Now this doesn’t mean much to those of you down in the 30s and 40s, that’s degrees of lattitude, but for those of us in the 50s and 60s, June 21st or so means something. The summer soltice brings me 18 hours and change of Sun above the horizon daylight, and it never really gets dark overnight, such as night is; as I write this at 2:30 AM, it isn’t really dark outside, I couldn’t read the paper, but I wouldn’t stumble over things.
For a few days on either side of the solstice, the Earth sorta’ wobbles and the days are about the same length. After that, at the high lattitudes, the days begin to get shorter precipitously; by August we’ll be losing more than six minutes of daylight every day, almost an hour every week. In the three months from the solstice on or about June 21st to the eqinox on or about September 21st, we go from over 18 hours of daylight to 12 hours of daylight. From the Fall equinox to the Winter solstice, we go from twelve hours of daylight to about six. And in a land of mountains and valleys, you don’t see that low Sun for much of that six hours. Because of the surrounding terrain, in December I see the Sun, if it is sunny, from about noon to about two PM, max.
Probably most of you weren’t really interested in a solar geometry lesson on a political blog, but as some of you might have noticed, I’ve almost sworn off politics. We lost and we lost in the worst way and to the worst sort of person and party; we may well never get America back after Comrade Obama’s regime. But life goes on. I live in a Red State and until they come and nationalize the oil, we’ll live pretty well and even though the US has a huge presence here, the State is just too big and daunting for a bunch of wimps from DC to really govern, but there is a fin d’siecle air to things.
As a longtime bureaucrat, “Since the house is burning, I’ll keep warm” was a good motto. The house is burning, but gas is still relatively cheap and the fish are biting. I burned a hundred gallons of Tesoro’s finest yesterday and today and caught a few of the wily and elusive King Salmon. I’m burning some of AmeriGas’s propane to smoke those fish so I’ll have good smoked fish and salmon dip for football games and NASCAR races this fall and next winter. Damn, I must have an awful carbon footprint; guess they’ll eventually be coming for me over that.
But, untill then, I’m going to do what I do. People like us, living the way we do, are the ultimate affront to the urban castrati and their ugly prunefaced, sexless women. Go burn some gas, catch a fish, or kill a deer, make a baby, or something. Do something you’re not supposed to do in Comrade Obama’s world. And remember; the Sun also rises.
Daniel Horowitz
Neil Stevens
Moe Lane
Steve Maley
Jake Walker
As much as I think you're probably right, I refuse
janis (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 8:34AM EST (link)to accept that it’s too late for America. We are not yet Venezuela, though we’re certainly trending that way. For all the power and resources he has accumulated, Obama has paid a price and will continue to in the months to come. Even in the media, he has started to lose his luster.
What I worry about more than Obama is the American citizenry. Will enough of them care to help stop this freight train of disaster?
They don't know what they don't know.
Achance (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 9:11PM EST (link)Two or three generations now, depending on where you live, of enforced ignorance and indoctrination have finally produced a majority that function at a medieval level of ignorance and superstition. It isn’t a big majority and some of them may be educable, so the thing hangs in the balance, but right now the balance isn’t tilted our way.
In Vino Veritas
China to the rescue
6eorge Jetson (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 12:48AM EST (link)Our lenders are already starting to balk.
Spain, after a fool’s rush to drink the green kool-aid, has an 18% unemployement rate.
The entire world knows Barack is a wuss.
General Motors will soon be making green cars at the whim of politicians. I, for one, will not buy. Creditors rights have been trampled. The credit world will not forget.
And we haven’t even gotten to health care, yet.
Barack only won by seven percent, a margin that can be nullified if only 3.5% of voters admit that they were wrong and vote differently next time.
Barack must see the world differently than me. IMO, his agenda is about the surest way to throw his popular appeal right down the toilet.
Quite profound, Art.
Kenny Solomon (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 8:54AM EST (link)Excellent.
Being a bizarro-world resident (South Flori-duh) has left me in a bit of perpetual rage lately, but I too am taking part in the rather simple things free people can enjoy….. Golf, grilling with real charcoal and even target shooting competitons for beers/drinks after the day is done.
Like the overwhelming majority of us, I believe it is NOT too late to stop the bleeding. But reversing some of the damage already done will be the task of our kids, grand kids and great-grand kids.
Let’s all just “hope” no man-made disasters” occur, or the “change” may be insurmountable for too long a time for freedom.
Fresh Salmon tastes so good
alabamared (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 10:33AM EST (link)You post makes me miss my time in Alaska. If you are going to just sit back and enjoy, you are in the right place to do it.
I'm with you AChance
Dave_in_Fla (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 10:54AM EST (link)I don’t fish though. I’m watching with amusement and feel free to comment with my opinions, but I figure its all over but the shouting in a lot cases. Healthcare has a reasonable chance of going down, but the rest is likely be here for a long time.
So I’m just maximizing my income to enjoy things while I can, keeping my investments as low risk as possible, and planning to pay as little tax as I can get away with, without going to jail. In the meantime, the sun rises over the Indian River are still beautiful, my daughter starts college in the fall, and we bought season tickets, we have a fabulous cruise next year paid for with 2008 dollars.
The rest of it is in Gods hands.
“If they were merely incompetent, then at least SOME of their actions would have been to the benefit of the country.” – Joe McCarthy
I don't fish. SWMBO fishes and I drive the boat.
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:42AM EST (link)She won’t net them or hit them in the head, so I do that. I also “relax” the halibut with a little H&R .410 that I keep on board. If you’re really good you can relax halibut with a knife, but if you don’t get it right you have a very large and angry fish trying to tear your cockpit apart. The shottie is a lot more reliable.
All my kids are more or less out on their own now, though the younger one was a lot safer in Afghanistan and places like that than he seems to be in Anchorage; kinda worried about that one, ain’t making the transition to civilian life real well.
In Vino Veritas
*applauds*
Finrod (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 11:39AM EST (link)None of us can be politics all the time; it’ll just drive you loony. We all need to take time out now and then to engage in our non-political hobbies, or else we’ll end up as bitter and twisted as the Kossacks and the moveon.org types.
For my part, once I move into my new house (yay), I’ll finally have space to set up my pinball machines that have just been sitting in my garage for the last 5 years for lack of space. Then I can finally try once again to break 50 million on my Black Knight 2000, hooray. Maybe I can even get the dead monitor replaced on my Gauntlet II.
Let’s get down to brass tacks here. How much for the ape?
The totalitarians always end up regulating sexual behavior
civil truth (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 11:44AM EST (link)…and other “lifestyle choices”.
That’s the great irony of those who vote Democratic under the fatally oblivious belief that the Democrats are the one who will preserve their precious lifestyle choices: one day they inevitably will end up in the gulag for reeducation or “purification” of the nation and never understand what hit them, nor how they brought it down on themselves.
The greatest evil…is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern. -C.S. Lewis
http://www.gmsplace.com/
Civil,
Leopard1996 (Diary) Thursday, June 25th at 5:17PM EST (link)I agree with that statement, when their “lifestyle choices” start to interfere with the social order of things, they will go from allies to villians quicker than my 9mm shell blows through a paper target.
“The accumluated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the whores and politicians will look up and shout, “Save Us!”….and I’ll look down and whisper, “No”…The Watchmen
I appreciate this, AChance
Jack_Savage (Diary) Friday, June 26th at 12:06PM EST (link)Especially the last paragraph.
To be honest, I have been mourning for the past few months about the America I will leave my children. It’s been hard for me to even mow my yard – if no one else gives a crap, really – why should I? Won’t the city take care fo it if it gets too high? IAnyway, it won’t be close to the America I grew up in – not close. Obama voters have no idea what they have done, and I am pretty sure that we will not recover from this. I have been a businessman for nearly thrity years, and we haven’t seen the worst of this by a long shot.Twenty years from now we will be lunching with the French bitching about how no one pays any attention to us anymore. I pray I am dead and gone before then.
One part of me hopes that everything the left wants comes to pass, and when their parents start dropping dead when they get the kind of health care the government is going to dish out, maybe they will understand. Or when their daughter decides she really doesn’t want that baby, a week or two before the due date, maybe they will get it. Or when Al Gore becomes a billionaire on the increased energy costs we will pay, or when an Islamic extremist leaves his safe haven in San Fransisco and poisons the water supply.
I guess the only thing I can do is fight where and when I can, and show my daughters what a man who still has his testicles does. I will write a letter of apology to them to be opened in the event of my death, and get on with my life.
Thanks.
Probably not.
Sorry
Jack_Savage (Diary) Friday, June 26th at 12:08PM EST (link)“Probably not” had nothing to do with “thanks” – should have been erased. Ooops.
It’s five o’clock somewhere, and I am about to govern myself accordingly.
Living your life the way you want is fighting them
nessa (Diary) Friday, June 26th at 12:40PM EST (link)Keep it up! You still have enough liberty to have whatever size carbon footprint you desire, enjoy it while you can!
“If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams
Contributor to Unified Patriots
teh twitter
You're talking as if Lord Voldemort has returned and Death Eaters are around us to spread malice and kill.
Rod_Patrick (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 7:02AM EST (link)Anyways, you’re probably right.
Why not take advantage of the little comfort that we conservatives currently enjoy in Red States?
That is supposed to our… err… your right to exercise. And that’s the reason why we are fighting the Dark Lord Obama.
Go for it, bro! Enjoying the blessing of liberty, freedom and unbridled simple lifestyle based on common sense is the reason why we are still here and continuing the fight!
So....it's over?
David Hinz (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 8:00AM EST (link)Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?
Well, it ain’t over now!
The Minority Report — The HinzSight Report — TMRB.tv — MFOB “Miss Tagart, do you know the hallmark of the second-rater? It’s resentment of another man’s achievement.”
The Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?!
jcincy Saturday, June 27th at 8:06AM EST (link)It may have been over had the Germans managed to bomb Pearl Harbor… that would have meant they either made some serious advances in technology or they managed to possess bases in the Pacific.
“Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation, to select and prefer Christians for their rulers.” — John Jay
jcincy - that was a nod to the movie "Animal House"
Jack_Savage (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 8:10AM EST (link)Don’t worry though – sometimes I get tripped up too.
Ever seen the movie "Animal House"? :) (nt)
Thrhheggeegwc Jjtkylkfofud (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 8:27AM EST (link)David, The "Art" of embedding. Hahahaha!
barry915barry (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 9:01AM EST (link)I guess this shows our age as bad as anything else.
itrytobenice (Diary) Monday, June 29th at 2:42PM EST (link)Either that or the pathetic state of education in America. If they can’t remember Classic American Cinema, and their teachers failed them so miserably, by God they need to get off their stupid lazy behinds and EDUCATE THEMSELVES.
Proper grammar saves lives.
Let’s eat Grandma.
Let’s eat, Grandma.
"Let him go, he's on a roll"
Dave_in_Fla (Diary) Monday, June 29th at 10:06AM EST (link)“Bluto is right! Insane, but still right!”
“If they were merely incompetent, then at least SOME of their actions would have been to the benefit of the country.” – Joe McCarthy
Great diary Achance. You are right.
Danielle Davis (ocleverone) (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 8:54AM EST (link)Today is a picnic and burning fuel on a jetski. Tonight we will add to the pollution with a BBQ of smoked brisket and chicken.
We will toss the lacrosse ball around, read to the kids and tell them (and each other) how much we love them.
Today is family. Tomorrow I will start the fight all over.
To me, “consensus” seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is something in which no one believes and to which no one objects … There are still people in my party who believe in “consensus” politics. I regard them as Quislings, as traitors … I mean it. — Margaret Thatcher
We have a Small Craft Advisory up today,
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 2:49PM EST (link)but I may go stick my nose out and see if it really is too lumpy after the Nationwide race today.
In Vino Veritas
Hey Art..... Need a new fishin rod ?
Kenny Solomon (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 2:55PM EST (link)You can always use Joey Logano.
Man, that kid needs to eat something.
I can't say much; I'm built about the same way,
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:01PM EST (link)except since I quit smoking I’ve put on some weight in all the wrong places. So, now in profile I look like a pregnant pencil or something.
Kid can drive a race car, though I don’t know how he’d have done back in the day with no power steering, a lever actuated clutch, and drum brakes on a car with a seven liter engine.
In Vino Veritas
I'd like to see most of the new kids try and handle the old-school cars.
Kenny Solomon (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:07PM EST (link)The screams most heard on the scanners would be “It ain’t turnin’ !!!”
I did ten or twelve laps in a '63 Ford
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:16PM EST (link)that had been a Holman-Moody “Grand National” car. This must have been in ’65 or, probably ’66. Buddy had bought it to run the local dirt. That thing was a handful on a half mile of dirt. ‘Course we weren’t used to anything but heavy steering and bad brakes and a clutch that would make your leg start shaking if you had to keep it disengaged more than a few seconds.
What made it a lot easier is the thing had so much torque that you could steer it with your right foot; just hang the tail out and give it more or less power to tighten or loosen it.
Now if you remember either Holman – Moody or “Grand National” you’re dating yourself.
In Vino Veritas
Grand National... Oh yeah...... I'm old.
Kenny Solomon (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:26PM EST (link)I had a 1970 Ford Torino, 351 Cleveland engine. It was my regular car, but yes it was “race ready” and believe me, I let her loose much more than once.
The main thing I remember other than the sheer power and joy of driving fast and making left turns was, at 150+mph, the rate of the gas gauge moving towards the dreaded “E” .
I’d love to have that lil lady again.
Hey, Kenny, the "fishing rod" won today.
Achance (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 10:13PM EST (link)Or at least Zippy won. That was one where the Crew Chief should be considered the winning driver.
That said, that was some of the best real, honest to God racin’ I’ve seen in years. Gorden and Kurt Busch going at it door handle to door handle, not that they have door handles anymore, for lap after lap was about as good as it gets! Kept me from my fishing and my “honey-do” list.
In Vino Veritas
'Twas a great race.
Kenny Solomon (Diary) Monday, June 29th at 4:52PM EST (link)Even though Jamie got whacked early on (by Harvick), and the whole thing rain-shortened, the day was definitely an A-1 killa-dilla oval party.
BTW, Big Ears in the 18 apologized to the field for causing ‘the big one’ late in the game.
Congrats on the king salmon
redstatebluestate123 (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 9:05AM EST (link)A rare catch (although possibly less so up there, I wouldn’t know).
Not rare, but it takes a lot of rod hours and gas.
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 2:48PM EST (link)I’ll confess to having absolutely zero skill in catching Kings; I’ve caught a lot, I guess, but I attribute every one of them to having just been lucky to be at the right place and time. There were quite a few of them in one of our favorite fishing areas the other day and we took a few, but then a cow and calf humback whale showed up and every other living thing disappeared. The big whales don’t actually eat big fish like salmon, but they so dominate any area they’re in that everything else clears out.
Did see one funny thing: Couple of guys were out in small skiffs, say sixteen feet or so, just trolling or moochiing for salmon. For some reason the cow took issue with their presence and got right between them and practically stood on her tail and flopped down. Visualize a 50 foot whale doing a belly flop less than a hundred feet from your little boat! Didn’t swamp either of them but they wasted no time getting out of Dodge. I was more than a hundred yards away and felt the wake in my boat so it must have been something in those little things.
In Vino Veritas
Achance, you see the most exotic creatures
janis (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:00PM EST (link)where you live! And there’s nothing here in Tennessee that comes close to competing with a humpback whale and her calf. Or salmon, because catfish are just not that exotic! Beyond the wildlife where you are, I’d give a great deal to have a climate closer to yours, at least in the summertime. It’s 96 here with a matching humidity. Walking outside is like having someone wrap you in a big wet overcoat.
Fall cannot come too soon. Even homegrown tomatoes are not worth the sucky southern summertime.
You got hot, sticky summers, I got long, cold, snowy
Achance (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:06PM EST (link)winters. But, I’ll admit, up to a point the cold is easier for me; you can always put on more clothes or just stay inside. There’s nothing you can do about hot if you need to be outside.
Gotta say though, as I’ve gotten older, I can really feel the cold in ageing joints and walking on ice all winter is just daring the broken hip or something.
The animals are fun, though. This time of year, I could pretty much guarantee you seeing humpbacks, eagles are just pests there’s so many, seals, sea lions, lots of sea birds, most days killer whales, and I could do that probably within an hour of casting off and certainly within two.
In Vino Veritas
I'll take the cold any day. But I must agree about the
janis (Diary) Saturday, June 27th at 3:16PM EST (link)aging joints and finding myself instinctively more careful about where I walk after we’ve have some ice,
As to the animals, I’ll trade you a passel of ticks, chiggers and snakes for any animal in your neighborhood you care to name. And I’ve been meaning to ask you if there are any snakes in Alaska? I’d assume not due to the prolonged cold.
If energy costs start shooting up any time soon, people in the south and southwest are liable to get as cranky from limiting their air conditioning needs as all those folks in the Middle East.
Took me forever to get used to the idea
Achance (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 9:35PM EST (link)that I could pick things up off the ground and reach into places I couldn’t see! No, there are no snakes in Alaska. A few frogs and salamanders are the only reptiles, and they’re few and far between. Here in Southeast we do have lots of spiders though; house gets bug bombed three or four times a year to keep them down.
But we have legendary mosquitos, especially up north and out on the Arctic/Bering Coasts. I was out in the Yukon Delta flying into one of the villages and the second the prop stopped, the windows of the plane were black with mosquitos. 24 Hour Off lasts about twenty four minutes. Eau d’Cutters or Eau d’Muskol are the Alaskan’s favorite summertime scent. Then, there’s no-see-ums, a biting bug that can penetrate any screen and sometimes they’ll just drive you inside no matter what scents, repellants, or insecticides you use. The nastiest one is called a “White Socks,” a nasty, venomous beast that has a bite more like a spider that literally starts rotting a hole in your skin. Sometimes those can get badly infected especially with little kids or old folks.
In Vino Veritas
Cold, snowy winters? Wait a minute...I thought AlGore said
eburke (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 8:40PM EST (link)the entire state is melting?
The wife and I were up their last August and it was cold and rainy about 80% of the time. Locals said it was the coldest summer in years and that the summer glacial melt didn’t come close to melting the winter’s snow.
Oh well…so much for the hockey stick model.
“All that need be done for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
Unified Patriots
Last year was just awful; cold, constant rain,
Achance (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 9:25PM EST (link)and $4.60/gal. marina gas. I put the least hours I’ve ever put on the boat. Between the awful weather and the price of gas, you had to have a really, really good reason to fire it up and leave the dock.
I don’t believe in AGW, but I do believe in the power of soot and dust to melt snow and ice, even when the temperatures are below freezing. It is amazing what a little dust or other discoloration will do to melt snow. The whalers used to take coal oil and even blacken it with carbon black to softent the ice when they got iced in.
Between Russian and Chinese power plants and huge forest fires, you can get a lot of “stuff” on the Arctic ice and even on the ice caps here and the melt can be very dramatic. A few years back, 2004-05 IRRC, we had a couple of very warm, dry summers and on the flight to ANC and back, you could see bare ground that probably hadn’t been exposed in centurries. Now we’ve had a few years or record or near-record snowfall and glaciers are advancing. Nature is amazingly self-regulating!
In Vino Veritas
My son spent 3 summers working up in Alaska and
eburke (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 8:37PM EST (link)he and a couple of buddies were in one of those 16 ft skiffs fishing for halibut when a humpback decided to swim directly *under* their ‘craft’. He said it was a rather disconcerting sight to look down and see the tail exceeding the width of their skiff.
They chose to relocate.
“All that need be done for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
Unified Patriots
Achance,
bags64 Sunday, June 28th at 6:36AM EST (link)the wife and I are headed your way in a couple of weeks to celebrate our 20th. First time for us both and we’re as excited as we can be.
Save some salmon for us!
Cruise ship or independent? nt
Achance (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 8:46AM EST (link)In Vino Veritas
You need to make it
Justin_Case (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 8:29PM EST (link)up to Copper River and use one of those newfangled fish wheels. ;>)
What a beautiful place. Took your advice and visited Chitina among others.
One rule of thumb is, when local people give advice on places to see etc, take them up on it.
Thanks for all the tips.
Glad you enjoyed it.
Achance (Diary) Sunday, June 28th at 9:39PM EST (link)used to spend a lot of time in the Copper River Country. Us Honky Dogs can’t use fish wheels, but I’m Hell with downriggers and square-shank Mustand commercial hooks.
In Vino Veritas