the official term for the season here is "break-up". The weather is gray and over the past few weeks there has been hardly any precipitation. The weather has edged into the 50's letting most of the snow melt but the temperature at night slips back to the 30's. I think the only reason the temperature is rising is because we now have about 16 hours of sunlight daily. When I get up in the morning around 5:30 its light out. Not bright sunshiny, but that early morning twilight. And when I go to bed at 10:30, it's twilight. It won't be to much longer before there isn't very much darkness in-between the two. And then, the decrease to darkness is probably just about as dramatic. I also heard that fall starts in August... lets hope its the end of August.
We received an invitation from Jake's school for an award ceremony. He didn't know he was to receive an award, so not only was our appearance at school a surprise to him, but so was the whole ceremony. The ceremony was for Academic Achievenment Awards handed out to students from each department. These awards have a lot to do with enthusiasm and leadership capabilities. Jake received his for Concert Band. Pretty good for a kid who has only been in school since the beginning of December.
The weekend before Easter was really the first nice weekend we had experienced. The sun was shining and the temp rose into the mid 50's. It seemed that everyone in town was outside. The sidewalks were loaded with bikers and runners. Actually, there were people who looked like they were runners all over the place. They were walking all over the place, even into the REI store. Maybe they just meant to look like they were runners!
I decided to take Rosey and Riley out to Kincaid Park for a walk.
The trails had lots of people on them, lots of mud and lots of moose poop. I guess even the moose would rather be on the trails then breaking through the bush. I haven't seen as many moose lately. Except for the one that was pulling up the landscaping around the hospital today. You can also see moose damage on many of the young saplings. The moose tear all the bark off, girdling the trees. The aspen planted in front of work have all been ravaged by hungry moose. And since everything is still brown, no green in sight, bark must be about all they have to eat.
Back to the walk... this park is HUGE and has great trails. I didn't really go on much of a walk due to the mud, but I did get a few photos.
Recently, I had two things happen within a very short time of each other that while they were unrelated, they created a connection in my mind.
The first thing was one of those commercials for kids in 3rd world countries where they ask you to contribute money to provide a better life for them; build them schools, provide healthcare. The second was meeting a patient from the little town of Savoonga on St. Lawrence island. St. Lawrence island sits in the Bering Sea, about 36 miles away from the Russian coastline. Savoonga has approx. 650 people in town, the majority (98%) is Native. The first language for many of the population is Yupik, not English. About 32 homes haul their water and still use "honeypots". Unemployment is about 11.5% and there isn't much hope for economic growth. Reindeer are a major influence on the island, and many people come to go birding. Hard to believe this is still a part of the United States.
Tomorrow, we fly on a little plane down to Soldotna. It's about a 30 minute flight which is much bettter than the 3 hour drive. It's also the next closest hospital to Anchorage, after Mat-Su. And Mat-Su is 40 miles out of town, CPH is much farther then that! I hope that I get some good pice
Until next week.
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