My "Weekends"

Tuesday nights always send me into Wednesday recovery mode. It’s a mile or so to The Marlin, a bar that I frequent in the middle of my "weekend" of those two days, and I always take it upon myself to walk it.

This trip has become sort of a ritual for me, and as the night temperatures fall to single and negative digits, it is a passage that I must endure to allow myself to enjoy the beer or five I have at the bar. The path is becoming so automatically recognizable that it, for a second, seems like I’ve been here longer than two months. I can gauge the time and distance traveled by almost any landmark, street name or swerve in the street.

I amuse myself with my thoughts and my iPod., mercifully kept in the breast pocket of my jacket. I worried about exposing it and my cell phone to the cold but was relieved to hear the worst that usually happens to electronics is the freezing of LCD screens and alkaline batteries.
The first few walks were a brisk jaunt on the north edge of town, with the moon – and sometimes the aurora borealis – to please my eyes, but a cloudy fall has limited my entertainment to music and kicking packed clumps of frozen snow.

When I arrive at the bar, I usually head directly for the restroom to hand-comb my beanie-matted hair and, recently, wash the ice off my beard that formed from my crystalized breath.
The DJ group that spins every week is called Hangover Lounge. They dabble with soul-inspired rap and harder beats but generally stick to pop tunes from the '50s and '60s. Sometimes the mix becomes too overbearing for bar conversation, but

Because it’s a Tuesday, the place is near-empty. This, for many people, means a poor socializing atmosphere. Not me. I grab my first beer, usually an Alaskan Brewery pint of some sort, and nudge into a conversation. From this alone, I’ve rounded up a Tuesday Night Crew of sorts. They’re mostly hippies and free spirits that either grew up in Fairbanks or go to UAF.

There’s Zeb, the gay model who moved to Portland three years ago and realized how rough big cities can be. He’s better for the experience, I think.

Then there’s John, musician (including Hangover Lounge) by night and short-order cook by day. He seems to take his cooking as seriously as his music, and he’s shared stories with me about surviving in a hot kitchen and the transition to -40 degrees outside.

And that’s not to mention Emily the constant dancer, Joel who wears glasses without lenses, Gwen the gleeful flirt, Lauren the brewer ... well, you get the idea. I’ve got a Tuesday posse.

We drink, we dance and we part for the week. Depending on how much ale I’ve enjoyed, I usually have to stop once or twice to write my name in the snow. Back in Florida, I could put off bathroom breaks for hours. In the cold? Fifteen minutes, tops.

Then comes Wednesday. I always have lofty plans for Wednesday – hiking, exploring, self-empowering activities – but well, I’m usually pretty hung over. Nevertheless, I push on, only to realize I lack the proper equipment to do so.

My first foray into exploring some of the winter trails was promising. I walked about three miles on a path north of UAF, fighting a snow flurry that continually strengthened. I was able to snap a few shots but the snow was a bother and I didn’t want to ruin my camera.

I'm not trying to look smooth, that's just the closest thing I could force to a smile.


This trail looks inviting but it's actually an amazingly tiring walk. There's treelimbs and roots buried under the fresh snow, so I nearly tripped four or five times.

Yeah, it's a booger shot, but I wanted to give the trees some scope of size.

Does this trail dead-end or never end? I honestly don't remember.

I decided to further explore that site the next week, but it had been closed to hiking because it was a groomed cross-country skiing trail. I attacked the same hill from the other side and got as far as a mile into it, before being blocked by another groomed trail.

Last week, I discovered a cool indoor driving range behind Play It Again Sports. It’s a simulated experience, but still, it’ll keep my already-shabby swing from deteriorating.

Even though there’s limited light, I plan on using the next few weekends to explore the nearby towns of Fox, North Pole, ect. It’s not exactly tourist season, but I’m sure they got some cool stuff to see somewhere in the tiny towns ‘round here.