Today, part 1: Before the ash fell - Scenes from my walk; hot water heater ruptured, replaced

I had barely begun my walk today when I came upon this moose. If you look closely, you can tell that it is the very same moose that I came upon yesterday, the one that inexplicably scared me. Well, today I redeemed myself. The moose did not scare me at all. I hung out with it for awhile and we visited. I learned that its name is Gertrude. 

Gertrude has a calf nearby and I photographed it, too, but I want to get this done and get to bed, so I will leave the calf out of the post.

A little further on my walk, I saw this kid on a four-wheeler.

Please note that this is not a state trooper, but a Wasilla police officer who is taking the driver's license from the poor sap in the van. (Should you ever happen to read this, poor sap, please do not get offended. Sooner or later, frequently or infrequently, we all do our time as poor saps.)

Even though they call this area Wasilla, and the mailing address is Wasilla, it is just beyond Wasilla city limits and the Wasilla police did not used to have jurisdiction here. Remember how I told you about the time I had to make a citizens arrest on the drunken ice cream lady and hold her as my prisoner for one hour while I waited for the Alaska State Troopers to come, because the Wasilla police would not?

Or did Wasilla finally incorporate my neighborhood and I just didn't hear about it?

I hope Wasilla did. I am tired of paying all these sales taxes to Wasilla and not getting any direct benefits back.

So maybe this cop who has pulled this poor sap over is finally a direct benefit.

As I neared home, a Tahoe stopped on the road beside me. It was Jacob and Muzzy.

After that, somehow, I wound up walking the rest of the way home with a St. Bernard.

As I neared the house, I saw Jake pulling someone who had slipped into the culvert directly in front of our yard out of it.

Jacob and the guy he pulled out.  Jacob told me that this guy is new in the nieghbor and has three big dogs.

If I were to tell this full story, it would take all night, so I won't. Suffice it to say that, this morning, when Margie got up, she heard the sound of rain hammering plastic, but it was not raining.

The sound came from the crawl space beneath our house. It was hot water, pouring out of our ruptured hot water heater through a vent in the floor down into the crawl space.

So here is this Don, putting a new hot water heater into the laundry room.

Don attaches the natural gas line to the new hot water heater.

As for us, we were $1000 poorer than we were when we woke up in the morning.

That was a pretty hard blow to take.

Don lives in Anchorage where he has a plumbing business. We did not hire Don, Sears did. They keep him on contract just so he can help people like us out.

Don has been coming out to the valley to install water heaters and do other plumbing work for 20 years.

Besides Sears, we also checked Lowes, but they would not have been able to install until maybe Tuesday - and their installation fee was higher, even after the $90 emergency fee to have Don come out on a Saturday was added into the Sears installation fee.

Kalib with pan that he wants us to fill with hot water. He wants to boil a fish in that pan, that's why.

I have no time for this blog tonight, none at all - but what the hell, here it is

So here we are this morning at IHOP, Margie, Lavina, Kalib, me and our waitress. There's a pretty dramatic story behind that cup of coffee, and I thought I would tell it tonight, but I'm on deadline and haven't the time.

Someday, I will tell the story, if I don't wind up in Hell, first.

Pioneer Peak, from the stoplight immediately before the Taco Bell turnoff. No matter how crazy it gets around this place, guess what?

I can look any direction I want and Alaska is still out there.

And that feels good. I cannot tell you how good it feels.

Only Alaska feels that good.

Did you know that I love this place?

The place they call Alaska?

Damn, I love it!

A late afternoon drive on Schrock Road.

Lavina barbecues pork chops. They were damn good, scrumptious.

Muzzy invades and marks the red dog's territory. Red Dog can't do anything about it.

It's free, but I was afraid that if I took it, someone would shoot me, anyway. People are always getting shot around here for taking free TV's. Afterward, the shooter removes the "free" sign and claims he shot in defense of property.

Not a single shooter has ever been convicted.

I never take these free TV's.

That's why I'm still alive today.

Jacob turns Kalib's stroller loose on a hill.

Jacob and Lavina get into a game of "catch the stroller." It's Lavina's turn to catch.

Now it's Jacob's turn.

The game of catch is over, but the fun isn't.

Jacob, Lavina, Kalib and Muzzy.

Three fellow photographers at the Iditarod Restart - for one, Governor Palin rides to the rescue

If I had searched, I could have found several more tons of my colleagues as they wielded their cameras at the Iditarod Restart in Willow, but I didn't, so I only photographed the three that popped up in front of me.

This is Jim Lavrakas of the Anchorage Daily News, who I first met 28.5 years ago. He was shooting for the Daily News then as well. The Daily News has always had an extremely talented photo staff and Jim is one of the best.

If you doubt this, then please take note of the extremely difficult technique that he uses here to photograph the race. It is called the "Lavrakas Two-Gun Technique" and he spent over a decade perfecting it, but finally mastered it on July 22, 1994.

Jim's theory is that the photographer should always hold two cameras in his hands, on either side of his vision, but never bring the viewfinder of either to his eyes. He then focuses each eye on a different subject. Then the photographer, like the two-gun gunslinger who, with dead-on accuracy, simultaneously fires in multiple directions, shoots both cameras at the same moment.

In this case, a Super Cub was flying overhead while down below a little boy was reaching over the fence to high-five a passing musher.

I did not see the results myself, but I understand Jim caught both moments grandly, in perfect unison, as he always does.

I have tried this technique myself, but have never succeeded at it.

This is Wayde Carroll, a fine architecture photographer who also conducts photo safaris not only in Alaska but Costa Rica as well. As you can see, Wayde also employs some pretty sophisticated technique. He asked if I would pose for a portrait so I did. He threw in some light with the umbrella held in reverse.

Then I shot this portrait of Wade.

We photographers like to go around shooting portraits of each other.

We want someone to remember us when we're gone.

And this is Al Grillo, who shoots for the Associated Press. He is a most likable guy and I often come upon him anywhere in Alaska, and I also see his pictures from all over the state published regularly in the news. This has been the case for many years.

I commented on this. "You've got a really good job," I complimented.

"If it wasn't for all the interest in Sarah Palin, I wouldn't even have a job right now," Al answered. As AP does its part to keep our governor focused in the national eye, they tend to send Al anywhere in Alaska where she does something that might be noteworthy.

And there I find a second reason to be glad that Sarah Palin is our governor.

I found Al kneeling in the snow at a gap in the fence. A bit later, an official hall monitor came by and told him to move, that he could not be there.

Al protested. He told the hall monitor that he was with AP, had press credentials and was acting within his right and duty.

"I don't care who you are or what credentials you have," the hall monitor fired back. "You have to move, now."

But Al didn't move, and for this I was mighty proud of him.

The hall monitor walked away, murmuring threats that Al had better have vacated that spot by the time he came back.

Then a lady who was standing behind the fence (that's her elbow in the upper left corner), piped in and told Al that she knew Governor Palin personally. "I've got her phone number right here in my cellphone," she spoke authoritatively, "I can give her a call right now and she'll straighten that guy (the hall monitor) out for you."

Al gave her a polite smile and kept on shooting.

This is not a photographer, but a kid named Ian, who lives in Palmer. I took this picture as the second musher to come out of the chute passed by, waving at the friendly crowd as he did.

Ian told me that he loved the Iditarod. "It's lots of fun," he said. "It's exciting."

When it was all over, and after I had visited and photographed Rose Albert, as seen in yesterday's entry, I discovered that I was hungry and wanted to eat. Given the setting, only a hot dog would do.

I found this stand, selling "Reindeer Dogs," made of genuine Alaska reindeer.

I ordered one, plus a bag of Lay's Classic Potato Chips and a super-chilled Pepsi that the lady pictured above pulled from the ice chest that had protected it from freezing altogether.

I bit into the reindeer dog and discovered that it was mostly gristle and fat. It was hot, so that fat oozed out in great drops of oil.

Oh, geeze! It was good! Scrumptious! Just what I needed.

When I think back upon it, I wish that I had bought two.

There were still mushers leaving the chutes as I pulled away, hoping to beat traffic that I knew from experience would come to a standstill. As I did, these two tiny kids, towed by a snowmachine, zipped by.

As I neared Miller's, where I bought the chocolate-dipped ice cream cone recently pictured on this blog, I came upon this scene and found that someone had been pulled over by a state trooper. 

How I love this place! How could I not? Can you see how beautiful it is?

It is an honor to get ticketed in such a place as this.

Still, I was glad that the honor went to someone else, and not to me.

A little further down the road, I turned off the Parks Highway and onto Pittman, towards home and on that corner passed by this familiar roadside tourist shop. It was a great reminder of the thrill of the Iditarod.

Soon, the tourist season will begin. Many tourists will pass this shop and they will gaze upon it with proverbial wonder; they will realize what a majestic and beautiful state they have the privilege to pass through.

Catch 22 upon Catch 22: I could blame the ravens, but actually, it is all my fault

I want to go to bed right now - in fact, I wanted to go to bed an hour ago, but I have fallen behind on this blog and if I don't catch up right now, when will I?

I have a good excuse. I had a little project that had to be postmarked no later than March 1 and it ate up all my time, day and night, and then after I drove to Anchorage late Sunday night, got the postmark, bought a cheese quesedilla, a cheesy-bean burrito and a strawberry mango drink at the Parks Highway Taco Bell all-night drivethrough and then drove home, I was drained and have been ever since.

Taco Bell. That is where the problems started. Not the one on the Parks Highway in Anchorage, but the one here, in Wasilla, Saturday, where I photographed this and the other two ravens seen here. 

This is how it happened: I had no cash on Saturday when I went through the Wasilla Taco Bell drivethrough. Margie was stretched out across the back seat of the Escape, so pulled out my wallet, slipped my debit card out of that, paid with the debit card, slipped the card back into the wallet and then put the wallet...

Where did I put the wallet? Did I put it on my lap? I don't remember. Perhaps because I was paying too much attention to the ravens. I always pay attention to ravens. They demand it.

Did I put it in the little pouch on the inside of the drivers door?

Just where did I put it? It was black. These ravens are squabbling over and eating something black. Did they take it? Did they eat it?

All I know for certain is that, after we finished dining, I drove up to the outside Taco Bell garbage can. I handed my sack of Taco Bell garbage back to Margie, she put her sack of Taco Bell garbage into it, handed it back to me and then I got out of the car, walked to the garbage can, threw it in, got back in the car and then drove straight at the ravens, thinking that they would fly before I got to them.

But they didn't. They called my bluff and I had to stop and then go around them. It is not because they were stupid and did not understand the danger a Ford Escape could pose to them.

They are smart. They just knew that I was bluffing, and that I would stop. And if by chance I didn't, they had it all calculated down to the micro-second just when they would actually need to hop and flap out of the way.

But they did not want to do that unless it was absolutely necessary, and they knew it wouldn't be. They wanted to call my bluff, to humiliate me, and they did.

Margie wanted to go to Carr's to buy some groceries after that. So I drove her to Carr's. I thought that she meant that she wanted me to go in and buy some groceries, but she meant she wanted us to go in and buy some groceries. It would be the very first time that she had gone into a store since she suffered her injury, January 20.

I drove her as close as I could to the door, got out of the car, opened up the back door, helped her out, made certain she got through the new fallen snow to the walk that leads inside the store, then got back into the car. By then, the lady and the boy above were in front of me, so I took their picture.

I then found a place far from the store to park the car. Being a rough, tough, Alaskan, I did not care at all about the falling snow. I hiked from the car to Carr's as if it was not even snowing at all. As if I was in Phoenix, Arizona.

That's how I did it. I then entered the store and these two boys - I assume the one with a beard is a boy, but who knows, he could be a girl - how could I tell? - offered me a Peanut Butter Cup. First, I took their picture and then I took the Peanut Butter Cup.

That is the kind of thing of thing that you do when you are a serious photographer, which I am. You take your picture before you take your Peanut Butter Cup. It does not matter how badly you want that Peanut Butter Cup, you take the picture first.

If you can't do that, then, hell, you might just as well throw your damn camera in the trash.

I wonder if I threw my wallet in the trash at Taco Bell? I wonder if I had accidently placed it in the Taco Bell sack when I was eating, the one that became my trash bag?

All I know for certain is that when I got to the check-out stand, with Margie hobbling behind, and the checker rang up the $200 plus bill, I reached into my pocket for my wallet, but it was not there.

I went back to the car and searched in and all around it. My wallet was not there. I went to Carr's customer service, to see if someone had turned my wallet in. They had not. I drove back to Taco Bell, to see if someone had turned in my wallet there.

No one had. I asked if the garbage can had been emptied. It had.

The Taco Bell ravens laughed at me.

You don't believe me? You don't believe that a raven can laugh? Then come to Alaska and you will learn otherwise.

So I drove Margie home and checked my online bank account. No activity. Checked my credit cards. No activity. Still, I had to cancel them all. Each and every one.

Worse yet, I had no cash. Worse still, Margie had no cash. Even worse, when I cancelled my cards, I also cancelled her's, because we share accounts.

We do not have a pre-nup, either. Don't need one.

Although she was a little irritated with me, right now.

After that, there was nothing to do but go home and work on the project that I was telling you about. I worked on it all day Saturday for the remainder of the day and then when the day ended, I continued to work on it.

I did not stop until 5:00 AM. I then went to bed, pulled the covers over me and then the cats piled on. I sleep better when cats are piled atop me. Unless they grow mischievous. They grew mischievous.

I got up a bit before 10:00 AM, fixed Margie some oatmeal, fixed me some oatmeal and then got back to work. I did not stop until I was done, and that happened about 8:45 PM. At that time on Sunday, the only open Post Office in the whole state of Alaska is the airport Post Office in Anchorage, so I climbed into the car and drove - without my driver's license, because that was in the lost wallet.

Margie could not drive me, because her leg is in a brace and still cannot be bent. Her arm is in a cast and she could not grip the steering wheel.

So I drove, without my license. I set the cruise control to four miles above the speed limit to make certain that I would not accidently speed and get pulled over without a license.

I drove very cautious and carefully, so as not to attract any undo attention.

I drove past car after car that had gone off the road. Some had flipped over, some were on their side.

The road was dry. It was not icy. All those cars must have slid off the road the day before, when it was snowing. A whole lot of cars must have slide off the road Saturday, for so many to still not be retrieved Sunday night.

Probably, in the past, some of these drivers have laughed at news reports of snow-caused traffic mishaps in Lower 48 cities, especially in cities unaccustomed to snow that suddenly get snow.

Today, we seen such reports come out of Tennessee, and other southern states, like Maine.

I bet these drivers didn't laugh today.

Others did, though. Their time is coming.

As for today, it dawned clear, cold, and beautiful. -20 at our house. For you celsius people, that would be -29 on your scale. But I drove over the hill that is behind me in this picture and on Wasilla Main Street, it was +3. We live in a cold sink, that's why.

The good thing is, I now have so many bars on my cellphone right in my house that I haven't even bothered to count them, as that would require me to put on my reading glasses. But there are a lot of bars. No more dropped calls - thanks to this ugly monstrosity that just got turned on.

Now here is an amazing thing: when we flew out of Salt Lake City on the way home from Washington, DC, there was a guy at the gate next to ours peddling Delta Airlines American Express credit cards. He said if I got one and made just one purchase, why, hell, right there I would get enough free Delta Airlines miles just for doing so that I could fly free on a Delta Airlines roundtrip ticket  anywhere they go.

He said Margie could sign up and we could get two free round-trip tickets. I did not want another credit card, but I did like the idea of those free tickets. So I signed us both up. Margie was too broken up to sign herself up.

Those cards arrived the other day, but I just ignored them. This meant that I did not put them in my wallet. This meant that they did not get lost.

That is how I paid to mail my package from the Anchorage airport Post Office - with that Delta Airlines American Express card.

That is how I bought gas to drive back home from Anchorage - with that card.

And now I can fly anywhere in the US that Delta goes...

So today, driving illegally once again, I drove to the Department of Motor Vehicles in Palmer, figuring that I could be legal when I drove back.

When I got to the DMV, a sign asked me to please fill out all the relevant forms before my number was called. So I took my number from the number machine, then found the basket for the form that I needed.

It was empty.

Next, I sat in a chair and waited for my number to be called. My number was 241. As you can see, the couple in the picture here had number 237, and I had already been waiting awhile when I took it.

See the two portraits hanging on the wall? The one on the left is of our Governor, Sarah Palin. Ever hear of her?

I doubt it. It seems unlikely.

Anyway, 241 was finally called. I journied to the counter. The guy who helped me was most friendly. He gave me the form that had not been in the basket and patiently waited while I filled it out. He then had me take the eye test, which I passed just fine.

I showed him my passport and he agreed that I am who I said I am.

"That'll be $15.00," he said.

So I whipped out my American Express card.

"I'm sorry," he said, "the DMV does not take American Express."

Come on, Sarah - for hell's sake! 

So I drove illegally from the DMV to the Palmer McDonald's to buy a cup of coffee and some cinnamon nuggets. I chose McDonald's because I figured they would probably take American Express.

I made my order and pulled to the first window. A girl was there to take my money. I had put my American Express Card inside my passport. I absent-mindedly handed her the passport.

She didn't know what to do.

But when she figured it out, McDonald's accepted the card. I pulled up to the next window and this kid handed me my coffee and my cinnamon nuggets.

I drove out of the lot toward the highway and as I did, these two kids jaywalked right across the highway. They were lucky it was me driving. Most drivers would not have realized what was happening until it was too late and would have run right over them, but not me.

The coffee was scalding hot. Way too hot to drink. It would have to cool down. So I decided to take the long drive home, via fishhook road, which would extend the trip from about 15 miles to at least 20. I figured that would give the coffee time to cool down enough for me to drink while I was still driving home.

Plus, it is a more pleasant drive. 

I hadn't driven far before I grew impatient and decided that I did not want to wait for that coffee to cool down. If the coffee cooled, so would the cinnamon nuggets. I looked at the car's temperature indicator. The exterior air temperature was 10 degrees. That's the thing about this time of year, after the sun comes back. In December and January, if the morning temperature is -20, it might rise to -18 or so, but that's about it.

I looked at the speedometer. It read 55 miles per hour. I did some quick mental calculations and came up with a wind chill factor of -19. I figured that would cool down the coffee real quick, so I rolled down the window and held the cup out into the wind for a couple of miles. The inside of my hand was burning, the outside freezing, but it did the trick.

The coffee was drinkable in short order. The cinnamon nuggets were still warm.

I turned off Fishhook onto Polar Bear. I hadn't gone far when I saw this snow machine, just sitting in the road. 

And a bit later, on Church, I saw this guy. His snowmachine was working just fine.

Which brings me to another dilemma that I face. I might need to do some snowmachining real soon, to do my work which I have fallen so far behind on since I got hurt. Or I might have to hang onto the back of a sled. I have not done either since I shattered my shoulder and got it replaced.

I am much improved now, but I don't think my shoulder is capable of handling a snowmachine on rough terrain - and sea ice is always rough terrain. And neither is my wrist, which got hurt, too, but was completely ignored due to the severity of my shoulder injury. Now, it often bothers me worse than my shoulder. Each night, I lose sleep by the hour to the pain in my wrist, and in my shoulder.

What do I do?

In part, my Muse seems to have solved the problem. I promised her that when she got married, I would come to India to photograph her wedding. I am not a wedding photographer, I do not photograph weddings. But sometimes I make an exception.

For her, I will make such an exception.

Tonight, she informed me that she has set the date for May 3, and said that I must come one week early. That's probably when I would be doing the most heavy snowmachining of all. Now, on the hope that all goes well, I will be India, where it is pretty hard to drive a snowmachine.

You could do it, but it would be mighty hard on the snowmachine.

Oh, good grief! Did I write, "hard on?"

I never intended this to be that kind of blog. I am shocked.

And on a snowmachine! That would be awful. Something might break right off.

I think it is time to get out of this blog and go to bed. I think I am sleep-deprived.

But still, I would like to get on a snowmachine between now and India.

What do I do?

Now, being broke and all, how do I get to India?

My Muse has set her wedding date. I will find a way.

I have never let being broke stop me from traveling.

Now I will click "published," then "saved," and I will go to bed. 

Despite the time listed at the top of this page, it is 4:35 AM. 

Jack Russell puppies for sale; the boy is not sad to see the St. Bernard pup go... reflective Mocha Moose coffee girl

I got this bad headache, I am tired and the skin around the top of my head seems to be contracting in a strange way. I just want to go to bed without writing even one more word... or maybe not one more after this... but I have already placed these pictures. I suppose I should add a few words to them.

So here's the story above: once again, I coaxed Margie up off her convalescent couch and took her out for a fast food lunch, just so she could see something besides the four walls that surround her. It is a little hard to get her out the door and it is scary when she steps off the porch and onto the packed snow and ice of the driveway, but we are careful and it is good for her to get out.

We drove to KFC-A&W for chicken and cut through Fred Meyer's parking lot to get there. Before we reached the chicken, I spotted this guy, Lenny, trying to sell Jack Russell puppies, so naturally I stopped. He was asking $400 per pup, which he assured me was a very fair price, but it was too high for me, so I didn't buy one.

Of course, if Lenny had been giving them away I wouldn't have bought one either. There is no such thing as a free pup.

Although the lady is having a good conversation with someone on the phone and it looks like she might be telling whoever it is that she is bringing a Jack Russell pup home, she and the girls were pupless when they left.

Jack Russell butt. 

Lenny called his pickup the Jack Russell Pup Mobile, or something like that. When you have a headache as bad as the one that now smites me, it is hard to remember such quotations word for word.

Jack Russell ear.

Just beyond the Jack Russell Pup Mobile was another vehicle and in it this boy held this St. Bernard pup. As you can see in the windshield, the pup was going for $600. If Lavina had been with us, she would probably have bought it. She fell in love with it when I showed it to her on the LCD to my pocket camera. That was yesterday. This evening, she was still walking around, thinking about this puppy and sighing, wishing that I had bought it and brought it home to her.

Jacob strongly insinuated that if I really loved my grandson, I would have bought it for toddler Kalib. But, if a free pup is expensive, think how expensive a $600 pup is.

As for the boy holding the pup, you can see how sad he looks. "It must be kind of hard to know you have to give up the pup," I said to him.

"No," he said, "It doesn't bother me at all."

I had more questions that I wanted ask, but a grim and solemn air permeated the St. Bernard Pup Mobile, so I kept my questions to myself.

If I had shot these as a feature for a newspaper, I would have had to ask the questions; I would have had to write down names. But since its a blog - my blog - I can do whatever I decide to do.

And I decided to leave it at that.

The puppy pictures are all from yesterday, but now this raven catches me up to today. I spotted it as I took my walk. It is so good to have all this sunlight back, to see such a blue sky, but it fooled me a bit.

I did not wear my earband. My ears got cold.

Even so, the increased hours of sunlight is finally beginning to drive the SADS out of me. I am still lazy and listless, but new energy is radiating back into me.

A snowmachine trail across Little Lake. Little Lake is not really a lake at all, but a pond, a tiny pond. When my kids were small, they named it, "Little Lake." They even made a sign that said "Little Lake." They posted that sign by Little Lake so that all who passed by would know its name.

Serendipity. Damnit. That hill used to be mine. 

This dog came running from a house, barking at me with joy. He was so happy to see me. Or maybe "she." I didn't check.

Today, to get her out of the house again, I took Margie to Taco Bell. Right next to Taco Bell is this construction site. It will be a Walgreen's Drugstore. 

Wasilla grows ever more mainstream, but in a haphazard sort of way.

The coffee girl at Mocha Moose reaches out towards her own reflection to take a customer's money.

Headlights coming down Shrock Road. Click on the picture, if you don't believe me. And that is all I have to say about this day, which for me, in its entirety, was spent right here, in Wasilla, Alaska. Maybe not all within the official city limits, but Wasilla, just the same.