The Best of 2011 for Things that Matter to Me! (Part 1)

Local Talent Promotion: Seth Abrumz –

“Flaky” or not, you have to give credit to DJ & Promoter Seth Abrumz for selflessly exposing more budding digital music artists, visual designers and dancers/poi performers to the Colorado masses than anyone else in the state this year. Seth has consistently packed more venues in Fort Collins, Greeley & Denver than anyone else, often with little direct benefit to his own musical ability promotion.

Ironically, he continues drawing out crowds of “rowdy ragers” to a music style, Dubstep, that even he admits is relatively boring. I couldn’t agree more, “Rage” is the new “Epic”, where this generally 21- crowd is more interested in “Facemelting” noise and blinding strobe lights, than an artistic style of music or visual production that promotes dancing. Much props to the GoGo Dancers who can dance to Dubstep, as there is rarely anyone in the crowd that can maintain more than 30 seconds of something resembling actual dance…. But I am digressing.

There are many artists throughout Colorado that should be very thankful to the work Seth has done promoting Dubstep, without him, they’d be lucky to have more than a couple dozen fans.

Getting Out There & Living the Dream: The Kayaking Trio of Ben Stookesberry, Chris Korbulic & Pedro Oliva –

The Boyz are back in central Africa, setting first descents & exploring rivers never kayaked before, all while carrying on the legacy of their lost brethren Hendri Coetzee, who tragically lost his life to a crocodile during the groups’ first African Expedition late in 2010. Ben’s documentary, “Kadoma”, never intent to be about overwhelming inspiration & horrific tragedy, rather just some more “kayak porn” for a very small group of viewers, touched & pulled the heartstrings of thousands of kayakers and non-kayakers alike around the world.

I’m looking forward to their tales from this expedition, and would encourage those with a zest for life & experiencing new cultures to do the same. I wouldn’t want to try to list where all they have been this year, but know they’ve made inroads to bringing the excitement of kayaking to the masses with their work on a television series in Brazil.

Humble beyond mention, well except for the flamboyant Pedro , these adventurers are out there doing it every day, living the life of their choosing. I was fortunate enough to meet all three to show them my crappy kayaking skills this year, but hell for me it’s about being out there amongst great people, and I’ll gladly “take the walk” so I can be out there again another day.

Best wishes & safe travels to them all!

Honorable Mention: Jonathan West –

Seriously I didn’t even know Krygky-eke-eke-stan even fucking existed and now he’s living & bringing renewable energy to this remote central Asian, old Soviet state for a year! Props brotha, was good seeing you this year in NOLA!

Oozing Positive Energy, Engaging the Crowd Stage Performances: Jay Jaramillo aka Project Aspect –

Although I don’t know for certain if Jay would consider his productions “Dubstep” it is generally characterized as such & within that genre of music in the local scene. Project Aspect’s opening for Vibesquad at the Fox, was one of my first shows since returning to the music scene, and the energy Jay conveyed in his work was instantly obvious to me, just as it is to his growing fan base.

As mentioned above, Dubstep doesn’t really promote dancing. The beats are too slow in my opinion & the choppy nature, non-continuation of a tract often results in the “30 second get-down” followed by the “now what am I supposed to do” irregular beat for 10 minutes. :\ Not to diverge, but this facet of the music, in conjunction with limited need to do much with computer-based digital music during the broadcasting*, beat-matching is relativity simple in comparison to old school vinyl mixing DJing, the interaction with the crowd to me is more important, and here is where Jay excels!

I saw this for my first time at the Fox, and then was blown away by it, as was everyone else at Sonic Bloom, when Jay teamed up with his brother Ronny, aka Unlimited Gravity, to form Unlimited Aspect! I would argue this performance in the dome, even up against the other big names there, was the best of the weekend in bringing out the energy of the crowd, by Jay exuding so much of his own positivity & vibrancy. I see this energy every show I go to when Jay is performing, it’s addicting.

I’d venture to say Project Aspect will be a much more common name around the country by the end of 2012. “Much Love” Jay!

* – Production of the music is where the real work & expression of the artist’s talent occurs. “Mixing” other producers digital tracts and calling it your own… well old school “DJs” who did that with vinyl, we generally find them working the wedding & karaoke circuits today.

Music I Can’t Stop Listening To!: Kaskade –

This Salt Lake City native takes the honors of being the second Mormon thing I love, right after the State of Utah, well its geography anyways! My first exposure to Kaskade was at ID Festival in Vegas, and while all the kiddies were going nuts to his infectious beats & the “melt you into a bucket of quivering chicken parts” female vocalists, I was quickly catching the bug while being mesmerized by female eyes in his visual display. It was meant to be, Kaskade & I! Stemming from my roots & affinity for high tempo house music that works so well with how my brain operates, and saturating the tracts with some of the best female vocalists in the world, I literally cannot stop listening to his music.

I take a break every so often to listen to Nero’s remix of Calvin Harris’ “Feel So Close” on a 10x repeat, but then back to Kaskade! I’ve gone so far to Google who these female vocalist are, mmmmmm…. they melt me every song, every time.

Minimal Bias, Global News aka Real Journalism: Al Jazeera English* –

I remember living at Trevor & Bree’s in Golden during the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, when this “old western” suburb of the Mile High City almost had a collective brain aneurysm over the Buffalo Rose’s, a biker bar at that, hosting of Al Jazeera for their coverage of the event. I had never seen Al Jazeera, only “knowing” it was the “Anti-Christ” itself according to Faux Noise, and consisted “only” of anti-American rhetoric, US flag burning, and where Al Quead aired the beheadings of Americans taken hostage. I wrongly assumed it was only in Arabic, as MSM would like me to think, so I would never watch it “knowing” I could not understand it.

Well hello many weeks living in the middle of BumFuckUAE, and the only thing on the tele was either in Arabic, Hindi (1 of 100s of Indian languages), or consisted of Camel Racing, when what do I click to, Al Jazeera English! I’ve long been a fan of BBC for getting world news, NPR does a decent job as well, though very limited in coverage of world affairs on the whole.

In the first 3-4 hours of watching, this is what I saw: limited bias investigations covering multiple sides of each story running minutes long; no fucking sound bytes sandwiched into paid “analysts” fabrication of what occurred; coverage of 20 plus different nations, some I can honestly say I did not know existed; no shouting matches or one political favorite given 10 minutes while the opposing speaker was given 10 seconds. If “flag burning” was happening, they would show it, BUT key difference being it would come with an accounting of what was the motivation behind it, not some fucking sound byte, “All Muslims hate Americans” or some other quackery.

Searching Direct TV when I returned to the states, the best I could find were some program shares with some off the wall station that carried “Democracy Now!”, but no Al Jazeera itself. But guess what, they have live feed on their Facebook page! Hands down best find of the year!

*Apologies for the “4-letter words” within, but they are the only true way to express my 20 year frustration with MSM

Biggest One-Achievement Wonder: Occupy Wall Street –

I’ve posted enough about the “movement” that I care not to go down that path further, but let’s just say I was a large supporter of the concept in its early days until it went “mainstream” and became fashionable to support. I’m just glad these indecisive, need 100% consensus on anything to actually do something pansies chose the Vendetta mask as their “mascot” instead of tarnishing Che Guevara’s legacy by picking him up as a cliché attempt to define their revolution.

Their only accomplishment – Shutting up the Tea Party! Although, this wasn’t directly by their efforts, “dangly fingers” would have never all consented to it!

2012 “Movement” I would like to see: Occupy Churches, Mosques, Synagogues & Chapels

An investment in your home or business that actually pays for itself.

As some of my readers may have noticed, I have not been around much lately. The reasons being multifaceted, but center around a couple key factors; I’ve returned to Colorado, a place I love; I’ve gotten out of my funk of the past couple years; and lastly I starting working for a company that proves renewable energy is not just a figment of future promise, but is competitive currently and actually works, and the last two months I’ve been working my ass off towards bringing renewable energy into actual people’s lives.

Wind Turbines on the north side of the Columbia River in Washington State.

En route out of Oregon and my year long hiatus from my tree pruning business, I was in search of employment working on the giant Wind Turbines, but much to my dismay along my entire course through Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming & into Colorado, the only ones I saw were in Arlington, WY. Ironically, while moving my wife, to Colorado we saw many, many more. In Arlington, Oregon another large wind turbine project was being constructed. What is the roots of the name Arlington, windy as fuck?!

Giant Wind Turbines in Arlington, OR

Shortly after arriving in Colorado, I was hired on by Next Generation Energy in Lafayette, Colorado. A short list of renewable energy projects we work on, with some details to follow, is solar thermal heating of domestic hot water (for bathing, laundry, cooking, etc.), homes tied into either forced air or radiant heat, grid tied solar electric systems and stand alone photovoltaic systems to power remote communication towers or “street” lights and small wind turbines in the range of two feet diameter blades up to 12 feet.

Now I think there is a huge misconception out in the world that solar energy conversion to human use is an instant gratification device that us Americans are so used to receiving, yet this is not the case when we look at the installation costs of converting the sun’s energy into something useful. The simple notion that you can’t get something from nothing is applicable in the renewable energy industry as well, but we need to think of it as an economic investment over time. If we can get over our instant gratification insistence & expectations which we are too accustomed to, then we can come to realize how every day the sun is giving us huge quantities of energy that is being wasted and converted into destructive end results.

Just think of the amount of solar radiation that is being “wasted” in our urban environments converted to heat as parking lots & asphalt roofs absorb heat in the day, that we fight with air conditioners and more power consumption, then releases it in the night making it impossible to sleep without have the AC cranking. By intercepting the sun’s rays that would be converted to heat in a form we either do not want or cannot use productively, we could cover our roofs with both photovoltaic cells tied to the grid to reduce our need for fossil fuel production during the days, then at night when electricity demands from industry lower, the power plants would supply the electricity, hence diminishing the needs for battery storage. Also on the roofs we could have thermal collectors, that efficiently capture the suns energy before it is wasted as heat we do not want or cannot use, store it tanks similar to a modern hot water heater and supply 80-90% of our domestic hot water needs when averaged over the year.

Most people do not think about how much energy they waste and subsequently pay for, as the power companies do not give rebates for hot water you heat but do not use, do they? Upwards of 30-40% of an average home owners energy bills are for the heating of domestic hot water and keeping it at the high temperature for use at any time. Convert that fact to reality, and much of those costs are paid for something you do not use and it is wasted. Most people have their water temperatures too high, just think of the last time you turned on only the hot water to take a shower. There is enough energy in most areas of the country from solar irradiance, where you could achieve 80% of your home heating & domestic hot water needs from the sun alone.

Street lights we manufactured & installed in Colorado with small wind turbines, a PV panel & batteries completely off the grid.

So let’s be realistic and return to the errant preconception of the prohibitive costs to solar power. If you could reduce your home heating & energy consumption through investing in a system that can convert the sun’s rays to something useful and save 80% of your energy costs through the year, why would you not do it? Oh right, it is too costly!

Oh contrare my good reader. You are thinking of it from the old preconceptions. It is an investment, and what is the biggest investment most average people know of? Their homes, yet they have this wrong idea that they could “invest” in remodeling their kitchen or adding a bedroom that would increase the homes value for resale. Well if the last couple months have shown anything, homes do historically go up in value, but what is the rate of return on a home when you factor in mortgages & interest rates, or a slumping economy? Now if we cannot be certain a home’s value will increase at a rate higher than that of interest charges on a mortgage, while at the same time we know for certain energy prices from fossil fuels will increase and we know what the cost of heating & powering your home from the sun can be calculated relatively simply, we can begin to see if we look at a solar system as an investment, just like we have been mislead to believe our homes are supposed to be, that the rate of return on a solar system is much greater than that of a home investment.

I’ll return in a future post with more details as to how exactly we can accomplish converting the sun’s energy (a free, unlimited resource) into something that is not only useful to us, but also cost effective and over the long term profitable.

Rattlesnake Mountains, Middle of Nowhere, Wyoming

Another day and another night is upon me. I am deep in the [Shirley] Mountains of central Wyoming, between the Pathfinder and Seminoe reservoirs near the Miracle Mile. I think it is called this because it is a miracle anyone ever found it. I know it is in Bighorn Sheep territory because my girlfriend in college, Liz Glass, volunteered to study them for the BLM back in 1995.

I don’t think I’ve been here before, but it does look familiar even though a lot of the drive in was not as I recalled it. I recall the Miracle Mile section being right along the river between the dam and the short strech of river until the Pathfinder Res. started, but on this drive in, was a long hill climb through the wildlife protection area and no camping due to protection of the M[organ] Creek area for drinking supply. The only one drinking water up here is the animals, although it could be for the BLM station above the dam. It is not like this is Bullrun in Oregon, protecting the water supply for half a million people.

So back to where I am. What I was remembering was a torturous winding dirt road with cliffs ready to cave in on you. Also, I recall the mountains not so large and not so isolated. Sure this is Wyoming where everything is isolated, but I am fucking in isolated, remote mountains, more so than I think I have ever been. Once I reached the top of the unexpected mountain pass and the end of the protected no camping area, there were three choices; turn around, go further into the completely unknown down a equally steep hill that took me to where I was, or finally veer right onto a two track and hope their was a camping spot close. You guessed it, I chose the last option, not the brave, blaze on into the unknown, but not the chickenshit, tuck tail and retreat either.

Morgan Creek Wildlife Habitat Management Sign just south of road summit.

Unbeknown to me, the two track had no flat stopping spots, nor any locations to turn around either for a least a mile of very rough, very narrow, sandwiched against rock faces and crowded by trees until opening to a mountaintop meadow and a barbed wire gate leading out of the protected area.

Opening the gate, consciously pulling the wire back out of the two track versus just laying it down and driving over it, which is what traditionally done, to assuredly avoid puncturing a tire, I proceeded through but only as far as needed to locate an area large enough to put down my tent free of rough sagebrush.

I am in here that is for certain, about 40 miles or more from the civilization, if you want to call it that, of Sinclair, Wyoming, and at least five miles from the BLM/Bureau of Reclamation housing. I can sence the remoteness and it is easily just as remote as the ‘bush’ in Alaska.

Seminoe Reservoir from summit in Shirley Mountains, looking South.

As of course it was getting dark, the sun long having already set, the first thing I did after getting some water on the Coleman, was scan the area with the million candlepower spotlight I have for any native residents. Having had this battery powered light for close to three years now, it has never been charged, although now it is needed to get a little boost to energy as its intensity is not as it has been in the past. Of course first perimeter scan reveals a pair of eyes about one hundred yards at the edge of the meadow where trees start. In the days last twilight, they could be a smaller deer or potentially a fox or coyote. All I know is that I am most certainly in mountain lion country and I am hoping not grizzly, as this is remote enough to be home to the top bear, but I think they are more to the north.

Seminoe Dam at dusk, Miracle Mile is downstream from dam.

Those eyes were enough to put me in scared mode. I don’t scare too often, but the mind races and reverts to primal instinct rapidly on its own. This meant scanning the hill above me and the entire area about every minute or two with the light. The tent is within inches of the two track, the truck parked at an angle within four feet of the tent door, and I have completely surrounded the tent…
Just had a scare that was nothing but the grasses rustling on the tent fly. The heart beats harder and the ears are ringing.

…with miscellaneous supplies as tripwires and boobie alarms if something comes near investigating the invasion of its territory. I am laying in the tent, and within reach is my river knife, which I did just grab a moment ago. This is erie out hear to say the least and I am spooked whether this is rational fear or otherwise, I cannot honestly say.

Daylight takes away the scary unknown factor

Before retreating to the tent, I replaced the batteries in my headlamp and even though it has three LED bulbs in it which I didn’t think got weaker in brightness as the batteries died, it was 100 times brighter after the replacement.

So I could be sleeping in the back of my truck on top of the divider and below the canopy, but I did that as a last resort yesterday on the roadside at a crossing of the Green River about an hour south of Jackson, but I felt claustrophobic, as though I was in a coffin, and slept like shit until I opened the back hatch so that I could ‘breathe’.

There are no mosquitoes here and other than the pair of eyes I saw earlier, there is only the sound of a few crickets and the sporadic breeze rubbing tent fly against dried stalks of mountain grasses. I occasionally hear a jet pass 20 some thousand feet over this location at roughly 8500 feet in elevation.

Awoke this morning completely free on any invaders during the night. Around six a.m. the remenants of the nights fog were passing through the meadow and the nearby peak was veiled in a blanket of mist. A heavy dew covered the landscape and the sun slowly began to burn through the moisture with the breeze peaking up from the differences in temperature.

Morning Fog burning off

I’ve set things to air out, filled the sun shower and waiting for it to heat up for my first shower in three days since being in banks. Baby whips just don’t cut it as a means to feel fresh after cleaning up. I think that explains why I used to use the phrase ‘baby whip fresh’ with much sarcasm intended.

As I wait out the warmer water, I’ve walked towards the southeast edge of the meadow, the location of the menacing eyes of last night, and then scrambled to the top of the knoll, that is the peak of this mountain and picked my way flip-flop clad as always through the sagebrush and undergrowth along the ridge to ah outcropping of rocks overlooking the basin to the north.

I can see two rock piles out in the valley, where years ago we were chasing after some elusive mountain sheep, only to realize almost to late we had ascended much higher than we thought when a thunderstorm came racing in, bolts of lightening crashing around us on that completely exposed outcrop, and Liz and I beat serious feet getting down and into the relative safety of the van.

Oddly, as I can recall this incident vividly, I don’t remember driving in as far as this to get there, yet there were no other mini-mountains on my drive in last night to have been the location.

The clouds have moved in, so much for the warm shower, and was a pretty stiff breeze has died to absolute calmness. Grey streaks of shade reach from the clouds to the basin floor, and all the is to hear is a distant gust, the squaws of magpies below my vantage point, the flicks and songs of little chickadees, and the random passing of a bee. There is the chatter of a ground squirel or chickmunk, the bee circles around and there was just the distinctive song of a robin.

Odd, never had to prove my being somewhere I actually was before, see comment below...

Two of the noisy magpie just fly by heading west and I am in amazed awe of the complete lack of ticks around here. My six sense, the Tick Sense has yet to be triggered, yet I wandered through prime habitat for them and nothing!

The sound of a vehicle climbs the dirt road I did not want to descend last night and it reminds me that time waits for nobody, I have wind turbines to see yet to day.

[edited: for spelling and proper naming, see below]

[edited: after "finger pecking" this on my palm pilot on the ridge, I descended and walked up the two track, finding some fresh hoof tracks on the dust of the road, and looked toward my truck, and the "two scaring eyes" of the night, revealed their owner as this harmless little guy here, who was inspecting my camp while I was away.

The scary eyes of the night, revealed in the daylight.

Post from the road & Borah Peak, Idaho

i’m at Borah Mnt, Idaho tonight. i’ve been through here at least one time before and potentially driven up this side dirt road to see the 1983 historical marker of the 7.2 earthquake splitting the ground, but do not fully recall.

what I do know, is this is a slightly magically place for me. Being BLM\USFS the first things I ran into were cows, but amazingly only a few and even more so no cow pies on every square inch of land! Driving up a two-track to a vantage point overlooking the entire valley, or at least a good 40 miles of its length, the first natural residents I was greeted by were two giant black and burnt orange swift-like birds. They were easily twice the size that of the swifts at Smith Rock, and they were swooping around close to the ground close to me in the manner of Killdeer protecting their hidden eggs on the ground, but I did not come across any future generations and they quickly disappeared.

Once I located a “level” place to camp, I pulled off the two-track, checking the clearance between exhaust system and dry groundcover so as to not ignite a brush fire, and I was immediately hit with the old familar aroma of the Sagebrush. Its pungency nearly enough to burn my nostrils, but I would have it no other way to remind me, I was home.

At Smith Rock, I had gathered upba few sprigs of Sage and breathed deeply with the leaves placed under my nose, but even that proximity to the olfactory, was not sufficient enough to match the aromatic strength of a few tire crushed shrubs emmitting their scent.

Not to be outdone by the swifts or the aroma, thee mosiquitos are the size of hummingbirds here! Where they come from, I haven’t the slightest clue, but they descending upon their newest meal with speed and the unforgettable, genetically recognizable buzz one can never forget. I would not be surprised if these predators of the annoyed were picked up on military radar given their enormity, and I only wish thec swifts would have stayed around longer to devour a few more. A slight breeze did keep them at bay for the most part, not forcing me immediately to drive into my tent sans dinner, but I could easily have been very complascent without their existance.

A grunt from close proximity resulted in my startled jump and an even more instinctual fear of a great bear descending upon my being. But, a scan around the vast perimeter revealed no dark ball of fur, nails and teeth lumbering towards me, and a second guttural sound revealed the source to be a not too distant four chambered stomach bovine, the parahia of western lands. At least they had not left me their prairie paddies as a testament to having been here first.

Setting up home away from home became a two-fold project, as darkening skies from an already set sun, loomed more omenious with black sheets of rain masking the transition between mountain sillouettes and the sky to the south, and heavy drops of liquid began to fall just as I fired up the Coleman.

As water was set to begin boiling at seven thousand foot elevation, I scurried between setting up the tent and trying to locate a jacket. Before there was even time to mount a serious endeavour to locate some protection from the impending deluge, I caught a first glimpse of a waxing quarter moon nearing the western horizon as it broke through a cloud patch, and the clouds and raindrops moved to the south.

This is the Basin and Range west, land of scant moisture, where ominous skies fools the mind’s eye into thinking the worst torrential downpour is nye, but only delivers a smattering of liquid.

As skies continued to darken and faint, solidary white beams tailed by a red speck marked the travel of a motorists locked to the pavement in the valley center a few miles distant from the Sagebrush Explorer, the icons of western evenings greeted the moon, even as it prepared to depart their views. A few coyotes qued up a corus in a slightly distant proximity to the north. Just as the moisture that would never give life sustaining sustenance to t1he Sagebrush evaporated before hitting dirt, so too did the coyotes songs.

In the midst of setting up camp and a single gourmet meal of bowtie noodles, sauce, melted chunks of cheese and slices pepperoni, I noticed flashes of light to the south of my perch over the valley and the way by which the maelstorm retreated. A cumulus bulk of clouds siting over the southern horizon and partially blocked from my viewing pleasure by the flanking mountain to Borah Peak, was a decent display of lightening, although to distant to hear the thunder.

Finished eating, downing the last of a PBR, and the moon descended below the next range of mountains to the west, it was time to dive through the tent door and sealed up the hatches prior to any unwelcome humming vistors making themselves feel right at home.

A few pages in an Astronomy book read, while the stars were out in full force without the light pollution of urban centers, street lights and strip malls, this happy camper was quick to sleep not willing to donate sangre de Hanso to the local blood bank. They’ll have their chances in the morning.

Camping out below Borah Peak, Idaho. The highest point in Idaho at 12,626 ft (roughly). Sagebrush in the middle of the Intermountain West's Basin & Range country.

Awoke early to the rattling and scuffing of the tent. The mind instantly tracks to primal belief of a predator snooping around, but alas it is only the brushing of fly upon tent in the cool morning breeze.

An hour before daylight the local populations announce the looming morning. The coyotes sound off, the swifts are chirping and flying around the tent, apparently to announce my presence as they did with my arrival, and the return of the gutteral sound of last night. I had originally thought it to be the cows in the area, but after hearing the sound of a sprung piano wire low on the keyboard, I realized it was mostly that of a Sagehen or Prairie Chicken instead.

As daylight arrives, the breeze fluttering the short grasses outside the tent, I am greeted by a couple impatient mosquitos desparetly attempting to get through the fly netting and to their mark. There will be none of that, as I unzip the tent fly doors to let in the view. To ward off the chilling breeze, I wrap the sleeping bag around me as a hummingbird, actual not the dreaded bitting kind, performs an S-shaped flight manuever between the truck and tent.

Could the bright orange kayak atop the truck or yellow recycle bin on the ground drawn in this unlikely visitor, who came from afar to scope out this new item of bright color in this overly colorless landscape?

The sun is nearing the breach of the NW to SE running mountain range, a white halo brightens in the pale blue sky. Their shadow has been steadily marching towards the east across the valley, and the sun is only a minute or two from blinding me, while at the same shedding some direct heat upon my chilled body.

As I wait the last few minutes, the visibility of Borah Peak, a bulky mountain of improbablly held up scree, is obscurded and faded by the rays of light.

The sun is upon my face, another day has arrived and only time will tell what it brings. Time to get up, mosquitos be damned!

Pictures from Idaho & travel on the road

Middle of Nowhere, eastern Oregon

Smith Ferry, Idaho

My first "cat life" lost resides here on the North Fork Payette River in Idaho

My home on wheels in Idaho. All important "necessities" are contained within.

Heading out on the road tomorrow!

Out from my $1000/mo rental house and the jail that it had become.  Out from the prison and weight on my shoulders of everything I own owning me.  I huge sigh of relief has passed over me now, and a dense cloud many years in the making is lifting from my thoughts and things in general are looking much better.  My business is closed, no more dealing with the stresses imposed from without and from within, no longer will I stress myself out being guilty I am not addressing every potential customer, every current customer, all my employees and all the bullshit that goes with running a business.  Sure I am not making the bank I once was, but when money is the only thing that makes one “happy” that is not happiness at all.

I head out on the road tomorrow, spending a couple days climbing in Smith Rock, then on to SLC and climbing in the Wasatch Mnts, then on to Colorado and maybe stop off in Red Rock country to clear the mind and reattach with my roots.  Life is looking much better, my brain is actually functioning clearly and although I really have no clear idea of what I will do in Colorado, or whether I will be “homesick” for Portland, everything is much better right now.  Time to see how things go, being out in the open air and living simply again.  There is nothing better!

Drill Here. Drill Now. Pay Less!

US Wind Power Resources available to us in the USA.

courtesy of Montana Green Power.com

Montana Green Power

The wind in the United States could produce more than 4.4 trillion kWh of electricity each year–more than one and one-half times the 2.7 trillion kWh of electricity consumed in the United States in 1990.

Whether you are religious and believe God created everything around you, or are science based in thinking, there is no debate as to the cost of WIND POWER: IT IS FREE FOR THE TAKING.

US Electrical Grid courtesy of Geni.org

The US Electrical Grid is already in existence for bulk transportation of electricity from one part of the country to another and if people live there, there is a distribution (collection) network already in place servicing the vast majority of the nation. Therefore, minimal investment would be needed to connect Wind Turbines to the Electrical Grid and from the Grid to your Home.

So which do we prefer? This….

Wind Turbines courtesy of Alibaba.com

or this….

"Smoke" Stacks image courtesy of TheDailyGreen.com

or the potential for a nuclear meltdown like at 3 Mile Island in the US…

3 Mile Island Nuclear Plant courtesy wikimedia.org

Why can’t we be reasonable, when reasonable is the intelligent, safe & fiscally responsible manner in which to proceed?

A heavy push for the Nuclear option fails simple logic on several fronts if we are being told it will help with fuel costs.

*at present cars are not powered by electricity
*the Hydrogen Car is years if not decades away from everyday American’s use
*the entire fuel delivery infrastructure (the gas stations) would need to be reworked and billions would need to be invested to retrofit them with hydrogen fueling tanks & pumps
*The US has no comprehensive plan for dealing with Nuclear waste
*How can the same people that believe Nuclear Power is the “Solution”, yet still be against Nuclear Waste being shipped across the country in railroad cars through their neighborhoods?

I am not stringently opposed to Nuclear Power in the mix, but it does not solve our energy problems when it comes to high gas prices.

Although I am slightly skeptical of what ulterior motives there may be for “freeing up” natural gas, potentially for use in tar sands oil recovery, there is no doubt moving to 20% electricity production from Wind Power is a positive & good thing to do. We have everything to gain and very little to lose by moving in this direction.

Let’s stop the insanity, move forward in a positive direction and quit fighting each other!

Which do you prefer, a relatively silent, clean wind turbine in your backyard or any of these options; a Nuclear Power Plant, a train carrying nuclear waste through your town & by your children’s school, contaminated water from “cleaning” the coal in “Clean Coal” technology, oiled beaches when a tanker runs aground or your children dying in a war to protect “our oil interests” abroad?

This truly is a no brainer, think about it!

Dichotomous Mediocrity

I think that about sums up the overall result of my living of life when I average it all out.

To say I am bi-polar is not correct, but my actions are. I can never find a middle ground in my decisions, fight mediocrity tooth and nail, but am completely content to be doing nothing, i.e., being mediocre when I cannot be doing what I truly want to be doing.

When I began to find myself in college, I exhibited this “bi-polar” perfectly by achieving 2 As, a D+ and 2 Fs in one semester alone. I fought against the notion I needed to memorize upteen million Calculus formulas & an equal amount of formulas in physics, to which I received my 2 Fs. At the same time I excelled in my 400 level engineering classes on hydrology and of all things dam building & feasibility studies. I had a battle within myself between principles & concepts and practicality & a hands-on-approach.

I find this to be common in my life. If something interests me, then I am all over it. I paid off my college loans of $30k in a little over 3 years then shortly after 9-11 paid off a vehicle loan in under a year based on the my principle of not being locked in to any responsibilities. Both of which are unheard of in today’s society. Yet now, I find myself completely content and at ease with zero remorse for defaulting on a loan for a vehicle I purchased for my business, intending to pay down the principle of $35k in max 2 years, but finding out I was locked into a 5 year payment plan. I’ll lose about $10k on the deal now that they repossessed it and it goes to auction for far less than it is worth and it destroys my credit, but hell I don’t give a crap. It means nothing to me.

Just as it means nothing to me that I built up a very successful business, operating completely “cash on hand” (minus that truck) then ran it into the ground and another $8k in debt on a credit card, when I stopped giving a shit about it and was pissed at the lousy deal I was dealt on the loan and some meaningless regulatory agency exerting their useless mandates on me.

The weird irony in this all, outside the obvious of credit rating either being 1000 or 400 if it were calculated daily, is that my principled mind would never allow me a day of collecting unemployment to which I have paid into. I cannot allow myself to get something for not doing anything, yet I know people, lots of people who are completely content to get laid off seasonally so that they can collect unemployment. I could never do it and live with myself, yet at the same time, I have zero remorse for defaulting on a loan or credit card.

Is this my battle against injustice in this country were big corporations receive billions in subsidies, read: welfare, while their stupid minions fight social welfare & entitlements to the death? It must be and it must be where my remorseless actions of screwing over a credit card company comes in while at the same time being unwilling to accept money that I have paid into through governmental taxes. Fuck the Big Money companies and banks! They want to screw over me and my economic class with pathetic interest rates on money I have in their possession, while they rape us with 20% interest rates that we borrow from them, then they can take their losses, which of course they will easily write-off and more likely then not get payment from the government in more corporate welfare from my tax dollars.

Why should I be held to a higher standard of fiscal responsibility than a bank or corporation? Bear Stearns comes to mind here. Government for the Corporation, by the Corporation, paid for by the People.

Anywho that’s my rant of the day….

Mr. Smith, A Reconnection Please (pictures)

Today is a bad day. Today is no different than yesterday, nor has anything much changed from a week ago, nothing of significance has transpired to make this day any worse or better than a month ago, but for me today is just really bad. Today more than any before it I would like to stick my head in the sand but I can’t without going to Lacuna Corp first to erase all that I know, or going back 70 years in psychiatric “medicine” to receive a lobotomy thus lacking the ability to think cognitively, so what i really need if for Mr. Smith to reconnect me to the Matrix.

I think somewhere around the my 17th birthday when we were invading a far off country, that we would return to a decade plus a few years later, was when I first became aware of something not being right, something not sitting right between what I was “seeing” and what I feeling. This intuition grew over the following years. During my years at college I noticed the machine’s grasp increase as my loans piled on while I willfully fought institutional education in search of experiential learning.

My “memorial” overlooking Delicate Arch

Over these four years I turned the engineering I was being indoctrinated with on end, by spending summers on the road in the American West growing to love John McPhee’s “Basin & Range[s]“, Edward Abbey’s Slickrock Country & Mark Reisner’s “Cadillac Desert”. I took on western bureaucrats I knew in name only, in their attempts to open Utah’s wilderness to oil shale mining and but one of many attempts to lie the nation into opening ANWR for oil production through letters, phone calls and using my “public debate” courses to expose the bullshit for what they really were.

Souther Utah

I became a vegetarian to protest federal subsidies to western ranchers on public lands, vomiting the first time I went all veggie in Utah’s High Uintas Wilderness where I volunteered, took backpacks to the grocery store prior to “carrying your own cloth bags” became cliche’ to do and was a closet Hayduke in my detest of growth for the sake of growth. “Subvert the dominant paradigm” was not just a bumper sticker analogist to today’s “yellow ribbons”, but a lifestyle I desired and would strive to live for many years against all pressures to constrain me.

Plastics. They never go away.

What Chemistry & Plastic is doing to our World with all of our help. This is a Must Watch Series

essential2health

Americans are living longer, healthier lives than at any point in history, thanks, in part, to the advances of chemistry. Chemistry helps to ensure an abundance of fresh food and clean drinking water. Chemistry has made breakthroughs possible in medical technology, new disease-fighting agents, and research that monitors trends in health.

American Chemistry Council
For Immediate Release April 17, 2008
Contact: Tiffany Harrington, 703-741-5583
Email: tiffany_harrington@americanchemistry.com

ACC Calls on FDA to Update Review of Bisphenol A

ARLINGTON, VA (April 17, 2008) – The American Chemistry Council (ACC) today sent a letter to FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach requesting FDA to update its review of the safety of bisphenol-A in food contact applications.

The extensive body of scientific study regarding bisphenol A is well documented and well reviewed. Nevertheless, recent media reports have raised concerns about the safety and use of polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins, unnecessarily confusing and frightening the public.

An updated review of bisphenol A in food contact applications, led by the premier food safety agency in the United States – the FDA – will help explain the extensive scientific review that has already been conducted on this compound. And this review will allow the agency to issue the most recent evaluation of all the science, and all agency reviews to date, quickly and in a way that is understandable to the public. We believe that an update by FDA, accompanied by a clear communication from the agency about what the science means, is needed, and ask FDA to move forward promptly with this review. It is important that FDA move as quickly as possible to undertake this review, since the results, regardless of outcome will help better inform the public.

The use of polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins for food contact applications has been and continues to be recognized as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the European Food Safety Authority, the Japanese Ministry for Health, Labor and Welfare, and other regulatory authorities worldwide. Members of the American Chemistry Council (ACC) are committed to openly and transparently sharing environmental, health and safety data with the government and the public. Today, people are living longer, safer and healthier lives through the essential benefits provided by the business of chemistry.

Bisphenol A is used to make polycarbonate plastic, a shatter-resistant and clear material used in a wide array of products ranging from plastic bottles and eyeglasses to sports safety equipment, as well as components of lifesaving medical devices such as incubators and kidney dialysis machines. It is also used to make durable epoxy resins, materials used as the coating in most food and beverage cans, helping to protect the safety and integrity of our food supply.

The two are not in balance with each other, is all I can say

Evidence against “Bigger is Safer” vs “Economical [smaller] is Less Safe” False Logic

In the debate over SUVs and larger vehicles being needed for “safety” over going smaller more economical, either for ecological or economical reasons, the data doesn’t match the “Status Quo” Conventional Wisdom pushed by many, including the “Global Warming Skeptics”. So let’s look at the “big” argument in favor of “Larger is Better”, and Semis versus Passenger Vehicles. [No this is not a male enhancement advertisement, heads out of the gutter please ]

Maybe a “factor” in choosing safety over economy, should be respecting the semi in the first place. Cut one off, drive in it’s blind spots, drive like an idiot around one, be accepting of Newton’s Law when it plows into you.

If your[the] logic were true, then we should all be driving actual tanks, but then we would not be safe from each other, so then we should upgrade to

What could Government Welfare to the Nuclear Industry Buy Us?

My commentary on an article published in CommonDreams on the Nuclear “Welfare” Handout.

Here’s a little music to get you into the mood of what follows and it is key to understanding the reality of what is being sold you by the Nuclear Power Industry & Lobbyists. Thanks to youtube and especially Royksopp as I love this song!

Published on Thursday, May 29, 2008 by CommonDreams.org
Half-Trillion Dollars for Nukes!
by Karl Grossman

“With Wall Street unwilling to finance new nuclear plants, U.S. Senators Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and John Warner of Virginia have cooked up a scheme to provide $544 billion –­ yes, with a “b” — in subsidies for new nuclear power plant development.

Their move will be debated on the floor of the Senate Tuesday, June 3.

A Lieberman aide describes the plan as “the most historic incentive for nuclear in the history of the United States.”

The Lieberman-Warner scheme is cloaked in a climate change bill — the claim being that nuclear power plants don’t emit greenhouse gases and thus don’t contribute to global warming. However, the overall “nuclear cycle” ­– which includes mining, milling, fuel enrichment

10 Real Presidential Candidate Debates Needed

Ok, if you are anything like me, you are fed up with 90 minute debates that contain 80 minutes of drivel and gossip, followed by 10 minutes of real issue discussion after 90% of the viewers have already left out of disgust. I would have to say, like myself, you are tired of “canned debates” and speeches, where all of the following occur; the audience is screened, the “journalists” may have engaged in male prostitution, the questions are selected by the Main Stream Media with the only reason being they want to prolong the debates to increase profit, the questions are “softballs”, and the candidates recite the names of past presidents, dead or alive, as answers to the question.

As all past debates have proven, we cannot count on the MSM to have the attention span any longer than a kid with ADD in Toys-R-Us without his Riddilin. The issues we face in the future are too great and too important to believe we can spend 10 minutes, or less, on any one of them with the notion they will be revisited in future debates, because they will not be as “new breaking gossip” rears its ugly head once again. Therefore, as the concerns of this nation are too important, each one of these debates must be about one main topic or theme and there is no room for tangents taken off of these predetermined issues.

I have watched most debates, both Republican & Democratic, and honestly I have not learned much, if anything, about either Senator Barack Obama or Senator John McCain in the over 30 hours they have “graced” the screen. It is time for open,

What American’s Think of the World

A friend of mine from college posted these on his blog. I have to say it is the best representation of how American’s consider the world to be.

take it away Ira!

Look at the 1st world map about 1/2 down post

plus a picture from way back…..

you remember those days bud?

Interspection- Part 1. Who am I?

Part 1. Who am I?

I am Hans, 34 white male of mainly German decent, college educated one and a half times over, hard working when I do work, perfection oriented, amazingly lackadaisical to a tee. Born in upstate NY to parents who divorced before I was able to remember, I lived with my mother, a direct immigrant from Germany shortly after WWII, and her boyfriend- my “step father” from the time I can remember.

Raised by an overwhelming mother, coddled, protected, smothered and as always the single son who could never do any wrong. For the most part happy, a child that was not of a rich family, but never lacked for anything and in all reality was surrounded by too many material possessions.

My name was not always as it is now, although the name I have now was one of many I was given, following German tradition of two middle names. My parents claim it was out of love, that I cannot doubt, but I see it slightly differently as a sort of laziness, giving me all of my male relatives’ names. The only one I didn’t get “branded” with was my mother’s for obvious reasons. And it wasn’t long before this “gift” caught up with me, first having to give “all” my names to the teachers, etc., in my elementary classes and them looking befuddled, “why so many names?”