random-chunks-of-kori's-life

ATTENTION

2006-12-01T18:48:00.001-08:00

I have gotten a new blog that will show my profile. this one is messed up and i cant figure out how to fix it, so i just made a new blog. If you wanna check it out, and read a post that's alittle more up to date, go to www.hardkori.blogspot.com or just click on "My New Blog" under Links (left side of the screen). oh, im putting in dreds! and im going to get a puppy!

halloween!

2006-11-01T15:58:00.000-08:00

So for halloween, we ate a wonderful dinner of cat litter that mary made. Then we went trick or treating with my little brothers, cameron and carson. Jo dressed up as a skeleton, Kona was also a skeleton, with the help of some black tape. Cameron was a homeless bum, carson was a ringwraith (from Lord of the Rings) and me n' mary were gypsies. After freezing our bare toes off, well me n' mary's, we headed back and watched Pirates of the Caribbean, in honor of Chris's costume (see below). Good times had by all.
Then today, being the little plasma-hore that i am, i went down to the plasma center to sell part of my body for cash. To my dismay, a new guy picked up my folder. "Which arm?" he asked. "Left," i replied, and settled down in the cumfy reclined seat. He took forever to set up the machine and sterilize my arm with iodine, making me even more uneasy about what was coming up...the gigantic needle! The preasure cuff around my upper arm swelled up, and I sqeezed the short piece of PVC pipe in my hand to make my veins bulge. The new guy touched my vein by the needle scar, and asked me to pump my hand harder around the PVC pipe. he wasn't to sure about my vein, "perfect," i thought. I hate it when new guys stab you with that 5 cm wide needle! It always hurts more than usual when going in, and then, sometimes they can't get it into the vein right! So, they move this large metal piece around in your arm till they finally get it into your vein correctly! Not too comfortable, if you know what i mean.
Well, he finally pulled the cap of the needle, and made the approach to my vein, I set my jaw for the worst and tried to focus on the movie playing (Hook). It wasn't too bad of a prick, i've had more painful, but i noticed an odd amount of blood oozing out by the needle. Then suddenly, a stream of my life blood rocketed out into a spraying frenzy! (He DIDN'T put the NEEDLE in right!) Showering the open library book on my lap, along with me! The new guy was frantically ripping open cotton swab packages and trying to stop the blood without pressing on the large needle in my arm (i was very grateful for that curtousy). To my relief, a more experienced worker was soon on this exciting scene. He quickly opened another cotton swab and then pulled the needle from my arm, i applied pressure to the gaping hole until he had my arm securly wrapped. He then stabbed my right arm with the needle to harvest out my plasma, and i got to feel that lovely prick once again. Everything else went smoothly after that, they soaked up the large puddle of blood on my seat, gave me 25 bucks and i was on my merry way, with both arms incapable of bending less than 90 degrees for the next two hours (until i could take the wrap off), and a bloody book (hopefully the library won't mind).

The Gypsies
Cat litter and eye ball wine that mary made for dinner. Divine!
Sven's mom, Chris, a.k.a. the fearson pirate.

pumpkins,pumpkins,pumpkins

2006-10-28T11:44:00.000-07:00

Good ol' fall adventures

2006-10-28T11:07:00.000-07:00

Jo powerhousin' up an overhang at city of rocks

marcus crankin up the same overhang
jo climbing at the bread loaves

Biking some trails around pocatello, wahoo fish tacos!
Jo leading a sweet climb! Massacre Rock
city of rocks, elepahnt rock

mary getting attacked by her bike
lil' potty break, the dogs thought i was going somewhere excitng
Biking in Kelly Canyon

26.2 Whahoo Fish Tacos!

2006-10-12T20:54:00.000-07:00

The post-marathon pic. I loved the ice-cream at the end!

me n' mary stylin' our cool marathon shirts

me, mary, and becky climbing in St. George. it started dumping rain on us, we were soaked in 3.54 minutes, and so we cleaned our routes and scampered on home.

2006-10-12T20:36:00.000-07:00

CLIMB ON

2006-10-03T19:26:00.000-07:00

Thoughts about the upcoming marathon.

2006-09-28T19:01:00.000-07:00

The race for quality has no finish line- so technically, its more like a death march.

Nothin like bikin in the snow!

2006-09-26T18:13:00.000-07:00

So, me, mary and jo decided to bike wolverine a few days ago. There was a bit of snow at the top, but we took off anyways. The bike trail instantly became a rather intense slippery slide as we struggled to maintain control and slow down with our frozen brakes. After a few crashes into the snow, we started to get cold and a little more cautious. Biking the few uphills was pretty much impossible with the snow, forcing us to walk up. Before long it started to get dark, then really dark. We all were pretty cold by this time, especially our fingers and toes, and since biking down in the dark was getting kind of scary (especially when we hit an invisible jump), we all consented to start walking our bikes. We walked off the trail a few times, the only thing visible was white Kona. At one point we came to one of the streams we had to cross. I was determined not to get my feet any colder, so without any precaution or further thought i leap off into the darkness with my bike! To my surprise and dismay i land right in the stream bed and while coming down i scraped the side of my quad on the edge of the BRIDGE. Jo and mary cross over the stream, unscathed and dry. Well, we continued on down the switchbacks and eventually made it to the truck. Not exactly the bike trip we were hoping for, but it made a good story. Headlamps were a wonderful invention, if there is any doubt whether you'll need your's or not, just bring it.

2006-09-21T18:42:00.000-07:00

Back in I-da-ho

2006-09-21T18:23:00.000-07:00

Well, i'm back in good ol' school; studying as little as possible, going on as many adventures as i can, and giving plasma to pay for the gas.
climbing at Ross Park in Pocatello with jo and marcus

2006-09-21T17:15:00.000-07:00

Weekend at Island Park
slacklining over leaches at Island Park, a little more motivation not to fall

hike to the hot springs, so good!
me, jo, and kona kayaking in Island Park
jedd and me under windy bridge in Denali, AK. "livin on the edge"
kramer, me, jedd, and jordan. Denali, AK. you could say i'm the man's lady.

This just in: It's Raining!

2006-08-21T20:51:00.000-07:00

For those of you who haven't been outside in Alaska for the past month, bring your rain gear and check your windshield wipers! So, you could say we've gotten alittle rain lately, pretty soon we'll need a boat to feed the sitka deer. Our fox enclosure was getting pretty muddy. so, with only a few injuries and minor setbacks, we were able to net all of them and put them in a seperate kennel while we put gravel down and then some wood chips on the floor of their enclosure to help the water drain better. We gave them their shots and dewormer medicine while we were at it. I was elected to sqeeze the dewormer medicine in their mouth. The main objectives: get all the medicine in and my fingers out of the way before they got snapped. With all the rain, the roof on our lovely outdoor restroom was starting to leak, giving everyone a nice shower while they took a dump. We thought about charging people extra for the shower, but decided to fix the leak because the all the toilet paper was getting destroyed. Rick did a fine job at fixing the problem by tying down one of our huge tarps on top of the roof. Brilliant, cheap, and quick; just what we needed.
This morning i woke up to the sunshine! The clouds cleared and i felt the sun on my skin again (few better feelings in the world). It was a happy, gorgeous day. Well, I'll be coming back to idaho soon, whoopya! Everyone pray for Sven's ankle. Peace out.

2006-08-20T20:33:00.000-07:00

result of me trying to high line over the gorge, i hit my foot a lower rock when i whipped around on the leash.

2006-08-19T23:22:00.000-07:00

keith high lining over a gorge in alyeska

2006-08-19T22:59:00.000-07:00

Climbing with melissa, sarah, and mary

2006-08-19T22:11:00.000-07:00

our sitka buck thinking he's all big and bad, testosterone levels rising a lot around here lately, all the males are out to kill somethin'
me playing with Sadie, our little grizzly cub

2006-08-19T21:44:00.000-07:00

me wakeboarding behind a little fishing boat with mary!

2006-08-18T22:34:00.000-07:00

gorgeous alaska sunset

Four days of Fun

2006-08-18T21:23:00.000-07:00

Melissa and Sarah flew up alaska to visit me and i got four days off to do nothin but play, whoopya! We hiked up to byron glacier and played on a rocky beach in Cook Inlet because melissa had never been to an ocean before. Then the next day we drove up to Denali to meet mary and jedd. we got up there and went river rafting down the Nenana River for free! Jedd knew this river guide, Stephanie, that needed to get certified and fill her boat with some employees around Denali (Clients were too big of a risk), so we just pretended that we worked in the area and climbed on board. We wore wet suits, booties, beanies, and gloves, cause we were goin' through some chilly water. It was class three and four rapids, really fun! Stephanie was a good guide, she was a really cool girl (you could say that me, mary, and melissa all wanted to be her). Later we hiked up Healy mountain, met this guy on top that had climbed "the mountain" (mount Mckinley), and then we ran back down, it was way fun!
Oh, i took out my braids and decided not to put dreds in because BYU-I will probably make me cut them out once school starts and it wouldn't be worth the effort, some of their rules are alittle ridic i think. so anyways i wanted my hair shorter, so melissa cut it for me that night, in the dark, with a pair of regular scissors, with me sitting in a lawn chair in the middle of a dirt road. i'm sure it looked hilarious. melissa did a good job, despite the circumstances, i was impressed.
The next day we left Denali, rock climbed by anchorage for a while and then met keith in Girdwood. The Grand Plan... to high line over a gorge. We hiked in and set up the slackline. My attempt to cross the gorge was a little intense. it was my first high line, so you could say i was a little shaky, and my reaction time seemed to be a little slow for some reason because every time i fell off i would just dive off head first and only caught myself on the line twice (good thing we wore harnesses and had a leash). so the first time i fell i think i hit my foot on a rock below me (i didn't walk out far enough) because when we were done and my adrenaline rush had lowered i found two big cuts on my foot. The last time i tried, i dived off head first (I'm a freakin genious, i know)and saw the the rock literally flash before my eyes by only a few inches! to sum up this little drama, if the leash was any longer, the line any looser, or if i had taken one less step, i could have hurt my head just a little bit (to put things lightly). So i did a great job at officially freaking everyone out, they seriously thought i was going to die. we got it on my camera video, it looks pretty intense. i was willing to try one more time, but it was getting pretty dark and melissa said she wouldn't let me go again, probably a smart idea. So that's the end of that adventure, it was a good one.

2006-08-14T17:46:00.000-07:00

view from my back door
standing over a big crevace in Raven Glacier

2006-08-14T16:36:00.000-07:00

camped out on top. beautiful alaska
hiking up alyeska with keith

hiking crow creek pass with vanessa, joel, and nascar

2006-08-14T15:02:00.000-07:00

climbing pics! (Still light at midnight, whoopya!)

mary and keith climbing
We went to a muskox farm, and they had a mule and horses, it made me miss riding horses with my little bro, jon.
running in alaska, through the chugach national forest
One of the many glaciers that surround where i live

Inside: NEW and EXCITING details about kori blakely, check it out!

2006-07-21T22:50:00.000-07:00

A brief update, i haven't written in a while, so i'll tell ya the cool stuff that's been goin on and leave out the boring details. Let me see... we had a few gorgeous sunny days, one of them was my day off and i went down to Moose Flats and laid out in my bakini, the first time this summer (and probably the last)! That night a grizzly bear came into our center, me n' vanessa spotted the dangerous fellow when we went out to feed the moose calf at midnight. He was having a swell time, entertaining himself by "playing" with our mallard ducklings, they however did not enjoy this new playmate. So without further delay, me and vanessa ran back in to get Mike, i ran up the stairs and yelled for him to get up. To my surprise and dismay he came barging out the door in nothing but a little speedo, i gave him the news and went back outside. By this time our large brown enemy had discovered a new target, Honeymoon, our little moose calf. The bear was banging against the metal fence when Mike came running out (fully clothed, except for shoes) with his thirty aut six rifle. He fired into the air and the grizz took off past our gift shop and luxurious porter potties. Kelly came tearing out in the old truck, mike jumped in the back, and i was hot on his heels, i was not going to be left behind on my first grizz hunt! Kicking up gravel we left everyone else in the dust. The grizz busted through the gate and got behind our brown bear enclosure, he was trapped in an alley between two enclosures. me n' mike ran back there after him. i asked mike how many cartidges he had left, (just thought it would be a good thing to know under the current circumstances) "two," he informed me. Then we saw him! trying to dig into the bear enclosure, mike fired another round into the dirt, and he took off further down the alley. me n mike were right on his tail, me in my flip flops and mike in his socks! We came around the corner and couldn't see him for a little while, makes your nerves alittle jumpy, then we spotted that fellow, he was trying to climb over the fence. he saw us and gave a little growl and started to come back down! Mike yelled for me to climb up in this old dump truck thing that was by us, the adrenaline was pumping but i tried my best to stay calm and find a handhold to pull myself up, mike fired our last cartridge...(into the air), the grizz decided to climb up over the fence. we met kelly on the road and then drove into the enclosure the bear had gone into. we found his tracks over another fence (outside our center), going into the river. The grizz was gone, pretty exciting night though, for sure.
He came back for his revenge a few nights later, he broke our coffee machine and broke into our barn. luckily we had started to put honeymoon and the ducklings out back at night, so they were not threatened. Mike started sleeping out in the truck with the rifle across his chest.
Moving on to the next event: me, Joel, Vanessa, and carolyn hiked Crow Pass, a 26 mile hike, we hiked three miles in, camped and then hiked 23 miles the next day. it was a cool hike, we saw some black bear and a moose. we crossed, fell, and scrambled across a river flowing directly from a glacier. very, very very cold. my brain and body were struggling to work for me by the time we reached the shore, but we got a fire started and changed into some dry clothes, then hiked the rest of the long way out. Good alaska adventure.
Just the other night me and keith hiked up a mountain in girdwood, we climbed about 3,700 feet in an hour and a half, pretty good workout. we camped on the top of the ridge on this little mossy spot. it was so pretty! the next morning we scrambled down the steep, slippery mountainside, ate a great breakfast, and then i rode on keith's tour bus back to the wildlife center and keith left with his tour. well, i think i've mentioned everything exciting that has happened lately. Farewell and goodnight

continuation of the lengthy update on my life

2006-07-21T21:20:00.000-07:00

I've gotten to go climbing a few times, Wahoo fish tacos! I climbed with Mary on a fun rock out in the middle of this forest in Girdwood. A black bear came down the trail to visit us, he was only about 30 feet away. That same day we met up with keith and went climbing again! YES, i really love life sometimes! We climbed on the side of the highway going into Anchorage, we didn't leave till after midnight, the sky looked like the sun had just set! About a week later i met up with Mary again on my day off, we drove into Anchorage to pick up her brother and his wife (they were flying in to visit). On the way we climbed a few routes, they were way fun! It was my first lead climbing this summer, so I was a little nervous at first, especially climbing routes that i haven't done before and we weren't sure what they were rated. But i did good. The second route we did was cool, it had sidepoles all the way up that made you lay back to the left but the bolts were far out on the right, so it made me use a lot of balance sometimes to clip into the bolt. fun little challenge. The next morning there was a 5K race in girdwood that me and mary ran. it was fun, my first 5k! i did pretty good, considering i hadn't trained for it and i was recovering from the devastating disease known as Giardia. I placed 13th out of everyone, my time was 20.17. There were some good runners; three girls about 14 years old kicked my butt. they placed 5,6, and 7th; they were on some kind of (hard core) running team.
Lets see, the next exciting event in my life was when Keith, Kramer, and Nick showed up at my place after work and we went to Anchorage, Vanessa came with us. Me, Vanessa and Keith went climbing that night and camped out. It was vanessa's first time climbing she did pretty good. The next day i bought a 90 foot slackline, Whoopya! i figure i'm not going to make much money this summer and will have to take out a big loan for school, so i might as well buy what i want. At least i'm not charging anything, hate credit cards. I have a ton of pics to put up, but i can't figure out how to bring them up on this computer, i apologize to all my fans out there, you will just have to wait.

it has been confirmed

2006-07-01T15:31:00.000-07:00

went to the doctor. bloody stool. Giardia. I'm a survivor (so far).

An alaskan adventure

2006-07-01T14:43:00.000-07:00

driving like a maniac to our adventure
safety precaution. mary wore her helmet

skyline trail

I have giardia, and live my life. You can too. call 1-800-bloody-stool. Get your life back. I did.
mary trying to be hard kore like kori
juneau creek falls
The one and only... GRound Pounder!

old suburban, $200. bungy cord (required), $2. forgetting about my stomach ache, Priceless.
scandelous scars are just tatoos with better stories.
Finally all the reasons i came to alaska have started to come about. me and mary went on a little hike, straight up a freakin mountain. it was a pretty good workout but on the way down my stomach was getting pretty shook up, but i held it in so i didn't puke on mary. she's thanking me right now for my thoughtfulness on her behalf. Then we went Mountain BIKING! i had the sweetest bike i've ever beheld. It was a "Ground Pounder," a good old Walmart special. I figured it weighed about 50 pounds counting the hard core kick stand that was securely attatched. It was a full suspension bike that came with a small ratteling sound so mary wouldn't lose track of me. this sound was provided by the rear derailer brushing the spokes. The adrenaline rush on the way down made me forget all about my stomach ache and for the first time in TWO and A HALF WEEKES my stomach didn't hurt while i was awake. so me n' mary figured that was the cure, i just need to be having a blast 24/7 to feel good. thanks for the camera dad, loving it.

some new pics

2006-06-29T12:54:00.000-07:00

a cool looking gift shop in Whittier
sea lions in front of another glacier
sweat glacier!
soakin up the sun on the deck
me, vanessa, joel, nascar
sea otters
the chugach mountain range in the background (the largest coastal mountain range)
vanessa, me, and joel getting seconds
porpoises racing our boat
cool little waterfall,there was kind of a rainbow at the bottom

2006-06-29T11:50:00.000-07:00

a pair of "old man" wranglers i bought at the thrift store w/ mary. they're made of that kind of stretchy material.

going on a jet boat ride to a glacier

our boat driver
slacklining in mary's backyard

it rained on me n' mary while kayaking, got soaked and cold
kayaking with mary on the kenia

A sign me n' mary saw, reminds me of home.
our little baby muskox, we call him Meatball. He is my favorite.

two sunny days in a row!

2006-06-29T10:57:00.000-07:00

Tuesday we went on a 6 hour Prince William Sound cruise. Kelly (my employer) hooked us up with free tickets. We went through a 2 1/2 mile tunnel under the mountain to get to Whittier, it was pretty cool. It was cloudy and overcast in Portage Valley but when we popped out on the other side of the mountain there was nothin but blue skies and glorious sunshine! The boat ride was awesome; they served us halibut for lunch. the waitress lady was impressed by how well we cleaned up our plates and i told her we were starving interns so she brought us up seconds with two big pieces of halibut. It was good, i got pretty full. We saw a bunch of cute sea otters, sea lions on pieces of floating ice, and some porpoises (killer whales) came up and were raising the boat for a while! It was a good day, i did some bouldering across the benches on the top deck and soaked up the sun. When we got back to Portage the sun was shining there too! I went running and it felt so good. My stomach is finally starting to feel better and didn't hurt for the whole hour i was running, the sun felt so warm on my skin, loved it! Yesterday was the second sunny day in a row since I've been in Portage. Went running that morning; i run down this road surrounded by trees and mountains, i love the view, escpecially when the sun is out. At work, me n' Vanessa shoveled a bunch of gravel for some walking paths, it felt good to sweat in the sun again. Then we picked up and burned some branches in the black bear enclosure with Joel. I found an old, rusted pocket knife and the three of us had a little knife throwing contest. Later me and Vanessa had a sword fight with some sticks on a fallen tree; I help keep us intertained at work. That night Mike (my boss) picked me n' Rachel up to load the brush that he cuts down with a chain saw. We cut willow and alder to feed to the muskox, elk, caribou, sitka deer, and moose (a lot of brush). Mike tells everyone he gets scared that if he doesn't saw the brush down fast enough I'll start pulling it out by the roots, mike's pretty funny. I think he has figured out that i know how to work. I met Mary late that night because i have the next two days off, wahoo fish tacos! Oh, and i had my first drink at a bar with Joel and carolyn (nascar), dont worry it was a Sprite.

2006-06-22T18:24:00.000-07:00

today is my day off, the weather is cold and overcast, it hasn't rained too much today though. But i haven't been outside yet, i think i'm just sick of being cold and constantly under cloud cover. I keep telling myself i need to go running before it starts raining again but i'm still feeling sick to my stomach and my digestive system is still out of whack. It's been over a week now, what the heck is wrong with me, the only time my stomach doesn't hurt is when i'm sleeping. maybe i got the west nile virus, there's a ton of mosquitos here. living in idaho all winter, i really look forward to the hot summer and getting tan, this alaska weather just isn't cutting it. at least the scenery is good. I wish i was closer to mary, becky, keith, kramer, and jedd; i have so many friends up here but i never see them. i really miss hanging out with jo too. i was hoping to get some experience out in the field with this internship, but i don't think i'll be able to since we just work with the animals we have here at the conservation center, so that's kind of a bummer. but it is cool feeding the animals. we might get an orphaned, grizzly bear cub soon! the other day we got to ride this jet boat up a stream to see this glacier up close, it was pretty fun. The boat had about 400 hp and had a new hull design that could cut corners like butter! it only needed 4 inches of water to run, we could look over the side and see the rocks right below us, crazy! one of the boats had a tower on it, to bad i didn't bring my wakeboard, but i don't have a dry suit so i would literally freeze to death. i put up my climbing pull-up bar today, so i can at least pretend i'm rock climbing now and hopefully some day mary will be here with her rope when its not raining.

mary gets to alaska!

2006-06-15T19:48:00.000-07:00

back from running in the rain

the kenai peninsula
me n mary
goin out on the lake behind the house mary's stayin at

barbecue with the bison

2006-06-15T19:28:00.000-07:00

joel
me and carolyn (nascar)
kelly and lexie
we had a little barbecue in the back, moose hotdogs and salmon. while the barbecue was goin on mike, my "boss" let the plains bison behind the bunkhouse to graze some of the grass down. pretty good lawnmowers. i wanted to take a picture of them running by but didn't get my camera in time.

2006-06-15T18:48:00.000-07:00

me and honeymoon

me and rachel at cook inlet
star flower
joel, kelly, lexie (kelly's dog) me and rachel on gull rock trail

2006-06-15T18:36:00.000-07:00

the bunkhouse
isn't she adorable
me at the cook inlet

2006-06-15T17:55:00.000-07:00

kuma and uli (our black bears) nappin
native eskimos doing the blanket toss

sweet air!
big yawn
rachel feeding honeymoon

ALASKA PICS!

2006-06-15T17:39:00.000-07:00

me and honeymoon, the baby moose
Sweet alaska- this is where i LIVE!
Vanessa and danny, the bull elk
another view from my place
our two brown bears, hangin out

2006-06-10T17:15:00.000-07:00

I'm leaving for Alaska today! Yippie skippy!