Author: Emma

Fact: It doesn’t have to be fun to be fun.

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Whenever I find myself in a sticky or otherwise unpleasant situation, I draw upon the wisdom of Mark Twight, a prolific alpinist and writer who initially rose to fame after his first ascent of “The Reality Bath,” a since-unrepeated ice climb in the Canadian Rockies described by one guidebook author as “so dangerous as to be of little value except to those suicidally inclined.” So, this guy is not fucking around. There are lots of little Twightisms, and when the going gets rough, I use them to remind myself that nothing worth doing comes without a little (or, as the case may be, a lot of) suffering.

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The Tao of Dar

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Sometimes Kevin jokes that I must secretly be a much older woman. That’s kind of fair, because I drink a lot of tea and I’m usually in bed by ten o’clock, if I can help it. It’s also true because I like a lot of the same music as my mom, and by a lot I mean almost all the same music. She introduced me, at the tender age of twelve or so, to a folk singer named Dar Williams, and I have since then done my best to live by the Tao of Dar.

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2012 PFDs to be spent on Ark-building materials; firearms

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As I think has been well established, Alaska is a place of extremes; it is by no means fucking around. This philosophy applies to its weather conditions as well as its residents, and this week was no exception: heavy rainfall in the Mat-Su Valley led to some pretty NFA flooding  of the Knik and Matanuska Rivers, and the Alaskans whose homes are affected are dealing with the phenomenon in the only way that is truly Alaskan: with large vehicles and frequent updates on the weather.

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Wasilla; or, Life in the Woods

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Brown pebbles sponsored by Blue Buffalo. Oh, the beer? Don’t worry, it’s New Belgium. Only the best for this guy.

It probably won’t surprise you to learn that here in Wasilla, hometown of Teen Abstinence Ambassador Bristol Palin (wish I were joking), there aren’t a lot of people like us. We’re from Boulder, where people hang Tibetan prayer flags in their yards and feed their pets holistic dog food. It might be a little pretentious, but it’s home, and while I won’t publicly admit that we’re guilty of either of those things, I will tell you that Blue Buffalo holistic dog food isn’t sold at our local Pet Zoo.

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Pioneer Peak: bona fide NFA

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Over the last few weeks, we’ve been looking for a way to accurately describe just how Alaska it is up here. It’s pretty simple: Alaska is not fucking around. I could use a gentler synonym, but that’s exactly the thing: milder language wouldn’t fully convey the amount of fucking around that isn’t happening.

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