This lotta light of mine...

I have been trying to write more and actually keep this blog going, really I have. My past posts generally revolved around movies because that is what I was doing. Because I haven’t been watching too many movies lately, at least none that blew my mind, I have been struggling with what to write about. At 10 p.m. last night while I was making soup from scratch, I realized what to write about: why the hell I was making soup at 10 p.m.

The answer is that the amount of light up here is tweaking me out. The sun for most of the winter rose around 11 a.m. and set by 3 p.m. I survived the four hours of weak daylight by sucking down vitamin D supplements, overloading my body with endorphins at the gym and spending my dark evenings watching movies.

Now it is light by 8 a.m. and dusk starts around 10:00 p.m. I have light and have no idea how to deal with it. I am one of those people where if it is light out, I feel like I should be doing something. I can’t sit on my butt watching movies if sunlight is pouring through the window, so I have been trying to rework my daily routine. Drinking my time away at the bar, which I have been doing since Iditarod, finally had to end. Although I must say that that was good bender while it lasted.

I now try to spend a lot of time at the gym. I will go to yoga then workout, hold mma club, play volleyball, run on the treadmill or do whatever I can to fill up time. All the art projects that have been stirring around in my mind are now being put into fruition. I make myself sit down and be creative even if I’m not feeling the creative urge. This is a good thing as I have been slacking on arts and crafts and even playing guitar. One of my main goals in moving to Nome was to be a semi-hermit and make lots of art. I started off strong but the cold and dark had the creative juices frozen so I am attempting to thaw them out.

The light has also forced me to put tinfoil over my bedroom windows. After making the mistake of trying to go to bed early one evening, I found that light pouring into your bedroom does not make for a great night’s sleep. Blackout curtains, well certainly less ghetto, have two distinct disadvantages. First, they do not reflect the sun so your apartment heats up. Tinfoil does. Second, they are expensive. Tinfoil is not. Let the ghetto good times roll.

I have also been cooking a lot. There is a program up here where for $40 every week, a box of organic produce is flown in from Full Circle Farm in Washington State. My expanding body has me attempting to cut down on red meat and eat more veggies. A mixture of lots of weightlifting and mma, heavy eating and my body adapting to negative temperatures has bulked me up quite a bit. An assortment of weird veggies every week gets me healthy and gives me a project – learn how to cook a new food. So far from my produce boxes I have learned that I like beets and turnips, chard is alright, and bok choy will probably go to waste.

The latest new ingredient I got was leeks. I found what looked to be a delicious recipe for shrimp, scallop and leek risotto. I then went searching Nome for ingredients and came back short scallops, a red chile pepper and arborio rice. By searching Nome, I of course mean to go to the two grocery stores in town. Groceries in Nome are what a grocery store in the lower 48 would have been like in 1990, good enough selection to vary your diet, but lack the fun and odd ingredients that foodies love. My solution, make a soup and add orzo pasta instead. Try it. It is quite good.

In conclusion, here I am in Nome with 12 hours of light to work with and about 8 more to come. Let's see if I am as successful with dealing with the light as I am with dealing with the dark. If I continue with my pace now, I will have an apartment full of art and a refrigerator full of leftovers. Both are good things to have.



Jeff’s Light Tweaking Shrimp, Squash and Asparagus soup
1 leek
1 red pepper
3 carrots
4 stalks celery
Garlic
Green onion
2 yellow squash
1 bunch asparagus
1 lb shrimp
2 cartons of vegetable stock
Bay leaf
Old Bay seasoning
Orzo pasta

Dice leek, red pepper, carrots, celery, garlic and green onion and cook in olive oil over medium heat until tender. Add chopped squash and asparagus and vegetable stock and bay leaf. Simmer until asparagus is tender. Add half a box of orzo to the soup. Sprinkle shrimp with Old Bay and sauté in oil. Add to soup. Let simmer until orzo is puffed out and tender.