The Zoo

My DH is cool and endless days

Well of course I think he's "cool", I also think he's "hot" but that's my opinion. I mean he's not here in this hot weather, he's keeping cool because he's in Alaska right now.

DH and our 2 yr old Sarah went to Alaska to visit the in-laws and attend SIL's wedding. DH says the weather has been quite nice and cool there.  He said it's actually cold enough at night that he had to get Sarah a new jacket and gloves.

Night in Alaska is quite subjective. I've never been there so it's really hard for me to understand/envision the whole thing. See, where they are in Alaska the sun doesn't really set at night during the summer.  DH says the sun goes "down" about 1am and comes "up" about an hour later. Night there in summer is a very short twilight, not completely dark. DH and Sarah are staying in a guest room with very dark curtains so they can sleep.  The dark curtains must not help much because they both seem to be up at odd hours.  DH keeps calling me at around 2:30am  (that's 12:30 am where they are) and forgets that I am sleeping. YAWN!!!!  Midnight there is when his family tends to slow down for the day and go to sleep, so he calls me then because he's run out of things to do. It must be really hard for your body to know what to do when it's daylight out and the clock says midnight. Sarah has been awake every time he calls and she's full of energy as she tells me about her day.  "Daddy caught a hal-i-but" (that's right not just any old fish, he caught a halibut) "We saw moose" and "I got a polar bear purse!"  

This whole no night thing got me to thinking today. Shabbos (the Sabbath) starts when the sun goes down Friday night and ends when the sun goes down Saturday night.  If the sun doesn't go down, how do you determine when Shabbos is?  After asking around I was directed to one resource that said that the time the sun reaches lowest point in the sky during the never ending day, would be considered sunset.  Wouldn't it be odd to have to wait until the wee hours of the morning to light the Shabbos candles?  What do you do during the festival of Shavu'ot when you are supposed to stay up all night long and daven (pray)?  Not much davening can happen in an Alaskan summer night I suppose.

Untitled Comment

{ 03:03, Wednesday 26 July 2006 } { Posted by happymama }

I have never been to Alaska either, but I have a sister who lives there, and she said it took very long for her to adapt to the light. What fun they must be having...I am a little green with envy because it is a whopping 111 degrees here today and the low for tonight is 85 degrees!!! I would love the cooler temperatures. Hope you have a wonderful day!
Rossie

I often wondered that

{ 05:03, Wednesday 9 August 2006 } { Posted by Phillyfarmgirl }

They must figure our halachic sunset or something like that. I wonder what my children would have with such shabbats. During the summer months they thought shabbat was plenty long, of course that was wehn we moved to the city. In the country they could play outside most of the day, but then it was a lot lonelier there on shabbat. Mazel Tov on the wedding!