Gazebo weekend

Man, oh man, what a weekend. I'm sore all over and tuckered out. Hans and I worked like hell on the library gazebo all week, getting the structural strapping on and gluing corks in the bulletin board. Then we had a hell of a time directing volunteers, cleaning up the premises, installing this and that and cutting and hammering and sawing and chiseling and painting and sanding and digging and lugging and...well, you get the picture. People mostly didn't arrive until noon, which had us feeling sorry for ourselves in the morning because we got there at nine each day, and then sorry for ourselves in the afternoon because then we couldn't concentrate on the tasks we were hoping to get done because we had to help people find tasks to do. But despite all that, it was amazing. A ton of people showed up and a ton of work got accomplished. It was great. I wrote a big thank you to all the volunteers I could think of on the JTEL blog.

There's still more to be done, but Hans and I are going to take care of the rest of the ceiling and the varnishing this week. We hope. I'll post photos as soon as I find my camera.

The gazebo is beautiful, and is now officially the Ida Lane Clausen Gazebo. Bobby Lounsbury read a wonderful biography of Ida, and Ray Hadley described first meeting her. George also spoke, and Shannan Turner told a few anecdotes about her, one from her sister and one from Christie Ragan Barstad. Joe Thomas showed up to the dedication party, and asked for a tour of the library land, so Maggie Billington and he and I walked up to the (extremely overgrown) library drive and proceeded to view the cliff, the car garden, and driveway & parking site, and the actual library site itself. Oodles of people came. I keep remembering more of them: the Lounsburys, Jody and Jerry Hassle, Janet Thompson and Dave Sala (who took a tape recording of Ida at the Malemute that Jill Cameron had and recorded it onto a CD so we could play it as background music for the event), Jill, Amy Cameron and Joe Geiss, Kate and Maggie Billington, Scott Allen, Ray Hadley, Ruth Jasper and Shannan Turner, Hans and me, Nancy Burnham and Don Cameron, Ginger Meta, Sarie Brainerd, Jeff and Corinna Martt (who brought bratwurst and a grill), Margaret and Stanley Rogers, Kayt Sunwood and Sine Anahita, Monique Musick (camera in hand), Greta Burkart, Lynn Kulp (with homemade mocha ice cream!), Brad Rouda and a friend of his named David, and a whole lot of wasps (who concentrated on the salmon, so we left them to it).

The place is wonderful for parties on a summer day, I can tell you! It's an amazing space. I brought Ida's Clip Joint sign, someone else brought a photo of her, and we have a copy of the dedication on the cork board. Amy Cameron brought a few posters, so now the cork board is Officially Open for Posting.

Yeah!

Cats and cancer

Last year, our cat Archie developed a fatal cancer, and we had to have a vet come out to give him a lethal injection. We buried him in the garden and this year grew huge bunches of catnip over his grave. Now our big rangy ditz of a feline, Hexer, also has cancer, this time of the intestine--and quite probably throughout his lymphatic system. It's fatal also, and so we will be putting him down later this week too. Not only am I greatly upset by this (and Hans is too), I am afraid for our other cats and for ourselves--I suspect that we may have a radon problem.

This really sucks.

Ukulele madness: Carl Ostergren's banjolele

On January 6, I received a belated inheritance: my grandfather's banjo ukulele. Chip Funk, family friend and luthier, had helped my mother clean out my grandparents' house after my grandmother died. Grandpa had died several years before that, but in a closet in the livingroom was stashed an old canvas case containing a banjo uke. My grandfather, I discovered when I talked with my mom about this delightful instrument, had been in minstrel shows (in blackface) back in the thirties, maybe the twenties, too. He used to ride a motorcycle around New England with his banjolele strapped to his back, playing music with friends.

I didn't know what a banjolele was until this summer, when Gretchen Kerndt brought hers out to the Golden Eagle to jam with Lost Dog on the porch. This one has the original skin drum on it, signed by my grandfather's friends (and his brother Harold, too).



It sounds a lot like a banjo, only not quite so twangy. It's a little smaller than a tenor banjo, and the strings are nylon. Buck thinks it's a Sears Silvertone, but it's hard to tell—no brand name on it anywhere. The tailpiece is a replacement for the original. It has a nice sound. More reasons to practice!

So this makes now four ukuleles: my Lanikai baritone, the Lanikai soprano, my Kala mangowood cutaway baritone with pickup, and my mystery banjo uke. I've been taking lessons with Russell Copelin (had my third lesson last Monday); that's been helping, but I REALLY need to practice every day. I slacked off a bit this week.

I've been showing off my banjolele to the Banana Girls and various local musicians. Last night Robin Dale Ford, Pat Fitzgerald, Richard Fineberg, Andy from on Pebble Road, Hans, and a couple of other people came to the Eagle to jam. I brought ukes and played a bit, but definitely could not keep up. It was lots of fun, though. Hans made a case for the banjolele, a temporary one of foam, duct tape, ribbons, and a bungie cord, but he's making a sturdy wooden one of cedar for it.

2009 in review

Once again it is that time of year: resolutions and reflections to gird oneself for adventure and mud-slogging for the days of the coming year. In some ways, this was a pretty rough year. So, here's how it looked last year:

January
The Stones' house caught fire.

A letter from Emmonak was published, and all hell broke loose. Sarah didn't notice, though.

I began my descent into ukulele madness, with the purchase of a brand-new baritone uke. Little did I know that this was the start of serious musical obsession. Woo-hoo!

Obama was sworn in to the presidency, and Service was Restored.

I received notice of my 30-year high school reunion. O gads.

February
Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir assumed the post of Iceland's prime minister. This is notable because she is Iceland's first female prime minister and she is openly lesbian.

The Fairbanks North Star Borough School Board decided that bullying on the basis of gender identity was every bit as nasty as discrimination or harrasment on some other basis.

Dave Lacey died of cancer.

March
The Republic's publisher and contributors and fans celebrated ten years of crazed publishing in a MAJOR party with live music (Back Cu'ntry Bruthers and the Slippin' Mickeys) and the Publisher's Picks.

I joined Facebook and set up a page for the Republic. Now it's become a major time drain…WAY too much fun.

I helped organize the first of a series of CSA roundtables at my university job. The group that has arisen from this, the Alaska Community Agriculture Association, gives me a little hope that Alaska may yet feed itself and with good, wholesome food.

I was invited to speak at the Alaska Press Club annual meeting as part of a panel of bloggers. It was quite entertaining, but I got stuck in Anchorage (flight cancellation on account of belching volcano). One of the big topics was Mike Doogan's outing of Mudflats, the resultant fracas, and whether it was appropriate for bloggers to be anonymous. Hans drove down to fetch me, o noble spouse that he is.

April
The Ester Republic got a new office! Photos here and here. Here too.

John Reeves decided to shake things up in Ester a bit with a nuclear power plant proposal. Ester may or may not be a nuke-free zone.

May
Lee Shauer, Dwight Deely, and Linda Patrick committed suicide, all in one week. Ester was reeling.

The Banana Girls Ukulele Marching Band started practicing for the 4th of July. I started taking strum classes with Jean McDermott.

June
The Ester Community Market began its second season.

Emma Creek West reared its ugly head again. Or rather, Land Management did, with an old, previously rejected development plan. They just don't get it.

July
The Ester Fourth of July parade was GREAT. And the Banana Girls were there.

Sarah Palin's resignation speech got edited by Vanity Fair. More hilarity I haven't had in a LONG time.

August
The Onion once again published prophecy, this time on how Congress works not to provide health care.

Our cat Archie died of throat cancer.

September
I found a great song to learn.

Adam and Kelly Hullin of Wasilla embarrassed themselves publicly in an interview in the Frontiersman. Sadly, they probably have no clue just how stupid they made themselves appear. Sigh. Another blow to the Alaskan reputation.

October
Marjorie Kowalski Cole, scheduled to be the first speaker for the Ester library lecture series, was unable to make it but sent in her talk in written form anyway.

Mike Musick ran for borough assembly again and won, but Luke Hopkins and Tammie Wilson had to go through a runoff.

November
I got serious about Facebook.

Monique Musick gave the first lecture for the John Trigg Ester Library, a slide show and talk on her trip to China in 2008.

December
Marjorie Kowalski Cole died of cancer. I sent her book of poetry to the printer.

Addendum 1/5/10: (I never did a 2008 in review post), 2007 in review, 2006 in review

Archiecat

Well, yesterday was a bummer. Our twelve-year-old cat, Archie, had to be put down. He had, it seemed, developed a tumor on his layrnx, which led to slightly louder snoring and a little bit of whuffling over the last few months (not really noticeable), and then yesterday a sudden inability to breathe. He sounded like he'd swallowed a kazoo--every breath was an effort. The tumor had reached sufficient size that it flopped over and practically closed his trachea off, and the pressure made a vibration which came out like a musical wheeze or honk.

We contemplated driving him down to Anchorage for surgery, but after the vet here consulted with a surgeon down there (no one in Fairbanks is qualified to do this type of operation, evidently), it was pretty clear he was a goner. So we took him back home, and a kind veternarian from Mt. McKinley Animal Hospital stopped by on his way home from work and gave Archie a lethal injection.

Then we made him a casket and buried him with some catnip in the garden. It seemed the right thing to do. Simply burying him in the ground wasn't right. It would have messed up his fur. Hans went and got a bunch of big stones and made a ring around the grave, and we will fill it with good garden soil next year and plant catnip. Archie was an intelligent, friendly cat, and a companion, and it makes me cry to think about all this.

A while ago, I put the photo above onto Wikimedia, into the public domain. I also used this photo to create an illustration of his eyes. The photo is one of two that I have of him. I painted a portrait of him that sold to the Aurora Animal Clinic, I think, many years ago when he was only a couple of years old. So he'll be around.

"I meant," said Ipslore bitterly, "what is there in this world that truly makes living worthwhile?"
Death thought about it.
"Cats," he said eventually. "Cats are nice."

--Terry Pratchett, Sourcery

Flamingo Man

The mysterious Flamingo Man was last spotted at this weekend's birthday bash (theme: Pink) for Raz, held in the deep woods off Chena Pump Road. While ordinarily he'd stick out like a fuscia bird in a flock of white, he was relatively tame in comparison to some of the other guests, and so was able to mingle unobtrusively.

For those of you who might want to see how a publisher really works

This is the shipping area. Not quite cleaned up from the Big Move (yeah, I know what that sounds like, and moving is rather a pain...)

Now, just so you don't think I'm completely slatternly, here's a view of the shelves (made by the Noble Spousal Unit) for the back issues (80 out of 121):



ADDENDUM: I just noticed that I had already posted two of my messy-room photos, so I've deleted them, but if you want to see the paper-piled desk and the boxes of junk/stuff to burn/files not yet put away, then look below.

Office essentials

So, boys and girls, I went shopping today with the Delivery Dude and picked up a couple of office essentials: a coffee maker and a microwave. Alas! When I unpacked the nuker (chortling in anticipation) I discovered that it had taken a fatal blow in the midsection and the glass door was shattered. Hans' driving was quite sedate, I assure you—it was a problem with the box when we bought it. What we'd thought was a handle hold was actually a dent--the hole in the front was there when we got it. So now we have to take it back and exchange it for another.

I am sore annoyed.

Not, of course, that I had any food bits lying around to microwave, but still.

I also got a card reader, so now I have unloaded photos from my camera of the new setup, as of a couple of days ago. First, The Door:



The Desk:



The Boxes O' Junk:



The Totem Cartoon:



Since this stage of affairs, the New Office has acquired a bicycle, a chair (cozy, musty, sans cushions), another chair (plastic orange mod), a drafting table and tall swivel chair (also known as Amy's Desk), and sundry articles of clothing. We need a coat tree and more lights.

Hans is here!

Wahoo!

The Threat Level is Orange

Hans is driving down from Fairbanks to fetch me; he called this morning from Cantwell, where there was an extraordinary amount of background noise. Normally when we go through Cantwell on our way to and from the Alaska Press Club conference, we gas up at Cantwell, and it's dead quiet. (There was one exception, when a blizzard had created near-whiteout conditions. That was the time we got mooned by some impatient immortals.) This year, however, there's apparently some sort of snowmachine happening, and the place that Hans called from had all kinds of laughter and conversation and bustle in the background.

There's a peek of sunshine coming through, which dovetails with the weather prediction last night, that the wind would shift for a while in the late morning and then come back straight from the volcano to Anchorage. However, my flight isn't scheduled until something like 1 pm, by which time who knows what will happen. I still haven't been able to get through to the airport to take a flight credit/change, whathaveyou. I've been using my boarding pass from yesterday as a bookmark. Keeps it functional.

Had a great but extremely pricey dinner at the Corsair restaurant last night, in the basement of this building. It was odd, eating alone, just sitting there listening to the background music, being annoyed by a loud-voiced woman at a nearby table who kept up a stream of incredibly vacuous commentary on her dogs. The dogs sounded ill-trained, and the woman hardly let anybody else get a word in edgewise. It made me think about the kinds of conversations I have at dinner or in public places. I can see trading entertaining dog stories, but really, how long can one carry on a monologue about the dog running around the neighbors' yard and getting the dogcatcher called on them? Not really very witty anecdotes, and more repetition and just plain dullness than I thought was possible in real life. It was like a long, drawn-out,not very funny low-budget sitcom performed by a very bad actress off stage.

The conversations I hear in the Eagle there's all sorts of interesting topics and thoughtful discussion, witty jokes, anecdotes of reasonable complexity or pertinence. Politics, religion, science, construction, music, poetry, books, dance, body language, social interaction....I mean, even when the people I know talk about dogs, they at least have something sensible to say. This was just DULL. Still, I probably missed parts of the conversation, because the people who were with her seemed to have quieter voices, but still. For those of us forced to eavesdrop because of the sheer volume of a voice in a restaurant, it would be nice to listen to something intelligent. If somebody was talking like this in the Eagle, everyone would get up and move away from the speaker, or they'd be cut off because they would obviously have descended past the point of higher brain functionality and be unable to drive themselves home.

Ah, yes. Orange. The color of interminable waiting, of dull conversation, of travelers' disappointment and annoyance, of excruiciatingly stupid television programming. Of petty security bureaucracy.

I have to say, however, that the Era Aviation people have been pretty helpful through all this repeated attempts to get out of town. And the coffee cafe ladies were great.

Apron Parade

I can't sew very well, so I won't be one of the people contributing an apron to the Lallapalooza apron parade, but Hans is planning to do one with duct tape and blue tarp. Possibly with bits of Carhartt, too. We'll see. People keep chortling and snorting when I ask them about their aprons, so my suspicion is that the fashion show will be rather fun this year. We went to visit Material Girls and Northern Threads, and those hand-painted fabrics are enough to make me almost want to get out the sewing machine. All those pretty colors! Hoo. Hard to resist. I suspect I won't, but probably won't sew with them....coming to a collage near you!

Back to the political grind

Hans snorted out loud this morning when he heard the news about Senator and not-so-honorable Jerry Ward. Yet another corrupt Republican. Ben has yet to be bagged, and Don's still spending money on defense lawyers in anticipation of, well, something he doesn't want to tell us about. The Democrats down south now have their token crook (we've been hearing about that over and over again, too), and apparently he's a foul-mouthed so-and-so. Not a civil servant, indeed not.

And just in case you thought it was cold up here in the Frozen North, Sarah Palin's hometown church was recently torched.

Ah, politics!

He's a star!

Well, sort of. The SunStar ran their center-spread article on the drag show, and there are several lovely photos of the event, including one of our Valkyrie Viking in white frilliness. Much better quality shots than the grainy things I took. Their story says that the group earned over a thousand dollars; I'd heard it was better than $2000. However, that was gross, not net. Several people put in a LOT of money to make the show happen.

It's always really nifty to see people get together for a good cause, but events like this take a lot of effort, a baseline of cash, and a lot of time. It's good when it ends up being fun, too!

The same issue has a nice little story on the various Friday art openings, including a short interview with Sandy Gillespie (at the Annex).

One drag queen and a whole lotta cross-dressers

Drag'd through the Ages was last night at the Wood Center Ballroom, and it was hilarious. Seeing the completely silly and outrageous was fun, and the costumes were over the top, a few of them just fabulous. It was a fundraiser for the Interior AIDS Association. World AIDS day was on Monday, December 1, and was the 20th anniversary of IAA's founding. It felt good to have such a good time at such a silly event for such a good--and damn serious--cause.

I got a lot of great photos of the backs of people's heads, among them Craig Buchanan's pony tail, but most of my photos didn't come out very well because it was a bit too dark and the photos were way too grainy. The camera seemed to give up after a certain point, so though I thought I got pictures of every number, only about half of them actually took, and of course those were bad. (If you've got any good high-resolution shots of the show, I can use copies for the Republic if you can get them to me by Monday.)

Hans helped the troupe by working on the props, making a dragon ship, and--ta daaaah!--participating in one of the skits as a lip-synching viking.



There was one actual drag queen in the event, Dixie Normus, and pretty much everybody else, male and female, gay and straight, were cross-dressers. The Burlesque Show troupe formed most of the cast. Raz Finnel was the producer and Hannah Hill was the stage manager.

singing

Sometimes, I get to singing, at the top of my voice, in tune, with the lyrics, and I think to myself, Damn I'm good, if I could only relax and remember the entire song. That's my main two problems when it comes to singing: I get uptight and my voice cracks as a result, and/or I only know the refrain, or one or two of the stanzas but not the whole thing. Very frustrating. I've long wanted to learn an instrument, but of course I'm really not terribly into practicing, and so I have never gotten myself ept at music.

However, it will happen. Hans, who is musically inclined, is getting himself back into performing (he plays guitar and has one hell of a voice), and as he plays more and sings more and goes off practicing, I recall that yep, I'm reasonably good at music too and actually like to sing, and try to do more in that vein.

Tonight, the song that inspired us both (after Mack the Knife, which I do know by heart) was Under Pressure, by Freddie Mercury and David Bowie. Going over the lyrics of a song again and again forces one to really think about what those words actually mean. In this case, it seems to be about homelessness, and despair, and yet hope: how inner or physical alienation can still be overcome or resisted by paying attention to the things and people one loves. Really, a very hope-filled song, and given that Mercury was dying when this song was written and performed, an amazing piece of music. Something we should pay attention to in this day and age.

Bailing 'em out again

So, on the radio this morning, they were interviewing the former CEO of General Electric, who said, oh don't worry about it, this has happened before: the Japanese recession of '95, the recession of '90, and the recession of '87. The government introduced liquidity and our bacon was saved.

So, asks Hans, you mean the taxpayers have bailed out these boondoggles before? When are people going to notice that the system doesn't work very well if you have to bail out the big guys every so often?

No wonder people are mad. The little guys get to pay for the big guys' mistakes over and over, and the government keeps allowing the same sorts of stupid behavior on the part of large corporations and networks within different industries.

Pre-party cleanup

Hans and I have learned that, aside from keeping the dishes under control because we need something to eat off of, really the only way that we get motivated to clean the house is to have a party. So that is what we are doing this Saturday. This is ostensibly my (very) belated birthday party, but since my birthday was a month and a half ago, that's just a token excuse. We just want to have a clean house.

So yesterday I laid down sawdust next to the raised beds and on the path in the garden. The grass from the lawn is invading the herb bed with a vengeance, and making some serious inroads into the lettuce bed. It was amazing how much sunnier the beds became when I stomped down the grass and weighed it down with a pile of wood shavings. We'll see if this keeps the weedery down next year, too.

I cleaned up the greenhouse and the atrium, and Hans hauled away a carload of trash. I picked a handful of berries, and tidied the plastic bag avalanche (no pictures for the public of that monstrosity, alas. Then I cooked an absolutely fabulous dinner featuring roast slab pork and orangey-pink borscht-like lentil soup (with local vegetables, except for the lentils and leftover chicken bits). The Noble Spousal Unit did the dishes!

I've put a paper plate up in the bar ("Transvesterites Welcome") but people don't seem to realize it's happening. So, for those of our friends and relations who may be interested, it starts at 4 pm and goes on until the cows come home. Potluck, with games and music and movies all night: The Rocky Horror Picture Show, To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything Julie Newmar, The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, and Kinky Boots. Ought to be a lineup to frighten the local homophobes away, I hope.

Today we'll continue the Grand Cleanup. Mopping is on the horizon. In the meantime, I'm going back to bed, as it's still really way too early in the morning, especially since I woke up at 4:30 am (too much rum last night--gives me insomnia).

As promised: black slate countertop photo

Finally got a photo of this so you can see what a recycled pool table looks like when installed in a kitchen:

Black slate and the Big Teeth

Been a pretty busy couple of weeks. First, there were the Big Teeth: Hans finally got his teeth fixed. Major mouth surgery, but not much trauma--he heals fast. One very welcome side effect of the massive tooth removal was that his low-grade, constant infections are also gone, and after about three days his joints stopped hurting. However, dealing with the new teeth has been a bit of a challenge. There's an old Scandinavian/Northern European joke about how the Other Guys talk: like they've got potatoes in their mouths. "Ja, Danish/German/Swedish is just like Swedish/Danish/German, only talking around those earth apples." That's Hans for right now--has to learn how to talk with the new teeth. I've been very impressed with how well he's doing, though--both in good humor, health, and ability to adapt.

What with the rain, and Happy Road turning into a slippery swamp (aka Ye Olde Job Site), Hans has been spending more time at home and continuing the repair project on the kitchen. This has now expanded to include the countertops. Several years ago, Hans (with the help of a not-quite-dressed-yet and sleepy Jim Smith) extricated a huge hunk of black slate (pool table slab) from a dumpster. Last year he cut it into countertop-sized chunks and sanded it off, and yesterday, he installed it in the kitchen. It looks GORGEOUS. He oiled it with walnut oil, which will take a while to soak in all the way, but it's a lovely deep dark charcoal grey and it makes me want to keep it all nice and clean just so I can look at it. Very dramatic. Now, of course, I've got to get to painting the cabinets. That old plywood looks pretty yucky in comparison.

And I am SO glad we got the horrible old paneling countertop cover off.

Photo to come in a later post.

Germany vs. Spain

Hans is chortling and whooping and groaning over the European Championship soccer match this morning. We're up at the IWP's place (aka the black bear portrait photographer, aka the Stepfather-in-Law, aka Peter) and they're watching the match on the tube. The score is 1-0, Spain. Best entertainment I've had all week, listening to him expostulate over the near misses, saves, etc.