I'm good at taking care of plants. Really.
I've just been really busy this past week, what with work and Crabfest and radio and everything. So when my mom informed me that my herb garden was looking pretty wilted, my first thought was, "I have plants?"
My second thought was, "Oh no, I'm a horrible plant mother!"
As I watered my plants, my mind randomly wandered to my poor neglected blog. The last post I put on here was dated sometime in March, and it was really depressing. So now I'm going to give you a happy update on what's been going on here in Kodiak.
First off, we moved! When the owner of our previous house informed us that he had found a buyer, we started on a frantic search for someplace to live. We ended up finding a house about 5 minutes out of town with a BEAUTIFUL view of the water and the mountains, and moved in over Mother's Day weekend as we kind of tag teamed with various people being at work and off work. Eventually it all worked out, and now we're pretty much all moved in!
We celebrated the completion of our move, as well as the holiday weekend, today with a BBQ at our house. We invited pretty much everyone we knew, and we had a bunch of people, as well as four dogs! We have so much food left over, and we're all tired, but it was so worth it. It was a fantastic end to a busy weekend full of work, radio, and...
...the 2012 Kodiak Crab Festival! This is the big event of the year, much as the Old Fashioned Festival is in Newberg, the Rose Festival in Portland, or the Eugene Celebration -- except on a much smaller scale of course. There are commemorative sweatshirts, T-shirts, hats and more, which begin going on sale at Commfish (a fishing trade show that takes place in mid-April) in anticipation of the event.
This year marked my very first Crab Festival, so it took me almost a full day just to take it all in. Luckily, it lasts for five days. The event is centered around a midway with vendor booths, food booths and carnival rides (the latter are shipped in from a company based in Chugiak, which I thought was pretty cool) set up at the harbor, which provides a fitting backdrop for the festivities. In addition, there are a variety of other events surrounding the festival, such as a bike race from Pasagshak (about a 75-minute drive from town) to Kodiak, a 9-mile run up and down Pillar Mountain, the Ididarock (which combines the previous events with a one-mile swim at the local pool), Coast Guard rescue demonstrations and a survival suit race, a parade, and so much more.
I can't mention Crabfest without talking about the food. In addition to your typical carnival fare such as cotton candy, kettle corn and caramel apples, there were many items for sale that were unique to Kodiak. Some of my favorites were: giant turkey legs (imagine a caveman gnawing on a dinosaur drumstick and you get the idea), two taco trucks (one of which is owned and operated by one of my coworkers), Bruin burgers (a dough pocket filled with a hamburger helper-type filling and then deep fried), dough buoys (Kodiak's take on doughboys or "elephant ears"), bacon-wrapped scallops, hand-dipped chocolate ice cream bars with huge almond chunks, homemade chicken soup, and probably the most popular booth, a huge plate of crab legs, which always sold out early every day.
When I wasn't at Crabfest or at work, I was at KMXT, the public radio station I volunteer at. I started out doing Nightlite every other Sunday with Kathrynn, then started doing it on my own, then started filling in for other shows. I've now done Nightlite, Friday Night Oldies, Ritmo Latino (Saturday night), Spruce Tip Brew (Wednesday night) and World Music (Monday). This weekend found me doing three nights of radio in a row, which is unusual, but it was fun.
Now Memorial Day's almost over and another week of work begins tomorrow, so I suppose it's time to end this post for now. But I'll be back soon!
