Rearranging Things

About 2 years ago, Bryan turned the upstairs storage into a Pool Room for his new pool table. He had to remove all the stuff that was in there first, so he could start in on the walls, flooring, electrical issues, and whatnot. All that stuff had to go somewhere until we could figure out where it would all go on a more permanent basis – so it ended up in my craft room. He tucked it all as tightly as he could to one side of my room so as to not take up too much space, but it was there, nonetheless. And even though he swore it was just temporary, it pretty much stayed there.

Until a few weeks ago, that is. I finally got tired of waiting and took maters into my own hands. I went through three of the biggest boxes (which were, admittedly, full of my own stuff) and took several loads to goodwill. Bryan got involved, too, hauling the two big file cabinets down to the shop where he plans to keep his stuff in them. Several other items found homes in other parts of the house, with a few even going to the dump, until finally it was pretty much cleared out.

Since I had the opportunity and space available, I decided to rearrange a bit. Both of the chairs are now up against the half wall with a lamp between them for lounging after a hard day of crafting. The big wooden table is in the middle of the room, strategically placed between two of the big lights up above. I can, if need be, pull out our extra tables and put them in various places, even!

What do you think? I like it.

People can be so nice!

Back in August of this year, Bryan and I took a little trip to Cordova for the week. While we were there, we visited the Cordova Visitor’s Center to see if they could recommend any trails or fishing spots. They have an entire wall of their office covered by a giant magazine rack and had just about every edition of EdibleAlaska on display. While Bryan spoke to the lady at the front desk, I perused the magazines wishing I could take some home with me.

When we got home, I remembered that wall with all those magazines and really wished I had taken one of each edition. I said to myself, “Why not?” and looked up an email address to see if they could send them to me. I typed up my request a lot better than that, of course, but that was the gist of it. I sent it off and basically forgot about it. I really didn’t think anything would come of it.

A few weeks later, I got a reply! Cindy Brinkerhoff, Program Assistant to the Cordova Chamber of Commerce, not only said she would be happy to do that for me but already had! She boxed up 13 magazines and shipped them off to my home address! All she asked was for a check to cover postage: $7.47. The box was at my front door a few days later!

To say I was astonished is an understatement, to say the least. I quickly wrote out a Thank You card, popped a check in the envelope, and sent it on its way to Cordova.

I then sat down to happily read through all my magazines! I’m so happy.

I just don’t get it

There is a group called Alaska Survey Research that periodically sends out (via email) surveys. If I have a few minutes to spare at the time, I will typically take the survey and send my results back to them. They then collate the results and create a report to send back to those who participated. They are not a political group – they just gather data about numerous topics, then put the information out there for everyone to see.

This particular survey was a political one, however: namely asking questions about our current President and his policies. The questions were all “Do you approve/disapprove” type of questions, concerning Immigration/Securing the Border, National Security, ICE Deportations, Foreign Policy, Jobs & the Economy, Tariffs, and Cost of Living/Inflation.

Across the bord, the answers all leaned toward the negative side. A vast majority of those who responded to the survey strongly disapproved of all these policies. And yet – when asked if they would vote for him again, the majority of participants said they WOULD.

Why in the world would you vote for somebody when you don’t approve of a thing he’s done while in office? What kind of logic is that? They even acknowledged that his plan to run for a third term is in clear violation of the 22^nd Amendment of the Constitution – and yet they STILL plan to vote for him.

Now, I make no bones about the fact that I am strongly opposed to the current president. I did not vote for him, nor do I approve of a single thing he’s done. And I certainly am not going to vote for him a third time.

But at least I am consistent. I just don’t see the logic.

Earthwatch Expedition #10

Good News!! I signed up for my tenth expedition with Earthwatch the other day! I am going down to Florida for 8 days in September 2026 for the Tracking Sharks and Rays expedition! I am so excited: I really, REALLY want to see a hammerhead! And wouldn’t it be so cool to go down in one of those shark cages!!!

What makes this even MORE exciting is that a good friend of mine, Sarah Stone from Miami, might join me. She is doing the money thing now, trying to figure out how she’ll be able to afford it. I have known Sarah for a long time, corresponding via email since my 2^nd or 3^rd expedition. I even got to attend her wedding a few years back.

Money is always a huge deciding factor on these expeditions. Thankfully, the company I work for is very good to me: this expedition will be paid mostly from my bonus. Also thankfully, I have some mileage points with Alaskan Air that will cover my flights there and back. If Sarah does go, I might even stay a few days afterwards, just to hang out with her and maybe go visit her parents who live nearby.

There are, as always, a lot of things to do to prepare – namely, starting January 1^st, I will be going to the pool every Wednesday for the public lap swim session. I really don’t know how to swim all that well, but I can grab a paddle board and hit the lanes with it. At the very least, it will get me comfortable in the water again. I haven’t been in water for decades!

The First Quarterly Craft Project

Three of my favorite people came over the other day to work on a craft project with me: my sister-in-law Heather and her two children, Kaylee and Tabitha.

The project came from a company called Kristy’s Craft Room who has what they call the Craft Night in a Box. Four times a year, they send a box containing all the supplies needed for 4 people to create their masterpiece. This was our fist time doing one, so I told everyone it was our trial run. A survey taken at the end of our day together revealed that we all had a great time with it, so we decided to continue with our subscription. The next box will be shipped to us on November 5.

The project this time involved paint, glue, and lots of raffia! The girls did great – I thought ahead and got drop cloths for my table as well as some reusable paint pallets. The drop clothes ensured that I wouldn’t be stressed out watching the girls paint (truth be told, Heather was the messy one!) and the pallets ensured that our paint was easily accessible.

The end result turned out so cute! We are looking forward to more craft days together.

October at the Pioneer Home

October’s Festive Meal was an "Octoberfest" themed feast, with fried pork chops, sourcrout & brats, pickled cabbage, and potato gnocchi. For dessert they had Black Forest Cake with whipped cream, one of Mother’s favorites. The festive meals are always well attended, but this one seemed to have even more people than usual. The food was quite plentiful, although Mother only ate a few bites of one or two of the dishes.

The music afterwards was quite good: an older gentleman played the guitar and sang the old Country songs that Mother grew up with. Several of the residents even got up and danced! Mother was tired, however, so she opted to go lay down and sleep in her room after eating.

Family Reunion in California

Bryan and I went on vacation a few weeks ago, going down to California to attend his family reunion.

We flew into San Diego late Thursday and checked in to a hotel for the night. The next morning, we headed over to Sea World and spent a lovely morning strolling around the park looking at all the fascinating creatures that live in the oceans. I had seen on their website that they have an enclosure full of Magellanic Penguins, so had to go see them because I got to work with those penguins last year when I went to Patagonia. But my absolute favorite was at the entrance to the park where they had a touch pool full of feeder fish. I put my hand in and hundreds of tiny fish (the biggest being maybe 3” long) flocked to my hand, all nibbling at the dead skin. I could have spent all day at that pond and told Bryan that when we get rich and can have anything we want, I’m getting a pond full of feeder fish! That was just the coolest thing ever.

Around 2:00 or so, we headed on down the road to the town of Canyon Lake where his cousin lives in a gated community. Within this gated community was the campground where the reunion was to take place. We had reserved our spot ahead of time and arranged to have a camper waiting for us – so all we had to do was navigate the bumper-to-bumper traffic on the 7-lane highway. That was not fun, let me assure you.

But we eventually got there and got settled into our camper. The reunion was organized by his cousin Randi and her husband Nick. They both put in so much work, coordinating the schedules of over 50 people from all across the nation. There were many different activities available to keep us occupied, from playing in the lake to sitting around the campfire shooting the breeze with everyone.

The grand finale of the event was a big family dinner at Randi’s house to celebrate the matriarch’s 90^th birthday – Shirley was Queen for the Night and enjoyed an amazing dinner, a big birthday cake with lots of candles, and a slide show with hundreds of pictures of all her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren – most of whom were there with her!

Cordova 2025

For our big vacation this year, we decided to stick a little closer to home since we’re both still recovering financially from our Iceland trip last year. Neither of us had ever been to Cordova, so that’s where we decided to go! My sister agreed to babysit the kittens for us, so we packed up our rented RV and hit the road to Whittier to catch the ferry.

The ferry ride was quite the experience: they pack those vehicles in there tighter than sardines! Bryan was super nervous about getting our big rig out of it, since it was not a straight drive thru. We had to drive in from the back of the ferry, then had to take a 90-degree turn to the right to exit the side. Our RV was not a large one, just 25 feet, but even that had a hard time making that turn. But, 6 hours later, we arrived in Cordova!

The campground where we reserved a spot was a nice one, with a shower/bathroom house, power hook-ups, and even a communal fire ring. We set up camp and were quite comfortable. My brother loaned us his big pop-up tent and a small generator, and Bryan had tables, chairs, camp stoves, and all of that. The camper came equipped with a lot of that as well, so we had more than enough.

Each morning, we would walk into town for a cup of coffee, about a mile and a half each way. There were basically two coffee shops to choose from, so we alternated back and forth between them.

From there we’d walk the docks for a while, inspecting all the boats and watching people gear up for their day of fishing. Cordova is definitely a fishing town (commercial, not recreational) – I think there are more boats than there are houses!

The breakwater that protects the harbor from the ocean had a nice little walkway on it, complete with a few benches and some informational signs. It was a short walk, but we did get to see lots of birds & otters, and of course more boats.

The town of Cordova is small but really nice. Bryan found himself a bar to sit and have a drink now and then – their sign outside the building is up-side down! Not sure if that was intentional or not – but I’m sure there’s a story behind that.

After walking through town each morning, we would head back to our camper for lunch and then pick a direction and drive out that way, to see what we could see. Sometimes we’d go hiking, sometimes we’d go fishing, sometimes we’d just enjoy the views.

The Eyak River Trail was a surprise; I did not know it would be that beautiful out there. Lush and green and just breathtaking. The trail was easy enough to walk on, with minimal trip-hazards and only a very slight elevation gain. We hiked in for about an hour and then turned around and headed back to the camper.

The longest drive we took was about 15 miles out to the Sheridan Lake Trail that leads you a short distance out to the Sheridan Glacier. We almost didn’t go: not only was that a gravel road (really hard on RVs) but once we got there it looked like the trail had been washed away. Thankfully, a kind hiker showed us how to get around the washout so we could continue our walk. The glacier was beautiful.

The Heney Ridge Trail was definitely a bit more challenging but oh so worth it! Again, we could have gone a lot farther than we did, but we turned around after an hour. Lots of elevation gain to this one but the trail was a good one with steps and/or boardwalks where needed.

The Fishing turned out to be really good this year. We had apparently timed our vacation perfectly so Bryan got to catch 5 fish over 2 days of fishing. One of them was the biggest silver he had ever seen, so he was a happy little boy! In fact, he’s now thinking that next year he’ll pack up his truck and head across the bay for a weekend a few times to fish the rivers some more.

We saw a lot of wildlife: mostly otters and harbor seals, along with millions of seabirds. But we also saw a bear – I just didn’t get a picture of it. Sorry.