It was Christmas Eve and Bob Cratchett sat huddled over a candle flame trying to warm his hands. Scrooge heard his lack of work, counting money and writing figures, and told him to get back to work. Bob said, “Please, Sir, may I take off a little early tonight? It is Christmas Eve, after all.” Continue reading
Today was bitterly cold with heavy winds that blew through our tent. Our boss told us to mark all our trees and wreaths at half price, and even at that people tried to get us to let them have a tree for less! At some point today a couple walked in. The man was blind in one eye and they both looked hard up. The first thing the man said to me was, “We’ve had a bad year. We’re hoping you have a small tree.” I showed them our only table top tree which is flocked, and at half price it was $25, but that was obviously too much for them and they left, looking rather dejected. Continue reading
It was in the mid-70’s today. Mark and I have let our employees go with a handshake and their final pay. There are so few customers coming in now that we can handle it ourselves. We’re down to our last thirty one Christmas trees as of tonight, and we spent a lot of today beginning the tear down process while remaining open for business. We are so-ooo looking forward to this job ending!
Happy Thanksgiving to all my readers! I was looking forward to having a day off for Thanksgiving, but it didn’t exactly work out like that. We had a delivery of trees this morning, so I called in one of our employees. While he and Mark dealt with the trees and some other set-up stuff, I tried to find a Laundromat that was open. It’s been over a week since I’ve had time to wash clothes (let alone dishes)! Continue reading
All Mark and I are waiting for now is to get our new windshield installed. It finally arrived at the body shop today and will be installed tomorrow. In the meantime, I felt the need to go for a walk today so I convinced Mark to take me on a photo shoot. Here’s the result: Continue reading
You may have thought to ask yourself today, “How does Tok celebrate the 4th of July?” Let me tell you, there are no fireworks. For one thing it would be a fire hazard, and for another, it never gets dark enough at this time of year to see them. We did hear a few gun shots this evening, but the big event was the parade at 11:00 this morning. They shut down our stretch of the Alaskan Highway for it. Here are some pictures I took today as it went past our office: Continue reading
We had plans to drive to Fairbanks today and see what that’s like. We both needed better work shoes and there’s no place in Tok to get good ones. On our way, we stopped at North Pole, Alaska! Yes, Virginia, there really is a Santa Claus! Here are some pictures: Continue reading
This morning we had brunch at The Nuthouse with Aunt Marg, my mother and step-father, and my son and daughter-in-law. I gave Mom a funny picture of Mark and me taken on the Big Wheel in Seattle with the wish that it might make her smile every time she looks at it. I gave Aunt Marg a jigsaw puzzle of the Butchart Gardens so she will have something to do while she misses us. We took pictures. Continue reading
I know that most of you won’t get this in time for Easter, so happy belated Easter. This evening we took Aunt Marg to see Heaven is for Real. It’s based on a book by a pastor named Todd Burpo. Reverend Burpo tells the story of his four year old son, Colton, who had a near fatal illness and came back saying he’d been to heaven. If you haven’t seen this movie or read the book, I highly recommend it. Continue reading
I just realized I haven’t written in nearly a week. It’s not that I haven’t had things to write about, but I’ve been busy experiencing things to write about. Continue reading