Excuse the length of this entry, but there are quite a number of things to get out and I have not really posted in a while. Whee!
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Thanks to a certain level of overzealousness in my nature, I am recovering from an injured back right now. I woke up a little sore yesterday and because of my right knee being a bit angsty after a run on Sunday, I decided that heading to Reed and using one of their rowing machines would be ideal. Less impact on the joints, slightly more efficient exercise. Not outside, but at least there was Comedy Central.
Pulled a few muscles. Somehow. Not sure how, as I was not doing anything
too strenuous and did a few minutes of warming up as well as the two mile bike ride to Reed beforehand. After getting home, it felt like a crowbar had been smashed into the middle of my back. This morning it felt more like a baseball bat was used. And this afternoon, we're all the way to heavy toddler dropped on me. By tomorrow I should be on the level of an achy back from too much sleep.
The upside is that I have caught up on all of my Netflix watching, finished a book, and all of those bookmarked links from the past two links are now read. The downside is that I really needed to go grocery shopping on Monday and now might have to have cinnamon rolls for dinner. Wait, that might be an upside.
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Two weekends ago, I joined Cameron on a Portland Parks & Recreation Mt. Hood climbing trip. Back when I first returned to PDX late this spring, I mentioned to a few friends that if any of them wanted to climb Hood, I would be more than willing to head up again and take in the view with them. Of all of the peaks in the Pacific Northwest, Mt. Hood has always had the most enjoyable and scenic views (in my opinion) and with the least amount of effort. Cameron said yes, so I made good and joined him for the entire trip.
Doug Ironside and Rodney Sofich were both leading on this trip, and being my two favorite guides that just made the whole thing all the more pleasurable. Snow school was a breeze, as I have done enough technical climbs to do the basics in my sleep. Our snowcat up to the top of Pallmer was at the incredibly early hour of midnight, so I only knocked off for probably two or three hours of sleep after I changed rooms because of a snorer. The early snowcat also meant we had a total of five hours to get to the summit for sunrise. Almost twice the amount of time a fast climber would need to get there.
So, we ended up having an extremely leisurely climb all the way to Hogsback. Thanks to numerous people going up and coming down late in the morning and early afternoon of Saturday when the snow was soft, we had glorious steps, hardened over night. Hard to stay awake as we just slipped into our groove. I was yawning something fierce for the first couple hours, and if you look at the
photo of Cameron and I on the summit, I give the distinct impression of having just woken up.
The summit was lovely. We were the first ones to the top, although another group was right on our tails and more than once I wanted to smack the girl leading them as her group was obviously just following us and had at least 25 feet of rope between each member to the point of it being worthless as any manner of safety with the slack and inability to communicate. The entire climb up at that time of day could have been done without rope and probably would have been safer.
The way down was a different story. Rodney counted nearly 200 people climbing up that day, and the majority followed our route up the Old Chute (Mazama route) so there was quite the traffic jam. Instead of going down that way, like the aforementioned group behind us did
while another group was trying to come up, we went further along the summit ridge and down a slightly more eastern chute. Cameron took an excellent shot of me as I led our group along the ridge to this chute:
While lacking the traffic jam, the snow on our chosen descent route provided less certain steps as it had a couple inches of old, windswept, brittle snow making our crampons less effective for gripping the mountain. There were some old steps down, probably from climbers at least a couple days previously, but half the time they were collapsing on me as the lead climber. Not the most comfortable conditions for people climbing down a mountain for the first time, so I asked Doug to put the group on a belay while we climbed down.
In retrospect, I think the belay may have been a bad call on my part. For the first thirty feet, it was extremely steep (50-55 degrees) and that made it seem prudent. I just imagined one member of our group slipping and with the poor condition of the snow for self arresting, there just seemed a good chance they would take everyone with them. Yet, being on belay while climbing down a steep slope brings about plenty of its own problems. The rope has to be kept tight and if the group is not moving as a cohesive organism, problems occur. One member of our group got a bit nervous and her legs were tired, so we had her trying to lay against the slope (crampons go out, you go down) and stopping to rest when the group really could not be stopping. All this made even worse by not being able to easily communicate with Doug, who was belaying us, about our difficulties. Frustrating. Tiring.
Except, Rodney went at a different angle, found better snow, and belayed his group all the way down. And despite having better snow, better ice axe positions, and walking backwards with all points of their crampons into the mountain, I saw two members of his group slip and fall during their descent. One rather dramatically. That seems to say to me I made the right choice in asking for the belay. Tough choices.
We all made it down though and I think everyone had a worthwhile experience. Afterwards, Cameron and I took Doug and Rodney out for a mid-morning breakfast and chewed the fat for an hour. I recall hoovering a whole plate of French Toast in about two minutes and then looking around confused wondering where it had all gone; I was still famished. Good climb.
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Call it cynicism. Call it boredom. By golly, call it disinterest, but I simply do not care about Obama's campaign or that he is running for President. I do care that so many people are invested in his campaign so blindly though. There are so many people I have met who support him for no other reason than an emotional belief that he will save the country from X. Others will simply spout off talking points about him, or spout off his campaign's criticisms against his opponent without taking a moment to see if they are even true. Really, for me, who really likes a strong foundation of rational thinking in his politics, it is maddening.
Populist rhetoric is never what you should believe. A new kind of politics? Change you can believe in? Hope? A strong, uncompromising vision of a safe, diplomatic, liberal country? Go fuck yourself,
America you damn irrational, unthinking Americans, if you believe that Barack Obama is not a
calculating politician who will break promises to his loyal followers when it suits his needs and desires. Principles are the first thing to go in politics.
Negative ads. Free Trade. Cutting Corporate Taxes. Rejecting Public Financing. FISA. Telecomm Immunity.
Not saying I disagree with his position on these either (although I mostly do), or that I think he is a bad candidate, or that I would not vote for him in the general election (still undecided on whether to vote for a third party candidate). Simply that I am rather tired of Obama supporters being either a) surprised by his actions; b) apologists, who try to explain his actions away; c) not even paying attention and supporting him anyway. Obama is a politician. Treat him as such. Blind faith in a politician or government only gets you into trouble.
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Not sure how I got directed to this article but
Staying Smart in Dumbed-Down Times was well worth the read. And not because her conclusions are well formed and valid. In fact, rereading it just now, I have a hard time agreeing with many of her points. That is where the comments come in. They are fascinating! Their range, depth, exploration, challenging the article's points one by one, and even the absurdity brought into play had me reading every single one. If anything, it provides not only a feedback to the article but actually live criticism my other academics. Makes me love the internet.
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Having read Neil Gaiman's
journal today, he posted this
disturbing article from the LA Times:
U.S. Courts have ruled, as recently as this spring in a case stemming from a search at LAX, that there's no need for warrants or suspicions when a person is seeking to enter the country because any "routine search" is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. In effect, it's like luggage: anything and everything in your laptop, cellphone, BlackBerry or digital camera can be examined and copied by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents.
The LA Times article links to this
analysis of that recent case on law.com. The juicy part:
"We are satisfied that reasonable suspicion is not needed for customs officials to search a laptop or other personal electronic storage devices at the border," Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain wrote.
Think that over for a moment. Whenever you come into the United States from another country, your laptop can be opened up and looked through by any customs official without reason. They can take snapshots of your hard drive, if they deem it necessary. Seems, oh, I don't know, a little scary?
