Hi again, I'm still here. Sorry I haven't posted in a few days, It's been...interesting up here. First of all, I've been sick as a dog for about a week. Some kind of flu/cold thing, pretty nasty. Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of laying in bed getting better. For some reason the stove doesn't seem to care if I'm sick or not, it wants to be fed. For anyone who has never put on snowshoes and run a chainsaw to drop a 50' tree in
-30 temps while you're running a 101 temp and doped on cold medicine..it IS a rush, but don't try this at home, kids. Nick had his very first REALLY close encounter with wildlife the other night. We had just taken down a tree and were cutting it up when the dogs began chasing a moose. Apparently it was a mentally challenged moose because it ran within 10' of where I was bent over, running a chainsaw at full RPMs. Nick was busy plugging the truck in so we could try to get it started and the moose actually ran close enough to him that he felt it brush his arm. Another couple of inches and he would have set a news distance record for teenagers in flight. I make light, but it was actually a very scary situation that could have easily NOT been funny. The moose are being really weird up here right now, we aren't going out to cut without being fairly heavily armed. Ah, Alaska..As I write this I'm trying to warm my house back up. We've all retreated to my bedroom where we run the space heater at night to keep warm. Now, when I say all..that is the 4 of us, 4 dogs and at least 3 cats, usually 4. The old girl, Momo, is a himalayan and seems to prefer hunkering by the fire as opposed to being social. Anyway, the wonderful crowded conditions and sleepover elements have all combined so we share germs beautifully. Yep, now ALL of us have the same crud floating around..Anyway, I better cut this short today, It's actually above 0 for the moment so I need to take this opportunity to go cut some wood so the chainsaw will actually cut instead of acting as an ice chipper. Have a good day, everyone! I'll write again soon.

Well, the results are in at Amazon Studios and, unfortunately, they didn't pick my script to move forward with. Not a huge surprise, I didn't really expect them to, but somewhat crushing none the less. Eh, I'll wallow in self pity for a bit, It's a luxury I've learned to allow myself for a little while, then I'll polish the script, add to it and send it someplace else under a different title. Even if it never gets produced I know now that I can write an entire script in 48 hours. Rejection is a HUGE part of writing and I suppose I better get used to it earlier rather than later. Still, I'm pouting for a bit. Dammit, I've earned it. It's a good day for self pity. It's -22 again, the wood pile is shrinking fast, and I'm absolutely miserable with whatever crud I've been infected with. Headache, body ache, incessant cough, all the top contenders for the 'I feel like crap' award. I'm not going to delve deeply into the self pity thing on here, Mostly because it's honestly really boring reading. (Hell, I wouldn't even want to read THAT and I'd be the one who wrote it. It TOTALLY makes proofreading difficult when you can' stand reading what you wrote! Oh yeah, wait a minute..I rarely proofread.. But I digress..) I'll reference my post the other day about "sometimes life just sucks no matter what you do" and leave it at that. For anyone who didn't read that post- HA! Now you'll either be forced to go back and read every other post I've done until you find that one reference or live forever ignorant of what I'm talking about! For school I have to have a script finished and turned in by 8:00 tonight. I've been writing a comedy, although hopefully I feel a little funnier before I have to finish it.   I'm thinking a double dose of nyquil and I should be hilarious! I've been looking at the statistics of this blog and I feel I have to send out a big thank you to my TWO loyal readers! I appreciate you taking the time to read this tripe. You completely validate my newest odd habit and it makes me feel slightly less crazy for doing it. Knowing someone is actually reading this stuff makes me feel more like I'm talking to someone and less like the crazy old dude who wanders down the streets of cyberspace mumbling things to himself. Well, I still mumble things to myself, but I try not to giggle to loud at the funny jokes I tell myself in my head when others are around. Have a good day, Both of you! I'm gonna go wallow for a bit now.

Yeah, I know..I just posted, but the muse is upon me and I'm waiting for Beenie to get up and get ready for school so I figured I'd write more. I saw a preview for 'The Grey' last night. It looks like it will be another new "plane goes down in Alaska, passengers have to fight the elements and a vicious pack of wolves to survive' movie. Yawn...I really wish the people that write these things would actually bother to talk to someone that lives up here before they film stuff like this. The kids want me to take them to see it so they can laugh at it. They love watching movies like this and mocking them. I guess when you have a pack of wolves that you hear on a semi regular basis in your own back yard it sort of hardens you to watching over dramatized tales about the 'vicious wolf pack' that tracks them for hundreds of miles. It might not be a bad film, It's a Liam Neeson flick, probably worth a watch, I'm sure it gets all into the 'man vs. nature' philosophy that so many writers are fond of. Ah, thank you, Jack London.. I just wish that some of the people that write scripts like this would come spend some time up here, See what it's really like. I suspect watching it from our perspective there will be a million things that the kids will chuckle about and say "You know, if that really happened and they tried something like that, they would be SO dead." Maybe someday I'll write an Alaskan survival film. a more realistic one, although there has to be SOME suspension of disbelief I suppose, or it would be a really short movie with an unpleasant ending. In the previews it showed a group of beaten up, ragged men walking across the frozen tundra, sinking inches into the snow as they walked.. All I can say is I hope they made snowshoes, although it didn't look like it, because I can't manage to go 50' into my yard without them. Maybe if the writer tried walking in 6' deep snow for a few minutes he'd gain a new perspective on things?

Well, the brief respite in the weather has come to an end..It's now back down to -12 and falling again. Still, I'm comforted by the fact that we have a tree cut and split, sitting happily in the wood box. It's amazing how fast we're getting at doing that. I took down a ~50' birch tree yesterday afternoon. The kids and I descended upon it like locust and we had it cut, sectioned, split and stacked in the house in just over an hour. Pretty amazing stuff considering our ragged band of lumberjacks! I was also reminded of the frailty of life when we were cutting it. I followed all the rules, made sure I had a clear path of retreat, sectioned the tree in the proper way and when it fell I tried to run away as per normal and my snowshoe got buried under a minor avalanche and all I could do was cover my head as I watched the bases of the tree kick over and start coming my way. Well suffice it to say, it missed me..by inches. I was lost in a huge cloud of falling snow for a few minutes, the kids thought I was a goner, but it fell right next to me instead. I guess I think that when things like that happen maybe Glenda is watching out for me, giving the tree a little nudge while she shakes her head and sighs. Eh, life in the wild. Experiences like that definitely remind you you're alive. I was also reminded of how spirited and tough Alaskans are yesterday. One of the residents of Willow, an 83 year old man, was attacked by a moose as he was letting his dogs into the house. It's that time of year, the moose are going crazy cause of the snow and the cold as much as we are, so they're cranky. His wife saw this and did she call 911? Nope..well, afterward, I'm sure..but during the incident she didn't wait for help, she didn't wring her hands and cry piteously for someone to come save her husband, she relied on herself. That's right, the 85 year old woman grabbed a snow shovel and went after a 1200 pound bull moose. Beat the snot out of it. Chased it away from her husband and THEN called for help. THAT is the Alaskan spirit alive and well. Stand up, face life's wild animal charges head on and pick up the pieces later. Kudos to you, Dorothea Taylor! I wish this country had a million more just like you!

Ah, I'm basking in the (Nearly) seemingly tropical heat! It's FINALLY +4 degrees out and it feels like it's about 50! It's amazing how a prolonged period of incredibly cold weather puts you into a state of almost animalistic hibernation. Just about all any of us have wanted to do is sleep. Crawl under warm blankets and pull them over our heads and forget about the fact that all the water in the house is frozen, that we have to bathe out of buckets, or that we were literally burning almost an entire tree a day to keep the house above 50. It occurred to me during this period how much heating a house with firewood is like raising a child. They both demand constant attention, care and feeding, they both require careful nurturing to reach their best potential, and they both give you a warm, happy glow when they're doing what they are supposed to. I had a really cool comparison about when you know they're both going to be all right, about them busting into flame and beginning to burn on their own without any help from you, but honestly I forget what it is. Ah well, I think my brain is still defrosting.  I got my 'fortune cookie' on Facebook the other day. It read "Any rough times are behind you." Ah, I wish I could believe that was true! It would be nice if rough times were behind me, even for a while. I've had enough of them, I'm tired of them. Unfortunately, unless some miracle comes along and gives me a source of enough money to live, I fear that fortune is entirely incorrect. I have approximately 20 days to come up with a miracle solution that will allow me to keep my house. So far the sky hasn't exactly opened up and showered me with ideas, although who knows. I'm trying to stay positive and look for opportunities. I've heard many people over the years say, usually to a complaining child, "Life is what you make of it." And that's true, to a certain extent. Of course there is always the disclaimer of "And sometimes life sucks eggs, no matter what you try to do." Maybe my egg sucking time is coming to an end for a while, we can only hope! Anyway, to my loyal reader out there, sorry I haven't posted in a few days, like I said, hibernation. I've managed to get my school work done, although not nearly as well as I would have liked to, and managed to keep everyone sort of fed, although I actually want to start cooking again. A steady diet of ramen and sandwiches gets pretty boring after a while. But..The house is thawing, it's wonderfully overcast, it's above zero out and I'm not beat yet, We'll keep going until we can't go anymore..and who knows, maybe 'Any rough times are behind me'...

Hey there! If there is anyone out in E-Lnd that's missed me I'm sorry. I wish I could tell you that I had a fantastic reason for my disappearance, like having high tea with a yeti or Sarah 'Palin swung by for a snowball fight, but I can't. Plain and simple- I got totally and completely sucked into a different world. I've been playing Skyrim. See, what happened was we had a CRAZY cold snap this weekend. -30 at night, warming up to -8 or 9 during the day. and the boys relocated to sleep in my room. (First rule of brutal cold- small rooms are easier to keep warm than houses are.) And of course, when they relocated, so did the X-box. Oh, I resisted at first, but the game finally sucked me in. See, It's a great imaginary world, just chock full of problems that are EASY to fix. You don't have enough gold? G on an adventure or take out some vicious robbers. You screw up and die? Just reset from your last save. You can even get married in the game and you don't ever have to worry about losing your spouse, because she's as close as the next game reset. The game makes you FEEL like something special. You're the first one in hundreds of years with special powers, put on the planet to save the world, yada yada..It's incredibly seductive and seduced i was. I emerged from that warm room only for biological reasons (Difficulty compounded by a toilet that froze and has to be flushed by pouring water from a bucket down it), to cut firewood, (Still had to ATTEMPT to keep the house above freezing.) or to feed the animals and the kids. Well, I also did a few quick homework assignments, but the lions share of the last few days has been spent curled up in a nice warm room fighting dragons.If you aren't a video game playerI highly recommend you try it, if only just for a little while. The biggest problems in the world case into the back ground for a little while when a dragon's flaming breath is filling your screen. More later!

All right, My snowplow driver hates me. I can deal with that. I'm not sure why, I've never even met the guy, but he definitely has it out for me. Yes, we got more snow, about 7" total I would guess, enough to summon the demon plow driver howling from the bowels of hell to once again destroy my garbage can. I'm not sure why he does it, it's a nice enough garbage can. Plain, unassuming, doesn't really say much, but somehow it's very existence offends him. He religiously swerves in order to catch it in the spray of snow planing up from his blade. I can imagine his cackle of glee the day he came by right after trash pickup and I was gone so I couldn't move it out of the direct path of his fury. Poor can lost a wheel that day. Today I thought I would take precautions, I moved it back about fifteen feet from the edge of the road. I can only surmise that on his first pass he saw it, sitting there innocently, probably whistling a little tune, just happy to have disgorged it's content into it's good friend the garbage truck. When he made his second pass he had to have accelerated, grinning widely as he dug his blade a bit deeper into my road. The wave of snow he threw hit the poor can hard enough to throw it another twenty feet or so, right into the back of my X-terra.  poor can lay on the ground, half buried in snow when I found it, it's lid hanging open, gasping in pain, it's one wheel hanging crookedly off to the side like a wounded game animal gasping it's last breath. Seriously, Dude- Enough is enough. If my dogs would have been outside they never would have even felt it as they got run over. Or one of my kids, walking home from the bus stop. Fun is fun, but I 've just about had enough.

Okay, Here we go again. The fire is FINALLY going, I've been messing with it for the last couple of hours, again, wet wood SUCKS for anyone who didn't get that in my previous posts. Here's the cool thing about it, though..I FINALLY got the fire going and that heat feels amazing! I guess in the end that kind of answers all the questions I get from people. You know, the WHY would you ever want to live out in the middle of the woods? Why do I heat exclusively with wood, HOW can I live without cable? (I love that one!) In the end the simple answer is: Because life is real out here. So often people lose track of reality living in the instant gratification, everything is easy world. Let's face it, when was the last time you HAD to build a fire to keep warm or there would be severe consequences? When was the last time taking your kids to the bus stop could result in a life or death situation? It doesn't happen in the 'real' world. People have gotten safe and secure and that's great- to a certain extent. The problem I see with that is that when safety and security are essentially assured, the human animal begins making up conflicts. Things that should seem entirely ridiculous actually become important. I mean, really- Step back for a moment and look objectively at ANY reality TV show on the air. Is there even a tiny little bit of content on there that makes a real difference in your life? Do you really CARE who America's next top model is? Does getting more responsibility and having to work more hours really enrich your life in any way? Probably not. I'm not saying that any of those things are bad or wrong, I'm just saying that you look at life a whole lot differently once they are gone for a while. Don't get me wrong, I'm not proposing that everyone in the world disconnect their power, hunt wild game to exist and sit around a fire in their living room grunting at each other. Hell, I already said before I have power and I have running water and I REALLY don't want to have to live without them. I know now for sure that I could, I just don't want to. I go to the grocery store just like everyone else. I enjoy conveniences. All I'm saying is that a taste of what is REAL in life is a good thing every once in a while. It brings a bit of perspective to have a moose walk through your yard or to have the pipes in your house freeze because you were a moron who forgot to keep wood in the stove. It's an amazing thing to walk 100 yards into your back yard and have all of the veneer of civilization stripped away. to strap on a gun, not so you can feel 'cool' but because you might need it to save your life sometime. I'd highly suggest to anyone to try it, just for a little while. Turn off your furnace and start a fire in your fireplace for a couple of hours on a cold night. Kill the power to your house and live for an evening with nothing but oil lamps.  Go catch a fish, clean it and eat it. If you're feeling REALLY brave do it without using a pole. What the hell, just sit back for a few minutes and make a mental list of all the things in your life that are really conveniences that you have come to think of as necessities. Step away from civilization for a while. get back in touch with real. THAT is why I live in a cabin in the woods in Alaska.

Ah, snow again. I can't really complain, though, We missed most of the crazy storms that have been going everywhere else in Alaska. The fire is being difficult today, a lot of that wood that looked good yesterday is actually rotten and doesn't want to burn well. Funny thing about Birch trees. Most trees die and don't rot until they actually hit the ground. Birch trees will actually stand and rot in place. They don't really dry well, if you can find a freshly dead one the wood is okay, but if they stand for a few months they are pretty much useless for firewood. The bark burns REALLY well, it's actually awesome tinder if you ever find yourself lost in a birch forrest and need to build a fire peel some of the bark and some old man's beard and you have a great source of flame for a few seconds if you add a spark to it. the dead wood itself, though? Useless. You might as well try burning wet cardboard. Ah well, we have another load of the good stuff down at the bottom of the hill, I'll retrieve that when Nick gets home from school. Talking about Old man's beard- That stuff makes incredible rope. Not really sure WHAT type of vegetation it is, but it grows all over the trees down in the marshy areas. Its thin and twisted, really bushy stuff. Well, it actually looks like an old man's beard, hence the name I suppose. Makes an awesome fire starter, like I said, but the strands are also really tough but compliant. I was showing Beenie how to make rope with it. Take a couple of rope strands and double them up, twist them together and you have some really great cordage. All the kids have been getting interested in winter survival lately. Consider the environment, I suppose. We've done a couple of night time snowshoeing trips, always keeping an eye out for ways to start a fire, best places for emergency shelters, etc. At this rate they are going to be better woodsmen than I will ever hope to be! One of our favorite pastimes is to watch Man VS. Wild. The kids love to watch the show and point out the mistakes he's making that are going to get him into trouble and make his crew have to rescue him before he gets hurt. They take particular pleasure in the Alaska episode. Ah well, familiarity, I suppose. One of these nights they want me to take them on an overnight survival snowshoeing trip. I probably will, although it's not going to happen until it stays in the 20s as opposed to the -20s. It's only fun until somebody gets frostbite.

Ok, here I am again. Homework is finished, wood is in the house and it's finally warming up again and I have a glass of Crown beside me to sip on. I'm watching snow fall again as I type this. It was a rough day gathering wood today. It was warm out so the snow was getting slick and nasty, we were sliding all over the place even with the snow shoes on. I was at the bottom of the hill using the pulley system we rigged up with the snow anchor when it gave way under a full load of wood (About 150 lbs) and the sled came flying down the hill. Of course it went on the opposite side of a tree from me and before I could get my arm untangled I went for a wild ride in a complete circle and hit a tree while airborne. Sometimes it's nice to be wearing a lot of layers of clothes! Just for you science geeks out there I have now proven that a 195 lb man CAN NOT stop a 150 lb sled moving at approximately 15 miles an hour. That sucker didn't even slow down! As I lay in a snowbank gasping for breath Aoibheann and the dogs came running down the hill to make sure I was ok. The worst part about the whole thing was that we had to replace the snow anchor, lighten the load and start all over again! Eh, no matter, we have plenty of wood for a couple of days and I got a fun story to tell.

Ah yes- The promised entry about the joys of cutting firewood at -20. Well, here is what happened. Since I spent all summer working I didn't have a chance to put up as much wood as I wanted for the winter. That and a couple of long and annoying cold snaps (-20 to -30 for a week or so at a time.) have combined to make me burn through my winter supply faster than I intended. I THOUGHT I was going to be in good shape, I have 8 large dried logs in my front yard that I was planning on cutting and splitting as needed but unfortunately the first couple of snow falls were larger than I expected and the ensuing avalanche off of my metal roof has pretty successfully buried them until breakup under about 5' of mostly ice. So...it's out into the ravine behind my house with Nick and Corbin to cut wood. It's not difficult, really, there is plenty of dead wood back there. The complications lay, as they say in the execution. Now, I don't know how many of you have ever been in -20 temperatures  so let me say this..it's REALLY damn cold! exposed skin begins freezing in a few minutes. You can always tell because those areas that are starting to freeze stop hurting. That is a good sign that it's time to go inside and warm up for a while.  So, preparations to go outside and cut wood in these temperatures are as follows: 1. LOTS of warm clothes. Typically I have on a patagonia base layer, 2 pairs of socks, one thin cotton pair close to the skin and then a thick wool pair over it. a set of wool extreme outdoor pants, a t-shirt, (under the base layer, it wicks the sweat away. Sweat is a killer.) a wool military sweater, a thick wool coat, a couple of pairs of really warm gloves (One pair is kept next to you inside your coat so you can switch them out when your hands start getting wet and cold), an insulated face mask and fur lined bomber hat or a thick insulated balaclava and goggles. (The goggles prevent wood ships in the eyes plus they keep my contacts from freezing to my eyes. It happened to me once, I definitely don't recommend it for a good time!) Oh, and of course the insulated snow boots, rated to -30. Now, dressed and ready to face the brutal outdoors I grab my snowshoes and get ready to go outside. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that, didn't I? We have almost 5' of snow on the ground at the moment. Essentially you don't go anywhere that isn't plowed without snowshoes. Well, unless you enjoy swimming through the powdery white stuff. So, we put on the snowshoes. Now, if you've never walked with snow shoes on it's an experience. Imagine having size 95 feet with half of them sticking out the back. It takes a bit of getting used to. Ok, now we're ready to go outside and cut wood, right? Nope, not quite yet. NOW we have to load and strap on the .44 magnum, my woods gun, because when we're in the woods we are sharing the area with all kinds of critters bigger than us. Bears aren't a problem, they are all happily snoozing, but there's always the chance that you're going to trip over a panicky moose or, even less likely but still possible, a pack of wolves that haven't eaten in a few days. Now, to be honest, I have never had to unholster my gun, but as some very wise friends once told me, it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. So, we're finally ready to go cut wood now. Oh wait, I forgot- The emergency bag with water, Arctic canteens are awesome, regular ones are frozen solid in about 5 minutes), fire starting utensils and the first aid kit..NOW we're ready to go out. The boys have been mimicking this process, by the way. Oh..that's right, it's ALASKA in the winter, it gets dark by about 4:30 in the afternoon right now. So we put on the headlamps and head out the door to find our wood, dragging the sled behind us, Axes in hand. We come to the edge of the ravine and hook the sled up to a really cool rope and pulley system we came up with. We're using a square headed shovel as a snow anchor and have a rope tied off to it so we can pull the full sled (Around 150 lbs) up the hill when we get back. We run the sled down the hill  and head down behind it (Oh, all right, sometimes when we're feeling daring we ride the sled down, but that's always crazy and usually involves bailing out in terror at high speeds before hitting a tree.) Now, we're in the woods. We take off, plowing through the snow looking for suitable deadfall.Why don't I have a chainsaw with me you may be wondering? Well, because the chain freezes solid after the first cut or so. As soon as it gets any snow on the chain it's pretty much a 10 lb rock that we're carrying with us, so we use it to cut the wood into sections small enough to burn when we get home. So, we find a suitable tree and start cutting. It's absolutely amazing how fast you can start sweating when you're swinging an axe, even in that cold a temperature. Soon the goggles are fogging over, my hair is totally soaked with sweat, I'm gasping for air, (If you've never worn a heavy balaclava just wrap a thick sweat sock around your face and breathe through it, you'll get the picture.) The tree comes down and it's break time. The head gear comes off, sweat immediately freezing my hair into some kind of strange bristly ice sculpture, and I grab the canteen and swill about half of it, maybe relax for a few minutes, drink a cup of coffee if I've been smart enough to pack the thermos, wait for my pulse to get to a more normal level and start again. Now the wood needs to be sectioned into small enough pieces to load and drag. Huge overhead swings, like Conan killing a garter snake. Wood chips fly everywhere, the axe digs deep into the frozen wood. Ah, what a manly feeling, watching the tree break under the mighty axe! The tree gets sectioned, we load it up, drag it back to the cool rope and pulley system and pull the loaded sled up the hill. We repeat this process for two or three times before we're done for the day. At -20 2 fully loaded sleds = about a day and a half of heat in the house. Wow, I'll be glad when the cold snap is over!

All right, I cheated. I know I said I wasn't posting anything until tomorrow but since it's after midnight I guess it counts. I was sitting in my dining room a little bit ago when I heard the wind chimes I have hinging off my porch start ringing. Now, this is a normal occurrence if it's windy out, however, it rarely ever happens when it's calm unless we're having an earthquake. Since I didn't feel any unusual rumbling I took a look out my window to see what was going on. A bull moose had spotted a tree that is bent over from the weight of the snow and leaning against my porch roof. Since he saw a clear path he just wandered up, leaned against the porch railing and started munching. I stood and watched him for a while, even took a couple of pics that I posted on Face Book. Finally, since the dogs needed to go out I walked outside and shooed him away. It's amazing what a dirty look you can get from a 1000 lb animal when you're chasing him away from dinner! Ah, the fascinating things you see out of your door when you live in the woods!

       Well, This is it. My friends, relatives and other interested parties down in the lower 48 have been bugging me to start a blog so they can get a peek into what daily life is like in Willow, Alaska. I finally decided to start this after I began going to Full Sail University on line as a Creative Writing major and they recommend writing as much as possible. Since scripts, novels and magazine articles (All of which I'm working on, only one of which has actually been published so far, but I'm hoping!) sometimes get boring to write I decided to start this blog and open the window into my crazy life. First of all, a little about me: (I know everyone who knows me already knows this, but sometime some poor sap might stumble on this page and it would be rude to not at least introduce myself!) I really do live in a cabin in Willow, Alaska. It's not entirely removed from the world, it's about 5 miles off the only highway that runs through the Denali range (Mt. McKinley to most people that down't live here.) It's not as primitive as some places around, I have electricity and running water, but I do heat the place entirely with a wood stove. I live with my Stepson, Nick, My son, Corbin, and my daughter Aiobheann (It's pronounced Eveen before anyone even asks.) Up until last August I was an IT professional. In case anyone doesn't know that's the guy that either answers the phone when your computer is broken and you call the help desk because you want to yell at someone or, alternately, who interrupts you in the middle of a really important phone call because you left a message your Yahoo stock ticker quit working and you need it fixed ASAP.
Anyway, I was one of THOSE guys. It had been my career for the last 15 years and was actually the reason I ended up in Alaska. (No, I'm not going into that now, it's a long story better left for some other time. This is just the intro!) Anyway, that life came to a grinding halt for me. Last March my wife of 13 years, Glenda, was killed in a freak snow machine accident. I suddenly found my life turned completely upside down, left alone with three kids and about 3000 miles from where I started. I tried to continue my job, but after a few months realized that with an 8 year old daughter that isn't allowed to get off the bus without someone to meet her, kids getting sick, etc. the 80 mile drive one way to work and the 12 hour days just couldn't continue to happen. I decided to exit my job gracefully, start school and pretend to be an Author so I could work from home. I say pretend to be an Author because I don't consider myself one yet. Maybe someday, if I get paid for my writing or achieve high honors or something.I don't really know when someone is supposed to consider themselves an author. if anyone has any ideas feel free to tell me! As of this moment I'm a writer. nothing more or less. I write because I enjoy it and because it keeps me from going completely insane. Let's face it, you can only carry on conversations with moose for so long before either A. they get bored and walk away, or B. the nice men in the white trucks come and take you someplace where all your worries disappear. so..I write. I'll probably write about anything that comes to mind, although a lot of the content will be about life up here. Alaska is a different world that the rest of the  United States. I'm sure there is no place like it anywhere else. If you've never been up here I highly recommend a visit, even if it's one of the cruise packages. It's something you will never forget. When I first came up here one of the first guys I met was a tough old Alaskan named Chuck. He got elected to show me around the hospital I worked at and we immediately became friends. We walked outside and he stopped, looked at me for a minute, clearly sizing me up. Finally he said, "Dan, I'm going to tell you something. You aren't going to believe me now, but you'll understand in time. Make up your mind now if you want to stay here, because give it a month and you'll be a different person. Alaska changes people..it gets into their soul and no matter where you may go it will always be there. It'll never go away." I have to say, I nodded and smiled and changed the subject. I thought he was just a slightly touched old dude with a highly developed sense of drama. Wow, was I wrong! I have to say he was absolutely right that day. I've been here almost 7 years now and this place has touched me in ways I never thought possible. So long, Chuck, You're very missed, old friend. Sometimes I swear I can hear you and Glenda up there laughing at me when I do something stupid. Anyway- I'm guessing by now anyone reading this will realize I have a tendency to ramble on a bit. What can I say, it's an online journal! As I sit writing this it's a balmy 17 degrees, the wind is winding away and we're expecting more snow tonight. Maybe tomorrow I'll discuss the joys of wood cutting at -22. Yeah, that sounds good. Interesting story, that..Have a good night everyone, Hug everyone you love because you never know when that chance will be gone.