The Festival

Free time at the  festival. It's a bewidlering concept to rid yourself of the other twelve people you have been in constant community with and be alone, or at least with only one other person. Alone is still too foreign a concept after 6 weeks of field school.

The Yukon River Campground seems like a nice establishment and the lot I will spend my nights at is near the river, still a silty grey colour here as it had been in Eagle. Dawson City is across this river, so we all pile into the pickup truck/camper combination, three in the front, and let's say many more in the back. Perhaps this weight would be the cause of later bolt shearing...

It's a short drive (thankfully), really walking distance to the ferry. A short stretch of water, really bridge distance, but that might make Dawson City jsut another truck stop, and you wouldn't want that.

The town, in addition to the wood, historical buildings largely displaying what each contains in bold font on the front and the wooden boardwalks has that old smell that one only gets opportunity to enjoy at historical forts and the like--a mixture of decaying lumber, oil, and grease. Of course as we sit down on the planks outside the bank, a banjo can be heard playing in the distance.

It's the festival. Young and old alike flock the streets. The old dressed for the most part more practically, fleece coats, t-shirts, practical, the young people dressed in a range from hippie to hipster. Here and there people of any age are wearing their new purchases; colourful dresses, Dawson City Music Festival merchandise, the floppy hat on my head. Standing out is a couple of German men, who look perhaps even more early 1900s than the town itself.

Folk music can be heard, coming from the large red and white striped tent where the main stage of the festival is. Someone stops you at the gate to take a glimpse in your bag and then you're free to enjoy all of it, my favourite a band from Nunavut, named the Jerry Cans, who are complete with Inuit throat-singing. My feet can't help but dance to that.

The festival grounds aren't the only part of Dawson alive and well during the music festival. The streets are full, the restaurants fuller, and the bars perhaps the fullest. But the wait to kiss the sourtoe is still relatively short. Rest assured, though the legend says that one will lose their toe after getting their membership, my feet could still travel to the enjoyable Dawson City Museum the following day.

The museum is like the city itself, old yet interesting and full of life. As my friend from Dawson City said, "It's a crazy little town but it's one of a kind that's for sure." And my feet can't help but dance to that.

The City of Dawson

We're in the van but more enclosed than usual, a thick fog settled in around us. The edges of mountains and hilltops can be seen but we know that we're missing impressive peaks.

We reach customs. An isolate, the "town"-called Eagle Creek, Alaska- has a sign letting travelers know of its unfathomably large population of two people. Mr. Brown, border patrol officer, seems nice but takes his job very seriously to the point of asking the two Americans in our vehicle specifics he heard from our instructor moments before. Population thus makes it into the safe to joke about column, while security was left behind on the road of gravel and dust.

A little beyond the customs station, the fog lifts, affording that impressive view we knew we were missing. A few people familiar with Tolkien's works thought the landscape was very Hobbit-like, in my mind, I agreed with the others who thought it looked very much like Scotland.

The road turned to real highway for a time but of course it made its way back into gravel and dust, gravel and dust. One turn and snow in July; a snowball fight in summer, the sandals on my feet a regrettable choice as they caused me to slip and lose precious throwing abilities.

More time spent in this ulterior world, the otherness multiplied by the fog, still settled in around, hugging and still clinging to certain parts of the landscape and then as my bladder reaches dangerously full levels, Dawson City appears below on the wide Yukon River.

We have arrived at a city of gold, made on gold, but corroding at the edges.

The Sands of Time

Remember that canoe trip I mentioned? That was a miserable failure. Bob gave us a rough idea of where the path was and we completely failed to find it, got ransacked by the most mosquitoes I have ever had to contend with, and almost got lost. Luckily, the sun acted as guide to tell us what direction to go.

To wash away the defeat, a trip to the river was necessary. The Yukon River carries so much silt that it hisses as it weaves by. Still it cannot have made me filthier than a day of digging and a considerable amount of time could be spent in the water as it was pleasantly warm.

I spent some time finishing our first unit--making it through 10cm of the sterile sands to ensure that they were indeed sterile (I found only one paper thin flake at the very top of this layer) before moving on to help Lisa and Thomas in the unit they had started adjacent to our original 2011-25 unit. This worked out quite nicely for me as digging the sands was easy and fun (I was fulfilling childhood dreams of digging to China) and the annoying work of cutting through the matted duff layer was finished by Lisa and Thomas before I joined them. Win-win-(win?).

The new unit was empty until about 10-15cm down when flakes and bones and a flake/bone feature and a giant chopper and many other things were found. Unfortunately, our time at the David Site was cut a bit short. Lisa was much more upset than me, as she had just found the largest, most complete bone thus far at the site (with spiral fracturing too) but only part of it as the other part was stuck in the wall and had to be left unexcavated.

A group of us also hiked to the top of the Calico Bluffs in one of our evenings. Difficult because of the sliding colluvium on the steep slope, but of course the struggle became worth it when the height provided a most spectacular sight.

So, we broke another camp, loaded Andy's boats one more (he was very thoughtful and drifted around the bluffs so we could see them from river level) and headed back to Eagle. As Pawel, Norm, and Niki rearranged our cargo for the trek to Dawson, Bob took us to do some shovel testing across the river.

Shovel testing is about as fun as it sounds. Digging a 60m diameter, 1 m deep hole is only fun for so long. The area we were in was a Swedish homesteader's field that he had fertilized with fish bones in the early 1900's so we found fish bones rather than stone tools though both were anticipated. Colin, who I was working with finally uniting team Chrisniuk, knew what king salmon vertebrae look like. I did not. I would have thrown the small piece from our screen to the ground thinking it was a weird looking piece of root, which seems very stupid in hindsight.

Once we were done our test pits, goodbyes were said to Bob, his wife Pam, his son Sam, his employee Christine, and his other employee that had been our teacher first, PhD Michelle.

And on to the same random campground we had stayed at on the way to Eagle (not so random now), some sleep, and forward to Dawson City. 

David Site

We went into the world of real archaeology. Dropped off by a boat, hastily making camp, and bush-whacking to the excavation site. That's Alaska, the Last Frontier for you. Yes, I am wildly exaggerating as the camp has been established in previous years and so trails, cabins, and other civilized things exist.

Plus, we have neighbours. Kate and Andy with their log cabin isolated on the Yukon River and their herd of dogsled dogs seem like something out of a reality TV show. Actually, they are presently being filmed as a reality TV show. It is not going so well as the producers are looking for more conflict, danger, and drama then Andy and Kate are willing to provide.

We had a productive day of excavation, finding lots of flakes, cores, microblades, and even some bone. Personally, I found flakes, which is always pretty neat. The pit I am presently excavating in produced a 4500 year old moose mandible in year's past. Tomorrow, we are likely excavating westward and starting an adjacent unit. I am optimistically concluding that we will find the rest of the moose skeleton. Perks of the site are the sandy sediments which allow artifacts to easily stick out and allow screening to be functional. (At :Little John the sediments were water saturated which only permitted hand screening- slower but more fun). Also PhD Michelle allowed me to wield the legendary megatrowel. One word: epic.

Stormin' Norman has been feeding us well- so any family reading this: don't fear, I am eating plenty to feed my growing muscle mass. Right.

Later we are going canoeing- Amandolin, Josh, and myself. Should be fun and hopefully provides a stunning view of the Calico Bluffs. One can hope and dream. If not, I can always take a trip to the outhouse.

Yes, you read that right.

Top of the World

It's not just a great Imagine Dragons song but a wonderfully weaving road through amazing Alaskan scenery. After a short stay at a random campsite (very cozy when snuggled up in a small two man tent with Amandolin for expediency's sake in set up and tear down) and we were back on the road to Eagle.


The Mongols did a lot of things and 10-70 million were killed. Woah, easy Genghis Khan, you probably don't have to kill the entire world, but apparently you think you do.

But apparently we are close to Eagle so the end of the tale may never be told. At least we figured out how to fade the sound forward in the van so other thoughts can be thought besides imaginings of what the brutality of raping and pillaging done by the Mongols would have been.

It's Time for a Goodbye

I am not very good at goodbyes, they make me uncomfortable.

I do not know of anyone who likes goodbyes. I don't even like writing them. Admittedly, I left writing this post to come back to it. Sorry about the lack of order.

Leaving the Little John Site was a bit of a scramble but we managed it. As with most goodbyes, it was bittersweet. It's thought-provoking to be in a place and know you may never be back there again. The places I would go to and return to if money was no option. I'm definitely going to try to convince my parents who are picking me up in Whitehorse to make a drive through Beaver Creek, preferably on a Sunday or Wednesday for a last slow pitch game.

Because while the Archaeology was cool: hearths, obsidian flakes, a rodent tooth, bone fragments, and a preliminary or perhaps heavily eroded side-notched point in addition to other student's impressive finds of blades, a complete bison heel bone, a perhaps 13000+ year old game-changer biface, and the admittedly really cool, very old squirrel bones, behind all of those things except perhaps some of the bones, is people. The cultural material only exists because of people. Accordingly, it is the people that made my experience in Beaver Creek. People like Leslie, Chelsea, Tamika, Eddy, Blake, Bessie, Wilfred, Louis and Robert, Eldred, Jessica, Pat, Pat's wife (whose name unfortunately always evades me), Jolinda, Ryan, Glen, other Glen, Marilyn, DJ, Mike, Tristain, Leon, Tayla, Tom, Forrest, Ian, Martha, Julius, Susie, Selena, Roland, Star, Derrick, Ken, Doug, many more people and names I am forgetting, and of course Ruth and David. A list of names that may be forgotten corresponding to a community of people I intend never to forget.

Luckily, Tamika had the great idea to have hers and Eddy's birthday celebration before we left so there was a nice gathering that unfortunately ended with goodbyes. The birthday party felt like home: copious amounts of food, the older people eating first, and three types of dessert (because one just isn't enough).

It felt like home because of the parallel's to my own family's celebrations but also due to the welcome we were afforded in our time at the Little John Site: our welcome sign the first day, countless visits, teaching us Upper Tanana and how to make birch bark baskets, shotgun and rifle shooting, ball games, numerous other activities; their way of life. As David said, we are now ambassadors of their culture and if possible, I hope to be able to show some of the character the White River First Nation showed us.

No, I am not good at goodbyes. What do you say? How do you thank enough, wish well enough people who did so much yet you may never see again? Consequently of these thoughts, I am a most awkward person at goodbyes and perhaps do not look like I feel much, but as I put this goodbye on paper, I could cry.

But instead, I choose to smile at both David and Eddy describing my hair as bushy in one night, Eldred's well wishes to all of us, Ruth telling me to get over my fear of birds as she said goodbye, and huge hugs from Tamika and Eddy.

I will smile and remember fondly the people who made my time in Beaver Creek.

Mongols and Mountains

There is a remarkably large amount of remarks that can be made about the names  Mongols as a history podcast will tell you. Surprisingly, hours of this podcast remain interesting. Fun facts like horses were likely domesticated in what is now Ukraine. The podcast also reminded us that 15-16% of all people are thought to be directly related to Genghis Khan; an incomprehensible fact, yet a repeated one. 

We are on our way to Eagle, Alaska for approximately a week's worth of excavations with a man named Bob. 

Oddly enough, it is not far beyond the border that you can tell you left Canada. I mean besides the obvious US flags and passing through customs. I mean things like accents. A few hours from Beaver Creek and yes, there's an accent for Alaska. And plenty of fireweed.

I love road trips so I'm quite content to be in this car all day alternatively sleeping and sight-seeing, jumping out at Northway, Tok, and Chicken, and realizing that I'm once again under legal drinking age. Not that I'm too concerned, just an odd regression of things. 

Tomorrow we cross the Yukon River on some sort of boat. Sounds like it should be a good time. Niki, who has been here before says that it's only fun for like 15 minutes. I think she's underestimating my love of boats. 

I think I'm enjoying this Mongolian podcast more than the last one (about Egyptians and Persians) because the names are familiar. Genghis Khan is a big deal. Plus that Chinese ceramic paper I did last semester was focused on the Sung dynasty so I at least somewhat know about people like the Jurchins. Funny when information soaked up in school is actually relatable. 

Yes, there is a remarkably large amount of remarks that can be made about the Mongols. But the Alaskan mountains; the mountains, the scenery.They speak for themselves. 

Catch Up

My laptop's screen went black as I was trying to type up a blog entry one evening. So let's hope that is recoverable. 

Things that have happened in recent memory (list form because it's late and I'm sleepy).

(Order not necessarily correct).

1. Found another obsidian flake.

2. Perfected parody words.

3. Started preliminary choreography of parody music video.

4. Let Amandolin find 2 more flakes in my unit so that I could go spend time with the NCES kids. You're welcome, Amanda.

5. #4 makes my unit most productive. And we were all thinking it was a dud.

6. Started a coffee challenge competition with Thomas: who can go without coffee the longest, loser eats a half cup of grounds. 

7. Tried tricking Thomas into drinking coffee.

8.  Failed at #7.

9. Got tricked by Thomas into drinking a very vile and bitter tea/coffee concoction. 

10. Became even more bitter than that concoction. Drew a drawing entitled "Anger".

11. Felt better.

12. Became that weird, artsy kid in camp (or at least further embraced my role). 

13. Opened a new unit at N13 E06, found some burnt glass and charcoal. 

14. Saved some of said charcoal for art purposes and some for radiocarbon dating purposes. 

Thus further doing #12.

15. Hosted a tea with the crew for the community.

16. Fed a bird out of my hand (1/day is the goal). (Got to conquer that bird fear). 

17. Added to my dirt/ tan ring line.

18. Joined in a rendition of Barrett's Privateers by Stan Rogers/ learnt that song. Apparently not knowing this song makes me a failure of a Canadian. 

19. Went to Alaska border and traditional fishing camp of T'soogot Gaiy.

20. Learnt a stick gambling game.

21. Perhaps got too into said game.

22. Slightly cut thumb nail while hacking through O horizon (root layer) in N13 E06.

23. Realized I should not be trusted with a saw.

24. Failed miserably at pool against Eldred and Jessica. In my defence, Josh did not counter-balance my pool inability with pool ability.

25. Went fishing at the creek.

26. Further tangled the fishing line of the tangled fishing line pole's line and witnessed Amanda catch her first fish ever.

27. Cringed at the knife butt to the fish head that fishing requires. Also the lingering flopping. Also the face and gut removal. 

28. Got to meet David Yesner and his cool collection of rings and toe rings.

29. Peeled spruce root for birch bark baskets. Trust me, although this sounds like a counter-intuitive statement, spruce tree is necessary for birch bark baskets.

30. Failed at making brownies in the wood stove oven for the community tea.

31. Resurrected said brownies with canned pear and cinnamon/sugar mixture into a mud pie delicious mess in a cup, thanks to Trapline waiter, Doug's suggestion.

32. Hit a baseball that subsequently took a bad bounce and hit NCES Tim's face. (But at least I didn't pull a Niki and playfully push him out of the way to get to second base creating an imbalance and disallowing him to block the ball that then hit him directly in the nose like she did to our field crew Tim).

33. Said goodbye to Field Crew Tim.

34. Made plans to meet up with all the BC/AB kids at the 2013 Chacmool Conference at UofC.

35. Told other people to come to the conference.

36. Remembered how wonderful bubbles are thanks to Jamie. 

37. Participated in a random round of writing each other's names in other languages on people's hands, so Ukrainian, Polish, Hebrew, Arabic, or whatever languages other people knew.

38. Convinced Tim, Jamie, and Lisa that I knew how to write Chinese.

39. Wrote their Chinese "names" on their hands.

40. Convinced them that Tim's name was the longest in Chinese despite being the shortest in English because of the way the characters work.

41. Somehow in these shenanigans, stumbled upon the Chinese symbol for "five" in writing Lisa's name.

42. Told Thomas that I have 25% of the pain receptors of the average person. Why? Why not?

43. Took a couple naps. Delicious.

44. Made two spruce bark necklace pendants.

45. Realized I do not have carving skills and used some permanent marker on the "Yukon '13" on #43's pendants.

46. Ate some moose stew.

47. Ate my weight in bannock.

48. Ate my weight in peanut butter.

49. Continued carbo-loading strategy.

50. Woke up to freezing temperatures many a morning.

51. Found a Wisconsin quarter in my tent. Jackpot. 

52. Acquired a tshirt from NCES to put my total clean t-shirt count to 1.

53. Exaggerated a little bit on #52. An alarmingly small bit. 

It's Not the Colour of Your Skin

The past few days have been hectic. This will happen when you add 20 or so people to the camp and 15 of those people are kids.

We were joined by youth participants of the NCES and their resilience counsellors for the Art and Archaeology Program going on at Little John. This was something that I was very much looking forward to as both art and archaeology are two loves of mine as well as working with youth. Because kids are great. These kids were no exception. Despite the labels of "at-risk" and "troubled", they were pretty well like all other kids their age in that they want their surroundings to engage  them, many want to learn new things, try new things, they want to have a good life. Unfortunately, it's clear in a few minutes of conversation that events or circumstances have inhibited them from fulfilling this wish at many points in their lives. I hope that their time here was part of their good life.

The lavel "troubled" set me up to almost fear them or at least be intimidated by them. "At risk": at risk of what? Of making a better life for themselves? Of rising above their situation? Let's hope.

Labels aren't always just words. An image can be a label in itself. What do you think of when you think of a Native person? Do you think of a drunk brown man on 17th Avenue or do you think of a blonde, blue eye girl from the wolf clan who excavated her archaeology unit meticulously? If  you saw me on the street in my current state would you know me as a middle class university student or a homeless person? (Because rest assured, I look more like the later than the former).

We're not one thing, one entity, one label. And labels can't be made with our eyes alone. They probably don't need to be glued on at all. 

Inspiration and Indian Feet

My laptop is dead but the good news is that I have found my notebook, so I shall transcribe this later. It would have been nice to have this before the midterm. But it's ok, Stormin' Norman was generous with the bonus marks.

Today Sarah told me I inspire her. I asked why. She said I always have a smile on my face and she loves my quick responses. I have had several people ask me if I was sad on several separate occasions when really that's just my face. It looks sad. So Sarah may have been full of it, but it did cause a smile on my face.

This evening, we had many Upper Tanana visitors. First Tommy was over for supper. He's the oldest Johnny (The Little John Site being named after a Johnny). Unfortunately, I didn't get much of a chance to speak with him as I was cooking. However, I am sure I will get to hear more from him soon.

In the evening, our regular visitors, Eldred, his girlfriend Jessica, his father, David, his mother Ruth, sister Bessie, brother-in-law Wilfred, nephews Eddy, Blake, Louis, Robert, and niece Timika were all here. They're all insanely generous. We haven't even fully repaid Bessie and Wilfred for transporting a crazy amount of our groceries from Tok and already Bessie brought us something else-- a delectable rhubarb crisp which Timika helped me serve out to all our "customers".

I did spend the majority of their time here finishing up posters for Canada Day and hanging out with the kiddies. This is because as an awkward sort of person, it is easier to make a silly face than conversation.  I should work on that.

Plus Eddy, Timika, Blake, Louis, and Robert are full of energy and fascination. Kids are great.

As David was leaving and I said my goodbyes, he said that if I continued to walk around barefoot, I would get Indian feet; my feet would grow wide. I said I might reconsider going barefoot. But he wasn't saying it as a bad thing. Both him and Ruth assured me of this. It was merely a statement. By the end of this field camp, I might just have Indian feet. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Tent City

Sleep rarely eludes me. I can count on my digits the number of times I have spent the night tossing and turning. The thunder last night that was remarked upon as loud was something that I slept right through. It is 5:30 in the morning and this time, I’m awake. This is thunder.

My McKinley “Kluane 3” tent—an inaccurate name meaning whitefish—was covered by an industrious blue tarp three weeks prior when we arrived at the Little John Site KdVo-6. Though I feel glad of this (I do not overly want to test the waterproofing of my tent), the cloudburst that seems like it is occurring right over my head is overstated by the pit-pats that are rain hitting plastic. I think for a moment of peeking out and seeing the true, unenhanced force of the rain, but I cannot be bothered. Besides, the clouds have yelled their anger once more, and the only thing of importance to me, is that it’s loud, loud enough to keep even me awake.

“Tent City” is what we have been calling this portion of the archaeological field camp. We crammed our tents closely together at the beginning. So close that it is possible for me to give a notebook, a bandanna, or perhaps a camera from my tent to the owner of the nearest tent to me without ever leaving, save for sticking my hand out to pass on the desired item. It was even more packed before. One tent has been removed.

At our arrival, I feared bears but I will pretend as though it was for the practicality of using one large blue tarp over an amalgamation of tents that I placed my temporary home so near the others. “City” is a term that when you’re in an isolate of civilization, approximately fifteen people in the bush, and a bumpy, twenty-minute drive from the nearest town of perhaps eighty people, means only four tents. Tents apart from Tent City are quite near to us as well, but most of these have individual tarps, a tedious project but necessary to work around the labyrinth of trees.

Camping like this is strange to me. Not the tarps or the closeness so much as the lack of clearing—wedging even small tents into the limited spaces had been difficult. Some people took the time to remove stumps, add moss to their sleeping surface. For my part it seemed unnecessary, it is the first time that I have camped on the layer of decaying trees and forming organic soil that covers the ground here, instead of the hard dried out ground of the Prairies in mid-summer.

I know soon that I will have to properly awaken, attempt to squirm into clothing in my sleeping bag, staying at a cozy temperature and then making that first brave movement out of the warmth. Donning my yellow rain jacket, an obnoxious article of clothing to walk in the small gap between my tent and my neighbour’s to turn left and walk down the path which quickly changes into boards (so we are not quite so uncivilized) to the fire, covered by a shelter that is extended by a tarp, grab breakfast and sit on one of the crowd of benches and chairs.

Follow this path back and on my right I will see the square Rubbermaid containers, a blue one and a white one, that almost always contain dirty water. Sixteen people digging in an assortment of sediment cannot hope to keep water clean.

Further along is the large, rectangular canvas tent that consists of our camp laboratory. Contained within are collections, a microscope, and additional toilet paper, amongst other things. If I continue along this path, I will reach the road, which the Americans call a “street”, a strange term I think as it is in fact the Alaska Highway. One of the first days, a group constructed a marker of sorts—three poles tied together, like the start of a tipi, with orange flagging tap that flies with the wind. But if I am not to cross the road, I can go left, and this is the path that passes where the grouse laid her eleven eggs and the van, containing all our items that are scented are stored. The van that drove us up here and will presumably drive us back. Past this is the “red box of hell”, as Colin likes to refer to it, the outhouse, a necessary place to visit but somewhere that is avoided at almost any cost. Within hell, a quote on the wall, Einstein, or a poem that Amandolin and I painstakingly copied and yet somehow managed to still make look messy—fitting for the surroundings.

A few metres south of the red box is the deepest excavation unit within the field camp, one that was a test of the pit crew who dug it, who willed it to produce one artifact and has produced only a razor blade and a collection of small animal bones. Neither are of particular interest but were celebrated nonetheless. Further south is my pit crew’s excavation unit, of a lesser depth but of more archaeological importance.  Here we have lamented out of frustration, bickered, rejoiced over finds, and swatted at the ruthless, continuous cloud of mosquitoes.

A small unit is east of ours, and beyond that, the “Pit of Despair”, deep and with plentiful paleosols. South and east of my crew’s unit, there are a few shallow pits. Here many flakes have been found but they are within the end of their units, having hit moraine and unable to proceed downward. These units are near a cleared area from which low, tree covered mountains carve the sky. A pier projects off the hillside—a perfect place for watching the sunset.  A path near the pier supposedly runs to the creek of which a sliver can be seen. Another path to that same sliver of reflecting light goes by the red box. Both must cross through the muskeg—round mounds stick up and look like something out of Dr. Seuss. A few large trees are interspersed. But if I head back here at the end of the day, to the pier, it is a perfect place to watch the sunset. The sun pierces its way through the birch, orange and pink often crop up above the horizon and subsequently begin to fade. And though the sun hangs there, barely below the hillside, it still marks the end of another day. 

Notes To Self

1. Your prof is potentially reading this: Don’t say anything incriminating.

2. Barefoot is best. I am trying to train up my feet to be tougher. Also it is better than having shoeprints in your pit.

3. Stop eating dirt. Though it can be conducive to comparing stone to bone, there can also be dormant disease in the cold soils up north and there have been reports of archaeologists contracting illnesses.

4. #3 may be incriminating. Please see #1 again.

5, Note to self: Grouse chicks are really cute. So that bird that you now think is disgusting was once cute. This could be helpful for conquering bird fear.

6. Denali complex had microblades but Nenana/Chindadn did not.

7. Illinoian/Reid glaciation: 200, 000 – 120, 000 years ago. Wisconsin/McConnell glaciation: 70, 000 – 11,000 years ago. Glacial maximum of this was when people came over on Beringia.

8. Write letter of discontent to Apple. Beringia is a word and should not be underlined, spelling and grammar.

9. I really hope my tent is fully waterproof.

10. Be less obvious. While collectively, we got Josh to day “student government” approximately 5-6 times yesterday, the gig may now be up on that one. But is was fun while it lasted.

11. Sweep tent or something. It’s a mess in here.

12. Naan + cheese = a delicious grilled cheese sandwich.

13. Keep with the glasses. You know that putting in those contacts in previous weeks was disgusting and your hands are much too filthy for that.

14. Slightly moving your hand troweling all day may seem like enough exercise to be a license to eat, but it’s really not.

15. Stop carb-loading. You’re consuming your daily intake of calories in all the sugar and cream that’s in your coffee.

16. Become stronger and learn how to drink coffee black.

17. Be more secretive about yours and Amanda’s secret handshake.

18. Charge phone. Music makes a happy pit.

19. Get “Safe and Sound” by the Capital Cities on said phone.

20. Don’t let local girl, Leslie tell you sasquatch stories before bed. You may think you are brave but that solo walk to the outhouse will test you.

Predictions

I felt good about our pit the day Lisa found our first artifact. Daniel told Amanda that she would find something in her pit today, and she did. Predictions of what will occur have been holding up thus far. Can I predict a mammoth head with an imbedded projectile point for myself?

No, I cannot. However, I did make my first real discoveries since the historical artifacts for myself today. I thought that piece of colluvium was bone and that interesting looking rock with the minerals aligned in such a manner that they looked like shell was an artifact as well. But that vermin tooth and obsidian flake today were the real deal. This I am sure of.

The midterm is today. Maybe I should be more stressed but Stormin’ Norman ensures us that it will be easy. I will let you know on the other side. Somehow, I think it is quite possible that he is overestimating the amount of knowledge I have accumulated. Or perhaps I will surprise myself. Let’s hope for the later.

This week has been stifling hot, as previously lamented about, but luckily this meant that Stormin’ Norman took pity on our souls and let us have a shower this evening. Very refreshing. It is possible to forget how dirty you are while in the field because as stated beforehand, clean is a relative term. Still, you remember what clean is and how nice clean is when clean becomes a reality. (As opposed to some occurrence so distant that it seems almost mythological).

This evening in town was also spent in part at the community garden, complete with greenhouse and pump track—a type of bike track for the kids to amuse themselves on as the parents garden. I am a big fan of community gardens. Who doesn’t love a nice commune feel? I didn’t realize before this excursion that there are many things like cucumber and tomatoes that are unable to grow here. Apparently Dawson City has a better climate for growing things than Whitehorse even though it is further North. Interesting.

Things to look forward to: Art and Archaeology program next week. I don’t know how we’re going to manage that many people but it certainly should be a rewarding time. I am potentially doing the video for this as part of my term project. Check out the post entitled “June 24, 2013” for more details.

Stormin’ Norman “caught up” on my blog and told me it has “flavour” and tells of many things going on around here or something like that. I really could not tell if this meant he liked it or not but I am going to assume that it doesn’t 100% displease him as he said to carry on.

As a side note, I think I may write more prose-like in a subsequent post but in the meantime, let me “carry on” with more things I want to say in a typical conversation tone.