#life in alaska

[littlepawz]

Momma bear takes a break in the tree while letting her youngsters burn off some energy...and then it’s time to head home for dinner :) These adorable photos were captured by my favourite Alaskan nature photographer Amy Bragg 

[it-is-bugs]

I live in a small enough town that multiple people will respond to a request on FB to take a package to the post office from an assisted living home resident. Like me.

Naturally she didn’t reply to my offer so naturally I drove to the home and they just totally let me in and hunted the oldie down for me. She gave me a $20 bill against my protests and explained it was a birthday present for her grandson. He was going to a concert and she was sending him 25 one dollar bills inside a pizza box as a joke so he could get refreshments. If that’s not too pure and good for this world nothing is. 😭

[wolfcomix]

Jelly cycle, gamblin ink on kitakata paper, hand pressed

[luthqrs]

EMILY PRENTISS in CRIMINAL MINDS 5x21 | ‘Exit Wounds’

[dandelionsresilience]

Good News - May 15-21

Like these weekly compilations? Support me on Ko-fi! Also, if you tip me on Ko-fi, at the end of the month I'll send you a link to all of the articles I found but didn't use each week - almost double the content!

1. Translocation of 2,000 rhinos in Africa gets underway in “one of the most audacious conservation efforts of modern times”

“The 2,000 rhinos - more than are currently found in any single wild location in Africa - represent around 12-15% of the continent’s remaining white rhino population. […] “Rhinos perform an important ecological function in the environment as a large grazing herbivore,” says Dale Wepener[….] “The protection of rhino is far more than just looking after rhino; other species that occur in the protected areas will benefit from the protection,” explains Jooste. “This will lead to an increase in diversity and result in much healthier ecosystems.”

2. Florida Corridor Buffers Effects of Climate Change on Wildlife — And People

“A massive multi-partner effort that has conserved 10 million acres for wildlife in Florida over past decades will help buffer wildlife—and people—from the effects of climate change, a new report says. […] Protecting these corridors is important for wildlife genetics, demography and connectivity […], conducting prescribed fires in the corridor can reduce the risk of more intense wildfires [… and] they can provide buffers against hurricanes and seasonal thunderstorms.”

3. Global life expectancy to increase by nearly 5 years by 2050 despite geopolitical, metabolic, and environmental threats

“Increases are expected to be largest in countries where life expectancy is lower, contributing to a convergence of increased life expectancy across geographies. The trend is largely driven by public health measures that have prevented and improved survival rates from cardiovascular diseases, COVID-19, and a range of communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases (CMNNs).”

4. Valencia has Spain’s longest urban park

“Jardin del Turia (Turia Garden) is the green spine of the City of Valencia and Spain’s (and possibly Europe’s) longest urban park stretching for a length of 8.5 kilometres [… and] the current administration plans to make Jardin del Turia Europe’s largest city green space by extending it to the sea[….] Almost all Valencia residents (97 per cent) live within 300 metres of an urban green space. […] Jardin del Turia is a true urban oasis that provides exceptional thermal comfort, with a temperature difference of up to three degrees compared to other areas of the city.”

5. This Paint Could Clean Both Itself and the Air

“When an artificial ultraviolet light source shines on [photocatalytic] paint, the nanoparticles react with pollutants to make them break down—theoretically removing them from the nearby air and preventing a discoloring buildup. [… R]esearchers developed a new photocatalytic paint that they claim works using UV rays from ordinary sunlight, making its self-cleaning properties easier to activate. They’ve also shown that they can effectively produce this paint from recycled materials [including fallen leaves].”

6. Planting Seedlings for a Cooler Rockingham

“A dedicated group of volunteers recently planted over a thousand native seedlings in Lewington Reserve [… and] re-established canopy cover to areas of the reserve to create cooling shade for the local community and provide homes for native wildlife. […] Planting lots of trees and shrubs in urban areas can help create shade and cool cities, mitigating the impacts of climate change, contributing to biodiversity conservation and building greener, more resilient communities.”

7. Sydney’s first dedicated affordable housing for trans women designed to deliver ‘positive outcomes’

“Community housing provider and charity Common Equity NSW, […] which is for people on very low to moderate incomes, prides itself on creating inclusive living and promotes the independence and well-being of people and communities […, and] will deliver the first-of-its-kind social housing in a bid to provide a safe place to live for transgender women seeking an affordable home.”

8. Rewilding: How a herd of bison reintroduced to Romania is helping ‘supercharge’ carbon removal

“170 European Bison reintroduced to Romania’s Țarcu mountains could help capture and store the carbon released by up to 84,000 average US petrol cars each year. […] By grazing a 48 square kilometre area of grassland in a wider landscape of 300 kilometres squared, they helped to capture an additional 54,000 tonnes of carbon each year. That is around 10 times the amount that would be captured by the ecosystem without the bison.”

9. World’s biggest grids could be powered by renewables, with little or no storage

“[…] 100% renewable supply can then match the load by putting surplus electricity into two kinds of distributed storage worth that [an energy expert] says are worth buying anyway – ice-storage air-conditioning and smart bidirectional charging of electric cars, and recover that energy when needed, filling the last gaps with unobtrusively flexible demand.”

10. Supporting the Long-Term Survival of Copper River Salmon and Alaska Native Traditions

“With $4.3 million in NOAA funds, the Copper River Watershed Project and The Eyak Corporation will remove fish passage barriers, opening more streams for salmon spawning and subsistence fishing. [… As part of this effort, o]ld narrow culverts that constrict water flow will be replaced with “stream simulation” culverts wide enough to fit the full stream, including its banks. They are also deep to allow contractors to place stones and other material inside to mimic a natural stream bottom.”

May 8-14 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

[iluvjewells]

Posted this on ig the other day

[thoughtkick]

If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can’t know better until knowing better is useless.

John Green; Looking for Alaska

[books-life-alaska]

The cutest void. ❤️

[alteredstatesstuff]

alaska waves

[losthavenmine]

Russell Crowe Filmography Series || Arms

[resqectable]

If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can’t know better until knowing better is useless.

John Green; Looking for Alaska

[el-warverine]

Grumpy man feels joy for once:

Me:

[it-is-bugs]

Totem poles are a finite art form. The cedar will decay and reform. Some detail from a pole that I pass daily and yet haven’t stopped to appreciate.

A halibut fishing hook with river otters perched on the weight side. A halibut is diving to take the hook but an octopus lurks…to take the prize?

[charminglyantiquated]

So, I’m seriously looking into getting into tall ship sailing (waiting on follow-up from an interview rn) and I’m wondering for getting into it more long-term -

what do people do after sailing tall ships? Like, it’s a pretty physical job, and I’d assume there’s a point where your joints just can’t keep up with it.

Are there other jobs in the industry that people move to? I’m not really keen on the idea of moving up in the ship’s hierarchy- admin and being someone’s boss both aren’t really my thing. Do people retrain in completely different careers? Go back to whatever they were doing before they started sailing?

Anyway, I know your sample size might not be super large so I’d appreciate anything. Thanks a bunch!

This is hard to answer directly - on the one hand sailing tall ships is such a niche industry that there are limited pathways for straightforward advancement. But on the other hand, it overlaps with such a large number of other industries, and requires such a jack of all trades skillset - tourism, carpentry, history and preservation, hospitality, marine electronics, etc. etc. etc. - that there's a lot of ways forward for what I guess I'd call lateral advancement: moving to another job which uses most of the same skills. So there's no one answer, but if it helps, here's some things my tall ship deckhand friends have ended up doing, after no longer deckhanding tallships:

Get a captain's license and keep sailing. Captains often have it a bit easier physically (balanced out by the mental stress lol), and are paid better. Owning your own boat is optional; plenty of companies hire captains by the season to sail the boat, while the management of the company is dealt with by the actual owners. (This is what I did! I don't have the sail-hauling arms I did as a deckhand, but my knees and bank account are both in better shape).

Bosun, first mate, engineer, some other specialized non-captain crew member, usually involves licensing or other education that's useful down the road if you switch to an adjacent career

Racing yachts

Captain for hire on private vessels

Outward bound guide, other wilderness education programs

Harbor cruises, lobster tour guides, and other motor-powered tourist boats, both as captain and as crew - you have the patter and the safety skills but you don't want to deal with the hassle of sails

Water taxis, ferries and other passenger vessels

Lobstering, fishing, aquaculture, tugboats, other non-tourist waterfront industries

Marine surveyor, marine electrician, other specialized technician

Working in a shipyard - good fit for all the fit-out skills of sanding, painting, varnishing, covering and uncovering the boat

Cruise ship hostess

Train conductor (the passion for the early 1900s carried over well)

Working at a a museum focused on local maritime history

Tour guide for local buses, walking tours, etc

Boatbuilder (IYRS, Wooden Boat School)

Teaching the captain's license courses (nota bene: there were obviously some other steps between deckhand and teacher, notably ten years of being a captain in between. But this is what they settled into when they decided sailing was too physically taxing, so I want to include it).

Carpentry, house painting

Designing and selling custom made van-homes (apart from the technical skills, living on board a ship helps familiarize making use of every square inch of space)

Sailmaker

Of course there's other friends who went on to try something completely new and unrelated - I think because so many of the people who start sailing tall ships are here for something completely new in the first place, that's not an intimidating prospect so much as an exciting one. But many of them did make use of tall ship skills even when moving on from tall ships, so I hope the above list is helpful in giving a broad sense of what can follow!

[travel-learn-repeat]

Denali: Majestic Peaks, Untamed Wilderness, Unforgettable Views

[pangeen]

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“ Billowy Crystal ” // © Pat Webster

Music:  Shakey Graves - Family and Genus