other, stories

–is its dynamic nature.

I mean, we are talking crazy. This is teleporting from the surface of pluto to the surface of the sun in oh, like, 15 minutes.

Ok..so, to be honest, maybe sometimes it is too dynamic. But not often. Most of the time, the worst of the worst comes right before the type of great day that makes me want to sit and stare out the window and savor the feeling and not forget it ever, ever, ever.

Like friday* was one of those beautiful days. Incredible. I worked really, really really hard and used every trick I know, and it all worked. Clockwork. Swiss clockwork with half a gazillion ruby crystal bearings. The kids understood me well, they worked hard, they were helpful, and everybody learned and had fun. Lovely. Did I mention that thursday was positively hell on wheels?

I think this dynamic nature of teaching appeals to me so because it tells of the human condition. Generally, a rough day for me means that one or more of my students was having a bad day. When a day goes from being the worst day ever to being the best day ever (for me, that is), that correspondingly means that one or more of my students exhibited some great resilience and heart and went from having a miserable time to having a hoot: smiling, laughing, and learning. And I love that about humans, resilience and heart and the ability to recover and stand up and do well. And when I see that in my students, well, lets just say the stark beauty of it has gotten me misty-eyed on more then one occasion.

*This was from sometime late april ’14, written on a monday.

diomede, other

Well, two years is much less time then what I wanted, but so it goes. So it goes. Farewell, Diomede–I’ll miss you. I’ll miss my students. I’ll miss those kiddos. A lot. I’ll miss my coworkers who also are some of my best friends. I’ll miss the store and the summers and the smiles and the friends and the wild experiences and the friday night ball and the birds and the crab and the eskimo food. There are many more things I am thinking and feeling about having to leave Diomede; it all needs time to mull about and settle, though. Right now I’m light and the ‘thinking’ and heavy on the ‘feeling,’ and the feelings are largely composed of sadness and frustration.

One chapter ends, another begins. While I am sad to have to leave the island, I definitely am excited to work in Lake & Pen, and I’m excited about lots of flying, reading, writing, music, and drawing this summer. Well, ok. Realistically, probably only two or three of those things (I tend to say I’m going to do more then I actually do).

Also: an hour before our ride arrived the weather had cleared out enough and I launched my rocket. The cloud ceiling was at maybe 1500-2000, and she punched through it quicker then you can say bub’s your uncle. The sound was truly awesome. Launching big rockets is something I would like to do more often.

Liftoff
Liftoff
Farewell, Diomede
Farewell, Diomede
The crew
The crew
diomede, other

This is what it’s like to fly in to Nome in a Bolkow Bo-105 in the springtime. Moderate breeze, good pilot with a steady hand.

Pardon the two ‘oh I should rotate ninety degrees here’ moments. I thought it’d be cool to be able to see what the pilot was doing better, but when I’m taking video I tend to forget that I can’t just, like, rotate part of the video so that it’s all right side up. I don’t shoot video very often.

Also, this is a pretty good approximation of the view from the back seat:

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diomede, other

She’s finished. Permanent-marker coloring job, parachute and shock cored rigged and attached, motor loaded.

Today (the last day of school!) was rocket day, the kids fired off all of their rockets, I didn’t launch mine though–visibility wasn’t too good, ceiling of maybe 400′. I’m hoping for a clear morning. In the past half hour (it’s 2:30am now) things started to clear up a little bit, so there’s hope!

Also, there are a couple pictures of the fleet of my students. All launches were successful! I have more photos, but they are all of students working on their rockets, so I shouldn’t post them (privacy). I don’t have any photos of the launches, as I was rather busy at the time :)

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diomede, other, stories

More rocket building! She is almost ready to fly. I skipped a step involving putting glue into a spot I firmly believe there is no way to get to without some specialized tool (super narrow and long glue syringe?), which I don’t have. The glue was to firmly connect the fins to the body tube, so I figured I’d just make some mega epoxy filets on the outside. Same thing, right? Actually no, because epoxy is way heavier then CA glue, so she’ll need a CP/CG check once everything else is done. Basically: if the center of gravity (CG) is too far aft (i.e., behind this rockety thing called the “center of pressure,” or CP) the rocket naturally goes into a turn–not a spin, a turn–as soon as it’s in flight. Turning rockets are bad juju. Speak of bad juju, I will add–at risk of jinxing this whole thing–that I am a wee bit worried that the fin mount rings aren’t well-enough secured to the motor tube. If that concern bears fruit (weird way to say it? yup), then the motor and motor tube will blast through the rocket and fly god-knows-where, spinning and turning and corkscrewing at speeds extraordinarily unbecoming for such behavior. Exciting! I believe I will wear scientist goggles and hide behind a piece of plywood for the launch.

:)

Checking the fin mounts for alignment in the body tube
Checking the fin mounts for alignment in the body tube
Fins mounted!
Fins secured!
Final motor mount centering ring epoxied in and fin root filets done. She's close!
Final motor mount centering ring epoxied in, launch lugs mounted, and fin root filets done. She’s close!
Thanks to willis for storing his tripod in my classroom, for without it this selfie would not have been possible!
Thanks to willis for storing his tripod in my classroom, for without it this selfie would not have been possible!
diomede, stories

No, actually, literally, Russian dogs. From the Russian military base across the dateline. They showed up last week and wandered around, staying clear of the village. Then yesterday three of the four took off straight out to the edge of the sea ice, skirted north around the open water and then made tracks straight back to Big Diomede. They left one behind, which was shot late last night.

Seriously, I’m not making this stuff up!

The second photo is a very, very very cropped version of the first.

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other, stories

The last week of school is: Rocket Week!! This year I decided to take part in the fun. I’ve wanted to shoot off a big model rocket for a while, and when I was buying model rocket motors in Anchorage back in August I simply couldn’t not pick up the largest motor they had that didn’t require a license (an Aerotech G80-10, for the interested). When I ordered rocket kits for the kiddos, I also ordered a big rocket for the big motor.

Since next week is the last week, today was building time! The motor mount is all done (approximately half the work). It was very interesting and kinda fun to put together: unlike the small rockets I’ve made before, this model’s design manifests significant thought towards distributing the motor’s impulse effectively to the body through surface to surface joints and not through cement/glue/epoxy joints. Which is to say it made me feel a little bit like a rocket scientist as I worked.

Also, according to a youtube video, this sucker should get to 2000 to 3000 feet, traveling at 600+ mph. Yeah! Awesome!

Er..also..yeah..that does make me a little nervous. Did I mention the launch-button-controller thing has all of twenty feet of wire between the switch and the alligator clips? I’m seriously considering building a plywood box with a narrow-slit-window from which to control/launch/video the launch.

Reading instructions and looking at diagrams
Reading instructions and looking at diagrams
Checking the fin mounts for proper alignment. The fins, which mount through the body, transfer the motor's impulse from the motor mount to the rocket's body. Cool, huh?
Checking the fin mounts for proper alignment. The fins, which mount through the body, transfer the motor’s impulse from the motor mount to the rocket’s body. Cool, huh?
everything ready for epoxy? ready! ready-set-mix! and apply! Go go go! ... that's kinda what goes through my mind when work with a very, very very limited supply of 5-minute epoxy.
everything ready for epoxy? ready! ready-set-mix! and apply! Go go go! … that’s kinda what goes through my mind when work with a very, very very limited supply of 5-minute epoxy.
One motor mount ready to go. Not seen: the cool internal steel-ribbon baffling designed to cool the gasses from the ejection charge before they reach the fragile lightweight parachute. Rocket science, folks.
One motor mount ready to go. Not seen: the cool internal steel-ribbon baffling designed to even out and cool the gasses from the ejection charge before they reach the fragile lightweight parachute. Rocket science, folks.
diomede, stories

There is a story behind this picture, email/comment for the details. Summary: it was either the best day of my life or the second best day of my life. Jury’s still out. Huge thanks to Ross for the photo!

photo

other

Go to google maps and pick an area of the world where there seems to be absolutely nothing then zoom in some and then pan around until I find a town then read the wikipedia article about that town.

other, photography

When I approach a large change in life I begin to wax nostalgic about good things from times long past. A big change is coming in a few months and this time around the subject of my nostalgia is: my central american year. For every person you see below, there are ten more who were in the story behind the picture, for every smile caught by camera there were twenty more when the camera was put away…

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other

Four days ago I accepted a position in a different school district. In a month and a half I’ll be leaving Diomede, and in five months I’ll be beginning again in a new village, Nondalton.

Nondalton is located on the Alaska Peninsula, about 150 air miles from Anchorage.

Not gonna lie, it will break my heart to leave Diomede and the kiddos and my friends here. That said, I will also say that this new teaching position is an unbelievably perfect fit for me. Literally–it is hard for me to believe it is real, it seems too good to be true! I will have opportunities to pursue aviation all year round, not just during the summer. There is a National Park & Preserve literally a few miles away, there’s a beautiful lake and a pristine river. I hear about the village is that it’s a very pleasant place, the school staff is a solid group, and the district has an incredible reputation. I am honored to be joining their crew :)

Here’s an aerial photo: http://www.paulcolor.com/index.php#mi=2&pt=1&pi=10000&s=24&p=3&a=0&at=0

photography

The sun’s an angel and the other day she donned her halo for us.

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