March 12, 2003

• Ken Anderson and team run along the Norton Sound with Old Shaktoolik in the background.

  
  

  Geez!  It’s four in the morning here… what am I doing (semi-)awake at the keyboard?   Fortunately for the whole household, I woke from the pressure of a dog and a cat who were trying to share a bit of body heat.  They were cutting off the circulation in my legs.

  
  

  A morale boosting sign is posted 5 miles outside of Unalakleet for rookie musher Cali King.

  
  

  The fire wasn’t out yet, hadn’t burned low enough that putting cold wood in there would put it out, but putting the cold wood in the stove did suddenly reduce the amount of heat it was producing.  The sane, sensible place for me would be over there under the dog, cat and covers at least until the new wood catches alight and the fire picks up.  It’s only 55°F in here now.  The wind is howling and roaring through the trees again, sucking the heat out of the house.

  
  

  Maybe I should go get my fingerless shooting gloves.  I’ve resorted to them before when my fingers were too cold to type.  A few minutes ago, instead of hitting the checkbox to edit HTML, I hit the button and posted an incomplete entry.  I hate when that happens… don’t think I can get away with blaming it on cold fingers, though.  Better go start a fresh pot of coffee…. BRB.

  
  

  The computer caught my eye on my way back from the bathroom, because the screen saver wasn’t working and the dialog box was there, saying our internet connection had been interrupted.  It had to have been Doug who disabled the screen saver.  Greyfox wouldn’t know how to do it, though it was he who was at the computer when I went to bed near midnight.  Judging by the state of the fire in the woodstove, he must have stoked it and fallen into bed around 2 AM.

  
  

  Doug went down around 6 PM, so I know if I’m going to have much time on the machine without having him hanging over me, resting his chin on my head ostensibly to read what I’m writing, but actually to make me uncomfortable so I’ll move away from his computer, I need to get it while he’s still snoring in his sack.  This computer-sharing thing has gotten crazy since Greyfox became addicted to TOTSE.  I’ve been spending a lot of my time with the PS2.

  
  

  Of course, since I paused here long enough on my way back to bed to turn the screen saver back on, I couldn’t resist dialing up the ISP and checking the progress of the race.  That done, I just had to check the comments on my “Women and Men” blog.  From that point on, I was already awake, so what the hell….

  
  

  RACE NEWS:

  
  

  Ramy Brooks breezed through the Elim checkpoint, in at 01:52 this morning, out at 01:53 on his way to Golovin with 8 dogs. 

  
  

  Robert Sorlie of Norway was there at the time, having checked in at 01:05.  He must have been hitching up his team after a brief rest and maybe a snack, when Ramy went through.  Sorlie and his nine dogs were out of Elim two minutes after Ramy. 

  
  

  Ramy’s time between Koyuk and Elim had been about three and a half hours longer than Mr. Sorlie’s, which either means he’s slowing down or that he took a break on the trail somewhere and his team might be fresh enough to hold a lead.

  
  

  
  

  UPDATE (7:20 AM)

  
  

  Read Ramy’s mom Roxy’s report.

  
  

  Jeff King (Cali’s father) left Koyuk at 23:18 last night with twelve dogs after a rest of almost five hours.  At 03:53:34, my latest available update right now, Martin Buser with ten dogs, Ken Anderson with seven, and John Baker with nine, were all still in Koyuk.

  
  

  An aerial view shows 4 dog teams resting at the Unalakleet checkpoint.

  
  

  The next five mushers are out of Shaktoolik on the way to Koyuk.  Four mushers are in Shaktoolik.   Dee Dee Jonrowe, with nine dogs, rested about four hours in Unalakleet last night, leaving shortly before 11 PM on her way to Shaktoolik.

  
  

  Of the 51 mushers left in the race now, only one, rookie Bill Pinkham in Kaltag on his second time through there, with nine dogs, has not taken his mandatory 8-hour layover.  All the rest have taken both mandatory layovers.

  
  

  Greyfox told me he read in the paper that one veteran musher has suggested changing the mandatory 24-hour rest to two twelve-hour layovers.  I think he’s right; it would be better for both the dogs and the mushers to space the rests out a bit.

  
  

  And….

  
  

  WOMEN & men 

  
  

  Here’s one of the comments I got:

  
  

  
  

  Ok so I agree with everything you said about “the mating game” but here’s what I want to know… you’ve explained the ideal situation but…

  
  

  “what would be the revolutionary change?” NickyJett

  
  

  I’m willing to entertain anyone’s speculation about what comes next when the current system breaks down completely.  All the Virgoan influences in my personality make me good at seeing what is wrong with the status quo.  A correspondingly large amount of Libran influence in my chart makes me favor justice, fairness and balance.  A lifetime’s experience of human capriciousness has taught me that change does not always trend toward rational and just solutions to problems.

  
  

  A science fiction story I read in the ‘sixties (if anyone can guess the title and author, please tell me), when overpopulation was the big problem, AIDS was unheard-of, and few had noticed global warming, presented one logical solution.  Children in that fictional society were given contraceptive implants before puberty. 

  
  

  The implants were removed or neutralized, ideally, when the “Board” decided the individual was worthy of parenthood and the society could handle more population.  In practice, in the story, the right to reproduce became just another perk or plum to be awarded by a corrupt power structure.  There was much popular opposition to the system.  Believable scenario, I think.

  
  

  Anyone else have any ideas?

  • 10:11 am
  • 8 Comments