little diomede

photography, stories

Firsts: ice axe, crampons, beard-frozen-to-parka, solo top trip, winter top trip.

I’m not sure I would’ve made it down safely if it weren’t for the tea and biscuits shot of calories and warmth one little climb short of the top.

The picture with the little pointy mountain is a shot east towards mainland AK and the village of Wales.

The nighttime shot is of the school, during the home-stretch back. I underestimated (badly) both how much daylight I had left and how long it’d take me.

The picture of me, that’s the only place up there where I could stand up straight-ish.

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It was a good monday afternoon :)

diomede, photography

Ice fog, snow and the fierce winter wind is beautiful in it’s unique way, but it’s nice to see the deep blue sky and our russian neighbor island once in a while. It’s been at least a week, maybe two, since I’ve seen something aside of white when I look out my classroom windows…

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And in unrelated news, a box with tea in it and another with a nerf gun in it came in the mail this week :-). Money can’t buy happiness, I’m a firm believer, but it can buy nerf guns. money can buy big nerf guns. and big nerf guns are up there with homemade cookies, good cigars, coffee and good tea for being close to happiness.

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see the nerf gun down there in the sneaky hiding place?
(of course, because of it's default status, the irish breakfast tea is in a lower cupboard closer to the stove)
(of course, because of it’s default status, the irish breakfast tea is in a lower cupboard closer to the stove)
photography

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red sunset through the steam from the ocean at the edge of the sea ice, shot with freezing hands (“I’ll just step outside for a second to take a picture”) from the snowbank behind my place
other, photography

start with some vienna sausages and make some bisquick. narrowly averted disaster when i started to crack the egg into the pan instead of the pancake mix
start with some vienna sausages and make some bisquick. and don’t accidentally start to crack the egg (for the bisquick pancake mix) into the pan, otherwise you’ll have some weird eggy-texture-mini-blobs in the pancake.
get those little guys good and crispy and delicious
get those little guys good and crispy and delicious
add some savory spice and pour that batter right on in there, on top of that sizzlin' canned meat
add some savory spice and pour that batter right on in there, on top of that sizzlin’ canned meat
put the spatula down child, no use for one of those. flip that big-boy-size fried pan-meatcake like a professional
put the spatula back in the drawer, child, no use for one of those. flip that big-boy-size fried pan-meatcake like a professional
and the maple syrup, put that down too. while you're over by the cupboard, grab the bottle of sriracha, 'cuz that's what you need for a big-boy-size panmeatcake.
and the maple syrup, put that back in the cupboard too, you won’t need it. while you’re over by the cupboard, grab the bottle of sriracha, ‘cuz that’s what you will need for this big-boy-size panmeatcake.
photography

wednesday, captain mike flyin away to pick up more mail, hank takin a turn holding down the cargo.

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diomede, funny, other

IT IS 3:01AM HERE AND 12:01AM 12/21/12 IN CHUKOTKA, RUSSIA, AND I JUST TOOK A PICTURE FACING EAST, HERE IT IS!!!!

nuke

just kidding. lol.

For real, here is a 30s exposure of the view east from the front porch of my duplex apartment, taken a few minutes ago at 3:03am. Too much weather to see big dio, but the dateline is definitely within visibility. The verdict is in, folks, the world is not ending, unless the end of the world is taking the form of complete coverage by sea ice. In which case, for us on diomede the end of the world would be hard to notice :-).

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other, photography

When you walk out on the sea ice, a walking stick is crucial. The tip is used for testing for good ice to step on. What’s good ice and what’s bad ice is pretty simle–good ice is thick enough to walk on. You walk with the stick horizontal–if you fall, the stick provides something to hold onto, to pull yourself out with, and (very important!) it keeps you from falling all the way in. Falling all the way in, aside of the obvious unpleasantness of submersion in very, very very cold water, is a dangerous thing because of the current. I’ve heard of several folks’ lives being saved by their stick.

Ed took me out with him for a little ice fishing, let me borrow one of his walking sticks.

So what’d I spend my afternoon doing? Working on a walking stick :-)

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