Yogurt

I've got my eye on thermometers this morning: outside because it's below zero and too cold for Super Cat and inside because I am making delicious yogurt.

It's super-easy and costs a quart of milk and a little starter yogurt.

Everything has to be very clean.

Here's what you do:

Heat two cups of milk (skim, 2%, whole) slowly to 204 degrees on a burner with a diffuser on it.

Transfer to a glass container and let it cool down to 106 degrees.

Add two teaspoons of plain yogurt and whisk together.

Filter into a very clean thermos and leave overnight or for 8 hours until it is thick.  Foolproof!

Pour into glass containers and refrigerate.

I've been taking one more step and letting the extra liquid drain through paper towel or cheesecloth, so it is extra thick and creamy, like Greek yogurt.

Union

The local IBEW 1547's three divisions voted down the company's offer on a four-year contract extension.

The company's offer is as follows for the O & E employees:

2013 Raise       3.75%
2014 Raise       3.25%
2015 Raise            0
2016 Raise       2.25%

Healthcare cost increases for 2013:  Company pays 60%, employee 40% with a $500 deductible.

Increases 6-10% for the following three years.

This means the lower grades, mainly Member Services, will be working for less wages in four years than they are now.

Still, you gotta have health insurance and you gotta have a job and there are so many out of work now, even up here.  The Anchorage School District just laid off over 200 people and the teachers are up in arms.

I feel we are very fortunate.

Sunday

Sundays are a balance of things I have to do versus things I would like to do.  The things I have to do I won't mention, as everybody has to do these get-ready-for-the-week things.  As usual, these posts tend to be about food because I do most of my cooking for weekday lunches on Sundays. 

Yesterday we went to a neighborhood grocery store called Red Apple, way over on the East side, across town.    I realized I used to shop there many years ago when I lived in Mountain View (when it was a safe and happy place), but didn't recognize it because there is an overpass over the Glenn now, instead of an intersection and a light.  I wouldn't have recognized it except for the location.

In those days, I lived in a suburb of ranch homes just across the Glenn off Bragaw.  I rented a room from a pleasant teacher named Carolyn George who was just as sweet and pleasant a person as I have ever met.  She met and married a ne'er do well named George, sold her house for an RV, and traveled around the Lower 48 with him.  We had a falling out when I mentioned his interest in other women.  I often wonder how she is, where she is.  I have always regretted choosing to mention an incident and since then, I have tried to keep my mouth shut.

The Red Apple caters to the overflowing ethnic population of  mostly Asians and Polynesians and stocks basic grocery items most of us need.  We had such fun looking at all the strange things written in languages an immigrant might be ecstatic to see.  The Irish was definitely the only white male there, but I was in good company with other Native women, although they looked a lot tougher than me.  

The first thing I saw was a stockpot that would take three men to carry.  It nestled among 50-lb. bags of rice, rubberbands, chopstickes, bamboo mats, and huge stainless steel woks.  I was happy to see plantains, several unknown kinds of turnips, but not the kale we have been looking for since before the 1st.  

There was an enormous selection of various meats (some of which made me queasy):  goat, tripe, pig uteri, oxtails on special, squid,  octopus, pigs' and calves' heads, sweetbreads, and many frozen mysteries.

We did not find duck sauce, unknown also at Carr's, Costco, and New Sagaya.  The did have huge jars of Spring Roll sauce chock-full of red chili pepper flakes, but that is not the same...   There were shelves and shelves oyster sauce which must be terrifically popular and from the size of the containers of most everything, all most unsuitable for two people, Chinese restuarants must stock up here.  I also saw a huge bag of coarse MSG.  Hmm...

Our treasures included fresh Thai basil, Bonne Maman preserves from France (most unusual given the clientele), and jars of roasted red peppers.  Any non-Alaskan dweller may not realize how expensive perishable and glass items are.  The glass items were 'on special' on the end caps, waiting to be plucked.  Perhaps Red Apple will be our go-to substitute for Ocean State Job Lot.  The store gets a plus as they carry not one, but two kinds of annatto seed and large boxes of Goya achiote powder with cilantro which reminds me of an old co-worker, a large and sour ex-New Yorker, who bore a child with a man of color, moved to insular and isolated NE Kingdom to live among the loggers, and cooked only Latin-style food.

Today I have made potato-leek soup, there is a turkey in the oven, and I am finishing the candied peel I started several weeks ago.  The peels were in water in the fridge, taking up space.  It was time. It is good in coffee.

It is snowing, but the days are noticeably longer and it is light on the ride home now.  Lovely. 

(P.S.  I don't seem to be able to add any pictures, so you'll have to imagine the frozen lemongrass, four voluptuous jars of red peppers, and the Bonne Maman with their colorful red and white checked tops.)

CAP Test Preparation

I am in the thick of studying to take and pass the Certified Administrative Professional exam. Most of the administrative professionals at Chugach have taken this rigorous test. Many have passed on the first try; some have not.

The study material consists of three manuals and an extended supplemental list of related books, magazines, periodicals, and newspapers. Office Administration, Office Systems and Technology, and Management are the three components of the exam.

Studying is slow-going and frustrating. The latest editions are from 2005, which is ancient, espcially with regard to Information Technology which is in a constant state of flux. Also, the authors have done a poor job of actually writing  and I find myself mentally editing what they have written, wondering if I have guessed and grasped what they really meant to convey.

Clear and precise communication is one of the most important objectives for the administrative professional and this concept is stressed throughout the three books. Ironically, the authors are often anything but. At first I thought it was just me, but my study partner Gorgeous Jen, who is very much on the ball and a former editor, has expressed the same.

Still, the subject matter can be surprisingly interesting, which is a good thing considering the profession I am in. I am definitely learning and appreciating all the new brain connections I am forging!

We started late and basically have to read and assimilate four chapters a day. Pretty impossible actually for both of us. Jen has two small children; I teach after work.

The test will be in Fairbanks as there were not enough Anchorage students to make it worthwhile to host the exam here. I am flying up the day before; Jen is driving. It will be interesting to compare the Fairbanks of 2012 with the town I knew 25 years ago!

Break a leg Jen and alison!

Update

I re-scheduled my test to May 2013, but Jen passed!!

 

Mid-Week

I have been in a seminar for administrative professionals this week in downtown Anchorage at a hotel.  Debra Ballard of Macon, GA is the instructor and she is wonderful: intelligent, funny, observant, and completely qualified after 25 years in the utility industry. 

I am proud to say I am able to negotiate the spirals in the parking garage without undue difficulty. This is a first for me!  Hurrah!!

Horror of horrors, there is another wind/rainstorm forecast for Southcentral this weekend.  Turnagain Arm and the Hillside are forecast to get the brunt, but I think I heard 60 mph wind in Anchorage.  As the leaves are still on the trees, this could do just as much damage as last week's storm. 

We are terrified that the big cottonwood in the back yard will go down.  It could easily take out any number of houses.  Think good thoughts, everybody.

We are on "call-out" alert at the utility company.

In other news, I believe I have found all the supporting evidence necessary to document our move to AK to qualify for the Permanent Fund Dividend checks that get doled out to AK residents in late fall.   I am rather proud of this as we have things piled everywhere in this tiny house.  This deadline is coming up fast, faster than the CAP test in Anchorage, and so, takes priority.

Of course, I had to do this when the lad was sleeping, so I am quite sure I woke him up.  This house is not working for us for a number of reasons; not least of which when one of us is up, we have to be quiet, for the other one is sleeping.

I am way behind on my studying as is Jen, my study partner.  Somehow that makes me feel comforted as she is formidably organized and has passed out a study sheet with dates, materials, and chapters when things have to be done, and both of us are behind.  This weekend I will have to hit the books hard. 

Lots of other things going on as well, such as house hunting and other related activities.

I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know my fellow Admin Assistants, who are all upstairs.  Especially Nikki who is strong, smart, funny, and outgoing!

Happy Birthday to my brother-in-law Kirk today!

P.S. I know there are people viewing these posts, but it feels a bit funny posting when there is no feedback.  About a year ago, I altered the settings so folks are able to leave comments, so please feel free to do so!  Otherwise, I will just publish a book~! 

Our Yard-Post Storm

September 2012 Storm and Aftermath

Yes, this is termination dust on the Chugach range.  We are supposed to get a frost tonight so will have to harvest the mint.

 

 

Hundreds of trees uprooted

 

                                         This poor little house!

 Directing traffic at one of the many intersections where street lights were out.

 
 The flagpole on the Park Strip came down.

Hurray for the Chugach linemen working so hard to restore power!

 

 

 

 

 

Some folks (less than 2000) are still without power after our terrific wind and rainstorm this week.  I feel bad for the elderly and sick who can't afford to go to a hotel.  But our crews were out working double shifts.  We pulled crews from Homer and Golden Valley and by yesterday there were 36 crews for Chugach alone working to get power restored to everyone.

Many small pockets of Anchorage went out.  Chugach lost miles and miles of lines and severely damaged the distribution system.  The hardest-hit areas looked like a bomb zone, according to the crews who were out.  Hundreds of trees heavily laden with leaves went down on lines.  The sparking and arcing on Tuesday night looked like fireworks and the sky was an eerie blue. Small fires erupted, leaving a burned smell in the air.

We were terrified the huge cottonwood in the back yard would come down because that could easily take out any of five houses.  Our neighbors were too.  It was not that one though, but others in neighbors' yards that came crashing down.  I heard the Irish say, "Bob's tree came down in our yard" and I just put my good ear in the pillow and tried to block out the wind.  This area does not usually get this type of wind.

Along Seward highway at McHugh Creek, the wind was recorded at 98 mph until the machine broke!  So we still really do not know (and does it matter) how high the winds blew.  We only know it did major damage and we had many many angry and upset customers who expected us to pay for their spoiled fish, caribou, moose, and bear.

On Wednesday, a sleepy city got up to coffee or no coffee.  School was cancelled, the Anchorage Daily News could not print the paper, hundreds of businesses were closed including the Irish's bank.  Eventually all you could hear was the sound of chainsaws and generators.  Many acts of kindness occurred as Facebook shows.

Our phone lines were overloaded and Member Services could not keep up so they asked others in the building to come and assist.  I never realized the coordination necessary in Dispatch to not only send the crews out to locations but to make sure no crew was near any other crew. 

I worked 3 1/2 hours OT on Thursday and worked the outage lines during the day on Thursday and Friday and in fact just got a call from June as I was next on the list asking me to come in and work.  I am not going to though as I have some major studying to do for the CAP test which is fast coming up and I still feel tired from talking to so many customers and upset that some don't understand that the crews are taking an average of four hours for each outage because they have so much chain saw work to do to get to the downed lines.

June sounded exhausted.