Anyhow, the move (as I said) happens tomorrow and we will be on the road for several days. The last couple times I drove the ALCAN I did it in 3 days or less. This time we are taking our time, seeing a few things along the way and generally trying to be sane about it. As I find wireless on the way I will update twitter so those who care can see where we are.

The house is currently in underwriting and should close soon, and we are getting everything packed and ready to roll. I will definitely miss working with the crew I am leaving behind, but I am looking forward to learning lots of new (to me) things, including interfacing with touch screens and some serious AJAX.

The downside of all this is that both this site and talkingfox.com will be down for anywhere from one day to a week (or if we have difficulty getting an apartment lined up possibly longer – although I don’t want to think about that right now.)

We took a short 1/2 day whale watching cruise, (the whole day cruises don’t start up until tourist season actually begins) and even though we saw more wildlife from the cabin than we did on the boat, it felt good just to be out on the water.

The Tennessee State Tourism Agency took out a half-page ad in Outdoor Magazine (among others) inviting mountain bikers to visit. The problem was, as Tim Woody noticed right away, that the picture was from a 1997 National Geographic story by Alaskan Roman Dial about traversing the Alaskan Range by mountain bike. The picture? Alaska’s Lake Clark National Park.

With 2 more months left, and lots more snow to come (for sure) I am having a hard time figuring out where to put all the snow that I am shoveling out of the drive.

If it wasn’t for the way the snow compacts under it’s own weight that berm would probably be well over the roof now. And yes, we did just have our roof shoveled off two weeks ago, thanks.

Not that I’m a photographer by any stretch of the imagination, but I did put a few more shots from around the house up on flickr. I was thinking about maybe doing a sno-b-q (a winter barbecue) and even got as far as where the barbecue is, but then I realized the charcoal and tools are still waaaaay out there in the snow.

In 2002, Joseph Frederick, a Juneau, AK senior was suspended for displaying a banner reading “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” on a public sidewalk outside the school. School officials suspended him because, in their argument, it was a school function, since the students had been let out of class to watch the Olympic torch go by, and were accompanied by teachers.

Frederick’s family brought a suit against the school board for violation of his First Amendment rights and the 9th US Circuit Court agreed.

Now the school board, represented (pro bono) by Ken Starr is preparing to appeal.

My take on it is this: the school does not have the right to impinge on the free speech of students when they are off-campus, not in class, and it does not have an effect on the educational mission of the school. Even when that speech is offensive, counter to the school’s standards, or as in this case, lacking any reasonable common sense.