Midnight Sun

The Summer Solstice, official first day of summer and longest day of the year, has officially passed.  Ironic that summer has only really just begun and we can already start complaining about losing daylight and the months of darkness that loom ahead.  But luckily, celebrating the Solstice in Anchorage is typically a joyous occasion: it is the exact opposite of those very dreaded aformentioned months of darkness. 

The Solstice celebration in Anchorage began on Saturday, because Anchoragites just can't pass up a nice summer day. (They are often few and far between).  With the Mayor's Midnight Sun Marathon and Half-Marathon, there are plenty of ways to torture yourself in the name of sunshine.  I ran the half, which despite being painful was also the most tanning I've gotten in all summer.  I guess I'll take what I can get. 

Downtown Anchorage was also alive with the Summer Solstice Festival-- basically a lot of overpriced touristy crap to buy and food that's sure to counteract whatever benefit running the marathon gave you.  What a great tradition.  Perhaps the most popular Solstice tradition is the midnight hike up Flattop mountain-- the most overused, overrated hike in Alaska.  Since you can drive your car halfway up the mountain (but  never find a parking spot) and follow a wide, gravel path and built in stairs most of the way to the summit, it is very overly popular on all days of the summer.  The wide, windswept plateau of a summit is perfect for late-night beer drinking and bonfires, both of which are illegal in the Chugach State Park. 

So Saturday night was the first of many Solstice-themed Flattop adventures-- mostly the 9-5 crowd who didn't have the luxury of waiting until true Solstice to make the hike.  The three extra seconds of daylight really made a difference.
What does it really mean to live in "the land of the midnight sun" on the longest day of the year?  Well, there's no tanning available at 2 in the morning.  In Anchorage, the sun set at 11:49 pm and rose at 4:20 am on the night of Tuesday the 21st.  Those four and a half hours of "darkness" never really get past the light blue dusky phase: enough to drive with your headlights on but not enough to be afraid of what's ahead in the shadows.  Drive eight hours north to Fairbanks, Alaska, where the sun only dipped below the horizon from 12:58 am till 2:48 am.  A couple thousand miles north of there, in Barrow, AK, the sun does not sink below the horizon for three months straight.  Then again, it still snowed there last week.

In addition to joining the masses at Flattop, there are plenty of late-night Solstice activities.  Most just include driving out to a scenic viewpoint and watching the sun(not)set:  Beluga Point, the top of Aleyeska Mountain, Point Woronzof, etc.  In a way, the Solstice is a bit like New Year's Eve: it never quite lives up to your expectations.  It may seem like the most exciting night of the summer, but the negligible difference in daylight gain really makes it just another long night of Alaskan summer.  Beautiful, yes, but it hardly turns out to be anything too special.  When I began this blog post at 2:27 am last night, my Solstice festivities had come to an end.  But now we're losing daylight more and more every day, so the rest of the summer will be a scramble to soak up as many minutes as possible before the darkness and seasonal affective disorder kicks in in the fall. 

Unfortunately, I can't get a picutre of the sky at midnight to upload, but I'll post one as soon as I can!

Doin' the Daily Grind

Ahh, that moment when you turned in your last final, packed your bags, and finally arrived home for summer.  Time to relax, tan, sleep in, and party with high school friends, right?? Err...for some of us, summer is the time when we've got to earn all that money that keeps us partying hard during the school year, and allows those lovely little weekend trips to the city or a neighboring school.  I've been lucky to hold the same job for almost four years now-- luckily, they are willing to take me back for holidays and summers when I find myself available.  Almost everyone has to find some sort of summer job, especially once they realize how quickly they burn through their savings while away at school.  There are always the classic summer jobs-- babysitting (as we get older, we may call it "nannying"), lifeguarding (usually an easy way to make money while tanning), hostessing or barista-ing at a popular eatery (also known as giving free stuff to your friends who come visit).  But there are tons of ways to earn money over the summer-- and if you say you can't find a job, you probably don't really want one.

If you live here in Anchorage, there are some unique jobs available.  We all know our friends who leave for two months to work at a fish cannery or commercial fishing operation, and make like $2,000 a week. In the words of Sarah Palin's Alaska, "Every Alaskan kid has worked on a slime line at some point in their lives."  (This is a lie. I, for one, have never set foot near a slime line, except maybe on a second grade field trip).  Or if you're really lucky, you can snag a Prudhoe Bay slope job. These kids usually have parents who work for an oil company, and they go up to the northernmost tip of Alaska for two weeks, work 18-hour days, then come home for two weeks.  It's actually a sweet deal and also pays extremely well.  It better, because apparently it was snowing up there yesterday.

I work a more conventional job, at a bakery, where I can actually go home after an 8-hour shift and not be stuck in the wilderness.  My bakery is so generous about giving college kids their jobs back in the summer, that we have far too many employees.  Even though I asked for 40 hours a week, the most I get is about 25.  They have to create extra things for us to clean, just to give us the hours.  It's kind of an inefficient business model, but I guess I still appreciate it!

I've had to look on craigslist a little for a half-assed attempt at finding another job, because sometimes I feel like I need a little extra cash.  Not enough to actually secure a second job, though.  I'll supplement with under-the-table babysitting jobs.  But craigslist is filled with employment opportunities, each sketchier than the next: "camerman needed for amateur adult films;" "Be the third wheel of our tricycle;" and more.  What do those even mean?!  My advice would be to stay away from all the job postings that don't mention the name of the business.  How do they expect to get any applicants??

An ideal job to me would be one where you make a shit ton of tips.  Unfortunately, my job discourages tips, so five dollars a day is making bank for me.  But if I was a barista or waitress, where you get around $100 a week in tips alone, I would save my entire paycheck and use just tip money for regular weekly expenses like food and gas.  Then, you're fully aware of where the money from your paycheck is actually going.  It seems like the best deal to me.  Or a full-time, tax-free nanny position.  Kids are bearable enough if you're able to drive them around to all those activities that are supposed to take the pressure off the parents.  When you nanny, parents pay gas money, activity money, and usually at least ten dollars an hour for you to watch tv and eat their food.

If anyone has either of these jobs available to me in Anchorage, call me up.  If you need a job, hopefully there are some places you can start looking: craigslist, local restaurants, your parents' offices, or the nearest summer camp.  I say enjoy these jobs while you can, before you have to do something productive and educational like office work or (gasp!) an unpaid internship in your intended field.  I'll stick with my mindless daily customer service and cleaning job for now.