From the other Camp

"Are you bringing a gun?"; "What's a McLeod?"

Despite fearful warnings from co-workers and friends, I went camping on my own this weekend at Sequoia National Park. I've done this before and it never seemed weird to me. But, when mentioned to a co-worker who then mentioned it to others it became a snowballing piece of conversation.

I didn't bring my camera camping because I wanted to focus on being present and memory. But my PDA does have one so you'll see a photo taken at the end of my trip right before I left. Yes, that's snow. It was gloriously sunny and reflecting off the white snow at that altitude. The drive down descended into fog and clouds and an overcast day.

This trip brought up the thing I love best about camping in the wilderness and the thing I hate the most as well.

At 1:55AM I heard yelling from nearby campers. I thought it was 5AM and early morning risers getting ready for the day of hiking but when I opened my eyes it was black dark. A dark that squeezes out all the light and seeps into you.

Immediately, I zipped open the screen of my tent and saw the most brilliant and gorgeous stars against the darkest sky ever. I've seen my share of beautiful night skies. Spending time in the UP of Michigan you see the entire span of Milky Way without lights. I've seen the sky from a boat. And even in the desert. But there was something about this sky...the stars looked so close and I could see all of the little pinpoints separately. It was just gorgeous! Of course I got out and walked around looking up and around the trees bumping into things with my glasses on, but it was worth it.

After 3 hours of hiking I come across a sunny part of the trail with long yellow grasses along side the mountain. The trail is narrow and it forces you to lean into the mountain so you don't fall off the cliff face. As I walk I look down to see black dots of various sizes on my pant leg. I look at the other one. There's some there too. Big and little. TICKS!!! I HATE TICKS!!! Wood ticks and the small pinhead ticks that give you Lyme disease. AAAARRRGGGHH!!! As I flick them off, determined that they will not stop me from seeing the waterfall at the end of the trail, I realize that with every sunny patch they will come flying off the grass and it practically ruins my hike. I get to a rocky overlook where you can see the waterfall. There is a small last leg left, but I turn around seeing only grass and ticks below. 3 hours back through more ticks and I walk downhill quickly (and run through the grasses) almost all the way. My knees are killing me, and I'm praying, no pleading with God under my breath to please keep the ticks away as well as any kind of bites or diseases. And, hoping I don't fall off the cliff.

I've survived. And if any ticks have, they're sitting on the floor of my car in the bag of clothes from that hike—waiting to be washed in scalding hot water separate from my other laundry.

Blew apart my Wildest Dreams

I have a new love.


As a child along with turtles and dinosaurs, seahorses fascinated me. But I recently made a trip to the Long Beach Aquarium and discovered a creature that has blown any idea of what is Earthly from my mind. It looks like something out of a movie or belonging to another planet.

I'm talking about Weedy and Leafy Seadragons. I have some actual photos from my visit (see first two below - the last photo is actually a fish...can you see it?) and bought a watercolor of it for my bathroom.

Just looking at it makes me smile, gives me hope, and is a reminder that whatever we think our world may be can easily be blown apart with the mere reminder of the existence of something that most of us (I think) would have never imagined up in our wildest dreams.

Live long and learn

I'm traveling alone and I've run into a local young girl. We can't speak each other's language but somehow find a way to communicate and she shows me her village and around her part of the country when we come across a group of Western tourists, all men, who somehow got surrounded by the young girl's village hunters. They're about to get killed because traveling without a female in your midst means your there for war in this part of the world. I try to tell the villagers they're my friends and step into the group. The weapons are pulled away and the group is safe.

I wake with a start. What's really interesting is the fact that I've been thinking about traveling a lot lately. I would love to travel alone. But a woman alone in the areas I want to travel...not acceptable. The eastern part of Turkey along the border of Iran and Iraq. Parts of Africa. And other parts of the world where traveling as a woman alone is okay, just a little dangerous. So the dream ends up reflecting an opposing view of reality. There are serious considerations that I would have to take if I were to plan some trips. I'll have to wait 'til I get home and have some time to think and figure out what the dream means.

Whenever traveling to a place with a different language--the words: "please," "excuse me," "hello/good day," and "thank you" become an absolute necessity and as I learn them, they're set into memory. My goal is to learn those words in at least 27 languages before I die. So far I know 7. I'd better have a really, really long life, eh?

Heaven on a bun and what we believe

Ohmigosh!!!! I just had heaven on a bun! Pastramiburger greasebucket fries from The Hat and yummmmmmmmmmm. If I were a cat I'd walk around myself twice and plop myself down for a nap. Instead, the human me has to work. *sigh*

On a different note, driving home from Thanksgiving Dinner, a few fun essays were read on NPR's "This I Believe." Each person talked about what they do believe in.

There's a fun one about the Pizza guy. Check it out:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4651531

Bye for now. Happy Thanksgiving and great holidays.

Merrily,
:)

Innocent Childhood and Netflix galore

As a child, I grew up reading books, doing school stuff, playing outside, and watching television. Didn't go out to see movies much, they cost money. Didn't rent movies much...we got a VCR the year of the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles and renting cost money too.

A relatively normal childhood for a child in America or at least I thought it was a normal childhood. Sometimes what we perceive and what others perceive can differ greatly.

I perceive Netflix as an amazing concept. I don't have to leave home, and can rent movies I wouldn't usually pay money to rent but interest me an inkling. Plus, the queue factor...that's all that needs to be said.

I was adding some movies to my list when somehow it came up at work that I'd never seen Citizen Kane, or The Graduate, or Animal House, or Jaws, or The Godfather, or Taxi Driver, or Chinatown, or Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory...and the list goes on & on.

Horrified, my friends and co-workers starting throwing more and more movies to add to my queue. I started wondering-- what on Earth did I spend my youth doing? Where the heck did everyone else find the time to see these movies when I didn't? And, how the heck and I going to find time to watch these movies now?

My friends and co-workers now perceive my youth as anything but normal. They've got me wondering about it too. I remember dirt trails and biking thorough the neighborhoods a lot. I remember daydreaming and looking at tadpoles in the mud. But thanks to my friends, I've also found myself lacking basic knowledge of pop culture in the United States.

So,if there are any must-see films that you think I may have missed(no porn or scary movies please), feel free to comment while I search my memory for what I did with the rest of my childhood...

Between a Rock and a Hive Place

Riding along the 118 freeway and exiting at the Topanga Canyon exit, a series of rocks rises out of nowhere like little teeth, or actually piles of poop in the middle of the desert.

During our group's decision to climb these rock towers, we missed two earthquakes that hit Los Angeles during the day. But nature did attack in other ways...during the last 15 minutes of climbing Scott was attacked by a bee and was stung on his forehead. (He's okay.)

Aside from the photos, we return with souvenirs of sore forearms, scraped hands, arms, heads (we forgot the helmet at home) and one bee sting.

Up next... a bigger pile of poop!

I thought I was a Geek

Well, after over 7 days of staying up until the wee hours of the morning (3-4:30AM) I finally gave up on putting together my wireless network by myself. The Mac works wonderfully. (Yey Mac! "Mac or PC?"entry) No problems with the d-link router. The PC's are the problem. And printing wirelessly is a problem too. *sigh*

I used to think I was technologically minded. That I was a geek. Well, this week I found that my geekdom has found it's limits. D-link customer support couldn't help so I called in the Geek Squad. They're coming on Wednesday. How wimpy is that? That I'm such a failure as a geek that I had to call in a substitute?

*sniff*

I think I'll go shuffle over to my pile of database and work with it while I play Wei-qi/Go on my second monitor.

*sniff*

And maybe I'll put on my big framed glasses so my blind self can see what I'm doing and wipe my nose with a sleeve that's not there.

*sniff*

Or maybe I should call my friend who's been bugging me to join her die casting gaming group and join in...

...hmmm maybe I'm not a geek. Maybe I'm just a nerd.