| Lunacy |
[Oct. 1st, 2006|11:29 pm] |
Just let me dust off the old diary here...
I went out and saw "Lunacy" at the Calgary Film Festival tonight. It's a Czech film, riffing on morality, religion, sanity, reality, truth, and ... meat. It was really really good; if you get a chance, see it. You haven't seen a film until you've seen two tongues fucking in stop-motion animation, let me tell ya.
Lots of new stuff in the ol' life, I guess...I've started teaching music. That's been a positive in my life I'd say. It's a big responsibility (at least I think so) to be, essentially, the first musical impression on young kids. That's the kind of responsibility I like taking on...it appeals to my pretensions somehow.
One thing I will say is, man, there is a lot of musical instruction out there that's complete bullshit. Music isn't about coloring all the F notes on a paper keyboard green. Music is about playing music musically. I think if you teach someone how to play something that they can identify and remember, you're going to go a lot further than having these bizarre color-name-idea-note associations.
Then again I don't have a degree in music education or whatever. I can play music though and I never colored any notes frickin green.
Speaking of playing music, I'm currently working on -- get this -- a Yes note-for-note recreation. Why? I have no idea. Sounds like fun, and it'll be a big challenge. First song on the to-do list is Heart of the Sunrise.
Hockey starts on Thursday. Normally I'd be excited except the Flames have had a rather forgettable pre-season and there are some ... concerns. I'm not horribly worried, but it would have been nicer to steamroll the opposition.
I started playing squash. I'm really enjoying it although, given how my elbow's felt this weekend, I have some concerns about it impacting my "health". God am I fucking sick of having to treat my elbows like I'm walking on spring ice. It's time to switch physiotherapists as clearly the one I've got now is not in-it for a long-term cure (or doesn't know how to achieve that.)
I'm proud to report I've started taking some risks. While I wouldn't say I've reaped any immediate benefits so far, it does get easier the more you do it.
I've been moderately-to-quite successful at re-arranging my priorities. I'm spending significantly less time fucking off and significantly more doing the things that matter. (That is, mostly, music-related.) I could maybe go a bit further in that direction but I'm enjoying the current balance so far.
Anyway that's about that for now. |
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| One man's small effect upon the world. |
[Aug. 19th, 2006|04:09 pm] |
This is a story told in reverse chronological significance.
Today: I was on lunch, and passed by the patio of a rather new restaurant called Avocado. It's a nouveau-Mexican kind of thing. A couple were enjoying (I presume) a plate of sweet potato fries, along with two dips: ketchup, and some kind of mayonnaise dip.
Two weeks earlier: I was on lunch, at a rather new restaurant called Avocado. It was a nouveau-Mexican kind of thing. The food was pretty good, but I really felt that the sweet potato fries could use a mayonnaise dip as well as the ketchup that my plate came with. I mentioned as much to the store manager when he inquired about our meal. |
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| (no subject) |
[Aug. 16th, 2006|02:52 pm] |
Hooray for mustard!
The Pagan King of all condiments. |
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| Lies // Noise |
[Aug. 14th, 2006|06:56 pm] |
Consider and contrast:
Galloway on Hezbollah.
Zionism as a force in history.
With the commonly held opinion that Hezbollah are damned dirty terrorists. That could be argued to be a simplification of the other side, and it is -- except that in many people's cursory understanding of the situation, that IS the underlying principle of the events.
The second link is so far to the flip side of that that I have an extremely difficult time reading it. Am I "conditioned" to reject information that far out of line of the mainstream understanding of the world, due to the same fears it purports -- that is, fear of the label of conspiracy theory? At what point do events that are plausible take so much behind-the-scenes-manipulation become "conspiracy theory" and therefore "on the fringe" or the workings of a diseased mind?
In pondering this, I came to this conclusion: it is impossible to find truth in media.
Chomsky's first filter on the news -- that media corporations are owned by businesses whose bottom line, and therefore principle motivation, is profit -- obviously applies here. I attempt to take anything offered me from a media corporation with a grain of salt, yet the pure volume of noise they spew forth has the echo-repeater truth-making property: if you hear it enough times, it becomes true.
On the flip side, you have the "conspiracy theorists" -- whatever that means -- a cunningly pejorative filter on alternative news interpretation.
What the hell is a so-called free-thinking person to believe? It is ironic that in an age of unlimited information, almost none of it is worthwhile. |
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| So. Angry. |
[Aug. 9th, 2006|12:35 pm] |
| [ | Feelin' |
| |  infuriated | ] |
So I'd had a gig lined up for late August since the beginning of May. We'd agreed on a price, talked about the gear, and everything else.
When I went to my cabin, I hadn't responded to one of her emails and was gone for a WHOLE LONG WEEK, so in that time she was contacted by someone else and she booked them.
What the heaving fuck?
If we were playing in two days, I could see it. But the gig's not for another two and a half weeks. How is it, after exchanging emails for a solid three months, that I have a week of silence and suddenly you give the gig away? Further, she HERSELF is a musician and has got to understand what a vicious underhanded maneuver that is.
There are literally 20 different nasty emails I could send to her at the moment. The leading candidate would be something like:
Hello,
I have been informed that you are seeking a band to play at your engagement party. I have a band ready to go, and if the engagement has not already been booked, if we could agree on the details and I provide that service for you?
Regards,
-Dave.
Too subtle? I don't think it is.
With all that said, I'll probably try and retain my "professionalism" and say nothing.
FUCKKKKKKKK.
Don't worry, you idiot, it's not as if musicians NEED THE GOD DAMNED MONEY. |
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| Why I Punch You In The Face |
[Jul. 14th, 2006|09:19 am] |
So I watched Why We Fight last night.
First, who knew that Eisenhower was such a smartypants? One of the most unfortunate trends in modern politics is the takeover by the political actor/handpuppet/schmooze-man from inspirational soundbyte guys with a full brain with which to speak.
Anyway I've got to run to work. But go see the film, or somethin, it's good. |
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| Yo |
[Jul. 12th, 2006|07:05 pm] |
Wish me happy birthday or you're UNFRIENDED
I'm not even kidding |
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| The serpentine sequence of life. |
[Jul. 1st, 2006|05:41 pm] |
| [ | Feelin' |
| |  exhausted | ] |
Join me in a guided meditation.
We move through life like serpents, each choice we make a twist of scaled segments our body's tail passes through like a flow of moments. Our future is our flesh, following our minds as we writhe along the desert sands; who acknolwedge our passing-by with shrugging dunes of sculpted memory.
Yeah, I kind of like that.
The last two days have been a whirlwind of seemingly random events. An impromptu night-on-the-town with Fredrik and Kirk last night is a tale that bares some telling.
We began at the Drum & Monkey, which seemed like a promising location until Fredrik had a sudden and irrepressible urge to go to the Back Alley. The Drum sparked a sequence that proved to be something of a theme: our standing around somehow provoked social interaction. My favorite was a sultry "hi gentlemen" from an even-more-sultry personality. A shame we didn't stay to force that moment to its conclusion.
The Back Alley was a complete flop: Fredrik's ID, a Visa -- with photo identification and such -- was evidently not valid to get him in the suddenly discerning doors of Calgary's most rawkish club. It works everywhere else, and had even granted him entry not two weeks ago to the same place, but his money was no good here, as it were. Too bad, as Chop Suey was playing just as we arrived which I can only assume was an auspicious beginning to what-might-have-been.
That failing, in a state suddenly bereft of lucidity, I announce that Outlaws is nearby and we can give that a shot. For those of you in Calgary, you already know what I'm going to say. For those not, Outlaws is a chachi hunk of garbage populated by underage females and empty-headed asshole males. But -- it's nearby! (It wasn't even that close, to be honest.) Anyway, there's another brief hangup at the door; I ask the doorman what it'll take to get my Norwegian compatriot inside and he mentions -- not ominously enough -- "it's not busy enough to take any money from y'all...but tip the cover ladies." "Done!", I exclaim, happy to perhaps end our state of always-going-somewhere-else-and-never-really-being-anywhere. It should have been another clue that the apparent $7-each cover charge was lessened to $10 for the three of us. We pay, and go inside.
There are literally 20 people in the entire bar.
Exaggeration is a tool used by storytellers when the weight of the truth is not significant enough to capture the attention of their audience. I am not exaggerating. I've never seen a place so dead. We take stock of this, glance at one another, and unanimously decide it's time for some fucking shots already.
While waiting, again our group is accosted with attention simply for having arrived (I presume). I was not nearly as interested as with the group at the Drum, and consciously avoid any meaningful introduction. This cold shoulder is astutely recognized and we're left alone shortly thereafter, and even less shortly thereafter, another decision is made to try one last establishment in the always hollow pursuit of a good time.
Our last resort is to meet up with our foil group, the Girls Night On The Town. They were at the Ship & Anchor. After parking, Kirk announces his night is finished as the spectre of morning work looms large in his mind. We should have been more understanding, but when the partymojo is fucked with, nobody's happy, you know? We leave him to sleep a bit of it off in his car and head for said Ship.
The foil party didn't appear to be there, but that was no loss. Fredrik and I had finally found our Mecca for the evening. It was busy, with an interesting crowd, and it was time to get drunk good and proper. I'm not sure at which point throwing darts in our state of inebriation seemed like a good idea. It didn't take long for Fredrik's inability to hit the dartboard to frustrate him, and such things as throwing all three darts at once, throwing them facing the other direction, and so on, were now the Soup Du Jour in the Feast of the Partymojo.
This, once again, attracted some attention. (Guys drunk and acting like idiots is apparently magnetic. If only I'd known!) "It's my friend's birthday and you just have to meet her," proclaims a cute little number who introduces herself as Jenny. I was presently embroiled in trying to get the fucking dart wings back on the metal shaft, a feat that escaped my faculties and we had to return the compromised equipment to the bar to retrieve my credit-card-collateral. Thankfully, they understood. With that accomplished, it was time to meet the birthday party.
As it usually is, when you "just have to meet somebody", you don't. Jenny was much more interesting than her friend, who was -- to be completely honest -- frumpy on the inside and out. (Why mince words?) After a couple of introductions and some conversation, neither of which I really remember, we were off again in pursuit of that elusive "good time". I'm pretty sure we ended up completely crashing a date of these two older folk -- I pegged them at about 36 -- in a hilarious flirt-with-the-older-woman turn of events. She was really digging it, her completely square date was...not. Shocking.
See, when drunk and looking for that good time, your brain acts in a funny manner. Things you'd rather not admit but really should are buffered significantly such that that uncomfortable realization only occurs after a deep hole has been dug in that excavation for -- that's right -- the good time. It was only after 10 minutes of flirting with this older woman did I realize the somewhat unhappy balding man next to her was probably trying to score. (It seemed entirely possible previously that he was unhappy simply because he was balding. Drunk logic, you know?)
To vindicate myself, she totally started it.
I think a good indication that you've...perhaps...imbibed excessively is being refused when attempting to purchase more shots. "What?" I exclaim, completely bewildered. "It's 2:30 man, last call was 45 minutes ago." Where the fuck did the time go?
With that, notice had been served it was time to go home. I mosey on over to the birthday constituency and announce as much, at which point I was pleased to learn Jenny was interested in my phone number. She lacked any means -- digital or otherwise -- to inscribe that precious, precious information, so I offer to get hers, It's now burning a digital hole in my cellphone.
Now: a question of etiquette. If you meet someone drunk at a bar, who is, presumably, also drunk, do you call them? If so, when? It's a careful balancing act between calling too soon, and leaving it too long. It really is a delicate situation, not unlike wheeling a unicycle on a tightrope over a pit full of bears. Too long and the drunken memory is sure to fade. Too soon and it's just kind of weird. The wait-one-day-and-call rule is mostly bullshit, but this is a weirder-than-normal situation.
I seek your thoughts! |
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| Sweet. |
[Jun. 29th, 2006|12:32 am] |
| [ | Feelin' |
| |  impressed | ] |
You know those experiences when you encounter something that will have an enormous impact upon you? When you read a book, or hear a CD, or watch a movie, or meet a person, or pick up a hobby that is just going to click with you and resonate on a very deep level?
I got that this week when I finished the book Dune. I had, for no good reason, passed it off until this point as being one of those overhyped books, like Lord of the Rings (kidding!). To put it bluntly, it's underhyped.
I'm not gonna get into why I like it really, because those that've read it know why (or disagree with me), and those that haven't, should just take my word for it and go read it.
But really. After the first few before-bedtime-reads the week before, once I hit about page 100 I quite honestly couldn't put the book down. I read about 200 pages per day and then it was over. If being impressed is like getting the shit kicked out of you, it starts with some pretty good slapping -- mostly in the facial area -- and then all of a sudden, you've got a great big punch to the kidneys flyin' atcha and you're underprepared. Keeled over from the urine entering your bloodstream from your ruptured organs, you get a knee in the jaw, some kind of judo-chop to the throat and a swift kick to break your kneecaps. You fall, obviously, but the beatings keep coming. You never know which paragraph is going to be the last, and you're never quite sure which vicious kick to the ribs will be the one that marks the end to your savage physical destruction. Then:
CRUNCH
You're curbstomped as you turn the page to read: "Appendixes". It's over. Suddenly. In such a perfect way. (Okay the simile loses its relevance with that.) You're crushed that it's over, but you want to go, with the deep core of your being that truly feels the universe, "yesss..." as you tighten your fist into a knot and shake it to mark your point. That is how a book should set you up and end.
In any case, it's going to be one of those few things that really defines my influenced personality measurably. Just for fun, I'll list a couple of others that belong with it:
- Baraka
- Tool
- Jeff Buckley
- Liberal-arts-classes-influenced communication
- Immersion in nature
- Other shit, I'm sure.
Some kind of distillation of some of these things gives a deep insight into the way I operate. I like things that I like very passionately. I really, really care about a select few things. Maybe there are more humanitarian things to give a crap about than Dune, or a band, like global warming or feeding and educating the world's poor, but one thing I've realized lately is that I like what I like and it's fair to allow everyone to do the same for themselves. Those things I mentioned are certainly a large problem, but I'm two weeks from 24 and I don't feel incredibly strongly about them already; it's probably safe to assume I'm just not the activist type. (Rueful muttering over beer is more likely, for me.) By the same token, I can't expect people to care about critical analysis of how we interact with the world through language.
We Now Return To Your Regularly Scheduled Dave's Mundane LJ
It's been pulverizingly warm here in Calgary the last few days. Despite the sweat, and the omigoditshots, and the sudden addiction to Starbucks Frappucinos, I'm glad it's here. The natural instinct is to bellyache about it because it can be so drippy and uncomfortable, but we were bitching about the cloudy-rainy weather that came before it; I'm basically just an eat-my-cake kind of person so I'm sweatily embracing the sunlight.
Now I just have to remember it's here and get outside a bunch.
I read an article in the Stephen Harper Presents: The National Post about Seasonal Affective Disorder sufferers who get their SAD symptoms from hot weather. I found that odd. Apparently, the majority of those types feel that because winters are so long in Canada, that there is this mad scramble to pack as much enjoyment and hot weather into summer as possible, leaving people with great anxiety from that preoccupation. Interesting. Personally, I just love the opportunity to be out in hot weather...and anyone that knows me knows I'm not a guy hellbent on maximizing my opportunities. (I'm more of a buffet-type.) I don't think Summer-SAD is in my hand of cards.
In sporting news, my hometown hockey heroes picked up a top-flight scorer on the weekend. One of my favorite off-team players, as a matter of fact. When I heard the deal announced on the radio, I barrelled headlong down an emotional gauntlet from utter shock to utterly thrilled. He's just the kind of player we needed; a couple key free-agent pickups for certain depth positions and we have another great shot at winning our division again next year.
That's all for now, I guess, I'm in danger of making this real long. |
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| Another case of beautiful serendipity. |
[Jun. 24th, 2006|02:31 pm] |
This morning I awoke for the always-a-blast time of trying to get floor seats to a big concert on ticketmaster.ca. In this case, the concert was none other than:
TOOL
We weren't sure what the ticket limits were, so we had three of us online trying to buy. We had 12 tickets spoken for, and thus if the ticket limit was 4, we'd be just dandy. My internet decided to crap out -- the wireless router being a source of endless frustration with me -- and the stress set in.
However, recognizing that I was constantly flying on and off of MSN, my cohorts each managed to get 6 floor tickets. Score! Except:
One says, okay, so, I've got 4 tickets spoken for, is that right? And you're taking the rest?
And it suddenly dawns on me: we're two tickets short. We actually need fourteen. I start to wince, and swear, and stress, and think, who the hell am I going to uninvite here? Ah goddamnit. It's about 10:20AM, 20 minutes following the on-sale date, and I head back to evilticketempire.ca to attempt finding the best seats I can for whomever doesn't get to be on the floor.
We are processing your request....
We are processing your request....
2 Seats -- General Admission, FLOOR
!!!
What?
I look again.
2 Seats -- General Admission, FLOOR
I blink a couple of times and then madly scramble to hit submit and order those bad boys. I still don't know what crazy confluence of events led me to scoring 2 more floor seats 2 minutes after the on-sale date RIGHT AFTER discovering I needed them. Somebody was looking out for me today!
Party of fourteen, ready to rock out! |
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| Revelations IX |
[Jun. 22nd, 2006|10:48 pm] |
| [ | Feelin' |
| |  pensive | ] |
| [ | Listenin' |
| | Always, always, Jeff Buckley. | ] |
The revelations bit will be a ... bit! ... later.
First, I want to say that last night was one of those weird serendipitous occasions that turns out to be fantastic. During my aforementioned solstice party, Heather pointed out -- perhaps not completely lucidly -- that there's this weird band playing at a local establishment (The Warehouse) tomorrow (last night) and we should go see them. A number of us, also lacking full lucidity, agreed! Tickets were bought, and the date was on.
We all kinda forgot that we'd done that the next day, except for Tim, who'd paid for them. The connection there, I feel, is obvious. Seven tickets were purchased but only 5 people ended up going, as two decided that perhaps being right boring was better than checking out some 'zak they'd never heard of. There was surprising resistance amongst my other acquaintances to go see this act, even with a free ticket on the table. Pretty underwhelming vote of confidence for live music.
In any case, the band was The Cat Empire, straight from Melbourne. (Aside: Melbourne is pronounced Melbehn or Melbin, and not at all in the way it is spelt. True story!)
They were sufficiently awesome! It's tough to categorize, they had everything from Motown to jazz to 50's rock-and-or-roll to salsa to funk happening. Lots of energy, very entertaining. Thus, I can laugh smugly at my lame cohorts for their lameness.
So, just now, I was chatting with a friend FROM Melbin about the very same band. Apparently the town is sufficiently small and/or backwater enough that he'd heard of them! Or that the band was big enough. Or, you know, it was random chance. But I try not to miss any opportunities to be pejorative. But in this conversation, the topic of social currency was briefly mentioned, and that brings me to my main point.
(To further exacerbate the problem in which I'm about to describe, I will now describe a problem. Why have my LJ entries got so fuckin' rambly and pointless lately? Further, does anyone even care? [Answer: likely not.])
On Social Currency
( perhaps long, perhaps only of interest to me. ) |
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| What a day |
[Jun. 21st, 2006|06:56 pm] |
So I hosted a Summer Solstice party last night. It was supposed to be a little more thematic than it was, but the food and drink seemed to be a success so I'll add another notch to my parteh-hosting belt. The dish-hit of the night was this eggplant-tomato dip, check it out:
- barbecue a whole eggplant on high for about 15 minutes (turn often!)
- scoop out the cooked flesh into a food processor along with:
- 1/3 cup fresh basil
- 1/4 cup fresh parsley
- 1/4 cup sour cream
- 1/4 cup sundried tomatoes (in oil)
- 1 teaspoon garlic paste or crushed garlic
- pepper / salt
Mash and go! Oh man, so good. It kind of looks like this vile brown vomit concoction, but after one taste you'll admit it's the best vomit-like substance you've ever had in your mouth.
So tonight for dinner, I put the rest of the dip in some pitas with spinach, tomatoes, cucumber, yellow pepper, and cut-up barbecued rib-eye. Holy crap. Best 15 minute dinner ever.
Dave's How To BBQ A Ribeye With No Prep Time Recipe:
- brush the steak with olive oil <-- VERY IMPORTANT
- add garlic powder, chili powder, dried oregano leaves, and pepper
- press the spice into the meat
- BBQ on direct medium for 6 minutes per side for a 1 inch steak, adjust for size, turning once halfway through
Rockin. During food preparation, I recommend The Rite of Spring at high volume, as experienced today. Originally, the listening of Stravinsky was supposed to happen at sunup on Summer Solstice, but nobody could stay up that long after the amount of wine consumed, so this had to make-do in lieu.
Later tonight I'm going to see some Dub band that we bought tickets for last night while under the influence. I didn't really even remember that we'd bought them until a phonecall at 5:00PM today. Oops! |
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| iPod question |
[Jun. 13th, 2006|06:54 pm] |
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Does anybody know how to up the average volume of your iPod without manually changing every song's volume? |
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| Foooocuuuussss..... |
[Jun. 11th, 2006|11:49 pm] |
Right now, I need to be concentrating as hard as I possibly can on how much I hated my computer job.
I'm 'looking' for a job and what I'm finding is, you're either skilled, or you do shit work for shit money. Surprise, surprise, I know. |
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| Why title a diary entry anyway? |
[Jun. 6th, 2006|10:24 pm] |
I saw X3 tonight. Thought it was fantastic. If you didn't you're just being contrarian damn you!
My dog is acting extremely strangely. He does nothing but lie about and mope. Furthermore, he seems afraid of absolutely anything, from garbage bags to beer bottles to a guitar. He's always had his odd little neurotic hangups but to be afraid of me carrying a guitar is really, really odd. It doesn't help that he stepped in some Round-Up the other day and his feet are really killing him, but I think he misses the cabin more than even Tha Heeoomanz do.
I went on a shopping spree today. (Which is probably some kind of subconscious way to force myself to get a job: if I run out of money, I have to work, right?) I bought three books:
1) Dune
2) America: The Book
3) House of Leaves
I started America already. To be honest I hope it picks up a little bit. It has its witticisms but on the whole so far -- only the first two chapers, mind you -- it seems to be relying on its premise to carry the reader and simply interjecting witty moments every here and there. However, if it doesn't pick up, it'll still be worth the money...I was just looking for something transcendentally funny, like Team America. It CAN be done, Stewart, don't let your writers aim too low.
Dune is one of those books I'm surprised I haven't read -- and so are most other people.
House of Leaves was recommended by Kristofer Straub of Starslip Crisis and Checkerboard Nightmare fame. I'm a pretty big fan of his, so following the recommendation I discovered the book was a post-modern linguistics/semiotics nightmare whose blurb mentions Derrida. Sold.
And I got some CDs. I bought The Art of the Trio Vol 2 and 4, and Anything Goesof the fabulous Brad Melhdau trio. I have Vol 3 and it earns continual play, so I have high hopes. People that really know me know of my inner weakness for the piano trio.
Also bought a Miles / Coltrane collaboration compilation. Can't go wrong with those two. (Well, actually, you can, but don't tell anybody I said that or I'll be lynched.)
And finally, Rubber Soul. Oh how I <3 the Beatles. Incidentally, while watching X3, on a weird level I equated Jean Grey's death with Lennon's. I don't know how I feel about my brain working that way, but there you go. Something about the death of true talent, martyrdom, and so forth. Jeff Buckley came to mind, too. Again, I feel like I should feel guilty about that but man I'm sick of those stupidass pop culture "how should I think?" moments. IF I WANT TO EQUATE THE BUCKLEY AND A COMIC BOOK CHARACTER I'M FUCKIN GONNA, AIGHT? So fuck you.
Unless you agree with me! <3 |
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| (no subject) |
[Jun. 2nd, 2006|08:44 pm] |
The random picture generator has provided more insight into the fucked up and seamy underbelly of LiveJournal.
Check this out.
I mean, I don't mind some harmless narcissism from time to time, but this is just weird. It's like the high-school incrowd left to fester and mutate into some kind of horrifying super-trash. I can't even blame this one on the crazy Russians.
In other news, I'm at that enormously irritating part of the cold cycle where your nose runs incessantly. I kind of want to bang my head against the wall hard enough that I'll fall asleep and wake up cured. |
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| Link Time |
[Jun. 2nd, 2006|12:58 am] |
Fun links.
First, I love watching this when the hour ticks past about 10:00PM. All the crazy Russian LJ users start coming out and it's like some kind of weird voyeurism. Different times of the day reveal some interesting things, although pictures of various Japanimation whatevers seem to be a round-the-clock phenomenon.
Second, speaking of crazy Russians and voyeurism, you'll have to check that out. I don't speak the language but the perv-ness needs no Babelfish. Heh heh, you crazy Russians.
Third, this serves as conclusive proof that cats are some kind of alien species that have no place as household pets.
Lastly, this defies explanation. |
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| Backcountry Shenanigans |
[Jun. 2nd, 2006|12:14 am] |
| [ | Feelin' |
| |  sick | ] |
Man am I sick.
I think it's partially my fault, as right before my two-day hike this week I stayed up with muh buddy Kirk drinking beers. Not that many, mind...3 pints...but the combination of little sleep -- we had to leave at 8:00 in the morning -- and dehydration made worse a cold that I felt like I was already getting. So with all that said, let me say that hiking with a cold is ... hard.
The thing that really got to me was the complete lack of sympathy from some of our group members towards my position. Before I sound whiney, let me explain. The first day wasn't that bad, as I was still getting sick, but waking up the next day fully sick and having to take the heaviest pack of the group 13km back to the car was difficult. It's not that I didn't do it, you know? It's that when I requested to take a 10 minute break an hour in, it was met with complaints and bellyaching. Thanks guys. I'd love to keep going at your pace but I fucking can't. When I very reasonably suggested that maybe someone take the garbage off my hands, which was probably around 2 or 3kg -- hardly a backbreaker -- only someone with a pack almost as heavy as mine was receptive.
You see, there were two of us with extremely light packs. Testing them I estimated that they were between 50% and 33% of the weight of my own. They also happened to belong to the most vocal complainers when I brought up my grievances. I'd say I don't mean to imply a lack of coincidence, but I obviously do.
And now, for the second grievance regarding said hike. Being the experienced hiker of the group, I felt it was my responbility to communicate backcountry duties to each of us. Things such as minimizing environmental impact by staying on the trail and not dropping food on the ground, and to properly account for the threat of bears by hanging what is necessary to hang in the bearhangs. You know, minimal little things that you're just supposed to do. Is it really that big of a deal to change out of the clothes you cooked and ate in before going to the tent for the night?
Actually, let me rephrase that question. Would you rather:
1) Change your clothes
2) Arouse the curiousity of any nearby predators
This attitude was especially ironic given just how paranoid everyone else was about there being bears around. In fact, the person least receptive to fulfilling backcountry responsibilities was also the most terrified of the possibility of a bear attack. After all: it's the time of year when they're coming out of hibernation -- meaning they're the hungriest of any point in the year -- and the only source of food is in the valley floors near sources of water, which was precisely our location. The utmost caution in these circumstances is required: more than one person per year does die from bear maulings in Banff.
So, Hello! I know what I'm doing and I know how to keep bears from our camp. Do you want to listen to me or do you want to act as though I'm spoiling your weekend pissup in the mountains? There are two pertinent taglines here: Leave No Trace, and the backcountry is a privilege, not a right.
(Incidentally, the person I'm largely complaining about here is one of the people I was complaining about earlier in the post. Doing the math, I've pretty much decided to never again hike with this person. They're just too annoying.)
It's too bad that this is what I'm taking away from the hike, too, as aside from these two issues (and being sick), I had a good time. I feel most at home in the mountains, and any time I get to spend there is fantastic. We had a fun time when they finally, begrudgingly, accepted that I was right about things like ... "no, our packs MUST go in the bearhangs."
Some rather interesting pictures were taken during our First Annual Look And Sound Like A Rutting Moose contest. I think King Fredrik won -- actually, it's no contest -- but it was a dead heat between him and I for the "retarded elk" side-feature. Damien, the Can't-Miss-Swiss, won the Rabid Rabbit going away.
You'll have to see the pictures (and videos -- oh yeah) to really get what I mean. They're coming, and I'm sure you just can't wait. |
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| Finding out what I already knew |
[Jun. 2nd, 2006|12:04 am] |
Stolen from ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) los_gobos. Meme-alicious.
It's a fun test, but if you're ultimately already familiar with your philosophical leanings it's kind of an exercise in looking in the mirror. You might notice something that wasn't there yesterday but by and large you know what to expect.
Anyway, I'm an N-S-R: a metaphysical non-reductionist, an epistemological skeptic, and a moral relativist.
( Read more, get the link, all that fun shit. ) |
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