The adventures continue

Hi Family and Friends,
Am off work today, Monday, June 16th. Got my laundry done - finally - and thought I would post some more of the notes I've been jotting down. Am feeling better but these days off are very long!! Talked to the kids yesterday on Father's Day. They went to Cracker Barrell to have their Sunday only served southern fried chicken to celebrate for me. Was great to talk to them. They are all doing great and have been adding to their blog, too. If you haven't yet gotten on their blog you should. It helps keep up on what they are doing plus they know how to put pictures on theirs! Linda told me about David Tate. What a shame - he was so young - we had a lot of fun times golfing with David, didn't we - he'll be missed. She also sent me some pictures of all of the flooding - wow! I cannot remember the bridge at Cooks Mills ever flooding over before. Hopefully your rain will back off big time for a while. Well, here we go with the writing:

June 1, 2008

It is hard to know where to start - the miles have been many, some hard and some easy - but none without you in my mind and heart. There has been much doubt in my mind as to why I have come back to this far-off place, where winter still hangs on like an ingrown toe nail that you keep stubbing. You can put up with it most of the time but you just can't kick anything quite as hard as you woud like. I will miss your birthday again, Linda, but you should have some flowers for your desk. Not quite the same but we can celebrate when I am home.


June 5, 2008

Last day of training. We drove all the way to Fish Creek just so we could train on the four mile stretch of road out to Ileson. It is a very dangerous and tricky part of the park road so we drive it over and over without people on so we can re-learn the road without distraction. It has been a very long day and I'm going to eat supper and turn in


June 6, 2008

Sittout outside on the back of the Murie Center. Still need a coat on over a sweatshirt if you are sitting still. Don't remember it staying this cold this late last year. But it has not snowed for five days and the sun comes and goes to try to warm us.

HATS . . . .

There is one thing that I have noticed up here that is totally different from home and that is hats. And I do mean different hats. Some are hard to describe. It seems as if people use them to help personify their personality. We have all kinds - not to say they are out of place, but they are unique to the person who wears them. The tourist men all wear a ball cap with the word Alaska on the front so that everyone will know that they are in Alaska - and I suppose so that they can do a quick check to remind themselves where they are. You have to keep in mind that the average age of tourists that come up here is 65. Not that that is old, but it is the right age for men to start taking their hats off to find out where they are. There is also that bracket of men that wear both the hat and the sweatshirt that say Alaska, and in most cases these men are also carrying their wives purses, and can be found staring into space with their mouths half open standing in line waiting for the right bus to take them back to their hotel, which they cannot pronounce the name of but their wife has a canvas tote bag from their hotel so they can just point at the name on the bag and ask the driver, "do you go here?" I love to say "no" then watch as the wife goes into full fly-catching mode with that "how will we ever get back to Cleveland from here" look on her face. But I always give in and tell them which bus to get on so they don't miss the salad bar opening and the start of the sing-along. They all know all of the words to "Someone's in the Kitchen with Dinah" and "I've been Working on the Railroad". Lawrence rules with this crowd! The tote-bag crowd I call them. Then there is the fly fishermen's hat. That's the guy who just bought the hat down in Skagway to impress all his friends back at the local bait shop. He can't wait to get home and show off all his new blue gill lures he has pinned through his new hat. You can always tell it is a new hat by all the bandaids on the guy's hands. You see, he keeps taking his hat off to tell where he is at and gets his hands caught on his new fishing lures. I say a fella with one hand that has at least seven bandaids on it and the other hand in a sling (with his wife's purse around his neck) is the true vacation fisherman. The bird lovers hat is another one that is hard to miss. They have this big floppy brim on them with a chin strap. Pray tell what the chin strap is for. Maybe if they see the right bird they will be able to fly also. These hats also have face netting that folds up in the brim. I guess this netting is to help them stay on their diet. You can always tell you are at dinner with a birder who has just purchased the ultimate bird-watching hat because they can't figure out how to get the netting to stay up in the brim after they have unrolled it. One of the best of the all time hats is the Alaskan wildlife hat. In my opinion, the moose is by far the best. What you have is a nice brown fur cap with a set of moose antlers sticking out the sides. The most common wearer of this hat is the guy with the World War II Cheerleader for a wife who has had three face lifts and looks at least thirty years younger than him. It is as if this hat gives him some new-found supply of testosterone - they spend a lot of time putting their head down and making cow sounds like they are going to goor something. Let me say this - there is nothing more touristy than some guy in a wolf or bear hat - but the one in a moose hat with the antlers is the best - and this macho "moose" guy is carrying his wife's purse!!! Next there is the Sherlock Holmes hat. Now this one is worn by both men and women - big bill in the front and in the back and inveriably one will leave the price tag on the under side of the back bill but put the hat on backwards. Not always, but most of the time they are traveling with another couple who have binoculars around their necks and nets over their faces. Not to be outdone - both the man and the woman will be holding a marshim pipe. The ever-present Elmer Fudd hat can also be seen in the gift shops in Glidder Gulch - with the red plaid out-numbering the green plaid four to one. Almost always, the men wearing this hat will have one ear flap up and one down. This is so they will be at least half way ready to go to the next gift shop at a moment's notice and can do so with only one hand needed to pull the "up" flap back down, freeing his other hand for - you're right - carrying is wife's purse. Then there is the photographer's hat. This hat has many categories of human under them. Mostly you've got the professional photographer with the 1000mm lens that looks a lot like a leaf blower, who's carrying a tripod and a back pack that is big enough to make an attempt at climbing Mount Foucker. This guy has everything he is wearing two sizes too big for him - shirt, vest, pants - but not his hat. It is this foreign legion style with a black bill, white top and a washcloth type thing hanging from the back. Most of these people don't carry a purse, though. I could go on and on. My powers of observation are exceptional - maybe it is my own little idiosinkricy or just my left-threaded way. Probably the best hat of them all is the Australian style bush hat, worn exclusively by people from Georgia and Alabama, all trying to talk like Crockadille Dundee with a southern accent. This hat is easy to spot in a crowd because the person wearing it is usually pulling a fold-up shopping cart that will have his wife's purse AND his sister-in-laws purse in it. I love to say "Good day, Mate, out for a walk about" in my best accent from down under. It seems, though, that every time I get a chance to do this, I say it at the same time they've been told to get something out of their wife's purse in the shopping cart and they don't hear me. Hats, hats, hats - none like Ivan's or Kenney's bucket hats though. Maybe they are just too flatlandish for up here, I don't know. But what I do know is that the one common demononator among the hat-wearing men I am encountering during my Alaskan adventure is the number of them that carry a purse!


Got a couple of folks waiting to use a computer so I'll stop for now. Will try to write more again tomorrow, as I am off then too. Monday and Tuesday is my weekend with this run I'm on now. Take care everyone - I miss you - hopefully you can comment back to me on the blog.

Monty