The view from the outhouse.
Tuesday January 26
Hello all from Silty Slough. It has been a over a week since my last post. No frost on the pumpkin this morning, it done froze and busted. One below zero on my bare legs when the boys and we went out to do our business.
I was texting with a friend in California last night. He said it was 40 there and they were huddled around the fireplace warming up. I told him it was 12 here. He said it didn’t even get that cold in their freezer. I’ll give you the day by day to get caught up.
Sunday January 17
Last night we left the river at Fish Lakes Creek for a shortcut to Roger and Myra’s house to get our mail that Roger had picked up earlier. Important package, repair parts to get our grandkids snow machine going. It is the main reason for Thorian to make the trip out here. Quite a trip out here riding double with Grandma Kari. It is still warm low 30s so unloading Clyde, the fuel barrels, and the treadmill isn’t too much of a chore for the three of us. We only had room to pump one barrel into our storage, so we will have to buy a couple more empty barrels the next trip in.
Now it is time to get the 1978 200cc Arctic Cat Lynx snow machine going. We need to replace the throttle cable and kill switch with new ones from a vintage dealer in Rice, MN. I can’t believe original parts are still available. All finished. I gave it a couple pulls and decided we needed some fresh fuel. While I was mixing the fuel and oil, Kari was looking everything over. Where is the drive belt? After all she is the resident expert on belts, having changed a Yahama belt in record time representing SkiDoo riders at the snow machine rodeo in Dawson City, Yukon about 10 years ago.
It’s right there and there is a spare. I guess not. Someone must have needed both of them more than they thought we did while it was parked in our stall at the landing. Bummer, well it started with the fresh gas. I’ll call Jerry back in Minnesota in the morning and get a couple on the way. Needless to say Thor is disappointed.
Monday January 18
Today I ordered the belts. It is still too warm for this time of year. Tomorrow we need to go back to town for some appointments on Wednesday and Thursday. I can’t remember too much else about today’s activities except the cook outdid herself by making halibut chunks and corn fritters with honey butter.
Tuesday January 19
It is still warm and we are concerned with the overflow conditions on the river. We checked with trailmaster Roger and he said we would be ok and on the way back Friday to travel light, 1000 pounds or so on the sleds. After Thorian had his Zoom home school we put the boys in there kennel on the sled, mounted up and headed down the river with a couple totes of trash and one empty fuel barrel. It was a good run in with the only problem being flat light making it difficult to see. The overflow wasn’t a problem with just a couple mushy spots. Thorian decided he was going to stay in town until his machine was running for sure, so we made the trek into the big city from the landing.
Wednesday January 20
Some of you have a new President. Mayor Cooper has made a proclamation that anytime this president is mentioned in Silty Slough he will be referred to as, “President by cheating Biden”. We missed the inauguration like most people since it was at 8 o’clock in the morning and we don’t have TV anyway. I here there were about 100 spectators and over 25,000 troops at the big event. “President by cheating Biden” just can’t ever seem to draw a crowd. How’s that Coopy? We had an appointment at 2:30 so I had to get the Kubota out and blow the driveway at noon. The weather here is very different from the cabin. At the cabin we have feet of snow, at Wolf Lake we have a few inches, barely enough to cover the grass. I have to fast this evening for my appointment tomorrow.
Thursday January 21
My appointment is at 11 and then we are going to take our cabin neighbor Steve’s truck to town. He parks it by the hangar to save on the parking fees at the airport since he is only up here a couple times a year now that he retired from the Slope. I’ll drive it and Kari will follow and pick me up. He arrives Saturday to spend a month at his cabin. His truck has a 5 speed manual transmission. I can’t remember the last time I drove a stick, years. It comes back to you pretty quick after you kill the engine a few times. Soon I was double clutching it like you had to do the old International trucks just to take me back to my childhood. I remember driving Big Red an International wrecker back when I was 16 or 17 when I spent most of my time at the gas station next door to my house. Anyway I made it to Anchorage Park and left it with the attendant. I was sort of relieved when she said they would park it. Not to waste a trip to town we made a low pass at Costco and picked up a couple things we needed. $500 lighter and we still didn’t have anything for dinner. Off to the Palmer City Ale House so I could have the Bloody Mary with the cheeseburger on top.
Friday January 22
The nurse called with my test results. Everything was in range just favoring the high side. She recommended eating a bit healthier and exercise. I told her that I had been exercising, after all just this week I loaded a treadmill into my pickup, then loaded it on the freight sled, then unloaded it at the cabin. Next weeks exercise program is to move it inside. The following week, plug it in and move the junk that will already be piled on it. After all one can only do so much. I think I’ll teach the boys to use it so we won’t have to go out in the cold for their exercise. I can sit in the rocker and have a Tiger Woods while I monitor their program.
Saturday January 23
Steve arrived in the afternoon. We got into a big discussion about the liberal Trump haters and the sad condition of affairs after only a couple days of “President by cheating Biden”
The temps are still in the 30s all the way up the river so we are going to hang out here until Monday when the temp is forecast to be 18 for the high.
Sunday January 24
Teddy and I need to get some empty fuel barrels for our next venture. More about it in the next view. I called my usual place that has them for $10 but they don’t have some. Motor oil and other lubricants come to Alaska in barrels, they are not worth shipping back so there are several people that make a business of selling used barrels. Teddy and I hadn’t talked about it or anything but as if by magic these barrels popped up on FB marketplace. I text the guy and he said to come on over $15 each. I got there, being a cheap airline pilot I offered $50 for four. He immediately said no. Ok full price. They were a bit heavy when we loaded them. When I got home I drained 1 gallon of new clean 10w 30 motor oil out of each one. Net cost zero or less. BobbyRay do I have to report the oil as income or can I send the barrels to Alabama for the chickens to stand on while painting the north side of the silo from your previous question?
I needed to accomplish something today so I worked more on the material list for Spruce Manor. Building material is out of sight since Aunt Teefa and the BLM turmoil sucked up all the plywood boarding up everything. We have decided to press on just like any other government project. Start out over budget, we can always downsize later. But it will be too expensive to downsize then so we will just continue over budget. Someone will bail us out. Maybe the boys can help by getting a student loan and going for their masters in bird chasing or barking at snow machines. I’m sure they can get employment somewhere. If not some of the working people with skills and jobs will bail them out. Please don’t get me started. I’m supposed to pay for some dip shit liberals degree in underwater basket weaving.
We made a quick trip to the landing to drop off 3 new 100# propane tanks and to pump 108 gallons of electricity into two of our new barrels. I had enough Fred Meyer fuel points from their liquor store to get a dollar a gallon off 105 gallons of gas. Would that be considered drinking and driving? I don’t want to break the law.
Monday January 25
Today is the day to return to civilization. It is 10 degrees so the river has firmed up. Pack up the totes, get the cold food in a cooler so it won’t freeze, load a 110 gallon aluminum truck tank to be used for the generator, and head for the landing after driving through Arby’s. 2 fish for $6, what the heck 4 for $12. One may be good on the trail at Scary Tree. At the landing the machines fueled and oiled, boys in the kennel, everything loaded and strapped down, we are ready to head up the creek. No paddle necessary. Made our usual stop after about 5 miles to check our load. We met Roger at about the 10 mile marker, grooming the trail. He asked if I wanted to make a round trip tomorrow, Kari said yes, I said I didn’t know. I don’t have anything at the landing to haul so by the time I go to town and round up enough to make a load it would make for too long of a day. We headed on and at the normal overflow spots we could see it had been really mushy. My sled is fairly light today about 1200 pounds, it would have been interesting yesterday. A good incision to wait until today. This is the first year for mile markers on the trail. I make all kinds of mental calculations as we pass each marker, 5 miles, do this 10 more times and we are there, 18 miles one third of the way, 24 miles one third of the second third done, 27 miles half way, 37/54ths of the way, and so on. Soon it is one mile to go to Silty Slough. Kari and I head up the ramp and make the loop to climb the hill to the cabin no problem. We have arrived at our asylum 80 feet above Silty Slough. Heat and electricity are still operating, the cats are happy to see us. Well as happy as cats can act. The boys are out of the kennels and rolling in the snow at their happy place.
Thank you Lord for a good safe trip.
I’ll be in touch.
Blue skies!!!
I’m not getting a lot of traffic on the blog siltyslough.wordpress.com. I’m beginning to think it may not have been worth all the work.
The View from the Outhouse 