Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Bonfire of Farewell


It was a bonfire of farewell of friends whom new Becci from the first day she arrived in Fairbanks during the UAF Forestry Contest. We meet her during a beautiful first snow fall of winter in Fairbanks and she leaving during the last cold spell of winter, with a heart felt fire of friendly souls.

We made the fairwell into an improvised birthday party with cake, candles to blow out, even had cute cone party hats.
We had a night full of laughter and fun with an electronic circular contraption game of charades with people from multiple nationalities. The darn thing had a timer that got faster and faster as the game progressed, and we were hard pressed to figure out how to depict what we wanted people to say.

That is one thing that is truly Alaskan is our love of life and spending it with our friends. There is nothing like listening and being with fellow human beings that are positive and full of life.
We also had a little bit of fireworks next to the bonfire. For a neuroscientist to say she only has a few fireworks, than you do not know your neurochemists. We or maybe just me in the beginning, started off with a few fireworks and didn't think it was too much of a problem of sending a few bottle rockets to the out house, while it was occupied. Well, little did I know, that the outhouse,until I used it later in the evening, had no darn front door and the bottle rockets could have ricocheted into the outhouse. Opps!, does this not reiterate the importance of communication.

Some of use just felt the good vibes flowing around and just had to post this great photo of "This is feeling good of being yourself and letting it flow".

The bonfire was full of warmth and a little bit of friendly wrestling going on. It took two people to pull one poor guy down.

Roomates got a little turned around and upside down, with everyone laughing and having a great time.

Being out by the bonfire we looked up and there was a beautiful aurora substorm beginning to build. We ran inside got the cameras and went to the road to watch the aurora have its own playful wrestling match. She danced and tumbled about in a beautiful rhythmic pattern of shapes and forms.

The colors of pale greens even had a bottom hint of light red flowing in congruent exotic shapes. One form that Becci caught for a brief moment in time was an angle.

Becci is off now on an adventure of a life time on the research vessel US Coast Guard Cutter Healy 430 ft ship in the dangerous and icy Bering Sea. Since it is on of the shallowest seas in the world, the swells can get up to 30 ft in only a few hours. She will be missed and we wish her good luck and a safe trip. If you want to see where the ship is in the Bering Sea you can go to the enclosed link for photos or page down to the google map I have embedded to update once a day, which is pretty cool. This is an experimental or
beta version of this function. Once you click on map and then click on Photos from Picasaweb you can see the photos, and click on weather to see temperature. If there are any problems please e-mail.

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