Moose at Gwin’s Lodge

These twins were born either early this week or late last week. This picture was taken across the road from where I live now near the Upper Kenai River.

Earlier this week while all my co-workers and I were having dinner, the mama moose ran past the window…wow, I never knew moose could run so fast.  Hope I am never in their way when they are in a hurry to get somewhere.

I saw moose before while living in NH, and we had elk all around the Grand canyon while I was there, so these Alaskan moose don’t scare me at all. Now the idea of seeing a bear  (to close) scares the crap outta me..so I don’t go walking much around here.

Now for the business~~The store is open but don’t think any customer has stopped in to buy anything. Probably because from looking at the outside of this business it’s really hard to tell that we are open.  I am still waiting for the restaurant to open. There is still lots of work to do around the property,  but not much that I can actually do myself, So I haven’t really done much of anything the last few days.

http://www.zazzle.com/moose_cooper_landing_travel_mug-168825058189863968

http://www.zazzle.com/cooper_landing_moose_buckle_oval_belt_buckle-256223288169817364

http://www.zazzle.com/cooper_landing_moose_neck_tie-151457278745932205

1 Month in Alaska

Hard to believe I have been in Anchorage for a whole month now. There is still alot of things in Anchorage I have not seen…and I probably will never get around to see it all. Basically Anchorage is just another city; much like any city in any state. Not really the picture I would conjour up whenever I would think of what Alaska was supposed to be like.

Of  course I would have to arrive just a week before the newspapers stated that we passed the record for the snowiest Winter on record. And now someone mentioned that we might get more snow tomorrow, so I guess Winter isn’t over yet.

I am hoping (and waiting) for a Summer job in Cooper Landing, which is about 2-hrs South of Anchorage. It’s a server job, in a little (sorta) remote fishing lodge, which will be a bit different then what I am used to but hopefully I can handle it. Just gotta keep telling myself that it’s just for a Summer. The area all around Cooper Landing looks great…with lots of trees and the river is right across the street I have talked to the owner/manager (not totally sure what Charlotte’s title is) and I know that she did 1 reference check, and I faxed back the paperwork she needed to do my background check. So now I am just playing the waiting game….oooh my patience will be put on trial this week. LOL

Tomorrow is payday from my very, very short job at Wendy’s….I’ll get paid for a whole 3 nights. Oh well, I will use that to buy a few supplies that I’m sure I will need once I get to Cooper Landing. I never did figure out why Wendy’s left my name off the schedule.

This week Anchorage is starting up a trolley that goes around to different areas of the city, and someone gives a narrative history talk for $15/hour. I want to do that before I leave here. Might end up being my favorite activity here.

Lunch at “Village Inn”

Wednesday is ‘free pie day’ at Village Inn.  I had only planned on getting coffee and a slice of pie. But the waitress is always so chipper when I go in that I ended up getting a salad. I didn’t realize the “fruit & chicken salad” would be so HUGE.  The little bowl has some type of poppy-seed dressing which was a little different and not something I would run out to the store to buy.  When the manager walked by my table and casually asked me if my lunch was ok, he turned around and went back into the kitchen and very loudly asked who messed up with the fruit salad. I guess my fruit & chicken were supposed to be on spinach, not mixed salad greens.    I ended up getting my Coconut Cream Pie to go, as I was to full from the salad.

Today when ever I get around to finishing another job application for “AlaskaTourJobs” then I can get ready to go out for lunch at another fun, cozy place called “Gwennies”.

We woke up to snow this morning and it’s still snowing out. Good thing Gwennies is just a 5-10 minute walk around the corner and across the street from this hostel I’m staying at for now.

North to Alaska

While I was sitting at the Phoenix airport for my flight to Alaska, I happened to watch quite a few different children use the escalators. It made me wonder..there were very young children who ran right to the escalator and jumped on it by themselves even though some adult was calling to them and telling them to wait. Obviously those kids were in a hurry to get somewhere and laughed all the way to the bottom of their escalator ride. For them it was exciting to be able to do something on there own, all by themselves. Some were ready to ride the escalators up & down a few times. For the families who had lots of time to wait for their flights, some parents had a hard time keeping their youngsters away from the escalators…always telling the kids that they would get hurt, kidnapped or just needed to stay where parents could keep an eye on them. Geez, what a way to make a kid scared of his own shadow and too afraid to try anything new. Course there was some kids who must of already gotten to that point because they screamed bloody-murder when someone tried to make them go anywhere near the escalator. Geez, wonder what they will be like as an adult.

Well after a childhood of watching some shows called Grizzly Adams & Swiss Family Robinson, I finally got to Alaska on March 31st. Believe me, Anchorage is nothing like those old shows. Anchorage is just another city with to many drunken weird people in it. But I guess so far the weird drunks do make for good entertainment when I have to go downtown. I have heard comments that Anchorage is “half an hour away from Alaska”. So I’m assuming that the Grizzly Adams type location is half an hour outside of Anchorage in some location that can only be reached by seaplane. There are places that can only get mail by plane…they have a zip code, but they don’t have electricity or running water.

I’m staying at the Spenard Hostel. It’s in what used to be the “wildest” part of town. I guess we still got quite a few bars and massage parlors around. I actually like this side of the city better then downtown. It seems quieter to me. A few people in the hostel went on a 2 day camping trip somewhere near “Nancy Lake”. I’m not really sure yet where that is but got a kick out of hearing the stories on how they got lost trying to find their cabin. The houseparent, Rachel,  that got hired in late January is hoping for a teaching job next year…somewhere off in the “Bush”.

Yesterday I went to a job fair for a company that I had actually applied to 3 years ago. After printing out my profile page from their company website, the folks doing the interviews were surprised to see me. I told them that seeing as they never contacted me while I lived in Arizona that I just had to finally come to them. One lady told me that was gutsy! They were supposed to call me back today…only I found out last night that the office shuts the phone off until 7pm, in the winter, when the office is open 7pm-11pm.. this afternoon I have noticed that the office phone says someone left voice-mail today, so I’m hoping it’s a call for me telling me where to go next with some job. This company has 10 different restaurants at the airport. Now with 10 restaurants..how can I not get a job?

It’s been about 33-41 degrees outside since I have gotten here. For me it’s cold but all the local people think it’s pretty warm. Everytime I see people run around in shorts or flip-flops, I just think they are nuts.

Independent Freelancer~Free At Last

Well my last day of work at the Grand canyon, was Saturday, the 24th. I hung around 4 extra days clearing out my room…giving stuff away to my dorm neighbors (they thought it was Christmas), I mailed a few boxes of stuff to my daughter in Maine, and I practically filled up a HUGE green dumpster in my parking lot all by myself. After mailing stuff to my daughter on Tuesday, I still ended up finding more stuff that should have gone to her. So I packed that up and brought to Flagstaff with me and then mailed out another small box to her today. And I still have to go through the stuff I have left here with me in Flagstaff, because even though I only have 2 bags left; they are very heavy bags. Yes alot of people were surprised that I got 5 years worth of stuff down to 2 bags…BUT I finally did it, and I don’t won’t to go shopping again for a very long time.

Last night after I arrived at the hostel in Flagstaff, I went out to eat. There is a place right nearby that I have never been in before. I decided to try their special for the night. “Texas Burger with Fries”~ They put pepper or something a little spicy on the fries…not my thing and the burger was not my favorite either. Even though it was not a great meal I still tipped the waitress…with a handful of change. I shouldn’t complain because it was the first thing I had eaten all day. I was to busy moving to eat before this. I was to tired to even read the menu to see if there was anything better.

Then this morning, I had the usual hostel breakfast. Instant oatmeal, toast and fruit (I grabbed an apple for later). Breakfast & coffee started at 7am. Thought I was going to die from lack of coffee by then.

An now ex-coworker that I always called “Grandpa” had gotten interested in a new book & diet called “Blood Sugar Solutions” and I now have the book on my kindle. Wonder if I can make that diet work for me while I am in Alaska.

One thing that made my bags so heavy yesterday was my container of change…I finally took it to Safeway to dump into their “coin star” machine. I was surprised that it came to about $104 worth of change. No wonder it was so heavy. I had given a bigger container filled with just pennies to an ex-coworker when he picked up my old desktop & printer. So I am still waiting for him to email me to let me know how much all the pennies came to. When he picked it up, he guessed that the container weighed about 30 pounds. I just didn’t want to carry that around Flagstaff today. Besides seeing as he said he would check out the desk top and get my old pictures off it and send them all to me…I figured he will earn all the pennies.

Later that night, I walked over to a Greek restaurant for dinner. I’m not sure if I have ever had Greek food, but the Chicken Pita Wrap I ordered was pretty good. Unfortunately it was to huge to eat. I brought it back to the hostel but ended up throwing it out when I left the next morning. Yes, I still need to learn not to order so much food…or just not to go out and buy anything I don’t really need (including food).

As of right now I am unemployed or I could say I just became my own boss with the job title of “Independent Freelancer”, which sounds pretty cool to me. Now if I can just figure out how to make that job title bring in some cash to live off of. Sure I read lots of blogs and stuff about others making a living online but so far I ain’t quite figured all that out. I’m sure all this new freedom will finally hit me once I arrive in Alaska..right now I’m still to tired from packing/moving to feel anything.

5-Year Anniversary & Birthday Dinner

Even though I took the shuttle into the Grand Canyon National Park on March 12, 2007; it was after closing hours for HR, so I had to finish all my paperwork on March 13th…so all my I.D. and paperwork says I got here 5 years ago yesterday. There is a special banquet every January for employees that have worked here for 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 years. But seeing as I am leaving in  2 weeks, I don’t think I will be back for my banquet.  I did get to go as a guest with 1 of my neighbors 2 years ago, when she celebrated 25 years of working here. I did get a special little 5-yr appreciation pin to wear on my uniform though.

This week is also my birthday, so as a gift everyone gets a special discount that they can use in the gift shops “or” at 1 of the fancy restaurants. Tonight I went to the Arizona Room to eat. I’ve been here 5 years and this was the first time I have ever eaten there. I took my manager’s advice and got there right when it opened for dinner at 4:30. The manager was right about it filling up fast.

I started out with Southwest Corn Chowder (YUMMY) and a Cactus Lemonade to drink, which is Vodka, lemonade, and a splash of Prickly Pear Syrup. Now I am not a fan of really hot spicy ‘southwestern’ food and if though this chowder does have a bit of a kick to it, it is still one of my favorites.

I got the Blackened Salmon Dinner. That’s an avocado tomatillo salsa on top of my fish. The salsa had no “kick/bite” to it…which evened out the blackened flavor on the fish.

I was so full after this meal, that I skipped dessert. By the time I got home I was ready for a nap….and then woke up at 10pm, which is why I am still awake nowand typing this at 2:30am.

Guess now I should get my morning coffee started, make some microwave popcorn and seeing as most people in my dorm-building are sleeping I can do some laundry.

In Like A Lion?

I have always heard the old saying “In like a llion, then out like a lamb”. It was what people always said to describe the weather during the month of March.  Well late this morning it got real windy but at least we didn’t get the snow that was predicted for today.  The high temps for today was about 39-40 degrees. So does a little wind mean that March came in like a lion or not? Well another lady that lives in Prescott,AZ (and writes a blog that I read often) seems to think today was a lion…so I guess I will go with that for now.

Today also started the new schedules for Yavapai’s open times and also for the shuttles. I got the employee shuttle at 4:15am today. But tomorrow I think I will catch the regular shuttle at 4:38am

There was a health inspection at work around 1:00pm.I got sent home early…about 12:10 because business was so slow. I guess next week we start getting our “Spring Break” guests coming in, so we will get busy then.

Anyways I was in a hurry to catch the shuttle this morning and forgot to grab money for lunch, so I had to wait until I got home and then I only ate a banana and celery sticks with peanut butter. Yes I know, it wasn’t much of a lunch.  But after getting weighed a few days ago for my mule ride, I’m sure I could live just fine with a whole month of my skimpy lunches.

I Got A “Snow Day”

I bet Michael will be froze by the time he gets done snow-blowing around Maswik. I walked down to Maswik to call work to tell them that the shuttle buses were not running until around 11am. My manager told me not to worry about it and take the day off. WOW! I guess school kids ain’t the only ones who get snow-days.

Michael’s daughter, Hope, is standing over near the sign…she was supposed to go meet her mom at the store, but we just hung-out at Maswik for awhile after I had breakfast. Obviously with the buses not running, we were not getting to Marketplaza this morning. Hopefully buses run on time tomorrow morning cuz I have to be at work at 6am tomorrow and I need to get to the post office too.

Below is my driveway when I got home about 10:30am. By then my feet were COLD and nothing left for me to do except hurry inside and make a pot of coffee. At least the roads were not icy while I walked home.

Supposedly we should have nicer weather tomorrow then more snow on Thursday…aahh, I guess March will come in like a lion, which mean it should go out like a lamb.  I will be in Alaska by the end of March and Alaska is not having good luck with the weather this Winter. Just as long as I don’t turn into a frozen popsicle before Alaska has its Spring-time, I should be fine.

New Friend~Willow the Mule

Yesterday after I got out of work, I signed up for today’s mule ride. Guests have to pay $120, employees get a discount during the month of Feb. and only pay $25.  Everyone has to get weighed because the mules have a weight-limit. According to the scale that mule guides use;  I now weigh more then I have ever weighed in my entire life…including each time I went into the hospital to deliver babies.  No wonder they gave me such a HUGE mule.

Here we are near the Abyss.  Getting on & off this HUGE mule is not easy. While sitting up on the mule, you don’t get the feeling that she is so huge.  Hopefully some-day in the future, someone will invent a padded saddle. My mule’s name is Willow and was told that she is also the mule that they use for alot of kids and just anyone who is not used to riding.

She loved to chew on stuff. She even started chewing on the barn before we got started. and would stop quite a few times to chew on shrubs & trees along the path on the way out to the Abyss. But she was pretty good about keeping up with all the other mules too.

Well I can check this off the bucket list now…and yeah, even though Willow was a great mule, I think 1 mule ride is enough for me. At least until someone invents a better saddle. Man-O-Man am I sore!! Got home over 2 hours ago, and I am still having a hard time moving around. Hopefully I feel better tomorrow when I clock into work at 10am.

30 More Days To Go

My last day of work here at the Grand Canyon is 30 days from now, on March 25th.

I had asked a couple people in the HR department about getting my last paycheck on the 21st…if I checked out early. But they would still have to mail it to me later. So I will just stick with the original plan of working till the 25th, and leaving the park on the 26th.

Yesterday I picked up 2 decorative mailing boxes from the post office. I need to mail out some stuff to Liz. The boxes cost $4.29 each. I’m hoping to mail them out Tuesday seeing as I don’t have to start work until 10:00am that day. This gives me a few days to get stuff organized & ready to ship out. Then I still need another box to send out my son’s stuff.

I also talked to someone who work in the gift shop and found out that he needs a microwave & vaccum. My microwave blew out the light-bulb over a year ago but it still works, so I will give it to him when I go.

Monday will be my last day off for this month, so I will finally go on the mule ride to the Abyss Point then. It’s either do it then or never because the employee discount ends on Feb. 29th. Just my luck, a friend told me that we are supposed to get a bit of snow on Monday.