Bon Voyage Maggie

I'd say the Alaska fall is crisp, sharp, and enlivening, but it is cold today. We had business to see an elephant, and my hands are still like clumsy blocks of ice banging away at the keyboard. I don't know what your opinion is of zoos. I am torn. I have always been a biologist at heart, and have spent days watching animals in the wild, at zoos, and at Christmas parties. I know that there are good zoos and bad zoos, and the Alaska Zoo falls somewhere in between. I think the best description would be "well intenioned."

We took the boy to a going away party for Maggie, our lone elephant since her partner Annabelle died almost ten years ago. I grew up with Annabelle, I also grew up with a in a caged lion outside Brown's Drive-In and a gorilla that lived in the BJ Circus Store, a flea market when I was in college. Although it made me sad each time I visited, I still went and watched and smiled (of course I cried one single tear at each visit).

Maggie is going to some elephant sanctuary in California, sponsored by Bob Barker of Price is Right fame, and finally settling the fight that has been ongoing over the past years between animal rights activists, the zoo, and the Alaskan public. I think this is a reasonable settlement. I think this is for the best. Watching Jackson watching Maggie, however, made me a little sad. He stood against the cage barrier talking to anyone and everyone about how there was "an elephant over there," and "what is she doing?"

I know he will ask about her when we return to the zoo, because, we will return and he does not forget. I smiled and cried one single tear.

Super glue

Doctor, there is a patient in room 4 with super glue in his eye. What is the correct response?

1) Emergency eye wash
2) Immediate referral to opthamologist
3) Remove the eye
4) Nothing

Nothing, yes, nothing. Where did I in my great medical knowledge find this? At the Super glue website. A grand storehouse of information on "what happens if I got superglue on...". What did I do? Eye wash, and call poison control.

Feeling insecure about trusting a public, nonmedical website I contacted poison control in Oregon. They said, "do nothing." In my now bolstered medical confidence, I called the opthamologist. Seriously, a guy mistakes a tube of superglue for visine and squirts a large amount into his eye, effectively gluing it shut. How could you leave that alone?

The ophthamologist said "leave it alone, and call me next week if it is still shut." Hard to believe, but I sent him home for a long weekend of radio listening. Apparently the oils and proteins in our eyes (even if it hits the sclera) and on our skin is enough to dissolve the glue if we just wait it out. Go figure. This was a much more entertaining exercise than the COPD exacerbation in room 2.

Of breast exams and dentistry...

Does this mean that the "hernia exam" my dentist was performing was unnecessary too? Please note that the patient at the end of the article "took to wearing tight shirts with high necklines" but somehow didn't think to change dentists. No bear stories today. It snowed. And to those of you who asked...no, surprisingly I did not soil myself.

I know what fear tastes like...

It is bitter, a bit salty, and has a distinct metallic quality to it. It is also dry and gummy and leaves an aftertaste for hours. Jana, Jackson, and C4/5 headed home yesterday, leaving me to a few days of bachelorhood and quiet. I left from the airport after watching them board the 727, an increasingly voluptuous pregnant lady and a kid she can barely hold in her arms, and headed right to the Buskin River. I have been repeatedly belittled and disheartened by the late season cohos that run these waters.

The late afternoon was brisk and I was hauntingly alone along my favorite hole. A couple hundred fish milled about without care that I continued to cast my line between them. I was alone and had initially brought along my iPod, but decided against it's use wanting to hear the sounds of nature (an bears) as they crept upon my senses. I had fished about an hour and was debating a retreat in disgrace when I heard...absolutely nothing. I had been quite vigilant (did I mention I was alone) watching up and down the river for that bear who lived on the other side. I had hoped to see him again and brought my camera, along with its dead batteries.

That nothing that I heard was the sound of a Kodiak Brown (maybe the same one, maybe another) crossing the slough just upstream. When I turned to look in my constant, remarkably unobservant, manner, I noticed that he was about 20 feet away and around a rock outcropping upon which I was perched. Did I mention I was alone? I quickly picked up my bag (should of had it on) and scrambled down the rocks to a small beach along the river. I was about 10 feet down an embankment and decided to creep up and see if he had meandered away as bears often do.

No such luck...worse luck...he saw me. I looked him face to face about 10-15 feet away, and he puffed like a dog tends to do when threatened. Now what do the books tell us to do in this situation? Hold your ground/back away slowly. Don't run. Don't panic. The problem was that the books didn't say what to do if he kept coming your direction. I am embarrassed to admit that I ran. Not really an "run" per say, but more of a scramble. I was trapped on that small beach and had no good place to back away, so I charged up the hill into some tall grass. A perfect place to hide from an animal that depends on smell. I squeezed myself into some dense bushes and waited. That taste, the metallic, sticky, salty one, permeated my senses. After a couple of minutes I poked my head out, knowing that he had headed off. Except he was still there, craning his head around the corner, looking for me.

Now, I doubt there was any real intention of menace or true desire to eat me (as the river overflowed with much tastier - I presume - salmon), but he was still there. Bears are supposed to run away when they encounter humans. I climbed a tree. That's what I did. I climbed a very short, stubby, stout branched Sitka Spruce. Would it have saved me? Doubtful, but at least I could see a little better. There I waited, talking loudly to said bear, trying to convince him that we had our own business, and mine was to go home as soon as he would let me. It must have worked. As I slowly crept down from my perch, he was no where to be seen (just like when he arrived) and I quickly, loudly headed the short hike back to my car past massive footprints and several piles of bear scat. I liked him much better when he was on the other side of the river.

I was a bit nervous last night, but slept well. I went back to the Buskin this morning. I still wanted to catch that fish and didn't want my experience to scar me. I dragged my feet in getting there and arrived about noon. Again I was alone on the river. I hooked a few, but brought nothing home. I stood vigilantly looking up river then down river. He didn't show himself this morning, but I know he was there. Bears are sneaky like that.

Close Encounter of the furry kind

Apparently truth is nearly as strange as the internet may lead us to believe. I did not take the picture of the fisherman and the bear, but sure enough, I was in that same situation just a couple of days ago. Val, one of my friends, who also happens to be stationed here in Kodiak and I were fishing the Buskin River last week. Taunted by 10-15lb silver salmon who wanted nothing to do with us, we were getting ready to leave (Val, my fair weather fishing friend had already taken her line out of the water and was enjoying the evening). One of the other folks fishing nearby called out that there was a bear up stream. Sure enough, a 4-500lb Kodiak Brown walked the length of the river bank, not 40 feet from us. We watched in awe as he munched on a pile of dead fish that had been left on the bank, then clambered into the river to chase down a not-so-lucky piscine victim of his own. Just like National Geographic. We watched for nearly a half an hour before deciding to head back to the car lest he intercept us on the trail home.

It continues to be sunny and beautiful here. The winds have picked up since Jana and Jackson arrived, so it has been cold, but still beautiful. This makes writing difficult. I'd better go play. Hopefully some pictures will come in the near future.