J. Jason Lazarus Blog

I know, I know, I’ve ben bad and haven’t posted in a while - although I really do wonder exactly how many people read this that aren’t my wife. Although, I do have to admit that more people have come to the site this month than ever before. Must be Lil’ Jon.
Manley Hot Springs Pictures
Two weekends ago on a lazy Saturday afternoon I blert out to Deanna that Sunday we should drive to Manley Hot Springs. Knowing my penchant for doing neurotically stupid and unplanned trips like this I was surprised to hear her agree to such spontaneousness.
Perhaps she had forgotten our sliced-and-diced tire on one of my last whimiscal trips up a very very long dirt road?
No, no in fact that was mentioned several times on the trip up there.
See, the problem is that the actual condition of Alaskan roads isn’t actually readily accessable - you can’t just bet that something is going to be paved or not. Additionally, online sources are horribly out of date, stating that even the Elliot Highway before the Dalton isn’t paved for 50-some odd miles that it actually is. In hindsight I’m sure that a quick call to the Roadhouse out in Manley would’ve sloved the problem but, also in hindsight, I’m completely convinced that there’s some “man law” that restricts me from doing completely logical things that could be , in some form or another, construed as asking for directions. It’s not my fault, it’s the testosterone that’s killing my brain.
Nonetheless, we started out a little later than I wanted on Sunday given that the long work week had stressed us both out to the point that we wanted to sleep in as late as possible. By the time we got on the road and toward Manley, it was almost 10:30 - not good when you consider we had a 320 mile round trip in front of us.
The trip up to the Manley turnoff wasn’t really eventful at all - it’s all paved and it’s a trip I made earlier this summer when some of my students and I went up to Livengood. However, right after Livengood is the Manley turnoff and the road almost instantly turns to shit.
By shit I mean 15-35 mph in my little sedan. Learning from my nice little trip on the Dalton to the Yukon River a few years ago, I learned to go just a bit slower - which managed to make the 320 mile trip even longer.
Thankfully the vistas were gorgeous - the road climbs up on top of a ridge and stays there for a good 30-40 miles and is absolutely gorgeous, even this late in fall. After dropping down back into the valley, magically, 60 miles from Asphalt, we get 18 miles worth of Asphalt road which manages to cut down the trip significantly. Even though it doesn’t seem like much, it did change it quite a bit. Now it wasn’t any secret that there really isn’t anything at Manley - I wasn’t going there for a mall. Even though the name suggests Hot Springs, I didn’t even go there for that either. Just for the drive.
We quickly got to town seeing that the road got better and drove through it quickly toward the Tanana Landing for just a few pictures and mainly just to see what was down a road. Went back to Manley, took about 40 pictures or so from a variety of cameras that I stashed in the car and had dinner at the Manley Roadhouse. These old Roadhouses always have a lot of character and there aren’t that many left in this great kind of condition (see first picture).
The town wasn’t all that great, nice for photos, but of coarse, then you ahve to consider that the season was really over. Went down a few roads to try to find the Cemetary, failed at that. Then we tried the Tofty Road, which was supposed to, who would’ve guessed, gone to Tofty as well as a few other mining areas. After this cute little sign that proudly proclaimed that there were no warning signs ahead (great final warning sign, eh?) the road was underwater enough to where I didn’t feel too good about the idea of getting my car stuck 7 miles from Manley and about 160 miles from Fairbanks and “civilization”.
One more road we tried was the Eureka Road which went all the way out to the non existant town of Eureka. Strange enough it continued for several miles and there was a rather large concrete bridge over Boston Creek - large enough to where it seemed out of place on a dirt road with absolutely no traffic on it (cept for us) - though it does make me wonder, as some TOPO maps I had on the trip suggested, if it goes all the way up to the Yukon River and the town of Rampart - which I’d love to visit. Giving up, we started home, hating the bumpy piece of shit road more and more. By the time we got back to the main road both Deanna and I were so aggetiated at the bumpiness that I doubt she’ll be going down a dirt road with me anytime soon.
Nonetheless, it’s just nice to know that still nearby Fairbanks, as much as I drive, there’s still a ton of roads I’ve never gone down in my 10 years of living in Fairbanks. Even though it wasn’t entirely successful for what I’m usually looking for, i.e., the traditional old mining equipment and mining towns long abandoned, it was still a nice drive and did give me several prosposective places to search on a longer trip.
Manley Hot Springs Pictures

Well… not really.
In fact, my Wine Tasting class, at least in my humble opinion, would probably bore Lil’ Jon. Although, considering Chappelle’s parody of him, one has to wonder if Lil Jon would appreciate the fine, delicate art of Oenology. But, considering his choice of chalace, one does have to wonder, what wine would be fitting in such a oddly shaped glass?
Last night was my first Oenology (Wine Tasting) class with Deanna and we both had a blast. Although this is my second time taking this class, please refrain from calling me a Whino - in fact, I already have a pretty plausable and completely beleivable reason for taking again. In fact, it’s a real reason:
I grew up.
I took Oenology first when I had just turned 21 or 22 - too early after I had turned legal to truly appreciate any wine, short of the cheap and sweet kinds. Like many taking the class with me, I came out of the class liking Arbor Mist the best.
Knowing from the get-go that Arbor Mist wasn’t high quality wine and just managed to be this side of alcoholic kool-aid, I waited a while for my… tastes to mature.
Within the next two years I “matured”, for lack of a better term, from Cheerleader Beers (i.e. Smirnoff Ice, Bacardi Raz, etc) to actual tried-and-true beers. Although many of my friends would suggest that even though this was a step in the right direction to mature my tastes, I managed to overstep myself - at least in their minds. Rather than falling in love with cheap, horrid domestics that liken themselves to watered-down beer, I went off the proverbial “deep end” and fell for the Stouts, Porters and dark beers that normally take people years, if not a full life, to appreciate. In fact, my friends will attest that my fondness for Porters borders on the insane because they taste rancid. Not to me, at least, not to me.
Nonetheless, understanding that I had now defined my taste in beer that didn’t presribe itself to frugality or peer pressure (God knows I can’t even convince any of my friends to drink an Arctic Rhino Coffee Porter), I began to believe that maybe, just maybe, I could elevate myself past my fondness of Boone’s and Arbor Mist. Granted, I do have more matured tastes than that, but my appreciation for wines, even after taking Oenology the first time, wasn’t that far-reaching. This time I’m actually planning on taking detailed notes and actually learn what I like. Last night I even took my digital camera to take pictures of the labels so that if I do find a wine I like I not only know the name of it but what it looks like as well.

And to be honest, even during this first class, as the teacher suggests, I’ve already found wines I was to do “homework” with later on this week. Last night was going over Rose wines (pronounced as snottingly French as you can, a la “Rooo-Say”) and I found a few that I’d like to try more of and explore further.

So, let it be known that I do plan to learn all I can about wine and, in the process, maybe even become a “wine geek” and waste hundreds, if not thousands, on wine a year.

Other than that one class, I’m taking a Fairbanks History class taught by Dermot Cole, a local celebrity of sorts. Both he and his twin brother are obsessed with all things Fairbanks and have both written a few books about Fairbanks. Very interesting class and right up my interest alley.

I haven’t been doing much else other than working and teaching. The addition of teaching a class to my schedule, although only adding an additional 2-3 hours worth of work a week has managed to fill my schedule, along with the classes I’m taking. Although, admittedly I do have quite a bit of time free, it sure doesn’t feel that way. What time I do have has been spent at the movies seeing Beerfest (great!), Wicker Man (the original was better) and The Protector (odd storyline but freaking excellent Martial Arts!). I’ve also been wasting away with my recent geekie purchase of Star Trek Original Series DVD sets - and I’m amazed at how much I like these episodes so much more than I do when they’re on TV. I’m looking forward to the redos that Paramount is gearing up to do - yes, just like George Lucas, they’re redoing Original Star Trek - adding better special effects and actual computer graphics - YAY!

Other than that, slight bit of playing of Guild Wars and a trip to Manley Hot Springs this last weekend of which I hope to blog about a bit later.

Lately I’ve… um… gone a little crazy with buying cameras. Even I’m admitting to this, especially when I start counting things out and realizing that I’ve bought (or recieved) five cameras in the last month. First it was my Medium Format Seagull SA-99. This last trip to Anchorage with my mom and Deanna I picked up yet another one - this time a digital one. Not to worry, I didn’t break the bank on this one - only $300 for a new point-n’-shoot. Basically, my 2 megapixel really was starting to show its age. Even though it is still a great camera, it’s not the best for Action shots - at all. So, I picked up an Olympus Stylus 710 and got a gig XD card for it. Overall I’m satisfied with it, although there are some serious detractions, I do have to remind myself that this *isn’t* a digital SLR and that no matter what model I would’ve gotten, I would’ve complained about something. Nonetheless, I’ll now have a lot better digital photos with the amount of customizable options - seeing that I did have to relinquish the Canon SLR to the Department for student use.
So, that covers two. Like I’ve been talking about for a while now, I got a Argus C4 from my mother-in-law - about a week ago I finally got it in the mail and automatically got giddy. I slapped in some B&W film and chirped off a whole roll of film of Deanna at Weeks Field - right behind Noel Wein Library. Pictured Above, (bit out of focus - went a little too far super-macro with my new Olympus) it’s an old rangefinder camera from the 50’s and from just looking at the negatives, I’m extremely pleased by the results. The rangefinder is hard to get used to - especially seeing that whenever I try to focus I find my hand on the lens rather than on the rangefinder, thus, changing the shutter speed rather than the focus. Even so, the results are great and I’m hoping to have samples of it soon.
Yesterday in the mail I received the first of two cameras I’ve bet on ebay - a Argus A4. A lot more simple than the Argus C4 but still stylish as all hell. Getting yet another in the mail soon - a German 35mm as well.
I promise that I will have an entry here sometime that actually doesn’t have anything to do with cameras - promise!

So for the last few years I’ve been eying my parent’s growing collection of obsolete sound recordings - from 8-track to 12”, 45’s to Cassettes, they’ve got a ton of them and they’re just collecting dust, and with the Cassettes and 8-tracks, loosing quality, I’m sure, quickly. At the local Fred Meyers they sell a, for lack of a better term, a analog sound digitizer - in laymen’s terms, plug in anything with Red-n-White Audio outputs and it comes into your computer crystal clear. I’ve decided to slowly start digitizing my parent’s old stuff and giving it back to them on CD - given that I get a copy of their 8-tracks as payment. Although not entirely “legal”, seeing that I’m not distributing it, it’s about as illegal as that copy of Snow White your parents recorded from Blockbuster.
In the last few years my mother has also been picking up 8-tracks whenever she can find them for a reasonable price and has gotten quite a few that reach further than her, or my dads, own taste in music. Bad for them, good for me.
I’ve already digitized 6 8-tracks: Johnny Cash’s Greatest Hits, Elvis - “Mahalo from Elvis”, Best of ‘66, Best of ‘69, Jefferson Airplane & Music from A Clockwork Orange.
The last two aren’t at all what my parents … um.. “dug”.. back then. But, I’ve always wanted to have the soundtrack for Clockwork Orange and the quality is more than bearable especially after a few filters through the included software. It’s also kinda interesting to consider that all those bulky 8-tracks are now on my iPod - only a fraction of the size of one of those horrid contraptions.
I also have to admit that I did show my age, not so much as I usually do, when dealing with these 8-tracks. Staring at the rather rudimentary 8-track player, I blinked a few times. It had be right around 10 years since I had even played around with my parents’ player and I just kept on blinking. After a while I gave up and called my dad…
“um…how do you… or can you… um… rewind a 8-track?”
“you don’t Son”
“oh.”

Once again taking Curt’s lead on things, I’ve posted pics from Whitter and Liberty Falls from the Holga I’ve been using this summer. I’ve got a few more rolls of film from the Holga to scan in and share, but this gives you an idea of what kind of pictures the Holga is capable of. Although on the surface to anyone who hasn’t ever used one they look like pretty darn crappy pictures, it’s the fact that you’re getting such interesting images out of such a POS camera. Literally, this camera has four focus settings (settings, you don’t ACTUALLY focus) and two aperture settings - that’s it. Fixed shutter speed and the lens is made of PLASTIC. The camera retails for $15 and you wouldn’t believe what kinds of looks you get from people when you’re carrying around a $300-$500 film camera around your neck along with a $1500 digital Rebel camera and yet you’re taking pictures with this “hunk of junk”.
To be honest, I love these photos - they may be simplistic and out of focus but, in my humble opinion, they’ve got style. The vinetting alone, although a “cheap” effect, makes the pictures so much more interesting. Tell me what you think!
I’m off to Anchorage area again for a while - going down with my mom and Deanna for a while to get some quality time with my mom. Just feel like I need to spend some real time with my family lately. Plus, it’ll be Deanna’s first *real* trip to Anchorage since May - although we had a quick jaunt there in July, it wasn’t really for Anchorage. Going down to Seward to the Sea Life Center as well - don’t know much else what we’re planning on doing, but I am planning on bringing 3-4 cameras. Deanna’s mom has gotten me a Argus C4 at a garage sale and I’m really looking foward to getting to play with it soon - although I had hoped for this weekend, that doesn’t look like it’ll happen. Ah well, I’ve got enough cameras to play with.