So I found this article about Cherry the other day..

When Apsley Cherry-Garrard, one of Captain Scott's companions on his doomed polar expedition in 1912, fell in love aged 50, his lovemaking followed an unusual pattern. He met 20-year-old Angela Turner on a Norwegian cruise in 1937. He was alone, she with her parents and brother.

One day, the boat docked and Angela and Cherry slipped off for a walk on their own. They sat on a bench where Cherry picked up a small piece of quartz and offered it to Angela. 'Years later, when she had become an Antarctic expert, Angela discovered that the courtship ritual of the penguin centres around stone-giving, stones being a vital commodity for the construction of the nest.'

This story illuminates the reserved, passionate Cherry-Garrard (always known, except to his mother, as Cherry) in several ways. At that time, almost no one in the world would have known such an intimate detail about penguin lovemaking, but Cherry had made 'the worst journey in the world' to collect penguin eggs and always retained a deep affection for the comical, determined birds he had nearly given his life to see.

He was also chronically shy and afflicted by bouts of dark depression which made expressing his emotions painful for him. This type of non-verbal communication was the perfect solution for a man who felt things deeply but had terrible trouble talking about them.

Awww. OMG I love this so much. *swoons* I think I just turned into a hopeless romantic LOL. That's quite an age difference, but I'd marry him too if he did such a sweet gesture like that. I hope I can find a modern Cherry somewhere..please, give me a rock and I'm all yours LOL. What a sweet and amazing guy! <3 (Cherry giving Angela quartz was even in the docudrama! I was wondering what that was about lol)

It can stop being windy ANY time now..20 degrees + wind = NOPE. Brrrr! A cold front must cave come through or something..

( Day 12: Post a picture of you just before you go to bed )

Today's trivia: The only satellite that has ever been destroyed by a meteor was the European Space Agency's communications satellite, Olympus, in 1993

Earlier I went on Facebook and saw "Grapevine Lake" under the trending column..that surprised me, since that isn't really a newsworthy place (and near where I grew up), and this is what I read:

GRAPEVINE, TEXAS - A dismembered body that had also been lit on fire was found at a park near Grapevine Lake early Wednesday, according to police.

Police said officers were sent to Acorn Woods Park, a densely wooded area with trails on the south side of the lake, around 6:30 a.m.

Grapevine officials confirmed to News 8 a woman's body was found burned and in "several pieces" near the water.

WTF??! That's awful!! I spent a lot of my childhood at Grapevine Lake, so that's even more disturbing to me. That's so sad :( (I always worry one of these days I'm gonna find a dead body when I'm geocaching D:)

( Favorite color )

Today's trivia: When the mummy of Ramses II was sent to France in the mid-1970s, it was issued a passport listing his occupation as "King (deceased)"

FAIRBANKS—High water continues on the Chena River, causing continued minor flooding upstream of Fairbanks and the cancellation or postponement of two weekend boat events.

According to the National Weather Service, between 1 and 3 inches of rain fell over the region earlier this week, raising the Chena River to minor flood stage in Two Rivers and North Pole. The Army Corps of Engineers closed flood gates at the Moose Creek Dam at 6 p.m. Wednesday, with a goal of limiting the Chena River flow to less than 12,000 cubic feet per second in downtown Fairbanks.

The flow was 8,550 cubic feet per second as of 11:15 a.m. today in downtown and was forecast to peak at 4 a.m. Friday. at 9,010 cubic feet per second, according to the Weather Service model.

As of Wednesday evening, the Chena River had begun dropping upstream of the Granite Tors campground, and a crest of water was moving toward the Moose Creek Dam. It is expected to reach the dam sometime today.

Minor flooding is expected to continue in low-lying areas in the Steamboat Landing neighborhood and may affect Freeman Road, off of Nordale Road. Drivers are cautioned not to drive their vehicles through flooded areas.

Heavy rain fell overnight and into this morning, and more is forecast through Friday.

When I flew back to Fairbanks on Monday I saw the river was pretty high when we passed over it. I'm glad we have that dam, otherwise we'd get flooded out! And really..you shouldn't have to be cautioned not to drive through flooded areas..DUH. lol

Today walking home from work I saw a guy holding his phone..he saw I was holding mine too and was like "Team Mystic!" LOL. We were at a Pokestop, so he assumed I was playing too (which I was..sorry not sorry :P). I did happen to choose Team Mystic, though I haven't battled anyone or whatever you do at those gyms lol (I'm nervous about trying it and messing something up lol). I only caught a Zubat thing this time..he was in my way!! Haha, I love this game :P

I hate the news these days..all these shootings and today I read about teenagers that burned puppies alive and posted it to Snapchat and another about an abandoned cat with her kittens tied to her..they rescued the kittens, but they all died. WHY?? How can people be so awful?? I wish the world would get better :(

( Who's your biggest role model? )

Today's trivia: There's a 230-foot-long sea organ on the coast of Croatia. The organ, designed by architect Nikola Basic, has 35 tubes that make music whenever the waves crash into them

FAIRBANKS - Fairbanks set another record high temperature on Saturday, breaking a mark that was set in 1915.

The thermometer topped out at 82 degrees at Fairbanks International Airport, 2 degrees warmer than the previous record. Fairbanks also set a record high of 79 on Friday. The normal high for this time of year is 60.

Interior Alaska, already under dry conditions, pulled through two days of record-breaking hot weather without a wildfire starting.

The fire service was ready for fire activity, Mowry said, as temperatures climbed on Saturday, hitting a high of 82 degrees at Fairbanks International Airport about 7 p.m. and setting a new record for a high temperature for May 14.

The old record of 80 degrees was set in 1915, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Ryan Metzger.

“(Saturday) was the first time we hit 80 degrees this season,” Metzger said.

It was so warm on Saturday that the low temperature, 59 degrees, broke a record too for highest minimum temperature on May 14. Metzger said the previous record, set in 2005, was 52 degrees.

Fairbanks’ low temperature on Saturday beat Chicago’s high temperature of 47 degrees, the meteorologist said.

Wow, 80 degrees in May. I'm glad it cooled off and rained some, especially since there has been so much pollen lately. I went to the clinic to get stuff for allergies and when the doctor looked inside my nose he was like "wow, it looks brutal in there!" It was too swollen to even breathe..luckily the stuff I got has helped some, phew

Yesterday I was talking to mom about how I still feel so much better on the Prozac..she was like "yeah, suddenly just one day it seemed this cloud lifted off you and I could feel your good vibes." Wow. I wish I had gotten help sooner, I felt like a shell of a person, existing but dead inside. It's given me my life back..I'm not sure why Prozac works so well for me when the others didn't, but I'm so happy I found something that works!

( List three animals you like )

FAIRBANKS — The 2015-16 winter in Fairbanks was the driest ever recorded, and it wasn’t even close.

Technically, astronomical winter still reigns for another 18 days, but meteorologists measure winter’s length differently. Meteorological winter in the northern hemisphere runs from the beginning of December through the last day of February.

Even with the extra day of Feb. 29, the winter in Fairbanks was by far the driest since precipitation recording began 105 years ago. During the three-month period, the Fairbanks area received only 2.5 inches of snow, coming in well under the previous record holder. Prior to this year, the 1918-19 winter held the record for driest in Fairbanks with 4.9 inches of snow, nearly double this winter’s snowfall.

Nearly all of the snow accumulation in Fairbanks this year came prior to meteorological winter. Between September and November Fairbanks received near-record snowfall, and yet total snowfall accumulation by March 1 is slightly below normal.

Of the 52.6 inches of snowfall recorded in Fairbanks before March 1, 50.1 inches of it is more than three months old.

Not only has the 2015-16 winter been “remarkably” dry, according to the National Weather Service office in Fairbanks, it’s also been exceptionally warm. For just the second time since temperature recording began 109 years ago, Fairbanks did not experience a single day at or colder than 30-below zero.

On average, Fairbanks experiences 25 days at or colder than 30-below during each cold season. This year there were none. That doesn’t necessarily mean there won’t be any. March, on average, has two days where temperatures fall to 30-below. However, meteorologists with the National Weather Service are forecasting above normal temperatures in March. They’re also forecasting below normal precipitation.

Fairbanks wasn’t the only part of Alaska to experience a wild winter. Barrow, King Salmon and Sitka experienced the warmest winters on record. Juneau and Anchorage, which was notably forced to take snow by train from Fairbanks for the Iditarod, experienced its second warmest winter on record.

Wow. A bunch of the snow has melted from the warm temps and some of the sidewalks are bare! It's just fine with me if it doesn't reach -30. :P It's kind of amusing we had to send snow to Anchorage haha

Sig Hansen, one of my favorite Deadliest Catch captains, had a heart attack while filming for the show. He passed out and when he woke back up, he wanted to keep fishing LOL. He was airlifted to Anchorage. I'm glad he's doing ok, I was so worried when I saw the headline on Facebook!

( 6. Something in school you really liked doing that everyone else bitched over )

Today's trivia: The American secret service tried to spike Hitler's carrots with female hormones to change him into a woman

FAIRBANKS — We’re a long way from Golden Days 2016, but already two Fairbanks groups have Chena River events planned for Sunday, July 24, 2016, designed to fill the void left by the cancellation of the KUAC Red Green Regatta.

For 19 years, public radio and TV station KUAC held a homemade raft competition inspired by the title character of the “Red Green Show” on PBS. KUAC announced this year that it is discontinuing the event because it was too much of a time commitment for the organization’s staff, which has shrunken because of budget cuts in recent years.

As the Red Green ship sails, two groups are eyeing the Sunday of the Golden Days celebration for their own aquatic events. One is tentatively titled the River Regatta, an event inspired by the KUAC regatta, but without the PBS character association. The other is the quasi-annual Dawg Gone Canoe Race, a fundraiser for the Yukon Quest that’s older than the Red Green Regatta. Neither event is really a race, they’re both flotillas that prize creativity over speed.

The new Friends of the River Regatta group announced the new raft regatta in a news release Wednesday. For now the group consists of private radio station owner Last Frontier Mediactive, Mammoth Marketing (the new name of advertising firm Neumuth Advertising) and GCI. The event will be a fundraiser for a to-be-determined Fairbanks nonprofit, according to the news release.

Much remains to be determined about the event including its official name. It’s simply the River Regatta for now, and may keep that name, said Mediactive Operations Manager Glenn Anderson.

Anderson said he started working on a replacement for the Red Green Regatta the day he learned KUAC was stopping the annual event. It’s too important a Fairbanks tradition to lose, he said.

“I started calling around and just went ‘no, no, no no, this can’t happen,’” he said. “So it’s not gonna.”

Like the Red Green Regatta, the new River Regatta will encourage “Alaskan ingenuity” but may not focus so much on duct tape, the construction supply highly prized by the Red Green character, Anderson said. Organizers may move the course to avoid Veterans Memorial Bridge on Barnette Street, which can impede tall rafts when there is high water in the Chena.

Yay, I knew someone else would adopt it lol. It is definitely too much fun and a great community experience for it to go away

( 10 Day- A Screenshot of your favourite online game )

FAIRBANKS - Monday's scorching temperatures caused several wildfires in Interior Alaska to blow up. A reported 649 fires have burned more than 3 million acres in Alaska so far this season, putting the state on pace to break the 2004 record wildfire season record.

While the official high temperature in Fairbanks was 89 degrees on Monday, just shy of the record of 90 degrees, thermometers throughout the area showed temperatures several degrees warmer.

Heavy smoke was degrading the air quality in and around Fairbanks Tuesday, with visibility reduced to less than a mile in many areas. At noon, the state Department of Environmental Conservation Air Quality site showed concentrations of PM2.5 particulates at 315, a level deemed hazardous.

Paulette told me today the smoke was as bad as it was in 2004..I knew yesterday's 90 degree weather would be bad for the fires..the smoke now is some of the worst I've seen. I'm glad it cooled off and is in the 60s today..90 is way too hot for here!!

Colleen is the new kitty I'm sponsoring..she has epilepsy and kidney disease..aww. She's so cute though :)

( 16:One of your favorite classical songs? )

Today's trivia: England is the windiest country in Europe

FAIRBANKS — The sequel is rarely as funny as the original, but that didn’t stop a team of ducklings from committing a copycat crime Wednesday when they wandered into a Fairbanks hardware store.

The raft, as a group of ducks is often called, breezed in through the front door of the Alaska Industrial Hardware store on Airport Way on Wednesday afternoon.

The move mimics the meanderings of a young male beaver that found his way into a Lowe’s hardware store on the Johansen Expressway two weeks ago.

The five ducklings, each about the size of a tennis ball — or cordless drill battery pack — likely didn’t realize the derivative humor of their situation, but, as they say, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

To get to the store, the ducklings had to cross the four lanes of traffic that make up Airport Way, according to store employee Tammy Medeiros.

After entering the hardware store, the team of ducklings made its way toward the pressure washers.

Employees called Fairbanks North Star Borough animal control to report their duckling infestation, and were referred to the Fairbanks office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The federal service would hold jurisdiction over migratory waterfowl inside a hardware store — or seemingly any other type of store — according to Alaska Department of Fish and Game Spokeswoman Cathie Harms.

The tale turned tragic for one young duckling that took a wayward venture under a vending machine before Fish and Wildlife could arrive on scene, but technicians were able to safely remove the rest of the loitering litter from the hardware store without incident.

No one from the Fish and Wildlife Service could be reached for comment on deadline Wednesday, but Harms said the ducklings likely would be placed with one of two options. If the mother could be located, the ducklings most likely would be reunited with her. If she could not be found, the ducklings likely would be placed in the care of a licensed wild animal caretaker, who would raise them to adulthood and release them back into the wild.

Haha wow, the animals seem attracted to hardware stores lately. :P Next there's gonna be a moose in Home Depot lol. I hope they can be reunited with their mom!

Also, wow: It’s been a warm, dry spring for much of interior Alaska. On the afternoon of May 23, a new statewide record was set for the earliest day in the year with a temperature in the 90s. A daytime high of 91°F was noted by a cooperative observer in Eagle. Crazy! I'm glad it cooled off and we're getting some rain..

( Day 17: A music genre that you hate )

Today's trivia: Cats hate the smell and taste of citrus fruit

FAIRBANKS - Interior Alaska's snow cover is shrinking fast, and record temperatures forecast for the rest of the week will speed the process even more.

Temperatures from Fairbanks south to the Alaska Range could reach record highs on Thursday and Friday, according to the National Weather Service. A ridge of high pressure is stuck over the area, and a low-pressure system moving into the Gulf of Alaska is expected to pump warm air north.

Highs from the 40s to mid-50s are expected under mostly sunny skies.

The record high temperature for March 26 is 48 degrees, set in 1970. The normal high is 31 degrees

It's been so beautiful lately..I'm amazed at how much snow has melted already. I've seen blizzards in March, though hopefully not this year haha

Today I saw my OB cause the birth control pills stopped working (like..I'd skip the sugar pills and have a period anyway..didn't really help with the cramps either) and they were making me depressed and anxious. We decided to try Depo-Provera shots, which last for three months. I hope that works better than the pills..

( 4. A Picture you think will make someone else smile )

Today's trivia: Napoleon would make his servants wear his boots to break them in before he wore them

ANCHORAGE — The race clock for the 2015 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race will start ticking in Fairbanks, not the usual takeoff point in Willow.

Members of the trail committee’s board of directors met Tuesday and voted unanimously to change the course due to low snowfall in some of the most treacherous sections of the trail’s roughly 1,000 miles.

Similar conditions forced the race’s restart to move from Willow to Fairbanks in 2003, bypassing the Alaska Range but keeping it roughly the same distance. The move to Fairbanks was considered in snow-starved 2014, too, and after the board’s decision kept mushers on the traditional southern route, the bruised and beaten up dog drivers criticized officials for not avoiding what some of them described as a catastrophe

Wow, cool! Apparently the Anchorage area is so snow starved there are bare spots..crazy. Hopefully it's not too cold so I can go watch!

Speaking of cold, after three weeks of bitter cold it FINALLY warmed up to 11! It's snowing too. I hate that these weather changes give me migraines, but I have Excedrin for that :P

( 22. Decisions are being made right now. The question is: Are you making them for yourself, or are you letting others make them for you? )

Today's trivia: The Vatican Bank is the only bank in the world that allows ATM users to select Latin to perform transactions