Episode 5

Another really good episode of The National Parks: America's Best Idea.  The ending came suddenly, before I could swallow a lump that formed watching footage of Marian Anderson sing before a crowd of 75,000 at the Lincoln Memorial.  I didn't know who she was before tonight.  In fact, I'm learning an incredible amount of history related to my employing agency through this documentary.  Although the hours have been odd this week, I'll be a little disappointed tomorrow that the series is over.  We've had a nice little crowd of 8 or 9 people during the last few days, and it's nice to see how much they've enjoyed this story as well.  My supervisor has told me since I started that a big part of our job as interpreters and educators for this group of parks here is simply to make friends for the parks.  Thanks to Ken Burns for doing just that.

On another note, I got my parka in the mail today.  That was one thing I accomplished in Fairbanks a few weeks ago.  It's very toasty, so I shouldn't freeze my torso this winter.  I still have to work on the legs...have to get some insulated bib overalls.  I tried some on in Fairbanks but couldn't get everything into my suitcase and didn't find a great price, so I'm still working on that.  So, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Speaking of snow, I'm imagining the two people reading this will get tired of the daily snow update, but it's still a novelty to me, so bear with me for now.  No snow overnight, but it snowed some during the day.  It's still not sticking.  When I was looking for snow goggles at the store (it's not fun to ride an ATV with snow pelting your eyeballs), they said the goggles wouldn't be put out until the end of the month.  I guess the snow won't be sticking for a while.  Anyway, as I left the visitor center after 10:00 tonight, it looked like tiny little styrofoam balls scattered everywhere.  I don't really know if it was classified as snow, hail, sleet or something else, but it was cool.  It was dry-like.  It brushed away as if it really were styrofoam.  Very cool!