Wilderness Blues- Ramblings from the Great Land

  When you read the title of this post you might think I'm all excited about getting a ticket. Well, I am, but not in a good way. See, it's not like a ticket to a basketball game or a lottery ticket or a ticket to travel across the country on a train, this is a traffic ticket. For the first time in my 51 years of driving, I've gotten a traffic ticket. Frankly, I'm really peeved about it. It was so unnecessary.  Six months ago my driver's license expired. For whatever reason the state doesn't send you a message stating that it's expired, you're just supposed to remember that after five years, you need to renew your license. Well, let me ask you, do you remember to drain some water out of the bottom of your water heater tank every year? In the fall do you change the filters in your furnace? Are you remembering to check the belts, hoses and filters in your car every time you change the oil? Do you change the oil when the manufacturer recommends, or do ...

  Last Friday I  got a call from my daughter who works at the city. She mentioned that her boss, whose brother is the harbor master said a boat had sunk in the harbor. When she asked which one, she was told it was the Talache. I'm quite familiar with that boat. Thirty years ago at the time I was buying the Bonnie J, two of my friends were also buying old wooden boats. It was what we could afford at the time. My friend Marlin Ryder bought the F/V Ricky Ray, and my friend Buffalo Bob Holden bought the Talache. He picked it up from a guy down in Sitka, who used to tack Masonite on the hull down by the water line so he could go fishing in the winter and not worry about ice cutting the hull. The boat was built with cedar from Port Orford Oregon. It is a double end troller, with both the bow and stern of the boat tapered. It's nice in a following sea, but it was a little narrow and tippy if it was at the dock. When the trolling poles were extended with stabilizers though,...

 Those who know me know that winter isn't my favorite time of year. Cold air, snow, slush, frozen ground, frozen pipes, frozen hands, frozen equipment- not a big fan. I'm watching my friends' dog again while they're in sunny Mexico. Don't think I'd care to be there either- drug cartels, shootings, bad water. I pretty much manage to find something wrong with everywhere. Anyway, dogs need to be taken outside, for their sanity and yours, so I was taking my canine charge down to the park yesterday for a walk. We were having a good enough time; or at least he was. I'm not too interested in sniffing the deposits of my friends and colleagues, but he was in seventh heaven. As it was, another person showed up with their dog, and since Rabano doesn't get along well with any other dogs, and only a few people as far as I can tell, we took a hike down near the harbor. I was already having some difficulty walking since I woke up with an ...

 Several hours ago I had some idea what I wanted to write for this post. I suppose I should have stopped right then and written it, but I had to make a trip to the store and the post office. There were some muffins to make for some friends whose family is visiting for Christmas. I needed to go to my daughter's house and enjoy an annual shoe box dinner with her and two of my grandchildren and a great granddaughter, as well as some close friends. These things are all blessings to me. Tomorrow we'll open gifts and have more family and friends over to share an abundance of food and hopefully and abundance of laughter. Like so many others, I sometimes get caught up in all the gift giving and holiday cheer, that I forget that there is a reason why we celebrate Christmas. It's because God loved us enough to send His very best. John 3:16 states that "God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but shall have eternal life...

 It's been awhile since I've written any posts. I haven't been out with the camera much lately. I guess I haven't seen too much that I wanted to photograph. The weather has been foul for weeks, rainy, snowy, windy- typical weather for Southeast Alaska in the late fall/early winter. Who really wants to see pictures of cloud shrouded mountains or rain thick seascapes? I started looking back through the archives of my pictures hoping to find something worth while to write about and I came upon this bench from down at the cannery. I remember asking my friend John Kveum about it some time back, but I can't really recall what he told me. I know it's been around for quite a long time. Back in the days when the cannery processed salmon, many a captain or crew hand or maybe cannery worker sat on this weathered bench, knife or fid in hand and decided to leave his mark. I guess there's something in all of us that wants to make a statement or be remembered. Ma...

   I've got a few pictures from Halloween 2019. One that I truly wish I had was a fine young fellow  who came out with his children on All Hallow's Eve to keep them safe. His name is Wilbur, and I've known him for years. He was a student in the school where I worked for a season. He used to address himself as Wilbyrightback. He's always been a pleasant young man and he's got quite the sense of humor. He frequently comes to work with assorted colors of nail polish on his fingernails. His daughter likes to paint them, and Wilby allows her to. When I answered the door on Halloween, aside from a lovely little girl dressed as I don't recall, her full sized father, Wilbur, was dressed in a mermaid costume, complete with wig and sparkly fins. It was hilarious. I do wish I'd gotten the picture, but I'm afraid it was an opportunity missed.  However, I didn't miss the chance to see my great granddaughter Evelee dressed as a fairy, complete wit...

    I was speaking to my daughter Autumn this evening and found that we both have a penchant for the delicious flavor of Almond Joy candy bars. As a general rule I never bother to buy candy bars. I'll admit that I do pick up a few of those little bite sized Reese's Peanut Butter cups when I'm in shopping at the store, and I imagine if you ate enough of them in one sitting it would be the equivalent of a full sized candy bar, but I try hard not to put too fine of a distinction on that. Anyway, with the recent passing of Halloween I found myself the proud owner of a number of M&M's, Snickers, Twixt,Milky Ways, Reese's Cups and the afore mentioned Almond Joy candy bars. When I was in Juneau shopping, I picked up the economy bag of candy at Costco. It had 150 candy bars and packs of M&M's inside. I didn't want to run out. Kids can be viscous when they come knocking on your door expecting a treat and you don't have anything. Better to play it...