In response to inquiries about living conditions...

Yes, I have gotten a few questions about how two people and two dogs residing in a green subaru actually works out scematically. Well, wonder no further, dear reader. Here are your answers with visual aids:

First of all, I provide a base example of the green subaru. This really isn't a fair example of car living, because I am the only person in the car. I include it mainly because it looks cool driving through a creek. When was the last time you drove your SUV through a creek? The other thing that makes our wheeled home look like it means business is the "THULE" Topper. Wes and I spend a lot of time arguing about whether or not it is pronounced "Tool-ee" or "Thool" (rhymes with "drool"). You may laugh, but these things are important if the word is printed on your house. Whatever its name, it holds everything from dog food to a tool kit to a yoga mat to a bunch of stuff we forgot we put in there but is wrinkled beyond recognition.
This is a file photo of my two-man tent. "Two-man" translates to "one small person in a thin sleeping bag," but it was a pretty good deal when I got it a Midwest Mountaineers a couple years ago and it does its job proudly.



Sometimes, it rains for days on end and we have to find a place to dry the tent before we can roll it up. Otherwise, it will get the Thule all moldy.



Even though my little tent has served us proudlly and never leaked, Wes decided to give Scotchguard some business. This was the result. Now the tent STILL doesn't leak, and it looks like a grizzly bear drooled all over it.

Once the tent was all drool-y (rhymes with "Thule"), Wes used it as an excuse to make his power play for a FOUR-man tent (translation: two-man tent). He claimed he wanted the extra space, but I think we can all see he wanted a dog door.







This is the Subaru's backseat. As you can see, the kitchen is on the driver's side, and the laundry room, passenger.










Constant source of hair and smells, the dogs and their rancid sleeping bag hang out in the back. Sometimes Toby climbs to the front to have a look around, smashing everything in his path and liberally distributing dog hair to the front seat.



I know it's all fairly extravagant, but we have managed to drag this palace thousands of miles in the last 2.5 months. We're now employed and looking for less mobile conditions, but I think we'll probably take our good sweet time. You can see why.

"For Sale By Owner"

By being an owner, you have proven only one thing: that you can BUY an item. You have absolutely no qualifications, WHATSOEVER, in sales. Do not delude yourself. Pay people to advertise. Hire a broker. Talk to a lawyer. Anything! Just trust me, you don't know what you're doing.
"How can you be so sure?" you ask me. Because I'm trying to buy your stuff, and YOU are stopping me! That is not the goal of sales. Please talk to a professional.

Still looking for an airplane...

We're in Fairbanks, where we followed a great deal on a Maule M-5. A friend of a friend recommended a great mechanic (don't think we don't use all those random names you give us of people you know in Alaska). The great mechanic did an inspection and we decided the great deal wasn't as great. The maintanence on the plane for the last 10 years hasn't been what you would call "Four Star", and we are as four star as two people that live in a station wagon with two dogs can get. The friend's mechanic was so great, he didn't even keep the wrench that had been left in the engine of the "great deal" aircraft. Back to Craig's List... more deals await...

The most important word to teach a dog

"Come." I've done research, and that's definitely it.
While staying with my cousin Solveig and her husband, Jeff, I decided I could take all three dogs (Wes' 2 + their 1, "Silka") for a jog. Jeff thought it sounded a bit ambitious, but I forged ahead. All went well at first, all three dogs heeling at my left-hand side, matching my slow trot. We drank in the sights and sounds of the neighborhood for about a half-mile, at which point we were ambushed. Two tiny dogs yapping, followed by a big dog barking, followed by two humans yelling, came running out of a flanking driveway. Chaos ensued, and I emerged moments later with three leashes wrapped around my legs, two dogs still at my left side, and one dog on the other side of the street. Silka had used the confusion to her advantage and slipped backwards out of her collar. She pranced and mocked from the otherside of the street as I demanded, "Silka! Come!"
In response to my repeated demands, Silka repeated her mocking dance. I proceeded walking down the road, Silka skipping along about 10 yards ahead of me. Fine, I thought, be that way. I can just herd you all the way home.
After another half mile of this ridiculous parade, the largest bull moose I have ever seen stepped into the road about 50 yards ahead. None of the dogs even noticed, but I thought it just might work to scare Silka into running back to me. We would continue down the road until she took note of this gargantuan.
Only to reiterate my estimation of the moose's size, a super-sized soccer mom vehicle came up behind us and proceeded down the road to within a few yard of the moose. It towered over the Expedition: Ford's Soccer-game-on-a-mountain Edition. Again Silka grabbed a window of opportunity as the moose stepped out of the road to allow the SUV to pass. She shot between the vehicle and the large mammal and trotted off down the street. The Expedition drove down the road, and the moose walked straight towards myself, Wrigley, and Toby. Knowing the moose should not be trifled with, I edged myself and the dogs to the otherside of the road, avoiding the moose that had closed the gap to 5 yards. Hoping we were safely clear, I ran after Silka, who had disappeared around a corner.
The moose couldn't be bothered with anything but the suburban shrubbery, but Silka had disappeared. I frantically called for a few minutes, then called Jeff.
"I lost your dog." Isn't the greatest thing to have to say. Jeff sent Solveig to come help look. She shoved on her shoes and opened the front door. There on the front stoop, with a clever grin on her face, was a collar-less Silka. Wrigley and Toby and I trudged back, dragging an empty leash, thankful that Silka hadn't been hit by a car. "I killed your dog." would definitely be a more uncomfortable phone call.

One of the Alaska State Fairs

Alaska has some understandable “big state” dilemmas. (No, not like Texas… they’ve just had a Napolean complex since Alaska got its own two senators in 1958.) Alaska has problems like: “Where should the capital be, since every city is a multiple-day journey from the rest of the state?” (They settle that by choosing the city that is most inaccessible to the most people.) Also: “Which communities should we spend our billions building roads to?” (This was solved by halting all road construction and concentrating on maintaining the three short roads they’ve got.) Another dilemma was to figure out where to hold the state fair. If they hold it in the state capitol, as in most states, no one could go. So, many communities proposed they host the state fair and an all out Olympic bid war began. The result is more state fairs than you can count, most of then no more notable than a county festival in rural nowhere.
I’ve passed opportunities to see the “Tanana Valley State Fair” and the “Kenai State Fair” just in the last week, holding out for the state fair near Anchorage (the states biggest city, weighing in at 500,000 souls). The “Alaska State Fair” is held in Palmer, a nearby community. Solveig and I went to take in the sights and the food, and I realized how spoiled my fair tastes have been as a long-time attendant of the Great Minnesota Get-Together.
We ate cream puffs, tamales, cookies, garlic potato chips, dippin’ dots, chewy sweet corn, and free water. But, I missed my hometown’s Sweet Martha’s, pickle-on-a-stick, Wisconsin cheese curds, Minnesota sweet corn, and all-you-can-drink milk. However, the tamales at the Palmer fair were the best I’ve found outside Mexico- impressive considering Palmer’s distance from the Rio Grande.
The pig racers came up from the Kenai (some shows cannot pick their fair allegiance), and watching pigs ears and tails flop as they sprint around a track is pretty hysterical. Lumberjacks came up from Wisconsin to do a “lumber sports” show, but I was sad that Alaska didn’t have some cabin-building woodchoppers to throw into the mix.
The big pig wasn’t as big as the one in Minnesota, but it was actively in labor when we went by the pen—with a piglet-catching attendant and everything. The live infomercials were excellent enough for a man with a fake foreign accent to convince Solveig to buy a Magical Star Fiber Mop. And, perhaps the saving grace of the whole scene was a couple sixty+ pound cabbages. Texas has never seen that much coleslaw.

The ADA (and other camping hazards)

We decided to take a break from our quest to have a relaxing weekend in Chugiach State Park with Gustaf and Ginger. Gustaf was keen on climbing a moutain. The smallest one we could find was one "Goat's Head Mountain," 5000 some feet. Now, it should be clear that sitting in a car for a month eating doritos and reading Harry Potter does not condition you for moutain climbing. We weren't even halfway before Ginger was skipping up ahead and Gustaf was all but dragging me to keep up. Toby and I, both creatures that see the value in a nap over exercise, would have been content to have a sit and wait for the rest of the group to notch their belt with this "accomplishment." But, good sports that we are, we hauled ourselves the 3 miles of ridiculous uphill and were rewarded with beautiful views and loads of blueberries. (Toby proved the more efficient blueberry picker.) Gustaf and I flew his kite in the breeze.
We spent and hour or so catching our breath, and with a Nalgene full of bluberries, headed down to camp and dinner. One third of the way down, we came upon a pudgy man carrying his pudgy dog that made Toby and I look like Olympians. The man's dog, Dixie had collapsed and the owner was alternating between carrying his dog and carrying his pack, shuttling up and down the hill for each, on the verge of cardiac arrest. I grabbed the pack, and Wes took turns carrying the dog (estimated at 100-lbs of sweat and smell and fur) the last two miles of downhill.
Dixie and owner safely returned to their family, we returned to our campsite and threw ourselves into dinner. Wes and Ginger were making ice cream, Gustaf was stoking the fire, and I was chopping vegetables, when a ranger walked up and told us we were in a handicapped camping site. After talking with the ranger, we discovered that though it wasn't obvious, if you had a doctorate in encryption, you may have been able to DaVinci Code-out that this was, in fact, a handicapped reserved camping slot. No, the ranger explained, no one needed the site YET (it was 9:30pm), but we needed to move to the one other open campsite in order to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. OK, we'll move.
But actually, we already have our fire lit, our tents up, our dinner half-ready, and we've been here for two days without incident. Would it be ok if we stayed in the site, (leaving the empty site available for another group) and if anyone came who needed the site (it's now 10pm), we would pack up straight-away and drive back to Anchorage... even if it's 3am? At this point in negotiations, the "camp hosts" (old people who live in an RV for free all summer in exchange for selling firewood and watching the campground) drove up, claimed they had been "looking for us all day", and accused us of "conveniently overlooking" the handicapped sign (which there wasn't one). Well, they poked the wrong bear: Ginger's mom has MS, Gustaf and I have a blind parent each, and Wes' best friend is a quadriplegic: accusing this group of intentionally taking advantage of the disabled just wouldn't sell. Wes pointed this out, said that was an unfair accusation, and explained that WE had been looking for the camphosts this morning, perhaps THEY need to be at their posts more frequently. The ranger, offended at any suggestions of change in HIS campground adminstration, skipped over strikes 1 and 2 and sent us packing. He saved the other open campsite until 11pm, waiting for us to apologize. Then he came over, yelled at us again, and shut down his "full" campground with two open sites and our $10 camping fee in his pocket. We rolled back into Gustaf and Ginger's in Anchorage at 12:30am.

Toby's Nose

We thought it was a foxtail (a common Alaskan weed), so we let him sneeze for two weeks in good faith. Don't get me wrong, we would look up his nose every few days and then argue about whether it was further in or out. We also spent a good two hours feeding him valium and then using six people to pin him down and pick his nose with dental tools.
Finally, we broke down and took him to the vet. Their drugs worked better than our valium-- he was a noodle within minutes, no holding necessary. Though the vet was cheating with her fancy drugs, it was quite exciting when she extracted a large chuck of hard plastic from the noodle-dog's nostril. The whole office got toogether and decided this item was something Toby had chosen to snack on, but instead of down his throat, it went up his nose, though this probably hurt even more than when you are laughing while drinking Coke.

Nature in Kenai Fjords National Park

Wes & Steph in Alaska Update

by Wes

We went to the bluegrass festival in Anderson, AK. I don't know what you think of as a bluegrass festival, but I was under the impression that there would be a lot of country folk with corn cob pipes strumming on the washboard, keeping time with two spoons taped together while a banjo plays and people dance the softshoe in the dirt. In reality, a bluegrass festival is a grateful dead concert....with country music. It's composed of rather dirty groups of teenagers, varying in age from 14 to 68, wearing lots of tye-die, and doing lots of drugs. When the fireworks at the end of the music went off, a full 75% of the crowd was giggling at what they thought was a great, but private, hallucination. Now, you must realize that it never really gets dark here, which helps the all-night party to go on at full speed and full volume. We set up our tent in the "quiet" area, but it really didn't get quiet until around 6:00am, when it started to rain, although you could still here the occasional group of people reliving the woodstock mud experience. Then another phenomenum erupted: the older RV'ers who could not sleep because of the noise, decided to exact their revenge on the passed out revelers by leaving early and blowing their horns while driving all the way through the camping area. Note to self: pass up the next opportunity to go to a bluegrass festival.

From there we travelled down to Talkeetna, the center of aviation for the Mt. McKinley flying tours. We met the owner of one of the operations that evening, he listened to our qualifications, including our hours of flight and told us: "You are in the right place at the right time, we need pilots!" He asked us to stay around til the next day to get a check flight with him, and we would have a job. Yay! We stayed in a B&B to the tune of $170 and dinner for $100 (Alaska is really expensive). We arrived early, studied the airplane manual, sat in the plane to familiarize ourselves with it, and then waited.... This lasted until 2:00pm when the owner's wife came over to tell us we didn't have the minimum hours for the insurance...good day. ARGHHHHHHH!!!!

Now we are in Anchorage, we had a very succesful interview yesterday, and were offered jobs flying freight and mail out of Bethel (a fly-in community with no road access) into the native villages, pretty much the kind of flying we are looking for. However, after looking at the cost of living in Bethel: milk at $6.50 a gallon, cell phone service at $1.00/mn and rent at $1,600 per month we calculated we would be living at a net loss. So, the adventure continues....

"Leaving 911 Response Area"

We're in Canada's Yukon Territory. The EMS forces of White Horse and Dawson City, which are entirely volunteer, have gone on strike. The feel they are overworked and underpaid. Can a volunteer be underpaid? So, the residents of the Green Subaru are not able to live recklessly, as we rely chiefly on government assistance to save us from ourselves.
In other Canadia news, an elephant or two were at large in Newmarket recently, escaped from a circus or some other elephant function. A resident called in the sighting to 911 (apparently still up and running in the eastern portion of the country), and the dispatchers chief inquiry was "How big of an elephant?" The callers response: "I don't know... an elephant." If you haven't laughed today, please listen to the dispatch recording: Canadian Elephant 911 Call

When landing on the beach, look out for dead whales

Wes' brother, William, procured a Cessna 172 and flew us to the Washington coast. At a Copalis State Park (S16), you can land right on the beach, ala Austrlia's Frasier Island. Thinking we were pretty cool, we hopped out of the plane for a stroll in the sand. I decided to go balance on a log, like I was in a Land's End catalog. I got close and thought, 'that's a ripe smelling log,' as Wes and William warned, half-jokingly, "That's a dead whale." But what I thought was a broken branch was a rotting flipper. The flies were having a feast and Green Peace was nowhere in sight.

We flew back to Seattle, disappointed that the fly-in fish and chips restaurant had been closed. But truly, I had already had my fill of sea creatures for the day.

My brother, the rockstar

On passing through McCall, ID, we got to catch the evening's big event "Ed and Joel". They played such audience favorites as Hootie and the Blowfish and "I come from a land Downunder." The pizza was good, if you could stand the line, and a stranger was awarded quote of the night: "My brother wouldn't even think of buying the shorts that your brother is wearing."

Home on the Range

Seven years ago, Madeleine and I drove from the Canadian Rockies to Minneapolis, passing through Medora, ND, where we were asked: "Are you going to the show?" Having been in the car for weeks, we had no interest in whatever cheesy entertainments North Dakota had to offer. We pressed on. In the interim, hundreds of (or at least 5) people have asked me, upon my mention of NoDak, "Have you seen the SHOW in Medora?"

Wes and I drove the same stretch of road this week and righted this oversight. The Medora Musical is $32 worth of campy song and dance, a piano-toting yodeler, and a large plush bear that they refer to as the sheriff. Most impressive, the ampitheatre in No. Dakota's badlands seats 3000. The show runs every night, all summer. And, on the Thursday that we passed through, at least 2000 of our closest friends were drinking in the family fun.

July 3rd... and 4th, Spicer, MN

Dad suffered a pre-party attack from deer flies.





The Jo Bros are replaced with college rock.








A new team of bartenders... the drinks just as strong as of old.





The frat boys do shots of Captain and margarita mix and pat themselves on the back for thier invention.





Monica's in from DC and ready to dance.





The Anderson family photo... and some other guy.



















Dick Score cleans up after the parade.

Anna is Abroad! Stalk her via the World Wide Web!

Anna has left the Midwest as an ambassador to her ancestors' homeland. Follow her adventures in Poland via a new blog .

There are two types of people in this world: Those who join polar bear clubs, and those who do not.

The Spicer polar bear jump was quite a laugh. (Mostly for those of us not plunging). The weather was a balmy 2 degrees F with a wind chill of -15 F. (That's -16C with a windchill of -26 C, for you international plunge fans.) The water was a tropical 30F/0C. The event took place in front of Melvin's On The Lake, one of spicer's two bars.
The Spicer police and fire seemed to organize the event and it was quite the layout. People were announced as they ran from a staging tent across the ice (often resulting in a comical fall, which delighted the crowd) and a rescue team stayed in the water in dry suits to assist any troubled jumpers.
After they emerged, the participants were hustled to a steam tent and then a hot tub before they got into dry clothes... no hypothermia here.
The bloody mary's at Melvins were great, but you had to drink fast as the drink froze in your cup before you could get to the bottom.
Thank all of you who supported the plunge! 180 crazy people jumped into Green Lake on January 27th, and raised over $28,000 for the Special Olympics. Our star, Wes the Benevolent, raised $430 all by his lonesome.
My beloved Aunt Jann offered to double down if Wes would make the rest of the plunge circuit (the special olympics holds similar events around Minnesota throughout the winter), but he isn't ready to get back in the water just yet.
Here are some photos from the event, and we'll hope to see you next year.

Irish v. Chicago

Better late than never... photos from the Dubliner's visit to Chicago

Boo hoo

by Anna



The mean streets of Chicago finally got me a few weeks ago on my way to work. The skinned knee was the only physical damage, but the old pride was in traction for a couple days. No one hit me. It wasn't slippery. I just fell off my bike for an audience of fancy people in their fancy cars waiting to get into the Mercedes Benz dealership service entrance. I was uprighted and whisked into the showroom bathroom to clean up the blood and dirt and given a teeny little band-aid by a teeny little mechanic. And off I went to work to complain about the ordeal all day long.

Fun Times, Fist-Sized Cocktail Shrimp

as reported by Anna

Lesson Learned: Don't try to leave Chicago at lunch time the Saturday before the 4th of July.

It took 3 hair-pulling hours to get out of Illinois, a trip that should normally take an hour and a half. Not-Brother Lucas and I got into the Twin Cities around 9:30 p.m. and headed straight to Café Latte to pick up a slice of turtle cake, because that's what Rachael Ray ate on the Twin Cities episode of "Tasty Travels."

Monday afternoon we ventured west to collect Marcus at St. Cloud State and then pressed onward to Spicer, where x-treme competitive tubing and a full cooler awaited us on the boat. When the guests started rolling in at around 6 p.m., out came the enormous cocktail shrimp and endless platters of highly addictive bite-sized tenderloin sandwiches. Eating. Drinking. Eating. Drinking. The Jo Bros. cranked out the classic rock hits in the back yard until the mosquitos came out, as the she-welder/bartender did her best to serve up Josh-calibre cocktails. When the party moved inside, Little Ed stuck with tradition and was on the guitar quicker than you could say Bye Bye Miss American Pie. Which we did.

In honor of Marcus, the self-proclaimed star of the evening, we ended up dancing to our own singing of that famous Men At Work song without knowing any of the words except for, "I come from a land down under!" Have a look .

Fun Times, Noodle Salad

The annual summer

Green Lake

bash is quickly approaching. The Jo Bros are making their triumphant return, Mom wrote a poem for an invite, and Anna might have another Brittney Spears acoustic number up her sleeve. Even the international crowd will be "there like a bear in a snare."

Fun in the Big City

(Yes, yes, this image is property of Major League Baseball. An umpire may sneak up behind me at work and haul me to copyright prison.)

Although the poor Cubs lost 3-9 to the Tigers on Saturday, our spirits were kept high by expensive beer and Kosher hot dogs, complete with hand-cranked onions.

Photo Booth Fun

I realize this is a little late, but I knew everyone was dying to see what happens when Anna, Steph & Wes get anywhere near a photo booth...


Rainbo Club, Wicker Park, late April-ish

Photos: Steph's adventures in and around Ottawa

Adults at summer camp in Illinois

A Tribute to Newt: May 15, 2006

Newt, my dad’s Weimaraner, was put to sleep today even though some of his closest friends had still not learned to pronounced the name of his breed. Newt was a good dog, as most dogs are. He was known for being slightly spastic, but overly friendly. He enjoyed nothing so much as a good petting, and one of his favorite moves was to walk to the nearest lap, lay his head in it, and fall asleep. Now, you biology majors may know that dogs cannot sleep standing up, and are thus keen on what would happen when Newt’s attention went from standing to sleeping. He usually woke up before completely crashing to the ground, but never without creating a humorous scene. His talents included hunting pheasants and tap dancing on wood floors. Things that made him sad were water and my cat, Magma. (Let Newt’s friendly personality not be faulted though; Magma always went out of her way to be mean to him). Newt has long suffered from a tumor on his spleen, but wagged his stub of a tail until his last days, and went out with a wry smile at having made it happily through 12 years of life, interrupted by only 2 baths.
My dad is what most people (short of Rush Limbaugh) would call Ridiculously Republican. He skips around on Election Day in a red tie with a conservative gleam in his eye. For this reason, many of Newt’s associates assumed that he was named for the Speaker of the House presiding during the year of his birth. That would be a really pathetic way to name a dog. Fortunately, someone more pathetic than my father named Newt. Twelve years ago, on a farm in western Minnesota, a man named Newton was breeding champion Weimaraners. He christened each of his pups as his own namesake (i.e. “Newton, Jr.”, “Newtina”, “Newt”, etc.). If George Foreman can do it, nameless horse farmers in the Midwest can too.
I am slightly concerned about Newt riding the elevator to heaven (Newt’s hips were wearing out on him, so we know he’s not taking the staircase), because he recently proved himself not very adept at elevator travel. On the first day I returned from Mexico, my mom and I got out Newt’s fancy, self-winding leash and took him for a walk by the Mississippi River. We boarded the elevator back up to the apartment and I began reading the announcement posting to my mother. Floor 18 arrived, Mom got off the elevator, Newt followed her, the doors closed, and I was left inside, holding the handle of Newt’s leash. The elevator began to descend. I began franticly feeding out extra leash line with one hand, and with the other hitting buttons on the elevator’s control panel. Floors above, Newt was dragged back towards the elevator doors as my mom tried to free his neck from his collar. I heard the leash snap and shortly thereafter managed to turn the elevator around. When the doors reopened on 18, after seeing Newt OK, I began to laugh hysterically. This was an incident the likes of which was only previously conceived in Woody Allen scripts. Unfortunately, sometime during this trauma, my father had also arrived on location. His face’s red hue was not, this time, to show his political leanings, but rather in outrage: first, at the abuse of his dog; and, second, and more emphatically, at the fact that I broke the fancy leash.
Newt stopped riding the elevator with me after that, and I would bet he’s glad I’m not with him now. With apologies, I wish him a safe and comfortable trip up. And, don’t worry Newt, I have on good confidence that they don’t have leashes in heaven… not even the fancy ones.

Steph's Back! Kind of...

She's within the confines of the USA, though still outside her comfort zone. Anna is attending a bachelorette party in Nebraska that the bachelorette may, or may not, attend. Hopefully, she will then have time to find Steph in Chicago, buy her 2-4-1 martinis, and send her back to the land of 10,000 lakes.

I Miss My Aesthetician

by Stephanie

Her name is Michelle and she works at Juut Salon in Gavidaae in Minneapolis. She can work wonders on a girl that naturally has the eyebrows of Oscar the Grouch. My grooming in Mexico has to be done by a self-admitted amateur (me). Michelle would be horrified to know that the other day I attempted to trim my unwieldy brows with a fingernail clipper. The results were disasterous. All photos from the next two weeks will be destroyed in order to protect the stupid. I was forced to go to a Mexican salon to address the situation. I was obivously concerned about dealing with a language barrier in the administration of hot wax to my face, but my choices were slim. The beautician I was working with took one look at my face and asked, "did you do that to yourself?" During the repair process, she held her breath, something Michelle never does and conveys no comfort to the patient, whatsoever. Eventually I left the salon in a condition mildly presentable to a peopled society, but I am still wearing a baseball cap pulled low.

In other horrifying news from south of the Rio Grande: I have finally discovered the limits of my stubborness. After two months of responding to peer pressure to skydive by saying, "NEVER. EVER. EVER.", I paid to jump out of a precious airplane. Falling at a tropical paradise from 12,500 feet was the best view I have ever seen. My mom thinks it might have been bad for my back. My mom thinks peanut butter sandwiches might be bad for my back. She worries professionally... she even has business cards. She was informed of my recklessless post-skydive because I didn´t want to tie up any business hours.

If you have worrying that needs to be done, the international lines will free up at the end of April. I have been enlisted to fly the Twin Otter belonging to Skydive Ixtapa back to Chicago on or around the 17th. I will call this the end to my chapter in Mexico as I will be out of work, sick of tropical birds, and desperate to see Michelle.

The other day while hiking, I was attacked by a tarantula. The kind they have at the zoo and teenage boys keep as pets. These things apparantly also exist in the wild. I seem to remember from a childhood field trip that they are poisonous. I jumped no less than 7 feet to get out of the orange-and-black-death-monster´s way. I am positive it was bad for my back.

A Little Healthy Rivalry...

Why can't Minnesota have 2 baseball teams?

Mexico Photos!

The much anticipated photos from Anna's visit to Steph.

"They will tell you, 'you can't sleep alone in a strange place', then they tell you `you can`t sleep with somebody else.`"

by Stephanie... in Mexico

I referred to a coworker as the "Canadian Time Share Messiah" and I got fired from my job as a real estate efficienado. Surprising? Not really, though I am certain the two events weren't directly related. What is surprising is that a week after firing me, my former boss tracked me down and asked if he could rent a room and be my flatmate. He did not see the strangeness of asking someone he just fired if he could move in. He also apparently did not find the humor of a real estate broker needing somewhere to live. I passed on my first chance at a 55-yr-old Mexican roommate. My Spanish might suffer. That's a risk I'll have to take.

For morale, I feel that it is important to be doing something more difficult than trying to learn Spanish, so I am surfing a couple mornings a week. The problem I find with both these endeavors is that improvement at either is nigh impossible to detect. All I notice is the things I cannot say and how much sand I have in my nose.

It has not been all losses since you last heard from me though. Operating on a standing policy of speaking to strangers in bars, I met the owner of the local skydive operation. I now have a nameplate on the right seat of his Twin Otter. As missing out on flying was the principle sacrifice of "Operation: Move to Mexico, Learn Spanish, and Eat my weight in Chips and Salsa", this turn of events was miraculous. "The Lord, He does provide." One of the company planes needs to go back to the States, so tomorrow, weather allowing, I will be spending 10 hours flying, 3 hours getting searched for drugs at the border, and 12 hours on the ground eating Cheez-its and drinking all the tap water I can swallow.

Happy Birthday, Carrie!

by Anna

You know you're really my friend if you get this for your birthday.

In honor of the trusty soundtrack to some long car rides and late nights, I proudly presented my old college roommate with a bottle of Old Whiskey River for her birthday. And yes, the faux autographed guitar pick is yours to keep.

A Standard Exchange Between Steph & Anna

From: Anna
To: Steph
Subject: Flight Details: Game On
Date: Fri, 03 Feb 2006 10:18 AM

Ok, dude. I bought the ticket [to come see you]. A lay-over in Mexico City? I better bring a pocket knife...

-------------------------------

From : Steph
To : Anna
Subject : RE: Flight Details: Game On
Date : Friday, February 3, 2006 5:03 PM

Awesome Opposum, I say.
I can top your layover in Mex. City with the news that I have been recruited as a copilot for the local skydiving company. they busted an engine in one of their planes and the replacement is being held hostage near the border in Monterey. I am supposed to do an overnight mission with the company owner tonight to try to recover the lost engine and bring it back. It will be 7 hours of flight time in a night cross country over all of mexico. and, handily, the plane we will fly is a very common alaska bush plane. if i get shot down by a drug cartel, you can still stay at my place in feb. I live in the neighborhood of Pelicanos in Ixtapa... the pink apartment building. no. 303. that should get you there.

see you soon,
steph

Cash-aroake

Jami´s latest on what´s cool in MSP:

I had the benefit of experiencing Casharoeke last night. You heard it right. Cash-aroeke. It's kareoke but with a live Johnny Cash band, and it's my new favorite thing. Every monday night Lee's Liquor Bar hosts this fabulous event. There were some truly hard core Johnny Cash wannabees, dressed all in black and everything, but it's okay if you're not inspiring to Johnny or June Carter as well. Do not be deceived from the outer appearance of Lee's. From the outside it looks as though the local crack addicts and hookers own the place, but inside it's a whole different story. It's the cleanest dive bar I've ever seen. The best part is it's Elvis Presley shrine. Sure there were still a couple local crack heads in the corner, but they were so far gone they were harmless. So if you like Cash, Johnny that is, head down to Lee's Liquor on monday night. It's located on the corner of 12th and Glenwood, downtown Minneapolis. I'll be there and if you give me enough to drink I might get on stage and make an ass of myself. It's a win win situation, there's no reason not to go.

So, I´m standing on the beach, holding an iguana...

by Stephanie, who seems to have made it to Mexico

...and the man who gave it to me asks if I want to eat the iguana. The iguana is wearing a necklace.

And we´ll interupt my Sunday afternoon there to let you know that I DID get collected at the airport in Zihautanejo. The stranger that came looking for me wasn´t wearing any shoes and laughed hysterically when I put my seatbelt on. I´m glad I left it on, as I´ve witnessed 2 fatal accidents in the last 3 days.

My home is in Ixtapa: I have my own 3-bedroom apartment, with a bathroom that makes most phone booths look spacious. The ruling force in my neighborhood seems to be a dubiously organized feral cat herd. They do some dealings with a pair of floppy-eared bassett hounds, but its clear that the dirty cats are running the show. Mail and trash are left in respective piles on the sidewalk for collection. I don´t know how the cats sort the mail, so its for the best that i don´t even know my address to give it to you.

I´m working for a restaurant called Casa Morelos and at a real estate agency. I work about 7 hours a day, which for here is considered near slave hours. I am doing¨"PR" for the restaurant, and I consider it quite the apprenticeship as my boss claims to have INVENTED "word of mouth" advertising. For the real estate people, my main job is to repeat the words: "it´s not a time share!"

I know a lot more Spanish than I did two weeks ago, but I would compare my current attempts at the language to a game of Taboo: due to my very limited vocabulary, I am constantly trying to describe things using totally unrelated words. Sometimes I cheat and throw in charades. The results are always entertaining, but usually nowhere near what I was trying to express.

I even have a mobile phone. Granted, I had to borrow most of its parts from one "Enrique Bravo" and it only holds a charge for the better part of one afternoon. I´m just waiting for the calls and texts to roll in: mexico country code: +52, my numero: 755 111 7746.

Visitors are welcome, but get your bookings in, as space is filling up. And, you may want to know that my mom is predicting a border war that will halt all travel between the two countries and leave all Americans trapped here. Her wild fortune telling isn´t always correct, but this would be a VERY HOT place to have to spend eternity.

And no, of course I didn´t eat the iguana! I don´t know where YOU went to elementary school, but at Hopkins, right between "don´t get in a car with a stranger" and "don´t eat unwrapped, poisoned candy", they told us "don´t ingest animals wearing jewelry." Public education serves me yet again.

In Latin American News...

by Anna Skorczeski

My landlord is this dude who is about our age, and his parents are from Mexico. This is a synopsis of a story he told me a week or 2 ago...

His sister and her long-time boyfriend had just broken up. The boyfriend was devastated and crying on the shoulders of the ex's (the sister's) family. The sister's family thought they were a great couple and were also sad to see them split up, so her grandmother offered to hire a mariachi band on the dumped boyfriend's behalf, so he could win back the sister's heart.

Yes, a mariachi band to win back her heart.

What's my story?

I'm charmed you should ask, really.

It's basically this: I want to learn Spanish. It has been pointed out to me (none too subtly) that there might be easier ways than going to Mexico for an extended period of time. I disagree. I will be leaving Sunday for Ixtapa/Zihautanejo (yes, that's the town Andy Dufresne goes to at the end of Shawshank). The plan for my immersion program is as follows:

Duration:This trip was supposed to begin in October, but unforeseen delays popped up (most of them involving small planes). I don't think I can lengthen my stay accordingly, so I will have to make my language immersion program work by Spring.

Job: I'll be doing "PR" for a restaurateur in Ixtapa. My only qualifications are that I speak English and German, and the German's not required. A good portion of my negotiated pay is in food.

Home: I supposedly have an apartment. Some friend of a stranger is going to get me at the airport and take me there. Last time I rented a place site-unseen, it included a 40-year-old German flatmate with a comb-over whose favorite outfit was boxers and knee-high socks. Last time I looked at a place before moving in, there was a race riot on the doorstep. So, I don't have the best track record for renting abroad... I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Language: I have been studying, and I know most of my numbers and colors in Spanish. If the majority of conversations begin with "What is your favorite episode of Sesame Street?", I'll be fine.

If you're in Minneapolis, I believe Liquor Lyles has 2-4-1s yet again this evening. The smokin' and jokin' will begin when you get there... except the smokin', 'cause you can't do that in Minneapolis.

Now you know all my planning secrets. As you can see, they're not very impressive, they may get me killed, and they don't currently include a surfboard. Hopefully, the triumphant email I send in a few weeks will make you feel bad for doubting me.

Love,
Steph

Northwest Airlines: Going Bankrupt because they SUCK, not because of Terrorism

by Stephanie Anderson

I was quite excited to see Uncle Ole, so his plane being continually delayed didn't really bother me. (He probably had a different perspective as he had started in Anchorage at 8am.) He was supposed to leave Minneapolis at 7pm Monday evening. We had time for one beer, but then the screen changed to "Departure 8:45"... time for another. We squeezed in a couple more Coronas before his flight finally boarded at 9:30pm CST.

In the only prompt move they made all day, Northwest had the flight from MSP to Fort Myers, FL in the air by 9:40. When I talked to Ole on Tuesday, I was more than surprised to find that he hadn't landed in Ft. Myers(RSW) until 7am.

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line (well, except for the trajectory of the earth, winds, etc.), so the plane took about 3 hours to get to its destination in Florida. Unfortunately, RSW was fogged in, and after missing two instrument approaches and circling for 45 minutes, the flight re-routed to Miami to refuel.

Of course, NWA didn't ring up their people and tell them to receive this flight in Miami, so when they arrived, no Northwest employees were available to man a gate or operate a jetway. They parked the plane out on the tarmack and told the passengers it was because Miami Inaternational Airport was CLOSED. Right.

No one was allowed off the plane... for security reasons. After a couple hours, the passengers travelling with small dogs complained that their dogs HAD TO GO. Fine, the flight crew would allow the dogs off the plane, but not the owners. Two small dogs were escorted out for a break by a flight attendent. While the door was open, one female passenger panicked and made a dash for it. The crew caught her and were able to calm her down, get the dogs back on the plane and close the door without any escapes.

Naturally, the passengers were hungry, so the good people of Northwest said they would "open up the galley and they could have anything they wanted." But, snackboxs are still $5 and peanuts/trailmix $3. This announcement was greeted by cabin-wide booing.

After about 3 hours on the ground, a man in First Class stood up and demanded to be let off the plane and given a rental car. He could have been in Fort Myers by now. Even the elite were not given special consideration, and this man was eventually coerced back into his seat.

Ole was glad for those few beers at ol' MSP, enabling to find a bit of humor in this whole debacle.

After 4 hours of captivity, the plane was refueled and given a clearance to depart. One of the flight attendents looked at her watch and said, "I'm timed out. Let me off the plane." The protests of the Chief Flight Attendent meant nothing to this woman who had worked through a delay in Detroit, again in Minneapolis, and now in cross-coastal Florida. With the way Northwest is treating its employees, why should she work overtime? She got on one phone with the union and one phone with the Northwest representative and was excused to go.

Tragically, the flight was now one crew member short of legally making the half-hour flight to Fort Myers. They called a woman in Miami, waited for her to drive to the airport, go through security and find the plane out on the tarmack. After 5 hours on the ground and a sunrise, the flight left for RSW, arriving around 7am.

Northwest felt really bad that it took 10 hours to get their customers from Minneapolis to Fort Myers, and they naturally wanted to compensate the passengers for their inconvenience. So, as everyone deplaned, they were handed a coupon for 25% off of a FULL PRICE Northwest ticket.

2004: Another Fine State Fair

by Anna Skorczeski

To get free parking our car needed one moreth
The dumbo at the lot wouldn’t ride in as our fourth

On the road walking in, an amateur spewed up her guts
We knew good and well that wouldn’t happen to us

So in we marched proudly, Gloria leading the way
A malt from Kiwanis started our day

Then direct to a stand boasting pork on a stick
It wasn’t too delicious, and bordered on ick

Casomorphins beckoned us to the fried cheese stand
Where a catastrophe nearly got well out of hand

A blur of hands and food, and then a terrible sound
A tray of golden cheese curds hitting the ground

Buttery corn that you eat off the cob
Glad selling miracle mops isn’t my job

A paper cone of cookies, from Martha comma Sweet
To get to the milk we had to move our feet

All you can drink milk is now a full dollar
“It was 25 cents 2 years ago!” was our angry holler

The oink booth monster was disgustingly big
1220 pounds is too much for a pig

We cleared up a few facts about numbers of ears of corn
While making the boy in the Ag Building very forlorn

With bursting full bellies, the last stop of our day’s plan
We marveled at the absorbency offered by the Chamois Man