In the meadow I can build a snowman...

or; Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

It's true, if I wanted to, I could build a snowman. Right now!!!! Well, actually maybe not... but not for lack of snow... it's really cold snow, as snow often is here, it's not packable so no snowball fights, no snow forts, no snowmen in the meadow...

(click for larger)

BUT WE'VE GOT SNOW!!!

Ha, I just love this!

And go figure, I leave town for the night after spending all day yesterday helping a friend move down to Delta Junction and so I don't even get to post about the snow sooner. I had to wait alllll the way until now. Oh well. Such is life. No big whoop.

Due to my lack of a digital camera, because owning all sorts of new technology doesn't impress me and I have no tremendous need to have pictures of everything, and because I wanted to post up a picture of the snow, from our local newspaper, the Fairbanks News-Miner, I've borrowed from their ArcticCam for the above image.

Outside my windows it looks very much the same... well, except I see no other buildings, almost one neighbors house through the trees, and no vehicles whatsoever. I can tell the road is there, it's completely snow-covered as is the ground everywhere and my driveway too. I see trees mainly, all covered white for the most part, some spots of green and brown showing especially under the canopy, and a dull grey sky above.

Essentially today is the most beautiful day of this half of the year!

The snow started over 24 hours ago. Yesterday I awoke at dawn, around 7:00 a.m. and there were flurries but no significant coverage. Helped move boxes and beds, dressers and bikes, etc down to Delta, like 100 miles from here. Flurries all day there. With each trip back up the Richardson, upon getting closer to the North Pole-Fairbanks area -- snow snow snow! On and off all day here there was a light snow, never really coming down hard, at least not when we were back in town packing up the van before again heading back down the highway to drop off a load. When I left Delta earlier this morning to drive back, not a whole lot of white stuff there at all, basically just a dusting.

Now it's 20°F (-6°C) approaching the noontime hour on the first Sunday of October and we've got a minorly significant measurable amount of snow, about an inch out there. It's been very coming down since I got outta bed a few hours ago.

I LOVE THIS!!!!!!!!!! First snow: October 7th. Sooner than I predicted.

Now, how does this affect my hiking/running? I was gonna head out there today but now I'm not so sure. Maybe later.

For the time being, even though I'm way jacked up, hyped up, stoked, delighted to the max, like all I wanna do is go frolick in the snow then come inside and sip on hot chocolate and watch A Charlie Brown Christmas. I think I'll settle for some the end of the Seahawks-Steelers game... and the Pats.

But for the immediate future, I will indulge in a little Sunday activity that's pretty fun and it's called...

Unconscious Mutterings



a free association game -- I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Cluster :: General George Armstrong Custer.
American hero... I mean genocidal idiot. There's a good movie or two about the guy, one with the great Errol Flynn. But they should only be watched as historical fiction and not as real-life bio-drama.

2. Announcement :: Important message.
May I have your attention, please. IT'S SNOWING!!!!!

3. Respect :: R-E-S-P-E-C-T,
find out what it means to me.
Sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me...

4. Incident :: Incident on 57th Street,
an ancient song, from the early 70's, from when Springsteen was a true rocker, when he made much of his best music. I'll soon have in my hands the newest Bruce & The E Street Band album, Magic, but I've read a lot of bad reviews so I'm not so sure I'm looking forward to it. Ahhh, well, at least there's the good old stuff to fall back on.

5. Accordian :: Bruce Hornsby!
Summer of 1997, on the Furthur Festival, during a song during The Black Crowes set, the other Bruuuuuuuce came out on stage with his accordian and seriously, I never knew an accordian could sound so amazingly cool. Ho-ly cow. I've heard Bruce before on accordian with the Dead, but he knows how to jam that sucker like I never knew an accordian could jam! Whew. (Or maybe, uh, it was the, uh, stuff I consumed beforehand, and that just, well, made everything sound slightly more... different that normal... of course I'm talking about Kool-Aid. Duh.)

6. Drunk :: I have never been...
in the past few years at least. I'm not a big drinker anymore. Every now and then I do like to indulge in a nice pint or two (never any more than that) of Guinness, maybe Bass, or Samuel Smith's Oatmeal Stout! Oh yeah!!! Sierra Nevada's pretty good. Alaskan Smoked Porter is pretty sweet, too. Some beautiful beers out there, just so long is doesn't start with B and end with udweiser, rhyme with Floors and certainly not Corona. Dis-freakin'-gusting, all of them. I'd rather drink turpentine.

7. If :: If I Had The World To Give...
I'd give it to you.
Long as you live, would you let it fall,
or hold it all in your arms?
-Robert Hunter

8. Dexter :: Manley...
a great defensive (American) football player, primarily for the Washington Redskins in the 1980's.

9. Wedding :: Selfishness.
I could so very easily go into 2,000 words here about how idiotic and pathetic it is to spend lavishly on a wedding when A) it only has a 50% chance of surviving and B) when so many people in this world suffer so horribly with nothing, children die because they don't have simple medications and clean water that we take for granted... but people want to have a thousand dollar wedding dress (sometimes even more than that!?) People want just basically to spend spend spend because it could never be too extravagant, right? That's sick. One of the greatest acts of selfishness there is in American society. Now I ain't sayin' don't throw a wedding celebration... but why not think first how the money you're spending could be better used in the world to help others? Keep it simple. Cut back. Help people instead your own selfish desires.

10. Gambling :: Stoopid waste of money.
The odds are not in your favor. The odds are always in favor of the casino winning and you losing. Again, isn't there a better way your lost money could be spent?

Why is a lavish fairytale wedding
or wasting money in the casino
more important than human life?