Why I Hate Alaska

This is my last day in Alaska and thus my last web blog entry. It's been a good and at times, bumpy ride but now its time for me to start my new adventure in Florida.

Throughout the summer I have highlighted the good things about Alaska. So to be fair, I now leave you with the reasons I hate Alaska:

1.) Far from Friends and Family
2.) Lots of Mullets
3.) No Target
4.) 2 hour waits at Dairy Queen
5.) Conference Services (but only sometimes guys)
6.) Baseball players, firefighters, and cross country children
7.) Endless sunlight
8.) The Tempo and how it fits in here
9.) August temperatures high of 56 degrees
10.) The potential of being trampled by a bear or moose on my way to work

That's all folks!

No Smores for Moose

The interns got two whole weekdays off this summer so that we could take a trip to Homer. Homer is a fishing town with a few cool tourist-type shops and neat restaurants located on the spit. The spit is a small peninsula that jets into the ocean.

We stayed in a cabin which was decked out in moose decor from the stuffed animals on the bed to the trim on the walls. Our cabin came complete with a constant visiting ten year old child who was the owners daughter and a moose who played peek-a-boo at the camp fire. We had a nice time but we are all ready to go home and see our family and friends at home.

We are housing all of the participations for the World Eskimo Indian Olympics. Last night my roommate Jean, her friend visiting from Ireland Jenna, and myself went to the games. They have many unusual events like the Muk Tuk (Whale Blubber) eating contest, Seal Skinning, Ear Pull, Knuckle Hop, and Walrus Blanket Toss. Check out http://www.weio.org/games/index.html to read more about the games.

When we were there we saw the talent competition for their beauty contest. Then some dancers from New Mexico came and did some traditional dances in their costumes. They invited everyone to participate and lots of people did. We saw the championships of the “One-Hand Reach” competition. This game requires the athlete to balance their whole weight on one hand and reach a target, controlling their balance and coming down to the original position.

Then they did the fish cutting contest. It was not about carving fish like jack o’ lanterns as I was hoping. They received 20 donated salmon from Gordon’s Fishery and the winner was the one who could score and fillet the fish the quickest and the cleanest. They had some extra fish and they were looking for some volunteers to participate. So my roommate Jean jumps in. Someone lent her a pocket knife and she joined in. Jean came in last even having someone take over for her. But, we did get a big salmon out of the deal. Pretty nifty!

The Frame is Bent, the Muffler Went, the Radio it's ok.....

I haven't been updating this web blog as often as I used to because from July 2nd to July 20 I have/ will be working everyday. Therefore I have no life for things to happen to. Plenty of work issues pop up though, like today.

Let's see I had a lot of common issues like guests being charged wrong, guests complaining about XYZ, or people not checking out of their rooms. But then I had the odd ball ones like: one of my employees checked in 1200 children who were staying for a night at a time over the course of the summer instead of the 25 kids staying for just that night throwing off all future reservations and housekeeping reports, so I had to manually change 1200 reservations. We are housing the participants for the Eskimo-Alaskan Native World Olympics but 25 of them decided they didn't need to make reservations in advance so I had to find them rooms. They are all cramming into 5 doubles we had left so good luck there. Prep crew as usual didn't clean all their rooms, so when a guest checked into her room and found lots of porn on the walls, chewing tobacco and beer bottles all over, she was upset. I had to clean another room myself so she would have some place to stay. We had to deal with cops because someone dialed 911+ number instead of 91+ their number on their room phone. Then someone dropped their car keys down the elevator so UPD had to be called again. All of my cash drawers are mysterious missing money. And now it's 11:30pm and my last task of the day was to collect several pounds of whale blubber from one of our Eskimo guests and find a place to store it. This wasn't a last minute thing though. My boss informed me in advance that I would be the designated blubber picker upper.

This job is draining me. I can't even sleep through the night anymore because I anticipate phone calls, which I usually get a few of during the night. I will never take a 24/7 job again.

The 4th of July I didn't do anything again because I was working. I was still bouncing hall to hall at midnight and it still wasn't dark enough for fireworks. Apparently they still try to have them but I didn't hear anyone actually going to them or see anything. For the last two weekends my roommates have been gone and my co-intern has been on vacation so I've had the apartment to myself. So when I am not at work I have been pretty bored lately. I actually helped Kristen clean and prep a room because I had nothing else to do. Why am I not in Boston right now? Why am I not in Texas or New York right now? Alaska has had its fun moments but I am in a boring stretch now.

Then there is Old Blue, our not-so trusty 87 ford tempo. According to the police officer that pulled it over, it hasn't been inspected since 1991. Now if I hadn't been to the doctor since 1991 I should probably be put out of commission too, but not Old Blue. My boss swears that it's perfect to drive. So if you are reading this out there and later read I die in a car crash, please relay this information to whoever is my legal representative.

Stephen and Audrey's Alaska Vacation

Hi all!

So after a much needed break I am back to tell you all the details about my vacation. Here is the link to my photos: http://suffolk.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031525&l=d7075&id=17909864

I have like ten million more on my computer but I’m sure you get the idea.

Stephen came up on June 20^th. We hung out in Anchorage for a few days while I had to work. Then we took a four day trip to Denali National Park. Denali is home to Mt. McKinley which is the tallest mountain in North America. We borrowed a tent and went camping at the Riley Creek Campground. Sleeping was difficult because the sun never goes down and the tent doesn’t do a good job at blocking all the light. But having the sun up for long periods of time let us hike as long as we wanted or cook a late dinner in daylight.

The first day we went hiking on several nature trails and then the four-hour hike up/ down Mt. Healy. It is one of the tallest mountains in the world (or at least seemed that way on the hike up). Okay actually its quite small in comparison but it was still a good workout. The second day we went white water rafting, that was very fun. I would like to go rafting at least once more before I leave here. I like it more then kayaking because you get more of a thrill ride. I have pictures of us in our spacemen-like dry suits on my disposal water camera I’ll have to show you guys sometime. The last day we saw a dog sled demonstration. They have a kennel full of huskies at the park that break trails in the winter.

When we got back from Denali I was informed that one of our guests killed themselves in our dorm rooms. We were also providing emergency housing for the fire fighters which caused the biggest mess to date. 150 Firefighters would come in at any given point and need rooms stat. I was very busy on my two days back at work before the second leg of our vacation.

Our second leg of the trip started in Soldotna as we went Salmon Fishing. We were in the boat with Larry our fish guide, and a mother with her 8-year old son. The boy caught two fish and the mom caught a 30 pound king salmon. I caught the first fish, a stupid 3 pound rainbow trout but I didn’t catch anything else, and poor Stevie didn’t catch anything. Well poor me because I had to put up with him whining for the rest of the night.

We drove to Seward where we stayed in a camper’s cabin at Miller’s Landing. The next morning we went to Exit Glacier, then in the afternoon we did the sea life center. At night we went on a wildlife cruise on the Kenai. It was very awesome. We saw puffins, eagles, sea lions, a harbor seal, humpback whale and porpoises. The whale and porpoises swam right up by the boat. We didn’t get a good photo of them though. We ended our vacation going to the Wildlife Conservation Center which is ten million times better then the stupid Alaska Zoo. Here the animals lived in big pens that resembled their actual habitats and there were families of the animals not just one.

Sadly I had to return Stephen to the airport on Monday :(

Stephen is gone. My vacation days are used up. All the other interns will be gone this upcoming weekend. Work is busy and difficult. Hhmmmm, I wonder how much I am going to really like the rest of the summer.

A Hiking We Will Go

So my roommates and I totally hiked up a mountain today. In Chugach State Park just east of Anchorage lies Flattop Mountain, the most climbed mountain in the state. The mountain is 3,510 foot tall, but to be fair it was only a 1280 feet climb from the parking lot. I was very proud of our car Old Blue for making it up to the parking lot AND back down. Way to go blue.

The first leg I entitled the Thigh Master. It was like regular hiking; very steep to begin with, stairs in some sections. The second leg was going through a rock quarry. The last leg was rock climbing. I found this to be the easiest part while Kristen thought is was the worst. I was like Spiderman creeping my way to the top. I felt like I was on Nickelodeon Guts and climbing the Agro Crag. Kristen was nervous about several spots but we coached her through it and all three of us made it to the top.

Going down Kristen and I were doing the crab walk/ butt slide down sections while Jean was walking down no sweat. We saw a bull moose on our way down, our first full adult male moose with antlers that we have seen. Along the way we met many happy families with children and dogs of all ages and types. If I am ever hiking up the mountain with my dog in a backpack please inform me that I need a reality check.

On a side note Stephen is coming up on Wednesday, how excited am I!!!!!!! He is staying for about two weeks so that means I won’t have any entries until after 4th of July. But fear not my dear loyal readers; I will have much to say when I return.

Crazy I tell ya!

Work has been very grueling this week. I had four days when I put more then 12 hours in, I had one no-show where I ended up taking the shift and I was awaken by four phones calls this morning (Saturday) between 7-8am. The busyness is because we have all three halls open now so we only have one person running each shift, which is hard on the newbies who are still making mistakes. Also we are full to capacity this weekend.

In North Hall we have both the contestants of a kids’ soccer tournament, plus a summer baseball league. This has been a good birth control experience for all of us because after dealing with all these screaming monsters I no longer want children. They are screaming and running down the hall ways, kicking the vending machines, locking themselves out of their rooms and trying to get the elevator stuck.

Then in West and East Hall we have the Special Olympics teams from across Alaska. The buses dropped them off in swarms and we weren’t exactly ready to handle it, but everything went okay. I was running back and forth between halls helping any way I could whether it was changing light bulbs or washing coffeemakers I did it. I had to let some people into their rooms not because their keys didn’t work but because they didn’t understand how their key cards worked. I am trying to rush around but the participants all wanted to start up conversations with me and its hard to walk away from them. Then whether I thought I could go back to my apartment I would get a call to come back to the halls. Crazy I tell ya! Hopefully after this weekend everything will die down. We won’t be full again like this. Plus I have vacation coming in two weeks when Stephen is coming. Can I tell you how excited I am!!!!

My only non work adventure this week was going to the mall. I got the chance to sneak away to the mall this morning to get my dad a present for father’s day. In the bottom floor, in the center of the mall here is an ice rink. You can see it from all three floors. A lot of people were ice skating. They were probably missing the cold weather and temperatures sky rocketed today to.....probably 60 something. I even got to take my jacket off today, whoooowho.

Oh and this sun thing all the time needs to stop soon. I go home from work at 11pm and its still bright as day out and I think everything is okay that A it’s normal to work that late and B it’s normal to be that light out. It totally throws off all concepts of time. Kristen and I were both fed up with the light coming from our shades that we each took our own solution. Kristen re-arranged all the furniture in her room so her bed was now facing the window. I put sheets of aluminum foil in my blinds to block out the sun. My plan was simpler and got the room darker but then when the heat kicks on from the vent the sheets of foil clang against the blinds making a loud nose and light show. I am definitely not the winner of life this week.

Okay now here is a real adventure

So with things starting to run smoothly at work, Jean and I wanted to further explore Alaska and took a weekend trip to Seward. Seward is 2 ½ miles south of Anchorage. It’s a touristy town near the Kenai Peninsula. It’s very beautiful there. We rented a car because the tempo wouldn’t have made it that far. They gave us a PT Cruiser. One thing to note about Alaska is that the streets are kept up well. They are also quite flat. So there are mountains or flat land, not much in-between. We took the Seward highway all the way down which again is very beautiful. On the way down I saw a guy along side the road walking his two alpacas which are like llamas. We also saw a Dall Sheep which live in the mountains.

Seward is a two road town. It is very small in size and population. We went down the road and went from mid town to down town in two minutes.

We had reservations for a guided sea kayaking tour with Sunny Cove Kayaking that was at the end of a dirt road off of the main road. It had been raining and the road was very narrow with a mountain on one side and a cliff on the other so driving was a little nerve wracking. But we made it and joined our group. We were in tandem (2 person) kayaks. The four other kayakers and two guides and us went from Lowell Point in Resurrection Bay in the Gulf of Alaska area. We did the half day afternoon trip. It was a little rainy but the water was warm. The view was breath taking and the water was like glass. We didn’t see much wildlife other then the head of a sea lion from a far distance and two bald eagles. I have our kayaking pictures on my water proof disposable camera, so you’ll have to wait till I get them developed to see them.

Next we headed to our hostel to shower and get dry clothes on. It was my first time staying at a hostel and well um it was okay. It was clean but it was old and rustic, yeah rustic is the word, we’ll use that. It strongly smelled like gasoline so I was a little concerned the place was going to catch on fire. The first floor was a kitchen a couch and an old little TV. The upstairs opened into the Men’s room with seven beds and the door to the women’s room which had five beds. There was one bathroom in the whole place and the toilet had issues so we were afraid to flush it. Although we were told when we made the reservations that the place was booking up fast, there was only two other people staying there: a girl who came in after us and before us that we didn’t get to meet, and Art, an old man who probably doesn’t have any family and who stays at hostels a lot. Art seemed nice enough although he was probably wearing my underwear when we left.

We ate dinner at Terry’s Fish and Chips, which had five different types of deep fried fish. Then to kill time we were looking for a nearby lodge to sit in their lobby by their fireplace. We drove all around Seward, (took five minutes) but all the hotels we came across didn’t look ritzy enough to have lobbies. In our travels we did discover a coffee house/ fine arts museum in this small church. We checked it out. As we are approaching we hear piano music. There was this high school student playing the piano at the front of the church, paintings hung up behind her and along the walls, four rows of seats (some of which were old pews, others were folding chairs), tables on the right with craft fair type items for sale, and a coffee bar in back. It looked like something out of the Gilmore Girls’ Stars Hollow. We entered and the lady asked if we were here for the show. We replied that we wanted to look around and might grab some coffee. After looking around we sat down and listened to the girl play piano. She played a variety of music from today’s pop hits to classic wonders. She hit most of the notes but the thing is if you are playing in front of people you should probably hit almost all of them.

After Mozart got done they started this one act show about Alaska Nelly, this pioneer chic who wrote a book about her boring little life, housed railroad workers and told stories for money. It was pretty boring but we didn’t want to be rude and walk out early so we stayed for the painful hour. As we made our escape a different lady then before asked where our tickets were. Apparently we needed them. First I was robbed of an hour of my life and now she wanted me to pay for it. So I pulled out my wallet looking to make a donation to the performing arts and she informs us that tickets were $10 a piece. WHAT!!!! That’s almost another night’s stay in the hostel and two and a half beers I could have had that weekend. Unfortunately I actually had cash on me so I reluctantly paid. Jean and I were bitter for the rest of the night about it. Oh well the money can go to buying her daughter music lessons.

All became better soon when we went to the local bar the Yukon Bar. It’s a townies meet hippies type place. The ceiling is covered in one dollar bills. The people were very friendly and nice as anywhere in Alaska (minus the stupid church/art/coffee/ one-act crap lady). And who was playing……Lulu and the Aqua Nets. This Alaskan band is the best I’ve seen in a while. Lulu I swore was a cross dresser but local fans claim she is a chic. They were very funny and entertaining, Lulu would crack dirty jokes, play parody songs they created, and encouraged audience participation. People any age would go up front and dance, didn’t matter if they were alone or not good. It was just a fun atmosphere. A guy Jean and I were talking to even spilled beer all over me and I still had a good time.

The next morning we went to the Sea Life Conservation. Unlike the zoo, this place didn’t suck. In fact, it was great. We saw puffins, seals, seal lions, jelly fish, anemones and a variety of different fish. The center is a rescue and release center so animals are only temporarily on display until they are well enough to go back into the wild, or not entertaining enough to keep.

We grabbed amazing gelato from this nearby shop. I had also bought some fudge which Jean accidentally through away in the car ride home not knowing it was my fudge, sigh. Again Seward is only really one, two roads of stuff. On it was three Chinese restaurants so that’s where I grabbed lunch and then we headed on the road.

On the way back we stopped in Girdwood. If you wanted to go skiing in Alaska you would go to Girdwood. It’s where Arnold the Governator broke his leg that time he went skiing. You can go skiing up till June there. Anyway there is a multi hundred dollar a night hotel there, the Alyeska Resort. So we stopped in, took a look around, and made ourselves comfortable. Then on the way back to Anchorage, we stopped off at Beluga Point. No whales out today but the sceneary was pretty, we climbed the little rock mountains to get a better view. Then we made it home safe and sound after our first real Alaskan adventure.

Click on the following link to see my pictures on my facebook page. No facebook account is required to view them or so it says.
http://suffolk.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2029661&l=17707&id=17909864

Welcome Barbara Fienman's Class

As part of my internship, I will be calling in to class both with Barabara Fienman's class at Salem State and with Mike Siegel's class at Suffolk University. Why two classes about the same subject? Cause I like the teachers and I like to talk about my Alaskan Adventures. So welcome newbies.

I finally got a picture of a moose. Kristen and I were driving back from the Snow City Cafe and saw a moose on our way back to campus. This was taken about 10pm so you can see how light it is.

Law and Order

My day today: At the beginning of training my boss told us there is no wrong decision. After this weekend we learned the only bad decision is the one we made. My boss just came back today cause HE got the weekend and Memorial Day off and we got an earful on wrong decisions we made over the weekend. Then we met with our accounting director and apparently with every shift for the last four days there was something wrong with the deposit bags. Yup, every one of our staff members is making a mistake with our financial transactions one way or another. Good to know since we are handling thousands of dollars each week.

Then we have an Austrian lady who already switched rooms because she plugged her toilet and covered the floor with 3 inches of water. We moved her to a new room and she has now plugged the toilet of the new room. She also has broken two phones and constantly complains thatthe vent makes a noise although it makes a normal vent noise and we can’t fix it. Let's see what else happened to me today. My UAA email account finally got changed. It was "anall1." Yes I was anall1@uaa.alaska.edu. An= staff prefix, all= my initials, and no my password was not probe. Now its just "audrey" which is a little more professional. Someone didn't show up to work yesterday and today I accidental overstaffed us. We stayed an hour and a half into overtime because we were so busy. Oh and we found raw hamburger meat and urine-filled bottles thrown on the roof by the window of the third floor. So how was YOUR day?

We then came home to find some hillbillies decided to throw the contents of their whole house in our dumpsters which prompted the cops to come out. One cop said “at least we didn’t find any dead bodies this time” which I would normally think is a joke, but being Alaska you never know. It looked like a scene out of Law and Order which is the only show that is ever on our TV. Morning, noon, or night we are addicted since it’s the only show the three of us can agree on. The theme song is also my new ring tone replacing Metallica. You can really only scare the crap out of the guests for so long with my previous ringer before it gets old.

We went grocery shopping tonight and if I haven’t gripped about prices yet, here I go. A 2 inch binders cost $13, orange juice $5.50, milk $3.99, small cans of vegetables store brand $1.50, ice cream $6.50, and chicken cost as much as steak and fish. The prices are so high because they ship everything here. Gas is finally busting over $3 here. I don’t want to think what it is in NY. See in Alaska we have the natural resources but we don’t have the refineries so the prices aren’t much lower then in the lower 48.

Yesterday I went for a long walk around University Lake, as I sometimes do. It’s right down the street from where we live. Lots of beautiful trails here. The day before we went to the Sourdough Mining Company; this is a restaurant yet again rustic and decorated with animal heads and a stuffed bear. Normally they have Dusty Sourdough (featured in picture) performing each night but he cancelled the shows for that night. Bummer. Across from the restaurant is the Wildberry Factory. It’s a chocolate factory where you can see how they make their candy from behind plated glass in the large gift shop. When you walk in there is a chocolate waterfall, like in Willy Wonka. Unfortunately like Dusty, it too was not working that evening. But we still could check two more local establishments off our to-see list.

Work It

So how did I end of in Alaska anyway? In December I applied for an ACUHO-I internship. There were about 255 schools and close to 400 applicants. Schools contacted the students they wanted and the University of Alaska picked me.

Because the majority of students move out of housing for the summer, that leaves the residence halls and apartments available to rent to outside people. Conference Services outreaches to individuals and conferences in the area to sell its beds. The apartments go to long-term guests such as visiting professors and interns. The three residence halls are used for all other conferences such as summer baseball leagues, the Special Olympics, and academic workshops.

The two operations interns oversee the prep crew. They are responsible for cleaning each room and making it seem like a hotel room. Katie and I are the hospitality interns. We oversee the hospitality staff who mans the front desks 24/7. Our people take reservations; check guests in and out, handle payment, and all customer service issues.

The first week we were here we were thrown into training. The following week we had to train our staffs. At points it was quite messy and disorganized which made me a little tense. About half of my staff is composed of returning staff members who helped us out a lot during training. I felt like George W Bush. I was responsible for overseeing everyone and yet I am clueless and they are better off governing themselves. But apparently last year’s interns were really clueless and did a bad job. Therefore the staff actually thinks we are doing a great job.

We opened for business on Friday. There were some few minor problems like people checking in days early, prepayments not being shown on the computer, and toilets overflowing. Other than that we are off to a good start.

Since we have been busy this week, we haven’t had any real adventures. We have gone out to eat to several local restaurants, had an ice cream social with our staff, checked out nearby stores, went to the movies, had a BBQ with the RA’s, even went to a drag show, but nothing too crazy. Hopefully once we get everyone gets the hang of things it will free up some more time to explore.

The Landlord

http://funnyordie.com/v1/view_video.php?viewkey=3efbc24c7d2583be6925

If you haven't seen this clip you should. "I wooork too hard, I want four beers!"

Dead Camels Aren’t Much Fun

If you come visit me in Alaska, the zoo is not a place I will be taking you. In fact, if you ever come to Alaska at any time in your life, don’t see the zoo then either. Oh locals rave about the zoo, but these folks are crazy. Just trust me; you will save an hour of your life. The Utica Zoo is 10 times better then this zoo. That should put things into perspective.

So we went to the Alaskan zoo on Saturday. Yeah, it’s not just the Anchorage zoo but the only zoo in Alaska. A little history for a moment: In 1966 there was a contest offering a prize of $3,000 or a baby elephant, added as a joke. Well this dude who won wanted the elephant. The company actually found an abused Asian elephant and shipped Annabelle to the guy who was like “what am I going to do with an elephant?” They kept the elephant at a nearby ranch which had heated stalls. People came to see her, cause how many times doyou see an elephant in Alaska. With Annabelle’s growing popularity in 1968 a zoo formed next to the ranch featuring orphaned, abused, and injured animals. The Jerry Springer Show of wildlife.

Annabelle was really depressed. They had her paint but decided getting another elephant as a companion would help more. So they got Maggie. Then Annabelle died from a foot infection because being locked in a small barn for most of the year didn’t allow her to move enough. Now Maggie was depressed because, dude Elephants aren’t supposed to be in Alaska. They developed a special treadmill to fix this problem but needless to say the elephant doesn’t use it. Poor Maggie keeps falling down and not getting back up, which is bad because if elephants lay down for too long it damages their organs. The zoo calls in the firemen to help lift her up because as Saturday Night Live stated this week, firefighters have so much experience dealing with elephants in Alaska. Maggie has been getting quite the media attention lately because they think she is going to die soon. It hasn’t helped that one of their camels, Knobby, died on Thursday. They got Knobby in March to replace Boris who died this winter. See God put animals in certain places for certain reasons. Camels and Elephants do not belong in Alaska and if Alaskans want to see them bad enough google images, that’s all I got to say.

Being the marks like we are, we totally exploited the animal and wanted to see the dieing elephant. But they closed the exhibit. They also had the brown bear and snow leopard exhibits closed which is the entire top quadrant of the zoo because it was so small. The animals looked very sad and dead-like. They usually had only one of each animal and they kept them in very small cages. We felt bad. The only interesting thing that occurred is that next to the Raven cage was an un-caged Raven and feathers were rustling and beaks were chipping. So the only alive animal at the zoo was one we could have seen from our house. Good to know.

We went to the Moose’s tooth after the zoo to help cheer us up. Very cool atmosphere, very good pizza. Then we went to get supplies for our BBQ. We tried Carrs which was a grocery store inside an enclosed mall. We got salmon for some grilling but the sign said $2$3.99. We thought it was 2-3.99 per lb. It was supposed to be $23 per lb. But the fisherman dude understood our mistake and gave it to us at our original price. Officially the most expensive salmon I’ve ever eaten. But it was so good grilling outside. The apartments around us are filled with interns from outside companies and they got to move in on Saturday. The biggest internship employers are the oil companies so lots of engineers and geologists are around. We invited a few of them up to chill with us before the BBQ. That night the parking lot was full of them playing soccer and throwing freebies. Being rotating Resident Counselors on duty, we have to distance ourselves somewhat from any large gatherings or parties, but I can see us picking up a soccer game or two with them. Perhaps a group night at the Blue Fox?

While checking on the noisy new interns out of our window, we saw a moose walking by. We all ran outside to see it followed by the oil kids. It just stood there eating grass as we all are oohing and ahhing at it while at a 40 foot safety distance. Unfortunately I was the only one with a camera and my camera doesn’t take pictures well at night. But yup real live moose chilling outside my crib. Let that be a lesson to you folks. Don’t spend money at the zoo. Animals will come to you.


(Picture: not at the zoo but at the mall with the grocery store. It's a brown bear caught and stuffed back in the '70's. Probably misleading since Kristen is really only 2 feet tall. )

Everybody Wang Chung Tonight

There is a crazy 50-something year-old man carrying all his possessions with him, trying to stay on campus. He used to be a student years ago but he has long since maxed out his financial aid and is apparently 80 grand in debt. Hence we would not give him on-campus housing. This mad man has been harassing departments over the phone and it is suspected that he is lurking around campus. (I state again, Alaska is the number one state for rape and assault.) We have affectionately named this man “the wanger.”

There are a lot of potential wangers walking around the streets of Alaska. Yes there are a lot of men up here, but like RIT, the odds might be good, but the goods are odd. Well some of the people here are just odd. I need to start leaving my camera in my purse, because on the way to the restaurant last night we drove past this house with antlers and fur all over the roof and lawn. Classy.

We went to dinner at Humpy’s which is dubbed the best brew house in Alaska. Humpy’s was dumpy and crowded but the beer was awesome. I had raspberry wheat, and I also tried some pyramid Apricot. Because the place was so crowded, these old ladies who had spent their retirement check at the bar before we even got there came and sat with us and started talking to us. One was probably mid 50’s, the other late 60’s, and they had a guy with them who was probably 30. Before these cougars could give us any life advice, they left us to go hit on younger men.

Then we dropped off the tempo and walked from our apartment to a nearby local bar, the blue fox. At 10 pm when we left it was just as bright as the afternoon in Boston. We decided to take the short cut though the woods, over the snow mounds and over the beaver-chewed trees. Only Katie fell and got covered in mud, but it was funny cause it wasn’t us.

The Blue Fox is a townie bar and oh did we meet the locals all right. (A lot of potential wangers here.) I blame Holly because she wore bobby pins in her hair which make her both angel-like and a magnet to crazy people. Let’s see there was the drunk guy next to us who swore he owned the place yet paid for all his drinks and didn’t know James Brown was dead; the grandma and grandpa who loved our country music selections, especially me and Kristen’s version of Save a Horse Ride a Cowboy; the cancer-victim who I thought was a guy but name is Eleanor who sang every sad, depressing, song in the book; and then there was the men.

John- probably 40 something year old guy who wore a yellow and blue Hawaiian button shirt with black and red spandex pants, a fanny pack, and a head light like a surgeon or night bike rider would wear. (No I am not making this up.) He had messy long hair and smelled like he hadn’t taken a shower in the past week or two. He was our first admirer. Why, oh because we were singing Karaoke. Holly and I started our troupe off singing George Michael’s Faith. When we came back, Holly met John who kissed and cuddled her hand to his face. Poor Holly kept bumping into him. He sat in the front row and was swinging his arms and cheering us on. He later came to our table and proceeded to tell us which celebrities we looked like.

Mike was a 25 year old skinny white kid who seemed pretty drunk but not too far off from how he probably would have acted sober (a little behind in education, and realizing he isn’t eminem) He also was attracted to Miss Holly. He sat himself down and invested in our conversation. At work we have a code word that we tell our staff to say when they are on the phone with us in front of a difficult customer, “I can’t seem to find the moose file.” This was a lost moose file situation.

Then when Holly went on doing her duet of Meatloaf’s Paradise by the Dashboard light with Jeff, the guy running the Karaoke (the only non-shady person at the bar). During that, a 60 year old man dressed as a cowboy with horrible teeth asked Katie to dance. She, still covered in mud, refused but Kristen obliged and the two went on stage dancing behind Holly. Well apparently Mike thought it was a good idea for him to join them and he started grinding behind Holly on stage and licking her. Holly looked mortified on stage but kept singing. Jean and I were ready to rush to the stage and lay the smack down, but luckily Jeff beat us there and asked the little punk to go away. Yeah we left shortly after that. We walked back to campus at around 2 pm, which was the first time we saw darkness in Alaska. Even then the sky was navy blue and you could see the sun coming up and some daylight in the distance. We locked our doors tight to make sure no wangers or bar men followed us home, then went to bed.

My first few days....

Day 1- Let the traveling begin

I had a 9:15 a.m. flight from Syracuse, NY which is about an hour away from my parent’s house. Of course I was running on Audrey time (late) and got through security as they were starting to board my plane. I had to get my backpack checked because apparently I looked suspicious. My first flight was from Syracuse to Detroit on Northwest. I sat in the second to last row, right on the jet which also blocked my window view. When you combine my claustrophobia with my fear of heights, you can imagine how thrilled I was to be on this little value jet. We landed in Detroit which has a nice airport (surprizing me). The tunnel connecting the terminals has this color changing background set to nature sounds, which was very cool.

Second leg of the flight was fro Detroit to Houston where I was greeted by my Stephen who drove 3 hours from Austin to hang out with me on lay over. He gave me a very cute monkey that I named after him due to their likeness in appearance. (look how mushy mr. tough guy is getting after all these years!) We walked through every nook and cranny of the airport and surprisingly didn’t get any security guards on our tail. After an hour and a few hugs and kisses later, I sadly left my Stevie behind and was on my final flight from Houston to Anchorage.

I arrived in Anchorage at the international airport after my six and a half hour flight. The airport was pretty small and contained a lot of stuffed animals, or at least their heads. I met one of my supervisors and two of the other interns right away, as we journeyed to our apartment.

We are staying in a 3 bedroom townhouse on campus. I room with Kristen from Boston, the operations intern, and Jean from Kentucky, the Reslife intern. Next door to us are Holly and Katie from Buffalo, the other operations and hospitality interns. The apartments are huge. They are filled with not so comfortable dorm furniture, but the necessities such as a tv and a coffee maker. It was also stocked with linens and groceries. After my 14 ½ hours of traveling I finally passed out for the night.

Day 2-

Training began at 8 a.m. We met a lot of higher-up people and were oriented about Alaska and the University. Then we got a tour of campus. The facilities are pretty nice, some rivaling RIT. The library has planted trees, museum-like exhibits, a starbucks, and beautiful views of the mountains. The academic portion of campus is connected by glass walkways called “spines.” While walking in the spine we spotted our first moose. Yup we have moose like crazy up here that come right on campus like deer. But they aren’t as innocent as they seem. Some guy died a few years ago from a moose attack on campus. The mother’s are very protective of their babies. Kind of like the millennial parents of the students we work with.

In the afternoon, we met with Michael from Reslife to go over all the responsibilities of being a Resident Coordinator. In addition to being conference interns we also have to take turns as RC for the residence halls. We learned about all the scary crap that can happen: suicides, alcohol abuse, rape and assault, fires, exc. Yeah and they are putting us in charge of responding to these emergencies. We learned that Alaska is the number one state for rape and assault. Go AK! I guess people just get crazy from the cold and the darkness in the winter.

After training, the five of us interns took out the shared intern car, our 97 ford tempo. This beautiful machine barely got us through our wandering of mid and downtown. Anchorage is kind of dumpy and small. We parked in apparently the ghetto and were walking around, passing by some interesting characters. There are a lot of fur shops here equipped with such great merchandise as a fur jockstrap and a fur bikini. On top of the crazy fur building was this wolf-looking dog that looked like it was going to pounce on us. We ate at Rumrunners and downed a couple of pitchers of Alaskan Pale Ale. It was a bonding experience. It’s good to know that everyone has a dirty mind and is a lush like me!

While passing a “dancing ladies” establishment we passed a giant moose right by the street. He was just chillaxing, eating some grass. Then we made it to Fred Mayer. This store has everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. It’s like a Super Wal-Mart but nicer. You could by anything there from liquor, groceries, guns, tv’s, jewelry, home décor, clothing, party supplies, and a variety of moose turd products. After stumbling around the store in our near drunken state, we made it back to the clown car without getting the groceries we came for but other stuff and headed home for the night. I think this is going to be a very fun and interesting summer with some really great gals.