This, plus one more day, and then I will push this blog into the past to make way for the new one

Counting today, this blog has two more days and then it is done. I plan to begin a new one Sunday, January 1, 2012.

Between now and then, I will spend more than the usual amount of time working on my blog - but not this blog - the next blog - which I have yet to set up or to even figure out how to set up.

I have been taking plenty of pictures - would you believe over 1000 frames today? - but I will keep today's entry and tomorrow's final entry very simple and short, so as to free up time to figure out how to begin anew.

I chose this picture from Thursday's very late morning breakfast at Abby's Home Cooking for one reason - to thank the anonymous blog reader who bought it for me.

I did question Abby to see if I could get some clues as who this anoymous gifter might be. I learned that she likes horses - and that gives me a pretty good idea. Still, there are numerous people who like horses and so, having a strong suspicion as to who it might be but not a certain knowledge, I will just say:

Thank you, anonymous gifter who likes horses.

Thursday's breakfast was very good: ham, eggs over easy, hashbrowns and, for desert, homemade wheatbreak and homemade rhubarb-apricot jam.

Breakfast, coffee break; Melanie comes out and we decorate the tree

Now, today:

In the morning, I got up and drove to Abby's Home Cooking. Abby had been at the wedding last night with her family, including daughter Emily who was a member of the bridal party.

So I decided I would go and let her fix breakfast for me.

I passed this cyclist along the way.

As you can see, another horrid mass of warm air has moved in from the Pacific - just like I speculated it would when I was trying to read the signs and predict the weather.

Damnit!

I hate this warm weather in December.

Funny, if any place else in the country, including the coldest states of the northern tier, had experienced the degree of consistent cold that we did in November, the religious among them would have said it was a sign that end was coming soon.

Hmmmm... perhaps all this warm weather in December here in South Central Alaska means... the end is coming soon?

There she is - Abby - cooking away behind the counter. This morning was the busiest I have ever seen it at Abby's. Every table but one was filled and there was action at the counter, too.

Shelly was not there to help her, because Shelly had run the restaurant all by herself all yesterday so that Abby could go to the wedding.

Abby's husband Andy was there, helping her.

Still, Abby was waitressing, cooking and busing.

If business keeps building up like this, she is going to have to hire more help.

As always at Abby's, I enjoyed my breakfast.

I guess I didn't totally work through the afternoon. Margie took the car and went shopping, so, having little rituals that I follow to keep me sane, when the time came, I walked to Metro Cafe for my coffee break. As I walked, this airplane flew by to both inspire and taunt me.

If it had been me up there, I would have had skis on by now.

I surely would have.

I'm not criticising, mind you.

This pilot might have a perfectly good reason to have kept this plane on wheels.

I can't think of a good reason, but the pilot might have thought of one.

Still, I would have rejected such a thought.

One of Carmen's guests had brought his 1974 yearbook to Metro. I would tell you his name, but I am going to let you see if you can figure it out for yourself.

If you can't, then I am sorry to say it, but your own education was a waste.

I don't care if you are a historian now, getting paid millions of dollars by government agencies and $60,000 a speech - if you can't figure this out...

Now, don't anybody post your answers in comments.

If you were wrong, I would hate to have to inform you.

In the evening, Melanie came over. We ate dinner, then we ate Alaska Wildberry chocolates. After that, we decorated the tree - or least Melanie and Margie did, after they went out into the yard while I was working on the wedding and cut it down.

For a long time, Margie had what she called "a Charlie Brown tree" all picked out.

They didn't cut it, though, because Melanie found another, even better, Charlie Brown tree.

Now, I have a very serious question to ask you:

Do you see any chocolate on the left side of Melanie's face?

Do you see any chocolate on the right side of Melanie's face?

Neither do I.

This is important, because a bit after I took these pictures, Melanie saw the image of herself in a mirror. She claims that chocolate was spread all across her face. She says she then washed that chocolate off.

She then began to scold me, telling me not to dare put a picture of her with chocolate on her face in the blog.

You didn't have chocolate on your face, I told her.

Yes I did, she insisted, and don't use any pictures showing chocolate on my face. Delete them. Delete them all.

I never delete a picture, I told her.

It didn't matter. There was no chocolate.

Margie hangs a Christmas tree ornament.

Melanie hangs a birch bark canoe ornament on a high branch. "We should get a star for the top," Margie said.

"Okay," I agreed.

This conversation has taken place now for, oh, I don't know... 25 years now? 30.

We really should, though.

Or an angel.

Or a cat, holding a song book, singing Christmas carols.

It could have a chip in it and really sing.

Last came the tinsel.

When it was done, I noticed they hadn't put the airplane oraments on the tree.

"Why didn't you put the airplanes on the tree?" I asked, reasonably.

"You have to do it," Melanie said.

"No," I said. "You could have done it."

"No. You always scold me. 'Don't put the airplanes on the tree,' you always say, 'only I can do that.'"

"No," I countered, truth on my side but to no avail, "I never say that."

Yet, it was clear that if the airplanes were going to get on the tree, I would have to do it.

So I did.

There were only two of them.

What happened to the rest?

I had enough airplane ornaments to decorate a whole tree all by themselves.

Not that I would ever do that.

But I had enough.

Where did they go?

Probably flew away, I guess.

Finally, the tree was done. The three of us stood before it and altogether we sang, "Oh Christmas Tree."

Or at least I did. All by myself.

Or at least I sang this much of it, in a non-existant key of my own invention:

"Oh, Christmas tree, oh, Christmas tree! How lovely are thy branches!"

"Dad," Melanie challenged, "are those the real lyrics? Or did you make them up?"

View images as slides

I turn the clock back to right side up and fall into wedding preparations; etc - and three Young Writer studies

I decided that it was time to turn the clock back to rightside up. I wasn't certain that I could do it if I didn't absolutely have to - and I didn't have to. But I wanted to see what daylight looked again - even if it was just the muted daylight of Wasilla in December. "If I get up before 11:00, I'm going to go to Abby's for breakfast," I told Margie, just before she went to bed at 1:00 AM.

I stayed up for three more hours. There was no point in trying to go to bed early - I would just lie awake if I did. So, at 4:00 AM, I set my iPhone alarm for 10:00 AM - and then I just lay in bed awake, until close to 6:00 AM. After that, I slept sporadically until a few minutes before 9:00 AM, then I got up, auto-started the car and then, right about 9:00 AM, climbed in and headed over. 

As I drove down Seldon toward Abby's, I got the thrill of my life: I saw a school bus coming.

As I parked, I could see Heather through the window. I could not see Abby. I could not see her truck, either. That's because she was home, visiting grandkids.

When the cafe first opened up on the Fourth of July, Abby tried opening up at 7:00 AM, but that didn't work out too good and it gave her a very long work day, as the restaurant does not close until 8:00 PM. So she tried opening up at 8:00, but that didn't work that great, either. She said that I was about the only one who came at those hours, and since I usually only come once a week, she moved opening time to 9:00 AM.

I was the first customer of the day. I took a seat at the table that I always do if no one beats me to it - the little round one, right by the window adjacent to the door.

There was a card lying on the window sill, so I picked it up to see what it was. I would tell you, but you can see for yourself.

I turned it over to see what was on the backside and found out that the guy on the front was St. Michael. And here was a prayer to him, beseeching him to use his sword against evil on behalf of the supplicant.

A pickup pulled up and a woman got out. I recognized her immediately, so I pointed my camera at her to see what she might look like viewed through the reflections upon the window.

Again, you can see for yourself.

It was Arlene Warrior, who I had first met over 25 years ago when she was Arlene Lord, a student at the University of Alaska, Anchorage. I was working for the Tundra Times then, and was doing a story on Alaska Native students at UAA. 

I don't remember all the details about the interview and the story that I wrote way back then, but I do remember that she hoped that once she got out of college whatever she learned might help her to earn lots of money.

Now she told me that her daughter was getting married December 16, and she wanted me to be the photographer.

Oh, that is always a tough one! 

I am not a wedding photographer.

But how could I say, "no?" I told her to give me a little time to think about it. I told her that if I did it, I would not shoot it like a wedding photographer does, but like a photojournalist.

She said that was good.

I asked if she would mind if I put it on this blog and said that would be fine.

She wondered how much she would pay me.

I didn't know.

When I was in New York in late September/early October, I met a photojournalist who also shoots weddings. He charges $15,000 a wedding and will only shoot on the condition that he will do the editing and pick the pictures, which he then makes a Blurb type book out of. 

He limits himself to six weddings a year. With the income from those weddings, he is then free to go about and shoot the photojournalism projects that he wants. If he doesn't make a lot of money, fine. His wedding work will carry him through.

But there is no way I can charge $15,000 - not even close.

The wedding will be at the Alyeska ski resort. Her daughter will wear a dress that Arlene described as beautiful, white, buckskin. If I remember right, Arlene made it - but maybe it was her daughter or perhaps they sewed on it together.

Arlene went back to the truck and then came back with this piece of moose skin that her mother, who lives in Kaktovik, gave her. Arlene is making it into a wedding shirt for her son, Roland Warrior, who was named after her father, the late Roland Lord.

Arlene and her husband are spending a lot of money on this wedding, but there are two things they are not going to spend money on - liquor and the bar, and the Alyeska Starbucks coffee shop. "I'm not going to get anybody drunk," she explained to me. If any of the guests want to go to the bar and buy drinks for themselves, then that will be fine.

As for the coffee, Arlene says she will not patronize Starbucks. This, she said, is because on 9/11, there was a Starbucks not far from Ground Zero that stayed open. When thirsty firemen, risking their lives in the hope that they might save others, Starbucks made them pay for water, she told me.

So she does not patronize Starbucks, and Starbucks is the coffee shop at Alyeska.

"If people want to go into Starbucks and buy their own coffee, okay," she told me.

Pretty soon, Heather came with my omelette and hashbrowns, cooked by Shelly. Boy, that omelette was good! Abby's Home Cooking produces the best omelettes I have bought in this valley.

As I drove home the moderately long way, this snowplow came charging past.

It was about this same time that my iPhone alarm went off in my pocket.

Back home, Pistol-Yero was chillin' in the warmth of the fireplace.

Before I started to work, I took a walk. This raven came flying by, a feather missing. Did you see the raven, Sandy?

Soundarya? Soundu? 

At 4:00 PM, I headed out on the usual excursion to Metro Cafe, where I shot three Young Writer studies. Here is the first:

Study of the Young Writer, Shoshana, #3222: The young writer smiles as she prepares an order for whomever is inside the truck in front of me.

Study of the Young Writer, Shoshana, #42: The young writer prepares to deliver that order.

Study of the Young Writer, Shoshana, #10,029: Shoshona with her beau, Justin. As you can see they are very happy together. May they long remain so.

I took the long way home. Not as long as some long ways. I didn't drive through Texas. That would have been the long way home. But it was longer than it could have been if I had taken the most direct route, which is very boring and it gets me home too fast.

Along the way, I crossed paths with a school bus.

View images as slides

I stepped out of the house twice today and these are the people that I saw

Determined to get myself on a schedule that is more in sync with the world around me, at 3:30 in the morning I set my iPhone alarm for 10:00 AM, right about sunrise. I had not engaged in my favorite morning activity for quite some time - going out for breakfast. I told Margie that if I made it up before 11:00, I would go to breakfast at Abby's and invited her to come with me.

I didn't sleep very good and I don't think I will until these shingles leave me. I believe they are on the retreat, the scabs are gone and the color is fading, but even so they are pretty damn tenacious. When the alarm went off, I could hardly move. So I tapped "snooze." Pretty soon it went off again, so I tapped "snooze" again.

I did this about three times and then finally got up at about 10:20.

Margie had already eaten, so I went to Abby's Home Cooking by myself.

Tim Mahoney was there, drinking his coffee from a cowboy cup. That's bowhead balleen from Barrow on the wall, brought back by another Mahoney brother who had been working on a construction project.

This is baby Luke. Just like baby Lynx, he was born small - five pounds, eight ounces. He went down to five pounds before he started gaining weight but now he is growing and looks fit and happy.

The eggs, ham, hashbrowns, homemade wheat bread toast cut thick and topped with butter and raspberry jam were excellent.

Abby said she had been worried about me and Margie because she had not seen us for a long time. She looked at this blog to reassure herself but still was worried. So she wouldn't let me pay for breakfast, because she was that relieved to see me.

I left a big tip.

A little after 4:00 PM, I headed out into the dark and ventured off to Metro Cafe. I have not shot any Young Writer studies for quite awhile, but here is one:

Shoshana the Young Writer, Study #2228: Shoshana about to prepare my Americano.

And one more:

Shoshana the Young Writer, Study #4: Shoshana stirs cream and raw sugar into my Americano.

And that pretty much sums up the people I saw during my two adventures outside the house today.

The girl who sat across the room at breakfast time

As usual when Margie is off spending her weekdays in town to help Lavina with the little ones, I got up thinking that I should fix myself some oatmeal, for reasons of economy, health and time, but quickly found an excuse not to. It was cold in the house, maybe about 40-45 degrees and to build a fire felt like a waste of wood, what with Margie not here to enjoy the heat.

She has the car, so I got on my bike and pedaled to Abby's Home Cooking. There were many frozen puddles along the way and I made a point to pedal right across as many of them as I could. Some broke, crunched and crackled beneath my tires and some didn't. The ones that broke did so because after the surface had frozen, the water beneath had gone away, leaving just air bubbles behind and the ice covering those bubbles was not strong enough to support the weight of me and my bike.

Then I got to Abby's and it was warm inside. I ordered ham, eggs over easy, hashbrowns and coffee.

I'm not quite sure what Danille, Abby's grandniece who will be two next week, had ordered. Maybe it was a breakfast milkshake... an eggs, bacon, potatoes and blueberry pancake shake.

I've never had one, but I understand they are quite tasty.