tom.bl*g

March Madness

Four weeks, three weddings, 10 pounds of hiking gear, 13 ounces of digital camera, two carloads back to Jacksonville, one conference paper, and a class project. A fun month.

New Camera Gear

Pentax Optio S4i (3.8 oz.). A four megapixel digital camera the size of an Altoids tin. Recieved decent reviews on dpreview.com, and will still be usable after I get of the trail, as long as it is still usable after I get of the trail. Originally, I wanted to carry a film camera like the Olympus Stylus Epic, thinking that the cost of film plus camera would be about the same as of the cost of a digital camera.

Leather case for aforementioned camera (1.4 oz.). It's a leather case; what do you want me to say?

256M Secure Digital memory card, with case (0.35 oz). I'm going to carry two or three of these and send them home to get emptied as necessary.

D-LI8 Battery (0.6 oz.). One for the camera, one for backup—I should be able to last almost two weeks without a recharge.

Battery charger (2.8 oz.). Maybe I'll carry the charging gear, maybe I'll bounce it from post office to post office. Not only I would have to get to a P.O. during business hours, but I would need 3 hours 20 minutes to charge the batteries before mailing the charger up the trail again.

Power cord for charger (4.0 oz.). The power cord is heavier than the camera!

On Giving Presentations

Nothing boosts your confidence more than confusing the audience.

—B, on how to give talks.

I suppose the converse holds.

A Turn for the Corporate

Isn't all my new gear just so *terribly* exciting, that you want to get up and do a little jig?

I've been slogging through Pimsleur Mandarin I, II, and III for two semesters now, and I'm almost through—14 lessons left. 28 days later and I'm done, as long as I maintain the steady once-a-day, each-lesson-twice pace.

Anyhow.

So I've been learning how to be a tourist, "Shanghai has very cold winters, colder than Nanjing, don't you think so? What about Qing Dao's beaches? I think Qing Dao is a very beatiful place. I'm going to take a boat there this summer to vacation."

All of a sudden, business vocabulary has popped up: "Mr. Han is a very important customer, and everyone from the international department is going to participate in next Tuesday's meeting. How are the preparations going?" I feel the sudden urge to get an MBA.

More New Gear

Lexan soup spoon (0.4 oz.). I may cut the end off so that it pits into my pot. I may not—life is full of mystery.

Tyvek, 4 ft. (2.4 oz.). I am going to cut a groundcloth a little over 8 feet long and fold one end back to make a pocket for my feet for protection from the wetter elements. This material is normally wrapped around houses under construction to keep the elements out. It's a thin plastic that crinkles like tinfoil when you first get it. I hear a run through the washer fixes that.

Thermarest Z-rest sleeping pad (15.5 oz.). I wish I could get by with the 3/4 length, but I'm freakishly tall.

Leki Makalu Tour hiking poles, 1 pair (19.2 oz.). These are Leki's low-end hikers, with no funky grips or suspension. Still pricey, but Leki has an outstanding relationship with the hiking community, and deserves your honest support. Cue the swelling, patriotic music.

Adventure 16 bug bivy, with stuffsack (7.2 oz.). Tarps don't have walls, so I carry an extra few ounces for a self-erecting bug screen. It looks like a sunshield that you would put in your car, only warped. And made of screen.

Ibex Flint T-shirt, large (7.1 oz.). Merino wool—Product of New-Zealand. The fit isn't perfect, and the shirt is 4 inches to long (which a quick trip over to my grandmother's place will fix), but it's wool. I hope it won't wear out before I'm done hiking. Supposedly better at doing all the things that synthetics are good at, with the benefit of being stink-resistant. That's a big plus.

Thermo Fleece long sleeve, large (7.5 oz.). A long-sleeved merino wool base-layer—"pure new wool". I may send it home if I don't ever wear it.

Frogg Togg pants, XL (6.3 oz.). These are bright "hazmat cleanup team" white, but there were in the overstock/discontinued catalog, so I got them cheap.

Frogg Togg pullover, XL (6.4 oz.). I should paint a nuclear warning logo on the back and carry a geiger counter. This material feels like paper; it's a tougher version of the popypropylene smocks that surgeons wear. At least it's blood-proof.

New Gear

Oware Cat 2 tarp, with sill nylon stuff-sack (12.1 oz.). An 8x10 silnylon tarp with a caternary cut for stability. I wanted to take a tarp with me last time, but chickened; tarps are lighter and less civilization/comfort baggage, even if you can't keep the bugs out. From Oware; go to their website and look for a "Cat Tarp" link on the left.

Aquamira water treatment (3.1 oz.). On my last hike I sent home my pump after a month and a half; it was nearly a pound and a half. Now I filter my water through a bandana, and treat it when my cautious common sense directs me.

6 High visibility titanium tent stakes (1.5 oz.). Stupid people like me pay more for the high-premium, lightweight, low-benefit gear now so that the rest of you can pay less later. It's my duty as a going-to-be-moderately-well-paid engineer to spend money on gear.

New Balance 806 shoes, size 16 (37.1 oz.). I've heard mixed review, and I'm afraid that these shoes will break down before 500 miles, but what else am I going to do; you try shopping for a pair of 16s.

Nike Usurper Slide sandals, size 15 (11 oz). They are as light as my old Teva flip-flops; they don't have the toe-strap so I can wear my socks in them. They fit very uncomfortably and I may have to ditch them.

Smartwool Adrenaline Mini Crew socks, 1 pair (2.0 oz.). Socks from the future.

Photon Micro-Light II, with key ring (0.35 oz.). Flashlights are too heavy. Headlamps are too heavy. I have two LED lights: red and "night vision green"; it worked last time.

Appalachian Trail Data Book, 2004 edition with price-tag (4.3 oz.). If I didn't want to keepsake the book after it's all over, I would tear out and throw away the pages I didn't need, cutting the weight.

Montane Aero windshirt, XL with stuff-sack (3.4 oz.). This windshirt is a luxury item I'm not sure what I'll do with—wear to keep the bugs off, wear to keep the sun off, or wear to keep the cold wind out. In the end, it's a light layer, so it goes into my pack; let's see if it makes it to Katahdin.

that tears it!

I *must* know how many ounces my new tarp is, and how many more my old tent was, and what my new shoes weigh, and how much I'm going to save by exchanging the large toenail clippers for a smaller pair.

Quickly, to Wal-mart!

Not all who wander ...

I'm going to hike the top half of the Appalachian Trail this summer; up until last week I hadn't given it much thought, and was worried that maybe I wouldn't get excited, that maybe my heart is fickle and no longer loves the hiking and the rain and the pain and the whisper of the trees.

There is an intense but simple thrill in setting off in the morning on a mountain trail, knowing that everything you need is on your back. It is a confidence in having left the inessentials behind and of entering a world of natural beauty that has not been violated, where money has no value, and possessions are a dead weight. The person with the fewest possessions is the freest. Thoreau was right.
—Paul Theroux, The Happy Isles of Oceania: Paddling the Pacific, 1992

But now my concerns are: will my shins or my knees give out on me? Do my size 16 New Balance 806s fit? How much more leg strength and aerobic stamina can I get from the Gainesville Health and Fitness center before I leave? Do I have the discipline to stay focused on school and research right now? If I make it, what will I feel and what will I think atop Katahdin?

Long distance hiking is not a vacation, it’s too long for that. It’s not recreation, too much toil and pain involved. It is, we decide, a way of life, a very simplified Spartan way of living ... life on the move ... heavy packs, sweating brow; they make you appreciate warm sunshine, companionship, cool water. The best way to appreciate these things that are precious and important in life it is take them away.
—Cindy Ross, Journey on the Crest, 1997

Over spring break I sat down to research the gear I would need to pick up; my heart has pulled the trail down out of the attics and dusted off the cobwebs. While I decided between a set of Frogg Toggs and the Montane Super-fly, between the Nike Usurper and Waldies, between the Montbell Ultralight Thermawrap and their down inner jacket—while I was making all of these decisions, I fell back into love.

Mostly, two miles an hour is good going.
—Colin Fletcher, The Complete Walker III, 1989

Last time I went for a long hike, I had a moderate amount of know-how, the kind that comes from being an Eagle Scout in a troup that camped once a month, every month, for many years—but really, I had no clue what I was doing. Now I have a grasp of a few of the finer points that 900 miles of consecutive walking teach: don't carry a water filter; you only need one shirt; after you've lightened your pack by sending home everything you thought you would need, planning water stops is the key to keeping your load light; Nalgene bottles are over-rated and over-weighted; don't wear your poncho when it rains, except to avoid hypothermia; food is fuel, and fat is the lightest kind; hot-water showers and cotton sheets are heavenly luxuries; and so on.

Most people are pantywaists. Exercise is good for you.
—Emma ‘Grandma’ Gatewood, at age 67 first woman to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail (1955), 1887—1973

But now—now I know what I'm doing; I'm going out with a silnylon tarp and a Tyvek ground-cloth, a pepsi-can stove and 10 oz. of denatured alcohol, and a fondness for the trail that has is at least five years old, sprung from a natural affection rooted deeper in my adolescence.

Our suicidal poets (Plath, Berryman, Lowell, Jarrell, et al.) spent too much of their lives inside rooms and classrooms when they should have been trudging up mountains, slogging through swamps, rowing down rivers. The indoor life is the next best thing to premature burial.
—Edward Abbey, US environmental advocate, 1927–89

Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.
—Genesis 13:17

I took these quotes from Memorable remarks on trails topics, a compilation.

Xiao4 Ao4 Jiang1 Hu2 Zhi1 Dong1 Fang1 Bu2 Bai4

So I'm the only peson in the house who likes The Legend of the Swordsman. I don't understand these people; they consider both the inane Zoolander and the homoerotic Dude, Where's My Car? hilarious classics. You never can tell.

Beyonce calls it Crazy!

Welcome into this disfroptic opera. The mean end is a dead horse, and language will. Will won't. Who didn't? And then the number two was split five times over.

A spaceship through space: it crashes on a strange new place a little like that other place where the people all dance and let loose the warcries. It's one kind of thing they bring with them, and it's another kind they use to take readings with, but no one expects the new life in this new place to be so alien. Seven and six more were lost; the translatory is a dangerous place; nevermind the view.

How many times? Iit's not the multitudes that count. Re-parse your question.

Smashing Genius

Wigu is brilliant occasionally. Like today.

British Culture 101

Cricket is the ultimate sport: the tactical complexity of chess, combined with the thrill of a very hard ball aimed at 90 miles an hour at your head. Plus tea breaks. [link]

Blah Fortune

You can depend on the trust of the collective.
Lucky Numbers 10, 13, 17, 19, 28, 35

Blah Break

This weekend Dave and Chris--a female Chris--got married in Orlando. I was invited in part to support Dave's older sister's husband. It was a beautiful day for their lakeside wedding. I responded approriately by drinking till I was rip-roaring sloshed. The bridesmaids were scandalized, I do think I engaged one of the fiestier goomsmen in a round or two of fisticuss, and the friends I was embarassing had to carry me out and put up with my antics until I passed out on a couch. Or maybe it was the floor. Or maybe I'm remembering more than happened. In any case, my company put up with me; props for that.

It really was an extraordinary wedding.

Blah Space

So I was mapping out the variance of [blah blah blah] state variables, [blah blah] spiking oscillator, as a function of [blah blah blah] weight parameters, when I discover a new pattern:

The red region in the upper right is expected. The rays radiating outwards are not. They were not even visible in previous experiments, because I was sampling the 2D space very coarsly. Anyhow, It's pretty.

The sudden compulsion to cross one's self

There is commentary over at thinklings.org about the titantic sweeping of the Oscars by ROTK. From their article, I discovered that not only was Jackson behind "Heavenly Creatures"--a rather disturbing little picture wherein two girls beat their mommy out of her mortal coil with a bag of bricks IIRC--but he was also behind... *shudder* ..."Meet the Feebles". There are scenes the forgeture of which I would gladly suffer brain damage to obtain.