|
|
|
|
|
Digg It!
|
Rating: 3.9/5 (28 votes cast) |
|
|
| Words, photography and impressions by Janson Jones, a Floridian living in Alaska. |
|
|
Blog Details |
Overall rank: 412844
Number of inbound blogs: 17
Number of incoming links: 340
ATOM: ATOM feed
Last update: 2008-08-06 09:02:16 GMT
Estimated value: $230,373
|
|
Analytics |
Incoming clicks since last reset: 0
Outgoing clicks since last reset: 80
|
|
Latest Posts |
Really?
Yes, really!
On 30 November, after a week of Mumpower feeling remarkably odd, different, and slightly uncomfortable, we decided to take a home pregnancy test. And what did it say? YES+ Our first reaction was, of course, shock and surprise. But it was the positive breed of shock and surprise. We hadn't planned for this... and we weren't really actively working for it... In fact, we believed it might be quite difficult to conceive a child. We've been together since 2001 and haven't exactly been trying to prevent a pregnancy -- so for it to now suddenly happen? Kind of a miraculous little turn in life. Unexpected but extremely awesome. Then we thought, but what if this test is an anomaly? What if Mumpower's not really pregnant? 
We did a follow up pregnancy test. And the result: YES+ Confirmed! At least, confirmed on the home pregnancy front. Mumpower started pouring through the internet, reading and researching pregnancy and signs of pregnancy while I paced nervously around the house, thinking about space. One by one, she checked off the list of early signs of pregnancy. All the signs were pointing to pregnancy. It looked real. It felt real. And then on Tuesday it was confirmed to be real. This is the first photograph of the future Mumpower-Jones hybrid: Obviously, this changes our lives enormously -- but it's a welcome change and a change we feel blessed and privileged to experience. There's much to learn. Much to do and much to prepare for this little one, though I suspect there's no way one can be fully prepared for a transcendence such as this. The road will be a bumpy one -- but hey, we like off-roading. Life just took an unexpected turn for us, but we're looking forward to the adventure. And the work. And yeah, even the poop... More to come as learn more. This next week should bring lots of information to light -- like due date, etc. And for right now? Now, it's back to grading. Rah rah! Seward Highway, 28 November 2008
A few shots of the frozen waterfall action along the edge of the Chugach Mountains and the Seward Highway. Back in Florida, the only ice I loved was in a margarita. In Alaska? I love it on walls... Giant, rocky walls. McHugh Creek, 28 November 2008
...and then there's McHugh Creek, a frequently visited locale along the Seward Highway and Turnagain Arm. As with most of Turnagain Arm, I'm always surprised at how differently it can appear because of the Alaskan weather patterns. Today, with the overcast skies and the oncoming snow storm, the contrasts were particularly lovely and strong. Bird Creek, 28 November 2008
The closest we got to actually "hiking" on the 28th was at Bird Creek, nestled along the edge of Turnagain Arm. During the summer, this is one of the big salmon fishing spots. During the winter? It's something else entirely. So we hopped over and trekked a bit around the slushy, mucky area. ----- The creek runs lows and the thick muddy banks are frozen over this time of year, creating a fascinating and bizarre mix of mud and ice. Moving down the bank, closer to the tiny river basin, you escape the brutal chill of the Turnagain winds blowing in from the east. But with the easing of the wind, so too comes the crackle of the ice below you. You just can't be sure what's mud, what's earth, what's ice, what's water... ----- Turning to the south, a small hill blocks your view of Turnagain Arm. It's a small, narrow hill, but with the snow piled high, it takes on a heavier presence. Perhaps just a reminder of the weight of the winter, still just beginning. The Kenai looms over the snowy rise, a little farther to the south, through the hazy and frosted overcast skies. ----- And then, once you gain elevation over that small hill, you catch a glimpse of Turnagain Arm in full. It echoes Bird Creek, only magnified a thousand times over. A broad, vast stretch of ice, mud, earth and water. The wind is again pounding you from the east, but the vantage before you seems virtually motionless -- as if stuck in a moment. In truth, it is not static. The ice is slowly contracting and buckling. The tidal surge is slowly beginning to move back into the Arm. And you remember that Turnagain Arm is always in flux, ever changing. Every time you come here it looks different. The earth, the mud, the water, the ice, and even the sky. Bird Point, 28 November 2008
These guys are just beginning to tinker around with the idea of climbing an ice-coated cliff. Personally, this isn't my handle. I know myself too well: Janson(+)Ice (x) Elevation(+)Gravity (=) Bad News Bears. Still, I enjoy seeing the ice climbers. Most of the time, they don't get much more than ten feet from the ground, or so. Unless, of course, I'm only catching them all as they just begin their ascent. The blasted and cut bluffs seem to be among the more popular along this stretch of the Chugach, as they provide for more vertical flows of ice. The Alaska Railroad line passes at the base of this wall. You can see the various layers of the cliff as it was carved out and blasted by people, to make way for the railroad. In the spring, water will spill down this bluff. As the snow melts from the mountains, the edges of the Chugach Mountains become a symphony of waterfalls. In the winter, the ice looks down as the climbers look up. It's a dance of perspective, caught in a moment. Portage Lake, 28 November 2008
(... Continued) Our intended Black Friday hike was to be the Trail of Blue Ice in Portage Valley, but we were double-whammied from our destination. First, the snow plows had cleared the roads, but literally blocked off and buried the access routes to the trails under a thick base of snow. We literally couldn't stop to park the car. Several feet of snow guaranteed that. Second, it started to rain. Freezing rain. Not snow, but rain. And trust me, it's not much fun doing photography in the Alaskan freezing rain. We did find that there was some access to Portage Lake at the terminus of Portage Valley, so we braved the raining ice from the sky to take in some of the freshwater glacial iceburgs floating throughout the lake. I was somewhat amazed that the lake wasn't more frozen over, but it has been an odd Fall. The temperature down there was actually warmer than it was at the other end of Turnagain Arm (and that is fairly odd from my observations). After rooting around briefly at Portage Lake, we began to head west along Turnagain Arm, hoping for clearer skies and gorgeous landscapes to soak in. Perhaps even without rain? Beluga Point, 28 November 2008
Rah rah! I finally made it out for a little photography tour! It feels like ages since I've been able to get out and do some photography, but at last, at last... I got out today. If but for a little while. I headed down Turnagain Arm with Karen of From NY to NC to AK. Our plan was to head down to Portage Valley and take in the Trail of Blue Ice (one of my favorite spots in the region during the winter). As luck would have it, the further south we'd head, the warmer the air got (up to the lower forties)... and with the relative warmth came the rain. Freezing rain. It was an odd day for weather. Weather defined by odd contradictions. So yeah, our planned hike didn't go quite as planned, but Turnagain Arm still presented a plethora of beautiful vistas, as always. Our first spot for the day was Beluga Point. The sky was an ambient shade of gray and the wind was blasting from the east. The tide pulled vast chunks and shards of ice down the Arm, toward Cook Inlet and eventually toward the Gulf of Alaska (far, far to the west and south). Unlike in Florida, overcast skies actually make for some fine landscape shots in Alaska. The contrasts can be striking. I never tire of looking across the Arm at the northern edge of the Kenai Peninsula. It still amazes me to live so near the Kenai, Turnagain Arm, and Portage Valley. The long and narrow stretch of road running the length of Turnagain Arm is a veritable festival of hiking and photographic opportunities. Chugach State Park eventually becomes the Chugach National Forest. Trails thread through and around the mountains, streams and glaciers to the north. Ice slowly drifts by to the south. It's quite fantastic. There would be much more to see over the next few hours, as we made our way west toward Portage Valley and then back to Anchorage. The weather turned several times over, the colors shifted, and the short day came and went. A good day, despite the weather and the loss of our planned hike. More, of course, to follow... Happy Turkey Day!
From our family here in Alaska, to yours... somewhere else. clone wars; or, how I just vomited in my mouth
I just watched the dreadful Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated film. It was terrible. Horrible. Dreadful. Painful. Rancid. Putrefying. Let me be clear: this sucked. Bombad. I admit that I'm writing this as a thirty-something Star Wars fan. And this was clearly a movie made for and intended to be marketed to children. Not me, but young children. Very young children. Children who aren't watching a movie to think. At all. I'm talking tiny little kids. Perhaps embryos. I'm not a Star Wars elitist, mind you. I'm not one of those dudes who rants on and on about how much the new trilogy sucks, yatta yatta yatta. I actually like Revenge of the Sith enormously, and there's enough in Attack of the Clones for me to watch it again. (We won't talk about Phantom Menace.) But this? The Clone Wars? Oh. My. God. Granted, it's basically three animated television episodes bundled together as a single story, but man oh man... what a piece of crap story. It's basically this: The Clone Wars are going on and stuff, and then the bad guys kidnap Jabba's Kid --yeah, Jabba's got a kid-- and it's like up to the good guys to rescue Jabba's Kid from the bad guys, and like return him and stuff. If they don't, then the universe will end. And stuff. Okay, fine. Not much plot. But what's going on with these characters? Too much KiddieFeature activity going on here. 
In the original trilogy, the big KiddieFeature were the Ewoks. Terrible little teddy bears, those Ewoks were. I find them frustrating as all hell whenever I watch Return of the Jedi. But when I was a kid, I thought these cheesy little Care Bears were fun. Thus: KiddieFeature. A character-type intended to play well for the kiddies. In the new trilogy, Jar Jar Binks was the big KiddieFeature. Comic relief sidekick, a real gaggle for the kiddies, and an utter nightmare for most people over the age of fourteen. I was able to forgive Jar Jar. It's for the kids, I'd whisper to myself between moments of despair and grief. It's just a KiddieFeature. So what's the KiddieFeature in the new movie? Other than, you know, the entire freakin' mindless movie? Well, we've got two. First up is Jabba's kid. As I said before, that's right: Jabba the Hutt's got a kid. A tiny little turd who farts and burps his way through the movie. Strapped to the back of a Jedi. A burping Hutt. This little dude was beyond irritating. I don't want cute little giggling turds in my Star Wars lore. I just don't. Why must we do the whole "Young Jabba" thing? "Young Vader." Or "Young Greedo." And "Young Indiana." God help us if someday we get "Young Yoda: The Adventures of a Young, Green Padawan Who Believed He Could And Did Because There Is No Try." Jabba's baby is the last draw. No more Young-Anything. He is, literally and figuratively, a piece of shit. By design and by intention: a piece of shit. Amazing. 
And what's worse than Jabba's little turd blossom child? Try his uncle. Yeah, Jabba's got an uncle. He runs a joint in Coruscant. Whereas Jabba is a backwater, country Tatoonie gangsta', Jabba's uncle is an urban city slicker. A sassy clubber, it seems, as he wears a ton of makeup and talks with a ridiculous lisp. It's not too hard to see what they're doing with Jabba's uncle. He's like a composite of every gay stereotype from my youth. He wears makeup and talks with an effeminate lisp. It's almost like this character was drawn up from the notes of a twelve year old circa 1986, regarding homosexuality. It's absurd. And it's offensive. It's utterly, fantastically, mind-blowingly offensive. Even worse than Padme being reduced to The-Pregnant-Gal-Who-Only-Brushes-Her-Hair-And-Cries in Revenge of the Sith. And this is the point. Okay, it's a kiddie movie. Okay, you're blowing off the adults and producing a simplistic, unintelligent, unsophisticated animated flick for kids to consume and imitate. Fine. BUT: that's all the more reason to not perpetuate such ridiculous stereotypes. I mean, come on. 2008. Get with the damn program. Ridiculous. What the hell were they thinking? Hey, it's an animated film intended for kids. Lighten up. It's just for fun, not for thinkin'. Yeah, like that big dumb WALL-E movie. Heh. WALL-E is a prime example of what animated films can be: intelligent, moving, beautiful, and sophisticated. Kiddie Movies don't have to be celebrations of stupidity, farts, and stereotypes. Kids aren't stupid. (Adults are.) Yatta, yatta, yatta. I'll stop ranting now. It's just that I'm angry. And I feel a little abused. On the positive side, the animation is quite lovely. It's pretty. And the tv series might (maybe perhaps) work a bit better. If, that is, they actually do some thinking. Thinking is not a bad thing. It really isn't. Peace be with you, and also: may the forceful-franchise be with you. nine inches of snow, or so
We've got a fresh blanket of about nine inches, or so, of snow. It's lovely outside. Tonight we may pick up another two or three. I say: bring it on. I'm digging the snow right now. As odd as it may sound (and it should sound very odd to those of you who know me from Florida), I absolutely adore shoveling snow. It's just not the kind of thing one would expect to love, shoveling snow. And yet, I love it. I adore it. I like making little mountains of snow. Little trails cutting through the little mountains of snow. Last winter, I had a snow pile in the backyard taller than myself. It was over seven feet tall. And it was awesome. It was my own little private Hoth. So today's been a chill-down day. I've got four albums playing on random right now, and I believe the selections exemplify the mood I'm in right now: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young: Deja Vu (1970). Neil Young: After the Goldrush (1970). Steely Dan: Can't Buy a Thrill (1972). Supertramp: Breakfast in America (1979). Feeling rather chilled out right now. Decompression. I hope it snows soon. I can't wait to shovel more snow. (And no, I'm not being sarcastic. I actually love to shovel snow!)
And then? Then it snowed. And after it snowed? Then... Then it was Turkey Break. Anchorage is starting to pack in some snow, at last. At this time of year, snow is a welcome comfort. If you've got snow, it means two things. First, it's not that cold. When it gets too cold, the snow doesn't fall. Second, the snow helps light the darkness. We're at a little under six and half hours of daylight now. Of course, the sun hangs very low during the day, so we don't necessarily get six and a half hours of direct daylight. The day feels like an elongated dusk. So, when the snow is here, and the ground radiates light, it's a good thing. It brings some life to these long, long nights. Yes, I've come to (greatly) appreciate the snow in Alaska. Snow is a good thing. A very good thing. We wrapped up classes today and now we're on Turkey Break. A five-day span of no-classes. And then one more week of classes, followed by Finals. The semester is almost over. I think we're all very ready for the big break, but I can't tell you how much I need Turkey Break. It was an incredibly stressful couple of weeks back there and I haven't quite been able to unwind from it all. The abstract business of life, the ambiance of hyper-activity, can feel oppressive at times. I need to unwind. I need to go outside and play in the snow. I need to slowly and deeply breath in that chilly, crisp air. Perhaps follow the fresh, snowy moose tracks I noticed in the front yard earlier tonight... and see where they take me. Yeah, I'm looking forward to this little break. I'm so glad --thankful-- that the snow is here. It's going to be a bright, crisp little break. rest up
I'd originally planned on heading down Turnagain Arm today, Sunday 23 November, but with the snow and ice on the roads, Karen and I figured we'd each stay in Anchorage and play a little rest-up. Perhaps hit the snow next weekend, or over the break?
Turns out it was a good day to stay home. Got some work done, got some rest on, a little of this, a little of that. Relax. After the past few weeks, I still need it.
Still... I am itching to get down Turnagain Arm soon. I'm curious what the light's doing right around now. A month ago, it was utterly gorgeous. I hate to think what I've been missing.
I need to get my balance back.
Janson. some waves are bigger than others
It's Thursday, November 20th, 2008. The days are short, here in Anchorage, Alaska. Today we had six hours and fifty minutes of daylight. The sun set at 4:11 p.m. Today's high? 21 degrees Fahrenheit. The low? 18. We've got snow on the ground, on the trees, on the roads. And where there isn't snow, there's ice.
It's quite lovely, but I do admit that after the last few weeks --these last few brutal weeks-- I could really go for a long, lazy, hot and humid day. I sort of miss sweating and humidity right now. I could really go for a bit of sun on my skin. Some salt on my skin. Perhaps even the sounds of crickets and frogs late at night. A rolling wave of thunder accompanied by the rattling of a window pane.
Yeah, right now I could really go for a nice, long, sticky summer day. ~~~ I'm listening to Bill Laswell's recent album, Imaginary Cuba -- a Laswellian ambient-dub reworking of Cuban roots. Great percussion and, of course, some fun bass work. It's serving me well right now, Laswell's album. Fits the mood I'm in, as I begin to recover a bit from this past run of work. ~~~ I figured I'd get back on the blog this weekend, but had to jump on early. Typepad, the service I use for this website, updated their posting interface with a bundle of goodies. It almost feels like a reward... So, I had to post a post. Get back online and say howdy. Throw a nod to the sunrise that's a few hours away on the east coast.
I'll be getting back into the swing of things now. I apologize for the relative absence these past few weeks. Work comes in waves and, as I learned as a kid growing up in Volusia county, some waves are bigger than others. Just got to keep swimming.
Hope all is well on your end of the wires ~~
More soon.
~ Janson
200
It's almost Thanksgiving already? Where is the time going...?
I read and commented on about 200 pages of text yesterday. Add to that ten student conferences and three full course meetings and it made for a busy, busy day. This has been going on for a while now. I'm not really complaining -- cycles like this happen. But when they do, man... It's just exhausting.
I'm on this heavy rotation for a few more days, but things should clear up by the end of this upcoming weekend. I'll have a brief window before the epic storm that is always the end-of-the-semester.
Looking forward to getting outside and doing some photography soon. The hoar frost is starting to crop up with the cold and the fog. It's chilly out there, but the light (what little there still is this time of year) is nice. When it's dark, the light is precious. And I'd like to get outside and see more non-screen light. wall of voodoo, and you too.
My manic run of mayhem continues -- and I find myself generally without the energy or will to do significant posting on the blog. Work is piling up and I now feel like I know what it must feel like to swim for twenty days straight.
BUT: A note.
Tonight, as I process, process, process... I'm listening to Wall of Voodoo's 1981 self-titled EP. Re-released on the Index Masters Wall of Voodoo compilation, it is a work of beauty. It even has the most beautifully odd over of "Ring of Fire" I've ever heard. Not quite as creepily awesome as Devo's 1978 cover of the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction"... but still, pretty damn awesome.
I must say, some kick-ass, twisted and alternative post-punk from the early 1980s goes a long, long way in helping give me that extra push I need to get through yet another long night of reading and writing.
Sonic coffee. It's jazzing me up. And I need it.
Sunset was at 4:17 p.m. today. Long nights made even longer. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
