Palmer

I just worked through my travel plans for next week, and it looks like the drive from Palmer, Alaska to Denver, Colorado will take about ten days. I could probably do it a day or two faster, but I'd like to visit Haines, Alaska, because I've never been there, and I also like Stewart, British Columbia.

Here are my approximate travel plans, by day:

Yesterday afternoon I wasn't feeling well, and laid down for a short nap. When I woke up, I made a cup of coffee, then tried to turn on my six-month old MacBook Air, only to find it was dead. Technically I got the spinning beachball of death, and then found it was completely dead when I tried to reboot it. In short, the computer no longer thinks it has a hard drive (or in this case, a solid state disk drive).

We're going through another one of those stretches here in Palmer, Alaska where I haven't seen the sun since, well, I don't know when. I remember thinking I should have gone to the State Fair last Monday or Tuesday, so the sun may have been out then, or at least it was less cloudy.

But today it's both clouds and low-hanging fog, and if I'm not mistaken, some of those clouds are leaving another sprinkle of "termination dust" on the mountain tops.

Today is a departure from my normal writing, and just a collection of random thoughts:

Not much to say today, but here's a short video clip from yesterday's "Friday Fling" here in Palmer, Alaska:

Somehow I managed to forget about the "snow in June" here in Alaska. This "summer snow" is from the cottonwood trees.

When I lived in the cabin in Talkeetna in 2007, right around June 20, 2007 it started "snowing" like crazy, with white stuff floating in the air like a gentle snow storm. After talking to some people in downtown Talkeetna, I learned that this cotton-like substance was from the cottonwood trees.

Sorry folks, if you're interested in learning about Alaska, this is one of those "one off" posts where instead of sharing something about Alaska, I write about some technical thing I've done in Alaska. In this case I've created a software application I've named the "Cato CRUD Generator", and I thought I'd share an announcement here.

As I'm seriously thinking about moving back to the Lower-48 at the end of this year, I thought I'd make a list of things I'll miss about Alaska if I do leave:

Over the last few weeks I've been helping a friend and former neighbor get her new website launched. She owns a dog "pooper scooper" business in Wasilla, and was having some problems with her previous hosting company and website tools. We got her set up on Wordpress with a new hosting company, and the result is her new Valley Poop Patrol website.

Here are two photos I took during my "joy ride" on the Glenn Highway yesterday afternoon. As I may have mentioned yesterday, I took the afternoon off, hopped in my car here in Palmer, Alaska, and drove north along the Glenn Highway. This drive is probably my third-favorite drive in Alaska at this time, and here's why.

First, here's a view from a cliff on the side of the Glenn Highway. I'm not sure exactly where this was, but it was probably between mile markers 60 and 90: