Brrrrrrr

Ok, so I’ve been a big time blog slacker of late and I’ve got a couple of major updates since my last post.
1) I’m freezing my snowballs off.
2) I’ve made some headway on my quest to win the 2010 Iditarod…

So, I’ll start with being cold…since that’s exactly what I am ALL day. The weather has taken a serious dip in the past few weeks. To be short, it was nearly -40 degrees with wind-chill on my way to work on Thursday! This past week it’s been consistently -10 to -15 degrees without wind-chill. Honestly, I thought I was pretty tough and fairly prepared for the weather here. I mean, c’mon, I’ve survived a few Boston winters! But, it is so cold here that when the weather climbed up to about 5 degrees early in the week I was walking around with out a hat and several people declared it, “warm”.

To make it even more challenging, the sunlight is heading the way of the warmth…Sunrise is after 10am each morning now and it is setting before 5pm. Now that’s not too bad but, as I’ve mentioned before, we’re losing our sunlight at a rate of about 5 minutes every day. It’s amazing to think about but we’re actually just under a month away from the darkest day here. On December 20th, the winter solstice, we’ll have just about 4 hours of day light. In anticipation for this I’ve already started taking Vitamin D supplements, and plan on spending at least a little time in front of our “happy” lamp.

Don’t get me wrong…I’m not complaining. I think this is awesome! I’m not sure I’d want to deal with this every winter but I’m very excited to experience what’s well known as a “Bethel Winter”. Even in Alaska, you’re considered pretty hardcore if you live in Bethel. And, there are some really cool benefits to this weather. For one, my walk to work has been almost cut in half. Typically, I had been walking through my neighborhood to a boardwalk that crossed the tundra and ponds to my office. Now I walk out my backdoor and walk straight across the tundra and a pond to come up right behind my office. There is also some cool recreation that comes with the cold. For all of you current and former (tear) BC students you’re probably familiar with “Broom Ball”. The Campus School at BC held a Broom Ball tournament every year in Conte Forum. Well, every Saturday since we arrived in Bethel there have been pickup sports games. It started as soccer and turned into flag football once the fall came. And now, we’ve advanced on to weekly Broom Hockey games. This is no rag tag pick up game. We have official broom hockey sticks that look almost like upside down lacrosse sticks. The ball we use is very similar to a mini-soccer ball. Even at -10 degrees Saturday we had almost twenty people out there for a couple of hours. For the Broom Hockey newbies, the sport is played in sneakers/boots and is just like roller hockey with out any pads, even for the goalies. They’re so hardcore here we even (kind of) play with offsides! Our Swamp Donkey’s team would have our work cut out for us! And it should be noted, that since we’ll have ice here until April, our Broom Hockey season will take us through March...

As for the Iditarod…Recently (and fairly unintentionally) I received a crash course in dog-mushing. Our family friends, the Klejka’s, have their dog team and sometimes need a hand running the dogs. When mushing the dogs outside of town on the tundra you need a small crew of people just in case things go awry…and with a team full of dogs that have been waiting impatiently to get out and run around, small ‘hiccups’ are likely. On the sled, you have the Musher; the person who is standing and controlling the dogs. There is also someone who sits in the sled. Basically, their job is damage control. Typically this has been my job. I was handed a pair of hooks attached by about 8 feet of rope to the sled. In case the Musher gets tossed from the sled, I can theoretically stop the dogs simply by tossing the hooks to the side and allowing them to catch in the tundra, pulling the sled to a painful and abrupt stop. "Theoretically" was the key word in that sentence. A couple times on our training run, our fearless musher Jessie was thrown from the sled leaving me in a semi-panic stricken, semi-ecstacic state bouncing around on a runaway sled. And, while the hooks stick well in the snow on the Tundra, they are completely useless on ice. A couple of times I was left trying to jam hooks into the frozen ponds as the dogs pushed eagerly on into the great Alaskan wilderness. Needless to say, I finally jammed the hooks into the ground once we reached a patch of tundra, Jessie breathlessly stumbled up to the sled and we made it back to tell the tale. It may not have been the smoothest few practices but I’m finally making some serious progress in conquering the Iditarod. In fact, Jessie Klejka’s older sister Jessica (interesting fact: all 9 members of the Klejka family begin with ‘J’) actually won the Jr. Iditarod last year in dramatic fashion, coming in just 3 seconds ahead of the 2nd place finisher after having to carry an injured member of her dog team on her sled for the final leg. Soooo, I’m learning from a family of winners…Basically, it’s in the bag!

"TREEEEES!!!"

So this dated in October because I wrote it a while ago and forgot to post. Anyway....

Never have I been so excited to see trees than when I stopped off the plane in Anchorage at the end of October. We spent about 5 days in the CITY as part of our JVC Alaska retreat. The houses from Sitka, Juneau, Bethel and Anchorage all met in Sara Palin's stomping ground, Wasilla. Now that I think about it, there was a woman hawking books on a street corner that looked very similar to her. Hmmm........

One of the coolest parts of my weekend in the Anchorage area was a hike that I went on with my roomates John and Joe and our friend Greg from the Sitka house. Anchorage is beautiful. It sits right on the water and is surrounded by mountains in nearly all directions...basically the complete opposite of Bethel. Our adventure-starved crew rented a car and headed off to the nearest mountain trail. We ended up on a pretty amazing hike and experiencing our first Alaska snow. It was about 50 degrees at the base of the mountain but up near the summit it was snowing.




Just when we thought we had finally made it back to the base, we got word that there was a herd of moose just a short walk away. We certainly weren't about to let a real, in the wild, moose sighting pass us by. We hustled down the path until we discovered the perfect "National Geographic-like" scene. 16 moose were grazing just a 100 yards away! Bethelites would have been in moose heaven!

Wild Times in Bethel!!!

This past week we had an absolutely wild Friday night! And by, "absolutely wild Friday night" I am not referring to any raging parties or adventures on the town. Our wild night included...

1) Going to the "Friendly Dog Farm" where John, Jamie (our area director) and I took care of the 35 sled dogs, the same ones that I helped run in the past. The caretakers were away for the weekend and by some miracle decided that they trusted us enough to care for their prized possesions while they were gone. Taking care of these dogs is very different from anydogsitting I've ever done. At no time were we sprinkling kibble in a bowl, patting the dog playfuly on the head or tossing them a cute little doggy treat for being good.

First was the feeding...The moment the dogs even THINK that you're within 100 yards of the dog farm the howling begins. Ever hear 35 hungry dogs howling like they hadn't been fed in three weeks? When Casey was giving directions before the weekend she made sure to explain everything a good distance from the dog yard. Barely paying attention I chuckled to myself thinking, "what the hec is she so worried about?" Well, I learned very quickly. Once we got through the gate into the dog yard even trying to talk to John, who was 5 feet away, was a near impossiblity. I felt like a quarterback trying to send signals to my teamates amid the deafening roar of the crowd at an away stadium. (Basically, nothing like Alumni) John and I quickly retreated to a corner, all while dodging dogs left and right, where we strategized the best way to go about our business. I addition to the hostile atmosphere the food can really send you staggering. These dogs don't get your run-of-the-mill kibble. We had to make a carefuly measured concoction of kibble, left-over restaraunt grease, and chunks of salmon (bones and all) from a pot of a "fish stew". This fish stew is basically just a giant pot (about 3 feet in diameter) of water and full dead salmon. Let me tell you, salmon doesn't smell so good when its left out in a pot of warmed water. The farm has a walk in freezer stocked floor to ceiling with the salmon they use for the dogs. And, according to Casey, they make a transistion from salmon to BEAVER for the winter. In addition to feeding the dogs we also had a few other "small" tasks. One dog needed to take pills (why, I have no idea). All I know is I was the lucky one who got to stick the pill down Rudy's throat. I'm just glad Rudy liked me...I still have all my fingers! Other responsibilities include scooping poop, taking care of some month-old puppies (really cute), and making sure none of the dogs have escaped from their chain. A dog freeing himself from his post is not unlike the scene of a jailbreak. As soon as a dog's free, mayhem erupts! Every other dog in the yard starts hooting and hollering and straining as hard as they can against the heavy duty chain to join the escape. We only had one attempt that was succesfuly foiled when the dog dragged his chain and pole along with him through the yard just a few feetbefore he got tangled with another dog. "FREEEEEDO...ughhhhh"

2) Once we finished with the dogs we headed home. Our journey was interrupted, however, when we noticed a pack of cars on the side of the road and people standing in truck beds craning their necks to see something in the brush. We obviously had to stop and check out the situation. What if we missed something exciting in Bethel?!? We would never forgive ourselves...just kidding...but seriously, we wouldn't. John slammed on his breaks and we all leaped out of the car to see what was going on (John was so excited that he forgot to put the car in gear and it started to roll away...) Turned out that two young moose calves had wandered into town. News got around fast because half of Bethel was there to see them. Even being in Alaska it is extemely rare to have moose in Bethel. Part of the reason is that Bethel is surrounded, for the most part, by tundra which isn't exactly known for being ideal for moose. Unfortunately for my roomates and I there's a no hunting law in Bethel (something about 'safety concerns'), not to mention that moose hunting season was over. The moose flaunted their immunity and seemed to enjoy the attention as all of Bethel watched with excitement. I stood in awe watching these moose eat their dinner, then it hit me...I have been transformed, at least partially, into a Bethelite. Looking around at the masses of people I felt like part of the community and i was really having FUN watching a moose eat a bush. THEN, a voice of reason spoke from above (well actually from behind...). Examining the scene, a man commented only half-joking, "We REALLY need a recreation hall in Bethel!" Aw well...

And the winner is.....

Hey! Check out the first minute and a half of this news clip (on the right side of the page) that played on the state news in Alaska!

http://www.ktuu.com/global/story.asp?s=11277937#

On Tuesday we had our long awaited election that gave Bethel residents an opportunity to lift the local option. The issues surrounding alcohol restrictions in the area are being highly debated even more-so now that Bethel has control of its own rules and regulations. An update on this election soon to come!

"CUCKOOO, CUCKOOOOOO!!!"

Just another Sunday night in Bethel…This past weekend my roommates and I went Ptarmigan hunting. Ptarmigans (said like, ‘Tarmigan’) are medium sized birds found on the tundra that surrounds Bethel. No, we didn’t have a gun, crossbow or even a bow-and-arrow in our arsenal. We had a beat-up 1980’s 5 passenger station wagon, 2 radio stations and some good company. See, the trick to catching these Ptarmigans is NOT concentration and pinpoint accuracy …it’s simply cruising around town in any old clunker car as it gets dark. Heading out when it’s dark outside is vital… These brilliant birds actually fly into telephone wires and poles, knocking themselves unconscious. Our job as the hunter is to find the helpless poultry, throw a bag over it and kill it by spinning it around a couple times in a helicopter motion. Sounds pretty easy…

The seven of us piled into the stealthy hunting vehicle just as it neared dusk and set off to find some unconscious prey. We drove around some of the back roads for over an hour scouring the ground for any signs of these white beauties. Unfortunately, we had no luck. We pulled out all of the stops…even attempting to lure the Ptarmigans to us with my best Ptarmingan mating call. My mating calls proved fruitless and no Ptarmigans were apprehended. We haven’t given up hope however…we’ll be making the rounds a few more times over the next couple of weeks. Just last week, my roommate Joe came within inches of catching his first Ptarmigan…except when he reached for the bird it suddenly sprang to life in his hands and narrowly escaped becoming our dinner.

Clearly, our subpar hunting skill isn’t what’s keeping us fed. Thankfully, we have generous friends in the community. In addition to the millions of salmon that have been donated to us, we’ve also been given duck and moose. We had a delicious ‘moose stew’ for dinner last week. If you’ve never eaten moose, I highly suggest it. Moose hunting season just ended here so there is a good amount of moose in town right now. Each moose has about 800 POUNDS OF MEAT!!! Needless to say my roommates and I never caught the elusive moose…maybe next year?!

On a separate note, we're slowly losing our daylight here. On my first night in Bethel it was light outside until just after midnight. Since then however, we've been losing about 6 minutes of light EVERY day. Now it's actually getting dark close to 9pm. That probably doesn't seem so bad but at 6 minutes a day, we're heading for some dark days ahead. We'll continue to lose daylight until mid-winter (January-ish) when there is just about 4 hours of light a day (from 11am-3pm). There's a good chance that I'll go through an entire day seeing just a few minutes of daylight as I walk to the courthouse or lunch. TIB

This week I get to travel to Anchorage for the annual Public Defender's Conference. It will be a cool opportunity for me to a learn a bit more about the CINA cases and law in general. I'm also just really excited to see some mountains and experience another part of Alaska!

Jabzz

Please keep my friend Jabulani’s family in your prayers. He was a friend of mine from South Africa who passed away just a couple of days ago.

Next Stop: Iditarod

This past weekend I made my first, very important, step towards winning this year’s Iditarod… Our friend Mike invited me and a couple of the roomies to help ‘run’ the dogs. ‘Running’ dogs, as I mentioned in the previous entry, basically just means 'training them'. Because there’s no snow yet the dogs are forced to run the streets of Bethel. Eventually, when it snows (in like 15 minutes) we’ll hook them up to a sled and actually take them out for realski.

For a basic intro to dog sledding, based entirely on my very limited knowledge…Sled dogs stay in a dog yard of sorts. There will be a bunch of dogs chained up to posts and each with its own dog house. At this particular house there are about thirty dogs which get broken up into about three teams. The first and second team will race in all of the major races including the Kuskokwim 300, one of the biggest races in Alaska. The dogs train and race throughout the entire year except in the summer when it’s simply too “hot” to take them out. The max temperature they like to ‘run’ the dogs at is 50 degrees. Any hotter and the dogs over-heat. After the dogs’ long, boring summer they are all ecstatic to start training again which I learned quickly as I was pounced on and nipped at by excited huskies.

I’ve been helping out with these dogs on weekends and this weekend we made that major step towards actually racing. We learned how to hook up the dogs into their spots and bring them on a training run. They formation is probably exactly what you’ve seen on TV. We had 5 rows of 2 dogs. Maybe the funniest part about the whole experience was taking them from their dog house to their spot in the line. You’re supposed to grab their collar and pull upwards forcing the dogs to stand on their hind legs. Then, they hop like a kangaroo the fifteen or so yards to their spot in the line where we connected them to a beastly six-wheeler that looks very similar to a Gator. No sooner did we have the dogs in their spots than we were jetting off down the street. The entire process of unhooking the dogs from their chain and bringing them to their spot is a chaotic, noisy and sometimes frustrating endeavor. The dogs are so excited to be moving around that they have no regard for the pitiful rookie (me) trying to hop them like a kangaroo then hook them up in their spot. They don't waste anytime as the moment they’re hooked up the dogs are pulling. We actually had to put a block in front of a wheel of the six-wheeler so they wouldn’t take off without us. God bless these dogs, they were pulling as hard as they could but we kept the six-wheeler at a cool eight miles and hr to pace them a little bit.

My vantage point was fantastic. I’ve never experienced anything like it. I was cruising down main streets in a sweet six wheeler being pulled by ten very hyper sled dogs who were leaving a trail of slobber and sweat in their wake.

A couple of times an extremely bold (some might say slightly idiotic) dog would run out into the street to challenge the sled dogs who were now parading through their territory. Don’t be fooled by the amazing strength and ambition of these sled dogs... as soon as they saw a challenger they immediately slammed on the brakes and began a chorus of barking, snarling and posturing. Casey, Mike’s partner, and I sat powerless as these dogs all tried to get a piece of the poor sap that thought it stood a chance. Besides a few minor hiccups the training went great. We cruised around Bethel for about twenty five minutes. Any longer would have been a real struggle for the dogs, especially in this weather. It was about 55 degrees and I could tell by the frothing mouths and 3 feet of slobber hanging off one of the dogs that we were pushing our luck a little bit.

After the run was an equally amazing sight to the hyper, crazy pre-run moments. My roommate John commented that it looked like Casey and I had driven around the corner, beat the crap out of the dogs and come back. The dogs were covered in slobber and panting so heavily that the drool literaly poured out of their mouths. An even better indication of how tired they were…they actually let me take their restraints off. Although it was easier to unhook them, there was also the disadavantage of being covered in doggy drool.

All in all, it was one of those TIB moments. It was really cool to get an inside look at an activity that is so ingrained in the culture of Alaska. I’m really excited to see the team progress over the next few weeks until it snows somtime in October.

Random comments….

BC football…54 yards. Seriously?!?!?!

I had to wear a winter hat today on my run…very depressing.

My land line phone here is 907-543-2319. You are all welcome to call here anytime. (Just remember it’s probably a 4 hr difference for most of you!)

I miss you all and I love to hear updates so feel free to send me an email pj.driscoll1@gmail or just say ‘hi’ on my Facebook.


PEACE

TIB

TIB = This Is Bethel

This a little phrase that my roomates and I use to explain the things that happen here that just leave you shaking your head in confusion because you have never experienced anything like it. (Ten points if you name the movie that we got "TIB" from. Hint: "TIA")

For instance... I woke up one morning towards the end of August and began my walk to work like I do every other morning cutting behind some abandoned apartments to the board walk that crosses the tundra. I took one step onto the boardwalk and nearly 'bit it'. The boardwalk was frosted over. IN AUGUST. By the end of the day it was about 60 degrees and I was walking around in a t-shirt. TIB

A few times I've tried to get to the library or the gym and they've been closed due to 'staff shortages'. The 'staff shortages' are a result of the flu that everyone and their mom seems to be getting in Bethel. (watch out mom, the flu's coming!) When one or two people are out these places are on 'staff shortage'. Word on the street is swine flu has made it to Alaska somehow...over 30% of the high school was absent the other day. TIB

We went out boating on the river the other day and on our way back we say a little 10 ft boat with an ENORMOUS moose (weighing almost 1,500 pounds) in it. Moose hunting season just began at the beginning of September after 5 years of a hiatus. The hiatus was an attempt to build up the moose population in the Delta (the area I live in). Everything in the area basically stops while moose hunting season goes on. We're waiting for a construction crew to finish our siding and at the court they say its almost impossible to get jurors right now because people are out hunting. One thing I've learned is that hunting has a VERY different meaning here than back home in many of the lower 48 (that's where you city slickers live). Here hunting is done for survival. Many of the people here practice subsistence living; hunting and fishing for their food. My roomates and I have dreams about tracking down a moose ourselves! TIB

The past few weeks a couple of my roomates and I have been helping out with some dog teams. Dog racing is HUGE in Bethel. Bethel hosts the Kuskokwim 300, one of the biggest Dog Races in all of Alaska. Every Sunday we have dinner with a local family whose daughter won the Jr. Iditarod last year by 2 seconds. Most of you have probably heard of the Iditarod which is Alaska's most famous race and stretches for 1,000 miles. Hopefuly within the next few weeks I'll be helping 'run' dogs. We'll strap the dogs to a four wheeler and they'll train by running around town. It's not out of the ordinary to see a team of sled dogs cruising around on the gravel streets as we head into dog racing season. Before you know it I'll be competing for the Iditarod! TIB

This was a fairly quick update so there will be more to follow. Sorry there haven't been pictures but it takes about three years to load them on the internet here. TIB

Also, I do NOT have a cell phone here. I guess I should have mentioned that a month ago. There are no cell phone towers that call outside of Bethel. Cell phones are slowly making there way here but so far there are no major carriers. TIB

I love you all.

Peace.

It's cold....and it's only August :(

A lot has happened in the past two weeks...

We successfully completed TWO trips to the grocery store!!! Trust me, that’s a big accomplishment! Each person (we have 7) has a monthly food stipend of $72! Yes, that’s per month. I easily went through $72 a week at school and now I’m trying to stretch that out over four weeks. My roommate John calculated that we’re spending a whopping $2.66 on each person a day for food. Not bad considering that milk is $9 and a bag of Tostitos costs $10! Guess we won’t be having chips and dip anytime soon. The 9$ milk is the real killer. My diet at home consisted of at least a couple glasses of milk a day. Now….well I mix some powdered milk, pinch my nose and chug… The high prices in Bethel are due to the fact that everything has to be shipped in. Since Bethel is not connected by road to any other city everything is either flown in or shipped in by boat up the Kuskokwim River. As frustrating as the food situation has been at times it has definitely been a good learning experience. We’ve really had to get creative with our meals. They’re not always good…. Our fridge was looking a little empty yesterday so we had to get real ‘creative’…I was in charge of the pasta dish. Being the master chef that I am, I used my expansive knowledge and skill set to make a pot of pasta-roni, spaghetti, and tuna. John then expertly cooked some corned beef hash and spam in oil (because obviously we don’t have butter).
Tuna Pasta roni + corned beef hash + SPAM = wholesome JV lunch

Another really interesting thing about Bethel is that it’s a “Damp” city. Alcohol sales are illegal in Bethel. However, it is legal to possess and consume alcohol. So, to get alcohol people have to order it from liquor stores in other cities and ship it in or stock up when they leave Bethel. As you can imagine this is a point of huge controversy. Coming up in October the city is actually having a vote to make alcohol sales legal. Rates of alcoholism are extremely high in Bethel. Many of the crimes that take place are a direct result of the alcohol. The alcohol gets shipped in periodically (there are only 4 planes into Bethel each day) and when it does get shipped in people drink almost immediately it seems. Because of shipping costs, hard alcohol is the most price efficient (a bottle of 'cheap' vodka might still cost 80$) to have shipped in. What comes as a result of only having hard alcohol, and alcohol that gets shipped in periodically....is serious binge drinking.

Ok, so on to my job… I am working as a client advocate at the Bethel Public Defender’s Agency. A 'public defender' is a lawyer who is paid by the government and gets assigned to clients in the Bethel area who can not afford their own attorney. As a client advocate I’m helping both the lawyers and the client. I’m working specifically with CINA (said like ‘China’) cases. It stands for Children In Need of Aid. In these cases Child Services has removed children from the home because they determined that the parents weren’t fit to care for the kids. Most times this is a result of reports of domestic violence, abuse and alcoholism. Unfortunately, the Office of Child Services in Bethel is not exactly known for being the best run office in the state of Alaska. Many times our lawyers are arguing that the kids never should have been taken in the first place. Basically I, along with the lawyer, am helping parents get their children back from the state. That also means that in our position we are not necessarily taking into account what is "best for the kids." We are simply assigned to defend the parent's rights. My role in the whole situation...mostly I work with the clients to get them into AA programs or other treatment centers as needed. Essentially, I help them make the necessary steps to get their children back. I could rant on and on about these cases all day so I’ll spare you…for now

I’ll try to be more consistent with the blog posts in the next couple weeks! Miss you all. Lots of love from Bethel!

PEACE

Salmon, Salmon and more salmon.....

So after an incredibly long journey I finally made it to Bethel, Alaska!!!!!

WARNING: LONG POST AHEAD! PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!!!!!

Last week I was in Portland for orientation. We had to sit through a lot of workshops and lectures. Needless to say, I spent most of the week ready to get to Alaska.

We had to take 3 flights from Portland to Bethel on Saturday. All 3 flights were delayed for about an hour and half (each for separate reasons) and on top of that we were up at 4:30am so it made for the longest day of my life....LITERALLY. The sun didn't set until 11:30pm that night. Seriously. Sounds real cool except when all you want to do is sleep and your mind keeps telling you that it looks like its 2 or 3 in the afternoon even though its 10!

When we finally got here we were welcomed by a crowd of neighbors, "friends", and former volunteers who still live here. They brought us on a "tour" of Bethel. "Tour" is in quotes because
Bethel has one main road which is just a big doughnut. It's a 6 mile loop. The rest of the roads in town are dirt and gravel and branch off of it. The tour was literally just a drive around the loop in which our guides pointed out all of the big bldngs in town and all 6 of my roommates and I just sat with jaws dropped, nodding like bobble head dolls.

THIS IS WHERE WE ARE SPENDING A YEAR!?!?!?!?!?!?!

After the tour we were dropped at our house and given a few pieces of advice before being left to make ourselves at home. Bethel is essentially on a big marsh so all of the houses are on stilts. Our two story home is no different. The house was surprisingly nice. We have 5 bedrooms for 7 people. I lucked out big time and actually got a single with a queen sized bed. This happens to be in an old spa room so my bed is literally on top of an old hot tub!

Because Bethel is only 6,000 people EVERYONE knows who is town. Pictures of the seven of us have been circulating town on fliers for several weeks now. Word on the street is that these fliers have been posted in grocery stores and we actually saw a stack of them at church yesterday! At mass on Sunday they made all of us stand up in front of the parish and introduce ourselves then the pastor kindly invited everyone to OUR house that night for a pot luck dinner which we were hosting!

This has actually been such a blessing for our group. The community has been sooooo welcoming and takes a very vested interest in our well being. We haven't had to go grocery shopping or cook yet because of meals people have prepared for us and leftovers from the pot luck. We learned pretty quickly what our diet is going to look like this year. I'll put it this way....the only meal that I haven't eaten salmon at was breakfast this morning. We are right along a river where salmon are pretty abundant. People go catch their own salmon and eat it for almost every meal. We're planning on getting out on a boat this week to catch some salmon to stock up for the winter....which comes in October!

For the past week or so a couple of my roommates and I have been talking about getting ourselves a moose. They aren't that common in this area but we're keeping our eyes open!

Oh yeah, believe it or not gorceries are amazingly expensive. A gallon of milk costs 9$. Yes 9$! We're also thinking about just keeping a cow in our closet so we can have milk.

That is all for now. If you stuck it out this far you must really be my friend...or be really bored! Either way, thanks!.

Please post any questions or responses you have! I'd love to hear from you! If you have gmail I'm pretty sure you can just sign using your gmail account info instead creating a blogspot account to post.

Numero Uno

So I'm just a few days away from leaving for Portland then off to Bethel, AK from there! I'll update this blog as much as possible so you can check here if you haven't heard from me in a while.