I’ve Moved the Blog

Sorry to be a nuisance, but I've moved the bl;og to my own server, as this WordPress one slows down too much in the morning when traffic gets heavy, making both posting and reading frustrating. The new URL is http://www.explorenorth.com/wordpress/

Winter Flashback

The garage sale on Saturday was a success. We have lots more room in the house and garage, and had a few hundred bucks in my pocket. "Had" because we spent it all on Sunday (and a lot more), on a new bike for Cathy, a bike rack for the Outback, and helmets because of the Whitehorse bike bylaw (some people just can't mind their own business ). I replaced both tires and tubes on my bike that hadn't been ridden in about 5 years, but about 50 feet into the first ride, my derailer snapped. So today I have to decide how to deal with that – repair my old bike or buy a new one. Repairs will be costly and will take quite a while because the bike shop is buried in work. If the derailer snapped because of neglect-corrosion (likely), what else is wrong – would I just be putting good money into a bad project?

Yesterday, we loaded Monty and Kayla into the car and headed down to the White Pass on a bear-hunting expedition. We saw fresh bear scat on the highway along Tutshi Lake, so the bears are out of bed, but there was a lot of traffic (by South Klondike Highway standards) so we saw nothing furry. On Dail Peak there is still too much Indian snow to pick out the Dall sheep and mountain goats (Indian snow – a patchy here and a patchy there ).

Carcross is still the demarkation line between Spring and Winter – south of the village it got pretty ugly, with lots of snow squalls, and the temperature fell from 4°C to 1° (from 40 to 34° F). The picture to the right was shot at the Bove Island viewpoint on the way north (click to enlarge it). Yes, the lake is still totally frozen.

We went as far south as the new Yukon Suspension Bridge project, to see how it's coming along. They have a long way to go before the doors can open (there are no doors yet – or walls). We had a good look at the layout from the road. If the rumours are true about admission being around $20, they'll have a very hard time attracting anyone driving by – the market will be cruise ship passengers who don't know what they're getting, and where the price is buried in a package price. I noticed in the Yukon News that they've changed their "help wanted" ads to include mileage as well as wages. With accommodations virtually unavailable within 90 miles, that may not help much; finding help at any price may be their biggest problem of all.

Tourism Scams

For visitors, know who you're booking with. For lodging owners, be aware of how the booking transaction is being handled – if it looks odd in any way, proceed only with caution. A Yukon B&B owner was targetted by this scam in recent days: http://www.pillowsandpancakes.com/scam-warning.htm

Spring – or just Getting Ready for Summer?

We have funny seasons in the southern Yukon. Spring and Fall are so brief and indistinct that it's easy to just say that we have 2 seasons, Summer and Winter. It's late Winter now, but it feels like Summer will be here shortly. Scattered pussy-willows can be seen along the roads, but the crocuses (possibly the most eagerly-awaited of our wildflowers) are still hiding from the below-freezing nights. Trumpeter and Tundra swans are already leaving Marsh Lake, Lake Bennett, Fox Lake and the other few stretches of open water in the Whitehorse area, headed for their nesting areas in the interior and far north of the Yukon, NWT and Alaska.

Not only the swans are on the move. One of the reasons I love this time of year is that many of our neighbours can be seen along the roads. Last week, I got very close to caribou, mule deer and a wolf along the South Klondike Highway between Whitehorse and Carcross (click to enlarge the caribou photo taken last week). Any day now, black and grizzly bears will be out alongside the roads, eating the first green vegetation to get their digestive systems back in order after a long winter. A sow grizzly and her cub(s) of the year used to spend 2-3 weeks at a mineral spring a couple of hundred yards from my bedroom window, but a project to clear a firebreak ended that, as it removed her cover. I truly miss them this time of year – they were always good neighbours to me, though one of the cubs from previous years became a danger in the village (charging people at the daycare) and had to be shot last summer.

Tourism is an important part of the economy of both the Yukon and Alaska, and the pace of preparations for the summer is rapidly picking up day by day. In Skagway in particular, the sounds of saws and hammers echo through the still-dusty streets as new buildings go up to house those with ideas on how to separate some cruise ship passengers from their pokes of gold (that sounds like the days of Soapy Smith – this is completely legal separation, though!). As in every previous summer, one of the toughest aspects of running a business is finding enough help. Countless ads are running across North America to get young people up here, but there's always a shortage. If you ever want a working holiday, there are a lot of business people here who would like to make you an offer. Check out the job boards at http://www.explorenorth.com/jobs-ak.html and http://employmentyukon.ca/

Another unmistakable sign of Spring is the start of Garage Sales. Cathy and I are having one at our Whitehorse house tomorrow, and I have a lot of work still to do to get ready, so I had better quit typing and start sorting!

Gas Boycotts

You've probably all received at least one of these in recent weeks – another brilliant idea about how to force the oil companies to their knees so they lower gas prices. Here's the most recent to land in my Inbox:

GAS WAR – an idea that WILL work This was originally sent by a retired Coca Cola executive. It came from one of his engineer buddies who retired from Halliburton. It' s worth your consideration.Join the resistance!!!! I hear we are going to hit close to $1.15 a litre by next summer and it might go higher!! Want gasoline prices to come down? We need to take some intelligent, united action. Phillip Hollsworth offered this good idea.

This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the "don't buy gas on a certain day" campaign that was going around last April or May! The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn't continue to "hurt" ourselves by refusing to buy gas. It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for them. BUT, whoever thought of this idea, has come up with a plan that can really work. Please read on and join with us! By now you're probably thinking gasoline priced at about $0.85 is super cheap. Me too! It is currently $1.05 for regular unleaded in my town. Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a litre of gas is CHEAP at $1.05 to 1.15, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the marketplace….. not sellers. With the price of gasoline going up more each day, we consumers need to take action. The only way we are going to see the price of gas come down is if we hit someone in the pocketbook by not purchasing their gas! And, we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves. How? Since we all rely on our cars, we can't just stop buying gas. But we CAN have an impact on gas prices if we all act together to force a price war.Here's the idea:
For the rest of this year, DON'T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one), Esso and Shell. If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit. But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of Esso and Shell gas buyers. It's really simple to do! Now, don't wimp out at this point…. keep reading and I'll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people.

I am sending this note to 30 people. If each of us sends it to at least ten more (30 x 10 =3D 300) … and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x 10 =3D 3,000)…and so on, by the time the message reaches the sixth group of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers. If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted! If it goes one level further, you guessed it….. THREE >>>>HUNDRED MILLION >>>>PEOPLE!!!

Again, all you have to do is send this to 10 people. That's all. (If you don't understand how we can reach 300 million and all you have to do is send this to 10 people…. Well, let's face it, you just aren't a mathematician. But I am, so trust me on this one.)

How long would all that take? If each of us sends this e-mail out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next 8 days!!! I'll bet you didn't think you and I had that much potential, did you? Acting together we can make a difference. If this makes sense to you, please pass this message on. I suggest that we not buy from ESSO & SHELL UNTIL THEY LOWER THEIR PRICES TO THE $0.85 RANGE AND KEEP THEM DOWN.

THIS CAN REALLY WORK!!

Yeah, this could work – about as well as the hot stock tips, free software deals and penis enlargers I get emails about.

The oil companies know that nothing will change the way we drive, so they keep jacking up prices – we haven't seen anything yet. SUVs are the "in" thing – then people whine that they use a lot of gas (they didn't think about that when they were in the showroom?????) Only when riding buses or bicycles and driving tiny hybrid vehicles are the norm will they care even a tiny bit what we think (yeah, like that could happen!!). Notice that no such suggestion is ever made in these emails. In January I parked my big gas-guzzling Ford pickup and bought a Subaru Outback which gets 3 times the mileage (and is much more fun to drive), but now I spend more time behind the wheel, so it isn't as big a saving as it might have been.

The picture to the right (click on it to enlarge it) was taken around Jasper, Alberta, as Cathy & I were driving to Kelowna, BC, to spend Christmas with my folks. The return trip was over 5,200 km – most people in Europe don't drive that far in a year, but we do it on a 10-day holiday because that's the way North Americans live. There is already a fair bit of talk online about how gas prices will affect Yukon-Alaska tourism this summer. I have no doubt that many RVers will stay much closer to home. Others will make up for higher gas prices by parking at Wal*Marts along the way rather than in RV parks. The question is not whether gas prices will hurt tourism, but how much.

Dictionary Additions

It looks like a gorgeous day coming - a good day to lighten up. Here are some essential vocabulary additions for the modern workplace (some of them made me cringe when I remembered working for the Yukon government a few years ago ):
1.      BLAMESTORMING:  Sitting around in a group, discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed, and who was responsible.
2.      SEAGULL MANAGER: A manager who flies in, makes a lot of noise, craps on everything, and then leaves.
3.      ASSMOSIS:  The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss, rather than working hard.
4.      SALMON DAY:  The experience of spending an entire day swimming upstream, only to get screwed and die in the end.
5.      CUBE FARM:  An office filled with cubicles.
6.      PRAIRIE DOGGING:  When someone yells or drops something loudly in a cube  farm, and people's heads pop up over the walls to see what's going on.
7.      MOUSE POTATO:  The on-line, wired generation's answer to the couch potato
8.      SITCOMs:  Single Income, Two Children, Oppressive Mortgage. What Yuppies turn into when they have children and one of them stops working to stay home with the kids.
9.      STRESS PUPPY:  A person who seems to thrive on being stressed out and whiny.
10.     SWIPEOUT:  An ATM or credit card that has been rendered useless because the magnetic strip is worn away from extensive use.
11.     XEROX SUBSIDY:  Euphemism for stealing free photocopies from one's workplace.
12.     IRRITAINMENT:  Entertainment and media spectacles that are Annoying, but you find yourself unable to stop watching them. The J-Lo and Ben wedding (or not) was a prime example – Michael Jackson, another.
13.     PERCUSSIVE MAINTENANCE:  The fine art of whacking the crap out of an electronic device to get it to work again.
14.     ADMINISPHERE:  The rarefied organizational layers beginning just above the rank and file.  Decisions that fall from the adminisphere are often profoundly inappropriate or irrelevant to the problems they were designed to solve.
15.     404:  Someone who is clueless.  From the World Wide Web error Message "404 Not Found," meaning that the requested site could not be located.
16.     GENERICA:  Features of the American landscape that are exactly the same no matter where one is, such as fast food joints, strip malls, and subdivisions.
17.     OHNOSECOND:  That minuscule fraction of time in which you realize that you've just made a BIG mistake. (Like after hitting send on an email by mistake.)
18.     WOOFS:  Well-Off Older Folks.
19.     CROP DUSTING:  Surreptitiously passing gas while passing through a Cube Farm.

Fallen Soldiers – We Do Care

I tend to ignore events Outside because I can't deal with the atrocities that are happening in my country and around the world. Today in eastern Canada, insensitivity is added to atrocity. At 6:20 this morning, the bodies of 4 soldiers klilled in Afghanistan on Saturday arrived at CFB Trenton in Ontario. Lieut. William Turner, Cpl. Matthew Dinning, Bombardier Myles Mansell and Cpl. Randy Payne were killed by a roadside bomb. The media has been kept away, and the government has not lowered our flags to half-mast to honour them. I think this is appalling. Canada.com stated this morning that: "It was the first such event deemed out of bounds to reporters since the Afghan mission began four years ago. Some accused Mr. Harper of imitating U.S.-style tactics, where images of returning war casualties have been banned as the Bush administration attempts to control their damaging effect on public opinion." Sixteen Canadians have died in Afghanistan since 2002 (including 4 killed by an American bomb that was dropped on them) - that's 16 too many.

Addition: at almost midnight Ottawa time, I received a reply from my Member of Parliament (Larry Bagnell) about this:
"Murray,
Thank you for your views on these issues, to go along with a number of others I have had from Yukoners, with varying perspectives on the situation. Some of the feedback that I received was the same as yours.
The day these issues arose, our Party raised them a number of times in Parliament, but the government would not review the situation.
Thank you again for adding your heartfelt feedback to that I have received from other Yukoners.
Larry"

Welcome North!

Hi – welcome to my new blog! Since blogs are the way to communicate nowadays, it’s time I joined in. The ExploreNorth Blog will be the more casual, more-often-written version of Explorenorth’s email newsletter, with much more than just notes about Web site updates. With Spring just now arriving in a serious way, there's a whole lot going on in my world, and this will be where you can read about it if such things interest you. To some degree this is also a training exercise for me, as my writing has suffered over the past couple of years due to having too much happening that distracts me.

This past weekend, I took a judo club down to Prince George, BC, in the charter bus that I've been driving for the past few years. I love traveling, but it's become too disruptive, so I'm retiring from bus driving in August. The Prince George trip was the last sports charter I'll be doing (the people were great, though). There isn't a whole lot to do in Prince George in the Spring, but we got lucky and had fabulous weather, so after a short visit to the beautiful art gallery on Saturday, I walked several miles around downtown, the railyards and Cottonwood Park. A new Lions charity program is resulting in 7-foot-high fiberglass "Spirit Bears," each decorated by a different local artist, being installed in several communities around BC – see SpiritBearsintheCity.com for information. I found 6 of the 7 installed in Prince George so far (there will be 14 in Prince George within the next few weeks). I really enjoy trains, and the highway bridge to Cottonwood Park offered a great bird's eye view (click on the photo to enlarge it).