Alpine Skiing Intermediate Private Lesson

Saturday I went to Sugarbowl and my parents had recently given my a cash gift after the sale of some property (my mother the queen of privacy/secrecy would give me hell for even discussing that much) they had so I decided to spend some of it on a private lesson to work on parallel turns. My instructor was Rich and he was excellent (another instructor said that as well).

His main points were

• focus your weight of the turning ski on the big toe
• rotate the other ski into the hill
• face your upper body where you want to go
• the rhythm is similar to riding a bicycle (turn-beat-turn-beat-turn...)
• (probably the hardest) during a turn, stay in the fall line a bit longer to gain speed and momentum and to allow the skis to get into position (my words). My right turn is not as strong and I cut the turn shorter than it should be.
  

He lengthened my poles to 120cm which initially felt way long but felt perfect later on.

In alpine skiing during a turn 70+ of your weight is on the outside ski (in Tele it's 50/50). Focusing on the big toe helps you get the correct edge into the snow. Now that I think about Tele's big toe / little toe adage is pretty similar to the first two points.

The third point is the very important and easy to forget "look where you want to go," but don't just use your head, your whole upper body should get into the turn as well (this is also expressed as "look down the mountain")

Later in the day as I practiced I finally started getting the idea of developing a turning rhythm. That's why good skiers look so good and why a intermediate skier generally doesn't. They're turning a lot more for one. They're turning while I'm resting my tired legs. But the cool think is that I can feel the rhythm working its way into my muscle memory and that's so excellent and probably the best reason to take a lesson. A person taking the time to watch and work with you can speed your improvement more that 3 times (in my experience) and help you push through stumbling blocks, and notice if you're doing something incorrectly or not as efficiently.

The last point about staying in the turn longer (on the "fall line" where you're basically going staight down the mountain momentarily) is the hardest one for me (and I would guess many folks) It's dealing with speed without getting panicky and my right turns is not there yet. I need to park myself on the Trailblazer blue run (via Jerome Hill lift) for a few days. The thing that's hardest for me is that the ski doesn't seem to respond as quickly and that may be me tightening up on the turn because of the speed, but part of it is that I want the turn to happen faster that it needs to.

As I speed up I can see that I'm going to occasionally crash harder. I did wack my head once. Maybe it's time for a helmet. If I'm going to write about how my head is important to me since I think for a living I should probably start protecting it in this realm. It seemed completely silly when you're going slow but now it's starting to feel more relevant and the snow gets harder at speed especially on a groomed run.

I did work up the nerve to go up the Judah lift and do the blue Tunnel 41 run. The top of the run is lovely, but it quickly gets too steep for me to do anything beyond survive. And the run takes you through the lower part of the terrain park which is not nearly as scary as it sounds but don't fall right before a jump as they don't like that. :) Fortunately the jumps are obvious and it's quite natural to ski around them. So it's back to Trailblazer and its cousins for me.

My leg endurance is better and I'm hoping that it doesn't have to get much better. As I improve it should take considerably less effort and that's a stage that's probably the hardest to get through.

Marianne of Babes in the Backcountry said that her Alpine skiing improves after she works on Telemark. My experience is the same. Wonder if the reverse is going to happen as the second part of my Tele clinic is going to be next Saturday also at Sugarbowl. I'm going to be using one of their group discount lift tickets so I have to remember to not have the pass around my neck like I usually do (but keep it around for lunch). Oh and this time I'm keeping my poles as they keep me from falling in stupid ways.

The pizza was delicious as usual. It feels so self indulgent to pay that much extra for a pizza at a ski resort, but it's such a nice reward.

The stretch lycra jackets that the instructors wear intrigue me. It seems like a nice compromise, but I'm wondering if that fabric has the same issues as the North Face one that I wound up returning because it was cold to the touch and stayed that way.

Did I mention that I was really into the equipment aspect of winter sports? (of any sport) - will have to write about that someday.

I might actually miss Mittens

Mitt Romney has "suspended" his presidential campaign (whatever that means) and it pretty much means that McCain is going to be the GOP nominee. When I heard the announcement I was actually a bit disappointed surprisingly enough. I mean he was really good for some amusing twisted reasoning (see: Freedom requires Religion), or thinly justified fabrications like "I saw my father march with Martin Luther King" (use Google to get a lot more refs) and then arguing that "saw" could be taken metaphorically, which I would say is not really correct as it's "see" that can be used to suggest hypothetical situations like "I see myself skiing down a black double diamond slope."

The reason I liked Mittens over say Bush's English hatchet jobs of sentences is that Mitten's can at least talk in complete English sentences (even if he doesn't think in them) and is not nearly as painful to listen to.

I Don't Care for Valentine's Day either but...

It's that Hallmark of holidays: Valentine's Day.

This post was prompted by:
Someone emailed KFOG and ripped into them for having someone on yesterday who talked about greener Valentine's day gifts. He or she called them hypocritical, since it's still promoting consumerism and if they wanted a good way to celebrate it then you should go on a walk together.

Yeesh, what a Grump.

I don't like V-Day as it's so hard on single people so on V-day I stand in solidarity with singles and don't celebrate it. But I think I and others should lay off on those who do.

I wrote this to KFOG:

Wow the person ripping into you all for being hypocritcal about V-Day, seems like they're unfairly directing all their frustration about consumerism at you.

Even though I'm in a relationship, I don't celebrate Valentine's Day, but the message I got from the Greener Valentine's interview was that if you want to celebrate it here's a way that you can participate in a more green way. There's tremendous social pressure to participate in Valentine's Day and I don't give anyone a hard time for taking part (especially kids - who really seem to enjoy it.) The thing I resent is how hard it is on single people and I do hope I follow through one year in having an anti-Valentine's day celebration for single folks, but still need to figure out how to make it non-condescending.

And I must say that it seems weird that the writer is blasting you for being commercial when you are a commercial radio station (Hello? Reality is on the phone and wants to speak to him/her). I think you all strike a nice balance.

Thanks for having a great morning show.

And before I wrote this I did some checking to see if Hallmark really did dream it up and the answer is No. Chaucer, of all people, appears to have made it up. Here's the Wikipedia entry on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine's_Day

Not to say that every single capitalistic enterprise hasn't jumped on the V-Day bandwagon screwing the guilt past the sticking point (to mangle a tired metaphor.)

And what a better time to plug the show:
My Sucky Valentine: Sour Grapes and bitter chocolates, Good writers on bad sex and tainted love.
(Soon to expire Yahoo listing here; craigslist ref here)

And the appropriate candy to go with it: http://www.despair.com/bittersweets.html

Anyway, enjoy the 14th whatever you do on it.

Voting in Person - Being Part of the Process

When I'm going to be out of town I vote absentee, and whenever I do I'm offered to become a permanent absentee voter.

Terri is and for a long time I went back and forth about whether to do it. It certainly is easy. In general I avoid lines whenever I can. I use self checkout at the grocery store, I rarely go into banks except to do something complicated like reassign all of my accounts to my trust (another post, another day), I don't even stand in line to go skiing - I have a day pass that they scan at the lift. But there's something about participating in the voting process. Maybe I just like see the workings of it all. Something I'm normally not a part of similar to courtrooms, police stations and television studios. I've had 3 surgeries and the prep for each of those was endlessly fascinating.

I guess it's (a) watching an unfamiliar process and (b) wanting to feel a part of it. That will probably change as I age but for now it's kinda fun. Maybe it's hearing too many times things like: well we know what the results are but we can't say for sure until we count those loser absent ballots. (Well that's what my brain hears). Given that a huge percentage of California votes absentee that's got to change.

Mechanics: My area got rid of voting machines quite soon after they became so controversial. I voted with a pen (no chad) on paper, and then fed it into an Op Tech scanner (it kept the paper). There was a small printer on it but it didn't print a receipt though I got the proof of voting tear off stub. - wonder if I could have gotten an actual receipt. I think the scanner provides a nice compromise. There is a paper copy, but it can tally the votes faster and if there's a scanning issue the voter is right there to fix things. I'm sure you can screw around with the scanner, but it's a pretty established technology. No, I didn't bring a camera as I trust my heavily democratic district. There's never been an obvious voting scandal here.

Oh and after all my agonizing? I voted for Obama.

American Gladiators "Crush"

The woman who plays Crush on American Gladiators is named Gina Carano, and she is seriously adorable. I was having trouble reconciling this cuteness with the story of her being a very successful Muay Thai fighter, even with her saying in an interview: Yes I hit people.

So I finally started Googling for her name and found all sorts of things to correct my thinking.

First a disarming interview but has fight footage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1o1Aa3Vjvg

Then a real fight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgRtBM-hWm4&feature=related
(And there's a lot more to be seen)

Ai-ya, not just a pretty face. I'll try to refrain from calling you cute anymore (or if I do it will be from a safe distance.)

While I love punching inanimate objects, I do not see the appeal of hitting another person. And I really don't want to be hit in the head (or anywhere else) by another person as I want to keep the wits I have- I have MS which can have cognitive effects and most importantly: I think for a living. The physical challenge of fighting for real has no appeal to me. (Though I do admit to trying to use being hit as a way through depression pain - it actually worked for a short while - I did a lot of things to try to [mostly unsuccessfully] cope with the pain of depression but that's another post.)

I love basic kickboxing, but don't yearn to hit someone for real. Sparring would be fine, but no blood please.

This Time My Vote Counts

... and that's kinda intimidating.

For the first time the California Primary is a part of Super Tues.
Usually by the time our primary comes around the candidate is clear.
Not this time. Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama are basically tied and the daunting thing is that for the first time: I have more than 0 excellent choices, in fact, I have more than 1 excellent choice. Argh. I DON'T KNOW!!! I've been an Obama fan for months and have really enjoyed watching his extraordinary campaign, but Clinton has more experience and in a perfect world I'd have Hillary for 8 years and then Barrack for another 8.

But the thing is that Obama could create a revolution Right Now, and that's really important since our country's reputation has really been trashed by the Bushies. Also, for reasons that I will never understand, there are a lot of people in this country who hate Hillary and the Clinton dynasty. There are Republicans who can see voting for Obama, but will lie down in front of a train before supporting another Clinton. I don't know why and I don't think I'll ever know why, but if the country can get behind Obama then so be it.

A year ago I wanted a bumper sticker that said: "Obama-Clinton or Clinton-Obama in '08"
There's a chance that I may get my way (yikes). While I'm still wishing, can we have John Edwards as Attorney General? And Dennis Kuchinich as something pretty high up too.

Finally Getting Blogoranized

I've always been a little frustrated by the blogger.com page organization. To use their fancy tools you have to have your pages on their site or be an expert on XML. Given that I pay for my own site that seems a little silly and I just haven't gotten around to be more than just barely passable at XML If I were to move the pages, I would have that much less control and it just doesn't feel right. So I finally finally got my act together and made my own Table of Contents for the Blog. Virtue is momentarily mine. That way it's not just organized chronologically, but instead by topic. An entry doesn't get heaped on the e-slag pile just because it's older. This way I can highlight favorites and group things how I choose.

Food Religion

or Cooking Dogma

I'm realizing that when it comes to cooking I can be very dogmatic - more so than I usually am since I'm usually quite flexible and sensitive to diversity. I think it's because we are a nation of cooking shortcuts even when it makes no sense to have a shortcut, and the shortcut has worked its way deeply into our culture.

When I was a kid, I though that all Parmesan Cheese came out of a green can. I thought that Cranberry Sauce came out of a can. What it ever a revelation that not only did it not have to always be in a can, it tasted better when it didn't and, (and this is the part that really astonishes me) having either fresh takes almost no further time. Grating a small block of Parmesan takes less than a minute. Making cranberry sauce from cranberries takes 10 minutes of boiling them in water and sugar.

It continues. When I first made a stuffing that called for cornbread I decided to make the cornbread since it was my understanding that making it was pretty easy. It is. Guess what took me a lot longer? Finding the cornmeal in the store. Oh it's there, but it's lost in a sea of cornbread mixes. One gets the impression that cornbread is intrisincally difficult, but I have yet to figure that out. Unlike say buttermilk pancakes for example, there's nothing exotic in the recipe at all. I'm all for convenience - I eat bagged salad all the time., but we're getting "help" with things that we don't need help with really or the help takes just as much time as the more standard method, some help that is. I get the impression that someone has been doing the equivalent of selling refrigerators to Eskimos to us.

But there are other shortcuts that are there just for the sake of capitalism. I'm definitely in the Bagels should be boiled camp. Non-boiled bakery items in the shape of bagels are usually quite excellent, but they are not bagels. Boiling brings the gluten to the surface and a real bagel has a semi hard surface and a delicious interior. Without the boiling (called kettling) before they're baked, you don't get that contrast in texture.

There are times when the shortcut is so entrenched it's difficult to discern what was before the short cut. I like to cook Indian food and I love Indian spices, and have learned from people like Julie Sahi (I'll check the name and get a reference) author of Classic Indian Cooking, that: curry is not a powder, it's a method - a combination of spices. Unfortunately, it's sometimes very difficult to get beyond "Curry Powder" and fortunately I never got in the habit of using it so I didn't have to unlearn reaching for it.

Then somewhere I get more rigid than is likely healthy. Take pesto for instance. It should have 5 ingredients and that's it: Basil, Garlic, Parmesan, Pine Nuts, and Olive Oil. Maybe Sundried Tomatoes if you feel so inclined. But parsley? Almonds? Heavens why?

My point? Well I think it was back there around the Eskimos.

Sports Specific Muscles

It is a little crazy making that you can be great at one sport and still totally suck at another one that's sort of similar.

Both cycling and skiing are very quad intensive. The difference is that in cycling you're not keeping the quad flexed for nearly as long as you are in skiing and that seems to make all the difference. I rock at Indoor Cycling now. One of my instructors noticed that I was particularly fast and intense yesterday. If I had been thinking on my feet, I would have said that I was compensating for doing so poorly at Tele Skiing, but I just instead gave this slightly embarrassed laugh and told her (truthfully) that it was more a matter of figuring out which abdominal muscles to relax which cuts down on the bouncing you can get at high pedal RPM (while giving her credit for that discovery as I would have never figured that out by myself.)

But I am feeling stymied. I've paid my dues. I'm at the gym 3-5 times a week. I do indoor cycling and group weight workout classes among other things. I'm in very good aerobic shape. And still I struggle at times. I guess that's a "welcome to life" moment. I guess the message is enjoy what you're good at and keep trying on what you're not.

One really nice thing is after the skiing clinic, my legs have recovered and are even stronger than they were. Now about that endurance...

Babes in the Backcountry Telemark Clinic

To say that Telemark Skiing is difficult is an understatement and not quite correct. Learning telemark is difficult. Doing it once you know how is likely not as hard, but I have the feeling that I may never know. But as I've said before: bad skiing is really great exercise.

On Sat Jan 26 I finally got to do one day of my Babes in the Backcountry Telemark Ski Clinic ("Tele Teaser"), and boy am I tired (well I was then).

To be fair, telemark skills are easier than what they were. Since the skis are more responsive these days, you don't have to bend down as far and then distance in between your feet when you're turning is only about 8-10 inches. That said, flexing your quad and keeping it flexed for an extended period of time while holding your weight and turning is a feat. Now when you're better at it, your form will be better and you'll be going faster so you won't have to hold the tele turn position for so long.

The instructors were great and Claire, the one I spent the most time with, actually skied backwards right in front of me holding my skis in position while I struggled with a turn. The thing that make it really hard was that she took my poles away and my confidence went along with them. I nearly played the MS card saying that I had to have them for balance, but if I'm claiming (correctly I think) that my MS is a-symptomatic, then I wasn't going to go there. I use the poles mainly to tell my leg to tighten for a turn.

After lunch I let them go back to the intermediate slope and I went and got my poles and spent more time on the beginner slope ("Meadow") which at Alpine Meadows is actually not that great since it slopes sideways, but for tele training it's actually fine since to make it work you have to traverse.. I probably could have done the intermediate slope ("Hotwheels") again, but I was pretty trashed so refrained.

So I've been pondering Tele vs Alpine styles and and rethinking my goals. Or more correctly reminding myself what my goals are. What do I want out of this anyway?

• I would love to learn Tele and intend to do so but I think I want more success (and less frustration) with skiing initially and continuing to improve in Alpine is probably an easier way to do it.
• My main goal is to be able to safely backcountry ski, and Randonee is Alpine Touring, so the quickest way to that is likely to get better at Alpine and ski Randonee and then learn Tele on the side

The bummer is that this would mean more equipment but the first steps are to continue on Alpine and then decide later about Randonee.

I also need to decide how to spend that day that Babe in the Backcountry owes me. The most obvious is to take the Tele Tuneup at Sugarbowl in Feb. I could bring my alpine skis as well so if/when I got tired, I could switch to alpine.

The other option is to either go with them to Shasta or go on a hut trip, but I'm pretty much already committed to Shasta during the week after their trip so I think the Tele day is winning.

Still Obsessing on Foraker

or more correctly finding out what happened to Sue Nott and Karen McNeil.

(Yes, I'm back at it. I wrote about it earlier here.)

I was looking at a route photo of the Infinite Spur route here: http://www.supertopo.com/rockclimbing/zoom.html?r=akfoinfi
and a voice kept saying in my head "They're up there."

Not only that, but the route that they took is very rocky (at times) and the places they could have holed up in a snow cave are less than they would be for other routes. Unfortunately that doesn't narrow it down much. The Forest Service thinks that it's up near the top and that looks like where most of the snow is.

I suppose one approach is to get in contact with the families and see if they would be interested in any attempt at finding them and see if McNeil and Nott left anything behind for them (not to bring their bodies down as that's a way hazardous, expensive endeavor).

Parallels in the Dog and Human World

My world's are colliding in a strange way though this time I'm in the majority asking for the rights of a minority instead of the other way around.

AKC is considering opening up to mixed breed dogs. They are debating whether to just let mixed breed dogs compete in performance events along side the purebreds (which is what most of us have been saying they should do) Or creating a whole new registry and letting them compete separately (separate but equal - where have I heard this before?) [Vague ref: http://www.akc.org/mixedbreed_survey/]

What's funny is that there are parallels between this and the same sex marriage debate that went on in the queer community (less so now). Right now, I'm in the middle of an email debate with one dog owner (not a reader of this blog) who owns both purebred and mixed breed dogs and her take is that mixed breeds have been discriminated against (my phrase) by AKC for so long that why would they want to join now? Why would they want to give in and give AKC money? - No thanks.

I feel like I'm debating with GL folks like Jane Rule (a Canadian lesbian author who had the option to get married to her partner and turned it down for similar reasons and felt that others should do the same).

My point in both issues is exactly the same. YOU don't have to participate, but if others want to they should have the option to do so.

Will My Digital Magazines suddenly disappear one day?

I subscribe to a digital magazine where I have to read it online (Clean Run - a dog agility magazine). I love the ease of access and that I can quickly flip through it, but I'm feeling paranoid or more correctly wary that my access to those is going to one day up and disappear. Most of us have lived through the Dot Crash era so it is an entirely possible scenario. What if Nxtbooks goes out of business? What happens to all those subscriptions? I wish I could just download the thing as a pdf and maybe I can but I have yet to figure out how.

I love that I don't have to give up more bookshelf space but I hate that too. There's a certain security in holding a book. Oddly I don't have this problem with electronic copies of music or audio books but I own those and my computer doesn't have to check in with another company for authorization.

[on further checking]
There is a way to save it on your system (either Mac or PC) and it creates a stand alone browser. What I don't really understand is: It runs slower than the online system. I wonder what it's trying to do? I suppose I should take this as an opportunity to learn more about computer security since it's something that I'm supposed to know more that a little about. :)
I'll have to set up software to alert on attempts at outgoing connections as the slowness symptoms are indicative of a program trying to make an outgoing connection, failing, and giving up and doing the right thing eventually. This is not a unique phenonmena, Microsoft does this with Windows Update even though the computer is configured to use a firewall proxy, it still tries to make a direct internet connection first (Duh). So the simplistic way is to try the viewer on a PC (Mac should work too these days) and keep running "netstat" and see if any outside connection attempts show up.

Cirque du Soleil - Kooza

Cirque du Soleil's Kooza has left San Francisco bound for San Jose, so I feel a little more free posting about the show.

Warning Spoilers. If you haven't seen the show and are planning on seeing it stop here.


I'm hooked on Cirque. The athleticism, the artistry, the music, the pageantry, the creativity. Pretty much everything. While I have yet to make the trek to Las Vegas to see the resident shows there, when it comes here I now make a habit of seeing it twice. That way I see much more as the first time I'm just dazzled and the second time I see more detail.

However one has to accept that you will see more of the underpinnings of the show especially if you're paying attention.

Kooza is a wonderful show full of all of the stuff that I love like aerial acts. There's one called "Wheel of Death" that has a couple of rings rotating vertically on an axis looking like a couple of escapees trying to evade the police at a carnival, and it's thrilling. Another photo of it is here. There's another act called the Teeterboard which is vaulting from a seesaw that's marvelous also.

And as always the clowns are a kick and the reason that if you're going you need to be seated at least 15 minutes ahead as the clowns are often out in the audience 10 minutes before. If you get there late or just merely on time you risk a clown ushering you all over the place to everyone else's amusement.

But that is pretty much the only unpredictable part of Cirque and that is actually what I'm writing about. Similar to Dralion, Kooza made use of a volunteer from the audence who is a plant (someone from the show pretending to be an audience member). Unlike Dralion, they didn't own up to it. Also unlike Drallion, they used multiple audience plants. I counted 4 myself.

I'm still not sure what I think of this. In every case there seemed to be something essential that the audience member had to know in order not to freak out and ruin what the creators where trying to show. One in particular was downright risky and I could see the Cirque lawyers insisting that that not be an unsuspecting person. However it still feels weird. Like there was a deliberate deception that the creators found it necessary to do. It's like they don't trust me or something (to take it all a wee bit too personally.)

The other odd thing was that the main guy of the very talented Highwire act found it necessary to fake a partial fall in the exact same place both times I saw the show and I later got an usher admit that it's part of the act. It did increase the response from folks to see him redo the trick successfully but it felt a little cheap too.

But all in all I'd still see it again. Twice.

Tiger Attack - Darwin Award

Right after the tiger attack at the SF Zoo, my sister (who doesn't live here) asked if there was any local information on the attack that hadn't made the national press. I told her that accounts were conflicting, but those involved were relatively young and not career criminals so odds were very good that the truth would come out soon enough.

In today's SF Chron is an article where Paul Dhaliwal admitted that they not only taunted the tiger, but stood on a railing and waved their arms while doing so.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/01/18/MNEIUH4B9.DTL

While this doesn't excuse the Zoo's wall being too low, it does suggest that some sort of Darwin award is in order here - though it's sad that the least drunk one of the three was the one who died.

Western Medicine - My Discomfort with Being an Icon of It

The quality of my life would not be possible without Western medicine and it's funny how uncomfortable that makes me. While I'm grateful, in a way life feels so tenuous because of it, and it's an easy guess that I'm not the only one feeling that way.

The two drugs that make my life so different are Rebif (an MS medication) and the famous/infamous Prozac. Rebif helps keep my MS in remission, it helps keep my feet from dragging, my head from spinning/drifting, my thinking clear. Granted, I bring a lot to the health table by taking excellent care of myself and that makes a huge difference, but the Rebif keeps my immune system considerably better behaved.

But the Rebif doesn't make me nearly as uncomfortable as the Prozac. If I didn't have access to Rebif I probably wouldn't notice it for weeks. Prozac on the other hand I notice that day, though initially it's just a withdrawal effect and not depression, but the depression comes back fairly soon. It's amusing to think what a horrible hostage I would make if I didn't have access to Prozac. Kidnappers depend on the fact that normal hostages fear for their lives and will work to keep it. With many depressed people regard for one's own life disappears. Kidnappers if they had any sense would just shoot me out of hand.

Every so often I test the waters by not taking it and see how I feel. I do this because the circumstances that caused the onset of my depression (a breakup) happened long ago and I'm very happy right now. The reason it continues is likely due to (a) MS or (b) I'm just miswired that way. I'm trying it today and initially I just get this squeezing sensation in my forehead which is a withdrawal effect. But kidnappers beware. :)

Privacy vs. Secrecy

I often hear about how our privacy rights are being eroded and how we need to defend them, and while I agree I always feel myself bristling a bit and have been pondering why.

The reason is that "privacy" has been a way to oppress queerfolk for, well, centuries (I wish that were an overstatement). "They should keep that private." "It's a private matter." What they mean is: secret. They should be ashamed and keep it secret and hidden. The less private glbt people are, the less we're oppressed. Over the last 4 decades (in particular the last 2) societal tension about being something other than heterosexual has eased and a big factor about that was more glbt folks being willing to Come Out publically and on a national stage. If we all had chosen to stay secret and if there had been no AIDS epidemic to force the issue then it's a pretty easy bet that glbt rights would be much less further along.

Another reason it makes me personally bristle is that secret keeping has not served my family at all. My parents (esp. my mother) are hugely private people. Obviously, I'm not (though I will [mostly] respect their desires in this post.) This is forever causing disagreements between my mother and I as I always seem to trip right over some privacy hot button that had never even occurred to me.

This of course leads to situations hurtling to the absurd (in my opinion). One example was that while traveling, my mother was knocked flat by a hotel automatic door. The paramedics were called and they decided that she may have had a slight concussion but that it probably wasn't serious, but advised a trip to the hospital (which my parents turned down). So the paramedics advised her to take it easy for the evening. I immediately asked if it was ok for her to take medication X which she takes regularly. (It was.) After the paramedics left, my mother took me to task for divulging private medical information. I was trying not to laugh as a pointed out we were talking to a paradedic right after she had fallen. It seemed a little relevant - you know? She wanted to be the one to decide whether to disclose that and while theoretically I fully support that, over the years she has show positively horrible and inflexible judgment about that. She hides things that these days are complete non-issues. As usual, we just have to stop the discussion in a stalemate as we'll never agree and we don't even agree to disagree.

Privacy doesn't serve abuse victims, rape victims, alcoholics or addicts. The list goes on. It's where "Breaking the Silence" catch phrase comes from.

Obsessions I really don't need to have

... and am currently resisting (for the most part)

I'm listening to a somewhat distressing book called Desperate Journeys which is litany of people having a seriously bad time of things. It's a collection of true stories about being marooned, lost, cast away and being nice enough to write about it (whether or not they survived the ordeal). I'm going to have to keep this book in mind when I find myself on one of my own misadventures as I like my misadventures to have a way out. You will not see me on an "Into the Wild" type of adventure, as that has no allure. (And I'm always asking people (let's be honest: men) about the attraction of tossing most of your possessions away and trying to live life as a hunter gatherer in the wilderness.)

But I do have this thing about remote places particularly mountains and islands and Desperate Journey's is full of remote islands. If I could afford it I would love to go explore every single obscure island that I could get to.

Ascension Island: http://www.ascension-island.gov.ac/
St. Helena:
Spirit Island: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattchamplin/107303267/
The Galapagos: http://www.galapagos.com/
Easter Island:
Kona (the Big Hawaiian Island) - will write more about this one later
Most of the Caribbean
and on and on and on

I have been to Orkney and Lewis (in Scotland) to look at stone circles and monuments. That's an obsession I allow myself as while you're trying to go to the ends of the earth there will at least be something to see and speculate about. On Lewis are the Callanish Stones (pictured) and while Google Earth photography has gotten miles better, you really have to see them in person.

Some islands have nothing on them which is actually kinda sad. Islands are supposed to have something special about them - that's the allure. But the reality is that they're just as often accidental pieces of exposed ocean floor such as the paradise turned ecological disaster area nation of Nauru is and many a Hawaiian atoll.

Sir Edmond Hillary - an inspiration

Sadly, Sir Edmond Hillary passed away

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/01/10/international/i145722S61.DTL

Mountaineers, especially the ones that climb big mountains, are stereotypically very selfish to the point of stepping around a stricken climber. Hillary wasn't, and he dedicated his life to making the lives of the Shepas who make climbing the mountain possible. He raised money, built schools and had a huge impact on the quality of life in the Sherpa community.

I love the 3rd photo - the shine in his eyes is so touching.

American Gladiators - No Stick Figures Here

I so rarely see my body type on TV (muscular, kinda tubular, not the hourglass type), so when I do it really surprises me.

We were just shutting the TV down after watching The Amazing Race and for some reason I flipped over to NBC and caught a glimpse of the premier of the new version of American Gladiators and was immediately entranced. I was looking at myself, albeit younger, and leaner, and in even better shape (a scary concept given how much I'm usually at the gym). The contestant I was watching was Jessie Foster. And unfortunately, she got hurt during the first competition so I didn't get to see much of her, but it was strangely encouraging to see, and a good inspiration to keep working on losing the 10 pounds I want to drop (even if it will make me colder in the snow).

I (and a whole lot of other people) am also really intrigued by the Gladiator named Crush (whose real name is Gina Carano). Carano got her name from doing well in the seriously butch Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) AKA Cage Fighting which is such a non-appealing sport to me, but granted I haven't seen Carano doing it. What I like about Carano is that she's beautiful and also doesn't have the typical hourglass figure. She's not in a swimsuit, but more of a body suit with a corset instead. I must admit that I wonder if the corset wasn't there if she would have a waist at all. :)

And all of the female gladiators (well besides the completely intimidating looking Fury) do have a little body fat which makes them look more human. In the past, they all would have been mandated to look like Fury, who while being astonishingly athletic, could also do a stint as a model on Deal or No Deal, which for years is the only female body type I ever saw on TV (beside comedic roles). Over the past decade this has been changing - finally.

And what American Gladiator post on female body images would be complete without talking about Hellga, more correctly: HELLLLL-GAAA!! (You can't help, but say it that way - whoever invented that character is brilliant and has my congratulations.) Hellga in real life is Robin Coleman originally from Texas. She's 6'2" and 205 pounds and can life up one side of a car. In Texas she said that dating was difficult, but no longer now that she's out where the show is broadcase (Los Angeles I think). People love her. In the audience I saw a guy with a sign that said: Hellga Marry Me. She said in an interview that even before she went on the stage for the first time that someone told her that the audience was chanting "Hell-ga, Hell-ga." Not bad girlfriend. Not bad at all.

• Her MySpace page is here
• Here Wikipedia page is here
  
• Her own site is here
  

I'm sure Gladiators is really bad TV, but it's a campy hoot and I'll watch it for as long as it lasts and no where near as appalling as fake wrestling. Who'd have thought it would be so validating and a good source of positive female body images.

Sugarbowl Poststorm

This is the same scene as from "Where the Weather is the Sport" entry. The busy little Sugarbowl beavers/elves have managed to clear the patio off. I checked on Sunday and while there were a few intrepid (obsessed, driven, psycho?) skiiers there, Sugarbowl wisely refrained from clearing the patio until the storm had moved on. Oh and note the snowblower in the center. Funny how they're not putting it away just yet.

Cotton Kills

... even at sea level

The cotton lobby must be very strong. First of all, I love cotton, I love the feel and the comfort of cotton clothing. However, cotton has a dark side that outdoor activity folks know all about, but the general public (including my mother) don't seem to be aware of and in fact have a hard time believing.
It's so insidious, cotton feels so warm and friendly when it's dry, but when it's wet it becomes this cold, clammy, evil body heat stealing thing So I should rephrase the statement: Wet Cotton Kills

It doesn't have to be that way. More modern "wicking" polyester fabrics (such as Coolmax, Polartec, ...) will still insultate even when wet. I have been completely soaked through from rain and still warm. This is not the bad leisure suit polyester of the 1970's.

My friend Bill had a bad run it with cotton that he describes (with permission):

 .... I excused my cotton Levis and
non-waterproof boots by thinking "it's just a short work session, how
bad can it get?" No rain pants, no polyprop underlayers.

Most of the day, whether it was raining or not, we were standing in
3-inch deep water.  When it was raining, my levis got saturated, my
underwear too, and of course my socks (all COTTON).

I got really cold - I'd say hypothermic.  We started about 10:00 and
didn't finish until about 4 PM.  By about 2 PM, my thinking was muddy
enough that I couldn't contribute many ideas, and was mostly following
directions.  By 3:30, I was reduced to standing miserably in a hangar
out of the wind, stomping my feet.

I should note this was at sea level at a populated location (an airport - packing up airplane parts). He was not in the mountains, not in the wilderness. It was during a torential rainstorm, but it wasn't so much the rain as just having wet cotton fabric laying on his skin that was slowly lowering his body temperature.

Fortunately he's fine, but he's going to be buying polypropoline stuff now.

It has to also be said that wool insulates when wet. It's just heavy when wet (itchy too). I personally prefer SmartWool.


Refs:
http://friends.backcountry.net/m_factor/cotton.html
http://www.hikingintherockies.com/other/clothing.htm
http://www.rockclimbing.com/photos/Trad/Cotton_Kills_16250.html

A (paper) chain letter - how retro

Some naive person named Jimmie made the ill advised move of sending me, a scam fan, a pyramid chain letter. Now Jimmie wasn't specially singling me out, but had purchased a mailing list that had my name on it. Bummer for Jimmie: sending it to a blogger who makes a habit of analyzing these things and writing out the details.

This is a classic old school chain letter. Hard luck story turned around by participating in this simple scheme. Send one dollar to the 6 names on the list. Remove the top name and add yours at the bottom. Buy a mailing list and send out 200 copies of the letter.

Of course it includes the claims that it's legal under US Postal code, Title 18 Section 1302 which ironically, is the exact law that says this type of postal slight-of-hand is illegal.

Oh and of course "This is not a pyramid scam!!" Actually, that's exactly what it is.

Refs:
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/scams/chain.htm
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/1302.shtml

This letter that I have refers to the boy making 71,000 also. Though the rocky grammar in mine makes it more special: "If a 15 years old boy ..."

Here are the names and addresses in my letter. According to the law, all these people may have broken the law. In practice, the gov't usually doesn't care unless someone actually loses money and I would be willing to bet it needs to be more than $6. According to Google maps all of the places really do exist. However, none of the names come up in telephone directory searches. My comments are in [].

1. Stephen Growers, 701 W. Grove Parkway #160, Tempe AZ [Pinnacle Ridge Apts]
   
2. Carole VanLuvender, 20 Rocky Ridge, East Stroudsburg, PA [a house]
3. Carolyn L. Halliday, 701 Garfield St., Lamont WA [exists - can't tell what it is]
4. Diane Thompson, 9002 W. Lisbon Ave #203, Milwaukee, WI [large apt. building]
   
5. Dennis Thorne, PO Box 7423, Loveland, CO
6. Jimmie Gaddie, 209 Risen Ave. Campbellsville, KY [exists - can't tell what it is]

Jimmie's name is last on the list and the letter came from "South Central" KY, so it's likely Jimmie is the sender.

This bit of infamy is likely all Jimmie is going to get out of the deal. What I find interesting is that if I were a scammer I would have made up the first set of 6 names and had each of the addresses be mail drops. This is why I went to the trouble to look up the addresses - I was really surprised that none of these locations was in a commercial district.

I am puzzled that I'm getting no matches on any of the names, so I started to do some searching on just the more unique last names like VanLuvender and Gaddie and I do see some correlation with the surname and the alledged location. VanLuvender has a eerie, almost spooky connection. One month ago a hunter named Lee VanLuvender of East Stroudsburg, PA was murdered and his murder is under investigation:
http://www.poconorecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071207/NEWS/712070358/0/LIVING100403
In the article or the obit I didn't see mention of a Carole.

I can only hope someone isn't deliberately using the names of the recently deceased to try to make money.

When the weather is the sport

We're having quite the storm for the Bay Area area. Kron4's weather broadcasts are strongly resembling a sportscast. I don't know is this link is useful beyond today, but here it is:

http://www.kron4.com/Global/category.asp?C=8555

Unsurprisingly, my Telemark Ski clinic was postponed as Tahoe is essentially a no go / no leave zone. Alpine Meadows is closed. Sugarbowl has one lift open - the beginner Nob Hill.

Glad I'm not on the road right now.

[Later]

Rain has let up some and I just again checked one of the Sugarbowl cams as the sun sets.

If you're familiar with this view (see the larger version), you'll know that that rail you see just before the sign is at hip height.

I can see the Sugarbowl crew is going to have a lot of digging out to do. And the third storm hasn't hit yet.

We just talked to Terri's mom Treva who is in Redding. She had said earlier in email that her gutter downspout was laying in the yard after the windstorm. While we were talking I offered to come up and repair it. She said "Well it's actually not mine." Oh my. Watch out for flying downspouts. She's going to go around to her various neighbors to find out whose it is. Those are the sort of tasks that amuse me no end because of their inherit absurdity. Sling the thing over your shoulder and walk around saying: "Excuse me. Are you missing a downspout?"

Treva says "It's like a glass slipper." I like it.

Health Net Follies

To be fair, this is not a health insurance horror story. It's not even a bad dream. For one, I have health insurance. It's more just frustration with insurance bureaucracy and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

It hadn't even occurred to me to blog about this and I think it was mostly out of a stubborn will to not let this become a hassle. It's like writing it down will give it power and I don't want it to have any more power than it has.

Another reason that I haven't written about it is that the story is just too dern complicated, so I will summarize. (You're welcome).

My co-pay for my MS medication is expensive. It's now over $500/month. But the total amount that I am obligated to pay per year is $1500. Once I've past the 1500 I file a form with an appallingly long name called Maximum CoPayment Liability Notification, and my copayment goes to 0. Sounds simple right? Well it should be.

I've done this dance for 3 years and this year has by far had the most snafus. First hiccup was me sending it to the Kentucky claims processing address and not the Van Nuys address (My bad, but you would think they would be capable of sending it on to the correct dept - nah). Then I sent it to the Van Nuys address, heard nothing. Called. No record of it. Sent it again. Nothing. Discovered that I could send them email so I sent them email to check. Still no record. Argh. I asked if I could fax it. They said I'd be most welcome to fax it (phew.)

This time it finally got scanned into the system and when a rep looks it up it shows it. Great! That should be it and they will "process" it and send me the now large reimbursement check. In a month I called to check and it said still processing. Then next time i called the person I talked to said that the claims dept needed verification from the Medical Group and she'd call them but wouldn't be able to get back to me for a week, but she'd call me then.

Stupid me let a week pass and no call, so I called and made the person answering call them while I waited on hold.

So now we're up to more hoops to jump through. The Medical Group says that I have to be the one to fax the request in and then they'll fax it to me and then I have to fax it to health net.

And you wonder why health coverage is so expensive?

So I faxed off the request and this is where it stands right now.

Health Net owes me about 4k so this is really starting to bite.

Stay tuned (or not).

Divide and Conquer - such a powerful concept

... especially in politics.

Us liberals are especially prone to it as we are willing to at least listen to many viewpoints, but sometimes have trouble when it comes to having a united front. Ralph Nader being my most famous example, I still blame him some for the whole Bush Co. nonsense getting a foothold at all. During the presidential primaries is the time for many view points, but once a party has a candidate, I think it's time to focus on keeping those other people (read: psycho, god-abusing, neo cons) out of power. You have to a make moral compromises and Terri (a Green who votes her conscious) and I debate about this all the time.

Another example is Cindy Shehan who is running for congress against Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi, despite her refusal to consider impeaching Bush, is a very popular representative and I think it's safe to say that Shehan has no chance and I wonder if more the point is to impress upon Pelosi that she may want to really reconsider impeachment. However I think there has to be a better way as no doubt BushCo is all for Cindy Shehan running as it's more Divide and Conquer. Encourage the other parties who oppose you to fight among themselves and they won't have the focus to challenge you.

What's ironic this election season is that the Republicans, who are usually very good at uniting, are not at all in agreement as this article in the LA Times talks about:
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-gop2jan02,0,6857177.story?coll=la-home-center

Now it's still the primaries, so it's shouldn't matter that they can't agree yet as in the past they have shown amazing ability to make all sorts of moral compromises to support the White Man of someone's choice to the point of supporting a candidate who doesn't have their interests in mind at all, but the article talks about historically the party that agrees sooner does better in the election which is something I didn't know. (Sorry for the run on and on sentence.)

I don't know how to do it, but we really should encourage the religious right to split off from the Republicans and form their own party. It may be distasteful to listen to them, but they will have less power if they are not associated with the Republican Party.

And for the first time in a while, the Democratic Party has a plethora of possible candidates most of whom would make an excellent president. Interviews of Democrats in Iowa (hear on NPR) describe being thrilled about not being able to decide who to choose knowing that any of them would be fine.

Let's hope so. I'm leaning towards Obama myself.

The Web Stats Say What?

I usually don't pay much attention to the web stats on my site but recently they've shown a couple of anomalies that are fun to speculate about. One is dog related so I'll put that in the Training Blog, but the other one is amusing me while it's mystifying me. There was a bump in traffic on this blog this week. Really? What about? Absinthe? Google Earth Moutaineering? Sub-Prime Borrowers ? Oh no, nothing so relatively informative. It was on Xmas day of all things. The 'I'm mellowing on the "I hate the Holidays" routine' entry.

That's too funny, as it probably means that people were googling on "I hate the holidays" or they were googling on Kung Pao Kosher Comedy. I suspect it was the former. I'm having visions of someone storming over to the computer in frustration and entering that into google. I just tried it though and the page didn't come up in the first couple of pages. This is good news as I would dread all the "Aw F.. off" comments to an entry about hating the holidays less from people who really were looking for holiday hating fare.

I just tried a google on Kung pao Kosher Comedy as well and the page didn't show up in the first three pages. And I tried googling on nondogblog and only got results pointing back to myself, so I'm pretty befuddled.

Words that you don't know you know

I just heard from one of my cousins who I haven't heard from in a long time. It is great to hear from her as I've been wondering how she's doing. It will be great to reconnect.

What I found funny is that she now works for a non-profit called Altamaha River Keeper. Turns out the Altamaha is a river in Georgia. I was sure I'd never hear of Altamaha and was puzzling out how to say it - sounding it out and verbally trying to say it. al-ta-ma-ha as soon as I started trying to pronounce it, I started hearing whispers in the corner of my mind. Paying attention, I started hearing my grandmother talking telling me something. The sound came and went - the more I tried the harder it got - which I always find so strange. As soon as I stopped trying so hard I heard it: ottamaha ri-ver
They must be the same. I knew how to say it even though I had no clue I did.

What's weird is that I don't have any specific knowledge about that river. It was just a part of a story that my grandmother was telling about someone she knew. What was funny is that I though the word started with an O which is not a bad assumption as a lot of things there start with O. (Okefenokee Swamp and a lot of the other river names

What's also funny is the "l" in Alta disappeared, but the l in Atlanta remains - it's not ottanta.

The tough part about playing poker anonymously

is that it's anonymous. It's the good and the bad.

Yoshi's avatar is now recognized at the tables he frequents. The players can chat back and forth and we do so a fair bit, which could get awkward for a dog. Most of the regular players are also on MySpace and Yoshi was asked tonight if he was on MySpace. (Answer was: not really) And he was encouraged to sign up. Which of course would end the anonymity. Yoshi is perceived male which is very convenient as women do get harassed sometimes. In fact the person that was asking Yoshi about MySpace was someone that he defended from some stupid loser who likes to type weird insulting things to pictures (avatars).

Thing is, they already have this image of Yoshi in their head (whatever it is), and I'm not sure I want to impose reality on that image as it would really mess with their heads, and they might think I didn't trust them. Never mind it's just that I had to come up with a login and Yoshi's was available and it worked very well.

I don't owe these folks "the truth" but in a way I almost feel like I do. As far as I can tell the main people involved are being honest. It's a strange position to be in as I lead a very transparent life (heck, I'm a blogger for one thing), so even though it's not, it feels duplicitous. In a way I'm messing with my own head.

Sub-Prime Borrowers - my solution

Sometimes (ok often) I wish I had a foundation like the Bill & Melinda Gates or John D & Katherine T. MacAuthor foundations where I had a lot of cash to help solve some of the world's problems.

I've been ranting here on and off about predatory lendors and what has now become known as the the sub-prime loan crisis. The problem is not that these are bad properties that people have gotten themselves into - it's bad loan terms. Now granted, they probably got talked into buying more house than they could afford, but many are working hard to try and keep their house (let's set aside the issue of speculators and just limit this to people who are trying to keep their primary residence).

I'd love it if I could set up a fund where the foundation buys the property for what they owe the bank (regardless of what it's worth) and then either rent back the property to them or setup some sort of lease to own arrangement. If the previous owners decide to walk away the foundation still has the property. Property values were inflated and are resetting to a more correct level, but we're still talking real estate and over a decade or two the properties will likely go up in value so it's not a completely losing proposition for the foundation, you just have to have the resources to weather out downturns.

I hope some foundation, or organization or some government program is doing something similar.

I'm mellowing on the "I Hate The Holidays" routine

For years (like about 9 of them) I was a enjoying hating the heavily Xian oriented holiday season. It's everywhere and it's easy to resent (just ask any Jew). But the emotional charge seems to have leaked out of it for me and that is very welcome indeed.

I think for me it was learning winter skills like skiing and snowshoeing so I had good reasons to anticipate the season, but other major factors are of course Terri and her emotionally healthy family, the dogs, and a learned deafness to commercials or at least a learned apathy towards them. I still hear them but don't feel the emotional tentacles that they extend. Also the only thing I do is ski more, socialize, go to parties, occasionally bake things, and try to make notice of Winter Solstice and wish the Sun a safe journey back to us in that Pagan-lite sort of way.

I haven't volunteered at Kung Pao Comedy for a couple of years and I miss it and hope to do so again. I owe the Jewish community (let's hear it for overly vague phrases) a lot for helping me through the tougher times of the more recent holidays. And for realizing that you don't have to be or act a certain way during this time. and that Chinese food tastes really good at this time. :)

We'll go to Terri's brother's today and I'll just try to enjoy watching the kids have fun. Oh and I'll train my dogs too.

I just got this spam dated Dec 25 7:27am. Subject: Summer is almost here, be ready!
Well at least it's after Winter Solstice. Barely.

I love telemark skiing but...

I went skiing at Sugarbowl yesterday and took my new telemark gear.

I love it - it feel so natural to have my heel loose. The boots that I had custom fitted to my feet are excellent. The skis that I converted are just fine. My only complaint is that the telemark cable binding technology is so, well, 1970's, and these are new bindings (see the pictures.)

They're not step in. They're not releasable. If you get buried up to your waist in an avalanche you are stuck until you or someone else digs you out.

These days there are releasable bindings but they're a bit heavy and awkward and they're not step in. Step in telemark bindings are being worked on but the one's out now would require buying new boot and telemark boots are really expensive so there's no way I'm going to replace my still new boots.

I just googled for step-in telemark bindings are there are quite a few matches like the one called the TeleBulldog in this link - not the picture - that's my binding):
http://www.backcountry.com/store/TTD0006/c1/s2/22-Designs-TeleBulldog-Telemark-Ski-Binding.html?id=KKHKHzEd

There is a 2006 review of bindings here (including my G3's):
http://www.backcountrymagazine.com/tele_bindings_06.html

Google Earth Mountaineering

I love Google Earth I'm just shocked that it's free and it just keeps improving. It used to be that the city views are great but the mountain views were relatively low resolution and you couldn't use the images to do actual planning of a trip. Now for trips to Mt Shasta and Mt Whitney you can take a complete virtual trip if you tilt the view so that you can see the elevation.


The only problem? It's a huge time black hole.

Absinthe - a dubious tradition

Let's hear it for Alameda. Respecter of history and tradition, and who finds the nation noticing it at really odd times. We now have the questionable honor of having the only legal Absinthe distiller in the country: St George Spirits.

Absinthe has the highly checkered reputation of causing hallucinations, violence, and urges to slice off one's body parts (all apparently untrue). Detailed here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/05/dining/05absi.html
and
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/05/MNQJTO9FM.DTL

Today is the first day of sales and even though I don't (ok rarely) drink, I really have to try this, even though I know it's going to taste horrible, but I'm realizing the extent that I will go to to get a good story is a touch further that most folks I come across. Does this make me a writing slut or some equivalent? What's odd is that I'm not a journalist nor ever had much compunction to be one.

Back to Alameda assisting with the downfall of civilization...
NBC ran a story not too long ago showing lines of a couple hundred people:

http://www.nbc11.com/news/14907465/detail.html?rss=bay&psp=news

Diane went but decided to leave after seeing how slow the line was going.

We're going at 5:30pm and it will be interesting to see how long the line is. Will report back...

[later]

The line wasn't as long, but there was still a line.

It most certainly was fun and I didn't even have to pay for it since it was clear that they were going to run out of $75 bottles before they got to us so they were handing out free samples.

That has to be the most unique, complex alcoholic beverage I've ever tasted. first you get hit with the 120 proof (60%) alcohol, then a whole series of different tastes come over you in waves. The oils in it coat your tongue but it doesn't cover up all the various herbs that are in it. The most curious sensation was that I could feel it cascading down my throat all the way down to my stomach while at the same time I had this uprising feeling of my brain being slowly pickled. And I only had 3 sips, but that was plenty.

While the anise was strong (you could smell it out in the parking lot.) it did not over power all the other ingredients which I was not expecting.

A very unusual, fun, and unique experience. Glad I did it.

Postscript: It's the next morning and I slept the whole night comfortably. This is unusual for me after I've had alcohol. Usually I have a less than fun time while the alcohol works it's way out of my system. I've been noticing that distilled alcohol doesn't really have this effect unless I have too much of it (which is not much in my case). Terri's thinking that it may be the fermentation that my body's sensitive to and distilled spirits are not fermented.

So the conclusion is obvious. I can have small amounts of alcohol, but it has to be really expensive. :)

Immigration - some thoughts

It amazes me what a hot button illegal immigration has become.

Compared to other issues it seems like such a non-issue to me, but I grew up in an environment where most of the orchard pickers (we had an orange grove) and house cleaners were likely undocumented. My family had the attitude that this is the land of oppertunity and why wouldn't they come? And I think that's the point. They are going to come. The human capacity to dream of a better life for their family is not something you can stop or fence out. Putting up more obstacles and increasing enforcement is only going to make them try harder (and at great risk to themselves).

So what is the solution (assuming there's a problem with paying someone below the minimum wage to pick your lettuce.)? Well let's back up and look at a larger picture. There is a huge economic gap in between Mexico and the US (we could include other Central and South American countries, but for simplicity let's just talk about Mexico.) As long as that dichotomy exists, people are going to come no matter what you do. They will find a way - bet on it. I think a real solution would be to improve Mexico's economy. Make life in Mexico more desirable so there isn't the giant incentive to brave El Norte.

Too expensive? Look what we're paying for border enforcement. What if we were to put our money into making Mexico a better, more humane, more hospitable place?

But why should we do such a thing? Well as you are no doubt aware we are 6% of the world's population and consume considerably more that that percentage. I think this is one way to give something back.

Freedom requires what??

I keep coming up with blog snippets and I keep thinking that they're not really long enough to make a blog entry. Then they become less relevant but they still bug me so I'm going to try to write about them even it they're short...

I just heard Mitt Romney (who a New England friend calls "Mittens" :) on the radio and he finally addressed (in his mind, the rest of us are baffled) the issue of his religion (Mormon). He said in this voice that is supposed to reflect profundity:

Freedom requires religion
and
Religion requires freedom

Say what? That's dead wrong on both counts.

Freedom requires religion. Er, how? Maybe for some, but it's not like a free person is required to have any mystical or faith-based beliefs.
Religion requires freedom. Well. Gee. I can think of the most repressed people in the world and many of them are/were quite religious. Jews (multiple instances of slavery, and genocide), African slaves brought to the US. a friend brought up Burmese Gov't and the Buddist Monks. those stuck in Guantanamo. Many of those have said that their religion is what got/gets them through their hellish life.

So what was he thinking? I'm sure by now he's come up with some clever (well he thinks clever) explanation, but I'm not sure I want to hear it.

Sexuality is a Many Splintered Thing

I likely have written about this before (but maybe not here), but I find it a fascinating topic that comes up again and again in so many contexts (sorry for the mind in the gutter pun).

Just to put things in context, I'm bisexual and am attracted to both men and women, but it's women who sweep me off my feet and though I've dated both men and women, it's women who I get into long term relationships with (oh and I'm monogamous which may be a minority in the bi community but we're not sure as mong. bi's are a quiet bunch we're discovering.

As a result I think I am a little more comfortable with gray areas that my gay and lesbian bretheren. Though it doesn't stop me wanting to talk about them and probably why I've run BiFriendly for 15 years.

But enough about me, let's look at a gray area I've been watching for a while now.

To my surprise, I find I watch the completely contrived Reality TV show Survivor. This I find odd as Survivor is not my thing, The Amazing Race and its simplicity very much is. I start watching a Survivor season just because I want to see the scenery and the puzzles (I'd love to be a puzzle designer for them), but sure enough, I get sucked into watching the people and their interaction (or lack of it).

During this season, there is a woman named Denise who would totally read as gay in my world, but who is married and has a daughter. Now queer folk who get married to members of the opposite sex (MOTOS - really old, old term) are not uncommon and sometimes find themselves in heartbreaking situations later on it life, but Denise had the opportunity to have her husband visit the island and she genuinely looked content. When she was cuddling with him, she had the involuntary smile that many truly happy people have. She could be bi, but who knows. I'm sure the lesbian community is dead sure she's gay, but I think we should just get a bit more comfortable with the gray area.

Methodist is Jewish-Lite? Huh?

I was idly listening to Randy Rhodes on Air America and she made the passing comment (in a vastly different context) that "wasn't Methodist Jewish-Lite?" (paraphrased). This totally got my attention and I missed the rest of the on-air conversation while I called Terri to see if she could explain the connection. Neither of us could and we both got quite a bit of amusement out of it.

You see, even though I'm no longer a Christian, I was raised Methodist, and I briefly considered converting to Judiasm (I'll explain more below). If there was someone who would have understood the comment, I would have, and I was completely befuddled as I didn't see a connection at all beyond an attachment to doing rituals exactly the same way each time. I was very much waving my hand in the air: "Excuse me. I have a question." Or as Terri put it "If this is on a need to know basis, I NEED TO KNOW."

I think we'll be forever in the dark on that one. Randy Rhodes doesn't do email for her show and I don't think fast enough on my feet to call her. I even tried Google and got precisely no where. Ah well, it was funny in that hurt brain sort of way.

What I love about the Jewish community that I'm familiar with is the willingness to laugh about familial dysfunction. My family is Southern (I'm the only Californian) and I see plenty of parallels between dysfunctional middle class Southern families and dysfuntional middle class Jewish families. The obsession with appearing happy and successful, heavily matriarchal (and the matriarch doesn't like to be disappointed), some powerful people in the family assuming that you just know what they want without them having to spell it out, oh and you must fit in and not be different.

But I realized that though I'm plenty spiritual, I'm not religious in the traditional sense so converting to Judaism didn't seem to be right for me. When asked I just say that I'm more a Jewish-Identified Gentile.

Bush: I don't care what the facts are

Yesterday the US Intelligence Estimate stated that Iran had abandoned its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and hadn't done anything on it since (a reference from the IAEA is here:
http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/PressReleases/2007/prn200722.html)

President Bush responded by saying "My opinion hasn't changed." "I still don't trust them" (I heard it on the radio but I'm sure you could look it up - I'll pass myself.)

I believe the proper term for this is Mule-headed Dufus-brain, but that is insulting to mules.
I'm wondering if he was talking off script as I'm hoping he has a handler that is still around who would encourage him to say "We are encouraged to hear this news." And this is the administration that is facilitating peace talks between Israel and Pallestine? Some God help them please - they need it.

But all this is just redundant as left wing radio had a field day with it yesterday, but there is one observation by a caller that I'm hoping doesn't get missed and it's well worth repeating.

Bush said "We don't want them to have the knowledge to build a nuclear bomb."
But that knowledge is easily available. in fact I just googled for: nuclear bomb construction and got plenty of hits here:
http://www.google.com/search?q=nuclear+bomb+construction&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

The knowledge is not secret and as the caller very astutely pointed out: you can not bomb knowledge out of someone (unless you kill them all and the draconian (and highly illegal) odds of that are remote indeed - there are almost always survivors.)

A caller to the Stephanie Miller show said that her and her colleagues often talk about the fact that Bush fits the diagnostic criteria for a sociopath. While I haven't run down the specific details of this I most certainly believe it.

Lhermitte's Sign

I spoke at length to my neurologist about the odd sensation of my bending my head forward that I wrote about in this post. and feeling numbness go does my spine and the resulting spasticity in my legs and how that not being my head forward makes the spasticity almost entirely go away.

Apparently it has a name: Lhermitte's Sign named after a French guy who wrote about the phenomena. While it's nice that other people experience it (1/3 of people with MS feel it.) There's not a lot known about what causes it. Turns out my theory about the lesion in my neck causing it may not be that far off at all. My Dr. explained that the spine is very mobile and it could easily be running over the lesion when my head bends forward.

Refs:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lhermitte's_sign
http://www.themcfox.com/multiple-sclerosis/ms-symptoms/lhermittes-sign.htm
http://www.aafp.org/afp/20041115/1935.html

Oh and that 4th symptom that I occasionally deal with (but very rarely now) that I couldn't think of when I wrote the original post is: fatigue. I'll edit the post.

A Better Way Down the Mountain

As I've written about before I've been struggling with finding a safe way to descend our scree stewn, ball bearing like fireroads that we have in the Bay Area. I was seriously considering carrying a scooter up and riding it down but that would likely get me in trouble on the No Bike trails. Kahtoola, who is a very innovative winter sports company and who has solved the problem of how to fit crampons on flexible shoes, has done it again and my hiking life is now so much easier.

The answer is the MICROSpikes which are a pair of small spikes that fit over your shoes and are made for walking on ice, dirt, and even concrete.

I went back to the Rose Peak area where I struggled so much to get down the hills that I had cheerfully bounded up. This is the very same hike where I injured my foot and it stayed swollen for a month and a half, due to some previously undiagnosed bone spurs in my right foot.

The steepest part of the climb is from the sign in sheet to the top of Rocky Ridge (basically the first part of the climb.) I got up there and had a great time doing so as I brought my heart rate monitor and noticed that I was able to climb at a faster heart rate that I was able to before.

Then I got to the top and put the spikes on the Keens I was wearing. What a miracle. They were perfect. I could walk down the hill like a normal person. I felt confident and moved at a steady rate. The only downside is that after a period of time your feet will become aware of the spike bases pushing into the sole, but it's tolerable for 30 minutes or so and probably much more tolerable with a stiffer sole than the Keens.

My hiking life is back now.





Muddy Spike

Yoga Balance Poses

I was looking for a reference for some of the yoga standing/balance poses
that I've having trouble with in Body Flow. I love what I come across while searching.

This is an excellent demo of advanced Ashtanga yoga shot in India, though the person demoing is anglo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hu9Sq1RvuoA
I can only hope to be half as strong as he is. He can go from Downward Dog lift himself up by his arms only, guide his feet forward through his arms and wind up in a sitting position. I didn't do a good job of describing that so it's best just to watch the video.

This one is more for us ordinary mortals:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iH1M-rEAdk

But back to balance poses.
This is close, but not the poses I saw in class:
http://www.abc-of-yoga.com/info/inverted-balance-poses.asp

This one is more like it and I like the quote that you have to maintain a sense of humor about balance poses (you sure do :)
http://www.cookinglight.com/cooking/hl/fitness/package/0,14343,1018291,00.html

The pdf that is on the page is excellent.

So You Don't "Have Time"?

My revenge for people having loud cell phone conversations around me is to write about them.

While this one was not nearly as good as a caller to Air America (or was it KFOG?) describing an overheard cell phone conversation about going to the bathroom while in the bathroom, it first set my teeth on edge and then amused me.

This is most likely because I've heard it before and I'm only now just realizing how silly it is.

This woman was standing in a parking lot beside her car (of course not in the car) narrating a conversation she had with someone else where she was saying very distinctly, measured, and loudly "Look. I. Don't. Have. Tiiiiii-me. [to deal with what ever it was]" which was apparently code for "I don't like your answer, do it my way instead." She repeated this a few times in the space of time that I walked across the parking lot. I was really hoping that she would still be there talking about her precious time when I got back but sadly she wasn't (bummer).

I just love it when a phrase just has to mean something else than what it actually means. She apparently doesn't have time, but she has plenty of time to complain about it to someone else while standing in the middle of a parking lot. I suppose I should be grateful that she's not driving or in the store, but still. I've seen that used to mean "I don't want to spend time dealing with you and your issues."

I think it struck a chord with me as my mother used to use this or was it a southern family member? It's funny what a habit complaining about not having enough time can be. My father complained about it recently and I looked right at him and said "You're retired, what do you mean you don't have time?" I don't remember his answer. I'm sure there was harumfing in it

Container Ship Crash - Lost in Translation

The investigation is no where near over but it sounds like there was a serious translation mishap on the bridge of the Cosco Buscan (the ship) when a critical piece of equipment failed. According to this Chronicle article:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/14/MNC5TBQ9R.DTL&tsp=1

"The pilot had to go along with what the master indicated on the electronic chart display was the center of the span," Meadows said. "That turned out to be the tower instead."

When the radar failed, the pilot (experienced local SF bay pilot), switched to an electronic chart, and because he wasn't familiar with their system (apparently they're all different - not a surprise), he asked the Captain to point out where the center of the bridge span was on the radar so he could place it in the center of the display and in turn have the ship head in that direction. It's starting to sound like the Captain misunderstood and pointed directly at the tower instead. Oh ouch. This is why we have local pilots, but if the primary equipment fails then "Houston we have a problem."

I'm wondering if there should be a way to standardize the equipment on the container ships or insist that if the primary equipment fails that the ship has to stop (tough for a huge ship) and let tugs do the steering instead. But what do I know about large ships? I only know how to sail and the basic "rules of the [water] road" and I live here on the bay, so I'm just a bystander in all this.

But these lost in translation issues are bound to happen with international commerce coming to town in really large ships. It's a wonder it doesn't happen more often. So we need to plan for a faster way to deal with it or prevent it as it's a nasty surprise for a migrating sea bird. Sort of way outside their experience.

The Amazing Race 12

I'm a huge fan of The Amazing Race, to the point I've been pestering Terri about auditioning, but she keeps firmly telling me no. (Stressing in airports is not her idea of a good time and things are very whirlwind. I keep saying: why not have a world sampler tour on CBS's dime?)

Anyway, the one thing that has been missing in all these episodes are two women who are partners and they fixed that this season with Kate and Pat: lesbian Episcopal Ministers who live in Thousand Oaks, Calif. (http://alpha.cbs.com/primetime/amazing_race12/bio/kate_pat.shtml)

They sadly only lasted two episodes as they weren't very fast, but they were truly a class act, folks just loved them (Example: http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/index.php?showtopic=3161628&st=15) and Kate in particular is really quoteable:

The Amazing Race is a love letter to the planet.

(paraphrase) We are religious people, but we also know that God doesn't care about The Amazing Race (or how we do in it.)

I was so thrilled to hear the second one as every time some wacko Xian racer invokes the name of God to help them in the race I'm yelling back "Hello? God doesn't give a flying fuck about your race or how you do in it." (I'm not a Xian, but I used to be and I've studied religion pretty seriously for a while in the past - need to blog about that sometime)

She also wasn't afraid to tell it like it is as when they missed the bus she said "We're screwed." Personally, I find that really refreshing. And you could see them whincing about how poorly Ron was treating his daughter. You could tell they really wanted to pull daughter Christina aside to check if she was ok (wonder if they did.)

Anyway, thanks Kate and Pat for representing queer clergy so well. Mission accomplished. And you both seemed to have enjoyed yourselves as well.

Sue Nott and Karen McNeil on Mt. Foraker - so what happened?

Unsolved mysteries bug me. Unsolved mysteries of what happened to two of the most accomplished female mountaineers in the world just drives me around the bend.

A year and a half ago, Sue Nott and Karen McNeil were attempting a climb of Mt Foraker's Infinite Spur route, Foraker is right near Denali in Alaska. Due to being located very North, the mountains in Alaska are formidable. Their position on the planet makes their effective altitude much higher that their actual elevation (need to find a good reference for that). Mt Foraker may only be 17,000', but it's one seriously tough mountain and the route that they were on is one of the most difficult. However Nott and McNeil are excellent mountaineers and excel at difficult climbs.

They never came back from Foraker, and while some evidence was found (a dropped backpack) they were never found and what actually happened to them is well, a mystery.

I've keep a Google Alert on "Sue Nott Foraker" ever since then hoping to hear more (how funny, this blog entry will show up there). Here's the latest which is an excellent recap of the Park Service's report: http://dailycamera.com/news/2007/nov/07/examining-the-evidence-of-disaster/

There is some new speculation. The lost pack was probably dropped as there's no blood on it. They are convinced that they saw foot tracks much higher on the summit, but saw no such foot prints on the decent. Well informed conjecture is that they dropped the pack by accident at 11,500', aborted the climb, but instead of descending they decided to go up and then down a much easier route, but died in the attempt and are likely in a snow cave near the summit.

Ok that's more answers than I had before but I still want to go find them even if it was to leave them in peace. I wish ground penetrating radar was more portable. I'm sure the families would likely want their bodies to remain there as it's probably what Nott and Foraker would have chosen (that's pure speculation as I've met neither of them). But honestly what happened? Finding their bodies and what they left behind (especially any notes or photos) what they lacked and what they had plenty of, would answer a lot of questions.

But listen to me "talk." I may be in excellent shape but I've never climbed any real mountain in Alaska (though I have spent a week on the Ruth Glacier there in a mountaineering course. I also tend to get altitude sick easy though if I spend enough time at altitude I'm usually ok. Also as they inadvertently demonstrated, Foraker is a really dangerous mountain. I suppose you could go up an easier way but then you have to descend some of the Infinite Spur route and then where do you start looking? I'm sure the Forest Service has some idea, but I doubt they would support such a thing that someone who has never climbed an Alaska mountain would propose.

If I were serious about it I probably should talk to Eric Simmonson head of International Mountain Guides and author of Detectives on Everest who is trying to answer the same questions about what happened to Irvine and Mallory.

I think one way to show (and to see if) I was at all serious about such an endeavor is to go on one of IMGs Rainier Climbs and see how that goes. Eric would likely not be there, but would probably be within contact and they and I could see how well I do. They have a ton of Rainier Climbs scheduled and I was thinking of doing one of those after ski season any way.

Hello? Water Boarding is Torture

I'm just amazed at the debate about whether Water Boarding is torture.
John McCain (a republican) certainly says it is and he was tortured by the Japanese during WWII (I heard it on the radio but I'm sure there are a ton of references on it.)

I've never been water boarded but I have had the experience of having an ocean wave go shooting up my nose, aspirating just a little of the water. The deep seated primal fear that that evokes is huge. Even though I was fine I had to get out of the water and onto ground for a little while just to reorient. Deliberated placing someone in that position and forcing them to stay there is patently cruel.

When I was in high school we took it as a point of American pride that we didn't torture, that we didn't start wars, that we were the good guys with principals. Ever since WWII that image and ideal has progressively eroded. Starting with Vietnam and Korea and now reaching appallingly new lows with Iraq, it's no wonder that the world hates us.

I can only hope that we can rebuild our tarnished image. When I travel, I don't lie and say I'm Canadian, but if someone asks if I'm an American I say "I'm from San Francisco" which says so much in 4 words about how I really despise what BushCo has done. I think, heck with impeachment, he and his cronies should be tried for war crimes and murder.