"Only in Alaska"

Well, after an early start and a long day last Friday, Louie and I have successfully made it to Anchorage, Alaska. Even our luggage made it, which was a pleasant surprise considering the juggle and shuffle of flights upon our arrival at Logan. Jeff and I dragged my two over-stuffed and quite heavy suitcases, my backpack of tricks and the infamous Louie to terminal A for check-in at Continental Airlines, only to find out that my flight from Newark to Seattle (flight 2 of 3) was canceled because of the pending weather forecast for the Eastern Seaboard... Instead of boring you all with the mundane details of what happened next, blah, blah, blah...suffice it to say that Jeff and I were able to get me and Louie checked in at Northwest Airlines and to the security line (running very late at this point!!) After a tearful hug and kiss goodbye, our gazes fastened upon one another for the last time for at least three months as I turned and walked away towards the (thankfully short) security line, and, to the unknown.

Jeff told me afterwards that as I reached the security line he was trying to get my attention by whistling to me...I wish I had heard him. I would have loved to have seen his face just one more time. Louie and I were the last ones on the plane.

---

It is currently Monday night, or your Tuesday morning at this point. In my three full days and one half day that I have officially been "living" in Alaska, and the unknown, I have witnessed: the inaugural "Running of the Reindeer"; foxes, wolves and wolverine skins hanging up for sale or to dry (not quite sure which); coworkers of mine perform some incredible, and in some cases not-that-great, karaoke; the live operations of AMP working their magic at an Alaska Aces semi-pro (or is it pro??) hockey game; referring back to the "Running of the Reindeer", seeing near-naked men in twenty degree Alaskan weather, English women wearing over-sized red hats and scarves, and red-suited men wearing long-johns and Santa suits, as well as many, many other characters who ventured out for the race. And to top it all off, for lunch today one of the reporters bought me Reindeer...I don't know what exactly to call it - all's I know is that it was Reindeer that I ate....and it was served in a sausage roll.

I'm pretty sure I can say that those are things that I never would have experienced in Massachusetts. Perhaps in Vermont (Kristy and Justin), but certainly not on the South Shore.

"Only in Alaska..."

So I thought this past weekend it would have been fairly easy for me to return at least several of the phone calls on the long list of people I've been unintentionally neglecting, however I was invited to several social and work-related engagements and felt I could not pass up the opportunities to get to know my new co-workers; who they are as people, in social situations, and of course, what they are like when they are in "work-mode". So far, so good...

It is going to take me at least a week I think to really get a good grasp of the schedule I need to keep up as far as being able to talk to all of you at decent hours of the night, or morning. Currently it's looking like so long as I wake up early enough I can make phone calls when you all are on your lunch breaks (hopefully). It's either that or I start phoning when I get home from work, typically around 6:30p Alaska time...or 10:30p EST. Take your pick I guess. I suppose that could be part of the reason why I started this blog - because the phone calls to and from home may be limited at times.

I hope I'm able to get in touch with all of you at some point soon. I look forward to it.

At the end of the posting here are some of the pictures I took of my apartment, as well as some other goodies.

Number of phone calls I need to return: 16

Number of emails I need to respond to: 14

Temperature update: 25 degrees F and cloudy in Anchorage

Alaska trivia: Nearly one-third of Alaska lies within the Arctic Circle

Descending towards the Anchorage area, shot through some very dirty airplane windows

...and my apologies about the neck cramps from the sideways pictures...

The new digs:










Louie wondering, "Where has all the furniture gone?"




The view from our balcony...










Until the Volvo ships in...


Sunset. Here, the sun sets in the Southwest