beautiful day in los anchorage...

 seemed fitting as this sculpture is in front of the local crime lab.  a new building with this cool sculpture.  i'm not overly fond of modern sculptures, but this one always picks up the light and looks pretty.  i do like light displays and colours.  people sometimes refer to anchorage as los anchorage.  i grew up next door to los angeles proper.  i'm a city girl.  i can assure you that anchorage is nothing like los angeles.  not that i abhor l.a. though.  it's my hood.

 i should have gotten up and moving much earlier.  as the light gets better i could be doing some super long hikes.  the perk to this low snow year could be some very fun long hikes on cool days like today.  it's also great for bike riders and moose.  i headed up to prospect heights  with blossom.  took the trail that heads to williwaw lakes, but since i didn't get on the trail til after 1, there wasn't time to go all the way back.  would be great though, no bears..nice trails..and amazing scenery.  my next stretch off if conditions are good i will have to kill my body and get some trails in.  no time like the present to get my arse back in hiking shape.

 still probably did nearly 5 miles. it's mostly uphill.  rio was good to sleep this one out.

 i could have headed up to near point or wolverine...missed opportunity.

 great views today though.  no denali out though.

 can't say as there was tons to take pictures of.

 finally got to the post office and the grocery store.  dishes, laundry...so something was accomplished.  i'm sure normal people would have done more house cleaning.  ran into a friend at the grocers.  always fun to see people you haven't seen for some time.  we finally exchanged phone numbers as we lost track of each other ages ago and when we do run into each other we forget and again lose track.  she and her partner went on a kayak trip i went on.  her partner and i teamed up in a kayak.  super nice folks.  fun, adventurous.

 another friend gave me news that she is moving out of state.  boo....always sad when people leave the state. hopefully, it works out for her, but i'll miss her.  :-(

 there is the crime lab

 was happy to read that they were able to get the kid who was being held hostage for nearly a week.  i think they killed the guy who had taken him and killed a bus driver in the process.  too bad the kid had to be held for so long.  always funny that this happy news was not front page news.  on the front page was some good news.  malala is improving in england.  she was the pakistani girl who was shot for trying to improve education opportunities for girls.  she is a brave young woman.  the taliban still would like to kill her no doubt, even more so.  can't recall the details but another woman was raped and tried to talk to media about it, both she and the reporter were sentenced to a year in prison.  the rapists are free.

 there is a bridge over the creek, there were some lovely icicles in there.

 the tustumena 200 dog sled race has lost 2 dogs.  two dogs died.  not sure the cause yet.  it's been a warm year for dog mushing.  dogs prefer to run in colder temperatures.  always sad to hear of dog deaths in these distance races.  this one is only 200 miles whereas the iditarod and yukon quest are closer to 1000 miles.  hopefully this isn't a sign of what may happen in those races.

 just more icicles.

 anchorage with sleeping lady in the distance.

 liked the reflection of sleeping lady in cook inlet. like i said, not too many photo ops really on my route.  blossom is tired after chasing her tennis ball for a few hours.

 anchorage...beautiful day out there.

 this tree trunk had some cool colours on it.

 oddly a few of my favorite photo's of the day.  got a few more loaded on my shutterfly account. i still have the rest of january to load and last years iditarod shots.  no idea how i missed those.  i try to be good about getting them loaded onto shutterfly and onto a dvd disc. want to keep ahead in case the computer crashes..they always do one day.  loads of pictures on this blog, plus these photos automatically go into a picasa account i guess.  at least if the computer goes or the house burns down it's not a total loss that way.  have known people who just lost all those memories from a fire.  you can't get that back.

 had hoped to maybe go out for a ski this evening, but i got lazy and crashed.  two more nights of work and then my stretch off.  still not sure what i should be doing to get ready for the new job or what schedule i will have.  maybe i'll try to call in the next few days and check in.

off to pay bills.