Calling a woman, who is anywhere near your own age, “ma’am” is apparently no longer considered polite in today’s society.
It brings about the question, “How old do you think I am, anyway?!” Which is a trick question, with no way out, and should be avoided at all cost.
It also means an afternoon of pop tunes over the radio instead of mind blowing Blues.
I just want my quiet, solitary jobsite back.
What’s a guy to do?
“I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive.”
—Henry Miller
Lucky bastard…
This morning while at the jobsite, my attention was diverted from the 20′ roof rafters to a pair of juvenile seagulls. They were squawking so loud, that I heard them over the generator. Judging from the birds’ noise, and the clumsy flight over the river, I’m fairly certain that it was their first (successful) flight. Two mature gulls were circling high overhead, and the two chicks were all over the air above the Chena. At times they seemed to have this flight thing licked, then suddenly the dirt colored gulls would free fall towards the water, and at the last possible second regain the use of their wings to climb unsteadily upward. Twice one of the gulls seemed to try to save face and simply plopped into the water, as if to say: “I meant to land here, I’m a seagull afterall”, but then the river’s current would take it downstream & away from the other gulls & the intense, panic squawking would start up again. Then all the birds would suddenly be screeching. I did take some pictures, but it was so dark today with heavily overcast skies, that I’m sure they are not worth uploading.
At one point today, I was fighting a particularly wet 20′ rafter up to the second floor, when I noticed a moose on the other side of the river. It’s ears were straight up in the air, and it’s eyes were obviously fixated on me. I guess the young moose had never heard words like that before.
This is my current jobsite along the Chena River. For seven to eight hours a day, I get to hammer boards together, while I think about fishing for salmon to the sounds of river boats flying up and down the river.
The Cleveland Volcano, out on Chuginadak Island, went off this afternoon sending ash to 35,000 feet. The ash dissapated relatively quickly, however.
The photo is from AVO’s “Cleveland Cam”.
This morning I was loading up the last of the old siding into the truck. After finishing up one pile of lumber, I came face to face with the moose above, who had been eating a tree just around the corner from where I was working. I guess the sound of boards slamming into the bed of the truck was not enough to interrupt breakfast. The pile of siding that the moose was hovering over had to wait until this afternoon to go to the dump. That moose simply did not want to leave, and no amount of attempted shooing seemed to work. I guess I have to do a walk around before I start the job in the morning.
Finally, with Solstice on Thursday, summer seems to be showing signs of itself in Interior Alaska. The temps actually hit 80 degrees today, which had me in shock & in shorts. It was a damn, fine day.
