Alaska

Civil twilight.

by

A little after 2 a.m. yesterday Anchorage entered a 28-day period during which the light never stops. Specifically, we will have 24 hours of either sun or something called “civil twilight.” That’s when the geometric center of the sun is six degrees below the horizon.

Even though we technically have a sunset, the sun is still within those six degrees. It keeps the darkness from taking hold – at least for the next 27 days.

Civil twilight is not to be confused with astronomical twilight or nautical twilight. But it sure confuses the folks on whom it endlessly shines. As I noted in “Breaking up is hard to do,” the increased daylight makes us all a little bit giddy.

Kids ride their bikes until well past 11 p.m., and ice cream trucks ply their wares long after what would be quittin’ time in the Lower 48. People fish all night and then go to work. Or they’ll play softball until they drop from exhaustion (and directly into the cool embrace of a bucket of brews).

 

Read more

The lettuce tree.

by

It’s been 11 days since my last post. Not dead, just dazed: by work deadlines, by the ever-increasing daylight and, lately, by the lettuce tree in our living room. (See photo at left.)

Yep, that’s lettuce. It began its life late last year as a romaine seed in a pot in our kitchen, because DF wondered whether it would grow indoors.

Spoiler alert: It did.

Initially the pot stood by a big window on our kitchen table. The lettuce likely wouldn’t have made it on daylight alone, thanks both to short days and low winter light levels.

They can get pretty darned low; as this Facebook post from Alaska Climate Info notes, on winter solstice the sun was 5.5 degrees above the horizon. Compare that to winter sun angles in Florida, which are as high as 38 degrees.

Fortunately, the lettuce stood right next to the Aerogarden hydroponic setup in which DF was growing Tumbling Tom cherry tomatoes. This setup features lights that are on for as long as we are up.

Although the romaine wasn’t directly under those grow lights, it got enough to survive. As you can see.

 

Read more

Spring, and cake, and springy cake.

by

Spring has sprung,

The grass has riz,

I wonder where the flowers is?

That’s a little poem my dad used to recite when I was a kid. He was also fond of:

Spring has sprung,

The grass is riz,

The bird is on the wing.

Isn’t that absurd?

I always thought the wing was on the bird.

Trouble is, spring hasn’t sprung – not reliably, anyway. As I noted in “Snow and soup,” we’ve been having back-and-forth weather. One day it’s so sunny and mild that it’s 95 degrees in our closed-up greenhouse. Then it drops into the 30s at night and only grudgingly inches back into the 40s the next day.

Today my niece sent a photo of a strawberry blossom in the bed next to her foundation. Woo hoo! And when will our less-protected beds follow suit?

While snow meant soup, sorta-spring has meant cake. I may have a new favorite. And it’s frugal cake.

 

Read more

Snow and soup.

by

All the snow had melted. The ground was clear for probably 10 days. Teeny-tiny plants were popping up in the bed next to the house, self-seeded from either the spinach or the Asian greens that grew there last year. Maybe both.

Close by the seedlings, dandelions loomed like Godzilla over the population of Tokyo. Eventually they’ll get pulled out, but for now I just let them grow so I could pick them for the boiling bag.

Here are there in this south-facing bed, the rhubarb was peeking up above the soil. The deep pinky-red spears and low, dark-green leaves made a stark contrast to the dark, wet soil. It made me think about lovely cobblers, and batches of compote for my homemade yogurt, and maybe a few rhubarb-raspberry pies.

Speaking of raspberries: They weren’t exactly budding, but they were definitely thinking about it. Although DF cut them back quite severely last fall, I was pretty sure they’d rally the way they did the last time he implemented his scorched-earth pruning policy.

And then the snow came back.

 

Read more

Still more s–t my boyfriend says.

by

This is the third in a series of posts spotlighting the at-times clever and at-times groaningly awful wordplay in which my partner regularly indulges. When he comes up with another zinger my response (other than laughter and/or eyerolls) is generally, “That’s going on the list.”

Not that I always remember to write them down. And not that all of them are suitable for sharing; some are too obscure and convoluted, and others are just kinda naughty.

Too, some of them aren’t pun-ny – they’re just odd.

About the headline: It spins off the best-selling book (and short-lived TV series), “S#*t My Dad Says.” The author was a guy whose father was given to pithy pronouncements, some of which were definitely NSFW.

The other two posts are linked at the end of this piece. Probably I should beg the readers’ pardon for sharing some of this stuff. But as Dogbert says, “Puns! Never apologize, never explain.”

Here, then is the third list. It almost certainly won’t be the last list.

Read more

In which the earth moves.

by

We get earthquakes fairly regularly* but not like this. Thanks to the instant news cycle, I’ve been getting calls and e-mails asking if we’re okay. Thus I figured I’d better post something.

I can say it was a big ’un. The local Tsunami Warning Center says it was 7.2 and followed almost immediately by another earthquake of 6.0.

It was loud, too. Rumble, rumble, rumble – a very locomotive-y noise, punctuated by the sound of falling books and breaking glassware.

DF immediately grabbed the piano – not to hold on for dear life, but to keep it from moving too far off the little blocks under its wheels. (Even so, it shifted about four inches to the west.)

I was on the phone with my daughter when it happened and kept asking her, “Can you hear this?” (meaning the rumble). Then I realized she was no longer on the line. When the shaking stopped, I was able to reach her and Abby calmly said, “Oh, good, you are okay.”

[Oh, boy: Another aftershock! That’s two in the past few minutes.]

 

Read more

Giveaway: “Sudsy Slim Rides Again.”

by

Hello again, and sorry to have maintained radio silence for so long. Some day I’ll let you know what kept me elsewhere.

Today is not that day, though. Today is the day for promoting Chad and Darin Carpenter’s second film, “Sudsy Slim Rides Again.” Specifically, it’s a day for giving away a copy of the DVD.

Their first film, “Moose: The Movie,” was shot entirely in Alaska, with a tight budget and a loose grip on reality. That one made me laugh like a loon, filled as it was with the type of goofy humor familiar to fans of Chad Carpenter’s “Tundra” comics.

Their sophomore effort is, frankly, less sophomoric than the first. Don’t get me wrong: It’s rife with humor, but is definitely more of a semi-serious attempt at movie-making.

Want to win a copy of this “spaghetti Northwestern”? Of course you do.

Read more

Wedding crashers.

by

The sun came out this evening, after five or six days of gloom and/or rain. DF suggested we ride over to Kincaid Park and enjoy a view of the water, or at least a view of anything other than our own yard and our own four walls.

The parking lot at the Kincaid Chalet (actually a former bunker for nuclear-armed Nike missiles) was fairly crowded. Not unusual, since a lot of special events take place there.

“I think it’s a wedding,” DF reported when I returned from getting my sunglasses from the car.

The chalet is probably the number-one place for wedding receptions in Anchorage. You get a great view Mt. Susitna (aka “Sleeping Lady”), Fire Island and Cook Inlet, plus tons of trees and, sometimes, moose and bears.

We heard music and laughter and a DJ’s booming voice, and saw nicely dressed people milling around outside the chalet, whose doors were open. We intended to walk on by. But then Louis Armstrong’s voice arose, singing “What A Wonderful World.”

I pulled up short. “Let’s dance.”

Read more

Newspaper is magic.

by

I spent a few hours at the public library yesterday, researching an upcoming article and working on a preliminary outline. Being me, I brought along a snack (peanuts from a giant Costco can) and a soft drink* that I’d partially frozen and wrapped in newspaper (diet sodas taste better very, very cold).

When I unwrapped the drink my eye fell on the newspaper’s date: June 20, 2016.

Aside from a little fraying around the edges the section was as readable as it ever was, although I’ve been using it fairly often for more than two years now.

Oh, newsprint: I will miss you when you’re gone.

 

Read more

Heat wave? It’s all relative.

by

The mercury edged over 80 degrees yesterday, the second or third day of the heat wave. Anchorage residents moaned and sighed and even jumped into local lakes. For my great-nephews that meant Jewel Lake, whose waters are somewhere between 50 and 54 degrees.

By comparison, the water off Cape May, NJ, averages 73 degrees in July. No swimmer’s itch, either, although there might be jellyfish from time to time.

I grew up in a hot, humid place, and remember lying awake wishing that the box fan in the window would magically find cool air and send it my way. My jobs in that region – a commercial greenhouse, a bakery and a glass factory – were not terribly comfortable, either.

In hot-and-humid Oak Park, Ill., our place had two air conditioners: one in the bedroom and one to cool the rest of the apartment. The bedroom cooled off just fine when the door was closed. The other rooms were never really cool, though. They were just a little less hot.

When I lived in Seattle the temperatures went over 100 from time to time (and my south- and west-facing windows grabbed every available ray). I’ve spent time in Phoenix in the summer, and last year encountered both dehydration and, I believe, a touch of heat stroke. (Thank goodness for air conditioning, tile floors and that jug of iced tea.)

I’ve even been in Death Valley in the summer. On purpose. Even so, I have to admit that an Alaska “heat wave” is startlingly uncomfortable.

 

Read more