Ordered some clothes for Seth online, and put together wedding invitations. Mine go in the mail tomorrow (still have to finish Seth's list). Still have to find a hairdresser in Anaheim, figure out where to rent chairs and a car, write vows, alter my wedding dress, make a petticoat and bloomers (I am giving it a try), have a bustle made, and arrange for a cake.

We are hoping that people will want to join us Sunday, November 15 at Disneyland. Bulletins with meeting times to be posted on www.redseth.com/wedding. 

We still have a fair bit of things to plan and pay for, though. If you would like to help us rent a car, rent chairs, buy a wedding cake, buy food, or pay for plane tickets, you can make a donation by going to the wedding website, or by just clicking this link: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=8356313. 

We don't expect gifts, and are telling people to send us well wishes, or buy themselves a ticket to Disneyland to join us on Sunday instead of buying a gift. For those who really want to give us something, we are asking for donations instead of traditional wedding presents because (1) we already have two households crammed into one little cabin, and (2) shipping bulky items to Alaska is expensive and inconvenient. Plus, Disneyland is more fun than buying and wrapping a toaster!
 

 Seth gave me an engagement ring today!  He got down on his knees and proposed and everything, in front of a coffee shop full of people. It was lovely. It has a ruby and two diamonds in it, which works- Red Seth and Agent Diamond. (get it?)

Well, I now have my dress and need to find a dressmaker to help me tailor it (it's a little too big). I also need a pattern for bloomers and a petticoat, or else break down and just buy them (I already have gotten a quote for these plus a bustle and corset- I just can't commit to spending the money just yet). We also need to either get a lot of fabric for Seth's clothing and start sewing (I believe we have patterns), or else break down and buy an outfit. I really like this one here, with a red vest:

http://www.gentlemansemporium.com/store/vict_mens_03.php

I don't think our sewing skills are anywhere near as good, but again, money is tight. Much depends on prices of fabric at JoAnn's. But if it costs more than $100 for fabric and notions, it makes sense for us to just buy the ready-made nice-looking jacket for $200. We can always attempt sewing pants, a vest and a shirt.

If only we knew someone that wanted to trade a dynamic website for clothing (my lingerie, and Seth's outfit)! Seth's websites are pretty cool, because they're dynamic you can update them as often as you like and don't have to consult the web guy or pay him- so he charges $2000 a site. For an example, see the Fairbanks Arts Association site: www.fairbanksarts.org. But if you are willing to trade clothing for a website, let us know. I also can throw in some of my soap or bath products, which I've started selling locally: www.tundrasuds.com. My website doesn't look so interesting because I don't have photos yet or any fancy stuff like a shopping cart on it. I may put in a Google Checkout link, but right now I'm too busy to make a lot of soap- I don't want to take orders I can't fill. I have about 12 or so different blends, by the way, not just what's visible on the site- I need to update it to include those. I also have a line of soaps and things under the name "Elizabeth's Bathery" that is to be marketed to goths- it's the same stuff, just different packaging.

We also have rented a house in Anaheim, and depending on how big it is we may have to ration out invitations to the ceremony. We are still hoping to have a bigger reception someplace else, though, and I hope everyone can come to that. If we can get a venue for certain (and not have to pay much for it), we can start arranging it. Seth's working on that.

My maid of honor is handling the flowers, and now all we need is a cake, sundry cocktail goodies and wine, airline tickets (my parents will pay for that, thankfully! We may lessen the burden on them by getting a companion ticket from friends of Seth's mom) and a rental car or a borrowed car. Oh, and rings. Seth is making them... from my old wedding ring and engagement ring, and a ring from a friend of ours (Lee Ann, for those that know her)! Hahaha. Oh, and I need a hairdresser to do a fancy Victorian updo.

What did I forget?

& tell him I'm at Pioneer Park, in the arts center. My cell is not working.

Thanks!

Hello all

Can you suggest books on the history of costume between 1860 and 1940? Websites that are not ephemeral will also help.

Thanks!!

Hi all - this is Liz. Here are the updated plans (still vague, as you can see) for our wedding. If you can help with some of the things we've indicated, that would be awesome. Formal invitations have not been sent out - I've sent a few informal ones, and Seth has yet to notify his list of friends that he wants to come. If you know us and want to come to any of the below events, contact Seth or I and we will put you on our list of guests. It will help us if you give us your address and phone number if you would like an invitation.

( Deets under here! )

 

</div>

 

Hope to see you there!!

Warm fuzzies,

Liz and Seth

Hi folks

This is the date we're planning on getting married, in Southern California. I've already sent out sort of pre-invitation invitations to most of my friends (a few didn't make it due to my not having complete addresses) and family that I hope to see there. Seth is a busy guy, though, so I don't think he's told anyone on his side but his mom and a few friends yet.

We're hoping for the following:

1. Early afternoon wedding in a park in one of the Beach Cities (I am hoping for Laguna Beach- only their city hall is hard to reach by phone, I keep getting told to leave a message in a voice mailbox that won't accept messages).

2. Time for photos. Everyone with a camera is welcome to bring it and snap away. The wedding party should be in Victorian-era (probably there will be anachronisms, like different periods in one place, but whatever) clothing.

3. Reception- we originally thought of a restaurant, but we might be having a potluck-style informal in-house dinner instead.

4. Top secret night out in a 21+ location.

5. Next day, Sunday Nov. 15th- Seth and I honeymoon with as many of you as want to come in Disneyland!

Seth and I are moving into our new log cabin. It took about two months and lots of stress, but we are finally here! Pics will follow as soon as Seth is able to put them up.

It was fairly late last night when we moved in, mostly because we didn't get the keys until noon, and then couldn't actually begin moving in until the previous occupants got their butts out- they finished moving out of the house and cleaning it at about 4 pm, and today Ray came by and was picking up some stuff they had sitting in the shed outside. We switched the cable and internet yesterday- we applied for service and picked up the box, and were connected ON THE SAME DAY. Woot! We were able to watch something on our TV (which needs its stand- currently sitting outside in the truck!) and have some pizza in our new home. Seth built a fire in the fireplace and discovered that we need a hatchet for making kindling. He had to use his saw to chop up a piece of wood.

I fell asleep early on our nice new Sealy mattress queen bed. It was chilly for me at first, but I soon grew used to it. I think there is poor insulation on the bedroom - that is one thing we will investigate sooner rather than later.

The view from the windows is amazing- trees covered in a dusting of snow. The cabin itself is cozy, though there are cold spots and some idiosyncrasies that we need to fix very soon. It is a fixer-upper cabin for sure, but I think when we are finished with it, it is going to be amazing! The first things we do will be to improve the energy efficiency- I am sure there are problems with insulation and air/vapor barriers here and there- and improve the bathroom. In the long term we are going to try to make it a fusion of log cabin rustic and steampunk/neoVictorian stylishness. It will take a while, and a fair bit of ingenuity and cash, but I think we are up to the task.

We only have an hour until we need the truck back, so I better cut this short. This house is the largest thing (literally and in terms of price) that I have ever bought- my name is on the title but Seth's will be added soon, since he helped with the downpayment and is doing 90% of the work to fix it up.

Woot! 

I am realizing that some of my favorite pieces of furniture, which I was planning to keep, will just be too expensive to ship up to Alaska from North Hollywood where they are in storage.

On November 6 in the afternoon, you can have some free furniture or a freezer if you come and get it, or give Seth or me an address in NoHo to take it to in the afternoon. I have no pics- and no, I cannot take any, as my furniture is several thousand miles away from me in a storage unit. Thank you for not asking.

1. Small wooden dresser - there are seven small drawers, it's about 2 feet wide, 2 feet deep and about 4 feet tall. I've painted it blue but it is easy to paint it any color you want. I love this little thing, mostly because the drawer knobs (wooden) are a really nice shape. Think 1950s kind of vintage-looking, but goes well with anything IKEA can throw at you as well.  I've had it for a long time, but I can't afford to ship it- I could buy a new one cheaper. It's in good condition, nothing broken, none of the drawers stick or anything like that.

2. Bookshelf - I had this made for me, it's got four shelves about 1.25 feet high and about a foot or so deep (great for huge books), it's pine with white board stuff for the back, and doesn't disassemble or I would ship it because I love it. I can buy a new shelf for cheaper, though. It was in my living room behind the couch in my apartment, so if you came over you might have seen it.

I also have for suggested donation ($50) a small Haier deep freeze. These things cost about $200-$300 new. I had it in my kitchen, so if you've ever been to my apt. in NoHo you would have seen it. It works fine, but again, shipping. It's perfect for apartments, condos or small houses, and it is fabulous to be able to buy all the frozen food you want when it's on sale without worrying about fitting it into the freezer that comes with your fridge.

For all these things, you either have to come to NoHo on Nov. 6th in the afternoon, which means sometime between noon and 4 (which is when the storage place I'm taking this stuff out of closes) and get it - exact time to be scheduled later- or you have to give me an address in NoHo to take it to. Unless Seth loves you a lot, we are not driving all over the place to deliver your free/cheap stuff, and not keeping it in a friend's truck indefinitely either. We will be in touch with anyone who wants stuff to schedule exact times later.

I realize that this is a Thursday, but this is when we're taking our stuff out of the storage unit I have in NoHo. We can't do it any other day. If no one confirms with us that they want one of these things, they're going to the Salvation Army.

News: I'm adopting a soldier! From the army, since Seth was in the army.

http://www.soldiersangels.com/

This is Liz posting. I thought I would ask you all (since this list has a greater circulation than my individual one) if there are any Macintosh computer experts in the house. My friend avice is having trouble with her Mac, and needs to download her stuff from it before she moves. If anyone can help, please let me (at agent_diamond, please) or her know. She lives in the Los Angeles area, but maybe if you don't live there you can help by phone?

*Edit*: she will feed you steak and beer if you help.

Thanks!

Seth is now in Seattle. He's busy running some errands for our friend Brian, and I think he needs a nap, but when all that is finished, he will be heading north again, probably in the morning. Once he is in Canada he can't take phone calls, so be sure to text him to say hi.

Poor Seth, this drive has got to be way less interesting than our first one, despite the audio book he rented.

LA Data... Part 1

Flew in about noon-30 Wed. took almost an hour to get my bags & the Fly-a-way. Made it to Matt's house & put the new plates on the car & promptly was reminded that there are more traffic lights on Van Nuys Blvd then in the whole city of Fairbanks!

Gave Pixel a ride home & wen tot LA to work on computers. & had more work & I am just too good & they want me to do everything...

Picked up Shok & made it to my Mogo's dinner 40 minutes late (damned Highland & Hollywood traffic!)

Made it to HELL a little after midnight, got parking in the street almost across form the door!

Realized that I live in Heaven with an Angel, so that is was funny having to fly down to go to HELL!

Finally slept!

Took car to get tires & stuff, to find out it has a bad bearing & after abotu a 2-3 hour delay, they gave me a rental car & I headed to the OC in a Dodge Dakota Crew Cab Pickup Truck.... got things from old house & did a Neon sigh job for a client there.  Remembered why I wanted to get out of the OC & made it back to NoHo about 6:15... only about 5 hours behind schedule so far... & the car will not be ready until Noon or so... still have rental for the night.

Picked up Shok & on the way to buying him a birthday dinner (Yummy Mexican Food) we stopped at Josie Cotton's house under the Hollywood sign to see if I could fix a new scooter she is giving him (.7 miles, but no gas & lost keys & too much has to be removed to replace the ignition, needs more tools)... Life can seem Surreal when you hang with Shok sometimes!

Now I am back at Matt's, sorting thru boxes & catching up on the Interwebs!

& soon to sleep again!

Hi all

Seth will be making a solo trek from Los Angeles to Fairbanks with a lot of our stuff, starting Saturday morning. He will be bored on the drive up, so be sure to text him and say 'hi'. When he's in Canada he will only be communicating via text, so that's why I am suggesting that instead of calling.

Liz

The solstice isn't over yet, but so far Seth and I have had a long day of it. We dragged our sorry asses out of bed "early" to head over to the bank to deposit a cheque for my rent deposit- and the Wells Fargo people there put a hold on it for six days, so now I can't mail my ex-roomie his part of the deposit back until then. Most annoying, especially since he's been waiting for it. Seth, who got paid the day he was supposed to, was able to deposit his cheque successfully. My paycheque, which for some reason they mail to your home address the first time, didn't make it through the mail (WTF, people, just put it into campus mail, I'm on campus!!!) so hopefully I will see it Monday.

So we took out a small amount of money, since most of what is in our account is frozen for now, and decided to hunt for garage sales. We spent a merry hour or so driving around looking for them, with no success. Then we decided to shop in some thrift stores, and made some neat finds. At the Salvation Army, I found a nice big jewelery box that I'm going to funkify for $2.00, and a handmade ceramic cup that looks like it's been fired in a wood kiln for 50 cents. At Value Village, I found a bunch of cute things and an amazing green evening dress beaded from top to bottom that has patterns around the neck that resemble plant stems or vines- it has a few beads missing but I have until the end of October to fix it, and I already have leads on places to buy beads in Fairbanks. It was only $25.00, which is nothing compared to what a dress with that much beading is worth. Woot! I figure once I get my sewing machine up here I can make green gloves to match, and a green velvet choker.

Once we finished shopping, we went to Pioneer Park to visit some people Seth works with, then to a festival that was going on downtown- lots of terrific food for cheap. I had an Ecuadorean meal consisting of a cheese pupusa (omg, so yummy) and this spicy cole slaw stuff, and Seth had a reindeer hotdog that was a foot long. We found the Shakespeare festival tent (Fairbanks has one!) where we learned that some lighting guy around Fairbanks is retiring! Maybe Seth can nab that job. In any case, we are planning to go to see "Twelfth Night" tomorrow afternoon.

After that was Pioneer Park again, where Seth has a job as sound tech for an ongoing series of events. Tonight it was a storyteller, who told a bunch of very funny Alaskan folk-tale themed stories, which I learned afterward he mostly wrote himself. One of them was about the Alaskan Pacific Fur Fish, which due to earthquake destruction of their spawning grounds, can no longer be found. But you can find a specimen of the Fur Fish mounted above the Pioneer Park general store, and I took a cell phone photo of it.

Coming home we had a minor disappointment- the Midnight Sun Tea that Seth had been brewing out on the porch had been chewed into by some rodent, probably a squirrel, destroying the lid. So no Sun Tea for us, though we are making Solstice Lemonade with our expensive lemons.

Now we are back, after spending a day out in the sun wandering around. Time for lemonade and salad!

I hope you all have had a very happy Solstice. I for one will be looking forward to having night again.

On Sunday, I woke up at the ungodly early hour of 7:30 am to drag my sorry butt out and meet Dr. Jill Johnstone, an ecologist with the University of Saskatchewan, for a little field work. We drove out to the Caribou/Poker Creeks Research Watershed, where I discovered that my camera didn't have juice. Damn batteries.

The reason we were heading into the watershed: in 2004, a series of wildfires struck Alaska, including the CPCRW. Jill is working on post-fire plant succesional trajectories, or in figuring out the differences in which plants re-colonize the burned areas. I'm interested in looking at the role of soil fungi that form associations with plants in post-fire successional trajectories, so I will probably be coming back to the CPCRW for my own work.

On the drive into the watershed, we encountered a pair of moose- a mother and a baby moose- browsing along the side of the access road. They promptly wandered up into some of the sites we were planning on going to, so we changed our plans and started with the northernmost sites first.

The landscape was hilly and beautiful, with unburned forests on the left side of the access road, sloping downward, and burned areas sloping upward on the right. The burned areas had been re-colonized with shrubs and mosses, so there was plenty of greenery on the ground. Stark black trunks of charred black spruce stuck more or less upright in the ground or had fallen, like streaks of charcoal against a variegated green canvas. High on the crest of the hill, unburned paper birch with lovely white trunks rose against a sky that constantly changed from blue to gray.

I helped Jill with a few of her measurements, including an assessment of the size of fallen trees, or the size of some outplanted seedlings, in a variety of the sites. I also did a little of my own stuff, taking a trowel and digging up tiny inch-high black spruce seedlings for one of the students in my boss's lab to work on.

At two of the sites we visited, Jill and her team had planted 'exclosures', or chicken-wire fences, around some of the seedlings they had planted to make sure moose and other herbivores did not eat them. Since the seedlings were growing fairly big in size, one of my tasks was to flatten the exclosures and wrestle them down the hill- this was more difficult than it sounds mostly because of the many fallen logs and uneven ground. Hauling a big bundle of pointy-edged chicken wire in these circumstances isn't fun, especially when halfway down the hill it randomly began to hail.

I started to laugh- I couldn't just make a beeline for the truck, as there were nearly-invisible study sites in between and I was supposed to go around them. All the DEET I had sprayed on myself, and charcoal I had picked up from the fallen tree trunks in doing the deadfall surveys, was being mixed with rainwater, leaving my skin covered with this kind of greyish sheen, and it was chilly- and my fingers were falling asleep since the chicken wire was cutting off circulation. Jill yelled at me to just go right to the truck (which, incidentally, is where I left my rain jacket), so I just plowed my way down the hill with this huge bundle of chicken wire. Naturally, about five minutes after getting down to the truck, it stopped hailing.

I make it sound terrible, but really it was a fun time. The watershed was beautiful and quiet, a cool breeze and sun most of the day kept the "Alaskan birds" (mosquitoes) at bay, and I was stomping around a green hillside getting exercise and doing useful things. My new hiking boots that I purchased at a thrift store worked wonderfully, and my only injury was a gash on my leg that I got climbing over a bunch of tangled trees during the deadfall surveys. It was minor, though, no big deal. There were plenty of opportunities to break limbs or such, and nothing like that happened! Yay.

Incidentally, I have health insurance and am getting life insurance...

Heh. But it was a beautiful day out in the open, and I am looking forward to my next visit to the watershed. Hopefully this time with a camera that works...

There is a red car parked opposite ours, with the license plate "BLUCAR".

WHYYYYYYY??????

Hey, folks, since I'm considered faculty, Seth can take courses with free tuition here at UAF. I find out more about how this works on the 17th.

Me, I'm done with school. Unless there are pottery-making classes. I will make an exception for those.

{Liz}

Well, everyone that's been reading this blog knows that the reason Seth and I are up in Fairbanks is that I have a job up here. A few have inquired as to what it's about, and I think I told them "fungi that help plants to grow".

I've decided, in a fit of procrastination, to elaborate further on this, for those who are interested.

First, a nerdy little aside: I just was given an article from "Science" (magazine) that described how people took really, really old ice cores, some as old as 2.4 million years, and tried to get short bits of DNA out of them. They failed with some of the older cores, but did get pieces from newer cores. The really interesting part of that article to me was the fact that they did some funky statistical stuff to figure out the identity of the DNA fragments they were able to get from the newer cores (maybe 400,000-850,000 years old or so?). They were able to pull out sequences related to modern day conifers and other plants found in evergreen forests, suggesting that ancient Greenland (which is where the cores are from) was covered in an evergreen forest. Neat, huh? The article is Willerslev et al. 2007 Science 317:111-114, in case you are interested in details.

OK, what I am doing right now:

Hi everyone

You can reach Seth and I at:

Liz Bent and/or Seth Schwartz (if you use nicknames, your mail might not get put in the box)
P.O. Box 750123
Fairbanks, AK 99775-0123

Please write! I will write back. I have a few postcards that I intend to send to a few folks, and there are plenty more on the bookstore racks to choose from. If you are lucky I will send one of the ones with the cute naked guy on it. ><

I also have a new cell number so if you would like to phone me and don't have it already, message me and I will give it to you. Seth's is the same as it always was. He is having issues with Sprint relaying each text message he gets to him about, oh, a dozen times each, so if you are a cruel person you will send him a lot of texts. If you are kind you will refrain. I leave it up to you to decide what kind of person you want to be... :D

We move into an apartment on campus tomorrow! Plus we have to go back to Beaver Creek because I need to show the border guard that yes, I do have a Ph.D.

Once I get my stampy thingy in my passport, UAF can add me to the payroll! Then I will be raking in the dough. Well, sort of. Seth and I are going to have to be economical if we are going to visit LA this Halloween, and I still have to get our stuff shipped up here. O_o

{Liz}

I'm trying to recall everything that was interesting that happened on the road and writing it down for posterity, hence these recaps (which are less than exciting since you all know we made it to Fairbanks safe and sound)

Here is a little news bulletin before I resume writing about the trip:

1. Seth and I have an apartment on campus lined up that we can move into on the 5th.
2. Real estate is cheap here- we saw a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom heated garage jacuzzi bathtub home on more than 2 acres for $179,000. It is actually about the same cost as renting. So we may rent until we find a good deal and then buy a place together, hopefully in time for Christmas so I can retrieve my pookies (cats) from my parents' clutches. The apartment we are going to rent is a no pets one.
3. Seth is keen on panning for gold. He wants to take the gold he finds and put it into a ring for me. He also wants to make this ring himself. This is fine with me- I don't like most store-bought rings. For fun, we poked around a jewelery shop and boy, were all those rings ugly.
4. I have a new cell number. I still have the old one, but I am going to phase it out. This is because there is no Verizon service in Alaska, and I am getting a cheaper service plus a new phone for a lot less than I was paying with Verizon. So if you want my new cell number email me.

Now, back to the trip:

After a restless night spent in the front seats of the car, we awoke at about 5 am to bright sunshine and waited for the gas station to open. I don't recall ever being so bored in all my life. Watched gas station doors and all that... In any case, a kindly older couple finally opened the door to the station and turned the "Closed" sign to "Open", which made me extremely happy since I had to pee and with the bright sunlight there really was no place I could sneak off to for a clandestine leak.

We headed out on the road again with empty bladders and a full tank of gas to Watson Lake, where there is a "sign forest", or collection of about 60,000 signs, nailed up on posts. They have been acquired from all around the world, and while I didn't stop and look closely at the forest (we drove by slowly as I held the video camera), i did notice a sign from "Aachen", which I took to mean Aachen, Germany.  We had a humble breakfast in Watson Lake and headed on northwest again.

I was disoriented from lack of sleep that day. Mostly I held the video camera in hopes of seeing more animals, and I think once a caribou dashed across the road and I completely missed it. Otherwise, very little by way of excitement. We decided to treat ourselves to a nice room in the Alcan Hotel in Haines Junction, Yukon Territory, that had a jacuzzi in it, and reached Haines Junction after an uneventful ride ("Look! A tree! Look! A mountain! Another tree! Wow!" - trees and mountains, while beautiful, get old after a while). We were pleased to discover that the Alcan Hotel rooms had full-size jacuzzis that accomodate two people lying down, so Seth and I put on Sound and Fury's "Cyranose", bought some snacks and juice from the local grocery (I discovered these things called "Beaver Buzz", which were Canadian energy drinks that are "Dam Good"), and took a nice bath while we watched the show from the comfort of our tub. Yes, Mom, we put the laptop that was playing the show far away from the tub so there was no imminent danger of electrocution.

We woke up early the next morning- our last day on the road!- and headed north, on our way to Alaska. Kluane Lake was one highlight- a big lake that was still partially frozen in the Yukon- and another noticeable feature was the rough road (permafrost damage- the road heaved up in places so as you drove along you sometimes felt a bit like you were on a roller coaster) in the Yukon.  Before we hit the border station, we came across the international boundary between the Yukon Territory and Alaska. There's a little park set up with a monument that marks the border, but more freakily, you can see the border cut into the forests in the surrounding area. I don't think there are fences or anything, just this swath where the trees have been cut down, straight as an arrow extending as far as they eye can see along the rolling hills. So we took some photos and naturally Marty came out. I think those might be up on Seth's site already.

 We crossed the border without incident- I thought I'd get a stamp or something in my passport but no, nothing. When the border guy asked if we had any food with us, I thought of the smoked salmon we bought, as well as the buffalo sausage that we had with us, and said, "nope". So we have contraband meat!

We didn't linger much in any of the Alaskan towns we encountered along the way, and naturally, since the video camera was out and running, we didn't get any pictures of wildlife either. I think we saw a grizzly bear, but I am not sure if that was day two (Yukon) or day three (Alaska). In any case, we were happy when we reached Delta Junction, the official end of the Alaskan highway. There's a little interpretive center there, and we stopped for more pictures as well as to view some of the road-building equipment that was still on display.

A few hours later, we were rolling into Fairbanks, and a short while after that, we were ensconced in the Seven Gables Inn. The College Inn was much cheaper, but since it pretty much seemed like a crackhouse we passed it up. This time of year hotel prices are through the roof, and we are lucky that we found a place to stay this week that's only $800 for the week. I like this place a lot- we are staying in a very comfortable room with a jacuzzi tub and a beautiful bed, and the breakfasts are interesting. They are not always what I want to have for breakfast- they have themes each day (so far we have encountered Indian, Chinese, Italian (best so far), and Bahamian) and the food is not always, shall we say, authentic. Still, for the most part, it is tasty.

This is the end of blogging about our trip from Los Angeles, California to Fairbanks, Alaska. I hope to keep this journal going with updates on our adventures in Fairbanks, though I don't think we will be embarking on any trips any time soon.