't come to a stop.

My first sign to turn around and not even attempt Ballaine Hill was sliding across Ballaine Road as I made a low-speed right turn on to it. But no, I thought driving cautiously and slow might be alright.

My second sign to turn around and not try Ballaine Hill, even slowly, came before the crest of the hill, when I asked a woman pulled over on the should if she needed a lift. Her car couldn't make it up the hill, she said, so she had called for a lift home.

By the time I noticed and paid attention to the third sign not to attempt Ballaine Hill even at a near crawl -- the third sign being all the other vehicles off the road below me -- I was already sliding downhill, ABS fluttering away, into the opposite lane of traffic, trying to gain some control over my direction and not slide into any of the other cars off the road. This was all happening very slowly, mind you, but that was little comfort.

Visualize, for a moment, a curling stone. You know how it comes to a slow, graceful spiral as it nears the end of the lane? That was my trusty, sure-footed little Soob. By sheer luck and maybe some decent steering, the Soob gently nosed into a mini snow berm on the shoulder. On my side of the road. Facing downhill. In theory, I could have tried to get down the hill. Problem was, there was no guarantee I wouldn't hit all the other cars half-in/half-out of the lane. And there was no guarantee I wouldn't end up spiraling into the opposite lane of traffic again. Which was a far sight better than most of the other 8-10 vehicles off the road around me. Most are going to require tow trucks which are going to be hard to come by today.

I managed to get all of the Soob on to the shoulder and walked back home on the snowmachine trail by the side of the road. As I was walking I watched two cars crest the hill going way too fast, lose control and almost hit the Soob and vehicles coming up from the other side.

The Tea Party: Party of the Petulant

2010-11-12T20:52:00.009-09:00

Joe reminds me of nothing so much as of a red-faced toddler drumming his heels on the floor and beating his sweaty little fists on the coffee table because he didnt get to eat the whole box of Sugar Bombs. With a poopy diaper to further enrage the lil' tyke.

Palin and Miller (aka Neo-Palin) have got that lower-lip pout down cold. When things don't turn out like the reality TV script said they would (whadda ya mean it takes more than 5" F**K Me heels and an up-do to win the vice-presidency???) , well these two do know how to pitch a royal fit.

Another "P" word: Paranoid. Party of the Paranoid, but we've known that for a long, long time. Voter fraud, conspiracy? Yeah right, Joe, gimme some of what you been smoking.

Because one thing is for sure - Joe's cognitive functions are a bit mussed up. He can't do maths to - well - win a Senate seat. Because, news flash Joe - winning the primary by just a couple of thousand votes when only about 28% (if that) of the electorate actually bothered to vote does not a path to the Senate ensure.

While it doesn't look like Joe is going to find out what moose-hunting along the Beltway is like, he is about to find out what eating crow is like.

And surprise, Miller is going to file yet ANOTHER lawsuit

2010-11-12T07:04:00.000-09:00

It appears that the Miller campaign has been turning over a few rocks lately, looking for the worst possible examples of lower life form to add to Miller's Sturmabteilung. Witness the addition of Floyd Brown, the man responsible for one of the worst examples of racebaiting I've yet witnessed.

I'm sure Karl Rove will turn up sometime soon.

But in the meantime, peoples, I highly recommend the political shorts put together by Alaska Robotics. I missed them prior to the election while in my work-induced funk.

Every vote counts, unless of course, your intent was to vote for someone other than Joe Miller

2010-11-11T07:47:00.001-09:00

Why are we surprised? Has not the bar been set, nay, buried beneath a two-foot berm by our own two million dollar hockey mom? This is Alaska politics now, like our sad, dysfunctional national scene.

And, clearly, this is all the federal government's fault.

If they'd just eradicated any vestigial foreign-ness stemming from the Murkowski family's origins at Ellis Island, back when Lisa's great-grandfather emigrated to this country to something very patriotic and American-sounding like, say, Smith, we wouldn't be in this mess. I'll bet the Democrats were in charge back then, too, allowing Poles to come over with their difficultly spelled names all willy-nilly taking away those low-paying jobs that our great-grandfathers wouldn't deign to do.

Try it.

S-m-i-t-h.

Easy! Got it on the first go!

As opposed to ~~Murkowsky~~ ~~Murcowsky~~ ~~Mirkowski~~ Murkowski.

Came the news that Miller and that bunch of Outside wackos, aka the Tea Party, are suing to make make any misspelling of 'Murkowski' not count. From the ADN:

"Miller is asking a judge to stop the state from making a judgment on a voter's intentions if the voter wrote in something other than "Murkowski" or "Lisa Murkowski." State law allows no leeway for other spellings, his lawsuit says."

What if a voter wrote in 'Lisa Ann Murkowski'? Or 'Lisa A. Murkowski'? And how shocking that Joe Miller, lawyer and ex-magistrate -- who made such an enduringly positive impression on his peers that word is that the magistrate's association spurned his campaign's request for an endorsement prior to the election -- has pursued this further. I'm seriously ~~suprised~~ surprised.

Better yet is Miller's argument that minor misspellings, may, in fact, be 'protest' votes. Frankly, I think one could make the case that a huge number of voters, hundreds even, intended to vote a protest vote and accidentally spelled the name correctly.

So there I was in the ballot box, so I misspelled it just to make some weird point that I don't understand but sounded really good when I heard it on talk radio... and I -- dang it -- what was that again ? ~~Murkowsky~~ ~~Murcowsky~~ ~~Mirkowski~~ Murkowski. Oh, shit! I think I voted for Lisa Murkowski!

Really, I am shocked that he hasn't started challenging correctly-spelled versions of the name on the grounds that they were cast, actually, by voters whose intent was to misspell it. It is entirely possible that 98% of those write in votes were cast by people in protest and they spelled the damned name right! My god! How will we ever know?

S-m-i-t-h.

Sayonara, Mike!

2010-11-06T20:18:00.013-08:00

The voter booting of the uber-grinch, Mike Kelly, can't go unremarked by this blog, where once, in more optimistic times, we blogged regularly and even posted a pic of Mike being burned in effigy. The near-win of Karl Kassel (losing by only seven votes) the last time Mean Mike was up for re-election was painful, but finally the screw has turned.

I could scarce believe it when I woke to otherwise very dismal election news last Wednesday. Could it be that the district 'Dweller and I live in is finally tipping to the more liberal side? Probably not - since our district has led in Joe Miller votes - both in the primary and in the main election. More likely, the late-in-the-day campaign that highlighted Mike's dismal record against organized labor and domestic violence did the trick. Whatever it was, I am grateful. Enjoy retirement Mike, and please, stay out of politics in the future!

So, yeah, as this country continues slouching on its path to government-as-reality-TV, there has been little to celebrate. Still at least two of the three Sarah Clones got a righteous shellacking (although Bachmann is still alive and kicking and as mentally incontinent as ever) and Alaska didnt wake up to the news that Unsavory Joe is our senator (y-e-t). Of course, he is doing everything he can to totally muck up and delay the ballot-counting process, but then could we expect anything less from such as he?

Criminy. Never did I think that one day I would write on this blog that I miss the days of Ted, Frank ( M-U-R-K-O-W-S-K-I), and all the rest of the corrupt bastards. True, they were less than forthright with their constituents, but by gawd, at least they were old school politics.

Yeah, even Don Young is looking better and better. Sure, he is still a foul-mouthed ass, but nothing like Tea Partiers and Joe Miller to make him look more like Robert Byrd every day.

They had C street smarts (even if sometimes they were too smart for their own good), they knew their facts and if at times they twisted information to suit their own purposes, at least it was clear that they were doing so for a reason other than pure babbling ignorance.

They were arrogant, but theirs was an arrogance born of ability, intellect (OK, maybe not in the case of Frank or Don) and experience. It was not the insanely annoying petty arrogance of Palin and her spawn who take no care to hide the fact that they just don't give a shit about accuracy, fairness, common decency, or truth, because none of that matters to the Legions of Christ when they are inspired by the Spirit, or mama grizzlies or whatever. Or, more accurately, are engaging in the magical thinking that, as any licensed psychologist will point out, goes along with extreme dysfunction. As in Michele Bachmann's case: if she says it costs 200 million a day for Obama to visit India, then it does, because she said so, and that makes it so (and ain't nobody going to prove her wrong).

On the other hand, her suggestion that Obama and entourage "visit" India via videoconference makes a weird sort of twisted sense. In this digitally-crazed age, people like Bachmann are where they are primarily because they reign within a pixellated realm fabricated by cable TV, Twitter and Facebook.

On a completely unrelated topic - 'Dweller and I have been AWOL due to a combination of anomie (the shrill onslaught of the Palin Pods has put the muscle on us) and too much going on in work and personal life.

Maybe I will start blogging about chickens again: they continue to be a constant source of entertainment and useful instructors in the nuances of human behavior in these dark days (and I am not referring solely to the solar cycle)....

The feng-shui is very very very good

....along with other daily marginalia, like the profound relaxation and enjoyment I have been garnering from my new wood-fired sauna, which I hocked my truck to have built. But it was worth it - a balm for the soul in during bleak times.....maybe Obama should try one.

Mike Huckabee Might of Called Me...

2010-09-10T09:46:00.011-08:00

But I wouldn't necessarily know if he did this past primary. You see, my cordless phone battery finally gasped its last. Judging from the on-line reviews of my particular Panasonic phone model, I have nothing to complain about (and I am not). I got over five years of charging on that battery - and most of the reviews cited the crap battery performance of no more than two years as their chief plaint.

Nor did the battery over-heat or burst into flames.

But, it finally just wouldn't hold a charge for very long outside of its cradle. So, tired of the incessant little beeping noise it made when I was on a call, I decided to replace it.

Not so easy. Because in this throw-away society, my five-year old Panasonic phone was absolutely Jurassic. I didn't even bother with the store of its original provenance, I went directly to the website. Where it was indeed confirmed that neither my phone model nor its battery still existed.

At this point, the first notion of replacing the thing flitted into my consciousness (what would a new phone cost? About 40$?), but I like the phone and it does its job. So, I called tech help to find a replacement battery. That took roughly 10 minutes, as I was routed first through all the menu options, and then shunted off to a call center that I strongly suspect was in the North Atlantic - like maybe Ireland - aren't call centers there booming the Irish economy?

It took quite a bit longer for the very polite gentleman to discover what battery # would work in my archaic phone - but to his credit he persevered and did not suggest I buy a new Panasonic phone. But, as this was the tech help center, not a purchasing center, the polite man, apologizing profusely, suggested the Panasonic web store.

Beep, beep, beep.

On to the web (now 20 minutes into the enterprise), but among all the various batteries available for web sales (at least 15), the one I needed did not have a little "purchase" radio button; instead I was instructed to call yet another 1-800 #.

Beep, beep, beep.

The wall of phones at Freddie's floated before my eyes.

I fought off the siren call of easy come/easy go, and gamely called the battery supply call center. And reached, I am quite sure, Bengaluru or some other mega-call center city in India. The extremely long relay time between our call and response and the very measured careful English with just a hint of melody of yet another incredibly polite man sort of gave that away.

I then embarked on a 35 minute ordeal of purchasing the battery - all while the beep, beep, beeping of my dying battery became more urgent and more desperately pitched. The suspense was palatable. Would I be able to complete the transaction (in which this very polite gentleman confirmed and reconfirmed each piece of information collected two to five times before completely satisfied) before my battery totally died?

Further, as the mere task of purchasing a replacement battery had now eaten over an hour of my time, with no real guarantee that I would complete the order and my objective, the lure of a new phone was becoming almost too much to ignore any longer. Not more than a few times during the agonizing process did I almost click the disconnect button. That plus the fact that it cost me $35 to get my new battery, by the time the shipping was factored in.

But, it just stuck in my craw to toss a perfectly good piece of equipment simply because nowadays something that is older than two years is considered fit only for the landfill.

So, I dug my heels in, and two days ago, my new battery arrived. I admit I was pretty much convinced that when I plugged the battery into my phone, it would explode. But it didn't. And my phone works, and it doesn't beep, and if Mike Huckabee calls again, I am ready.

Mike Huckabee called last night

2010-08-24T08:26:00.002-08:00

He said I really, really ought to vote for Joe Miller.

And I said, "Mike, dude, don't you know you are calling the wrong house?"

But Mike, like many of my Tea Party callers, wasn't interested in me. Oh no, it was all 'liberal agenda of Barack Obama" this and "serious time for our country" that, and some 'protect life' thrown in for good measure. Oh, and did you hear? Joe Miller is bold. And apparently, Mike called from a place called "Foreign Exchange" with a 402 area code.

So I went back to watching some mass entertainment put out by the vast liberal conspiracy to corrupt our youth and turn all tweens into sexters, although honestly, I have a hard time seeing the connection between Quentin Tarantino's "Death Proof" and any threat to the as-yet unlabeled generation. What are they? Generation Z? Did anyone actually watch "Death Proof?"

So there I was, back on the couch with a beer watching some pretty mindless violence. And who should call? Lt. Governor Loren Leman. Funny right? Loren and I don't talk on the phone much. He prefers things to remain the way they are -- him down in Juneau doing not much other than hop on the wagon of more charismatic candidates and spout some right wing clap trap, and me up here in Goldstream Valley rereading my copy of the liberal agenda to my same sex partner and occasionally writing a check to radical groups like those organic food growing CSAs. Loren: Happy. Me: Happy.

But no, Loren had to mess with our happy arrangement (see above) and try to convince me to vote for Joe Miller. Apparently Loren had been talking with Mike and a previous caller with the code name Alaskans for Common Sense. Loren was very concerned about the Barack Obama's liberal agenda. (Must remember to see if it is the same version as mine.)

It was impossible to get a word in edgewise. ~~otherwise I might have gently reminded Loren that as an undeclared voter, I'm not allowed to vote in the Republican primary.~~ (Edited on 8-25 because that just isn't true. One has to pick which ticket to vote - the Dem or the Republican.) Sure, after a number of drinks, I have contemplated registering as one just so I could cast a preventative vote before the general election. I have no illlusions, living as I do in Greater Redneckia, that Republicans won't get elected fairly frequently. But what a service to help make sure only the less crazy ones make it to the primary. I confess the concept is still so repugnant that I don't think I have the stomach for it. I remain unaffiliated.

I did eventually hang up, and would have called back later to apologize for my rudeness, but Mike was calling from a phone number that my caller id could not suss out. I guess I'll have to wait until he calls back.

Red Gold: Little Flavor Bombs

2010-08-09T08:16:00.000-08:00

We've been playing hooky, again, Flic and I. In our defense, the world is being kooky and appalling enough that surely, how important is it to point that out? La Palinista Supreme continues to generate headlines, so things are okay at least in Wasilla. (From the perspective of the Wasillians, obviously.)

Digressing.

When the times get tough, or too annoying, and it is June-August in Alaska, the wise woman goes dipnetting. Had another lovely time perched on a rock waiting for the bump of a red salmon. And bonus! Got there in time ahead of the hordes of people directed to Chitina by the ADN article the week prior. Spent most of the last week processing: brining fish, smoking fish, drying fish, drying and smoking fish... and enjoying the delicacy that is red caviar. It doesn't keep that long and I refuse to try to can it. It is awesome (particularly on a hot day with a cold beer) and oh-so-fleeting, a once a year treat. If you're harvesting salmon and don't try to make it at least once, I suspect you are a closet Tea Party member.

Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Hockey Mom

2010-07-23T08:57:00.000-08:00

New favorite annoying-ex-Governor related product.

I've come to the conclusion that resistance is futile.

Sure, Flic and I have vowed time and again that we were not going to feed into the crazed, publicity-hungry media frenzy that She Who Will Not Be Named has cultivated. We've tried, but one can't stay abreast of the news without running into some kind of headline, some cringingly embarassingly story, or quote, or description of the latest occurance in the family feud between her grandbaby daddy's family and her own faux-regular middle class
bunch.

Palin Palin Palin! There, I've said it. No more not naming that which ails us. No more hoping against hope that this will all just go away. Now, all that's left to do is to document this strange time. I'm hoping I can find the car sporting that bumper sticker that I saw last week. It read, "Palin = quitter."

Cold (50) Stone(s)* Fatty

2010-07-15T13:30:00.003-08:00

They could use a PB&C (TM), or several: Ethiopian famine victims**

Call me old fashioned - but I am still back in the day where being fat, even obese, meant being oh say somewhere north of 250 but south of 500. Anything above that was left to the carny, the Guinness World Book, or that rare individual who went reclusive and ate him/herself to the point where they had to be moved by crane.

I haven't cognitively updated for the PB&C(TM) factor. True, its been banging at my consciousness that more and more, I no longer get my own airplane seat (silly old-fashioned me). Being a person of normal weight, it has now become implicit airline courtesy that I am expected to give up my unused seat portion to the billows of elbow, waist and thigh fat that flow over from the seat of my aisle mate into my unused seat space.

You would think since I am (in) voluntarily giving up my extra space, and thereby saving them having to hork over the price of two seats to accommodate their girth, that at least sometimes there would be an offer of token compensation. Maybe an offer to buy me an on-board burger bomb, or a share in their box o' 12 Cinnabons that they brought on for a snack during take off, but sad to say, I spend my flights squished and wreathed in chemically contrived food smells that waft from the goodie bags jammed all around. Alas, to score a bag of peanuts and obscured by rolls of fat, I am left to wild gesticulations to gain the attention of the flight attendant.

So sure, I have noticed that bigger is well a lot bigger now in the US of Ay. But I didn't fully comprehend how far the scale has tipped up there to the elephantine, until this morning when I was browsing ByrlaneHome Catalog, and encountered its "plus+sizeliving" pages (where I can find "more comfort and convenience"). Here is a sampling of products offered:

A talking scale (for those whose belly obscures the read-out) that has a 500# capacity, and if that is not enough for all those baby elephants out there,
A 1000# scale with a remote digital readout.

And since maintaining all that weight undoubtedly means more waste removal, why suffer discomfort and concern about accurate aim when there is

The "Big John Toilet Seat (TM)": 19" wide from lip to lip with a 1200# capacity (offers 75% more area than a regular toilet seat!), which accessorizes nicely with the
Ergonomic Easywipe: a personal 15 & 3/4 inch "wand" that holds toilet paper on its soft silicone end, and which ejects used toilet paper with the click of a button (unfortunately, this item is available only through another catalog).

Then there's all the super-sized camp chairs, benches, step stools and other furniture that have been beefed up substantially to support the members of the 1/4 to 1/2 ton crowd.

Wow, so 500# is the new 200, and 1000 is the new 500. What does define obese these days, if furniture and hardware to support 1000 pounds is commonplace, and scarier still, in demand? Meanwhile, more and more populations in Africa are starving, with African nations poorer now than they were 20 years ago.

This is not an embarrassment of riches, this is criminal robbing of the grainaries by corporate rats, aided and abetted by sheeple drugged by 24/7 reality TV, fast crap food and sugar.

I think I am going to go for a run.

* 50 stones is roughly equivalent to 800 pounds
**Since 1990, coffee retail sales have jumped from $30 billion annually to $80 billion. Four multinationals control the coffee market, with the New York commodity market setting the price. Ethiopia is the biggest producer of coffee in Africa, with Starbucks buying most (if not all) of its African coffee from the Sidama region, Ethiopia. In 2006, the Sidama region experienced prolonged famine. Ever since the commodification of coffee, Ethiopian farmers cannot make enough to feed their families and are dependent on US aid to survive (mostly in the form of cheap wheat).

Photo downloaded from:
http://letschangetogether.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/20070406_ethiopia1.jpg

Holy Heart Failure, Batman!

2010-07-13T19:27:00.014-08:00

Here is what I have been wondering for the past two days: how many pounds do 68 slices of bacon make?

A little research reveals that the answer really depends on how thick the bacon is sliced, but for regular bacon, 16 to 20 slices.

Thus, 68 slices is a little over three pounds of bacon.

68 slices is also the equivalent of the amount of fat contained in one 24-ounce serving of a PB&C shake* from Cold Stone Creamery. That same serving packs a walloping 2,010 calories too: basically the full daily caloric intake for a healthy, active individual (and that is active as in old school active, not like nowadays where people sit around all day watching TV, engaging in social media, and well, uh, blogging).

What are the odds that the people who slurp down a PB&C shake eat nothing else throughout the course of their day? Not so good, I would imagine. And would those same individuals also sit down and consume at one sitting three packages of bacon? Not likely. Because while Americans are getting huger and fatter and more unhealthy with every passing day, most are not, in all likelihood, setting out to eat to become large enough to be buried in a grand piano-sized casket.

But if this shameless, irresponsible marketing of fatty, sugary crap continues, that is where a majority of Americans will end up.

Now, I should note that I am among the first in line to say that people are responsible for their choices, and to recognize that in a capitalist society, markets are driven by consumers. If people werent sucking down those PB&C shakes, well more than likely Cold Stone Creamery wouldnt be making them.

But....wait a minute. Ice cream milkshakes have been around forever. There is nothing wrong with having a sweet, cold treat once in awhile. But at 2,010 calories a pop, this type of drink is not a treat, its a threat. Old fashioned milk shakes, even ice cream made from pure heavy cream, don't pack that sort of caloric punch. So clearly, Cold Stone is adding a lot of something else to its products.

On its website, the company is not entirely forthcoming about what that something else might be. In fact, rather obviously the information about its products (all of which, including PB&C, are trademarked) appears to imply that these milkshakes are leaner and more nutritional than milkshakes of yore. According to the company's ice cream FAQ's, the PB&C (TM) is nothing more than peanut butter, chocolate ice cream and skim milk (there is that masterful stroke to lull those itchy dieters).

And while the company likes to blat about how its ice cream is "made fresh daily" (not obviously trademarked), with only the freshest ingredients, it is darn hard to find out just exactly what those ingredients are - let alone what their nutritional value is.

In fact, it takes following about four links on their web site to finally drill down to the table that reveals the dietary horror that its products truly are. Personally I have never stepped foot in a Cold Stone Creamery but I am willing to bet its even harder to get nutrition information from a server at one of the franchises.

Besides which, that is not the point. The point is that this corporation, like McDonald's and so many other processed, fast food corporations that try to pass as responsible corporate citizens, is packing its products with an excess of sugar and fat, while simultaneously using copy that appears to promote health, responsiblity**, slimness and in some extreme cases, weight loss (even though in reality, their products results in its antithesis).

If this was America in the days before there was a Starbucks on every corner and a Lowe's in every strip mall, this wouldn't be so bad. Sure, there have always been eateries that have promoted severely unhealthy eating. But they were local businesses that had impact only within their own regional reach.

Nowadays, where Anywhere USA clones Olive Gardens, Chilli's, Cold Stone Creamerys in every hamlet, burg and city in this nation (and beyond), their menus reach us all. Their dietary influence is ubiquitous and pernicious, especially as the new breed of fast crap food is re-packaged in ways that lull people into thinking its safer and healthier.

Case in point: Cold Stone Creamery's architecture, internal decor, marketing and packaging plays on people's nostalgia and memories of days when ice cream was ice cream: sweet and a bit fatty, but certainly not three-pounds- of- bacon fatty!

*Named "Worst Beverage in America" by the authors of "Drink This, Not That!", a timely expose of the hidden calories in common and popular beverages like bottled, flavored water, ice teas, energy drinks and coffee and ice cream specialty drinks. Rather than just list calories and grams of sugar and fat, the book does a nice job of putting the #s into equivalents that people can immediately relate to - such as 68 slices of bacon.

** From the company web site comes this gem of meaningless marketing babble: " Despite the general perception that ice cream isn’t as good for you as it tastes, at Cold Stone, we’re all about making people happy – for the long haul! – which requires a balanced and sensible approach to eating fun treats like ice cream. We therefore obsess, far more than most companies, about the nutritional aspects of our products as much as we do their taste. For some people, Cold Stone is a ritualized special treat, for others, a daily must-have."
http://www.coldstonecreamery.com/nutritional/nutrition_ingredients.html

Still Weathering This Summer of Our Discontent

2010-06-25T15:36:00.002-08:00

At right: the dusty ~~bee~~ wasp graveyard that is my woodstove.

Still out here folks, only occasionally breaking my news/blog fast long enough to realize that the world is still in the handbasket. If anything, it has picked up speed.

After each foray into paying attention to the larger world, or even statewide Alaskan news, I've been convinced that it is not yet time to once again wax bitchy about things. In my defense, I offer the following linked stories that drove me straight back into willful ignorance:

Nope, not yet time. In the meanwhile, it's been all about the house and yard, Goldstream Valley fixer uppers both. This being Squarebanks, we can get away with keeping the yard large au natural, occasionally making a mad sweep of things with the weed whacker. It's been a successful endeavor so far -- I found a missing dog dish and a few tools that had been lost in the knee high vegetation. I'm telling you, if we could just find a way to explore the possibilities of bird vetch as a biofuel, we could cut heating costs dramatically around here. An invasive species, this stuff freaking thrives if left unchecked, covering everything in a mat of ... vetch. I've long since abandoned any illusions of victory in The War on Vetch, it was already well established on my little acre when I bought the property, but I've accepted the idea of a permanent stalemate.

The ~~bees~~ wasps, however, are another matter. It's been another high ~~bee~~ wasp year at our house, the annoyance punctuated by my discovery that they are probably nesting in the pipe of the woodstove. Earlier in the week, while finishing up some interior painting (trim, and what a pain in the butt that is), I noticed this extremely loud buzzing sound. Loud, as in, amplified ~~bees~~ wasps coming to you straight out of a large empty room. Which they were - that loud empty space being the stove pipe. I finally figured that out when I kneeled down and peered at the glass of the door of the stove and saw them bumping up against it. I was too chicken to open it for a few hours and figured I'd find a one or two. Instead, there was a veritable mass grave, hundreds of them all covered in ash at the bottom of the box.

Off Clamming, Back Later

2010-06-07T08:45:00.000-08:00

Stunned into silence? Astounded by the mushrooming idiocy coming from "The Right?"

Yes and yes. Things have been dormant here for while, with Flic and I both gone to ground. Same reasons. As I've said in many other avenues than FBH, people have lost their g-damn minds.

And ya know what put me round the brink and off to sulk and brood and not even read Harper's Magazine fergodssakes? It wasn't She Who Shall Not Be Named clearing millions with her Wasilla-based cottage industry shilling for a bunch of fanatical hypocrites. It wasn't the Gulf tragedy, although that has certainly been on the mind. It wasn't even that idiot woman walking around here with a loaded handgun in her hand (not holstered) who insisted the cops overreacted when they stopped her and oh-mah-God Obama is coming for our guns!

No. What convinced me that I needed a break from the greater world was a small occurance on the way home from work weeks ago. Living in some of the best moose growing habitat in the world up here in Interior Alaska, one would think that folks would adjust to the idea that we have a lot of them and adjust their lives (and expectations) accordingly. Watch out for them on the road, fence the damned garden, and enjoy taking pictures of the calves in the yard.

So. Weeks ago, driving back into the Goldstream Valley on Ballaine, as I crested the hill and followed the curve down I noticed a whole line of brake lights before me. Seven or eight cars were at a complete stop on the back side of the hill, which could be a bit sketchy if you came round the curve and weren't paying attention. I stopped, curious, and then noticed that the lead car had stopped to let a moose and her newish calf cross the road. They were taking their time doing it. But, ya know, no big deal -- it was maybe 20 seconds of delay on all our trips.

They crossed, the line of cars began to move -- and the idiot in front of me slowed down as we passed the two moose, rolled down his window, and flipped them off. I can think of no finer illustration of the self-centered, irrational rage that certain members of our society have been wallowing in since Obama got elected than that.

Hope y'all are coping better than Flic and I. We'll be back again -- I will after the long drive to the clamming beaches.

The Brat Pack

2010-06-06T16:41:00.003-08:00

It's been awhile since we here in District 7 have been plagued with the rattles of that viper Mike Kelly. Of course it's also been awhile since there has been any action here at the old basket. I have to say, in the interim of our resounding silence, we - as in we of the global world - have been on a rip- roaring ride to that nether region. With the oil Armageddon in the Gulf, the Gaza Strip crisis, the Afghanistan/Iraq mess, and a host of other human-generated calamities (environmental, political, financial, and military), we are no longer in a collective handbasket, rather we are perched on a fiery blazing rocket to Hell.

My reaction has been pretty much to hunker down, watch my chickens and tend to my dogs, garden, and bees. I have been too gobsmacked by it all to gin up commentary on anything. In fact, I might even say that I am looking at the state of the world and wondering if it is at all possible that those fundy wing-nuts might be onto something with their end-times yapping.

Alas, there is no mark of the divine here - it's simply those all too human traits of greed, stupidity and hubris finally catching us up. It will be interesting to see what survives these human times.

In the meantime here we have Mike Kelly and that blank who is our governor - Sean Parnell. I mean, how long now has he been in office? And still, there really is no public sense of the man, other than if he was Lt. Gov. to she-who-shall-not-be-named he must perforce be conservative, non-analytical, and prone to governing through the very narrow and rigid lens of his personal value system. Though he lacks the overt meanness of Kelly, I suspect Parnell is just as hypocritically judgmental and intolerant of others he considers his lessers; perhaps not so much a viper as a guinea worm.

Shoot yer mouth first, ask questions later

So, first we have Parnell signing HB 186, the Alaska Firearms Freedom Act (oh pul-leese), sponsored by Kelly. This so-called "freedom" act exempts anyone in Alaska manufacturing guns or ammo or firearm accessories from federal regulation. No matter that there aren't any gun manufacturers in Alaska - Parnell & Kelly just want to send a message to Obama not to mess with Alaskans. After all, those durn federales are running roughshod over us: taking away guns, shoving socialism down our throats and paying our wimmin to have abortions. It's ~~ironic~~ hypocritical that the governor and a state representative would be so vocal about keeping the feds out of Alaska when Alaska is so much on the federal tit. In their zeal to put their boots across the throat of the Obama administration, Parnell & Kelly come across like petulant teenagers acting out against their overly-indulgent parents. The Alaskan brat pack indeed.

It's also rather pointless, since the Obama administration has done nothing to indicate our right to bear arms is threatened; quite the opposite. Under this administration, it is now legal to carry loaded firearms in national parks. Predictably, Denali Park has reported its first bear killing (probably since the days of market hunters) by a park visitor just one month into its seasonal opening. I used to spend a lot of time hiking and working in not so remote places with trail access, and my biggest fear was not of bears, but jumpy men with .45s who were uncomfortable in the back country, but were too macho to admit to the fact.

Throw that baby out with the bath water

Pointless and annoying, but the AFFA doesn't much impact our communities (except perhaps our ursine ones), unlike Parnell & Kelly's other little tantrum, which is turning out to be not so little at all. I refer to their shit-canning of the proposed increases to the Denali Kid Care program. Kelly was one of three representatives (Tammie Wilson being another - Fairbanks flops on this one) who opposed the bill, because he felt it encouraged fiscal irresponsibility (more on that in a moment).

Parnell, although supportive throughout, suddenly lost his senses and vetoed the expenditure because of his "recent realization that the program paid for abortions"(yes, Sean, 0.18 of the program funds, as it turns out - which quite likely also included counseling that helped at least some women decide against an abortion, but never mind that little factoid).

In the three or so days since this news broke, its critics have been making headlines, so there is not much new to contribute to the debate. Frankly, Parnell was doing pretty much OK with women and kids with his efforts to bring some exposure to the horrific domestic violence problem in this state, but he just zorched his karma points with this stinker.

Denali Kid Care is not Planned Parenthood; it is not a family-planning program. It's health insurance for low income children - from birth through 18, and for pregnant women that meet certain guidelines. You would think that the "Kid" in Kid Care might have been a tip-off to him that this isn't about women's health, it's about keeping kids healthy so that we have healthy adults.

Denali Kid Care is win-win for everyone: for the relatively low costs of providing health insurance to children of families who can't afford it, our society is saved the greater costs of unhealthy kids and the unhealthy adults they become. Not to mention that it is the mark of a compassionate, caring and intelligent society to help those among us who are the most unable to do so for themselves. I think even the Brat Pack might agree that those would be babies, young children and teens before they are in their majority.

Do as I say, not as I (or my family) do

But as bone-headed as Parnell's statements were (doesn't he employ fact checkers on his staff???) at least he claimed to have some moral compassing going on, even though many might not agree with the direction his compass points. Mike Kelly on the other hand is just arrogant and mean (hardly a new observation for this blog), and rarely misses an opportunity to promote his belief that if people are poor or unable to make ends meet, it must be their own damned fault. And as is often the case with these arrogant blow-hards who wear their moral superiority like a super-weighty crown, he apparently has not done a terribly great job of making sure he and his family pass the sniff test.

Case in point: here is the state representative who votes against subsidized health care insurance for low to low-middle income children because, he believes, this sort of "entitlement" will just encourage all those people to laze around on their sofas and milk the system for all its worth (which is the real subtext behind his statement that middle income families should be encouraged in "financial responsibility").

Then there is one of his family members who, a number of years ago, worked for a local minority-run organization. Not only did she run her own private business out of this organization during business hours (even using her office to meet her personal clients), but she often and loudly stated that she stayed at that job because of the health insurance. At that time this organization had a Cadillac plan: full health coverage for employee, spouse and dependents, with zero employee contributions. She also was fond of informing her co-workers that she was only staying in the job because she wanted that health insurance through her pregnancy and to help cover the costs of her delivery and maternity leave.

Not long after the baby arrived, a golden, healthy baby with all its prenatal care and delivery paid for by the insurance provided by this organization, she packed her personal business and left.

Interesting. A Kelly scion receives totally free health care for a number of years, even while apparently not quite producing the work for which she received compensation, including those yummy free health bennies. Yet Pa Kelly feels strongly that upper lower income families (the majority of whom are undoubtedly working like wage slaves to make even the barest of ends meet) should absolutely under no circumstances receive subsidized health insurance.

Quite the double standard there the Kellys fly. But then, that is what we have come to expect from the Moral Right.

The Jersey Barrier...

2010-04-09T16:01:00.006-08:00

...Re-purposed and updated

Here they have been morphed into planters, placed strategically to herd ~~shee~~people towards the door with the heat.

Arranged along the downtown streets, the jersey planters stand resolute against terror

Or my personal favorite - the random scattering of jersey planters at one of the now defunct entrances to the FBI - challenging the pinball talents of any would-be terrorist

Tourism in a Police State

2010-04-07T07:33:00.017-08:00

Pulled aside with ID confiscated and put in a holding pen by gun-toting men wearing dark glasses and with little curly wires snaking into their ears. If you think Green Zone check point or a prelim shake down prior to the next flight to Gitmo – think again. It’s what can happen to you on a tour of the East Wing of the White House – and it’s what happened to this blogger today.

I was told it was because my DOB didn’t match my SS# on the list of people scheduled to tour*, but when the Secret Service told me that at the final check point, I hadn’t yet given them my Social – only my driver’s license. I could see it on the guard’s face as soon as she looked up my name on the list: I was flagged even before I ever showed up – spit out by some database for some reason. And no, I am not paranoid. While I waited 20 minutes before they moved me into the pen, they asked none of the other tour hopefuls (all of whom had nice, safe Anglo-sounding, from-the-heartland names) for their socials. I also noted out of all of the 100s in line during the three-hour ordeal this turned into, none were obviously Arabic, or Muslim, and certainly there were no women wearing hijab.

Welcome to DC.

For several days now, I have roamed the Mall, the Tidal Basin, and the Memorials. You can’t really see any of these monuments without having to peer beyond the jersey barriers. They snake everywhere, and if it isn’t a jersey barrier, it’s heavy duty metal fences policed by flack-jacketed men. My particular favorite are the pop-up barricades that can be raised and lowered at will in the streets around the Capitol. There are men with police dogs everywhere.

The new DC monument: the jersey barrier

What all of this puts me in mind of is Budapest, circa 1970s. As a small child, I was terrified by the men who boarded the train toting guns to check our papers at the border. I was scared to death throughout our whole trip that at some point my father would be taken away by the police (as a former political refugee from this country, it was only a few years prior to our trip to see my grandparents that my father judged it safe enough for him to return). Like DC, every public place had men with dogs patrolling it – in this case Soviet soldiers. We had to show our papers when demanded to do so, we had to register with the government and we had to report where and when we were going within the country. We were not allowed to stay with any member of our family, and our movements were watched.

This was life behind the Iron Curtain. Although it would take another twenty years before the Soviet Union crumbled and the Soviet Bloc fell apart, already its satellites were challenging its viability. As the Soviet government felt more threatened, the more it tried to control its people: more dogs, more barriers and checkpoints, more random ID checks, more roughing up of people by the police and the military.

And now, here we are, subjected to the very same things in our nation’s Capitol – which for so long has been the symbol of the free world. As a child of a person who fled political oppression, it is extremely disturbing and depressing to see how rapidly our government has stripped away our freedoms and has become what previous US administrations and indeed our founding fathers vigorously denounced: a government governed by and governing through fear.

What it is most disturbing about the jersey barriers and the dogs, though, is not their presence, but that so very few question why they are there. Of all the American tourists that I poll as I wander around, no one thinks at all that this “security” is a sign of something very rotten and troubling about our government, its policies and its current global actions and positions. The standard response is of course that “they” want to harm us, and this is the price of freedom.

WTF??? How do jersey barriers maintain freedom? I don’t feel free at all. You don’t dare take your shoes off and cool your feet in the Reflecting Pool, you don’t find kids running around enjoying the grounds of the Capitol, you don’t dare take a picture of much in case they decide to hassle you. It bothers me at a very deep level that most people do not have the ability or the inclination to discern the profound disconnect, or to see that in fact, it is us, the supposed free citizens of this country, that are contained by the dogs, barriers and police.

It bothers and saddens me, but it does not surprise me. No one in this crowd of tourists of which I am a current member should ever dare disparage (but most almost certainly do) the German nation of 75 years ago or question how its government then terminated six million people, without the general population rising up in protest. Behold, here in our country right now is that very same seedbed that grows mindless acceptance by the masses of the oppression of the different, the singled-out, the faceless “other”. It is sown with the seeds of apathy, ignorance and blind faith watered heavily and well by a cocktail of fear, suspicion and intolerance brewed by a sophisticated and technologically advanced propaganda machine.

Although the Bush-Cheney regime created the police state in eight years – it's been in the works for far longer. I wish I had the belief that Obama can turn it around, but I think it is a juggernaut that is going to run him over as well as all the rest of us.

*To get on a tour of the White House, one must submit a request to a member of their Congressional delegation, or if a foreign tourist, through their embassy.

Jail Visits for Dummies...

2010-03-28T17:00:00.019-08:00

...Or things they don't tell you at the jail

Should you ever find yourself preparing to visit someone in our local hoosegow, the Fairbanks Correctional Center (or the Fairbanks Country Club as some wags in the Native community call it), the following tips might come in handy.

Getting in the Door...

#1 Don't leave home without your jailhouse cryptogram. This is the little schedule chock-full of abbreviations (GP, M, F, Ad Seg, Max/Max, Ad Seg PC) that, when decoded, tells you what times you can visit "your" inmate (FCC has the peculiar habit of using the possessive when referring to the person you want to visit), based on their sex and the nature of their offense. And like any good church potluck list, depending on the first letter of their last name, it also tells you what day you can visit "your" inmate (for example, Tuesdays, Thursdays & Sundays, L-Z).

#2 Don't go with the expectation that you will actually get to visit: Only eight inmates are allowed into the secure area during any one-hour period. Because the jail is so over-crowded that 41 inmates are sleeping in half the gym, eight inmate slots doesn't really cut it. It can be a scrum to get on the visiting list, and if you actually follow the instructions that FCC provides, the chances of you getting a visit are like that proverbial snowball's, leading to tip...

...#3 Be prepared to waste time: Although FCC tells you, for example, that you can show up between 9:10 and 9:20 to get on the list for a 9:30 visit, don't you believe it. You are going to want to be there by 8:30 at the latest, in order to gain one of the coveted eight spots on the "first come, first served" list.

#4 Sunday mornings are the least crowded, BUT, don't drink a lot of coffee beforehand. Unlike week days, there is no one at the front desk in the visiting area. Therefore, visitors must cram inside the little vestibule (heated, complete with camera and microphone, but no amenities) for at least an hour before their desired visiting time. And you dare not leave to go to the bathroom, step outside for a smoke break, or sit in your car and read or listen to the radio, least you lose that spot in line. (NB: its not your fellow visitors who will challenge your place in line should you need to leave, its the guards. Although they likely won't open the door til just a hair before the visiting hour, if they do, and you aren't there to get your place on the list, they may not honor it, no matter what your fellow visitors say. Since the door is just as likely to open at say 8:45 as it is at 9:29.5, no one dares leave the vestibule, even though it really only comfortably fits six.)

#5 Week days are best for visiting, because although your odds of landing on the visit list are better on Sunday, during the weekdays you are allowed into the jail to wait - where you have access to a bathroom, water fountain, and a bunch of bad magazines.

#6 Morning are the worst time to visit if your inmate is in general population and is on the list to be moved to the North Star halfway house. Although these are the times you are most likely to get in, visiting can seriously queer their chance to get moved. Even with the over-crowding and a spot on that list (its all about lists), if an inmate is not in GP, and in secure visiting instead, a guard won't come fetch them. Nothing takes the shine off a visit like learning your visit cost your inmate the chance to get over to North Star, the Holy Grail of the Fairbanks correctional system.

Once you are in the door...

#7 Dress like a fundamentalist Mormon: No bare shoulders, V-necks, or skirts or pants above the knee. No hoodies, hats, vests, jackets, or translucent or transparent garments. Zippers are a particular FCC fashion no-no. While one can get rid of a polar fleece vest with a zipper by stashing it in the visitor locker, one can't stash one's pants. I haven't had the nerve to test the zipper thing with pants, thus on possible visitation days, my current favorite pair with zippered pockets stay in the closet.

And through the security screening...

#8 Try and grab one of the phones on either end of the visiting row: Secure visiting is just like what you see in the movies or on TV. You are on one side of the bullet-proof glass, they are on the other and conversation is by phone. The phones have notoriously poor reception, so everyone in this tiny room is screaming. Bedlam, it's like talking to a friend long distance in the village. If you are lucky enough to get a seat at the end, you don't have conversations on both sides of you, which makes it easier to focus and to block out the commotion of jail house visiting.

#9 If they "forget" to bring out your inmate, hope for a nice guard. A nice guard is more likely to take pity on you sitting there forlornly without your inmate. Instead of leaving you there to rot for yet another hour, they may come over, lift up the receiver and ask who you are waiting to see. A really nice guard will actually call for your inmate, instead of simply noting the information.

#10 On weekends, don't expect to be let out of the secure visiting area before the hour is up. Perhaps apocryphal, a story has been recently circulating among the FCC visiting regulars that a very pregnant visitor was left locked up in the visitor's secure area for half an hour while guards on the other side of the door ignored her repeated ringings of the buzzer. Although she really had to use the restroom, they weren't about to man that desk where the visitor door buzzer is located, not until the visiting hour was up and they could buzz all of the visitors out.

#11 If you have claustrophobia, visiting in the tiny locked-from-the-outside secured area is probably not a good idea, especially since at peak visiting times, up to 24 people may be crammed in there with you (up to three people/inmate are allowed on a visit).

And finally, prison sartorial elements explained...

#12 Forget the stripes of old. Modern prison wear is indistinguishable from hospital scrubs, except an inmate doesn't get to choose his/her color. Blue is for misdemeanors, yellow for felons, and orange for the hard-core mean mothers who are in there for a good long time.

#13 What's with the pink? All FCC inmates wear bright pink T-shirts under their prison scrubs. This "pink-in-prison" trend was started by that redneck whack nut Joe Arpaio, sheriff of Maricopa County, AZ , who promotes himself as "America's Toughest Sheriff". As sheriff, he, among other highly questionable acts, forced inmates to wear pink underwear as a way to ~~subdue~~ humiliate them. Although one can't say for sure what the thinking is behind FCC's T-shirt choices, it seems a safe bet that the motivator was not the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

Half-Cox

2010-03-21T10:30:00.000-08:00

Charles Pierce (Idiot America) proffers the thesis that in this country the advent of reality TV, the web*, rant TV & radio has produced a situation where everyone has the potential to be an expert, thus no one is. In other words, because public visibility and the acquisition of an admiring audience requires virtually no effort, credentials or particular smarts, anyone with a drum to beat can be launched into instant expert status.

In fact, expertise has been conflated with celebrity: if one shouts loud enough, acts outrageously enough, and pisses off enough people (whether right or left) well, then not only do they deserve their own TV or radio show, but they should also run for public office to set this country straight. Forget about education, putting in long hours in the trenches to gain experience and wisdom, or working in a job that might prepare one for local, regional or national governance. All of that is just elitist crap promulgated by those East Coast limp-wrist nancys.

This ~~idiot~~ expert trend is gaining momentum in Alaska; perhaps not as much as in states like Idaho, Montana, Arizona and Texas - the latter still the standard bearer for inflicting idiots on America. These are the states which spawn the Minute Men and other militia and attract skin heads, Fundys and neo-nuts like flies to honey. However, on a per capita basis, I suspect Alaska is beginning to catch up.

In addition to Palin and Tammie Wilson (the ugly stepsister who didn't get invited to the ball and had to settle for the state house and no gift bags) we have Shaeffer Cox. Two years ago, at the age of 24, he gained some local exposure by unsuccessfully running for House District 7. Now he is in the news for being arrested twice in as many weeks. First for felony assault (later pled down to reckless endangerment) for hitting and choking his wife, then for the relatively minor offense of failing to disclose to a police officer that he was carrying a firearm.

The first offense is disturbing under any circumstance, in any situation. Mr. Cox apparently has trouble controlling his anger - so much so that he hit his wife in front of their two-year old son while driving the family to Anchorage. Then when called out on his inappropriate behavior, he reached over and grabbed her neck, pinning her against the passenger door. He appears to have an overweening need to be in control, especially of his wife, and gets really gnarly really quickly if he feels he is being thwarted.

Couple this with the circumstances that surrounded his second arrest, and watch the red flags pop.

Wearing a bullet-proof vest (because, Mr. Cox states, he has received "fewer than 12 death threats"), and carrying a knife and concealed gun, Mr. Cox arrived at the scene of a police search to monitor whether or not the subject's rights were being violated by the police. The arresting charge arose from Mr. Cox' s failure to disclose to the police that he was carrying a concealed weapon, as prudence, responsible gun-ownership, and the law require.

Setting aside for the moment the scary implications of having an armed, angry, self-aggrandizing control-freak interfering in legitimate police business, here is a text-book example of Idiot America in action. With virtually no formal education or experience in any of the applicable fields (law, peace-keeping, military, to name a few), Mr. Cox has appointed himself an"expert" in constitutional, civil and criminal law. He clearly believes he has as much right to be involved in a police action, as well, the police, attorneys and courts.

And what are Mr. Cox's credentials for being a Individual Rights Monitor ? Why, membership in the Liberty Bell Network , which according to their website is

a group of Patriots that have joined together to mutually support each other against an out of control Government, it's lust for power, and the ever increasing occurance [sic]of violating our inaliable [sic]rights.

In the tradition of the original "Liberty Bell", this is a public notification network. In the event that you, or one of your neighbors rights are being violated, a call to a member of your local network would spread the word throughout your local network, for people to drop what they were doing and come immediatly [sic], because a fellow patriot needed their support.**

Patriot??? That is not the "P" word that comes to my mind when I look at Mr. Cox's behavior in the past month. Paranoiac, psychopathic,putz and peckerhead, are, however, some that do.

In response to a court order that he not carry a gun for the next two months until his hearing, Mr. Cox had this to say: "Everybody's going to think, 'He's not armed, so let's go get him'." (Fairbanks Daily News Miner, March 20, 2010). Does this punk really think there is anyone who gives enough of a shit to take him out??? If this is not paranoid wing-nuttery I really don't know what is.

In the final analysis, its not these faceless hordes ready to trammel our rights into the ground that we need to fear. Rather it is Mr. Cox and all the other "experts" like him who present a clear and present danger to our free and open society - the one for which the true patriots fought so hard.

*I am well aware of the irony inherent in blogging about this.
**Pay no attention to the misspellings, mangled sentences and poor grammar. Proper writing is for socialists and them other goddurn furreigners, not Patriots.

If You Have to Ask What Wien Was, You Need Remedial Alaska 101

2010-02-26T23:29:00.001-09:00

As seen somewhere in Rural Alaska.

Yet More Reasons Why I Live Here

2010-02-21T18:20:00.008-09:00

and not there...

1) The dog races. It's hard to find a better way to spend a Saturday afternoon than munching ham sandwiches watching the sprint races on a warm, sunny blue-sky day. And where else but Alaska would sled dogs be treated as centerfolds? This morning found my SO pouring over the FDNM's cheesecake photo-spread of Hans Gatt's winning Yukon Quest team as if it were a Playboy magazine he had surreptitiously hidden beneath the bed.

2) Taco King. Yes, my blogmate has already noted this authentic (and authentically cheap) Mexican restaurant. It deserves mention again. Because after a day at the dog races, I then went on to savor a south-of-the-border dinner with a friend, prior to going to...

3) Fairbanks Shakespeare Theater's production of the The Tempest. Not only it is a treat to be able to go to productions in the Empress Theater (one of the very few old buildings still left in strip mall Squarebanks), but it is not hyperbole to say that FST is rare treasure, not just here, but anywhere in the US. Their sets are always minimal, clever and evocative, and their stagings (with one notable exception, at least for me, of Richard the III set unfortunately in Nazi Germany) witty, bright and polished. This run is no exception. Ariel deserves special mention for his fantastic body paint and green contact lenses, as does the incorporation of the band Good Daze to provide both the mood setting for Prospera's island, and some lively musical interludes throughout the play.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Its February, when the light returns, and it is not such a stretch to envision green trees, gardens and near 24-hour daylight. Everything looks good in February - except inside the house, where once again the returning sun illuminates the incredible scrim of wood ash, dog fur, and other detritus I have been nesting in these past four months. But even so, dogs, the Bard and a darn good adobada - how can it be anything but all good?

In Alaska, You Can Near Always Find a Coffee Hut

2010-02-10T21:14:00.007-09:00

As those of you who are regulars here at FBH might have noticed, coffee and beer are among my two favorite pleasures in life. Behold then, a sight that made my Grinchy heart grow by two sizes that day:

Ladies and gentlemen, possibly the world's northernmost coffee hut: Aarigaa Java in Barrow.

A Modern Proposal: For Preventing the Palins from Being (More of) a Burden to Their Country and Relatives

2010-02-09T11:31:00.000-09:00

Clearly, as the strange phenomenon that is the national obsession with She Who Shall Not Be Named shows no signs of abatement, those of us who have not drunk the Kool-Aid should consider more drastic measures than the liberal application of reason, evidence and logic.

The time has come for those of us Alaskans with a political memory going back far enough to remember the days before that someone swallowed up the reputation and image of this fine place to make sacrifices. For the good of all of us, even those living in Wasilla, we need to make the ultimate sacrifice:

We must, friends, bring her back to Alaska, even if it means electing or appointing her to something. We must 'take one for the team.'

In the former case, the only caveat, of course, is that it can't be a national position, i.e., a House or Senate seat. The idea is to keep her, like that crazy second cousin with who thinks the post office is unconstitutional, occupied and far away from things like the cable news circuit and national political office.

We might form a political action committee, the "Bring Sarah Back" PAC, and begin fundraising immediately. A movement starts with a few volunteers before it turns into a for-profit venture, and personally, I'd be willing to spend a few bucks and some sign waving afternoons if it meant a person could open up a newspaper or take a look at a online news site without being forced to translate English into English. We could use the money we raise to pay for her 'speaking fees' (in-state engagements only, please.)

Personally, I favor reappointing her to the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. I don't know that there really are any qualifications or requirements to be on it, which is a plus, and it pays very well: $120,000 a year. And what we are buying, really, is peace of mind.

So what is to be? State office or state appointment?

If for no other reason, I urge you to support the BringSarahBackPAC so that when a person admits to being from Alaska, the non-Alaskan can think of only one thing to ask about:

Polar bears.

You've Got Mail

2010-02-05T18:58:00.017-09:00

Coming home from ingesting a Teriyaki cheese steak gut bomb (the second in as many days - the blogmate and I finally got together last night at IJ's for burgers and beer), I caught the tail end of Alaska News Nightly.

That little story about the 1,500 Palin emails finally released to MSNBC by the State, after - what - a good year and 1/2 of foot dragging? Now that was a precious thing to hear. It gave me the tiniest glimmer of hope that maybe this is the tail of the rope that will not so much hang her as finally shut her the hell up.

Although I don't usually surf for news, preferring to get mine in the diluted pabulum form that is the News Miner (because I just can't shake the habit of a morning cuppa with news that I can hold in my hand), I had to go to MSNBC to check it out. The story more than satisfied.

Before I veer off into the outrage that engulfed me despite the fact that I should be totally numb to palinography, let me note the network's stroke of genius: its invite to channel our inner muckraker by combing through an online database of the Palin emails, and to help MSNBC reporters connect the dots of this travesty of governance that was the Palin administration. What a nifty way to recruit eyes to help sift the gold from the dross as more and more of these emails start flowing in.

That the State tried to buffle its way out of this public records request by claiming it would cost $15M didn't raise this blogger's eyebrows. As a veteran of many a public records request battle with the State, I know that little trick. I have had some fairly outrageous price tags thrown at me when I wanted records that weren't going to put a particular State Division in a very good light. I also famously once had a notebook hurled at me by [redacted], then head of the Division of [redacted], who shouted at me that from then on, he was instructing his employees to buy their own notebooks for meeting notes so they couldn't be obtained through a public records request.

Obviously Palin isn't the first state official to have the misbegotten notion that if state officials use "private" media to memorialize and communicate state business this makes them immune from the public right to know.

And that is where my outrage just refuses to be stifled. Are the Palins arrogant or ignorant, or some lethal combination of both? I just don't know, but I fear it is the latter - which is the most dangerous to our civil rights and democracy. Because who really buys (other than the Tea Partiers, the Fundys and other extreme right wing nuts) the Palin camp spin on this: that the emails merely reflect the spousal succor that Todd offered his wife in her tough job as Governor.

How stupid do they think we are? Of course, wives and husbands of people in public office are sounding boards and advisors, and yes, they do have a lot more information about what really happens during the execution of official duties and responsibilities than others outside that private circle. But that sure as hell aint the same thing as being in direct contact with employees of the Governor's Office and essentially conducting business the same as if one was the Governor. Which is how a whole lot of those released emails read.

Truthfully, I find the emails from Sarah trying to hide the fact that we Alaskans paid for electrical upgrades for her tanning bed amusing, and as with the Corrupt Bastards Club, a bit embarrassing. If I have said it once, I have said it a 1000 times: our corrupt politicians are sooo petty and cheap. Free wiring, dry-cleaning and flights for their brood, or maybe an electric massage chair and a large propane barby for the king salmon on the newly remodeled wrap around deck; these guys and gals (don't leave Bev Masek out of the mix) barely think beyond the double-wide.

Nope, I got a feeling these emails are going to be a lot like the Bill Allen secret videos. I suspect when its all digested and analyzed, they will reveal corruption and abuse of power. This time around its not a bunch of good ole boys guzzling beer, scratching their nuts and using potty mouth as they talk about who they are going to buy. But its the same vile brew of venality, self-aggrandizement and parochialism.

Sarah may have racked up a $150K tab on her campaign wardrobe, but all too soon I think its going to be clear the Empress has no clothes.

Fizzle in the Schizzle?

2010-01-22T19:50:00.009-09:00

Some in our audience may be wondering if the Fiery Blazing Handbasket has winked out like the tail end of the Hale Bopp comet (or the Heaven's Gate cult), or sputtered to a quiet sizzle like the occasional dud firework at the New Year's Eve Sparktacular (none this year, it was a great show!).

Nope, I think we are just in the lull of mid-winter, with perhaps a dollop of battle fatigue thrown in. The constant onslaught from the Christian Right crazies (bible verses on gun sights, palinography, Pat Robertson's mouth - need we say more???), the mega-corporations, and the insanely twisted body politic that is running amok has stunned us into blog interrupted.

I can only speak for myself, but I know these winter months, I have been in hermitage. It's one I frequently share with the S.O. (who has come in from the vil to escape for awhile that milieu's own version of crazy). Other times, its only me, the chickens, a few odd tropical fish and the snoring (sometimes greenly farting) dogs.

Unlike some past winters, there's no winter doldrums. I have been out nearly every day enjoying the roseate light that is steadily increasing - snow shoeing, skiing, running or ski-joring. I have cooked up a storm (which has caused the S.O. to imitate a bear and put on a healthy layer of insulation, soon to be worked off as caribou-hunting time nears), and finished many an unfinished sewing project.

And I have been reading up a storm.

My January favorites thus far:

Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement that Shattered the Party; Max Blumenthal
The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power; Jeff Sharlet
Going Rouge - Sarah Palin, an American Nightmare; edited by Richard Kim & Betsy Reed (and an Xmas present from my blog mate & her S.O.)
Methland: The Death and Life of an American Small Town; Nick Reding

Next on the list is Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army.

So, I expect that as the days lengthen and we head back up the seasonal bi-polar curve, 'Dweller and I should be revving back up in the blogging department - until then....

It's potluck.

Finally Forty

2010-01-13T08:36:00.000-09:00

Just last week Flic and I were pondering the unthinkable: a winter in Squarebanks without a single instance of 40 below. I went so far as to proclaim that, "Yep. It ain't gonna happen." All the while realizing that such behavior was inviting a major jinx.

Sure enough, we had a day yesterday, the first minus forty this winter. However, unlike years past, this cold snap didn't hang on long here. It's already up to the minus 20s (ordinarily a warm spell in mid-winter) today.

Burning Man

2009-12-23T21:33:00.008-09:00

Those who went before us were wise...especially about things outside the realm of the every day.

They knew the power of fire, and they never hesitated to use it. Its force is something I believe we tend not to think about too much in these days of other powers - like those that drive cell phones and computers, TVs and radios.

But when it comes down to dealing with evil, fire trumps all.

Many in life are lucky and pass their days without exposure to resident evil. Those who haven't encountered it may not truly understand its slyness. Evil's stalking grounds are more commonly the banal of everyday life: the chance encounter in a coffee shop, or a new colleague at work who seems really quite charming, until the mask is lifted. It excels at catching the unsuspecting off-guard, because while it is the expected companion of heinous crimes against individuals and against humanity, it is not expected to sit down at the dinner table in a quaint little restaurant. Sometimes resident evil is initially confused with abnormality, or a social or emotional dysfunction, possibly because it is pretty hard to get one's head around the fact that there truly does exist pure evil, even in neon-lit, box store-rich Squarebanks. And it's not always wielding an axe or a gun or some other very obvious and tangible instrument of evil.

For too long I left things in my house, stashed under my bed of all places, that carried the stink and contamination of the resident evil that had found purchase at one point in my life. Although these items had lain dormant all of that time, recently they came to life.

It was time to purify; throwing them out was insufficient, they were covered with the slimy slug trail evil leaves in its wake. Fire was the only route to protection.

Sure, burning at solstice is a cliche. But those ancients dealt a lot more with unseen forces than we think we do in this oh so modern and brightly lit time. Although often I think I would have preferred to give the whole experience a miss, most times I am grateful for what happened. Not only did I come out of it much stronger, but I gained awareness of the spirits and forces that are very much alive and cruising in our world. When science became a religion in the 20th century, its gospel of rational thought brought to us a dangerous myopia. It diminishes our abilities to discern that there is so much more walking these lands than what can be tidily explained by science.

It was a darn good fire, one of the best and the brightest I have ever tended.

Grassroots? More Like Astroturf.

2009-12-17T19:58:00.000-09:00

Normally, in a more sophisticated part of the world, politicians attempting to pull a fast one would know better than to admit they were trying to use state money to do so. But this being the state that once thought Sarah Palin was an improvement over Murkowski v.1, the fine folks in Juneau are not savvy enough to up and lie about what they are doing. I suppose we have yet another thing to be thankful for heading into Christmas.

For about $1.5 million, the Alaska Legislature is looking for a good p.r. agency to gin up a 'grassroots movement' to oppose endangered species listings. As reported over the AP wire, via the News-Minus this morn:

"'The (PR firm's) main role will be taking information from the conference and other information gathering efforts and trying to initiate a grass-roots movement, for lack of a better term, for going to Congress and asking for some reform changes,' said Eddie Grasser, a legislative employee who is organizing the PR effort."

How on earth is a government-funded public relations campaign even remotely grassroots? This is the sort of chicanery normally engaged in by megacorporations like the Artists Formerly Known as Monsanto or King Coal. Grassroots does not, generally speaking, begin with a bunch of politicians appropriating state money for a p.r. firm to create a movement.

In the Realm of the Unintentionally Humorous

2009-12-17T08:14:00.000-09:00

Once again, work has consumed at least half my brain; the remainder being assaulted by the liberal application of beer (and hopefully some of Flic's eggnog in the coming days.)

But when I've had the wherewithal, I've been shopping for gifts which is something of a challenge here in Greater Redneckia. The selection is spotty, particularly if you are looking for clothes other than outdoor gear or the offerings over at Little Wasilla. We really don't have a downtown like a major city, and no, Virginia, even Anchorage really isn't a major city. But I digress.

We do have a lot places to purchase guns. Two of the grocery chains (WallyWorld and Fred Meyers) stock them along with plantains and womens' underthings. (Safeway, however, does not. Funny that.) The outdoors gear shops stock them. And then there are the local gunsmiths. Face it, one area in which a consumer has robust options in Squarebanks is in the selection and purchase of firearms.

Which worked out great, because I'd settled on a .22 for the S.O. this year. Unfortunately, the big chains use the model I chose as a loss leaders, so it is not stocked by the local businesses (gunsmiths) which frustrated my plan to shop local. But Frontier Outfitters had a few in stock and that settled it.

I was not prepared, however, for the humor that is the form one fills out to purchase a gun. (I've been given guns, but never purchased one.) Is the form meant to prevent the sale of a gun to a criminal, or is it just to aid in tracking them down after they've done something wrong? Questions I had to answer:

Are you a fugitive from justice?
Have you ever used or possessed illegal drugs such as marijuana, etc?
Are you an illegal alien?
Have you ever renounced your U.S. citizenship?

High silliness.

'Tis the Season

2009-12-12T18:12:00.009-09:00

For decorating the tree. For me, Christmas starts just about a week before Thanksgiving. I don't subscribe to the Walmart way of looking at the world, which is to say that Christmas stuff should go on display after the goblins of Halloween have been put away. Well, I do confess to lighting my Xmas lights around my front door and along the driveway right about the end of October, but that is mostly due to practicality...a way to see the moose waiting in ambush when I schlep home in the dark at 4:00 PM.

But, even without the Big Box store way of things, I have always felt that living in Fairbanks is pretty much like being in Narnia under the White Witch- where it was always winter - except that we do have Christmas. And we have a lot of Christmas.

Although for quite a number of years I put up a classic Alaska tree (all the better to showcase one's ornaments) - of late I have been buying the excellent (and relatively cheap) trees at Alaska Feed. Except that this source of cheap trees is no longer known to just a few, and if one wants to get a half-way decent tree, one has to rush off and select it sometime in the first week of December. This year, I did wait til three days ago, but the trees were getting picked over.

So, perforce, my tree is up and in the process of being decorated. It's an exhausting task - necessitating many pauses and rests in the easy chair by the fire - with a cup of real* eggnog at my elbow and three snoring dogs at my feet.

Come to think of it, maybe its all the eggnog refreshment stops that are exhausting, not so much the stringing of the lights and the placement of the Christmas pickle (no explanation of this needed for readers of German heritage), the sparkly Christmas stars, the cat-in-the-jack box, or, my most treasured ornament: the squid ball (a clear glass ball filled with squid beaks sold in Point Aransas as a fund raiser for the local sea life lab).

Every year, I sort of drag my feet initially about getting a tree, but each time after I haul out the Christmas totes and unpack the many boxes of ornaments collected over the years (each with its own story) its worth it. And taking the time to load the tree so full of these memories that it practically tips over (it doesn't help that I never seem to be able to get the darn thing straight in the tree strand), is wholly enjoyable. It never fails but that I come across a little chotka that jiggles loose some long-forgotten episode of a Christmas past.

Some seasoned readers of this blog may remember the Tannenbomb of last year - where my tree croaked brown dead less than a week after purchase. Ah, this year I babied this conifer. Whisked it out of the store and into the pre-heated, toasty cab of my truck. Practically constructed a hermetically sealed corridor from truck to front door so there never was opportunity for freezing shock. Sawed off a hefty chunk of its stump, and plumped it into molasses-laden water. This time, I did it up right, and I am pleased to report the tree is drinking thirstily - having sucked up a gallon of water since last night.

Now, its back to work. Time to hang the stuffed cow-in-a-parka ornament....

*not the sugar-ladened stuff sold in the dairy section of Freddie's. Nope, this one is one dozen raw eggs, a pound of powdered sugar, two quarts of heavy cream and at least a fifth of whiskey or rum to "cook" those eggs, or more like, the imbiber.

Life's Little Mysteries: #1

2009-11-29T19:58:00.007-09:00

Why do they do it?

Why????

What compels dogs to eat large quantities of grass - or as in the case to the right - straw - and then hork it up all over the house?

I knew something was afoot when the dog kept licking his chops in that frenzied way peculiar to dogs about to hurl. That he was going around and eating soil out of the house plants within reach also was a tip-off.

The technical term that vets use is "bolus". But they dont have any better explanation for this irritating and downright nauseating aspect of dog ownership than I do.

Since I was awake and active, I was able to drag the bolus-afflicted mutt off the rugs and onto the lino.

But this is highly unusual. Much more typical is the nocturnal bolus-ejection event, which I am convinced is canine contrived to maximize the gross-out factor. First off, most bolus production seems to coincide with the periods of the deepest human REM sleep - how else can one explain the fact that most dog owners manage to sleep through the ungodly amount of noise a hurling dog makes??? Secondly, it cant be coincidence that, at least in my house, deposition occurs precisely along the flight line between my bed and the coffee maker.

Thereby guaranteeing a morning barefoot encounter with a slimy, congealed, cold mess of yak.

I am not one of those dog owners who view their dogs as little furry humans, but....

...in this case, I am not a little suspicious of some kind of canine conspiracy, which I would be only too happy to further expound on, EXCEPT, I gotta run ----

The dog is about to hurl again.

Seasonality

2009-11-28T16:42:00.010-09:00

Forswearing originality and a bit belatedly, here is the list of things that I am thankful for:

That...

...this Thanksgiving, I have a friend who is going to professional cooking school, and wanted, nay, begged, to do all the cooking for our communal dinner (dessert pictured at right).

...I didn't lose my dog on Thanksgiving Day. Oh, he went missing for a couple of hours - spooked by a dog team on the Goldstream trails - but he found his way home.

... of the 22 dogs I have had over the last 22 years, I have lost none of them, thus being spared the horror of repeatedly calling the pound, putting up signs, combing the trails, roads and woods, and facing many months of wondering what really happened to my dog.

... despite all my crazy athletic antics over the past 20 years, my knees, hips and ankles are still intact and functioning, and I can ski jor with my dogs.

...I have yet to burn down my house, despite a few close calls with creosote and,

....I have a huge stack of dry spruce to keep the chill at bay.

...they invented LED Christmas lights.

...I live in the Goldstream Valley and can ski whenever I want among trees covered in snow or hoar frost, on afternoons that are every shade of the palest yellow, orange and rose.

...I have not-so-new extended family that has not only taken me in, but has given me incentive to learn their language. Ma'shii cho, shalak naii.

...Apple makes a "shuffle".

...I have the opportunity to experience aspects of Interior Alaska that many often do not, even if at times it has been chaotic, unsettling and, a few times, downright scary.

...'Dweller passed on the wireless headphones - those might just have saved a budding relationship.

...I have a job, home and lifestyle that has turned out to be exactly what fits me.

...I live in Fairbanks, because even though it gets a lot of shit for being the stripmall arm pit of Alaska, it has everything I need, and it is only one small airplane hop or trail ride away from hundreds of miles of remote country.

...I have a core of solid friends who are particularly adept (especially Dweller) at pulling my fat out of the fire. Thereby enabling me to do some crazy-ass things.

....twenty years ago, I accepted an old Singer sewing machine from a very elderly lady; this sewing machine is still working for me, so that I can quilt, sew beaver hats, and otherwise keep myself occupied through long, dark winters, and finally,

that health insurance pays for happy lights, thereby enabling me to really enjoy this time of year without fatal leg chewing.

From Squarebanks With Love

2009-11-25T08:25:00.001-09:00

Forgive us, Alaska, we knew not what we did.

In choosing Luke Hopkins as borough mayor over Tammie Wilson in the last local exercise in the democratic process, we inadvertently paved the way for move to Juneau. How could we know Gov. Parnell would appoint her to John Coghill's empty seat? And in what strange world does a person lose an election and get a bump up?

I'll say this, Wilson is, by all appearances, a very Coghill kind of Fairbanks Republican, and will absolutely delight the folks out at North Pole.

One need only refer to the campaign materials sent out by the kind people at "Tammie Wilson for Borough Mayor" shortly before the runoff election. Now, we don't have a lot of the major statewide issues here in the borough, it's usually about school bonds, our inherent right to suck down polluted air in the winter, or the fact that people want services but don't want to pay for them. So, what platform was Wilson running on? Based on her the flyer that arrived in my P.O. Box, Tammie was running to save Greater Redneckia from the green hordes.

"Protect the Right to access borough land for Hunting, Fishing and recreation," it read. "The opponents environmentalists will show up at the polls in force. Will you?" On the flip side was an endorsement by Craig Compeau, National Rifle Association/Alaska Outdoors Council member and Director of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife. A trifecta!

Rumors of Our Demise Are Greatly Exaggerated

2009-11-24T18:28:00.000-09:00

Really, neither of us has sold our belongings and hied off to Mexico, nor decided to camp out in a wilderness setting in a wall tent.

We've just been busy. In my case, work has eaten my brain.

It's Coming Up Orwell All Over

2009-11-03T08:12:00.000-09:00

'Tis election day and I was going to type a wee rant about the political spectrum here in Greater Redneckia, but I went and paid attention to things in the larger world again. Yep, read the news this morning, and I have news for all you folks who think Obama is going to fix things: this country has gone so far off track it will take decades to find the freaking train, let alone drag it toward the tracks.

Really, and what is more important? Our collective loss of decency or whether or not Squarebanks elects a lefty or a righty?

I'm speaking vaguely, of course, of the disposition of the case Arar v. Ashcroft. (And all this info is a summation of a Glenn Greenwald story at Salon.Com. Go read that one.) In 2002, an innocent man (Canadian citizen of Canadian and Syrian descent) was sent to Syria through rendition by our government - where he was brutally tortured - all in the name of 'the war on terror.' His crime? Uh, well, there wasn't one. He did switch planes at JFK Airport, though.

Arar sued. Our court system, the Second Circuit specifically, ruled 7-4 in favor of the our government's position and tossed his case. What's that smell? That's the smell of the Constitution being burned. And, well, yeah, torture is illegal, but the court majority seems to think that no matter what the government does, nor how illegal it might be, people should not be able to sue for damages. The court should defer if the government tosses around the terms 'national security' and state secrets.'

Excellent quote in Greenwald's article:

"Reflecting the type of people who fill our judiciary, the judges in the majority also invented the most morally depraved bureaucratic requirements for Arar to proceed with his case and then claimed he had failed to meet them. Arar did not, for instance, have the names of the individuals who detained and abused him at JFK, which the majority said he must have. As Judge Sack in dissent said of that requirement: it "means government miscreants may avoid [] liability altogether through the simple expedient of wearing hoods while inflicting injury" (p. 27; emphasis added)."

Repeat after me, "War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength."

An Excellent Read Can Be Found

2009-10-26T08:04:00.001-08:00

@ Alaska Dispatch (linked to on the right in the sidebar) regarding the Point Hope caribou story that blew up last year. I'd say it's 'fair and balanced' but that would probably skeeve you out in a Faux News kind of way. It was linked to from the ADN's Newsreader, but probably warranted more prominent display.

Only two parts have been posted so far, but it is a thoughtful, well-written article, neither a lynch job nor a romanticization of village life. Shades of grey, imagine that.

Most interesting perhaps, is the observation on the issue of 'waste' as regards caribou. Caribou get a lot of nasty diseases. Agency types repeat the following often when rural folks bring up the fact that they were taught to leave sick/diseased animals in the field: the meat will be safe to eat if thoroughly cooked. They overlook the fact that a good portion of caribou meat consumed out in the villages is eaten raw and frozen (quaq) or dried (not cooked.) Perhaps after the dust from this settles, it might provide an opportunity for rural residents out there in the range of the Western Arctic Caribou Herd to talk with agency types about disease identification and the relative safety of uncooked caribou meat.

Behold - the Germstar

2009-10-21T21:04:00.013-08:00

On a recent (forced) trip to the lower 48, I had my first encounter with the Germstar, pictured at right.

It appeared one day in the lobby of my hotel. Apparently, the Purell hand sanitizers that were on every counter and table in the lobby were simply not enough. After all, we are in the middle of a pan(ic)demic.

There it was: jellyfish-esque, menacing. Also incontinent. A steady drip of sanitizer emitted from its bottom. Hotel staff addressed this problem by placing a soft towel, frequently changed, beneath the 'star.

As I waited for the elevator, I mused on its name. Clearly a Star Wars reference... to entice the mind ~~ful~~ less consumer to view hand sanitizer as the Force in this battle against evil germs. But wait.

The Death Star dispensed death. So, uh, wouldn't a Germstar dispense germs??

Oops. Someone in marketing was asleep behind the wheel on that one.

I did not then, nor do I ever during the duration of my stay, use the Germstar. This nets me disapproving frowns (Typhoid Mary!) from my fellow elevator users, who do most liberally use the Germstar, especially after I have punched the button with my germ-encrusted finger.

Really, can there be anything else that will ever demonstrate more thoroughly just what a nation of sheeple this country has become than the H1N1 pan(ic)demic?

On the same trip, I caught a news clip of a CDC spokesperson breathlessly holding a news conference about the 86 children who have so far died of H1N1.

Not to diminish the individual loss of these children, but 86? Out of - what- 250 million people? Don't tell me that the spokesperson doctor didn't know that she was spouting hyper BS. Any high school student with a smattering of math and a basic understanding of percentages can stand up and say that 86 out of 250 million isn't just meaningless, it ain't even in the universe of statistically significant.

We sure don't hear about the 1000s of kids that die annually (flu season or not) of suicide, abuse and neglect. It's easier to fear a microbe than it is to face our collective, civic responsibility for the good of the vunerable in our society.

Just put up a Germstar.

Just in Case Winter Decides to Make an Appearance

2009-10-19T10:39:00.008-08:00

Happiness is, or is at least increased, by a new pair of bunny boots.

At right: the old pair.

The old set was beginning to get a bit worn. The tastefully applied duct tape dates back to a dog (then a puppy) with the usual chewing issues. As the material of the boot aged, the tops were cracking in random spots. And, in testament to the wonder that is duct tape, I think that that is the original piece I slapped on there.

I'd had my the old, first pair of bunnies since 1994 when I still thought I would spend a few more months in Alaska and then move back to the Lower 48. I bought them off a friend's husband (who had very small feet for a dude.) They were one of the best outdoor gear purchases I've ever made, landing squarely in the sweet spot of price range and foot happiness. (Unlike, say, those stupid Sorel Caribous which supposedly are great down to minus 20. To that I say, "Ha!") Yes, they are ugly. Funny-looking, check. Heavy. Unwieldy. And yes, they are not suited for all temps, for sure, it needs to be cold to break these out, otherwise, ugh, sweaty feet.

At right: the old pair, so beaten up that the little valve thing to close the bladder in the boot just finally broke off. On both boots!

Yes, it is a bit silly to get sentimental about a pair of boots, fergodssakes, but these were the boots of my twenties. My really, really, fun twenties and very nearly all my thirties. I got good enough to drive stick shift wearing them (no small feat, a ha ha) and could even run in them, if need be -- for short distances of course, I'm not talking training runs.

I'll not ditch the old pair. They'll be relegated to the ever-accumulating 'spare gear' stash for visitors and folks who don't have proper equipment. Despite their increasing decrepitude, they'll still keep somebody's feet warm.

Juneau and Alaska Just Lost a Good Man

2009-10-15T11:03:00.001-08:00

Richard "Machine Gun" Foster's house was pink.

Which is absolutely fitting if you have spent any time in Nome specifically or any place else in Bush Alaska for that matter. Color schemes are not muted, housing associations and covenants don't hold sway other than folks might get a bit pissed if you drop a Conex and a pile of junked cars on the property line, and one's state representative might just walk around in camouflage pants all the time.

He was most famous for the whole big deal made (federal charges, actually) out of his having unregistered machine guns. And a 50 mm mortar. As I reckon it, no Nome jury would have a real problem with that. They are not your garden-variety Fairbanks gun nutters out there, but probably could relate to having a gun collection. Who wouldn't want someone like that representing you in Juneau?

Oh, and I highly recommend following the link above to read about his trial on the weapons charges in Nome. The ADN did us a favor by reposting it. Really, go read it right now.

Did I mention he was a Democrat? That's the kind of Democrat we have here in Alaska, all you Outside people: gun-toting ones.

I most remember the story of one election night when a reporter went to his house to get his reaction to being reeleected (again.) It took a bit of knocking on the door, as it was late and Foster probably asleep, but he finally answered the door, all disheveled in an undershirt and his tidy whiteys. They had a brief interview and it was very business as usual. Really, who needs clothes for an interview on your doorstep? Ah, Nome.

Foster died Tuesday in Seattle while undergoing dialysis. He was waiting on a kidney transplant. He'd served as a representative for Western Alaska (a district drawn so huge that it would have been a state in the Lower 48) for as long as I can remember. But his departure leaves The Lege with one less guy (or gal) who 'gets it' -- who understood Bush Alaska and had been around long enough to remember all the various evolutions of the 'rural-urban divide'.

His approach was the pragmatic one. One of only a few Democrats in The Lege, he voted with the Republican Caucus - and in return, guaranteed a steady flow of capital projects to the communities he represented. Not all of us liked it, but I think he still reckoned back to a less partisan time in Juneau and wanted to try to work across party lines. The dude, was just, well, nice. So much so that one year he quit the caucus largely over what amounted to hurt feelings about a sandwich. Eventually, they apologized to him and he rejoined.

He was a pilot and a Vietnam veteran. He was known for telling stories and jokes, many of the 'pull my finger' variety. He will be missed -- and Juneau will be a lot less colorful (and authentically Alaskan). Folks in the wilderburbs and suburbs like to talk about being a "Real Alaskan", but Richard truly was.

Safe travels, Richard.

The Fairbanks Area Election Results: A Poor Showing, Indeed

2009-10-08T00:21:00.001-08:00

Another election has come and gone here in the heart of Greater Redneckia, and I must say, we really did not impress.

Oh, I'm not commenting on the outcomes of any particular item (yet) but the fact that our voter turnout just, well, sucked. For the amount of whingeing and ranting prior to the big day about the great threat to wood boilers posed by clean air, not to mention the creeping socialism of trying to eliminate the ubiquitous plastic shopping bag*, one might expect a vigorous display of participation in the process. From a town with a significant military presence and a truly impressive number of flag decals on vehicles, one might expect a little more enthusiasm for the most basic act of living in a ~~democracy~~ representative form of gummint. Ya know, exercise that right that we've supposedly been sending our troops all over to protect?

But no. As to outcomes, the city sales tax didn't pass which should come as no surprise to anyone with a faint acquaintance with Fairbanks. I suppose I should be happy, as a not-city resident, but I do have to rely on its services while I am present in the city, which is at minimum five days a week. But fortunately for myself and all those who don't live within its bounds and therefore (do not) pay property tax in the city, Fairbanksans hate taxes so much more than your average tax hating American that they will scuttle any attempt to do something about paying for necessary services like roads and cops and the nice people who run into burning buildings for a living. So, uh, thanks for the free ride guys.

We have a run-off election for borough mayor to look forward to, and a clearer distillation of the political spectrum around here could not be found in the two candidates left standing: Luke Hopkins and Tammie Wilson. Hopkins is, to a certain segment of the local population, the face of creeping socialism, unionism, and flaming liberalism despite his having rolled over on the plastic bag tax issue, being a wood burner himself, and possessing a skilled trade (carpentry.) In other parts of the world, he might be considered moderate - but well, it's all about location. Wilson, and this is the funniest description of the other end of the spectrum I've heard recently, is described by the News Minus as a 'private property rights advocate.' Need I go further?

*Known in other parts of state as the "scourge of Western Alaska."

Finally, Chilling Out

2009-09-23T08:06:00.000-08:00

Yep, it's here.

When I went out last night to check on the dog, the rain had frozen to the top of the dog box. (The dog was nowhere to be seen, having tunnelled out of the pen to go after one of the many neighborhood rabbits whose mere existence offends her.)

(At right: the scene this morning on the deck.)

Hello again, blog reading peoples! I've been on a seasonally induced hiatus (read: sulk) since, oh, shortly after the likelihood that the Goldstream was going to go up in flames was still pretty high. Oh, I was thrilled for that rain that slowed all the fire down, but it was the turning point this year. Suddenly, it was FALL.

Fall has always been a terrible season for me. Winter? Cold, dark, but strangely comforting and a nice breather from running around trying to get stuff done. Spring? Just a leafy prelude to summer. Summer? Hello, months-long manic episode! But fall?

Usually, early in the fall, my temper gets shorter and I run about saying things like, "If this relationship doesn't work out, I'm never living with anyone ever again!" At which point, my friends remind me that I say that EVERY year. So far, I've veered between unhealthy doses of pop music, homemade peartinis, a return to working out, and replaying Half Life 2 on the hardest setting.

The political situation has not helped. Part of my silence has been due to near toxic levels of annoyance with the vast amounts of stupidity one can witness by simply watching the news. The Anchorage ordinance thingey, 'death panels', idiots carrying guns to town hall meetings ... I have been stunned into annoyed silence.

The arrival of cold, fresh air seems to be helping. Thanks to Flic for carrying this thing while I've been off sullking like a two year old.

The Mask of Ignorance (Part 2)

2009-09-14T12:32:00.009-08:00

Had the new city police chief – Laren Zager – hailed from parts Outside perhaps he could be forgiven some of the ignorance he apparently possesses regarding Interior Alaska Natives and villages. In fact, if he had lived and worked only in Anchorage, it might even make a tad bit of sense. But police chief Zager has spent 20 years in Fairbanks.

Of course, there are lots of people born and raised in Fairbanks that haven’t a clue about that portion of our Interior’s population who come from a totally different culture and race. True, Interior Alaska Natives (like all Alaska Native and Native American groups) may be demographically small in number relative to the majority population, but their rates of incarceration, suicide and violence perpetrated against them by members of the non-Native population (especially by non-Native men against Native women) are disproportionately high. Much of this is tied to their perpetually lower socio-economic status. Disenfranchised as they are*, Natives lack the political and economic power to substantively impact the racism and prejudices that make them more likely to be victimized, rather than championed, by our western legal system.

Thus, I would argue, if you are heading up a law enforcement department that has a long (and in many minds deplorable) history of ~~dealing with~~ arresting Natives, some extra effort at personal education about village realities might be on order. It might also help the police chief overcome some of the banal (but dangerous) assumptions about Natives that he appears to hold.

Case in point: I return to my personal bug-a-boo of the moment, police chief Zager’s assertion that, since spring, the number of chronic inebriates downtown has doubled, if not tripled (from about 100 to as many as 300). Towards the end of the August 19 article, Zager is asked to give his opinion on why this sudden rise in chronic inebriates.

"As for what’s behind the increase in the chronic inebriate population, Zager said one theory is spring flooding along the Yukon River might have displaced many village residents who have turned to the streets of Fairbanks because of the city’s reputation as being accommodating to the homeless. "

Wow – that is jaw-dropping.

First off, no one in a village is homeless if they lose their home. Most people have several homes. These are the homes of their relatives and extended families. Even without loss of a physical structure, people tend to move around within households. Village home life is more like having different components of a “home” distributed throughout the community, than it is about one single residence that is dedicated for the specific use of an individual and their immediate family (as it is in our culture). So unlike our culture, where a misfortune can result in one being out on the streets, this is not the norm in Native culture. People are much more generous and communal about their living spaces than we tend to be on our side of the street – where the notion that one’s home is their castle is still very much alive and well, even in these times of underwater mortgages.

Natives don’t end up sleeping in cars – they end up sleeping on a relative’s couch.

So the notion that spring flooding would have resulted in droves of homeless villagers moving to Fairbanks to live on the streets is just – well – ridiculous.

Secondly, this so-called theory completely ignores the possibility that maybe, just maybe, Natives live in a contextual sphere that is totally different than ours. Westerners’ sense of place is tied to physical possession, chiefly embodied by our house/property. Thus, for us, the loss of a house does open up the possibility of relocation, especially for young single men.

However, the flaw in application here is the assumption that what works for western sensibilities works for Native ones. It ignores the absoluteness of connection to the country experienced by Natives. And it overlooks the fact that this connection is organically different than any bond, tie or other attachment a non-Native may have for a particular patch of land. There really are no English words that convey the essence of the Native sense of place and connection within the larger sphere of country – because in our world view this simply does not exist. And while people from the vil like to come into town to shop, go to the fair, visit and to do all of those town things that we all do, in very short order most become very homesick: for their families, for the village, for their way of life and for Native food, and most of all, for the country.

The metaphysical aside, Zager is talking collectively about a people that are supremely used to dealing with and rolling with the punches that nature can deliver. A spring flood, even one as severe as the one that just occurred this past spring, is not about to turn any villager’s life upside down, nor drive them out of the country.

Finally, Zager shouldn’t misconstrue the fact that most of these people can live very comfortably outdoors, whether in the woods or in the city, as evidence that villagers find Fairbanks “accommodating” (to homeless or others). Few Natives view Fairbanks as hospitable. Most see it as an unfriendly place filled with unfriendly people (who are always willing to take their money), as well as a place that is just outright dangerous for them.

Maybe instead of trying to shoehorn Native motives into the misfit of western thinking, Zager should think harder about what might be more likely the cause of increasing numbers of younger, angrier men drinking on the streets. Interior Natives have been experiencing and surviving spring floods for eons, but they have been dealing with the white man for a little more than 100 years.

A more plausible line of reasoning is that we are beginning to experience the full results produced by two generations of Natives who have struggled with the social, emotional and psychic impacts from contact and colonialism: the loss of language and generational disruption from boarding schools and disease, the sexual abuse by missionaries and priests, and all the other systematic attempts by the majority culture to eradiate Native language, culture and tribal structure. Post-traumatic stress syndrome, self-medication and violence born of unresolved anger over the historical trauma suffered by these men and their families are more likely drivers behind an increase in downtown alcoholics than are the spring floods.

But better for the police chief to turn to deus ex machina, in this case the mighty Yukon, than to lift the blinders of ignorance and confront the problem head on. Because to do so would require Zager, the Mayor, the council, and all of us to grapple with the fact that the alcoholism, violence and ~~homelessness~~ hopelessness experienced by these men are rooted in human-caused catastrophes, not acts of God. And that might mean we have a moral, ethical and spiritual obligation to acknowledge, address and attempt to make right the wrongs done.

Far better to put the solution on FEMA’s doorstep, than to look at what really is going on in the city of Fairbanks – in its police department, its treatment of Native people, and its ridiculously inadequate treatment facilities and social services resources.

* a status that is shared by other minority populations as well – such as inner city African Americans and rural poor Caucasians in Appalachia.

15 Minutes of Fame

2009-09-11T12:56:00.002-08:00

When a copy of A Chronic Problem finally hit the vil – it generated a whole lot of interest on the vil street.

Not so much for its content – people are so totally, completely and utterly used to the News Miner publishing articles that cast Natives in a bad light – that yet another isn’t even worth the effort it takes to roll one’s eyes and say – here we go again.

Nope, what captured interest was the photo spread that accompanied the first article.

“Yo – look man – it’s your shoes!”

“And those there, those are my knees, man!”

“Ohhh, look, look there, that’s M----, see right there on the end of the bench!”

Inquiring minds might want to know how anybody could peg pants and shoes as their own – don’t many boots look alike, and how can you tell one pair of carhartts from another, for instance?

Well, because despite what the article implied, quite a few of these so-called chronic inebriates were not so blotto as to a) not be able to tell the photographer not to take their picture, at least not from the knees up, and b) not remember when the reporter/photographer came through downtown last spring.

So there they were, jocularly identifying quite a number of people in the photos that certainly are not homeless – including themselves – from the comfort of, well, their homes.

The Mask of Racism (Part 1)

2009-08-27T20:58:00.044-08:00

Chronic inebriates. This is what the City of Fairbanks, its police department and all the rest of the public policy makers here like to call the people with drinking problems who drink downtown (and who happen to be, 99 out of 100 times, Native). Lately there have been at least two articles in the Daily News Miner about the "chronic inebriate" problem. This is a re-occurring theme. And each time it reoccurs, I get more and more disturbed.

The last time this term cropped up was on August 19, in an article that blatted the headline: Fairbanks police step up patrols as downtown chronic inebriates increase. The nut of this story was that, under new police chief Zager, the city police are increasing their patrol unit by four in response to business owners' complaints that "a larger, younger chronic inebriate population is becoming increasingly violent."

There is so much that is so wrong with this article as well as the persistent and shrill attacks on the so-called chronic inebriates that it is hard to know where to begin. But for starters - let's look at why the City, the cops and everyone else in power in these parts uses the term "chronic inebriate" as opposed to the medically-accepted term "alcoholic"*.

These two terms are not interchangeable. If there is any organization that is up on the lingo associated with alcohol abuse, it's the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, part of the NIH. The term "chronic inebriate" appears nowhere on its website or in its publications. It's not used in its research papers, press releases, FAQs, publications or fact sheets.

So, what is up with the persistent use of this phrase by Fairbanks' mayor, city council, and police force? The term itself is not formally defined in medical, sociological or psychological reference books, but is understood to mean a chronic alcoholic who is homeless and drinks in public. Thus if challenged, I suspect the city and its police chief would defend their usage of the term by saying that these are homeless drunks, and thus their use of the phrase is perfectly justified, racially neutral, and transparent. No man behind the curtain here.

Except for one troubling little issue ---- very few of the people that they are labeling as chronic inebriates are homeless. They have homes; most of them in villages, some of them in Fairbanks. They may be alcoholics, even very advanced-stage alcoholics, but they are not homeless.

A majority of this pool of downtown alcoholics (to call them what they are) are cyclical. Throughout the year, they come into town and for varying lengths of time end up on Two Street or along the river. They come in for a variety of reasons: to drink legally (if from a dry village), for medical, to shop, or to visit. The fact is --- people who suffer from alcoholism, no matter how good their intentions are when they get on the Fairbanks-bound plane, are going to have a hard time resisting booze that is $11 a bottle (the current going rate for R&R) and a virtually unlimited supply when bootlegging in the vil puts alcohol at anywhere from $50 to $300 a bottle.

Furthermore, even if these drinkers are from villages, they aren't homeless when in town either. The majority of village drinkers (even those with relatives in town) stay in hotels - and not flop hotels. There are quite a few hotels downtown that are all too happy to cater to the village alcoholic (and even tolerate the impacts that go along with that) who comes over and gets stuck in town on a bender. Thus, the chronic inebriates and their relatives contribute quite a handsome sum to the hotel industry, especially during the winter off-season --- something that is never mentioned by the troubled downtown business owners.

So, this is not really a chronic inebriate problem but an alcoholism problem --- the same heartbreaking disease that strikes so very many in the non-Native population. Yet if the city officials used the term "alcoholic", they would have to acknowledge that Natives are vulnerable to the same disease as non-Natives. And in doing so, they then would have to look at the ugly fact that Natives are denied, through widespread indifference, often willful ignorance (of the problem) and an abominable lack of resources, many of the options for help and support that the majority population can secure for its members that suffer this dreadful disease.

Better to use a different term. One that does not imply disease as much as the fault of the individual. The words chronic inebriate literally translate to always-drunk: a hopeless drunk. In other words, one that chooses to exist in a persistent state of drunkenness, with a not so subtle top note of insufficient moral and character fiber to snap out of their derelict and debauched state. Its baggage is the implication that this state of being arises out of the individual's agency (blame the victim), not through the conjunction of biological predisposition, personal choice and the roll of the cosmic dice as with disease.

On the surface, city officials talking about chronic inebriates appear to be engaged in a neutral and rational discussion of a problem that is vaguely medical in nature. Look deeper and what you see is a term that is being used to mask the same racial biases and prejudices that the majority population has nurtured against Native Americans since contact. Not so ironically, it is these same prejudices and stereotypes that are responsible for the chronic low socioeconomic status that contributes to the high alcoholism rates among Natives and restricts their options for treatment and prevention.

This type of code talking serves no one well. It is time for city officials and other policy makers to address the severe alcoholism problem that plagues this region as well as the rest of the state. Contrary to what police chief Zager said in the paper --- it is about social services (and medical and behavioral health services). Alcoholics of all backgrounds and races face significant challenges if they want to go into recovery here, particularly those living in small villages. It is not about adding more police or establishing alcohol impact zones or a do-not sell list. It is about taking a hard look at the reasons why the people in power (local, regional, state and federal) do not want to allocate funds for the prevention and treatment of substance abuse, but instead prefer to fund those institutions which punish and incarcerate rather than heal.

*Doubt this? A simple google search on both the web and the FDNM site comparing the two phrases will amply demonstrate the veracity of this statement.

But Does It Come with a Shovel?

2009-08-25T22:33:00.005-08:00

Appetizer and entree (r.)

Little wonder Americans are fat. Pictured above is what constitutes an appetizer at a notorious eatery somewhere down the highway between here and the Canadian border. Buried under that brick of cheese food are enough nachos, beans and chicken to feed the 1950's nuclear family of four plus the family dog. Now it's considered to be a single-serving prelude to more food to come.

That Sound You Hear

2009-08-20T08:45:00.003-08:00

... is the sound of the shit hitting the fan.

Seriously? The ADF&G sonar was off? AGAIN? And so some of the restrictions in place for king fishing on the Yukon might have been unnecessary? How can fisheries managers ever hope to have local people buy into the regulatory/management process if you shut them down unnecessarily? AGAIN?

Due to a lack of coffee, I can't remember the year this happened before. Was it 2000? Anyone have a better memory?

[The sound you can't hear right now is the one made when I hit my head against my desk.]

At least the ADN put this into context. The lower river villages didn't make any money, which means a tough time buying fuel oil for the winter, keeping the electric on, paying off the bills from the previous year. (Of course the middle and upper river villages don't have commercial fisheries, so commercial closures only mean more kings coming up river to them for subsistence.)

We're looking at a disaster here folks. Folks who played by the rules and did not fish for kings have to be angry. Summer chum don't make it that far up the river and aren't available to many villages. And the folks who counted on fall chum for their subsistence instead are now faced with the possibility that that run is going to be a disaster, too. Yukon villages are looking at very tough times this winter.

Hopefully, Parnell's administration will get on this immediately. When a chum crash hit hit the A-Y-K in the mid-90s, the Knowles administration declared a disaster. One of the saddest things I've witnessed in Alaska was that year, when donated frozen salmon fillets in plastic bags arrived and local people, subsistence fishers, walked away with their share of the donation.

1000 Words

2009-08-13T12:18:00.004-08:00

Early morning, dipnet trip at Chitina.

Finally! Rain Arrives Just in Time for Fire and Fair

2009-08-06T08:35:00.006-08:00

That sound you hear? Quite a few of us exhaling in relief. It began raining some time in the wee hours and continues as I slurp coffee and read the news this morning. And it's not an indecisive, few-drops-here-and-there rain. This is steady stuff.

I don't know that I've ever been so pleased to hear the sound of rainfall.

The timely return of precipitation ought to give all the yellow shirts out there a chance to contain and subdue the numerous wild fires out there. It definitely helps to not have the entire area tinder dry. Even if the fires north, east, west and south of us hadn't gotten any closer to Squarebanks and its surrounding neighborhoods, conditions were such that any kind of fire starting up within them could have chewed up the wilderburbs pretty quick. Forestry and the local VFDs have been jumping on anything that started around here - but the question was how long would they bat 1.000?

As noted yesterday, it ALWAYS rains during the local fair.

Heck, I don't even like the Tanana Valley Fair that much. (I don't want to go on rides, or walk around eating booth food that I consume throughout the summer, and I don't have kids. Why go?) But I just might go and walk around in the rain.

Sitting Here in Goldstream, Watching the Smoke

2009-08-05T07:39:00.003-08:00

Yesterday evening, a bunch of us stood outdoors watching the sky turn a peculiar orangeish gray. There was so much smoke that it seemed like it might be 11 or 12 at night, not 9:30 in the evening. Everyone on the road had switched on their headlights. (For you Lower 48ers - we still don't get dark until pretty late - Land O' Midnight Sun, etc.)

The smoke wasn't from the Railbelt Complex down by Nenana, or the Wood River fire, but from the Hardluck Creek fire that is getting closer enough to our northern wilderburbs to make some of my friends pretty worried about their homes. More fire crews (likely from Outside, resources here are stretched thin) arrived last night.

All the fires here in Squarebanks region made significant runs yesterday. A new fire, out Chena Hot Springs Road, was ripping, from what I've heard. It's like 2004, which was my first summer in Squarebanks, except that we just witnessed the driest July ever recorded. It is scary dry out here. Relative humidities have been very low. Temperatures have been high. This is the kind of stuff that makes for what the professionals call 'extreme fire behavior.' Firefighters are not catching a break from this weather.

The Alaska Interagency Coordination Center's report this morning on Hardluck Creek was not encouraging:

"Extreme fire behavior was observed with torching, crowning and runs in Black Spruce with spotting 1/2 mile. Night fire was also extreme. 30 structures are threatened and 3 structures were destroyed: 1 vacation home, and 2 cabins. Personnel have been unable to accurately map the fire at this time.Tomorrow crews will continue structure protection and try and hold the fire on the North and the East at Bennett Road."

For days, everyone has been repeating the same hopeful adage - the Tanana Fair is starting this weekend, so you know we'll get rain then. Seriously, the Fair is famous for shitty weather. Me, I've been worried that one of my neighbors* (in the loose sense, meaning someone within a few miles of my property) will do something stupid: try to burn a brush pile, decide to dispose of trash via a burn barrel, opt to light off some fireworks, etc... And then we'd have fire busting out here in the Valley. Stupidity knows no season.

So, we're watching, waiting, and finishing up making our property 'fire wise', clearing all the combustibles from within a 30 foot perimeter around the house, aka creating 'defensible space.' A friend helped me chuck the wood pile away further from the house a few weeks ago, thankfully. I've spent days cutting down vegetation around the house and raking out all the dead stuff. Luckily, we don't have black spruce on the lot, and only one tree (a birch) is within 30 feet, and that sucker will come down in a heartbeat if we think things are getting close.

I can't necessarily say that for all my neighbors*. The Valley is, in places, a rabbit warren of dry cabins and houses tucked into the woods. Some places are thick with black spruce and downed dead trees. (And, friends in the Lower 48, we don't have hydrants up here.)

Fingers-crossed.

Splitsville?

2009-08-01T11:36:00.010-08:00

Sometimes vows are made to be broken. Like my vow of some months ago not to ever again blog about she-who-shall-not-be-named. And quite possibly, the marriage vows of the Palins - those paradigms of family values.

"Affairs on both sides" trumpets the Alaska Report, as this thing burns through the internet faster than the Wood River fire that is torching black spruce south of Fairbanks. More alluring is the tidbit that Sarah may have purchased land in Montana and is considering moving there.

Of course Meg Stapleton is denying, denying, denying - as of three hours ago. The Sarah Palin camp has always been shy on transparency, so why should they be playing level now? The scuttlebutt around some walks of Wasilla is that this is not new news. There were many other things out of Wasilla that were hotly denied by the Palin propaganda machine, only to later be proven true.

As is the case here. Maybe they are divorcing, maybe they are not - only time will tell if its just those troublesome "lefty bloggers" (guilty as charged Ms. Stapleton) spreading more filth and lies about the pure Palins.

However, if this particular grapevine bears fruit, all I can say is "Hallelujah, hallelujah!" And not about the impending divorce. Nope. I am a' praying right now that the rumor that she is moving to Montana is true. Could it be possible that in one week we will not only get rid of her as governor, but get rid of her all together? Please, Montana, take her. She's yours.

One thing to note, if this is one more nail that she is busily pounding into her political coffin, she is definitely proving her mettle as a Christian fundamentalist leader: monogamy, modesty, and moral behavior is for everyone else but her (and Ted Haggard and Jim Baker, and Mark Sanford and Larry Craig, and....)

And if a little color does show up in the bottom of the old gold pan after all, with this vein playing out to be something other than fool's gold, then maybe Alaska finally has a chance to fade back into the obscurity it once enjoyed. A place most people, if they thought about us at all, thought contained only Eskimos, igloos, gold and the occasional grizzled prospector.

2009 is a Berry Good Year

2009-07-30T18:42:00.006-08:00

10 gallons and counting.

Plus one gallon of raspberries. Its been blueberry crisp, followed by raspberry muffins, then blueberry cobbler, and blueberry pancakes, raspberry buckle, blueberry muffins - you get the picture.

Eight hours of picking (spread over about four days) has resulted in a freezer full of gallon bags of berries. This is a bumper crop of blueberries the likes of which have not been seen in the Fairbanks area for several years now.

The berries are so thick - 4 to 6 plump berries per cluster - that I turn my nose up at bushes which in past years I would have raved about as being sure signs I had died and gone to berry-pickers heaven. Yup, its fat city.

A few days ago I sent out a gallon to the SO's mom in the vil. You'd think that would be like bringing coals to Newcastle, but no. Because while the berries are fat, juicy and plentiful here, they are not so luxe elsewhere in the Interior - or at least not around that particular village.

I got kudos from mom for that bag of berries, so today another two gallons went over with someone traveling back to the vil. Mom has been around for many, many years and she knows good berries when she gets them. As an elder with specific tastes and high standards - getting props from her was well worth the air freight.

I am all about earning brownie points and looking out for mom. She is the glue that holds the family together - the force that keeps the men in the family in line, on track and from doing crazy men things. That makes my life easier and more pleasant with my SO. Additionally, without her all of us in that extended family are much reduced, and to no small degree without direction. When mom is around, family members' roles are clear, structure settles in, and there is harmony, purpose and peace - like a hive that is queen-right.

A queen-right hive produces lots of honey and is populated by calm bees unlikely to attack and sting; bees that are all working to the purposes to which they were born. A hive that is not queen-right is chaotic, agitated and full of angry bees that will attack at the slightest provocation. A queenless hive has no future for without a queen, the worker bees begin reproducing. Worker bees can only produce drones, and thus the hive starves and dies.

Like a worker bee making honey and taking care of the queen, I got a few more gallons stashed away for mom. A small price to pay for a queen-right family.

There's a New Rooster on the Block

2009-07-28T10:51:00.016-08:00

And no, I don't mean Parnell.

Lil Roo- a reasonably handsome red and white aracuna rooster - arrived this morning. He replaces Mr. Roo, who died from too much of the good life back in early June.

After living rooster-less for nearly two months, I discovered that a) hens are boring and b) I really missed the sound of a rooster - especially greeting me when I staggered home from a pub crawl somewhere south of midnight. No idea if my neighbors missed the 3 AM rooster calls, but since at least two of them have chickens, including several roosters, I didn't bother to poll the neighborhood on whether or not I should get a replacement.

So today Lil Roo arrived in a pet carrier - donated by an acquaintance who discovered that 50% of her sexed layers are roosters, not hens. For those new to chix tech-speak, "sexed" birds means those that supposedly had their gender determined prior to sale as layers, not, as one might suppose, birds with high sex drives.

Despite the prospect of being the only rooster in a yard of seven hens, Lil Roo had to be shaken out of his pet carrier. He is a young rooster and sized up next to the more robust older hens, quite small. He quickly realized this. Trotting around on the very tips of his toes, he began stretching his neck up and out as far as he could in a vain attempt to enlarge and enhance his size (a trait that male chickens share with their human counterparts).

Ah, but to no avail. Lil Roo failed to impress. The red hens moved in to make sure it was their pecking order that got established. After the dust from the chicken scrum settled, Lil Roo's feathers were decidedly ruffled, and quite a few of them pulled.

Attila the Hen moves in for the kill

Now, several hours later, the chicken cacophony has died down. A few minutes ago I went out to make sure it wasn't because Lil Roo was battered, bleeding and about to be dispatched by his harem. I found him quietly pecking in the small corner of the coop allowed him by the ladies, who were contentedly back to scratching for bugs and dust bathing. But Lil Roo is still on the short leash - every time he gets an amorous glint in his eye and makes overtures to one of the hens, he is severely trounced and forced back into his corner. What's a horny roo to do?

Bird Kvetch

2009-07-28T07:52:00.004-08:00

As for more important things than you know what, I give you my latest obsession. Or rather Quixotian enterprise: my personal war on Bird Vetch, aka Vicia cracca L, aka that invasive crap you see everywhere by the roads.

It is also known by its street name, "Alaska Kudzu."

I have a one acre plot on which my crazy old Fairbanks house sits, and a goodly portion of that lot has been overrun by the stuff. I dwelt in happy ignorance until the S.O. pointed the stuff out. And then I realized, it IS everywhere.

At right: One lone strand of fireweed, stranded in a sea of bird vetch.

Surely, the liberal application of a weed whacker could remedy this, no? Uh, no. Because the stuff has not remained unto itself, but as its alias implies, it spreads over everything, choking other plants out. And it has taken my gorgeous stands of fireweed hostage. Which means I have to clear the stuff manually, otherwise known as 'by hand.'

Over a week later, I have eight large piles of vegetation in the yard already. It's no exaggeration to state that it will be a pickup truck load by the time I'm done. (And I'm about halfway there, area-wise.)

Luckily, it appears to not be indestructible, just very good at growing. Hopefully, a few seasons of this type of removal and we can be vetch-free. Fingers-crossed.

From the site Weedwar.Org: "Bird vetch is a perennial that reproduces from copious amounts of seed. This species does not have the ability to resprout after cutting. Seeds are viable for number of years and large seed banks are common."

Sarah-Barra-Screwed-Us

2009-07-26T10:30:00.000-08:00

And I'm not witty enough to have come up with that myself, so, props to you, oh witty person somewhere out there. You know who you are.

Thoughts had been entertained about attending the soon-to-be-ex Gov's picnic today, but really, I have more important things to do -- continuing my own personal war on bird vetch, for one thing. The bad date is finally over. Perhaps we will choose more wisely next time?

But will the statewide and national fixation on an empty power suit finally wane? Can I again read some of my fave Outside sites, i.e. Salon, the Times, etc. and NOT encounter a Palin headline? Open a random entertainment magazine at the doctors office and not find a story there? Will the media finally stop feeding this idiocy by turning away unless it is a story worth covering? Will progressive bloggers finally stop patting themselves on the back and writing about progressive blogs?

These are questions I can not answer. But today's Squarebanks' event marks the end of her brief tenure as Gov. Which brings to mind my alternative header, which was "Don't Let the Door Hit You in the Ass..."

Many things about the Palinista Era chap my ass:

The first woman elected governor of the state of Alaska not only quit, she did a pretty crappy job. Why couldn't Fran Ulmer have made it there first?
The much publicized hiring freeze that wasn't. Talk to any of your state employee friends about this one.
Her profound disinterest in doing the job she was elected to do once elected. Legislators in Juneau wearing "Where's Sarah" buttons being the most obvious sign.
At times, I found myself wanting to defend her, because once again, the ways in which female politicians are criticized are different than the way male politicians are. Can we finally retire the S&M, dominatrix cartoons?
As much as I think she did a crap job, I am annoyed by the ways in which class-based stereotypes were used by others who were critical of her administration. And I am ashamed to have used them myself.
The whole freaking world now pays attention to Alaskan politics and our podunkery is laid out for all the world to see. Ignored, of course, is the fact that we are not all Wasillans and our podunkery is in many cases only skin deep. There are a lot of liberal, libertarianish, tree-hugging (and even bunny-hugging) peeps out here. Many of us are edumacated.
I can't go anywhere Outside without someone asking me about Her. Such questions have replaced igloo and polar bear questions for sheer annoyance.
She has paid more attention to Rural Alaska since announcing her resignation than she did when she was still governor. I'm sure all her photo ops in the Bush will be recycled one day for campaign (and possibly evangelical missionary propaganda) materials. It doesn't mean she has gained a freaking clue.
This year-plus freak show has obscured all the real issues in the state: the costs of generating electricity in rural areas, the cost of fuel oil to heat homes, the truly dismal king salmon season in places, progress on the freaking gas line -- which contrary to a Camille Paglia bizarro piece in Salon -- is not an accomplishment yet so much as a work in progress, the continuing failure to diversify our economy, the rejection of federal stimulus funds, our leadership (in a bad way) in the areas of alcoholism and sexual assault, etc.

Can we please talk about something else now?

Yet Another Use for 100 Feet of Internet Cable

2009-07-20T19:26:00.008-08:00

Alternative role for the moose-cutting, goose singeing spot:
a place to hang the laundry out of dog reach.

Yesterday, I volunteered to do the family washing. Armed with a book and enough change in a sock to do an inner-city mugging, old school style, I perched on the back of the four-wheeler surrounded by several trash bags stuffed full of laundry. Not even the loss of water pressure three-quarters of the way through the cycles slowed me down*. But, because the day was hot and sunny and the washeteria driers, like Laundromat driers the world over, have barely enough heat to dry tulle, I opted for the numerous clotheslines I had noticed strung among the trees at home.

Directly after hanging the second pair of jeans, I experienced a laundry malfunction. First one line broke, then the next, followed by a third and a fourth, dumping all the clothes on the ground. An inspection of the clothesline revealed it to be some kind of friable white plastic cord that had totally deteriorated in the sunlight and winter weather.

A forage of this house and the SO’s house-under-construction next door turned up no rope or rope substitute whatsoever. No wire, no phone cord, no extension cords, nothing.

I thought briefly of the brand-spanking new 100 feet of computer cable I just got in – but more than the fact that I needed the cable to hook up computers, I was just too lazy to walk back down to the office to get that or anything else that might work as clothesline.

So, I festooned the yard with duds. Since the family dog has a penchant for snitching (and chewing) shoes, towels and anything else that catches its fancy, I made sure that the sock racks (a.k.a. the saw horses) were up high off the ground. It worked. The dog only succeeded in making off with one towel that it was able to snag from one of the poles.

And while I managed just fine and made do with what I had and made lemonade out of lemons and did all those things that those annoying inspirational posters urge one to do, I made darn sure that clothesline is down on the list for the next box from town.

*Although the subsequent 24+ hour village-wide power outage a few hours later on one of the hottest days yet definitely would have. Suffice to say that tangled nests of wires festooning the village power poles are, like the Internet hook up, ghetto.

One Thousand Words

2009-07-16T23:53:00.004-08:00

As seen at WEIO.

Not Quite the Information Super Highway

2009-07-09T21:15:00.004-08:00

It's more like a trail

Dateline: In the vil

Pictured at right is the internet connection that I am currently working on. One might call it a little bit ghetto – but the .22 rifle tucked in the corner makes it indisputably vil.

As noted a number of blogs ago, quite a bit of my absence from FBH these past months has been because of writer’s block, but a lot of it is due to having found a second home somewhere north of the ‘Banks in the vil.

There is always plenty to do – swimming in the river, cutting meat, baking up treats with kids, keeping enough food on the table for an extended family – especially those who are working on building a home nearby – and generally just keeping on top of all the tasks that are part of daily life. Not much different than life as a cabin dweller – houses are small, most heat with wood, and there is no indoor plumbing in any private home. For a shower and the luxury of a flush toilet, a hike to the washeteria is required (except when the hot water boiler fails – which has been a reoccurring event of late).

One significant difference, though, is that when you realize (as I did last night) that you forgot to include a power strip, internet and printer cables with the new computer just ordered, well, there is no jumping in the truck and driving over to Computer Cache to pick up the missing parts. Nope, what one does instead is to call a buddy in town – in this case my blog mate – and ask for these things to be put on the plane. Of course, this requires friends willing to run around town doing errands and taking purchases out to East Ramp. ‘Dweller not only was willing to do the errands, she went to no less than three places to complete the shopping list – an effort that earns her at least two peartinis.

Alas – although she made freight before the mid-afternoon cut off for the afternoon flight – an excess of bypass, freight and passengers meant my little box of computer necessaries got bumped. They might make the morning flight, or they might not*. That too is the way of things out here. In the meantime, instead of spending the evening setting up a new computer at Tribal, I guess I’ll go swimming or take the kids for a bike ride. Bummer.

*After nearly a year of shipping groceries and freight out to friends in the vil, I have discovered that marking all boxes “CHILL” gets them out on the very next flight, because the bush taxi companies have limited refrigerated storage. I neglected to pass on this tip to ‘Dweller.

How Hot Is It In the Interior Right Now?

2009-07-08T18:40:00.004-08:00

It's XtraTuf beer cozy hot.

Current weather here at 6:54 p.m., according to the Weather Underground: 88 degrees with smoke. The dog does not rejoice to go outside anymore, she just climbs into the dog box and sulks. (Having fur must suck right now.)

Thanks to a week of temps in the 80s with no rain, there is wildfire all over the place. Here's a shout out to all my friends out working wildfires: Be safe! Mojitos will be ready upon your return.

And here is hoping for some rain, soon.

Edited at 8:02 a.m., July 9:
Woke up to the sweet sounds of a strong downpour last night! Yay! Here's hoping the areas where the folks in yellow are working away got some of the stuff, too.

Must. Not. React. Must. Not. Touch. Keyboard.

2009-07-07T22:52:00.002-08:00

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaagh. I couldn't hold out. But really?

"You would be amazed at how much time and resource my staff and I, the Department of Law especially, spend on this every day," she said. "It is a waste. We are spending these millions of dollars not on teachers and troopers and roads or fish research and other things that are needed in Alaska." -- soon to be ex-Gov. Sarah Palin, speaking in Kotzebue.

Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit!

I call bullshit.

Yeah, the reason why we inadequately fund education and troopers and roads in Alaska is because of a bunch of ethics investigations of your administration that began, what?, a little more than a year ago? Can anyone, even the most fervent Palin admirer actually buy that argument?

By that line of reasoning, if no ethics investigations had occurred, suddenly, a torrent of money (appropriated by our oh so rural-friendly Legislature) would have poured forth, attempting to actually meet the infrastructure and programmatic needs of our state. The same state where any number of geniuses think that the EMS needs of a large city like Fairbanks could be met by an all volunteer department? Where everyone wants services and no one wants to pay taxes?

Does anyone find it ironic that she has now made her second (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) trip as governor to rural Alaska?

And guess what, Cathy? According to the AP's Dan Joling, you live in a "remote Arctic village. "

Celebrating the Fourth in the People's Independent Republic of Ester

2009-07-05T10:15:00.008-08:00

Quitting? There's No Quitting In Baseball!

2009-07-03T15:55:00.006-08:00

Transcript of the conversation I had a few moments ago when the nice, older lady at the green house dropped the bomb on me:

NLAG: So, what do you think of Palin?
ME: What? What now? Is it the health lady thing?
NLAG: She quit.
ME: What? What? You can't quit being governor. There's no quitting...
NLAG: I know. I've never heard of such a thing.

I mean, wow. I never would have called this one. I'm sure more details will come to light as it is fed through the Media Bass-o-Matic. And there will probably be a lot of whooping it up on the part of some of her most strident critics. Me, I'll hoist a celebratory mojito (it's damned hot in Squarebanks right now) tonight and save the deep analysis for later. But thinking back over her term so far, I'm equal parts glad to see her go and pretty disappointed about how poor a governor she turned out to be.

Remember back in the beginning, in the days of 80 percent approval, when even folks like me liked her a little? Somehow, along the way, it's turned into a bad date. Bear with me here.

And this is an analogy. (The Gov likes analogies.) Sometimes, you land a date with a really hot person. And that first date rocks. And on the third of fourth date, you are still all twitterpated -- until the really hot person starts talking and you get a much clearer (and perhaps not beer goggle enhanced) idea of who that person is. And it ain't pretty. And they aren't that smart. But you hang in there a bit longer. As time goes by, you begin to wince every time that person gets ready to say something. Eventually, the hot person doesn't even seem hot anymore.

A good friend from Shish and I just watched the footage of her resignation. It's hard to to understand why she resigned, based on her the text of her announcement. She says she has reasons, but it is all pretty vague. But a couple of quick thoughts before I go hoist a glass or three:

on her basketball analogy and the 'full court press', as my basketball playing friend noted, "You don't put your head down and drive through -- you pass it."
on the lame duck thing: What? You're not going to run again so you turn the reins over to your lieutenant governor now?
as my basketball playing friend noted: "Parnell is not a three-point shooter."
is there something pretty scandalous out there? is she quitting ahead of it?

Faith-Based Governance or Hasty Covering of Butt?

2009-07-01T11:34:00.006-08:00

First, show me the data.

Seriously, if someone is foolish enough to Twitter that 50 percent of Emmonak residents are meeting their subsistence needs (presumably for salmon, though technically, I think it is reckoned normally by species, not by general category, so they ought to state whether needs are being met for kings or chum), then I would like that someone to post the data set. And the methods used to come up with that assertion. At minimum:

How many households (the typical way of counting things) did you talk to? Or did you just randomly talk to people on the street?
What questions did you ask them? How you word something matters a great deal, as it will skew your results if you are not careful.
Based on the the number of households asked the questions, or the number of individuals on the street, or from how deep you plucked your data from your butt, how (numerically, demonstrable by the equations used) did you calculate that 50 percent of Emmonak is meeting its subsistence needs?

Oh wait, perhaps this is faith-based science?

I've not been under a rock, but away from the System of Tubes for over a week. But when I returned and started reading accounts of the latest stupidity emanating from The Gov's administration, I went to her website and watched the following video titled "Subsistence in Emmonak."

Does anyone else find it ironic to call an an elder getting fish donated (presumably) from the ADF&G test nets 'subsistence'? Perhaps a more accurate title might be "The Future of Subsistence"?

Apparently, a member of her administration provided video of an Emmonak elder getting fish from ADF&G (who he terms the 'game wardens') from what I presume is the ADF&G test net. (ADF&G test nets that monitor salmon returns typically will make fish caught in test nets available to locals.)

Second, is it just me or is this '50 percent needs met' a covering of ass should this ever get to a lawsuit? Lawsuits seem to be the final avenue of these sorts of issues.

Third, I fear that this could turn into a divide and conquer scenario. The issues facing Emmonak, a Lower Yukon village that used to have a commercial king fishery, are different than those facing the middle and upper Yukon, at least on the surface. If the Yukon villages start feuding amongst themselves over who is getting more kings and when, it is a distraction from the larger, long-term issues.

The real problem is the absolutely disastrous return of king salmon on the Yukon River this year. And whether it ought to merit a disaster declaration. And what the hell exactly is going on out there in the ocean, which really is a great big black box that we don't know that much about. And the truly fucked up nature of industrial fishing, whether it be in Alaska, or Canada, or the Mediterranean Freaking Ocean, because it is probably not sustainable in the long term. And the fact that fish management is driven by the big guys, not the little guys fishing engaging in a small, local commercial fishery or just fishing for food for the winter.

Gone Clamming, Back Next Week

2009-06-23T09:03:00.000-08:00

Am desperately trying to finish loading the Soob up for the annual trip down to the Kenai beaches for clamming. (Obviously not so desperately as to completely avoid the System of Tubes.)

So, no time to do much other than to send a shout out to Flic, hoping she will be sufficiently enraged by the Supreme Court's decision regarding large international mining concerns' newly won ability to dump waste (conveniently called 'fill') into bodies of water supposedly protected by the Clean Water Act. Take it Flic! Run with it!

I'm sure those involved with Pebble and Donlin are immensely pleased. Clean Water Act? We don't need no stinking Clean Water Act!

Channeling Gunga-din

2009-06-18T18:51:00.015-08:00

This is a picture of:

a suppurating cancer photo op exploited by an obsessed pathologist,

a cross section of this blogger's brain,

a beached man o' war, or

a really weird fungus.

Those who marked "4" are correct; this hideously oozy thing is currently growing, weeping and fruiting (or whatever it is that fungi do) on a birch stump in my back yard.

But #2 is also a possible answer.

Stalwart readers who have kept up with us over the last few years probably have noticed that for a number of months now there has been just one water carrier on this blog....

...and, it ain't me.

At some point last winter my brain moseyed out of fertile fields of imagination into the Empty Quarter - a vast expanse of mundane thought and dreary story lines. For awhile I sat back figuring it would pass.

But it hasn't. Nothing jogs the noggin. Nothing. I figured the news that Kott & Kohring are going to go free would twang a little pang of need to write, but nope. Still wandering the Quarter.

It's a long dry spell and it looks to get even longer and drier before it breaks. Even around the old suburban homestead, nothing has jumped out and screamed - "write about me!" Oh sure, there is the immensely creepy and oozy 'what-the-hell-is-that?" fungus, the drop dead in his tracks rooster, and a few other quirky goings-on, but even those fail to jell a story line.

Guess 'Dweller is going to be water wallah a bit longer.

Not Worth a Month, a Week, a Mention

2009-06-18T12:39:00.015-08:00

Or a Response, Apparently

Quick! Mark your calendars!

Text from Governor Palin's latest proclamation, urging all Alaskans to recognize the observance of Alaska Pollinator Week:

WHEREAS, pollinator species such as birds and insects are essential partners of farmers and ranchers in producing much of our food supply; and
WHEREAS, pollination plays a vital role in the health of our national forests and grasslands, which provide forage, fish, wildlife, timber, water, mineral resources, and recreational opportunities as well as enhanced economic development opportunities for communities; and

WHEREAS, pollinator species provide significant environmental benefits that are necessary for maintaining healthy, biodiverse ecosystems; and

WHEREAS, the state of Alaska has managed wildlife habitats and public lands such as state forests and grasslands for decades; and

WHEREAS, the state of Alaska provides producers with conservation assistance to promote wise conservation stewardship, including the protection and maintenance of pollinators and their habitats on working lands and wildlands;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, Sarah Palin, Governor of the state of Alaska, do hereby proclaim June 22-28, 2009 as:

Alaska Pollinator Week

in Alaska, and urge all citizens to recognize this observance.

Prior to recognizing the bees, The Gov has issued proclamations for the following observances in June:

Alaska Invasive Weeds Awareness Week
Alaska Pacific University's 50 Anniversary Week
Juneteenth Day
Men's Health Awareness Week
Flag Day
Global Food Alaska Days
Automotive Service Professionals Week
National Trails Day
Fishing Week
Auburn Founders Day
Dutch Harbor Remembrance Day
Safety Month
Great Outdoors Month

These proclamations are pretty standard fare - knock out a few whereas' about a historical moment, a health issue, or a career choice, and proclaim a month, week or day the period in which to recognize that thing.

Me, I feel pretty guilty about having somehow missed Automotive Service Professionals Week. And it's a good thing that I am now aware of the invasive plants in my front yard, which, in a funny irony, are currently being pollinated by the very group we will be celebrating next week. Thanks to The Gov's proclamation, I plan on recognizing June 22-28 with the liberal application of a weed whacker. But I digress. Clearly, these things must be important -- after all, they each got a whole week.

Not worthy of notice or observance, however, is Alaska Gay Pride Month or the weeklong PrideFest held in Anchorage June 13-21. Organizers of the annual Pridefest activities there sent The Gov a request for such recognition (in addition to inviting her to attend the June 20 parade and festivities in Anchorage) but have not heard back.

With a nod to Bent Alaska, which made this point within a larger article.

Lost in a Haze of Daylight Induced Frolicking

2009-06-15T10:30:00.004-08:00

And We Haven't Even Started Fishing Yet

Have you noticed that many of your favorite Alaskan blogs, not to imply that this is indeed one of them, have been a bit thin lately?

Most of us, I'd guess, have been burning brightly of late, cramming house/cabin related projects, garden work and as much quality time (read: outdoor with friends and beer) as we can into our short little season known as summer. As I explained to a recent transplant and Alaskan-in-training, you don't want to be regretting how you spent your summer a few months from now when the temperatures have dropped and the daylight dwindled. Nope, time to embrace the daylight and the manic affective disorder.

I'm so M.A.D. stricken that I haven't even been tempted to go off when Sarah Palin says something truly stupid:

America is digging a deeper hole, and how are we paying for this government largesse? We're borrowing from China, and when you consider that now we own 60 percent of General Motors or the U.S. government does, consider, but who is the U.S. government becoming more and more indebted to? It's China. So that leaves you to have to ask who really is going to own our car industry in America?

Where to start? I mean, given her obvious ambitions to higher office outside of Alaska, she must have some handlers by now. Either they are dumb as posts, too, or perhaps they don't read either. Psst! Guys - start doing something other than watch FoxNews. There's a whole world out there online. Start here.

I had the great good fun to attend a Goldstream Valley party the other night. It had the requisites: fire, beer, tons of potluck food, interesting people, beer, and a blue-tarp-as-rain-shelter with a spruce pole post that was tied off to all the trees around it. (There really is no end to the usefulness of a blue tarp, is there?) Lot of little kids running around, but strangely, no dogs, which is pretty much an unheard of occurance.

There were many highlights to the evening, including my conversation with an end-of-the-roader who kept announcing during breaks in the conversation that Obama was running the country into the ground. After imparting his plan to survive the coming collapse of near civilization as we know it (the plan is your basic stockpile food and weapons type plan) I went back to the main conversation by the fire. Somehow, all the guys had gravitated over to the forge (ya know, where people make stuff out of metal) leaving the remaining women and end-of-the-roader, who was by that time fixed in place by intoxication. Don't worry, he wasn't driving home.

Somehow, and I could not have predicted this, our conversation frightened our end-of-the-roader so much that he left after announcing that:

We scared him.
He would never reveal anything we had said.
He had never been married and never intended to try that state.

The FBI's Little List, Growing Smaller By the Day

2009-06-05T10:30:00.011-08:00

Revamped to reflect the ramifications of the prosecution's misconduct.

The earlier question, "How Many More to Go?", should be replaced perhaps with "Thanks to the Justice Department, How Many Will Get Off?" We here at FBH suspect that the list will continue to change as everyone takes advantage of some truly boneheaded behavior by the DOJ attorneys who lost perspective in their zeal to win.

Which sucks, how can you blow a case in which you have guys on tape selling their vote to Big Oil?

~~Santa's~~ The FBI's Little List (First posted in December 2007 - Updated on May 5, 2009)
Items in bold are the most recent events.

Tom Anderson : ~~Naughty~~, Gray Bar Hotel
Bill Allen: ~~Very, Very, Very Naughty~~, Pled Guilty
Rick Smith: ~~Naughty~~, Pled Guilty
Pete Kott: ~~Naughty and Easy~~, ~~Gray Bar Hotel~~, Going to Go Free, Heading Back to Trial Court
Bruce Weyhrauch: ~~Naughty~~, Indicted
John Cowdery: ~~Naughty~~, ~~Indicted~~, ~~Pled Guilty~~, House Arrest
Vic Kohring: ~~Naughty~~, ~~Gray Bar Hotel~~, Going to Go Free, Heading Back to Trial Court
Ben Stevens: ~~Very Naughty~~ - In the Bag
Ted Stevens: ~~Very, Very Naughty and Haughty~~ - ~~CONVICTED!~~ Charges Dropped
Don Young: ~~Naughty and Rude~~, Under Investigation and Spending $ Like Crazy
Frank Murkowski: ~~Naughty and Slow~~, Give 'im rope
Jim Clark: ~~Very, Very, Very Naughty~~ Pled Guilty
James C. Hayes: ~~Indicted~~, ~~Tried and Convicted~~, Gray Bar Hotel
Murilda "Chris" Hayes: ~~Indicted~~, ~~Pled Out~~, Gray Bar Hotel
Beverly Masek: ~~Pled Guilty~~, Gray Bar Hotel

We're Doing a Heckuva Job With Fisheries

2009-06-03T10:23:00.009-08:00

With apologies, again, for this pale imitation of the inimitable Harper's Index.

“I hope you enjoy this book, as a resource and a reminder of the visionary pioneers, scientists, and leaders who have been a part of developing Alaska’s amazing commercial fisheries. The stage is set for keeping our fisheries wild and productive, sustaining ways of life and livelihoods for generations to come.”
-- ADF&G Commissioner Denby Lloyd, in the foreward to "Sustaining Alaska's Fisheries: 50 Years of Statehood", a publication commissioned as part of Alaska's 2009 Statehood Celebration

Salmon caught by Emmonak for subsistence in 1980: 2,256 chinook, 12144 chum, 1350 coho
Est. population of Emmonak, 1980: 567
Chinook salmon caught by Emmonak for subsistence in 2006: 2311
Est. population of Emmonak, 2007: 767
Total subsistence chinook harvest on Yukon in 2006: 48682
10 year average of that total prior to 2006: 51574
Percentage of Yukon area households reporting that more than 75 percent of their subsistence needs for chinook salmon were met in 2006¹: 41
Record number of chinook salmon caught as 'bycatch' by the pollock fishery, year: 122,000, 2007
Chinook salmon caught as bycatch in the same fishery in 2008: 20,000
Average # of chinook salmon caught as 'bycatch' by the pollock industry, 2005-2007: 44,000
Chinook bycatch cap proposed by ADF&G Commissioner Denby Lloyd to NPFMC in 2009: 69,000
Chinook bycatch cap supported by Western Alaska groups: 32,500
Chinook bycatch cap agreed to by NPFMC at April 2009 meeting: 60,000
Year bycatch cap will take effect if authorized by feds, treaty: 2011
Years in which Alaska failed to let enough chinook salmon through to Canada as provided by treaty: 2007, 2008
Percentage decrease in pollock abundance, per year, since 2003: 20
Cap of harvest set by NPFMC for Bering Sea pollock fishery in seasons A&B in 2009: 815,000 metric tons
Cap of harvest set by NPFMC in 2008: 1 million metric tons
Cap of harvest set by NPFMC in 2007: 1.39 million metric tons

¹Which is a very complicated way of asking if they got enough (or even 3/4 of enough) chinook salmon for their subsistence needs.

Selected (not all) Sources:
-1980 Census of the Population, Volume 1, Characteristics of the Population, U.S. Department of the Census, 1981
- Alaska Subsistence Fisheries Annual Report 2006, Technical Paper 344, Alaska Department of Fish and Game Subsistence Division, 2009.
- "Fast Fish, Loose Fish - Who will own Alaska's disappearing salmon?", Rowan Jacobsen, Harper's Magazine, May 2009.
- "Villagers denounce Yukon king closures", Kyle Hopkins, The Anchorage Daily News, May 29, 2009.

Cardboard Condo

2009-05-26T21:45:00.012-08:00

But what will happen when the rain comes?

A few weekends back, on one of the first truly warm and sunny ones of this spring, I happened to swing by ~~our local thrift store~~ the dumpsters across from the University. There was a full scrum in progress as people rooted and poked and ferreted out treasures from the bins, which were piled sky high with a winter's worth of refuse and goodies.

My first hint that I should not have left the digital camera home came when I approached the transfer station on University Avenue only to find traffic slowed to a crawl in the right hand lane as cars and trucks queued to make the turn. Within, all was madness - dumpster divers mobbing loaded trucks even before their wheels ceased turning. Heads were bobbing around deep within the towering piles of junk, and clothes, cushions, and what all were being flung with wild abandon at the recycle platform (I use the word recycle loosely, because more and more the platform is just a plein air trash heap).

In the midst of all this chaos, parked over to the side, was the Cardboard Condo - the latest creation of one of the transfer station's more colorful, persistent and creative characters. The Prophet, as some call him, was comfortably sitting under an awning of cardboard, much as one often sees retirees resting in the shade of their scroll-out awning at the end of a long day of navigating the 35-foot land yacht.

This was the first time I encountered the Prophet's latest construction project. Since then, I have watched with interest, as no doubt many Squarebanksans have, as the Cardboard Condo develops into the Cardboard Train: a series of shopping carts filled with cardboard boxes and pieces that he wheels up and down University Avenue. The train appears to be getting longer and longer, but its longevity, either as art or as shelter, is tied to the current dry spell we are enjoying.

Certainly more durable was the willow wicket period he went through several years back. Then he fashioned a quite elaborate bent willow receptacle that he put on wheels and used to collect the odd bits and pieces with which he furnishes his digs in the woods behind the transfer station.

My personal moniker for him is Burlap Man, born of a time, oh, about 10 years ago, when he wore a burlap serape-like affair and burlap boots - even in the coldest weather. He is given to Biblical utterances and rantings - and can become agitated and aggressive if one approaches a dumpster that he has claimed as his own.

As in any place, there are untold stories in the woods of Fairbanks. Once upon a time a young child froze to death in a tent. It wasn't madness nor poverty that drove the parents to live in a tent on the edge of the city within a stone's throw of shelter, food and warmth. It was arrogance, hubris and self-aggrandizement - the conviction of a particular man that he had the skills and wherewithal to live off the land in a canvas tent through a harsh Fairbanks winter.

The irony is that, of course, now he does, and has been doing so for well over a decade.

Notes from the Lower 48

2009-05-25T08:01:00.002-08:00

Subaru count thus far: 3 in 7 days
Palin free days: 0

I'm still not back in Squarebanks, but finally found a wireless connection to piggy back from my parents' house. (Their home being computer-less and internet-less.)

After so many years living in a part of the world where Subarus comprise at least one-third of the vehicles on the road, it has been strange not to see ANY. Of course, imports are a rarity here in the mausoleum of the U.S. auto industry (Detroit-area), but sheesh. It was something like 3 days before I saw the first one, and that was in Ohio.

I thought to have a Palin-free vacation. But no, thanks to the wonder of cable news, that hope went out the door. You know those scrolling headlines at the bottom of the screen? (Yes, I'm hopelessly ignorant of teevee terms - no cable at the Squarebanks dwelling.) Well, something happened, I dunno, Palin changed her hairstyle or something, and there were headlines.

There is no escape.

That, and the fact that after confirming that I still live in the AK, all my relatives at the family reunion deep in the heart of Appalachia had to know what I thought of Her. I tried to confine my rant to a few coherent sentences for a few reasons:

1) I was sincere in my hope to avoid political discussions with the assorted family members who ranged in outlook from mildly to jaw-droppingly right wing caricature
2) Most of them actually voted for John McCain BECAUSE of her
3) The possibility that the rant might derail into other topics; having ignored a raft of racist commentary for several hours previous

So, if the SarahPAC has a goal of appealing to absolute fringe of the Republican party, well, as Dubyah might say if he was anywhere to be found, mission accomplished. My hillbilly family members, who range from well educated to backwoods old-school South, love her.

I can't get back to the Goldstream Valley quick enough.

Out for A Fairly Long Smoke Break

2009-05-18T09:13:00.001-08:00

Except that I gave that habit up several years ago. No, this is a metaphorical smoke break from the blog, my peoples, while I get the obligatory trip to the Lower 48 out of the way.

I mean, who in their right mind would want to leave Alaska in the summer time? Bueller? Exactly. So, I'm off to other places before the summer actually begins here. We've been stalled out on the whole 'green up' thing for weeks now, so I got to get while the getting is good.

See you when the leaves are green.

Greatest Letter to the Editor. Ever.

2009-05-09T08:00:00.001-08:00

At least until someone one ups him. Gentlefolk, I give you the "Magic Truck" letter to the editor posted on the FDNM's website.

Thanks to KC at Geneflow for pointing this one out:

"Now the magic part comes into play. I, like almost all other pick-up truck owners, use the bed of the truck to “store” my trash. I put petrochemical based perforated carrying devices, (those are plastic bags with handles), that I acquire from Freddies, WallyWorld and all the other retail outlets in town into the bed of the truck. I put Styrofoam cups in the bed of the truck, I put paper sacks from the fast food joints into the bed of my truck."

I'll let you read the letter in its entirety and not spoil the pay off. I'd like to add that the truck fairies that are drawn to 'magic trucks' really render tarps over a load of treasure completely unnecessary.

Support Your Local Business, At Least Until It Does't Support You

2009-05-08T10:30:00.006-08:00

Goodbye, Goldstream Store

My attempts to support local businesses and waste less time and money driving to town to buy groceries just got derailed by the actuality of to whom I'd be giving my money.

When the ownership of the local store in my neck of the woods, the Goldstream Store, changed hands last year, it did so quietly. At least so much so that I didn't really notice. The same employees worked there, the same woman was managing it ... there continued to be great beer specials and that neighborhood feel.

In fact, I hadn't given it much thought at all until last weekend, when I took a short jaunt down the road to pick up some cold beer and some groceries and a bunch of employees were out front by the road, holding signs urging us to boycott the store.

Now, I'm not much more than friendly acquaintances with the people who work there, but they do not strike me as layabouts, or unfriendly, or bad at their job. Quite the opposite. Meaning, I'm inclined to trust them. And they'd walked out Friday night, finally, after months of crappo behavior from the new owner.

Apparently, said owner doesn't want any gays, tattooed people or Catholics working at his store. He has been vocal about it in the months of his ownership, so much so that the employees finally walked out.

This explains why when I had last been to the store, a bunch of guys who didn't know what the hell they were doing were waiting on people to considerable delay. They didn't even know they had to charge us tax until one of the customers pointed it out. Not knowing how to do that, I got my beer tax free that night, as I imagine everybody else did. There were to be no cash purchases of gas, since they couldn't do that either.

If said new owner doesn't want the tattooed, or the Catholics, or the gay people, or whatever type of person doesn't conform to his narrow understanding of what a human being is working for him in in the Goldstream Valley - his business is going to go downhill real quick. Because we might look like a bunch of hyper conservative rednecks, but he bought a business in a notably progressive neighborhood.

There's No Place Like Nome on TV (Yet)

2009-04-30T07:55:00.004-08:00

I've often said that getting off the plane in Nome is stepping into a whole, separate reality.

There are many places on earth that I love, but none really can compete with Nome. Dear, boozy, charming, strange, and to be absolutely truthful here, sometimes just heartbreaking Nome. Quirky doesn't quite cover it. Nor does offbeat. And I should be surprised by the recent news I received via our System of Tubes, but the fact is, it is just so ... fitting.

Word via The Internets is that TLC, home to many a reality show, has agreed to pick up a reality show filmed in the town whose best motto is, "It's not the end of the line, but you can see it from here."

Yep. Reality teevee. In Nome. I'm only sad that it comes after the demise of two of the town's older institutions: Fat Freddies and The Glue Pot. (RIP.) The world really missed out on an opportunity to see either of those two places.

A production crew spent some time there this winter getting footage, and it remains to be seen if the network will go beyond the two episodes initially ordered. It also is uncertain if the whole thing will have a touristy gloss or truly capture the unreality of the place.

Silent Spring

2009-04-28T10:30:00.001-08:00

It's been a long time since I logged in to blog. Long enough that there have been upgrades and changes to blogspot that I didn't even know about. Even increasingly pointed hints from my blog mate about how she was carrying the water alone didn't bestir me. If anything, 'Dweller's recent grand slam of pointedly funny pieces about La Palinista pushed me even further into blog slothdom.

Partly, my on-line absence has come about from circumstance. I have been on the roam this spring - spending a lot of time suspended above snow-covered vistas in a six-seater - finding my way to other places, mostly places that don't have easily accessible long distance service, let alone an internet hook up. There have been spring carnivals to go to, snow shoe races to run, fiddle dances and potlatches to attend. It's been evenings spent playing cribbage, watching basketball, and westerns that play over and over again in village homes, like Lonesome Dove and Dancing with Wolves.

But mostly, I have been suffering (and still am) from blog-block. Sure, there have been little itches here and there that I have put aside to scratch through postings, but they never amounted to much beyond some random thoughts.

My blogger-block isn't coming from a lack of worthy topics - quite the opposite. It's a veritable smorgasbord out there. I am feeling exactly the same sense of being overwhelmed into stupor as I do when I enter a Barnes and Noble and am faced with all of the 1000s of titles among which to choose just one, or maybe two.

It's sensory overload what with the Alaska political freak show led by La Palinista. Should it be a riff on the thieving sister-in-law who is such a dullard she robs the same place three times in a row (why not just grab the spoons the first time around???), or the growing dust-up between Levi and First Baby Mama over baby Tripp? Will the trash ever stop falling out of the trailer?

Or how about Palin's nauseating protracted use of her Down's Syndrome baby as political prop for her national pretensions? It's hard to overlook that her continued bleating about every child a wanted child totally ignores the fact that Alaska is among the top ten, if not the top five, in the nation for child abuse and neglect. As for educating those wanted children, fuggedabout dat in Alaska - La Palinista turned down the education stimulus funds, and you can betcha that education, domestic violence prevention and enhanced child welfare services are not at the top of her policy check list.

And it just goes on and on. Her ceaseless whingeing about the legal fees she's incurred because of "baseless" ethics violations, and the dupes that are paying into her legal fund. Natch, if she would just do the job she was elected to do, instead of carrying on like the Queen of Preen with a sense of entitlement as big as this state, most of that problem would melt away like the spring snows.

But there is no stopping her. She is a a caricature of a caricature of a caricature. Who could have imagined back in the twilight days of Frank the Bank that - gasp - it is possible to have a governor who is worse than him! Yet here we are in that very situation. Maybe the Queen of Preen doesn't exactly make Frank the Bank look good, but she certainly does make him appear, well, less bad.

Because while he was indisputably arrogant, he at least was politically savvy. Palin on the other hand is not only arrogant, she is a very dim bulb in the political chandelier. Therein lies the mother of all problems: she believes she is a political strategist of the highest order, sort of like the Condy of the Last Frontier. She believes this, I am quite sure, in the very same unquestioning, unshakable manner in which she believes that the Rapture is imminent, and that Alaska is the place to be during the tribulation.

And, it goes without saying - that makes her dangerous, dangerous in ways that Frank the Bank never was.

Oh Crap

2009-04-28T08:03:00.002-08:00

Looks like no commercial fishing for kings on the Yukon this summer.

Okay, now, can anyone foresee that there might be a problem in winter 2010? Something similar to this past winter? Maybe, uh, start planning now? Hello? Anyone in state government at home?

The Lower Yukon villages that have relied on commercial fishing for kings for their income (pay the bills, buy gas to go hunting, buy gas to go fishing for other stuff, take care of the winter's bills) may end up hurting again. Top it off with with subsistence restrictions and ... wow.

Of course, many of the upriver folks haven't even had a commercial fishery for kings to rely on to this point. Subsistence fishing restrictions are going to hit the Yukon hard this year.

But hey, don't worry, priorities are in order here on the Last Frontier. At least we're going to be growing more fish to stock lakes in the Fairbanks region. Per yesterday's FDNM:

"The goal is to double the number of fish that are stocked in Interior lakes and ponds to meet increasing demand from Alaska anglers."

Happy Birthday to Us! Number Three.

2009-04-23T07:33:00.003-08:00

Okay, technically, we turned three yesterday. This morning I vaguely remembered it was around this time of year (breakup, of course) that I finally just had "had it!" and was annoyed enough by my day job and the state of the world (Bush, Murkowski, etc.) that I started fiddling with Blogspot.

Since then, of course, I've shed the stupid day job and got a proper job, moved out of my dry cabin and mourned the loss of my late great Subaru Loyale, Francesca.

Three years of so-so layout, near endless sentences and not an insignificant number of posts about poop. All anonymously, or semi-anonymously at this point. I figure if I ever have something so earth shatteringly important and had to put it up online, I'd go ahead and out myself.

Y'all might be waiting a while.

But yet, here we are, tiny and humble and grumpy. People still come here, which, honestly, shocks me. I thought I'd share some of the keywords that brought readers to FBH recently:

what to do with the slop bucket water in a dry cabin
taco king fairbanks
fiery blazing handbasket
appearnace
alaska airline is it on this month of april?
sarah palin
cougar rock road
carolyn mark rumour
anchored down in anchorage
opec capital
libby reynolds iditard

At least 'Maxi Mounds' is off the list after something like a year on it. After Flic posted about, uh, something a while ago, any number of people looking for a ridiculously oversized set of implant boobs kept landing here. I suspect they were more than a bit disappointed.

As for those of you led here by the slop bucket question, the answer is simple: take it out away from the cabin and dump it.

Breakup: 100 Years of Attitude

2009-04-21T20:50:00.007-08:00

"As the time approaches when we may reasonably hope to be released from our winter quarters, it is a curious fact that everyone seems to be more impatient and irritable than during the winter months. It is possible that the excessively long days now make it more difficult to get a sufficient amount of sleep, and this may account in a measure for the phenomena. Be that as it may, the fact remains that everyone is more or less distraught and uncommunicative. Even the dogs seem to share in the general feeling of gloomy irritability, and from having been as a usual thing extremely affectionate and playful, are now ill natured, quarrelsome, and morose."

-- from "Report of the U.S. Revenue Steamer Nunivak on the Yukon River Station, Alaska, 1899-1901," by First Lieutenant J.C. Cantwell, R.C.S.

At least we'll always have Marmot Day...

2009-04-20T18:43:00.010-08:00

Let it not be said by the nattering nabobs of negativism that our Lege accomplished nothing in this recently concluded session. Why, I can think of several accomplishments:

On April 18th, state reps voted 38-0 to establish February 2nd as Marmot Day.
On April 6th, state reps voted 31-6 to designate the Alaska Malamute as the official state dog.
In keeping with the animals theme, the House passed HB 6, which expands the definition of animal cruelty laws to include bestiality.
Someone actually noticed that the Board of Fish was leaning even more heavily towards commercial interests. Palin's nominee, Brent Johnson, was rejected 42-16 in a joint session.
In a move vaguely reminiscent of the evolution of Alaskan marijuana laws, the Senate passed a bill outlawing the installation of tinted windows in cars and trucks. Note: it was already illegal to drive with them.
Minimum wage in Alaska will rise, eventually, to $7.75 an hour and remain at least 50 cents above the federal minimum.
It's been a long, difficult road for those who wish to end the scourge of Daylight Savings Time. As FBH readers themselves may know from personal experience, that one hour change twice a year is just hell. When it's been below minus 40 for over a week, and dark, and I truly dread going outside for more firewood, sometimes I remind myself, "Hey, at least tomorrow we don't have to spring ahead an hour." That does offer me some comfort. This legislative effort has stalled numerous times since 1999, but made it through the House as HB19 in 2009. As a public service, we have reprinted the following statement made by one legislator who introduced such a bill in 2002, offered by the bill's author, from a Juneau Empire story:

"It's just another one of those little hassles in life that you don't need," said Rep. Ken Lancaster, a Soldotna Republican and author of House Bill 409 to end daylight-saving time in Alaska. "Twice a year everybody is late for work or forgets to set their clocks," he said. "This year it's on a Sunday, so everybody is going to be late for church."
Actually, daylight-saving time always begins on the first Sunday in April and continues until the last Sunday in October, when clocks are set back to standard time. But the adjustment can be confusing to anyone.

The list could go on and on.

Clearly, the 90 day session is working out for everyone involved. Sarah Palin has 30 less days she needs to spend working on state business, freeing her up to lend herself to various causes near and dear to Alaskans: the outcome of the Texas gubernatorial race, the outcome of the gubernatorial race in Georgia and uh.... a Right to Life event in Indiana. She still had plenty of time to make some thoughtful, considered appointments to state positions: Wayne Anthony Ross, Brent Johnson, Tim Grussendorf, Joe Nelson, Alan Wilson. And hey, let's not forget -- she had time to visit ~~Emmonak~~ Russian Mission.

Never one to get out of a session without getting at least one stupid, ill-informed, offensive remark into the press, Mike Kelly, Mr. Representing My Neck of the Woods Thanks to 5 Stupid Voters, did not disappoint, even though he had 30 less days in which to speak in public on our behalf. Mr. Kelly had what I will from now on refer to his 'Let them cut wood" moment. Blue Oasis picked up on this one from the ADN, and it is just too awesome not to quote:

Saturday began with a confrontation in the House Finance Committee about what to do in regard to high energy costs in rural Alaska. The Legislature is poised to appropriate $9 million statewide for low-income heating assistance programs to assist. But Fairbanks Rep. Kelly said he thought it was supposed to be a one-time appropriation last year, and state revenues have dropped.
He said there are other programs for people who are needy and "not for any layabouts."
"I'd rather tell the guy, go out there and cut your own wood or do something for yourself. ... I don't know how many of the 200-plus villages have a wood supply within a rock toss, but there's a lot of them because I've been to a lot of them," he said.
Rep. Woodie Salmon, a Democrat from the village of Chalkyitsik, angrily responded that there have been millions of dollars in state subsidies for urban energy needs.
"They spent millions and millions of dollars on a coal plant, transmission lines, then they retire off the system, and then they don't help the rural areas," he said.
Kelly is the retired president of Golden Valley Electric Association in Fairbanks.

Alaska Airlines: Last in On Time Arrival

2009-04-18T10:54:00.000-08:00

Waiting on Weights and Balances, Not the Weather

I was not shocked to read recently that Alaska Airlines had been ranked last in terms of on time arrival of flights for February 2009.

And it would be really easy to blame it on the truly sucky Alaska weather this winter, except for the fact that it is a bogus excuse. In reality, I think the airlines decision to centralize (out of Seattle) some of its operations is the culprit.

I had the occasion in the last few months to fly a bit out in the wonderful world of Northwest (coastal) Alaska. You know, where there were near constant ground storms and blizzards? Snow up to the roofs? Drives home where people navigated reflector to reflector?

Funny thing is, my flights were not affected by weather. In an example of near miraculous luck, I got where I had to go before it stormed every freaking time. (Then it stormed again.)

However, all my flights on Alaska Airlines left at minimum a half hour late. Funny that. In each case, the delays resulted from the employees at a regional hub trying to sort out the weight and balances with the newly centralized operations hqed in Seattle. The pilot announced over the PA system the reason for our delay and apologized. More than once. We sat in the plane on the runway, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 minutes ... and waited. And waited longer. The only reason I made my connection back through Anchorage was because that flight was running late, too.

I would've not minded, except that upon leaving Anchorage, the pilot blamed our delay on weather (which was just fine, thank you) in the places from which we departed.

I did a quicky Google search for anything on the centralized operations (and weights and balances) and could only find something on this union site.

(Not) Winning the Battle, Losing the W.A.R.

2009-04-17T07:20:00.004-08:00

Beyond the obvious problems with the Wayne Anthony Ross nomination, covered virtually everywhere on the System of Tubes, all I can come up with this morning over cup of coffee number two is:

"What the Hell were they thinking?"

Is someone (and her probable boatload of consultants) so foolish as to pick such a no-go candidate for Attorney General just because he is a raging right wing nutjob? Was his anti-abortion stance enough to get the nod? Surely, they could have found another Republican, a qualified one even, to put up for AG. And since the last guy was something of a bust, maybe even look at his credentials and experience? And maybe, you know, vet him a little bit first?

Is the sum total of what La Palinista will offer in 2012 a strong anti-abortion record? Because the view from up here in wilderburbia is that she doesn't seem much interested in the boring job of being governor of Alaska. Nope, too many political events Outside to hit, so little time...

What we need are special updates on the evening news like the ones we get when Santa is traveling on Christmas Eve. "Do you know where Sarah is right now?" "Well, our special tracker has her somewhere over Indiana tonight, Bob."

It'd be helpful.

I've found one positive thing to say about La Palinista's odd, stumbling campaign for some national office in the future. [cough.]

It has driven the stake through the heart of the mythical West on Ice. Obviously, the Euro-Americans among us are not a bunch of pioneers on the homestead, churning our own butter and hitching up the mule to the plow to tame the Last Frontier. (Well, okay. Flic does keep bees. And there are a lot of guys with beards. And we chop a lot of wood. And a few people keep llamas.)

Nonetheless, this is not Little House on the Tundra no matter how many of us can sing "North to Alaska" from memory. Sing with me! "Way up North. Way up north..."

We are as Jerry Springer as the rest of the Lower 48. Our governor hails from the strip mall capital of Alaska. (The Mat Su Borough also being famous for some of the best pot grown in the United States.) And now that everyone is paying attention, the gold camp tourist version is getting harder to peddle, no matter how hard the desperate Lower 48 Republicans want to believe it. And we have La Palinista and her publicity craving immediate and extended family to thank for that.

T Bag Day: I Suggest an Alternative Beverage

2009-04-15T07:07:00.005-08:00

At right, my peoples, is my T Bag day offering:
a nice, strong cup of coffee in my favorite mug.

Good, sensible stuff: great to wake up to, handy to turn a snoozy drunk into an alert one, a nonthreatening it-is-sort-of-a-date move, an "Ohmigod I have four hours to finish this thing?" necessity.

And, frankly, much better for you than whatever the hell kind of Koolaid the rightwingers have been tripping on for the last couple of weeks. Perhaps the T Baggers just need to have a nice, simple cup of coffee and take ten deep breaths?

I've been working long hours lately, out of town, so I've been only casually following Alaska happenings. But due to the circumstances of fate, I had the unforeseen, uh, pleasure, of seeing a bunch of Fox News during that time. And let me tell ya, those people are worked up about something. I'm not sure what. Maybe it is that they lost the election and still haven't gotten over it.

But clearly, the right wing media machine is foaming and fomenting.

It's kind of like that whole 'wear your gun around town' protest that a bunch of Fairbanks hoopleheads held a couple of months ago. (A 'movement' now complete with its own 'task force'!) People were riled over a bill introduced in Congress (one that even Don Young admitted was going nowhere) that would have required state or federal licenses for gun ownership and given the AG power to track sales. That bill was DOA, but the right wing machine ramped up the rhetoric and agita like it was the Second Coming. (Of Stalin.)

Note to wingnuts: I'm one of those Alaskan lefty gun owners; I didn't buy what you were peddling. I did not strut around all day with any of my guns.

And so the strange right wing freak out continues. Last I checked, Obama gave us a tax cut. Ostensibly this costume party is about taxes, but it is more about ... again, remind me what this is about?

A Volcano Ate My Homework

2009-03-31T08:21:00.003-08:00

Seriously, is there any better excuse for not leaving on a much-not-looked-forward-to work trip than a volcanic eruption?

Or, as in my case yesterday, a flight cancellation because the flight crew scheduled to work the morning flight never made it to Fairbanks?

With apologies to those actually suffering through Mt. Redoubt's effects, ash, vacation plans mucked up, etc., I have been actually rooting for Redoubt to keep on rolling. Every ash cloud in the last week has been the harbinger of a possible delay - a much wished for one. It was with great relief that I got up at 4 a.m. yesterday to check the flight status for the 6 a.m. flight out of Fairbanks and saw the words 'canceled.'

Sadly, though, Redoubt isn't going to get me off the hook today.

I wonder if Ish has dug out of the snowdrifts yet?

You Can Tell A Lot by Their Appearence

2009-03-20T16:12:00.011-08:00

Or Not
Thursday was the last day of the Tanana Chiefs Conference Convention. This is the annual three-day meeting of delegates (typically First Chiefs) from the 42 tribal communities of Interior Alaska. In addition to reports on the previous year's business and financials of the tribal consortium, there is a healthy invite list of those in power that can, for good or ill, impact the governance and business of the Interior Athabascan tribes and their members. Among the invited dignitaries are, of course, Alaska's governor and its Congressional delegation.

Senators Lisa Murkowski and Mark Begich graciously addressed the Convention through the wonders of modern technology. Although their time was limited because of Congressional duties, they both still managed to deliver addresses that spoke to their goals and to some of the more pressing issues affecting Interior villages, and to answer follow-up questions.

Then there was Don Young. He sent a pre-taped video, which is what he does every year, and will no doubt continue to do, technology be hanged. Pre-taping obviates the need for him to convincingly act like he gives a rat's ass about bush Alaska, since any wooden stiffness and peculiar disdainful facial tics can be written off as artifacts of the video process. It also protects him from any audience questions that might spur him to do what he does so well ...putting his foot in his mouth by uttering some off-color, insensitive and outrageous response.

But hey, as obnoxious as Don Young is, at least he bothered to sit down and tape a message.

Not so Palin. What did the tribes get from Palin? Nada. A big fat zero. Certainly no personal appearance , even though now that she personally moved the capitol to Anchorage, we are only an hour away by plane. No live-feed, no taped message, not even a phone-call with regrets that she could not attend or appear via any of the technological substitutes for a live appearance.

In other words, the tribes got a resounding kiss-off from the lipstick queen.

Oh, she did allow her Rural Advisor to attend, but he came late, and hid in the audience, and who can blame him? TCC's president, Jerry Isaac, never one to mince words, offered some very pointed observations on the Governor's utter lack of respect for the Interior tribes, but its unlikely the Rural Advisor is going to report that back to his boss...heads have rolled in this administration for less.

On the brighter side, it's clear she's ignorant (willfully or no) of how closely her ongoing conduct and actions mirror those of her predecessor. In Frank-the-Bank's case, his arrogance resulted in plummeted approval ratings and a lost primary. We can only hope for the same outcome for Palin - both here and on the national stage. Keep up the good work, Sarah.

OMG - Yet Another One

2009-03-12T23:07:00.008-08:00

This is bordering on the ridiculous, as well as the redundant. But who knew when I started this little gag list back in '07, that it would grow, and grow, and, well, grow.

The latest ex-legislator to do the perp walk is Bev Masek. She bumps Kott off the list as the Cheapest Date in the House - since VECO bought her for a mere 4K.

~~Santa's~~ The FBI's Little List (First posted in December 2007 - Updated on March 12, 2009)

Tom Anderson : ~~Naughty~~ Gray Bar Hotel
Bill Allen: ~~Very, Very, Very Naughty~~ Pled Guilty
Rick Smith: ~~Naughty~~Pled Guilty
Pete Kott: ~~Naughty and Easy~~ Gray Bar Hotel
Bruce Weyhrauch: ~~Naughty~~ Indicted
John Cowdery: ~~Naughty~~ Indicted, ~~Pled Guilty~~, House Arrest
Vic Kohring: ~~Naughty~~ Gray Bar Hotel
Ben Stevens: Very Naughty - In the Bag
Ted Stevens: ~~Very, Very Naughty and Haughty~~ - CONVICTED!
Don Young: ~~Naughty and Rude~~, Under Investigation and Spending $ Like Crazy
Frank Murkowski: Naughty and Slow, Give 'im rope
Jim Clark: ~~Very, Very, Very Naughty~~ Pled Guilty
James C. Hayes: ~~Indicted, Tried and Convicted~~ Gray Bar Hotel
Murilda "Chris" Hayes: ~~Indicted, Pled Out~~, Gray Bar Hotel

Beverly Masek: Pled Guilty, Gray Bar Hotel

Oh, and on an entirely different political topic, How about those ruptured nuptials of Bristol Palin - are we surprised? The death knell of that particular union was rung on the day that the future mom-in-law got busted for drug dealing. To paraphrase a certain song about rehab (or in this case, drug-dealing): SarahPAC says no, no, no!

Lemonade!

2009-03-09T08:57:00.005-08:00

Two other bloggers, Naturelady at Boreal Kraut and Dusty Bee at Well Seasoned Woman, dropped us comments saying they'd nominated FBH for a Lemonade Award.

To which I say, on behalf of Flic the Bic and and I, thank you. Awards make me twitchy. I try not to talk about blogging itself usually - better to just write about the stuff rattling around the old brain pan - but I suppose a nod from others won't kill us.

Probably.

The award, vaguely dedicated to blogs showing 'great attitude or gratitude' requires one to bestow the same upon 10 other bloggers. And copy the lemonade stand thingey at right.

Does this mean we have a good attitude? Because we've worked very hard to communicate our bad attitudes about many things great and small here in Squarebanks. We've stuck to our amateurish layout, bad grammar and profanity for a reason. We're amateurs. We both deal with grammar and style in our day jobs and see no need to muck about with it on our free time. We both make liberal use of profanity.

Whatever the psychological implications of taking part in this may be, I'll play. Oh, and I'm implementing a new rule of my own. I won't nominate either blog that nominated me. Otherwise these things turn into a mutual nominating thing and suddenly we're all patting each other on the back. And I'm nominating five other blogs, not ten, because I am on mug of coffee number one and lack motivation.

1. Keeping it Real - When I read this blog I feel like I am still living out in coastal Alaska and have someone to talk to about it. (And shares my love of nigipiaq.) And the pictures are cool, too.

2. Kodiak Konfidential - He of photoshopping She Who Shall Not Be Named's face into a Vogue cover. I suspect that if Ish lived in Squarebanks we'd sit at the Eagle having a beer, coming up with even better blog ideas.

3. Redneck Mother - Not an Alaskan blog, but if I am ever a momma, I am so going to steal ideas from her and have to read back through a few years of 'raising children, lettuce and hell."

4. Ester Republic - The indie publication serving the Peoples Independent Republic of Ester and beyond.

5. AK Dave Down Under - Beer, koalas, and lots of pics of warm climate critters. Oh, and more titillating post titles than you can shake a stick at.

School Pride, Writ in Frybread

2009-03-04T16:29:00.003-09:00

At Least We Were Spared the Blue Mustang

2009-03-03T20:56:00.005-09:00

I don't know about all you gentle blog readers, but I really can't bring myself to like the new airport at FAI. I miss the funky building of questionable provenance, and the dusty plane, the scruffy taxidermy, and the colorful flags from all the Interior tribes.

Every time I disembark from an Alaska Airlines jet ('coz when I fly bush with Frontier, I still get to go out of the last vestige of the former airport), I miss the old place so much it hurts. For some oddball reason - maybe for the same reason why I still like landing on gravel strips with no outbuildings and a cluster of snow machines waiting to pick up freight and people - exiting a jet way into the drab, worn upstairs of the old terminal was just coming home. Now it could be in a terminal anywhere in the Lower 48.

There is no funk or eccentricity, it's all laminate, sparkle and faux granite. I am not sure what the orange vestibules on the outside of the building are supposed to be, but to me, they just look like an architect's rendering of the ubiquitous ATCO unit. The worst part about the new airport is that in its effort to look modern and hip and polish, it kinda flops - and it just seems even more outre than it did before.

But hey, it could be so much worse. We could exit the orange cubicles to a Blue Moose with crazy eyes.

They're asking entirely the wrong question

2009-02-24T07:52:00.005-09:00

Forget about whether the state of Alaska should continue to support the existence of villages. The villages ought to be asking themselves why they should continue to support urban, suburban and wilderburban Alaska.

Truth is, urban Alaska is dependent on the continued existence of Alaska’s villages. Tell me, what exactly does Anchorage produce? Fish? Uh, no. Timber? Nope. Coal? Negatory. Oh, the urban areas could say that it is not the villages, just the land out there (and everything on or under it) that they need, but they'd be wrong.

What Anchorage, Wasilla and Fairbanks do produce is infrastructure and employees of that infrastructure through which money flows to various programs serving village Alaska. A lot of that money is federal money. And a whole lot of money that should be going to services is spent on employing people in Anchorage, Wasilla, Fairbanks and Juneau. A lot of it is spent transporting them to village Alaska.

Our urban areas produce nothing. They are where the paper is shuffled and the point through which money flows. (After a lot of it stays behind.)

Those folks, in turn, can maintain a lifestyle that allows for the growth of communities that support all sorts of ancillary services – restaurants, tanning salons, doggie day care, Nordstroms, strip malls, Range Rover dealerships – all the crap that the folks who move to Alaska but want to turn it into the place they left want and have. They all in turn can buy houses and cars and lots of toys.

And it’s not just bureaucrats and TWPs (pronounced ‘twips’) … those transient white professionals that spend a year or two our in the Bush making bank and then move out. It is high paying work, whether you’re an itinerant health care worker, or one of the army of consultants, a lawyer, or an ‘expert’ on rural issues hired to do research every time there is an EIS or project proposal. There are scores of grants funding jobs at universities, all of which poke and prod and make vague promises about how they will help lower suicide rates or foster culture or promote local agriculture or something out in the villages.

And lest the conservatives sneer at these jobs related to ‘programs’ – a large number of the skilled trades would be screwed if village Alaska disappeared. Think of every construction and maintenance project – be it building homes, improving airports, water and sewer, weatherization, school construction, boiler work, hell even the AVEC guys (that’s Alaska Village Electric Cooperative for you Outsiders or urban residents) who work on the electrical generation plants … all these people fly in and out of village Alaska and collect a big fat paycheck. We’re talking carpenters, electricians, operators, and the like. And if it is a federally funded project, they make Davis-Bacon wages (a name I’ve always found ironic.) These folks, too, spend their money in urban Alaska.

Young teachers go out to village Alaska to get experience and make much better money. Typically they stay a year or two and then leave.

The regional hubs need the villages, too. There are a lot of high paying jobs in the hubs predicated on the existence of village Alaska. That’s true of every regional corporation, be it the non-profit or for profit. What supports all the small regional airlines? It’s not flying people out to the villages. It’s flying bypass mail and freight and all those white collar and blue collar people and their excess baggage out to village Alaska to work. (Although admittedly, the price of fuel is making bypass mail much less of a profitable enterprise. Whatever did happen to the proposed changes to bypass mail last year. Seriously. I lost track of that one.)

What would the snowmachine and ATV dealers do if rural Alaska emptied out? What about the barge lines that deliver goods to communities?

All this talk of whether the State of Alaska should support Alaskan villages misses the point. The fates of urban Alaska and village Alaska are inextricably entwined.

And frankly, this is merely the economic end of the discussion. Issues of history, values, and culture trump all this. But that is for another time.

It Was Just A Matter of Time

2009-02-23T13:07:00.005-09:00

...until this. Pictured at right is a security bin at SEATAC, with a little advertising logo stuck to its bottom. No longer just drab grey, the lowly security bin - that catch-all for coats, shoes, and the object d' threat du jour - IS advertising's new space, the final frontier.

Now we, the beltless, bootless masses, can ingest corporate sponsorship ads as we conga our way through airport security.

Brilliant. Thousands, nay, hundreds of thousands of bin bottoms just waiting to be sold to the highest bidder. A masterful stroke of revenue-raising genius in these trying times, when apparently even ~~the Gestapo~~ Homeland Security is having trouble making the mortgage.

An Alaska Political Primer

2009-02-15T15:53:00.014-09:00

Part Two

Vo-gler blue tarp as-pen Pa-lin A-I-P secede ass-ume
beard gun Spam Subaru

There is Alaska. Alaska is very big. It is very far away. It is the largest state in the United States. See Texas? It doesn't like to be reminded of that. Until recently, no one has paid much attention to Alaska. Can you see Russia? Sarah Palin can. O, what shiny long hair she has!

Some Alaskans want to be left alone by the federal government. "Send us money," they say. "Now leave us alone." They don't want their tax dollars supporting things called "programs." Watch Alaskans pay one dollar in gasoline taxes. See them get six dollars back.

See the aspen. Aspens are un-Alaskan! See Joe Vogler? See Joe Vogler cutting down an aspen with his teeth? O, how he hated them! He hated them almost as much as the federal government. Joe wanted Alaska to secede from the United States.

Joe wanted to build a road from Fairbanks to Nome. Sarah Palin and Mike Kelly want to build a road to Nome. They like the coal and gold and uranium in Rural Alaska. A road would let them get it. Remember Frank Murkowski? Frank Murkowski was famous for his "Roads to Resources" plan. Roads! More roads! Roads to Nowhere! No one knows if the Rural Alaskan communities in between want a road. No one asked them.

See the blue tarp? Blue tarps are very Alaskan. See the blue tarp roof? See the blue tarp boat cover? See the blue tarp woodpile cover? Alaskans are fond of blue tarps. They found Joe Vogler wrapped in a blue tarp. How Alaskan!

See Joe's friends? Joe had friends called the the A-I-P. Not many Alaskans are members of the AIP. See Sarah? She wasn't. See Todd? He was. Sarah isn't really friends with the A-I-P anymore, but they talk sometimes.

See the AIP? They want to leave the United States. They want to stay where they are. How they all want to secede! Bad U.S. government! Bad environmental protections! Bad aspens! They assume the North Slope Borough and Northwest Alaska will come with them. What a poor country A-I-P Land would be! Would A-I-P Land like importing its oil and gas from the United States? How ironic that would be!

See the Alaskan Democrats? See them? One must look hard to see them. See their beards! See their guns! See their really warm beaver hat! They look just like conservatives. Watch them eat Spam. Watch them make thai coconut moose curry. How they love both their pickup and their Subaru. How hard one must work hard to maintain one's sense of humor if one is an Alaskan Democrat!

See the Alaskan Republicans? There are lots, too, even more than Democrats. O, how many of them there are in Suburban Alaska. They run everything. Yet, they hate government. O, how they want to drill the Arctic Refuge. O, how they don't like things like education and health care and benefits. How hard one must work to find an Alaskan Republican's sense of humor!

Most Alaskans aren't party members. See them? They aren't Democrats. They aren't Republicans. They aren't AIP members. We call them 'undeclared or 'non-partisan.' Look how many of them there are! O, there are more of them than Democrats, or Republicans, or AIP! "Leave us alone," they say. "We'll vote for who we damn well please."

End Lesson Two.

An Alaskan Political Primer

2009-02-11T07:49:00.014-09:00

The Alaskan Political Primer (rev. 2009)
(With apologies to W.H. McGuffey)

Lesson One

Pa-lin Hair Mur-kow-ski Un-in-dict-ed Jet Su-burb Cro-nies A-bun-dance
Hus-band Snow-machine Was-illa Spam Me-dia E-lite Lib-e-ral I-ron-ic Dip-net
Sub-sis-tence PAC

See Sarah run. Run, run, run. O, how much more we like her than the least popular unindicted governor in history! Do you think Frank Murkowski regrets the jet?

Watch suburban Alaska elect her governor. What shiny, long hair she has! How many people they have in suburban Alaska! Few of them know anything about Rural Alaska. Does Sarah know anything about it? Will the people she appoints to government positions know anything?

Alaska is a BIG state that is far away from rest of the United States. No one really pays attention to Alaska.

Watch Sarah appoint friends and cronies to state positions. No experience or qualifications are necessary! She has a husband. His name is Todd. See Todd race his snowmachine? What a fast snowmachine racer he is! Todd, husband and snowmachine racer. He should be looking through State correspondence. See him go through personnel files.

O! A national election has come! See John McCain pick Sarah Palin! How old, yet smart, he is! Run, Sarah, run! Run, run, run! Does Sarah know anything about the world outside Wasilla? Does the Republican Party care? Has she not long, shiny hair? Country first!

See the rest of the country start paying a lot of attention to Alaska. See Sarah on national television. O, What a mean bunch those media elites are. What a liberal, unfair, country hating bunch they are. O, how the spotlight shines on Alaska! What a Big Figh t there is there.

O, Obama! See Sarah fly back to Alaska. She has not been elected ~~President~~ Vice President of the United States. Run, run, run. Has Sarah not realized the national election is over? Stop running Sarah. How fast she runs! How far!

Watch her put suburban Alaskans into place in key wildlife management positions. One! Two! How many Alaskan Outdoors Council board members can you get into the system? How interesting that the AOC is backing a lawsuit against Fish and Game.! How ironic.

See the lawsuit. See the dipnetters. They aren't happy. O, how unhappy they are that they are to be called personal use. They catch fish, lots of fish every year. How bright and shiny are the salmon! How they glitter and gleam! But they are not called subsistence fish. When they are eaten, they do not taste as good.

Has the Big Fight not ended? How many people were involved in the Big Fight!

Run, run, run. Sarah has a PAC. See the PAC. See Sarah campaign for a Republican in Georgia. See her campaign in Texas. Yet, Sarah does not want to be President of the United States.

(End Lesson One.)

Somebody Turned the Heat Off

2009-01-28T07:42:00.002-09:00

Ya know, after all that fuss about our last cold snap - and then realizing that while we were all wingeing about it and taking photos and talking about it like we were all 'To Build a Fire' or something, there were people actually having a pretty rough time in parts of our state and no one was really paying attention to THAT - well, I'm not going to go on too much about the fact that it is in fact a WEE bit chillier this morning than last.

Oh, of course now a lot of Outside folks are paying attention. I suspect it has something to do with our ~~vice presidential candidate~~ governor. Our press conferencing having, book deal getting, PAC forming, 'the media is so unfair to me' whining, publicity cultivator in chief?

Has, uh, anyone bothered to tell our governor that the next election isn't until 2012? I mean, suddenly announcing a hiring freeze that isn't exactly a hiring freeze but will look good when you refer back to it in 3 more years, but frankly, I think we have a few more pressing concerns here, right? And a road to Nome? That's what you've got?

Oh, and for those of you who think that the folks on the coast all just ought to get out there and cut some firewood and not whine about fuel prices - perhaps you ought to take a look at one of the maps depicting the extent of the tree line. There are a lot of places in our state that do not have trees.*

And as for getting jobs, well, they have jobs, usually. But when they can't commercial fish for kings, they suddenly have lost their jobs. Worse yet, the money earned fishing kings helps support the subsistence economy - it helps buy the gasoline, fix the boat, etc. That's why it is called a 'mixed wage-subsistence' economy. Less subsistence food put away means you are stuck buying a lot more food from the store. Which is less money for heating oil.

So the news that the next year's king salmon forecast is poor again is that much more of a bummer. Suggestions that people forgo subsistence king fishing for chums are all well and good, that is food on the table, but that will not help buy fuel oil for the next winter.

Does anyone else find it odd that the Bering Sea pollock trawlers can catch and discard as bycatch over 100,000 king salmon per year while the small, community-based fishing effort has to shut down? That we haven't even managed to let enough kings by on the Yukon to meet our treaty obligation to the Canadians?

All so Americans can eat cheap fish sticks?

*That said, and before my sieve-brain drops this idea - hello, pellet stoves! Hello Interior Alaska waste wood products. Perhaps now would be a good time to look at the numbers on producing this type of fuel.

Actually, Tom, I Doubt You're Paying $8 Per Gallon

2009-01-21T08:18:00.004-09:00

"Where will it stop?" asked Kenai Republican Sen. Tom Wagoner. "Everyone in the state has high fuel bills."

Actually, the cost of fuel in many road system areas (like Squarebanks) has dropped considerably since the economy has tanked. Even the price of firewood has plunged - now that fuel oil has come down, there is less demand for firewood. At the beginning of winter (before the economy tanked) some local people were asking for $375 for a split cord of spruce. $375!! This week, those same local entrepreneurs are asking $220. Coincidence?

Unlike, say, for Emmonak and every other community in Alaska where the fuel vendor has to buy an entire season's fuel before the sea freezes and no more barges deliver until ... you guessed ... the sea ice melts. They are locked in to higher prices until the next delivery, because they bought the fuel at the inflated price.

I asked a friend of mine in a coastal regional center what her fuel bill was per month right now. $800. Thank goodness she has a good paying job. But you can bet she is looking forward to spring and a new fuel delivery for her town.

You know why folks in urban centers like mine (even if I live slightly out of town) are surprised by the crisis in Emmonak and not particularly sympathetic? Because our own crisis has abated some - and human beings are odd creatures with attention spans slightly longer than that of a labrador retriever puppy - and now that we're better able to meet our bills and fill up the big fricking pickup trucks, now that it is not hurting us, everyone is suddenly all "What high fuel prices? Whatever do you mean?"

That, and despite all the hoohaa over our 50 years of statehood in my local fishwrapper, the urban-rural divide has never been greater. But that's a topic for another post.

I've Never Even Wanted to Watch an Inauguration Before

2009-01-20T07:32:00.002-09:00

Wow. I'd love the take the day off work and watch the festivities, but that isn't possible. Perhaps I can be all sneaky and stream it over the Series of Tubes at work.

And as a cynic who doesn't like to get all gooey over candidates or politics, still, I must add a 'whoo' and a 'hoo.' Whoo hoo!

The Backwards Bush calculator came down this morning. It's been a very long time. As my papa would have said, "Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out the door."

Yes, I'm a Dirty, Rotten Gloater

2009-01-05T08:52:00.009-09:00

Temps in my part of the Goldstream Valley this morning as I try to get to work?

Minus 22. But it seems to be dropping. Again.

Perhaps we had a bit of cloud cover in the wee hours here in the Valley as the O.F. thermometer (see earlier post) was telling me we hit a balmy minus 10. Or maybe we had a breeze? Couldn't tell at 4 a.m. because I don't function well at that time of day, but I woke up, as I've been doing, to check the wood stove. By the time I was struggling to get up to go to work, it had hit minus 14.

At right: Heading down from the top of Ballaine Hill, on Saturday afternoon, into the Fairbanks area. On a clear day, you can usually see Denali in the distance.

Stay warm!

And, Flic, time for hot toddies.