31 July 2007

pictures on flickr

hey ya'll!
i updated my flickr site (finally) with more pictures from the brooks! yeah!! the link is on the sidebar.

i went down to the anderson bluegrass festival last weekend with seth, blaine, katie, john & katie's parents. we had a good (and relatively mellow) time - now it's back in fairbanks to write.my.thesis.!!! though i was quite inspired (yet again) to get rockin' on my guitar...

any suggestions on motivational techniques (for my thesis in particular), please let me know.
other plans:

-guitar playin'
-frisbee tournament/game
-dog park
-making a decision on running another marathon this year
-eating good food

and i just talked with danny last night at troy's birthday par-tay about getting out *hunting* this fall! no shit, i'm going to try and help get me some moose meat. i'm not sure i'm ready to actually kill something, but i'm all about eating it, so we'll see if it pans out. it could be a whole lot of fun...who would have thought?! for now i'd like to just go and help haul stuff...i think i'll let someone else pull the trigger...baby steps, right?

26 July 2007

rugged wilderness is good for my soul.

i just got back from a week-long trip up north to go backpacking in the Brooks Range! jason had a week off from work at Toolik, so i jumped on a bus up there and joined him on a six-day trip into the mountains. into the incredibly rugged, rocky, beautiful and high mountains.

here we are, setting off into the trevor creek valley
this is actually on our last night, Jason cooking dinner up on a ridiculously small saddle that camped on. when i reached the top of it that evening i looked around, slightly incredulously, somewhat wondering where exactly we were going to camp & eat. but indeed it was beautiful. as usual jason had pegged it right on and we were not only okay, but in a fabulous spot.
one of many stream crossings. here i am, with the water just about coming over the top of my gaitors. i did pretty well, but here and in a few other spots i got a bit of overflow into my (phatty new waterproof) boots.

jason on our first night out.
look close and see me. feeling queasy, but keeping on. personal comfort was definitely pushed on this trip...
the scree slope we went down after lunch one day. it looked like it was pretty short, but indeed it was at least a mile long to get to the bottom....




this was the ridge that we camped on for our last night. please note the sloping off on either side...
a porcupine in the roche montenee (spelling?) valley!
the mosquitoes weren't bad at all, however our last stop of the trip proved to have a small swarm in the vicinity that found us pretty quickly...
a view from our last stop, where we ate the rest of our food. from here you can see the adigun river, the haul road, and the pipeline. we hauled ass from here out, and were at the road in ~45 minutes. my voice was nearly hoarse from yelling 'hey bear!' through the willow thickets near the end.

this trip was incredible, and many many many thanks go out to jason for such an awsome opportunity, incredible patience, and a neverending sense of humor and snarkiness that i deeply appreciate.
at some point i'll post up the rest of the pictures on my flickr site (the link is over on the right)

06 July 2007

on a happier note....

alright, so i've deleted my last posting.
it was bringing me down, keeping up such a negative experience.
not to gloss life over, but there is also not much of a need to keep it up and in your (my) face.
and since i don't have a plethora of things to update right now, i don't have the ability to push it far down into the archives.
so, if you missed my duck-debacle, and are terribly curious as to what made me break down and sob on the side of college rd. the other day,let me know and i'll fill you in.
otherwise, there are happier things to note:

summer is beautiful and i've been successful in enjoying much of it. mostly with the following activities:
* playing with my new dog (though she's not so much into fetching anything...)
* frisbee! i joined the fairbanks ultimate frisbee league! who knew i would play team
sports?
* running. i'm thinking about doing the portland marathon in october...anyone wanna join me?
* fun trips, and fun trips to come! especially:
* fishing in chitina a few weeks ago, and hopefully another trip to fill up the
freezer
* meeting meg & curren in denali, and then having them come up here
* backpacking up in the brooks range with jason

also...
the other night i was coming home from a fabulous birthday party for lorien and brian (which included a killer obstacle course, completed by well over a dozen people that included a very large and impressive slip-n-slide and a bmx bike with no brakes), but anyways, i was coming home late and saw what seemed like a sunset!

it's scary when the sky begins to get sunset colors again, because when that happens you know we're really losing the daylight. but, by the same token, i have to say that i kind of rejoice in seeing the colors of sunrise and sunset again.

alright. enough for now. back to working on my thesis!!