Alaska. The land of blood beer, lakes and Sarah Palin

I'm really rather cross with Sarah Palin. She has a lot to answer for in my eyes.

It's not that she comes across as a complete fruit-loop every time I see her on Fox News. That's taken as read. At least she's consistent in her fruit loopiness. At least she's a full-time fruit loop. In that sense you know what you're getting with Sarah Palin. I can't stand those pollies who come across as all smart and intelligent and then they get into power and ... wham! ... they suddenly become complete muppets. And then you've got to wait 4 or 5 years to get rid of them. Good old gun-toting, hunt 'em down, shoot 'em up and skin 'em clean, Sarah P is never like that. What you see is what you get. She's as mad as a cut snake. 

What really annoys me about Mrs Palin is the fact that she's from Alaska. That's all.

It's really that simple.

But it's important. I really wish she was from Ohio. Or Nebraska. Or at least from somewhere that I don't really care for or I don't know too much about. That way I could just ignore her and not be so annoyed with her. But I am. She's from bloody Alaska. And bloody Alaska will never recover. It's going to be forever linked with Sarah Palin. It's destined to be 'that place' where 'that nutty woman' is from. And the Alaskans? They will always be tarred with the nutty Palin brush when I'm fairly sure that they are, by and large, a pretty normal bunch. All 722,717 of them.

I first fell for Alaska at Uni. I was going through my left-wing radical phase. I even threw an egg at Margaret Thatcher. It missed. In fact it missed by so far that I doubt she even noticed that I'd thrown an egg at her. In hindsight it was a waste of a good egg. It was a good egg thrown badly at a bad egg.

When I wasn't throwing eggs (badly) at British Prime Ministers, I was listening to protest songs, wearing a woolly fez-type hat and smoking Gauloise cigarettes because they were French and France had had a revolution. Mostly I was listening to Billy Bragg. And Michelle Shocked. In between the rabble-rousing, burn the barricades stuff that Michelle put out, she recorded a simple and stunning little song called 'Anchorage' (have a listen here). It contains the words,

'You know it's kinda funny
Texas always seemed so big
But you know you're in the largest state in the Union 

When you're anchored down in Anchorage, Alaska'.

That's when I first got thinking about Alaska. 

& then a few years later when I'd stopped throwing eggs and wearing woolly fez-type hats, I met a chap in a pub. He was standing next to me and he ordered a beer. Nothing wrong with that I hear you say. Well, no. Except that he asked for a shot-glass of tomato juice to be dropped into his pint. Dropped into it. Right into the middle of a decent pint of English beer. Of course, I couldn't help myself. I asked him what the heck he was doing. Had he gone barmy? He told me that he was having a cool and refreshing pint of ... blood beer. Apparently he was just back from a spot of salmon fishing in Alaska (like you do) and blood beer was all the rage out there.

Blood beer. A pint of beer with a shot glass of tomato juice dropped into it. Naturally I had one too. It was a million times better than it sounded. And looked. In fact it was really rather nice. Alaska. It's full of little surprises.

Alaska.

It's the largest state in the USA and the least densely populated. Half of all Alaskans live in or around Anchorage. Basically, the rest of Alaska is more or less empty. It's twice the size of Texas and has more coastline than the rest of the United States combined. In short, it's big. Very, very big. And very, very empty.

It also has 3million lakes. Yep, 3 million. And 100,000 glaciers. In fact, more than half the world's glaciers are gently sliding south in Alaska.

There's a few rather quirky things about Alaska too. First off, the locals pay no income tax. And no sales tax. None. Lucky Alaskans I say. But that's not the quirkiest thing. Not by a long shot. The quirkiest thing, without a shadow of a doubt, is this:

Alaska used to be part of Russia. Yep, it sure did.

It was bought by the US in 1867 for $7.2million. That's $120million in today's money. That works out to be 0.2c an acre. Alaska, the largest state in the Union is officially worth just $120million. That's less than Manchester City football club's midfield line-up.

Of course, this valuation came before Mrs Palin arrived on the scene. I fear that the value of Alaska might have diminished in recent years. That's a real pity. It's always sounded like a truly awesome place to me.

Alaska. Flogged by the Russians to the Americans for just 2c an acre on March 30th 1867. Palin or not, I reckon the Yanks got a bargain. I'll raise a glass to celebrate. Of blood beer. Maybe. Maybe not - me and Picky are all out of tomato juice.

Btw ... on Sept 11th 2008 Mrs Palin made her infamous comment. She said that she could see Russia from her back yard in Alaska. Far be it for me to leap to Palin's defence, but in one sense she was spot on. The Big Diomede Island (Russia) is separated from the Little Diomede Island (Alaska, US) by just 4km. For much of the year, if you're game enough, you can actually walk between the two. That's 'cos the sea is fully-frozen. Don't forget your passport.

pip pip

Ps ... next up I'll be posting a few words about those very special grown men who cry at the movies.