Family
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There be Whales Here!
Ted and I started our last full day in Juneau by taking a walk through downtown, over to Douglas Island, and back. We saw some totem poles, a huge statue of a humpback whale (photo credit to Ted), and the State Capital Building, which is probably the smallest in the US. After that, we came home and had a light lunch, and then Maya, Kathy, and I went whale watching! I’ve never been whale watching before, though we did go dolphin watching in Maui a few years ago, which was great. We have whale watching off the coast of California, but that’s in the open ocean, while in Juneau you…
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Mendenhall Glacier
Tuesday, we all drove back out to the Mendenhall Glacier, which is where we had gone to see the stars a couple of nights prior. In daylight, it was sort of crowded with tourists, though not too bad. There is a waterfall at one side of the glacier, which we had seen and heard the other night. There is a beaver dam, though it is covered by branches and you couldn’t really see it well. Maya and I had gone to the glacier on our prior trip to Juneau, in 1999 (when she was 3, so she doesn’t remember), and I could see that the glacier has receded some since…
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Juneau
Juneau is so beautiful, I can easily see how my mom, Richard, and Kathy just fell in love with it. The flight from Anchorage to Juneau is pretty quick, and the price difference between coach and first class wasn’t that much, so we splurged. FUN! The picture above is one of many from that flight. The mountains just go on forever. As you can see, we finally got some sunny weather. Don’t get me wrong, I like misty, drizzly weather, but thus far it had really gotten in the way of some of the things I wanted to see, like the stars at night without light pollution, the Aurora Borealis,…
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Homer
Homer is a beautiful town of about 5,500 people approximately 220 miles southwest of Anchorage. Back when we lived in Fairbanks, my brother Richard and I spent a year at a hippy private school, when he was in 3rd grade and I was in 1st. I am not convinced that we learned much in the way of the 3 Rs, but we did a lot of fun projects, like building igloos and making applesauce. Most of the school went to Homer, 3rd graders through 12th graders. It was a very small school, I don’t know how many kids went. Not a lot. The older kids looked after the younger kids,…
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Anchored down in Anchorage
We spent two full days in Anchorage, and mostly took it easy. We started our first day by going to the airport to pick up our rental car. That normally wouldn’t be worth mentioning, but the service we received was so gracious, I feel it warrants mentioning. The clerk at the National car rental counter was having trouble with our rental, it was coming out about $400 more than we were quoted, so he called his supervisor in to help him fix it. She was able to override the system, and tried to figure out how to get it to charge us the quoted price, but somehow it came out…
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Alaska Railroad Adventure
The next phase of our vacation began with a rescue. When I had lunch with Aimee on Monday, she casually mentioned that she had a van big enough to carry all 5 of us and our luggage, and if we needed a ride to the train station Wednesday morning, to give her a call. We dropped off the car on Tuesday evening, and were planning on taking a taxi to the train station early on Wednesday. This turned out to be not as easy as we had hoped, as Ted called company after company, and none of them seemed to have vans or cars big enough for all of us.…
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Visiting the Old Neighborhood
We lived in Alaska for 5 years when I was young, before moving back to California when the overcrowding from the pipeline construction forced us out of Fairbanks. My mom moved back to Alaska, to Juneau, in 1993, and my brother and his wife followed in 1994. My brother and his wife (Richard and Kathy) had never been to Juneau, so it was a huge leap for them to move there sight unseen, but they fell in love with its spectacular beauty, with the cool weather, so different than Stockton and Sacramento, and the slower pace of life in a much smaller town. As did my mom. I have been…
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Home from Alaska!
We flew home from Alaska last night, we had a wonderful time. 11 days, and we went to Fairbanks, Anchorage, Homer, and Juneau. I have a lot to say and am still figuring out how I want to write about it here. I think I will end up making a lot of smaller posts, to avoid overwhelming with a ton of pictures and so on. For now, here is a picture I liked, from Homer. Loved this little otter just hanging out near the boats.
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Friday Thoughts
I saw this sad little vase of flowers on my sad lonely walk the other morning, and it felt right to me. I feel flat and sad without Mulder. It’s been two weeks now since he died. I know that we did the right thing, but gosh, it still hurts. It is, however, getting a little less painful, a little easier. I no longer expect to see him when I come downstairs. I no longer think he will come put his chin on my knee and beg for dinner every day at 4:30, knowing that dinnertime isn’t for another 1/2 hour, but hoping against hope that I have forgotten how…
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Wordless Wednesday – Missing my Boy
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Mulder
Mulder Asregadoo April 6, 2015 – May 19, 2023 You all know that Mulder’s lymphoma came back in April, soon after his 8th birthday. He deteriorated pretty quickly, and on May 2nd, I took him to the vet to try to determine his situation. His spleen and many other lymphatic organs were very swollen. She said that if we gave him an injection of enzymes, it would help, perhaps for a month or more. So we went ahead with that. It did help. It was miraculous. He felt amazingly better within 15 hours, all of the inflammation went away, he was playful and happy again. It was fabulous. Unfortunately, only…
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Mother’s Day
Mother’s Day turns bittersweet when your mother dies. A day to celebrate her when she is not here, it is difficult. I miss my mom every day. When I had Maya and became a mother, I felt a different bond with my mom than I had had before. I understood her more. She gave me such grace and understanding, laughed with me, gave me guidance. She was proud of the mother that I became. I don’t think there is anyone in your life that will love you as unconditionally as your parents, with the possible exception of your child or your dog. I am very thankful to have had the…
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Changing the Subject (Mostly)
This is Ted looking cute at a local restaurant in our town. We went downtown last weekend and had a snack and some wine, then went to a bookstore. Some of my favorite things: Ted, food, wine, books. Excellent way to spend a Saturday afternoon on a beautiful day. This is one of the dishes we had. I did not take a picture, this is from the restaurant Facebook page. It’s asparagus, labneh, blood orange, arugula, and a ‘perfect egg’. The picture has spring greens, but ours was just arugula, which is fine by me, because I love arugula. When the menu said ‘perfect egg’, I assumed that was going…
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Discouraged
This is my beautiful boy, darling boy on our walk this morning (Friday). On Tuesday, both Maya and I separately found enlarged lymph nodes on Mulder’s neck. They have only grown since then. I fear this means that he is no longer in remission, and his lymphoma is back. Shit shit shit. We have an appointment with the vet on Monday, but I know what the answer will be. He had 5 months of chemotherapy, and at first all was well. But as time went on, it got harder and harder for him. He had probably 3 bad days every week, where he would walk around feeling like crap, throw…
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Catching Up
It looks like I took a little blog break there. I’m back today, and have a few minor tidbits to share. First off, this is the same beautiful magnolia/tulip tree that I shared with you a couple of weeks ago. It’s downtown, and likely the next time I walk around the area, it will be bare. We’re having rain again, after a very dry period, which is welcome, but I imagine will knock down most of these blooms. Saturday morning, Maya had an appointment to get her hair done. I dropped her off and then walked around our little downtown for awhile. I like to explore, and went down a…
