Yesterday there was an avalanche 40 miles south of Juneau. It took out power lines that are our main source of electricity here. Today there was another. Please click on our newspaper link to read about it. It may not sound like much but it has put Juneau into an energy crisis. At this time they are predicting that our electric bill will increase 500%! That is not a typo. For us that could mean $750 dollars a month. They have flown over the area, but due to the continued avalanche treat cannot get on the ground. With toady's snow, it doesn't look good. We came home yesterday and unplugged pretty much everything, turned the heat off in both bedrooms and shut the door, turned the heat down to 55/60 in the rest of the condo, turned down the hot water heater. Wow, I just had a flashback to the square house. All the rooms closed off and mom, Aaron and I sleeping in the living room on mattress with the kerosene heater. I guess my brothers (Aaron, Scott) are right once a hillbilly, always a hillbilly. Tonight I am typing this to you in dark. They saw that it could cost $300,000 to $450,000 per day to run the town on our diesel generators. Today the Governor declared a state of emergency. I will have more to add on that later. Some of us don't feel that was wise. I'll explain why another day. On the upside we have diesel generators that were running so most of us never knew what happened when it did. It is going into the longer days, soon we'll only have 4-6 hours of darkness and it's not really all that dark. It is coming up on tourist season and Bob will have lots of overtime. I have my theater job and possible a job at the Red Dog Saloon. We will both be gone for a couple weeks (at the same time) this summer so we can shut this place down. Even though we got all that crazy snow today it is getting warmer out. So it's not all bad. A little scary right now, but well get through. I am going to be saying prays for all the families here who are struggling to get by. This could be devastating for so many people.
Okay, I will tell you why some of us are not happy about the governor going to the Feds for money. This entire legislative session there was talk about what to do with our states surplus of money. Moving the capital was introduce again, because we have all this money. New projects were talked about, because we have all this money. So Alaska keeps talking about all this extra money we have and now when we are in need we go to the Feds. Are you kidding me? Our country is struggling and we, with extra money, darn to go to the Feds for money. Since we have lived here I have heard several people talk about "the lower 48", "the Americas", "the United States", separating Alaska form the rest of the country and here we sit with a surplus of money and we dare to go to the rest of the country. Don't even get me started. Oh, I already have. Another little funny Ha! Ha! - - - While the Legislature was in session they actually vetoed a bill to give residents an energy rebate because of the high cost. Maybe now they will change their minds. Okay, I'm done. That's why I was going to wait until later. Bob and I are both fired up and he is sitting next to me and we are feeding off each other. So look at the positives, there are many.
Again, please check out our newspaper there are a couple pictures and more details that will explain how, why. Well, when it's dark all I want to do is sleep and it is dark now. Sweet Dreams. MJ
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