Lurkers

I'm a chicken. There I said it. Are you happy now? I am. And while I think it's wise to be cautious, I get frustrated with my chicken self on a regular basis. We live in the trees. Surrounded by woods, at a close proximity to the house. For all intents and purposes this situation is divine. Except for that first sentence, I'm (literally at times) scared of my own shadow!

Last winter I complained at our lack of moose viewings. This being mainly because I was home all day long, stuck inside, and jonesing for a big, fat moose to walk right up to my front door. I read lovely stories of people who had moose looking right in their windows, which would freak me out, but thrill me to no end. Now that it's happened, I can say it was worth the wait. It is still a little freaky, and wiping little moose nose prints off my car windows is annoying, but I'll take them.

What I'm having a harder time with are the bear scat, and now seeing a bear, at the end of my driveway. It happened last week. I had been hearing about people seeing bear, or bear sign, everywhere. Though I've heard that the bear here are elusive with some people only seeing one in the past twent years. Anyway, it's something we love to talk about. I was driving home from work one day last week, and as I pulled into the driveway, I thought "hmmm...that was big". I backed up and sure enough, there was a pretty little black bear sitting at the end of my driveway, in the gravel pit. I suppose it was a smallish bear, and so pretty, but still I couldn't help but imagining him trying to eat me.

I've always had a pretty healthy imagination. When I was growing up in Northern Minnesota, I would be scared at night that a bear would climb up the outside of the house, into my window and eat me. See, I have this ongoing thing with bears! LOL. Anyway, I respect wildlife, I don't want to get in their way, and I do enjoy having them around. However, I do wish that my first (and hopefully not only) bear sighting would have been a little bit further from home.

Like many Alaskans we've been busy trying to prepare for winter. Which, if we listen to the weatherman, is predicted to come with the first snow this weekend. I have to admit. Mentally I am NOT ready for this. But I will be. I cannot lie that I enjoy the first snow falls, the fluffy whiteness. The serene quiet of the world around. But I'm nervous about the dark that is pushing up against me like an unwelcome hug from a smarmy "uncle". We are losing light at the rate of 7 minutes per day. That's rapid. At this point in time we're about on par with light in the lower 48, well, Minnesota anyway. But the deep, dark night is coming.

We attempted to pick cranberries this past weekend. Brent really wanted to get out and get some berries in the freezer before he left for Portland. The berry season will be pretty much over when he gets back. But much to our dismay, and not for a lack of trying, we ended up with a small container of rose hips and no berries. I'm going to dry the rose hips for future use, or perhaps just freeze them. Apparently there are a number of things to do with them. This is new for me. I've not eaten rose hips before.

Other than that not a lot is going on. Brent's away for class this week, and the first night went much better than I thought. I guess that's one benefit to having a big dog and a few big guns! Ha. But really I was pleasantly surprised that I didn't freak out more. Of course it could have helped that I had been up for about 20 hours when I hit the hay, hard. I'm surprised I don't have bruises!!

While Brent's gone I'm busy organizing and getting ready for my first Alaska girls' night. Since winter is coming, quickly and with wild abandon, I decided that the only real way to meet people is to invite them over, er, bribe them with cocktails and food. Some of the ladies I know, and some of the ladies I've met on one or more occasions, but I don't know as well. I asked each lady to bring a dish to share and a friend. I invited 8 ladies, so that's potentially 16 new friends. Am I smart or what?? Ha!

In between there I'll snap some interior photos of the house so that you can all see where I'm living. And where the magic happens. My writing that is, let's keep it PG here people! Sheesh. My parents read this thing...

Happy Monday! What's happening in your neck of the woods? Have a happy day!