Fapacaca Mexico

For some odd reason, we've been internet-less for the month of February, but thanks to Mr. Longstreet, we temporarily have access. We are cat sitting for fellow law clerk and neighbor MB while she is in Anchorage. The absence of internet in our lives has been a source of significant consternation, but we are assured by the ever trusty flks at GCI that our problems will be solved some time next week. In the meantime, we are wireless internet pirates.




We left -20 and blustery...





















and arrived at 75 and sunny.









The Fapacaca was a great success. What's a Fapacaca? It's a lot like a Lapacaca, but forever. It's a more long term arrangement than Genevieve and I committed ourselves to.

We enjoyed one of life's little pleasant surprises when we ran into the stars of the show, Sasha and Andy, in the waiting area of LAX on the way down. We enjoyed the flight to Puerto Vallarta together. Their Fapacaca on the beach was a smashing success - lots of laughter, lots of tears. Generally a sign of good things to come. My favorite part was the reception and the customary smashing of the cake into the face. I believe Sasha was employing some form of cake jujitsu.

Anyway, the setting was beautiful. The beach was great, and the reception was held in a soon to be popular locale near the Sayulita plaza de armas. The Sasha Andy fapacaca reception was the place's inaugural event. A large handcarved three dimensional mural adorned the bar. The picture doesn't do it much justice, but it is pretty amazing.











One of those arranging the logistics in Sayulita was Mario, proprietor of Casa Duende and former judo olympic hopeful back in 1980.
















Here's a shot of the ladies looking lovely.













And a shot of those taking shots of the ladies looking lovely.














Getting back to Bethel was an adventure in and of itself. PVR-SFO-PDX. Overnight in Portland and out bright and shiny the next morning to PDX-SEA-ANC. We flew from Anchorage to Bethel (400 air miles), attempted to land twice and flew back to Anchorage. Supposedly the pilot couldn't see the runway on account of the fog. So we had a spendover in Anchorage, then hit the dusty trail on the 6AM flight and made it to Bethel just in time for work. Genevieve continued on to Emmonak, another 200 mile flight to a town on the mouth of the Yukon. All in all, it was about 40 hours of travel time. Needless to say, we read some books. Keeping us cool were three Arctic themed books - Ordinary Wolves, awesome, Looking For Alaska, pretty cool nonfiction about lots of different Alaskans doing the crazy things Alaskans take as normal (thanks, Jackle), and Nunaga, which was great to read in tandem with Ordinary Wolves. Sort of sets the stage in a way. It's about a Scottish dude who moved to the arctic and lived amongst the Inupiat Eskimos of Canada as a fur trader in the 50's. He lived as they did and took good notes, and his account makes for an exciting, Ernest Shackleton-esque read. We also covered the sci-fi genre with Brave New World and The Eye of the Heron. Genevieve read some Swedish crime novel. Some Vonnegut tidied it all up. And last and least, one of the least helpful self improvement books ever written, the 7 secrets of intimacy or something like that. But I don't mean that in a judgmental way, of course.