it's all in the shoes...

blossom checks back on me. andrea and kelly wait at the tank trail...blossom is on the powerline trail...below is kelly bundled up.

tanya watches the dogs romp and wrestle.

as you can see the monday walk was fun and beautiful. we did the gasline to powerline to tank to moose ridge link back out across the ponds and around to the big loop trail back to the cars. below is kiska enjoing the sun. we were out the usual 2 hours.

tanya and andrea are all smiles despite the chilly weather...helps to take the gasline trail to warm up a bit. hills do that. i did have to re-heat and thus nap upon returning home.
awesome views of the alaska range and denali and foraker mountains.

julie and linda hang with the pups on the monday dog walk.

above and below are from my bog here by the house.

i love wispy clouds like these. i keep meaning to get a book on the names of all the various cloud formations. they are so cool!

these three pictures are from n. bivouac the other day with blossom and rio between shifts.

blossom is just so dang cute. sorry...i can't get enough of her cuteness!

pictures are uploading like crap this week. not sure what the deal is...so frustrating. i have lots of fun/cool pictures to load. it's been so pretty out this week. clear blue skies, crisp...gotta love winter. i'm trying just loading a few at a time and that still isn't working. grr....!

just watched "paper heart" while attempting to load pictures.... don't really want to stay awake much more....some days computers can just make me nuts. oddly enough though at least the computer isn't freaking out that i took my camera's card out. the last week i've had to replace the little card in the slot in order to get the error message off. i could computer vent for hours. need to get more zen though. not sure i enjoyed that movie or not. just a strange documentary. strangish comedian charlyne yi questions love as she starts dating the dude from juno. he is just like he was in juno so though it all worked for that movie i sense that both those actors just were themselves in the movie and it worked, but that they probably do not have a long and successful acting career ahead of them. haven't heard of the writer turning anything else out of late either. i guess there are people who are one hit wonders in music it would make sense that you could be that way in a movie too.

work was fine...no drama. ran sledd a few nights. my hip has been spasming at work quite a bit this weekend. very painful and nearly disabling for the few minutes it's freaking out. was chatting with sandra today and she mentioned shoes...a little aha moment for me. i have my keens that i have worn to work for ages so they are probably super old and not at all supportive at this point. it would explain why my hip is way worse at work and why i can walk miles, such as i did today, and just have mild discomfort. i wear the ice bugs for my winter walks and those are very supportive. so i'd like to get some new work shoes...and maybe see about seeing employee health to make sure there isn't anything i can do to help. perhaps schedule a massage as well. i'm working on my to do list as i write and wait. it's getting long.

was going to go to gym tonight, but i fell asleep and then put the movie in. there was also a new episode of bones i hadn't seen yet. love that show.

rio sniffed out a moose in the bog the other day. as she was draggin me i was searching for the moose.....the object of her desire. we have conflicting desires on this front...she wants to meet the moose and i wish to prevent her from meeting the moose. it could be the web site is the one having issues with loading at times (just a random thought). anyway....i finally saw the moose, about 30 feet off facing the other direction so i thought i'd just keep moving forward past it. moose didn't like that idea apparently and did a 180 leap and started booking towards me. i ran with the pups and when i looked back the moose hadn't come out of the bush to the trail. i ran a bit more before deciding it was safe. those things can get big when they are coming at you....i really think they gain weight as they run towards you.

the next day i opted to go to the dog park at university lake. it's always crazy with dogs on the weekends. saw many of the regulars that i've known for years. after going the loop one direction i just joined up with the group and circled back. rio was wanting to follow the treats anyway. we took a back trail to the parking area....kinda silly that i'd never taken that path before in all these years.

today was monday walk. we had 7 dogs and 6 humans i believe. lets see...bohdi, buddha, blossom, kiska, mandee, rio and indy. those are the dogs obviously...humans, andrea, tanya, kelly, me, julie and linda. it was linda's first trek. i was worried she wasn't having fun but i think she was just lagging behind to take it all in. it was quite pretty out and also i think she likes to work on training with kiska. it was great to have kelly there too. it's been quite awhile. i gave her dates for a drive to kennicot this summer and she seems like she still wants to do that. she's off a bit this week so hopefully we get in another hike together to catch up more. i brought a calendar for tanya and showed it around when we were at kaladi's for our hot cocoa. kelly seemed like she would have liked one. will probably adjust who i send them out to next year. i sent to all my sibs but not sure several really are interested. haven't heard that the calendars were even received from most of them. figure that will be the sign to not send it next year if i make one. my family is strange that way though. joel emailed me out of the blue. he's kinda disconnected himself from the family in some ways so cool to get an email and actually have an exchange. i mentioned the calendar as i had run out of envelopes and hadn't sent his off yet. i asked if he wanted one and he wrote that he did and that he still had the moose calendar from when my picture was bought by anchorage daily news for thier annual calendar. who knew. our family just never really communicates...would be nice if we did more of that. was talking to my sister and it came up. i remember our dad never gave me a compliment that didn't have some sort of disclaimer on it. this is good but... apparently, he said nice things to other people about me....sure would have been nice to get a compliment from him myself though. it was just funny that my brother never even mentioned getting that old calendar and here it is years later and it's something that he has opted to keep.

it has been chilly like i said. as i drive home from work in the mornings it's like 0-5 degree's. i overdressed today though and felt a bit hot. kelly and i laughed at the idea that one could over dress in 3 degree weather...doesn't seem possible.

occasionally at work i glance out a window and see a moose. it happened the other night. always just amazing to look outside the hospital and spy a moose cruising down the sidewalk. the hospital rooms in ketchikan icu overlooked the water and so you could occasionally see a whale cruise by. i recall looking out at some pretty rainbows, sunsets, lots of boats and float plane activity. the cruise ships, ferries and tugs were just part of the scenery. you got where you knew which was going through.

well, since these pictures are loading slowly and i have a paper or two to read you will have to hear my views on current events....feel free to cut out now.

had to check out the best/worst dressed for SAG and Golden Globe awards. i still think those hollywood people are pretty egocentric that they need so many dang awards ceremonies for themselves. very few nurses get any sort of recognition, same with firemen, police, teachers...but these hollywood folks seem to believe they should be awarded for farting right. they do get dogs, children, monkeys and even asses to act....just saying. i still enjoy checking out what outfits their people convinced them they looked fabulous in. must be tough to have so many people kissing your arse....i mean how do you know who to trust.

gotta give clooney chops for putting together the event to raise money for the earthquake victims of haiti. i heard some in the background on my patients tv as i ran the sledd machine and i guess they raised over 60 mil. of course, that idiot, sean penn had to go down there himself. he always has to get in the middle of stuff and get all political. he's an idiot. just an actor that has been told too many times he's fabulous and perfect and now believes it to the degree that he has become a nuisance in my opinion. if you aren't helping in haiti, you are in the way. anyway...i really need to get on the red cross site and donate and i should try to download a few tunes from the fund raiser.

a few alaskan cross country skiers got named to the olympic team so that is cool. go kikkan i say. i've seen her out on the trails with her dad and dogs out at n. bivouac. just seems nice. jeff king won the tustemena dog sled race. the censes started and they chose to go to a remote village in alaska and start it off that way. i guess the censes dude flew in to a nearby village and then got a ride on a sled dog team to the village.

gotta make a potato head costume so add that to my to list for the week. eek! not sure how well i'll do at that project. still reading...anchorage has 5 off leash dog parks...yippee! overall they have worked out well since bieng designated in 2003 (and i helped!! ) i guess there are some trying to get a fenced dog park in the down town anchorage area. i wish them the best..as it sounds like a great idea to me! i guess at present the land has been mostly used by homeless as a drinking area. the lady who's dead husband the existing "park" is named after apparently isn't a dog fan though and is offended that this is being suggested. still reading...redoubt was spewing some steam last week. that was one of the pictures i was attempting to post. i was on a trail and i thought i saw a volcano with some smoke...but couldn't tell for sure if it was just some clouds...the paper says it's sputtering a bit.

done loading all i'm gonna attempt tonight. my errand list grew as i waited for pictures to load. off to bed....