Enjoy Yourself. Enjoy Yourself
It’s later than you think.
ED: We will be returning to reporting on the Bubba Bozo Trio, the corruption infecting Key West City Hall and the Conchtown shooter in the next couple of days.
To be honest, there hasn’t been much to report.
But this, I just had to they off my chest.
And as always, thank you for your support and making independent reporting possible.
Watch this space.
JUNEAU—That old saw from Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians rings true nearly 70 years after its introduction.
Most of you know I have been in Alaska for several months.
It is quite a shock coming from the tropics, I can tell you that.
But what I can also tell you is:
The.
World.
Is.
Melting.
Literally.
Since 2011, the 49th. The state’s capital has had multiple glacial outbursts (AKA floods) every year.
Avalanches and earthquakes are increasing.
Just last week, Mendenhall Glacier’s Suicide Basin let loose an outburst — which human barriers helped minimize a record-breaking — but not as bad as they expected — outfall.
The other day, some 70 miles south of Juneau, an avalanche caused a tsunami that they believe released 100-foot waves in one of the fjords.
Some islands were scoured entirely of vegetation and life.
To me, the weather feels pleasant.
It has been in the mid-60s every day.
But most of the mountains have lost their snow.
People are sweating.
Animals are looking for food.
It is an eerie thing watching the world die.
For those of us in the tropics — other than coral bleaching — I don’t think we see it as bad.
But now the blue whales are going silent in the Pacific Ocean.
Scientists are saying the gentle giants are spending more time hunting and singing less, due to global environmental changes.
Note that I didn’t use the term “warming.”
Anybody who can’t acknowledge that our climate is changing… is a part of the problem.
Almost 20 years ago, in Denver, I had an interesting interview with Yvon Chouinard, the founder of Patagonia.
The topic?
Microplastics.
Even then, Chouinard and the scientists that the billionaire-clothing company owner funded saw how microplastics were shutting down the thermoclines and convective currents in the Pacific Ocean.
The world-renowned rock climber painted a picture of returning to ice climbs that made his career… that no longer existed.
And of sardines, herring, and other keystone forage species gorging themselves on sugar-grain-sized plastic that they believed to be plankton.
And other fish and the great whalesdoing the same in turn.
It is truly a unique reversal of the food chain, with the collapse of microfauna leading to the collapse of megafauna.
The other day, I witnessed a vast area of dead herring on the water's surface, which looked akin to a fish kill.
There had been some lunge and bubble-net feeding by humpback whales in that area, but there seemed to be a lot of dead fish.
Like A LOT of dead fish.
I mentioned it during a meeting and was told it was a teaching moment and that it was fish the whales had missed. A suggestion was made to have our “guides” (supposed naturalists who cannot get their facts right) scoop the herring up and show them to our cruise ship passengers.
CRUISE SHIP PASSENGERS.
Something didn’t seem quite right, so I researched. Satellites showed surface water temperatures in that area in the low—to mid-50s.
That is right about the upper range of water temperatures for herring.
Fish kill or gluttony?
You make the call.
I know what I saw.
It is a sad state of affairs in the 49th. State.
Coming to a city, state, or nation near you soon.
We’ll return to our regular diet of corruption and murder in the next couple of days.
I just kind of had to get this off my chest.




The current clown administration isn't doing the world any favors either.
I shared your note with a pilot I met in Hanes - Fly Drake - and he and I hit it off one Keys pirate to one bush pilot - both living in an area that is both over-loved and suffering from neglect. He and I had some good discussions and that was 11 years ago. I hope he appreciates that some of us - from very far away - wince in pain on their behalf. I look at every tourist photo of the Mendenhall Glacier and track its retreat. Like people in the Keys - they are loosing their lives and culture. Thanks for writing what you did today.
Karen Beal
Key Largo