Currently: August

Currently living/working: Most of our jobs are slowing down their pace, which is fortunate since Justin leaves for his Kili climb in Africa 9/4! We’ll have airbnb rentals/cleanings through October, but my guided hikes & presentations will stop by mid-Sept. I am very much looking forward to Sept. 16 when my calendar shows nada for the first time!!!

 

Current mood: I’m riding high on what ended up being a summer packed with 3 cups of delight, 1.5 cups of chaos and only 2 tbsp of stress! I did not even come close to burnout, to which I’m so grateful, and was intentional with my time and energy. Moreover, I really think Justin improved his intentionality too!

 

Currently not excited for: The days are shortening & so are our shadows as winter is trying to elbow its way in. This transition period is when I need to remind myself how much I love those cozy hygge moments and the slow pace that comes with the darkening days. Maybe someday I’ll tire of living at 63 degrees North latitude—where I’m endlessly wrenched from one extreme to the other—but for now, I still love it. 

 

Currently excited for: Nearly 4 years almost to the day, we purchased a second yurt! We always intended to purchase this second yurt, but there were a few land issues that needed resolving, so we waited patiently, and now it’s ours!

 

Current guilty pleasure: Part of the rationale of having several jobs was to be financially ready for this next investment. We have the whole winter to spend our hard-earned money to collect all the things to make the yurt rentable for next summer. 

Currently amazed by: We cat-sat Ted for a good 3 weeks, and while she was with us, she apparently made a friend. Ted is 13, and according to her owner, has never befriended another cat before. But these 2 hit it off & got some good miles in around the neighborhood. This cat—who we had affectionately started calling Garfield—appeared out of nowhere. None of our neighbors have ever seen it. We posted about it on our local network, and all the orange cat owners around town said it was not theirs. But we just knew this mystery cat had loving owners out there somewhere. Well, I finally tracked down the owner and the cat had been missing for a few months from clear across town!! 

 

Currently regretting: We booked our fall travel (we are going to Panama!!! More details to come!). We struggled booking one of the domestic flights within Panama, as it was hard to tell which airline was most reliable, and unfortunately, we chose wrong with Wingo Airlines. Unfortunate because they canceled our flight a few weeks ago! Every piece of communication they sent us was in Spanish, and even though I can get by with my Spanish skills, I had to solicit my friend’s assistance to navigate the system in order to get a reimbursement. Fortunately, we succeeded, but that was quite taxing!

Currently thankful for: On our trip along the Denali Highway, we collected so many winter rations!!! It took days for my fingers to wash off the purple.

 

Current confession: I rarely go on grand adventures “solo” (without Justin), but I carved out a long weekend to drive 8 hours south with a girlfriend to check out a new-to-me spot in Alaska where Justin has already been (blog post to follow!). It was the getaway I didn’t know I needed to push through to the end of the season.

 

Currently proud of: Go Justin, go! If you want to read more about Justin’s upcoming Kili climb, I wrote about it here. But, if you just want a reminder of the dates to cheer Justin & his team on, that would be from Sept. 8-13!

 

 

Currently worried about: This seems to be happening with more regularity, but we found another wasp nest this summer, and it was conveniently located right by our front door.

 

Currently reading: On one of Justin’s beloved visits to the dump, he brought home a copy of Where the Crawdads Sing. I know I am behind on this popular book (and movie!), but now I can understand all the praise surrounding it. (And sometimes Justin deserves kudos for his dump hauls).

I deviated from my fiction run to read Alaska Tracks: Footprints in the Big Country from Ambler to Attu. The author, Ned Rozell, is a name I’ve heard multiple times, but never read. Anything Alaska holds my attention, but I can’t say Rozell is my favorite Alaskan author, so not sure I’ll read one of his other books.

Currently watching on Netflix/Peacock: Pretty much every night, we can squeeze in 30-60 minutes of something to stream, so this month from Netflix we watched Untamed (loved it! Beautiful scenery!), Hunting Wives (Brutal! With lots of sex! Are rich people in Texas really like that??) and Zero Day (couldn’t get through it … anyone else?). As for Peacock, every Tuesday, a new Below Deck still comes out and we still love it!!