In Which I Become a Barber (and Ivan is Brave)

Before

Supplies

During

 

 

 

 

 

 There is no barber shop on the island, so hair cutting is a strictly do-it-yourself affair. I've managed to dodge the issue by growing my hair out, but Ivan likes to keep his hair short (and he was getting quite shaggy). He was brave to entrust clipper duties to me.

Want to see the results?

Radio Silence

 

The state of the equipment in the abandoned LORAN station pretty much matches my blogging mojo of late. I’ve been totally consumed with my two shiny new jobs. They’re both part time, but together they add up to more than full-time, and have me working six days a week. Both jobs also involve working with children, which means that I have been unmercifully thrown into a pit of (very cute) walking petri dishes, and have been semi-successfully battling the slew of colds and coughs going around.

I am very glad to be working again (I was starting to feel rather like a 50s housewife) and I know that I’ll get used to the pace. But for now things may be a bit quiet around here.

Speaking of things that are quiet—or not—we’re still getting a lot of aftershocks after last week’s earthquake, which I should mention was downgraded to a 6.4 after seismologists had time to crunch some data. I'm so very thankful that there was no damage, no tsunami, and no injuries.

Parting shot. The island's mercurial weather is great for rainbows. This is the start of the path towards the hot springs, which Ivan reached on Sunday—quite a trek.

Holy Earthquake, Batman - Magnitude 6.9

Yeah, we felt that one.

(Screen shot from USGS)

6.9

33km S of Tanaga Volcano, Alaska

2012-09-26 23:39:58

51.583°N

178.200°W

40.5

The devastating 2010 Haiti earthquake was a 7.0-- not much more than this one. It went on for at least 30 seconds. The whole house was shaking, drawers were rattling, and you could hear and see the earth moving outside. I'm listening for the tsunami siren, but not hearing anything. Everything is built to be very seismically safe; as far as I can tell, there was no damage. Does seem that the phones are out, though the internet is chugging along just fine.

The island is a pretty seismic place-- ring of fire and all that. There are minor (< 3.0) earthquakes almost daily, and we had a 4.3 the other day that was definitely noticeable. The screenshot above (from the Alaska Earthquake Information Center) shows that one, and also how seismic Alaska is in general. Just another part of life out here in the Aleutians.