Stories, 34 degrees Tuesday morning

Yukon River still frozen: You have to go through 8 inches of water on the edge to get to the main ice though. Snowmobiles are still using the Yukon. the roads are mud and water so not good for snow machines now.

I was talking to some of my students and they told me about the tundra which is just beyond Emmonak. They are afraid to spend much time there because of bear, wolves, wolverines and foxes. Kids said they need guns to spend extended periods of time in the tundra. When I was a boy, mom would growl like a bear to get us in when it was late. That scared the crap out of me and I lived in the outskirts of Tacoma, WA. They have reason to be scared here.

I was talking to a Yupik gal who is almost a certified teacher. She was telling me about college in Fairbanks. They got a lot of snow in Fairbanks and they piled it up around the parking lots. The students made igloos out of the piles of snow. The Eskimo girls set up a couple of Igloos that they could see from their dorms. People would see the Igloos and walk in to check them out. She and her friends would yell at the people to get out of their houses. The people really felt that they had walked into someones house and left fast. It was really quite funny the way she told it.

By the way, my kids and I have made 2 igloos over the years. They can be warmed with a small fire and they are super quiet. If you want total quiet, make an igloo. It is too warm here for an igloo now, it would melt fast.