Vigil in Support Of Alaskan Muslims - Tonight (Saturday) at 7pm

The Interfaith Council is sponsoring a vigil tonight.  From the Facebook page:

"In light of the tragedy in Christchurch, New Zealand there will be a vigil tomorrow at 7pm, at the Islamic Community Center of Anchorage.  All are welcome to attend, and stand with our Muslim neighbors at this time of loss."

The Islamic Community Center of Anchorage is at 8005 Spring Street.




This is a good time to support one of our many communities that is particularly under attack in the US and around the world.  To show them we care and support them.

Beto O'Rourke Goes On A Road Trip

Beto O'Rourke's blog offers an introspective, somewhat introverted voice as he contemplates what his next steps should be.  An LA Times piece on O'Rourke's maybe yes, maybe no candidacy for president mentioned the blog on a platform I didn't know about (Medium), so I checked it out.

He offers himself as wanting to learn about the people he meets rather than talking about himself.  Last week he was traveling. Before this trip, his last post was in December.  The next post is January 16 and he's in Tucumcari, New Mexico.

The next morning I ran. Just a couple of miles. Down 66, then through neighborhoods, past the History Museum. My leg has really been bothering me since the campaign and so I had stopped running for a while. This was my first run in more than a month. Felt good, running in new shoes. 

Have been stuck lately. In and out of a funk. My last day of work was January 2nd. It’s been more than twenty years since I was last not working. Maybe if I get moving, on the road, meet people, learn about what’s going on where they live, have some adventure, go where I don’t know and I’m not known, it’ll clear my head, reset, I’ll think new thoughts, break out of the loops I’ve been stuck in.

I'm trying to piece together the trip on maps.  From Tucumcari he stays on 54 to Liberal, Texas.   Driving alone it appeared.  It's not clear how many planned stops there were.  His great grandparents had lived in Tucumcari.  In Bucklin, Kansas, where they were married, he went to the library to find their wedding certificate.  He reads about Bucklin history and offers tidbits, like this one in his Jan 17 post:

"From 1923: 'Visit by the Klan at revival services of Methodist Church. 5 members of the Ku Klux Klan, wearing the robes of the order, visited church and contributed $50 but refused the invitation to stay for the services.'”

January 18, 2019, he's in Ulysses, Kansas where he's in a funk.  This is a long quote, but I think it all needs to be there to get the context.

"I drove back to the hotel, passing the First Baptist church where kids were throwing snow and slush at each other in the light of the headlamps of their parent’s car. Made me think of our kids, and I missed them. Added to the low altitude I was experiencing. 

Maybe I’d been hoping for some kind of connection that day and hadn’t found it. All the conversations had been pleasant, everyone was kind, but there hadn’t been anything more than that. The waiters at Alejandro’s were nice but they were finishing their shift, they wanted to eat their dinner after having served everyone else all night and close up.
I called Amy. Kids were in the car, she was a little distracted, we didn’t connect either. Maybe you could meet people at a bar she said as we hung up. 

I pulled into the bar next to the hotel and started to feel self conscious. They aren’t going to want some stranger from out of town at their place. I walked in and took a seat at the bar, said a quick, probably nervous, hello to everyone and ordered a beer. Pro forma acknowledgement from the three or four guys who were already there. 

I focused on the college basketball game, thinking I’ll finish this beer and then get out of here. I told myself at least I tried. 

And then two seats down to my right the guy says do people ever tell you that you look like Beto O’Rourke? 

I said yes, all the time. 

The guy next to him says who the hell is Beto O’Rourke? 

First guy says oh he ran against Ted Cruz in Texas, and goes on to talk about Beto O’Rourke and I’m worried that it’s going to get weird and so I say sorry I meant to say that I am Beto O’Rourke. 

No shit! Laughter."

I'm thinking, "How do you write a blog that's honest, somewhat self-revealing, yet doesn't make you look foolish or disingenuous?"  Of course, I think about those things all the time as a blogger but for me it's about giving context for why I think something.  I'm not running for office, nor do I intend to, so what I'm writing won't be scrutinized by opposition research teams looking for pictures of me in blackface or admissions that could be twisted for political gain by others.

The impression is that he's writing all this himself, like Trump tweets.  (The analogy is only about who does the writing and editing.)  But clearly he's making points about issues - like the story of Klu Klux Klan visit to the church above.

The January 20 post has him arriving at a scheduled visit at Pueblo (Colorado) Community College where he meets with students:

What followed was one of these transcendent moments in public life… something so raw and honest that you want to hold on to it, remember every word… a flow between people. But going through my notes right now, I know that my recounting of the words and themes won’t do it justice. 

Raw. People adding to what the previous speaker had said, or challenging what someone else shared, respectfully but directly. Moved to speak up, to share, to add. At first politely raising hands and asking questions. And then, just speaking, having a conversation and not asking polite questions but sharing experience, suggesting solutions.

He goes on at length about the different people who spoke and what they had to say.  Was he really alone and taking notes on all these people and what they said?  Impressive.

The next post comes four days later (January 24) where he gets to the Taos Pueblo Day School in Taos, New Mexico.  An excerpt: 

"She told me about movie nights back then. Since the village had no electricity (and still doesn’t), movies were shown in the school gym. She said it’s hard to believe this now, but they’d often show Westerns, cowboys and Indians movies. And she said all of us kids, not knowing any better, would be cheering for the cowboys! She made the point that back then, the school suppressed the culture of the Pueblo, confusing children about their identity and roots. How dangerous for their development, their sense of self and their possibilities. And yet, that didn’t stop Mildred. Not only is she now teaching Tiwa at the school, she also opens her home in the summer for language classes and as the point of departure for nature walks with the children of the community. 

It made me think of the evolution of dual language education in El Paso. In the same schools where kids were punished for speaking Spanish in the 1960s, they are now being encouraged to speak Spanish, in fact to learn throughout the day in every subject in both English and Spanish."

Again, he recounts many people and the conversations and how good it felt to be connected to people who want to make everyone's lives better.

"We’re all connected, related, part of one another’s lives through the stories we tell ourselves and each other. For good and for bad. Our long memories hold the stories of what our people accomplished, but they also hold the prejudices, the injustices, the harm that we’ve received from others. Our short term memories can forget the kindness most recently rendered, our vision can become focused on the divisions and lose sight of the way up and out. And there is always someone, usually on cable TV or Twitter, to remind you how small or stupid you’re supposed to feel. Our side is truly American. Yours, not so much."

That's the last post.  I supposed being on the road, staying at hotels by himself each night, gave him plenty of time to write these long posts.  From Taos back to El Paso is an easy day's ride, so maybe he went from their home and life is more hectic so he hasn't written more.

Other politicians I've followed, have been on Twitter and that's a much, much different medium.  I'm going to link to this blog on the side column and see how it progresses.

The Important Stuff

We all have obligations to make sure our community and our nation function fairly and reasonably efficiently and effectively.  But an even more important obligation is to our family.  If everyone worked hard at having a caring and encouraging family life, then our greater public responsibilities would be far less.

The reason we were in Anchorage for such a short time was to be here in time for a birthday.

Book Club Members Check In On Earthquake and Other Updates

We had another aftershock - Alaska Earthquake Center says it was a 2.5.  Actually, we've had quite a few aftershocks, this is in the list on their page right now:

Latest Earthquakes
M2.5   at 01:26 PM, 12 mi NW of Anchorage
M2.0   at 01:25 PM, 12 mi NW of Elmendorf AFB
M1.8   at 01:24 PM, 10 mi N of Anchorage
M1.0   at 01:23 PM, 13 mi NW of Anchorage
M1.7   at 01:20 PM, 13 mi NW of Anchorage

My book club members live all over town.  Here's what people reported about Friday's big quake:

• I just want to send out the hope, belated but sincere, that all of you, your families, and houses made it through the quake ok.  The damage and experiences are so varied.   (I left town for Portland on Saturday, as planned  But I was home on Friday, got under a table for the first time, had a few fragile things fall and break but nothing serious.  Toilet water sloshed on the floor, bookcases emptied, pictures all crooked.  Neighbors three doors down lost the whole brick facing of their fireplace into their living room.)  Let us know how you did?  And aren't you glad we read the earthquake book so we know why this happened?
• Like all of you the damage was minimal. I had just started my car when the quake hit and I was at first annoyed because the car had just been serviced. Of course I quickly realized my error.   Hope that’s the last big on for at least another 60 years 
• Our little house that survived the '64 quake did fine. We had one broken bowl.  P was in her car in Sand Lake area and had a wild ride.  The tail fell out of our loon mask.  [Dog] and I were shaken, but did not stir beyond the back deck.  All in all, we are glad we survived November, and that it's over!
• All OK here and with extended family. Broken stuff.
• Music and musical instruments survived. Lucky for caring neighbors.   As they say, “moderate” damage. 
• All OK here and with extended family. Broken stuff.
• We were in Talkeetna visiting friends. Strong there but no damage. Then started get texts and calls from friends and family all over the country. Drove back into town in the afternoon past Vine and thankfully the detours on Glen were in place by then. Relieved to find house was just fine. However, Took couple days to clean up everything fell off high shelves and out of closets, fridge & pantry. Much Broken glass from stemware, China, crockery, lamps, bulbs, pictures, desktop computer, etc. Humbling experience, and especially as reflect on  the fact that ‘64 quake was 2,000x more powerful! Yikes. Kind of enjoy the little after shocks now..
• Grateful that we rode it out with (almost embarrassingly) minimal damage.  Glad you are all well. 
• I sent in a link to my blog post.  If you missed it, here it is

And since we're doing books, here's a message from the Anchorage libraries today:

Thank you to each and every one of you who have sent notes of support for our library. We've received messages from across the city, the state, the country and around the world. We feel truly loved by our community and we're sending good vibes right back at you. As of Tuesday, December 4th, Loussac, Muldoon, Mountain View and Girdwood have re-opened with normal business hours. Eagle River will remain closed until further notice and staff across the system have been deployed there to assist with clean up. Please see our earthquake info page for details on fines, holds, special programs and other resources; then be sure to follow us on social media for the latest updates. #ShookBooks #AnchorageStrong

City Planning Dept Holds Community Meeting On Waldron Lake Planning

Here's Waldron Lake from a 2012 post when the area was flooding.










At the church across the street from the Waldron Lake Park parking lot (where apparently people don't have legal access to park), the Muni held an initial community input meeting.

I put to pics together and you can tell if you look carefully - even not so carefully

Here's a map of the area - I added street names  The park is the area in yellow.


Here's some background from the MOA (Municipality of Anchorage - AKA Muni) website on this project:

"PROJECT OVERVIEW
Waldon Lake Park is Anchorage’s newest park.  In 2015, the Municipality of Anchorage purchased the property from the Boys & Girls Club of Southcentral Alaska for $3.92M with funds from an Alaska State Legislative Grant.
The 16.95 acre park is zoned PLI and will remain parkland into the future.  To ensure that future development of the park meets the needs of the community, Anchorage Parks and Recreation is developing a master plan."

It's hard to think of it as a new park.  My daughter played soccer there 30 some years ago.  But it's new as an MOA official park.

There were no formal presentations.  People could look at the maps and prior comments and talk with MOA employees in charge of this.

If you click on it, it will focus better

Here are some maps of the land over the years.  1960-70 appears to be when the area developed.

If you missed the meeting and want to be involved, here's the MOA web page for this.

Muldoon Farmers Market - Beautiful Vegies, Interesting Mix of Vendors, New Park

On the grounds of the old Mann-Leiser Greenhouse in Muldoon, there's now a new playground and on Saturday mornings, til it gets too cold, a farmers' market.

The farmer who grew these is originally from Nepal.

These two kabobs, the corn, a half a potato, and a roll - this was all $5 at Bub's Kabobs and BBQ.  The prices are low, Cindy told me, because they want to build up a client base.  This is definitely one of the best deals in town.

Here's Cindy and her daughter Brittany.  Bub's in the back at the grill.

A real mix of ethnicities.  And options.

It's where Debarr dead ends on Muldoon.

And here's Jerriane, one of the people who helped get the park and the market going.  I met her during the garden tour at the end of July and I finally made it to the market.

So, if you don't live on that side of town and haven't seen what's all going on there, Saturday morning (they're open until 2) would be a good time to see how that part of town is changing.

They also had music,  some food trucks, arts and crafts items too.

A Story Recalling Meandering, And the Flaneur

This all started out fairly early Tuesday as I went along with my daughter and granddaughter to watch the little one bounce for a couple of hours.

But to be an observer I had to fill out an online waiver.  I understand.  Trampolining can be dangerous.  Someone I know broke his neck at a place like this (maybe even this one.)  He was lucky and after painful, scary months and months we was pretty much back to normal.  But there's a lot of liability with a place like this.

But I was only there to observe.  And the online form there asks for dribbles of information.  A paper form you can see what they're asking for all at once and decide if you want to share it all.  So I asked - how much more are they going to ask?
She didn't really hear me and said, "everyone has to fill one out."
Me;  "But I'm only observing."
She:  "Observers can be injured too."  [Isn't this the time people should leave?]
She:  "They don't use the information."
Me:  "Then why are they collecting it?  [I was being snarky.  I understood what she meant - that it's only in case of an accident.]  But even if they don't, someone can hack the computers."

Out of principle - that way too much information is collected about all of us - I decided I would not stay.  Besides I really didn't want to see my granddaughter risking her neck.

So I decided instead to walk around this South Anchorage neighborhood - between Old and New Seward Highways -

I'd only driven by on occasion, but had never really looked at carefully.  It's a funky sort of place with all sorts of housing and yards.

[I'd note the meandering reference in the title beckons back to a long ago post about meandering that comes from Charles Dickens opening to David Copperfield.  It's also a good description of how I often write.  The Flaneur references a post I did about a book by that title that I read while we were in Paris and is about just wandering with no goal through neighborhoods.]

This sign below the mailboxes - click to enlarge so you can read it - was the first that suggested people weren't cleaning up after their dogs.  "Attention Humans:  Please Pick Up After Your Dogs, Thank you."  Then it addresses the dogs.

There were big houses with big yards and gardens.  This one was next to a lot with a  double wide trailer.















Here's another inviting tree filled green yard that reminded me more of the mid-west than Anchorage.









Near another lot that reminded me of old Spenard.

And there were lots of trees and green.

But there also were dozens of zero lot line condos (presumably) scattered in the neighborhood.  Some had more green space around them than others.












If you look closely, Spyglass Hill is a private street, so I didn't go there.  As I wandered around I only saw one other pedestrian.  A woman with a walker and a tiny dog that took his job as her protector seriously.  She was laboring up the steepest hill in the neighborhood.

But I did wonder whether people might not be alerting NextDoor  (I think you may have to sign in to get to the link.) or the police if I had been black or worse dressed than I was.    Especially since I was taking pictures of people's property.

After wandering streets and alleys a while, I got to a bike path that started green and shady, but after about a quarter mile I ended in an industrial area.

It came out near a school district complex.













Past the student nutrition area was a nursery I had never seen before.

I wandered around outside, excited by this find.  (It turned out everything was outside.) But when I saw this item, I realized why all the rocks in my garden were picked up along highway construction sites.  A cubic yard of 'angular boulders"  was $195.  Gravel was only $95.  A cubic yard of gravel is a lot of gravel, but I suspect a cubic yard of the boulders has lots of empty spaces.



There were also also lots of different kinds of trees at serious prices as well.  I quickly deduced this was more for professional landscapers, but homeowners can buy here as well.


Lots of ways to spend your money on things I didn't know I needed.

This natural stone table (and stools) was only  $2786.

Rows of critters of all sorts.

I can see possible uses for these planters.

This dragon was certainly the most interesting item. I didn't check the price tag.



It's interesting to know this is in town in case I ever need something like this.







But then I made my way back out and got to a small strip mall.  I don't know what they do at this place, but it doesn't sound like a place I would ever want to need.

Then as I got back to Old Seward Highway. . .

First I saw the cross. Then I saw the sign.


I checked on line to find out who Justin was.






From his ADN obituary:

Justin Grey Ashley was killed in a tragic motorcycle accident Monday evening, July 8,

2013.
Justin was born on July 9, 1992 in Fremont, California to Brian and Charise Ashley. He grew up playing soccer and baseball and loved to ride his bike with his two childhood friends, Josh and Alex. He was a Cub Scout and bridged over to become a Boy Scout.
Justin moved to Alaska with his family when he was 12. He quickly made friends. . .

So yesterday was just a few days past the fifth anniversary of his death.   My sympathies to his family.  My brother was two years older when he died, so I have a sense of their terrible loss.

As I passed Judy's Cafe it reminded me of the place where they charged me an extra $.50 to NOT have cheese in my omelette.  I checked with K who was with me at the time and he said it was not Judy's.














I was getting close to full circle back to pick up the jumpers, when this car with a Begich sign pulled up onto the sidewalk in front of me.  He got out and struggled to get some sandbags that
were at the curb into the car.  I did mention to him that it didn't reflect well on his candidate to be driving on the sidewalk, though parking in the street wasn't a good idea either and he clearly couldn't move the sandbags very far.


At a dog kennel nearby, a woman pulled up and parked right in front of a No Parking sign and went in.





Almost back and I passed what looked like a single family home, but it had four mailboxes in front of it.


I got back just in time to get into the car and open the newspaper before my bouncing family members came out.  I'd had my adventure too.

I thought of the year we lived in Hong Kong when we decided that we could take urban hikes - and just walk three or more miles as we would in a more wild setting.  And there we could catch public transportation home from wherever we ended up.

Airport Noise Impacts - DNL = "Driving me Nuts Lately"

I wrote Wednesday that the Anchorage International Airport has a temporary new flight plan sending noisy jets over our house throughout the day and night.  In the past we've had three or four week periods like this as they repaired the north-south runway.  But there was always a quiet period during the night.

This year's repairs are scheduled for all summer and next summer and there's no night quiet period either.  (The posting said the heaviest planes would have to use the east-west runway 24/7)

So I looked at their map.

The dotted red lines shows the area labeled:   During Construction 65 DNL Noise Contour  
I added the blue dashes to show how far significant  (at least) noise goes beyond those red dots. I'd also note there are two major hospitals just east of where I ended the blue dots that definitely are affected.

They don't explain DNL, but I have google working for me.  Below is a definition of DNL from MACNoise:

"What is DNL in Terms of Aircraft Noise?
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) established DNL as the primary metric for aircraft noise analysis and expressing aircraft noise exposure in the United States. "DNL" is the acronym for Day-Night Average Sound Level, which represents the total accumulation of all sound energy, but spread out uniformly over a 24-hour period.
DNL has been widely accepted as the best available method to describe aircraft noise exposure and is the noise descriptor required by the FAA for use in aircraft noise exposure analyses and noise compatibility planning. It also has been identified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as the principal metric for airport noise analyses.
The calculation for DNL considers the time of day an aircraft operated and applies a 10-decibel penalty on aircraft arriving or departing between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m.; the output is a numeric value in decibels that represents a 24-hour average noise exposure value. The current federally-established threshold of significance is 65 dB DNL.
While DNL also may be used for non-aviation purposes, the FAA's use of DNL is specific to aircraft noise. The Metropolitan Airports Commission publishes Aircraft Day-Night Level values as "ADNL" to avoid confusion with other uses of "DNL." 

The threshold is 65 dB (decibels) DNL.  That doesn't mean the sound level stays below 65 dB.  It means the average over a 24 hour period is 65 dB.

So if on average you have ten minutes per hour of jets flying over your house, it would appear that decibel level is averaged with the 50 minutes of quiet.   So, from what that definition says, you could have ten minutes of 120 dB per hour and probably still get a 65 dB DNL.  (I'm not sure, I don't know exactly how they calculate. How does the fact that the decibel scale goes up logarithmically affect an 'average'?)

Decibels

How loud is 65 dB DNL?   Here's a google docs chart that shows you lots of examples.  It puts washing machine, dishwasher, and refrigerator at 65 dB and electric shaver at 65.  If linking to the google chart is too much of an effort, I've added a chart from SCRIBD that has some extra pages of info.  You can scroll through it and enlarge it.  (Note:  the examples in the Google and SCRIBD charts don't always match exactly, and the SCRIBD charts has different examples on different pages)

Decibel Level Comparison Chart by Dang-dang Siggaoat-Copiaco on Scribd

As you look at the chart, the numbers aren't going to seem right.   For instance, here are a few examples:

breathing   = 10 decibals
light traffic = 50 decibels
inside subway car = 90 decibels

Is light traffic really only 5 times louder than breathing?  A subway car only 9 times louder?  The answer is no.  And here's why from Science How Stuff Works:

"On the decibel scale, the smallest audible sound (near total silence) is 0 dB. A sound 10 times more powerful is 10 dB. A sound 100 times more powerful than near total silence is 20 dB. A sound 1,000 times more powerful than near total silence is 30 dB. Here are some common sounds and their decibel ratings:"

Here's where the logarithmic scale is important.  Each step of 10 decibels is 10 TIMES louder than the previous step.  So, if light traffic is 40 decibels more than breathing, then that's  10  x 10 x 10 x 10 = 10,000 times louder!

The SCRIBD chart tells us that hearing loss can start at 90 decibels - a subway.  Permanent damage occurs at 140 decibels - a jet engine at 100 feet or a gun shot.


Noise and Health

There's lots of research showing the damaging effects of noise on health - though be careful with what you find online.  I found one article which made pretty broad claims, but the sources cited were extremely limited studies on fairly small populations.  While the claims were probably accurate, the sources listed couldn't be generalized to such broad claims.  So I didn't use it here.

But here's an article* about noise impacts at an airport in Turkey using European standards.  It has this chart which neatly outlines some of the key problems with airport noise.  The metrics are European standards

Effect	Observation threshold
	Metric	Value dB(A)
Hypertension	Lden	70
Ischemic heart disease	Lden	70
Performance	Ln	70
Sleep pattern	Ln	60
Subjective sleep quality	Ln	40
Mood next day	Ln	60

Below are the first seven of ten Key Findings from the European Environment Agency report Noise In Europe 2014.

The key messages from this report are:
1. noise pollution is a major environmental health problem in Europe;
2. road traffic is the most dominant source of environmental noise with an estimated 125 million people affected by noise levels greater than 55 decibels (dB) Lden (day-evening-night level);
3. environmental noise causes at least 10 000 cases of premature death in Europe each year;
4. almost 20 million adults are annoyed and a further 8 million suffer sleep disturbance due to environmental noise;5. over 900 000 cases of hypertension are caused by environmental noise each year;
6. noise pollution causes 43 000 hospital admissions in Europe per year;
7. effects of noise upon the wider soundscape, including wildlife and quiet areas, need further assessment;

I'm not sure whether Lden is the same calculation as DNL, but Europe's threshold seems to be 55 dB while ours (US) is 65.

Is this post going to end?

Basically, I've been taking notes here so I have some basis for raising questions about the decision to impose this level of noise on a big chunk of Anchorage for four months.  Two days into this and I'm already on edge.  Jets flying over all night - even with heavy duty ear plugs in - is affecting my sleep and there are all the other stress issues the studies show.  The DNL numbers are one way to measure this, but are they the best way?  The average sound is important for long term steady health impacts.  But in terms of health, I would guess that measuring  the loudest sounds and how often people subjected to them is equally or more important.  It's hard to sleep through occasional 120 dB periods (rock concert is listed as 115 dB)  all night.

I understand the airport makes a lot of money from cargo flights through the airport and disrupting that may encourage cargo companies to fly through Fairbanks instead of Anchorage.  Maybe the heaviest cargo planes that can't use the shorter north-south runway should go through Fairbanks at night.   Maybe they should give a discount to flights that are delayed during a night time east-west runway ban.  I don't know the answer.  But it doesn't look like health and inconvenience played nearly as big a role in their calculations as keeping the money rolling into the airport.  That's not a small matter, or course, but for a big swath of Anchorage to have its summer disrupted by continuous jet noise is no small matter either.  The Municipality's dog noise page tells us that:

"Few things in life are as annoying as having to listen to the constant bark, howl, whine or cry of another person's dog."

Well, constant loud airplane noises can be just as annoying.

 This is my starting point.  Let's see what I find out.

And I would add that it's Friday now.  Thursday night seemed to have fewer flights and with my earplugs I made it through the night ok.

[I've added some pictures of planes from our deck here.]

* I got this through the UAA consortium library, so I'm not sure if you need a library id to get this article.  Here is the citation.  An Anchorage library card would probably work through Loussac. Here's the citation:
Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment Volume 36, May 2015, Pages 152-159 Estimation of airport noise impacts on public health. A case study of İzmir Adnan Menderes Airport

Graham v MOA #12: Fire Chief LeBlanc Retires

First paragraphs from an ADN article:

"Anchorage Fire Chief Denis LeBlanc retired Friday after nearly three years on the job, officials said.
A successor to LeBlanc will be named in a few weeks, said Kristin DeSmith, spokeswoman for Mayor Ethan Berkowitz. Jodie Hettrick, the fire department's deputy chief of operations, is serving as interim chief.
LeBlanc, who is 70, said he told the administration of his decision in early May. He said he has loved the job, but he's been working on and off for 53 years, including a few decades in the oil industry. . ."

I'm including this hear because LeBlanc was fire chief while the Graham suit went to court.  He was never a fire-fighter (usually required for the chief's job).  He came from the oil industry, was City Manager for Begich, then went to CM2HHill (the company that bought VECO).

He was asked to get the AFD budget under control.  In his deposition he expressed no interest in reaching out to the community to increase the number of women or minorities in the AFD.  My hope is that the Diversity Mayor will be able to find a new chief for whom increasing the number of women (about 2% now) and people of color (about 12% now) in the fire department will be a major priority.

I'd note that LeBlanc was on the public administration advisory board when I was chair of the department at UAA and he is a very affable person who was always supportive of the program.

Arctic Entries - Then And Now - Alaska Story Tellers Share Their Stories

Back in November 2010 we went to see and hear something called Arctic Entries - seven story tellers each with seven minutes to tell their stories.  It was a Cyrano's (the original theater on D St) that held about 90 people.

Here's what it looked like back then at Cyrano's:

Image from the 2010 post on Arctic Entries

Like most things at the old Cyrano's stage, it was intimate.  The guy on stage in the picture is Max [Matt] Rafferty who was one of the hosts this week.  He was stepping down from that role, saying the speakers get seven minutes and he's had seven years.  So he thinks it's time. [UPDATE May 14, 2018:  Barbara Brown has become my new editor, letting me know when typos slip in here.  Thank you Barbara!  I do appreciate it.  Memory is a weird thing.  All I can think of is that Max Rafferty was a politician in California long ago and my fingers without my knowing replaced Matt with Max.  Not even a politician I liked.]


We'd heard it had grown a lot - so much so that tickets at the Discovery theater sold out in minutes.  That seemed like too much work.  But I heard the last one of the season would be held in the Atwood Concert Hall (holds around 1900) so I checked on tickets when I had to go downtown anyway.  I got two tickets, in the upper balcony was all that were left.

Arctic Entries has seven story tellers tell seven minute stories each evening.  They have to be their own stories of their own experiences.  Those are the basic rules.  These are generally everyday folks, not professional story tellers.

The image is from before the story telling began.  The place got packed.  They said it held 1900 people.

They also had a band - Blackwater Railroad from Seward.

But the stories were compelling, even from so far away.  It just wasn't possible to find and talk to individual story tellers afterward.

The theme was "Timelapse" and each story teller represented a different decade.  It began with 2000s and went back to the 1970's.  Then after intermission, it went in the other direction - 1940's to 1960's.

The group was diverse!  Adil Raja is a Pakistani immigrant who talked about winding up in Anchorage and falling in love with Alaska.

Mao Tosi, born in American Samoa, moved to Anchorage as a child, got into sports in high school and spent a couple of years in the NFL until he got injured.  Then he came back to Anchorage and became a community organizer.  He told about how his parents left him, when he was in junior high, to live with his 19 year old brother.  It was through sports and people at school and in the community that he kept away from drugs and graduated from high school.  His message was that the love of strangers that 'saved' him is important and we should all share our love.

Penny Scales Fairbanks is a Fairbanks hairdresser and she was recruited by one of the Arctic Entries organizer after hearing the story when she got her hair done.  She talked about how her brother told her he was gay in the 1980s, living in California.  And then that he was HIV+ and wanted help in telling their parents, and how her father's attitude changed while they were in California being with her brother while he was dying.

Donna Walker, Alaska's current first lady, talked about coming to Alaska in 1976 right after graduating from college to become a recreation director at an Alaska pipeline construction camp in Glennallen.  From there she took a similar job in Valdez where she met Bill Walker.  She said before getting married, she told him she wanted four kids and he said he did too.  Later he admitted that however many kids she said she wanted he would have given the same answer.

Then there was intermission and we moved forward from the 1940's.

Margaret Anderson, born in 1933, talked about growing up in Seward in the 30's and 40's.  On the one hand she said it was a great life for kids back then, but on the other hand, she said she couldn't wait to get on the ship out after high school.  But she came back to Seward and packed her seven minutes with lots of stories.

Carmel Walder talked about spending time with her grandmother in SE Alaska while her parents were having trouble and there she learned about order and calm and harvesting herring eggs and fishing.  She went back to her parents and more chaos, but staying at grandmother's had shown her there was another way to live and she graduated from high school and made a life which now includes her own grandchildren.

And finally, we had Paul Ongtooguk who grew up in Nome and was put into a program in the 1960s where Alaska Native kids were sent to white Christian families to live.  He was sent to Oklahoma.  As disturbed as that program was, he did see another life and got through college and has worked at the University of Alaska Anchorage for many years.


At the end of the program, the hosts unfurled a huge check - no one gets paid for working at Arctic Entries and all the proceeds go to Alaska organizations.  The fall non-profit partner was Hospice and the spring 2018 partner is the Refugee Assistance and Immigration Service (RAIS).  I looked on their website to try to find more on the checks, but couldn't.  I think there was a check for close to $20,000!

Arctic Entries website is here.  And at another page you can find links to most of their old story tellers.  (A few in the first year are missing, presumably they weren't recorded.)

"Nextdoor: An alternative reality where black Audis terrorize and everyone is a meth-addled menace"

Someone convinced me I should join Nextdoor - an online community where you can get to know people in your neighborhood and keep up with very local news - and it sounded like a good idea, so I did.  That was about a year ago.

More recently I've been noticing that a lot of people are posting about crime and suspicious people and situations.  I was beginning to think that there were a lot of fearful people on Nextdoor.  Sure, if someone breaks into you car or house, it's reasonable to be upset.  But if most of the posts on something like Nextdoor are about crime, it also magnifies people's perception of the dangers of their neighborhood.  (The same can be said for newspapers and tv news.)

Here are some recent posts from the Nextdoor pages from my neighborhood in Anchorage:

• Unsupervised Kids in Subsidized Housing Neighborhood [she's seen them carry hatchets and guns and take drugs]
• 2003 Black Tahoe stolen in midtown 1/30
• Car rifled. Stolen change, coffee cards, glasses and keys. They keys are for out o state property so not usable for them but a pain for us
• Abandoned Vehicle
• Mail thieves

These were interspersed with lost (and found) cats and dogs, items for sale, but I'd say at least 50% were crime or safety related.    

I guess it came to a head for me when someone posted a warning  earlier this month to be careful during the political seasons for misleading posts:

"Be aware of political actors for 2018, even now
Hey all, you may or may not have seen my activity in a thread regarding the mail voting situation. Just know, the Koch brothers have spent a TON of money in this area(I'm not joking or exaggerating), especially regarding unions, and don't take every resident at their word, because they may not be residents. You can talk to me in person, I'm not a member of anyone except my dance group."

That led M to write:

This is not a political site please do not post political posts .

Followed with:

Thank you M.  I'm thinking of quitting this site as I don't appreciate the nasty attitudes of some of these people.  When I signed up for this site I thought it was for neighbors to let neighbors know about thefts, car break-ins, etc., not an agenda to spout your political views no matter which side.  Surely there are other sites where you can go to vent.

Did that "Be aware of political actors" post sound nasty to you?  I guess "nasty attitudes" means things I disagree with because "Thank you M" was the nastiest attitude I saw.  Then others pointed out the guidelines allow for civil discussions of political issues that impact the local area.  But it appears that some people think this is just for reporting crimes and it seems there are people who see nothing but suspicious people and vehicles.

I'm not sure if people who aren't members can go to the link, but here are the guidelines for Don't Use Nextdoor as a Soapbox.


And so yesterday, when I saw this LA Times opinion piece, I felt a kindred spirit had written it.

Nextdoor: An alternative reality where black Audis terrorize and everyone is a meth-addled menace

He says all I've said, but he's much funnier.  Here's a brief sample:

"In the alternative reality that is Nextdoor, people are committing crimes I’ve never even thought of: casing, lurking, knocking on doors at 11:45 p.m., coating mailbox flaps with glue, “asking people for jumper cables but not actually having a car,” light bulb stealing, taking photos of homes, being an “unstable female” and “stashing a car in my private garage.”
From the very first time I logged on, my mission was clear: Do not let my lovely wife Cassandra find out about Nextdoor. Not because I didn’t want to worry her pretty little head, but because I didn’t want her bothering my pretty little head in panic about every black Audi driving down our block."

What Is The Difference Between Kosher for Passover and Regular Kosher Matzah? -The Human Capacity To Disagree

Over the years philosophers, psychologists, and other observers of the human condition have identified what they thought made humans distinct from other species.  A BBC exploration of that question begins with with Aristotle:

 We are "rational animals" pursuing knowledge for its own sake. We live by art and reasoning, he wrote. 

I'm not going to claim that disagreement makes us unique, but it sure seems be be common.  I probably don't have to give you any examples.  You probably can come up with some that occurred in the last hour.

But since tonight begins Passover, here's an example that makes my point.  Not just that people disagree over things that clearly have consequences (who to vote for, what to eat for dinner), but also things that seem to be disagreement for disagreement's sake.

Since our daughter and granddaughter are visiting next week, and since it's Passover, we can't make a bread together.  So I thought we could make matzah instead.  Matzah boxes are marked
"Kosher - not for Passover"  and "Kosher for Passover."

So I wanted to know what the difference was.  It's mostly about how carefully the wheat is treated from the time it is ground to flour.

On keeping Passover Matzah kosher:

"Most authorities maintain that it is sufficient to guard the wheat from the time it is ground, in order to use it to fulfill the mitzvah of eating matzah. Some authorities dispute this, however, and maintain that the wheat must be guarded from the time that it is harvested." 

In my role as a mediator at times, I came to learn that such disagreements - that seem to be about differences that don't really make a difference - are based on unspoken assumptions or issues that are the real problem.  It's not the purity of the grain, so to speak, but some other value it represents.

Perhaps it's just about who is right or who has the power to make the decision.  Or it could be that the stricter interpretation reflects a generally greater concern for detail by that position's advocate.

I would argue that the Jews in Egypt who first baked the unleavened bread before their exodus from Egypt, did so because they didn't have time to wait for bread to rise a few times before they had to leave.  And I'm sure they didn't use special flour that had been carefully guarded.

The use of the matzah today is symbolic.  It's to remind Jews of the suffering of their ancestors and to remind them that they too were strangers in a strange land and had to flee.  And thus Jews should remember to help others today who have to flee their homelands.  So whether we use extra special wheat to make matzah probably really makes no difference.  No one eating matzah can tell the difference.  It's the symbol that matters.  And if Jews eat made from the most vigorously guarded wheat, but forget how to apply the lessons of the story to those suffering a similar fate today, they've gotten so tied up in the rules, they've missed the whole point.


For those who are unfamiliar with the Kosher labels of food packaging, here's a website that looks at the Kosher labels and the labeling authorities.

DOT Hearing on Seward Highway & 36th, The Sun, And The Drawer Boy All In Anchorage Today

The State Department of Transportation, etc.  (DOT) is having a public hearing to talk to the community about congestion in midtown, particularly related to the Seward Highway.  You can find out more at a website with the url of www.midtowncongestionrelief.com.

More specific information about today's meeting is here.  Basically it says:

3-7pm
(presentations at 3:30pm and 6:00pm)
Loussac Library

Draft Goals:

• Connect commerce and community 
• Improve multi-modal transportation efficiency
• Improve safety to all users
• Align with city and state planning documents
• Realistic implementation play

You can see there real specific here and focused on using language that everyone can understand. (Sarcasm alert)

The return address is DOWL the engineering company that seems to get all the contracts for public participation for DOT.  The do an excellent job of making maps and charts and offering options, and being friendly.  But my experience - especially with the Bragaw extension through UAA greenbelt - was that it's basically show and tell and very little listen.  

But, there was an earlier plan for 36th and New Seward.  I never got to any of the hearings - timing was wrong for me - but I was appalled at the plans which included an offramp in the middle of the highway.  I know that happens places sometimes like LA, but in Anchorage with all the offramp to the right, it seemed user-unfriendly to have one that was different from all the rest.  The even bought the land where Nico's was on 36th just west of the highway.   But it seems that the plan has been scrapped and they are rethinking now the corridor from Tudor all the way to 20th.  

The Sun

The Sun is out yet once again.  I'm talking about the big fiery ball in the sky which has been in town pretty much every day since we got back last week.  It's beautiful.  And odds are good that tomorrow's early morning lunar eclipse will be visible.  

The Drawer Boy

Finally, The Drawer Boy is playing tonight.  The Drawer Boy was, in my mind and in the minds of the Anchorage International Film Festival judges (we don't always agree), the Best Feature film at last December's festival.  

Here's what the Festival is sending out about tonight's showing:

Anchorage International Film Festival is with The Drawer Boy at 49th State Brewing Co 
Anchorage, AK ·
Tuesday January 30th - Back by popular demand 2017 AIFF First Place Winner for Narrative Features - The Drawer Boy will be screening at 49th State Brewery! This is a free screening. Doors open at 6pm and the show starts at 6:30. Come in and grab a beer and dinner and sit back and enjoy the show. AIFF will have a drawing for an official AIFF17 Tshirt and throw your business card in the bowl for a chance to win an all access pass after our winter series at 49th State. We will do the drawing for the all access pass to our 2018 festival in April.

Like many others, I thought it was about a boy found in a drawer.  But it's actually about someone who draws.  Here's a link to the post I wrote after I saw it.  I tend to be low key and to understate things, so my enthusiasm for the film is telling.  There's also video of the director talking about the film after the showing.