Ice Thanksgiving

Last week I was out in Circle, arriving home by plane.  Good thing too because the Steese Hwy was closed at 12 Mile and Eagle Summits where it remains closed 9 days later.  The blowing snow and ice from warming temps have made it treacherous.

On Thursday night, Paul and I went to see "Home" at the Blue Loon.  The film was spectacular, but the theme was a real downer.  It was about the human impact and effects of climate change.  It showed massive deforestation, dying coral reefs, feedlots, overfishing, slums on the outskirts of Asian and African cities, the excesses of Dubai and Los Angeles and the scary fast erosional melting of the Greenland icefields.  As a result, my conscience was really working overtime and we BOTH vowed to try to go vegetarian after our freezer is empty.  There is mostly fish in there that we caught anyway, so I think it will be virtually empty in a month.

I've been imprisoned in an ice castle for 5 days.  The rain on the cold ground made ice skating conditions and schools were closed for 3 days (sorta) followed by Thanksgiving.  I did some cleaning, reading, cooking, thinking, arguing, phone calling but now I'm pretty irritable.  Tomorrow I'm going out walking.  For sure.

I need to rethink Thanksgiving.  I spent the day cooking and 3 great friends came over to share with us.  But really, holidays should have a deeper meaning.  Our kids haven't been here for Thanksgiving for many years, so it hasn't been a family reunion.  I personally don't think being thankful for my wonderful life is a one day event.  I'm not sure what else should happen that day, but I have a whole year to think about it. 

Our Annual Family Film Festival is gearing up again.  We each nominated a movie with a title that had a real geographical location.  We will watch them all, then vote on our favorite.  This year we will have a trophy for the chooser of the winning film.  Look on the right to vote for your favorites- 3 more choices still to come in.

We bought a Prius two days ago.  It gets 51 mpg in town and so far all I've driven is the short test drive.  The roads are still icy and even if I'm a good driver, there's always some hotshot out there burning rubber.  It's "arrest me" red and really sleek looking.  I think I'm going to like it once I get over my fear of change.

Enjoy our after dinner entertainment from Thanksgiving.  Shoutout to those guest elves, Don, Nathan and Larry:  http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/Sw0ZAGtT2F2MN2vD