December 5, 2008
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Yikes!! It’s raining.
Anyone who thinks that weather warm enough to bring rain to an Alaskan winter would be more pleasant than the usual cold, hasn’t spent a rainy winter here. One rainy winter that immediately comes to my mind is the year that my neighbor Duane Wetherell got his truck stuck in my driveway on Christmas. He wasn’t coming to visit me or trying to leave my place. He was going around a corner on his way home and slid into my driveway, then couldn’t get enough traction to get out of it.
The temperature is hovering around 33°F, and could go either way: down so that the wet layer becomes a slick glaze under a new snowfall, or up for a while so that the glaze layer will be thicker and slicker when it finally freezes. Freeze it will. Winter hasn’t officially started yet, and this is still Alaska.
I posted half a dozen new photos today and added a new profile pic, all taken yesterday while Doug and I strung wires and put up a floodlight for his chopping block and the side of the woodpile where he delves under the snowy tarp for wood to split.
In the shot above, he is standing on snow we have shoveled from the area around the chopping block, with a tray under his feet to spread his weight so he doesn’t just sink into the snow, which is about armpit-deep at that point.
For a brief moment around noon, as Doug was putting up a little hood over the light fixture to keep snow off it, before we broke for food and moved on to shoveling the driveway, the sun broke through below the clouds and just above the treetops to the south. Next week, it won’t rise above the trees at all. Then, next month it will be up again and by mid-February I’ll be able to feel its warmth on my skin. It will rise higher and higher, and farther east, then north, until June, when it will stop getting dark and the sun will set only briefly beyond the northern horizon before coming up again a few degrees west of its setting point. I love the way that works, can’t help marveling over it.
Above is the shot I promised, of my “snow gauge,” one of the railroad ties standing in my yard. I’m glad I captured that yesterday. If the rain persists, it will be warped and distorted or gone entirely by the end of this day.
Comments (11)
Wow. Some beautiful sights there and I like that photo of you. There is a certain look about it that reminds me of a friend.
Rain in Alaska? Wow. Gorgeous pics just the same.
Thank-you for your caring words the other day. My post today is slightly more optimistic.
Oddly enuff, it’s warmer where you are rite now than it is where I am at the moment (Ohio).
It’s 20 degrees outside here & going down to 9 degrees…got an Alberta Clipper headed this way & it’s supposed to snow tomorrow…but NOTHING like what yas guys have!!!
Stay safe & warm………..
Peace……..AbbeyC
New profile pic is VERY attractive.
It is lovely..but so cold. Keep warm!
It is something to see how beautiful it is and yet know how much work it must be to survive it. It’s hard to imagine myself there as I don’t think I could get out from under the covers. I woudln’t last long. Take care, stay warm and keep off the ice.
I think today, you may have been warmer there than here. Probably didn’t have the 800 mph (guestimate!) winds either. (But from the south, so tomorrow should be nicer… I hope!)
The snow looks heavy & wet. I always enjoy your photos…
O-U-R-A-Q-T. But as your fashion co-ordinator, I’m going to say that all the black looks a little oppressive on you.
The photo of Doug looks intriguing. I like it.
@Apocatastasis - *hehee* All that “black” isn’t. The hat is purple, with a black band, and the shirt is blue… photographic effect because the original was overexposed, washed-out. My hair isn’t naturally that dark, either.
I do, however, occasionally dress all in black. Maybe there’s a touch of contrariness in that. When I ran with bikers and everyone else was all in black and boots, I’d be the one in the red paisley shirt, orange hat, or rust brown knee high fringed moccasins.
Really, it’s mostly pragmatism. What I wear depends on what turns up in the dumpsters and how long it has been since I did laundry. Volunteering as my fashion coordinator is an act of extreme foolhardiness.
@SuSu - This dark computer monitor I’m using doesn’t help. Unless I look closely, it almost appears as if you’re wearing a black scarf and a blue shirt
All black? I knew it… ginger ninja!
@Apocatastasis - Bingo! You got me. Ever since I first read about Ninja techniques, I have practiced them. I love going into a public place and remaining unnoticed in a crowd. The only place those tricks don’t work is out in the woods. Wild animals are not so easily misled.