New Years Resolutions

With the year coming to a close come the countless New Years resolutions proclaimed between gulps of champagne and mumbled renditions of "Auld Lang Syne" echoing through dives, clubs, and sports bars the world over. More often than not I hear the announcement of, "Ugh... I'm never drinking again..." the morning after, but other resolutions come to mind, like getting in better shape, saving money, reading more books, and so on, with varying outcomes for the lot of them. This past year marked the first that I actually followed through with a resolution, being "have more adventures and not waste so many weekends complaining about having nothing to do" which lead to me doing a lot, including taking up running.

I really need to run more. Thanksgiving started the holidays, and with the holidays came food comas, cold weather, a lot of time spent in the car, and even more time spent indoors. While the Yuletide feasting has been great and snuggling up under electric blankets has been cozy, it hasn't been conducive to being active and not being a lazy ass. The weather outside is frightful, yes, and the fire is delightful, sure, but my running shoes have been collecting dust for weeks now and I want to get back at it. Working up the moxie to get out of the house when it's below freezing and windy is hard, and it hurts a lot when I start heavily breathing in the cold air. I need to suck it up, though, because there are a few races I want to do in 2015 that won't be easy to do if I continue on my path of doughiness.

I don't want to jinx it or anything, but I think running more races is going to be my resolution. I like having adventures every weekend, so I want to keep up that resolution from this past year and tack on more miles of hiking, running, and stumbling from exhaustion after hiking and running in the next. There are a lot of trails I haven't hiked yet, and a lot of places I haven't run around in yet either, so I have incentive to keep on the sweaty, painful track that I picked up (again) earlier this year.

"Continue doing stuff on the weekends" and "run more than usual" are pretty open-ended goals, I know, but the vague goal of "do stuff" helped me have a stellar year without so many wasted weekends. "Run more" might yield some good results too.

Have a safe New Years Eve and a happy 2015! Stay warm and don't drive drunk!

Quick Update 12/24/14

Happy Christmas Eve! This won't be much of a post, but I wanted to give a few quick updates as to what's been on in my world for the last couple weeks in the form of bullet points:

• Construction at the front desk in the hotel I'm employed through
• My 26th birthday
• The passing and funeral for my grandfather (which was hard but I might write about it later)
• LOTS of work
• LOTS of driving in poor weather
• The introduction of FitBit into my life (I'm lazy) (Also thank you, Stephanie)
• Bills!
• Shopping!
• Budgeting!
• A couple movies (The Hobbit was okay, The Pyramid was hilariously bad)

Along with plenty of other things, it's been a pretty busy time for me. I've been with my girlfriend and my family when I'm not working, but I'll sit down and write something interesting to read soon (probably next week with a NYE theme, like "New Year New Me" or some shit)

I hope everyone has been enjoying the season, and whoever celebrates Christmas has a holly jolly one!

Celebrating Fruitcake

The holiday season can be really stressful. Hemorrhaging bank accounts and stressed credit limits pave the way for mountains of gifts and decorations under the tree and decking the halls, holiday traffic and lines at the airport eat away at the precious few moments of the lives of millions, and holiday cheer in the form of eggnog and cookies and Christmas dinner add on to the pounds and high blood pressure initiated at Thanksgiving. Spring cleaning exists because the shock to the system the holiday season brings creates a kind of holly jolly coma to cope with the struggles of December I think. There has to be a moment of reprieve from the madness. There needs to be a moment-- if only a night-- that can aid in unwinding from the holiday horrors and remind us that this time of year can be a good thing.

Ladies and gentlemen, Independence, California, has your answer; The 10th Annual Independence Fruitcake Festival.

No, seriously, keep reading. Trust me.

I won't be able to attend this year since I'll be out of town, but that doesn't mean you have to miss out on the fun! I've written about it before in my critically acclaimed (though inconsistently updated) blog, and I will forever sing its liquor-soaked candied praises. It's exactly what you'd expect; a kooky collection of fruitcake and eggnog, singing and dancing, costumes and contests, and fabulous prizes, held at the American Legion Hall in Independence, California. The Inyo County Superior Court judges preside over the fruitcake contest, judging the best of the best from the ancient loaves and the best costumes out of the crowd. This years "Saturday Night Fruitcake Fever" theme should bring about even more dancing and even wackier costumes, and I don't know who in their right mind would want to miss out on a spectacle like that.

Why do I speak so highly of this event after being skeptical about it in the past? It's fun. It's a distraction from the headaches of gift wrapping and the "is she/he going to like this? Is it the right size?" thoughts that nag people into submission. It's a celebration of the simpler aspects of the holiday, taking something usually shunned and shied away from and making a party around it. You don't have to like fruitcake or eggnog to appreciate community and laughter from a good time, but you can get all of those things on December 13th.

If you happen to find yourself around Independence on Saturday and feel like cutting loose or cutting a rug on the dance floor you should consider checking out the scene at the Fruitcake Festival. It's fun and festive time worth checking out at least once. Once you do, I think you'll be open to trying it once again.

Since I can't go this year, someone drink some nog for me and have a good time.

My Morning, December 3, 2014

One downside to living in a remote area is the lack of nearby goods and services; the closest movie theater is an hour away, closest Walmart is 80 miles south, and the closest shopping mall is roughly 140 miles out. The same case goes for other things, like an animal shelter, DMV, the list goes on and on, and I was reminded of this distance from everything when I got a reminder that I had a dentist appointment an hour's drive away today. Since it had rained I thought there might be ice on the road-- and I knew it'd be hard to get out of bed since it would be chilly in my apartment and I'd be tired from getting off work late-- so I wasn't really looking forward to the drive. I woke up in my cold bedroom, started the coffee in the kitchen, and enjoyed the quiet of the morning like I occasionally (a.k.a. rarely) do before brushing my teeth and heading out the door.

One upside to living in the Owens Valley, though, is the views. The clouds hovered dark and low across the valley like a gray lid. The smell of wet sagebrush and autumn leaves hung in the air, kept fresh and condensed by the cool of the early morning. Blues and purples broke up the monochrome horizon. As the drive went on the clouds drifted lower, wispy offshoots detaching and meandering like errant cotton balls in the breeze while the big pillows overhead flowed along. The Inyo Mountains in the distance looked azure and floating above the clouds, and the Sierras to the west were shrouded in the grayness blanketing everything above me. Driving in the cool morning, smelling the familiar fall smell in the air, all of that made the drive so much more worthwhile.

The clouds broke to reveal the freshly snow-capped mountains on the return trip. Puddles of water glistened in the washes near the roadside, and the breaking clouds uncovered miles and miles of blue overhead. The valley transitioned into December seamlessly and unexpectedly, and I took a minute to stand outside my apartment to feel the sun and cool breeze on my face when I got back home. On top of finishing errands and getting a clean bill of oral health (hella rad), the weather was gorgeous, and I got to experience it for a little bit.

Today was pretty. I hope more wet weather comes our way, and I hope to experience more pretty moments more often.

Internet: Something Rad I'm Thankful For

It's that time of year again in the US when we gear up for turkey, football, day drinking, and awkward and occasionally painful conversations with family over dinner. Thanksgiving is an American holiday generally associated with food comas and mentally preparing for Black Friday shopping/trampling/brawling, but having to work and being nowhere near large outlet stores means I'm pretty much excluded from those festivities. What I do get to be a part of, though, is the mysterious and often forgotten part of the Thanksgiving holiday: thanks-giving.

I do my best to be thankful and grateful for every opportunity I've been given, all the things I have, and the friends and family in my life, but the fourth Thursday in November is as good a time as any to make my appreciation known. I could go on with a huge laundry list of things I'm thankful for (which I thought to do earlier because I'm lazy as well as thankful) but I thought to focus on at least one thing to talk about. Narrowing down the long list of wonderful stuff to one thing is hard, since beer, sanitation, Patrick Warburton, modern medicine, and national parks exist, but thinking about the remoteness of my home and the upcoming gift-giving holiday season, one thing stood out among the rest.

That thing, of course, is the thing you're using right now to read this; the internet.

Being in the middle of nowhere means a couple things; seeing my friends and family in far-off places is difficult, and not being near malls or stores means Christmas shopping can be hard and limited. Thanks to the internet I can catch up with people via social networks and have most of my gift shopping done at the comfort of my own home. I get to learn things via YouTube (see: TED, Vsauce) and waste my time watching stupid crap... via YouTube. I get my news online along with my bank statements, and I can pay my bills without going to the post office or writing a check. I can talk to my girlfriend with FaceTime, wish my friends in Toronto and elsewhere a happy birthday, and be updated with what my family is up to no matter where they might be. The internet is rad. Thanks, Al Gore.

There are a lot of things to be thankful for, and the information superhighway is just one of them. It's a luxury we're afforded. It's something not a lot of people have, like enough to eat, clean water, and safe haven. Help people when you can (the internet has countless sites that can tell you what you can do) and be thankful for what you have.

Also, be thankful for cat videos. They're great.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Beer in the Eastern Sierra

I spent part of my Saturday rolling up Highway 395, through the towering pines and along the jagged crags of the Eastern Sierras, on the way to June Lake. It's a quiet mountain town with plenty of hiking during the warmer months and skiing during the colder ones, but the trip wasn't for outdoor adventures. I'd been meaning to check out the new brewery-- June Lake Brewing-- since it had opened, but for one reason or another I hadn't made my way up that far north. Last weekend, though, my girlfriend came to visit, so a beer date and mini road trip through the woods materialized.

The outdoors and beer oftentimes go hand in hand.  My skiing and snowboarding friends like an après-ski brew. Beers after a good hike (or during, whatever) usually come up. The climbers I know usually end up drinking an IPA after playing around on the rocks, and camping tends to involve a libation or two around the fire. Maybe the outdoors pair well with beer, like a good steak and a red wine. Maybe craft beers, with their attention to detail and flavor, help people stop and appreciate the little beautiful things in the grand scene of nature.

I like beer and being outside, so that's why I do it.

At the brewery

Whatever the reason they mix may be, it works in places like the Eastern Sierra. Places like June Lake and Mammoth Lakes, with year round outdoor activities from hiking and climbing to snow sports, definitely benefit with a brewery. One of my personal favorites, Mammoth Brewing Company, has been in operation for nearly 20 years, and in that 20 years they have found themselves beyond their town of origin and onto shelves in stores around the state (they have their beers in select locations in L.A., Orange County, and parts of San Diego for a limited time, go out and find 'em!). Even though its reach is growing, their beers still have a taste that's indicative of the Sierras; bold, loaded with flavor, and definitely unique. The beers Stephanie and I tried at June Lake Brewing represented that independent Sierra flavor too, being creative and expressive while still being extremely palatable.

Stephanie and I got a growler of their "8140 Black IPA" since she likes porters, I like IPAs, and it's a pleasant combination of both, so that was rad.

It, and the other beers we sampled, were definitely worth the trip. It would be nice if there were closer options for craft beers on the south side of the east side of the Sierras, which is why I'm stoked that the brewing trend is moving further down. Over the last year or so, construction and preparation of Mountain Rambler Brewery in Bishop has been underway. They just started opening full time late last week, and their kitchen is getting pretty good reviews, but at the time I paid it a visit they only had "guest beers". Nevertheless, I expect pretty good things to come from them, and hopefully soon. The anticipation for new beer is almost too much for my little heart to take. After all, local is better.

The small but impressive collection of breweries forming on this side of the state is exciting to me. It's not just because I'm a beer fan, but because they produce things that are fun to explore. New breweries perfect their art to make something creative. Some have a bite while others go down smoothly, but they're all their own adventure. The mountains and deserts of the Eastern Sierra are kind of the same way; different flavors, different reactions, all beautiful and unique in their own way, and all fun to explore. Maybe that's why beer and the outdoors works so well together; both are an adventure for the senses, with sights and scents and flavors that vary wherever you go but remain interesting as you continue to delve into them.

I mean, I'm still sticking with "I like beer and being outside" but the adventure thing might work too.

Try a local beer next time you're in Inyo or Mono counties. You won't be disappointed.

Spicy Stuff

Believe it or not, I used to be whiter than I am today.

My brother (left) and myself, in the dopest Cub Scout swag

My complexion was a cross between skim milk and fresh fallen snow. Classic rock and country music were what I listened to exclusively (mostly because I was never really exposed to anything else). The town I was raised in was like if a Norman Rockwell painting and an Ansel Adams photograph built a village off their artwork. Basically, I was a living stereotype of middle-class whiteness as a young man.

I mean, I'm still a pretty generic white guy, but a few things have changed, like my skin being pinker and my ability to eat spicier foods actually existing.

Growing up, I didn't care for anything with a kick. If I ate Mexican food everything would have to be mild, and even then it was more than hot enough for me. Hell, I couldn't really even handle too much pepper on food because of the spice to it, which shows how big a pansy ass I was. For many, many years I lived my life in relative blandness. Sure, I ate sweet things, and sure I ate savory things, but peppers never played a part on my pallet.

I don't know when I grew out of my aversion to spicy stuff, but it probably started around the time I was in college and eating rice and Top Ramen almost exclusively. I experimented with ways to get rice to be less boring, and ways to get Top Ramen to taste less like Top Ramen, so I incorporated vegetables, canned meats, peanut butter (it was... interesting), and finally the realm of Tapatio and Tabasco. Sweating out the first few moments of Tuna-Tabasco-Top-Ramen Surprise, I realized hot sauce was pretty tasty; the kind-of sweet vinegary taste crossed with the heat of the stuff distracted me from the fact that I was eating a 60 cent on-sale food amalgamation abomination. From then on, I'd add a little hot sauce to other things I'd eat to add to the flavor instead of masking it, and things continued to turn out awesome.

Heaven in a bottle

Then the day came that I met Sriracha. I hadn't had the chance to try that beautiful red sauce praised and doted on by everyone when it first became popular, but when I finally did I learned what The Oatmeal was talking about. It's now found its way into almost every meal I eat in a day, in everything I cook, and with me wherever I go just in case I run into a food item that needs more flavor.

As far as flavor goes, though, I learned the joy of spiciness while in Santa Barbara. The Brewhouse has a habanero pilsner, but I think they were experimenting with another capsaicin-packed beer when I was there. The waitress warned me it was "screaming hot" but curiosity got the better of me, so I ordered it. It was a dark looking beast of a stout, in a 4-ounce glass without much of a head to it. I took a sip. Initially it wasn't too bad; slight chili sweetness, stout bitterness... then the burn came. It was like napalm coating my stomach. The cold feeling of beer crossed with the scorching sensation of whatever unholy pepper they made the stuff with was intense enough for me not to be able to finish it-- but it was pretty tasty regardless. Just... painful.

It's not to say I go out of my way for spicy foods, but I will say I've broadened my horizons with stuff I'm willing to eat (and drink, apparently). Some foods seem gross (see: pickled tongue, tripe) and some are potentially painful (see: whatever the hell I drank at The Brewhouse), but even if they are gross or painful they're food, and food is inherently awesome. It's worthwhile to try new things and acquire a taste for certain flavors, because there's a chance you could miss out on rad eats if you don't.

In short: Don't be bland. Try something tasty.

A Brief Summary of My Adventures in 2014

It's a little early for a recap of the year, seeing as it's only early November, but after being on a ship for four days and only getting back a couple days ago I figure it's as good a time as any to talk about the adventures I had this year.

When the year started I made a resolution to myself that I had no intention of really keeping. I felt my weekends were being wasted sitting around and thinking about how boring life was, mostly because I couldn't find the wherewithal within myself to get off my ass and do much more than eat McDonald's and feel sorry for myself most of last year. I told myself I'd do my best to have some sort of adventure as many weekends as I possibly could in 2014, because spending so many days staring at the mountains while at work and never taking a day to explore them should be a sin. The ball got rolling from then on.

Hiking around Panamint Springs

Within the first month and a half of the year I went hiking around places in the Alabama Hills I'd never explored before, camped in Death Valley (well, Panamint Springs, pretty much the same damn thing) and hiked to Darwin Falls for the first time, and took a few trips to the Antelope Valley in a Jeep Cherokee that would end up bursting a fuel line and eventually completely dying. Old Red biting the bullet meant going on an adventure in the world of grown-up stuff, like loans and financing and spending large sums of money, which is how I ended up with my Nissan Versa. My dad had told me having a reliable car would open up a lot more options of places to go, and I figured I wouldn't go much further than Lancaster or Mammoth, maybe Bakersfield or whatever. But then summertime came.

During the spring and summer, between hiking around the Sierras and taking up running again and participating in my first race in about 15 years, I went to Crowley Lake for Independence Day fireworks, then down to San Diego for a friends birthday and Ventura to show off my pasty white torso on the beach. To see the Pacific Ocean twice within the span of a few weeks after not seeing the ocean for a few years was mind-blowing, and to do things I don't normally do, like go out of town for the 4th of July or getting gussied up for a night on the town (or being shirtless in public like I was in Ventura) was a fantastic way to escape my comfort zone. After summer came to a close and things started getting more serious with my significant other (also a wonderful venture out of my comfort zone) the fun stuff kept coming.

I participated in The Color Run in Ventura last month, and it being the first time I'd ever been a part of a race with that many people. Like, hundreds of people flooded the streets with a colorful cloud of dust hanging overhead. Working off of no sleep, hours of sitting in a car, and a little coffee sent me off to run a few miles while getting hit with colored chalk. By the end of it I was a rainbow mess of sweat, exhaustion, and happiness. Washing up after the fact was a sight to behold: rinsing out my hair looked like liquid Smurf, and I was blowing Technicolor crap out of my nose for a couple days.

Then, of course, came last weekend.

Leaving Los Angeles

We left the Port of Los Angeles Thursday morning. During that time my girlfriend and I went brewery hopping in Santa Barbara, enjoyed three course meals every night, had in-room caviar, got an exclusive tour of the bridge, received a full body massage, and experienced the sights and sounds of Ensanada (though, we only really ate Mexican food after getting back from Mexico, go figure). We got back to LA on Monday, took a hard nap after waking up early, then I drove back home to be at work the next day.

Compared to last year, my mood's improved, I have more energy, and I'm in a lot better shape, not necessarily because I'm travelling all over the place but because I'm actually doing stuff, and doing stuff fairly regularly. Being lazy is awesome, and I'm a fan of laying around the house with a liter of Mountain Dew, a bag of Doritos, half a dozen Hot Pockets, and a lame horror movie, but actually keeping my body and brain stimulated and doing something with my free time has done me a lot of good. Life's too short to complain about having nothing to do, and I intend to keep doing stuff for the rest of this year and for as long as I can afterward

Long story short, this year has been rad. I look forward to more adventures.

The Legend of Great Bear Warrior

Halloween is a couple days away, and it goes without saying that I'm stoked about it. It's not like some holidays; Christmas has presents, Easter has ham, and Independence Day has horrible sunburns and fireworks, but none of those days have the spookiness factor like Halloween does. I like scary stories, horror movies, and all things autumnal in general, so the days leading up to the end of October get me hyped on candy corn and spooky tales of the occult and supernatural. When I think of scary stories, and especially ones I had a hand in, I think back to my time in high school.

Not specifically as scary as Miguel in a Mountain Dew box, but that happened too.

I had a classmate that was a little gullible, so one day I made up a story about a Native American warrior whose ghost still haunts the land and kills any white person he sees. The story has been polished over the years, and it goes like this:

Many years ago, before the white man came to this land, there was a warrior named Great Bear. He protected his tribe from all threats and dangers, and he was held in high regard by all that knew of him. One day, though, settlers came with their guns and took the land from Great Bear's tribe. His people were murdered, and the land they once hunted on and lived in was made into cattle ranges and town steads for the whites. 

This angered Great Bear greatly, and he sought to reclaim what rightfully belonged to his people. He sneaked into the US Calvary base, established to protect against tribal incursion, under the light of the moon, and he scalped five me in their sleep-- just like they did to his people. The other cavalrymen caught him in the act, and they began to fire upon him. Great Bear, in defense, hacked through another three men until he finally bled out from many bullet wounds and perished. Superstitious because of his reputation, the cavalrymen buried Great Bear under a tall tree in hopes that he would not rise again for revenge.  

Great Bear's soul cried to the spirits of the mountain, and the mountains heard his call. He wished vengeance against the ones who harmed the land and his people, and his anger and bloodlust morphed his furious and tortured soul into the beast of his namesake. To this day, on moonlit nights in the Owens Valley near the tall tree, his soul, half man and half bear, wanders the land in search of white men to prey upon and mercilessly slaughter for the sake of his people.

My classmate wasn't sure if I had made it up or not, so I played along and told him it was all true for most of that day until I cracked and admitted it was all bullshit. I wanted to keep the joke going, though, so I made a webpage on a free web building site with "real historical accounts" of the Owens Valley. I'd made a few pages with some boring factoids that people know about the area, but then threw in a page about "The Legend of Great Bear Warrior" that nearly mirrored the story I'd made up. I thought there would be no way anyone could be gullible enough to fall for a free-build website saying that a story I admitted making up was actually true, but sometimes life has a sense of humor.

I pretended to stumble upon the website one day at school, and my classmate asked what was up when he saw my surprise. I told him the story was online and it must be true (because you're not allowed to lie on the internet, of course), and he freaked out. He lived in Fort Independence, where the cavalry outpost was and Paiute reservation is now, so he was really skittish walking around in the middle of the night for a couple weeks. Every movement in the brush became something more sinister than just a rabbit, and every tree had a Native American warrior werebear ghost underneath it.

Pictured: something probably RIGHT BEHIND YOU RIGHT NOW 

He figured out that the website was farce after awhile, and he called me out for being a nerd with too much time on my hands to go so far as to make a website for a joke. I mean, he was right, but living in Independence, California, allowed for a lot of free time. 

So if you find yourself in the area this Halloween, with a bright quarter moon shining through the bare trees swaying in the wind, just remember there's probably nothing to fear maybe and that there might not be a bloodthirsty angry spirit wanting to rip your face off.

Happy Halloween! 

Junk Sales

I checked out a little rummage sale after The Color Run in Ventura Saturday afternoon. All manner of junk was laid out on display, from tacky 1990s ties (I did like the high-tech computer themed one with the boxy mouse and 3 1/2 floppy disk patterns) to legitimate antique snowshoes and cameras. I'd passed an old clothes iron-- nothing too fancy, just an thin metal iron with a cloth wrapped electrical cord-- and I excitedly pointed it out to my girlfriend, who laughed at me for being a lame nerd. I explained that it was the right size for the storage space of my in-wall ironing board cabinet, and it fit the time period the apartment I live in was built, but after realizing it'd be a dumb investment (I have an iron, and also the wiring looked less than fire safe) I passed it up to flip out over other antiques and junk I wouldn't buy either for their price or lack of practicality.

Some of my favorite things as a kid were yard sales. Big rummage sales, garage sales, any form of temporary crap-laid-out-so-I-don't-have-to-pay-a-dump-fee setup was something I looked out for. The rush that came with finding cool crap I didn't need that I could buy for a buck was fantastic. Sifting through a veritable time capsule of tacky shirts, useless "As Seen On TV" appliances, dusty knickknacks, and unidentifiable parts of things that might have been useful at some point, was almost like an archaeological dig. After spending $10 on a menagerie of odds and ends, the feeling of satisfaction that came with having a bigger trove of useless shit made my whole day. When my family would have yard sales, a fair chunk of what I'd amassed would go, and the perpetual cycle of yard sale stuff continued.

Like I've mentioned before, my apartment is a testament of my polished ability to collect yard sale crap and thrift store goodies. Some things end up being really cool antiques. Other things end up being placeholders for things I can't afford right away. Most of the stuff just looks kind of neat or ends up being kind of useful, but whatever the case for having a bunch of yard sale and thrift store crap may be, my place is decked out with the stuff. Is it environmentally sensible reusing and repurposing secondhand stuff? Sure, I guess. Is it trendy and cool? I don't know, actually. Is it cheap as hell? You betcha. That's why I still like rummage sales.

Before leaving the sale in Ventura, I spent a couple bucks on a Clinton administration pin for my girlfriend and a classic Mammoth Mountain pin for myself. Useless, sure, but neat, so I feel like it's worth it. After getting home and as the week progressed, my dad informed me that the Independence Lion's Club White Elephant Sale* is this weekend and they needed me to help set up. That means I get first pick on the coolest junk they've collected and kept in storage for the last year or so, and even though I don't think I'll find anything worth anything it'll still be fun to see what stuff there is to be had. Being around old junk is neat to me, so I look forward to it.


(*If you're in the Independence, California area this Saturday around 9AM, be sure to check out the Independence Lion's Club White Elephant Sale at the Chevron station in the middle of town for awesome deals on furniture, clothes, toys, and more. Proceeds go toward the community so it'd be cool of you to take a peek if you're in town.)

Autumn

I haven't updated my blog in awhile (if you were expecting a Wednesday post for awhile and haven't had one for the last few weeks, I'm sorry!), mostly because I've been busy with a few things; attending to various chores, getting things budgeted and sorted out for a trip at the end of the month, and-- most of all-- work. Since after Labor Day, the hotel has been buzzing and filled to capacity with retirees and various tourists from everywhere on the map, so by the end of the day my drive to sit at a keyboard and to use my brain for creative means comes to a screeching halt. Mornings I spend attending to chores, evenings I'm rushing around at work, and I relent to vegging out when it's all said and done.

Although, with autumn in full swing and the big town-wide film festival over, I've started to change my tune a little. I was standing outside Saturday night, sipping a beer and staring at the sky. From my patio I could see the moon rising over the Inyo Mountains, illuminating the inky night sky and drowning out the smattering of stars with its gray light. The breeze rustled the leaves on the trees and the ones already shed, sending fluttering shadows to the ground. A slight chill hung in the air. The crunch of yellow leaves underfoot crinkled out as a nearby tree released them onto my little space. The sound of music echoed through town from the festival, but I didn't want to celebrate with anyone; all I wanted was a quiet moment to stare at the moon, and I got that.

I woke up before the sunrise the next morning. I groggily made coffee, grabbed my old Columbia fleece, and sat out on the patio again to greet the chilly morning. The sun drowned the eastern mountains in gold light. The yellowing leaves still hanging on to any semblance or delusion of summer hung on for dear life in the wind. The day grew warm and the wind died down, but all around were hints of the season; the leaves collecting along the fence line by my apartment, the sunset coming sooner, the nights getting colder, and the nights a little quieter. After the deluge of traffic and the heat of another dry summer, the clues that the colder season is actually making an appearance made me feel a little warmer inside.

It's not the notion that work is about to slow down that has me a little more inspired... well, not entirely, anyway. Seeing the shift in the season has me more excited than workplace hibernation. Crossing things off my to-do list is satisfying, sure, but sometimes I miss out on quiet mornings and evenings staring at the horizon by being caught up in the proverbial rat-race. Taking a quick breather to stare at the sky really helps me appreciate being alive, and I guess in turn helps me gain a little more focus in hammering in a quick entry into this blog every so often.

Long story short: life can get really busy sometimes, and sometimes you feel like you might be falling behind-- and you might be-- but taking a minute to collect your thoughts and orient yourself can do a world of good for the things you have to do and the things you want to do.

Also, autumn is rad.

I really like autumn.

Campin'

Camping is something I grew up doing and have continued to love into adulthood. Finding a decent spot to set up camp, sitting around a fire with friends and family, waking up to the smell of early morning with the sunrise fluttering through the trees and the mesh windows of a tent, smelling like campfire, being sweaty and dirty, it's the kind of hobby that was easy enough to continue doing living in the east side of the Sierra Nevadas and along the Inyo Mountains. Whether it's backpacking deep into the mountains disconnected from the modern world or schlepping stuff out of the truck of the car after getting the WiFi password from the campground host, I take a lot of enjoyment away from sleeping in the dirt. Something about being a little more exposed than usual is cool to me. Getting to wake up outside is refreshing-- whether it's communing with nature or rediscovering how awesome having a real bed is-- and I wanted to share that with my girlfriend.

She told me she'd never gone camping before, aside from childhood expeditions in the back yard or spots on the beach within walking distance of stores, and it nearly broke my heart. I spent a lot of summers hiking and camping with my dad as a kid, and by the time I became an adult I made it a point to camp at least once a year. I was, and still am, very privileged to have had-- and still have-- a back yard that's federally protected wilderness, so awhile back I agreed to take her camping. She got a free weekend and came up to see me, and even though the weather report called for rain the chances were slim; 20% here isn't usually likely to produce anything other than maybe cool looking clouds, so we excitedly waited for Saturday.

I got my car camping gear sorted through and situated. A K-Mart quality tent and stove I've had for years, an old cooking set, a hand-me-down sleeping bag, and a bunch of other necessities made their way into the trunk of the car, and after a quick stop at the store for Doritos, hot dog buns, and other fireside munchies, we headed north.

The clouds swirled along the peaks of the mountains. The sky beyond them was gray, the darkness from beyond them skirting the white clouds and blue skies above the valley floor. The breeze was gently sweeping through the desert and making the sagebrush and errant tree sway lazily along the roadside. Light cut through the clouds in the Sierra canyons in golden beams. Jackrabbits hopped across the road as we made our way west into Gray's Meadow, in the foothills below Independence Peak in the Kearsarge Pass area.

We found ourselves a little wooded campsite and began to set up for the night. After the tent was up, the food put away, stove ready to go, and everything else in its place, we settled in. The clouds were drifting along overhead. The sunset brought bright oranges and soft pinks among the deep blues and grays, and the cool of evening crept in as the colors faded into the evening. I made a fire, starting it with some napkins and some (surprisingly effective and obviously delicious) Doritos, and I began making up scary stories while being laughed at. It was dark, but it was still early, so we looked forward to burning up the rest of the firewood and taking in the evening before going calling it a night.

Nothing could possibly go wrong.

Then the rain started.

Lightning was flashing off to the south once it'd gotten dark, but it was far enough away that it served as little more than something cool to look at. After awhile, though, a raindrop hit my hand, and after that a slight drizzling of rain started to come down. That would have been fine too except the lightning and thunder started to get closer, and as time went on the rain started getting heavier. In my infinite wisdom I'd forgotten to consider packing rain gear aside from the rain fly for the tent. As the lightning and thunder got closer, the rain got heavier, the wind picked up, and we got thoroughly drenched, we finally relented to the weather and broke camp in the dark.

As we drove back home, watching the storm surround the valley floor and lightning cracking through the clouds and to the ground, I felt a little bummed that I couldn't show the normal camping experience with someone who'd never experienced it. After we got home, dried off, and had a few rounds of Cruisi'n World for the N64 (which, for the record, I dominated), I was glad to have the experience of being rained out. It was something I hadn't really experienced in awhile, and it gives me an excuse to go camping again with her soon. It served as a reminder that things can be a lot of fun even if they don't go as planned, and how quickly the weather can turn sour.

I can't wait to go again.

Surprise Rush

Typically work slows down for me after Labor Day. School gets back in session, the weather starts to cool off, the John Muir Trail hikers and the Mt. Whitney climbers starts to peter out, and tourists leave behind a lull that sticks around for awhile until the annual film festival in town. Once those crowds leave, the town goes into its hibernation and waits for spring to bring the tourists back to the neighborhood. I don't mind it too much; after months of scrambling around it's kind of nice to take a little more leisurely pace with activity at the desk.

This year, though, September has managed to be even busier than the last few months. I don't know why that's the case, but it reminds me of how fun and hectic things were when I started working at the hotel. That little spark of accomplishment when I get to hit switch that turns on the "NO VACANCY" after wondering how to sell the last room, the pearls of wisdom old folks impart on me whether I want them to or not, the sweet relief of resting my aching legs after standing, walking up stairs, and trotting around the property all day, it all has decided to get fun and interesting (and occasionally infuriating and irritating) late in the game this year.

On top of a few packed weekends for weddings, photo workshops, tour groups, and film productions, run-of-the-mill tourists catching the heat in Death Valley and the not-on-fire parts of Yosemite are still coming in. It probably won't slow down until the end of October if the weather keeps doing its thing. Even though I look forward to things slowing down, it's kind of nice to keep busy since the more business town gets the better it is for everyone when it finally slows down.

Working in a tourist economy is a sporadic thing. Some years are flooded with hikers, fishermen, and people passing through, soaking in the gorgeous days at the base of the Sierras and seeing what there is to see. Others are spotty: crappy windy or rainy weather, irritable tourists, everything too expensive to afford a stop. Combinations of those factors can elongate a busy season or shorten it, but it's always a crap shoot how financially stable I'll be during the winter. With this surprise rush of business I get the feeling it should be easy to make it through winter easily enough.

So, until the typical fanny-pack-wearing looky-loos thin out and the thru-hikers retreat from the Sierras to the great indoors away from here, I'll enjoy the excitement that comes with keeping busy at work.

Lawn Clippings

Like I wrote about a couple weeks ago, I didn't get a lot of junk food when I was a kid. Every now and again I'd get to eat at McDonald's when I'd go out of town for shopping with my mom, awesome greasy pizza when visiting the grandparents, and hot dogs and other crap for various other occasions. The phrase "You Are What You Eat" comes to mind, and I think my mom kind of got the hint while my siblings and I were growing up. Whole grains, lean protein, fad health foods out the wazoo, a whole lot of it came to the dinner table as a kid (including these pale, bland turkey hot dogs... we've never really gotten over those...), and as I've come into adulthood I've grown to appreciate the healthy crap I was fed.

Lately I've jumped on the bandwagon for kale. It's packed to bursting with vitamins A, C, and K, a pretty decent source of potassium, a good source of omega-3 acids that are good for the brain, and toted as a hipster superfood and the greatest thing to grow out of the earth in the history of everything. It's a relatively sustainable and versatile crop with a long growing season and resistant to pests and drought (there's a whole article on it here if you don't want to take my word for it), so overall it's a pretty great vegetable for a number of different reasons.

Personally, I like the taste and texture. That's why I eat it.

I was chopping up some kale and some red leaf lettuce earlier today, and threw the greens into a zipper bag with some spinach. I mixed up the leafy concoction and decided to grab some of its contents to throw on a sandwich for lunch. I was putting my lunch fixings away and, for whatever reason, decided to take a whiff of the contents of my super-wonderful salad mix.

It was kind of like a fresh cut lawn. Like I took a grass edger and tidied up around a wet sidewalk. It was reminiscent of when I used to mow lawns as a kid, and it was kind of funny that my "rabbit food" smelled exactly like what the jackrabbits munch around my dad's yard. Sure, leafy greens are just glorified lawn clippings that are socially acceptable to eat, but it makes sense why some folks won't eat salads without dressings.

Like I said, though, I like the way it tastes and its texture. Leafy greens are pretty great.

Waking Up Early (at Home)

The faint blue glow of daybreak crept through my bedroom window. Soft shadows commingled with the dim illumination from outside, and the whole apartment was filled with the first evidence of day. The rooster at the house across the street hadn't started to crow yet. My neighbors in the apartment complex had left for work an hour beforehand. I stood in the front room, adjusting to the early morning quiet and the dimness of dawn before making my way to the kitchen to start the much-needed coffee.

Waking up late is a side effect of working late. After years of clocking out after 11 PM and trying to unwind after busy nights I've found myself tucking myself into bed well after 2 or 3 AM, then waking up usually seven to eight hours later, so watching the sunrise and soaking in the pace and quiet that comes with the morning is a rare treat for me, and usually I'm too tired to really appreciate any of it. Sleep usually burns my eyes, as if the sandman was a cop at a student protest in 2011, and the sense of longing for my bed is almost heartbreaking, but yesterday was different. I was just... awake.

I sat in the front room with my cup of coffee while the sun started to hit the Sierras outside my window. The pale blue sky and gray-purple granite were painted on the horizon, and the cloudless weather made the view seem more imaginary. The light through the slats of my window blinds went from blue to gold, and the world around my apartment started to wake up. The stupid rooster across the street started with his obnoxious crowing, cars headed to the high school rolled by, the delinquents finished their cigarettes in the alley by my apartment, and I was dressed and ready to face the day ahead of me.

Sometimes I wonder why I don't wake up early more often, but then I remember how rare moments I'm actually awake early are. I like my bed a whole lot, but I also like peaceful mornings and the coolness of the early part of the day. Then again, I also like being awake until the end of my shift, so my early mornings tend to remain uncommon.

They're nice when they come around, though.

Trains

When I lived in the city of Lancaster I rode the Metrolink trains a lot. The girl I was seeing at the time lived in Buena Park, and the car I had at the time wasn't cut out for road trips (or going anywhere since it didn't really run), so on weekends I'd spend gold dollars at ticket machines, ride the Antlope Valley Line to Los Angeles Union Station, then get on the 99 Line and get off at the stop in Buena Park, then walk the five or six blocks to her place. I didn't mind the interchange from train to train, nor did I really mind the sketchy solo hike through city streets at all, nor the amount of time I spent waiting and slowly moving along. Watching the view from the window go from high desert to trees to urban sprawl was fascinating. Wasting time at Olivera Street in L.A. was interesting. Not having to drive the I-5 was a dream come true. The people I met, tried to avoid, and observed on the trains and at stations were fascinating. Since I'd never been on a train before that point-- and haven't been on one since-- the act of train commuting was pretty fun for me.

Sitting in train stations is a great way to observe some of the more interesting people in a given area. People in business suits, families going on day trips, panhandlers, shady people, and the nutty folks all cohabitate on the concrete platforms before shoving themselves into a metal tube on tracks. People, some carrying briefcases, others with big packs on their backs, a few hauling matching luggage being them, make their way around the stations and stops, getting in the way of people that will eventually be in the way of someone else. The faint smell of sweat, cologne, and diesel fuel hangs in the air. The echos of footfall and voices echos off the ceiling of Union Station. The loud hiss of the locomotive's brakes sounds off, and people make their way into the cars.

My favorite thing about taking the train was watching the scenery change. The rolling hills through the Antelope Valley, without much more than Joshua trees and sagebrush dotting the landscape, can be hypnotic to watch. Staring at the tan ground set against the big blue sky, coupled with the clacking and droning of the train, was something I found really relaxing. Going through the mountains was always neat too, partly because of the change from the desert and the tunnels, partly because of being diverted off the track as to not collide with freight trains. Watching different cities and their stations pass by until getting to the end of the track, the occasional sunset over Los Angeles, the desert at dusk, all of it brought back memories of family trips where I'd stare out the window and watch the world go by.

It's been a few years since I've taken a train anywhere. I don't have a lot of reasons to go to L.A. much anymore, and I have a reliable car for when I do want to go on a trip, so I've been away from the Metrolink since 2009. Sometimes, though, when I find myself on a trip and I'm sitting in rush hour traffic on the I-5/14 interchange, I think about how nice it was to hang out on a train and walk a few miles down sketchy city streets to get where I wanted to be.

Pizza

When I was a kid I didn't get a lot of junk food. Soda wasn't ever in the house, candy was reserved for specific holidays (Halloween, Christmas, et cetera), and food like fast food burgers and pizza were reserved usually for trips away from home. Getting Rusty's Pizza when my family visited my grandparents was a blast; greasy cheese pizza, oil saturating the brown box it came in, washed down with a Pepsi. It was heaven. I knew it wouldn't be long before it'd be back to meatloaf, so I relished in the greasy glory of take-out pizza when I could.

I've grown up, and I still enjoy pizza, but working directly across the street from a pizzeria means the novelty of the pie has kind of... faded. Besides, the pizza across from where I work is made with fresh ingredients and hearty crust, fresh and wholesome (albeit kind of greasy depending on what you order). The wonderful experience of pizza that's essentially soggy cardboard covered in processed cheese and marinara before being thrown in an oven is something I rarely get. The hole-in-the-wall pizza joints make the best of the best, Little Caesar's makes the best of the worst, and the options for where to get pizza are as broad and varied as the toppings you can haphazardly order (pro tip: anchovies and sausage is too salty, FYI).

I love eating clean and healthy, and I like the feeling that comes with not toxifying my system with processed crap. Kale, spinach, and avocado make it into my mouth daily. I like lean protein and natural stuff, but I also really, really, really like shitty pizza.

AM Radio After Dark

One problem with working until late at night is the lack of things to do after a shift is done. Most people are asleep, businesses are closed, and it's not too long that I get tired and go to bed. I veg out with YouTube and Netflix most work nights, posted on the sofa and getting my fill of The IT Crowd reruns and whatever TED Talk might be interesting to check out, but the local internet provider sometimes falls short in the whole "providing internet" aspect of their services and I'm left to branch out from beyond my laptop. Sometimes I'll sit and read Outside Magazine. Other times I grab a book off one of my shelves and listen to a record. Every so often I'll fire up my Super Nintendo and play video games that haven't been relevant in over 20 years, but one night awhile back I decided to play around with a radio.

I got a nice wood paneled entertainment center thing for my birthday last year (thanks, Dad and Colleen) that has a CD player, a tape deck, a turntable, and a radio. I've played my vinyl on it quite a bit, and I've popped in a few long-lost mix CDs, but the lack of radio stations in the area makes for an unused tuner most of the time. I get my fill of country music and muzak pretty quickly, so I rely on either the music I already have or Pandora when I want to listen to tunes or have some background noise. The internet wasn't working the other night, so I opted to sift through the static on the FM waves to see if anything interesting would come up.

Gospel music. Muzak. Country. Pop through a haze of static. As expected.

I tried the AM frequencies afterward, not expecting anything to come up, but through the squelching and static came a clear voice. Curious, I listened to the DJ talk to a caller about some recent event. It sounded like they were talking about a torrential rainstorm or something, but then the DJ asked about "noises" the caller had mentioned earlier in the program before I'd tuned in, and I then realized that the rainstorm was only part of a multifaceted story about various UFO encounters throughout the US and Canada.

Apparently there's a radio show called Coast to Coast AM. Since the mid-80s, it's been a call-in show covering "UFOs, strange occurrences, life after death, and other unexplained (and often inexplicable) phenomena*" which I find really entertaining to listen to after midnight. I was a huge sucker for stories and "facts" about aliens and UFOs, ghosts, demons, and other spooky-scary crap that usually comes up on Halloween and on The X Files, so finding an AM radio show that caters to my hilarious, conspiracy-theorist, whack-job childhood interests prompted me to grab a beer, sit by the radio, and listen to loose logic from hearsay accounts of the supernatural on a radio station that I wasn't aware existed.

I've tuned in a few times since finding the mysterious radio station and the kind of spooky radio show. It's not like I believe extraterrestrials have any reason to go out of their way to shove probes up cow butts, or that little imp-like demons are possessing dogs or whatever in rural Kansas, or that the Illuminati is having game night this Friday at so-and-so's place, but sometimes it's fun to drop reality for an evening and listen to unusual accounts and cases from an AM signal at 1 in the morning.

*

Onion Valley

Haze from wildfires around Yosemite mixed with white, fluffy clouds over the granite peaks and tree lined foothills. My car struggled a bit going up the steep grades of the winding mountain road, but I wasn't in a hurry; 25 miles per hour was more than fast enough to putt along, arm hanging out the window, feeling the air steadily getting cooler. It had been a long while since I'd gone up that road, with the high, steep walls to one side and high, steep drop-offs to the other, but it was where I learned to drive and where I learned about how much I love hiking around alone.

Onion Valley is a lot more appealing a place than the name suggests; there are patches of wild onions growing during the warmer months, but the waterfalls, wood groves, and trails leading to various locations make is one of my favorite places in the Eastern Sierras. It isn't too far from where I grew up, and when I started getting an interest in hiking it was the home to the trailhead of one of my favorite day hikes-- Kearsarge Pass Trail-- and generally a fun spot to walk around and explore. Even after a few years of not bothering to make it up there, Onion Valley was just as pretty as I'd left it.

I parked my car, grabbed my CamelBak, and started walking. There wasn't a destination in mind, considering I wasn't even sure where I was going to go when I'd left my house, but I was there for a leisurely stroll in the high country to beat the heat of the valley below. I'd ended up on the Robinson Lake Trail; a relatively short but pretty steep trail to-- big shock-- a place called Robinson Lake. I found what looked to be a detour in the trail, so I started following it. After about 20 minutes I realized I'd been bushwhacking for a fair bit, and that the trail was nowhere to be found. I could catch glimpses of the parking area through the trees, but the ground was steep and covered with scree and vegetation. 

I walked less than a mile and managed to get turned around thanks to an animal trail.

Would anyone expect anything less?

It didn't bother me much, though; I could hear a waterfall nearby so I made my way to it. There was a nearby rock big enough to sit on, so I sat on it and listened to the rushing water while staring at the misty mountain tops, the surrounding trees, and the rolling clouds. It didn't matter that I wasn't too far away from people, or that I didn't even hike nearly as far or as long as I'd have liked (I started late and it was getting dark). I was after a day in the woods alone, and I got some meditation in somewhere I wanted to be. It was nice to go back to a place I considered a second home and to remember why I spent so much time there in the past.

After another 20 minutes of bushwhacking I got back to my car, with fresh bruises on my legs and the sky getting darker. The valley below and my old hometown came into view after a little while. Hand still out of the window and shouting lyrics by The Avett Brothers, I drove down the windy mountain road back to Independence and thought about when I'd make my way back into the mountains again.

California

The waves lazily rolled onto the beach as fluffy white clouds drifted through a light blue sky during my afternoon in Ventura. My pasty skin blended into the white sand but was burning quickly enough to have me stand out as a painful pink mess before too long. Some of my friends played volleyball by the water while my other friends and I sat in the shade and watched the water. Palm trees swayed in the breeze, people jogged down the walkways to the pier, and fanny pack wearing tourists shouted at one another in languages I didn't understand. All in all, it was a typical great day at the beach.

The next day I drove back to my hometown to visit my parents. While I drove along the east side of the Sierras up Highway 395 I watched blue-gray clouds rolling over the peaks to either side of the Owens Valley. Lightning flashed as cloudbursts opened up in the rolling mountainsides of the Inyos, and the granite walls of the Sierra Nevada to the west stood purple and menacing against the thunderheads above them. I sat with my father and watched rain spit on the valley below and the sky turn a menagerie of colors above my old hometown, and when I mentioned the change of scenery I'd had over my weekend he simply said, "Welcome to California."

I take my home state for granted a lot. I've been in just about every corner of it, from the freeway mazes of Los Angeles to the winding narrow roads through the redwoods up north, from the flat agricultural expanses of the Central Valley to the mountainous regions of Eastern California that I've lived in for years. It has its economic and political faults, sure, but it's so diverse and interesting that it never ceases to keep me interested in exploring it. Deserts, forests, plains, coastlines, alpine territories, the list goes on and on; even if I forget sometimes, I realize now that I get to live in a pretty cool place.

I still need to make my way up to Lake Tahoe soon, and I'd really like to see Eureka again. I've explored Southern California two weekends in a row, and I plan to be in Mammoth Lakes again Saturday I think, so hopefully this California adventuring trend continues north some more. My backyard has a lot to explore, but if the whole Eastern Sierras are my backyard then the state of California is the whole neighborhood, and I wouldn't mind exploring all of it.

Basically I want to keep driving and hiking and exploring, but that's nothing new. I'm just realizing again how stoked I am with how much California has to offer.

Cruisin'

Inyo County, California, has a handful of highways; 6, 168, 136, 190, and the main road of 395. Highway 395 through Inyo County is a scenic route, skirting along the east side of the Sierra Nevadas, through high desert, rolling hills, grassy fields, and sleepy small towns, and it's easy to stare out into the scenery and take it all in. Traffic isn't heavy on any of the roads in the county most of the time, and there are occasions where even the busiest of the roads have no cars driving on it for hours at a time. Growing up in the town of Independence meant watching cars lazily drive through the lazy small towns, and learning to drive meant braving the tamest roads in the thinnest traffic imaginable.

Fast forward to last weekend. It'd been awhile since I'd been in Los Angeles traffic, but I remembered what kind of a challenge trudging through that maze can be. The entirety of Southern California is a jumbled web of major freeways and perpetual road construction, and anyone that has to navigate it can tell you it's a pain in the ass the majority of the time. I drove 640 miles collectively last weekend, a fair chunk of it through Los Angeles and San Diego, and while zipping by concrete dividing walls, road debris, and people who suddenly decided they didn't know how to drive, all while trying to find the right exits to take and lanes to be in on a part of the map I'd never been on before, I was tense. Anxious. Feeling alive.

I really enjoy driving.

Freeways, dark desert highways, and back roads appeal to me because they can take me places. Even if where I end up isn't the most ideal (like the time I ended up lost and in a rough neighborhood in Oakland on accident) I occasionally find myself surprised and pleased with what I see (like the time I ended up lost and found myself in Santa Cruz on Highway 1 the day after I ended up in Oakland). Watching the scenery change, the miles roll on, and finding myself somewhere else is like hiking-- but quicker, over greater distances, and with a better stereo system. It's not a means of reconnecting with nature and the world like hiking is, sure, but there is a connection with something within the self that comes from driving solo for hundreds of miles.

Combine long solo road trips with long solo hikes and I flip out with happiness.

However, the weekend trip I took was just driving, but it did take me to a lot of places. I started out in my quiet town, then through the desert, then through mountains into the Los Angeles basin, then through rolling hills and to the coast. I woke up in my modest apartment in a small town, and spent the evening out on the town in downtown San Diego. By the next evening I was back in my modest apartment after going a different route than I'd originally taken. I spent a bit over 11 hours behind the wheel, keeping myself company, watching the lines on the highway roll on by and the traffic thicken and thin.

It had been awhile since I'd last driven somewhere I'd never been before. I'm glad I did.

I want to do it again soon.

Running (pt. 2)

The pennant was pinned crookedly on my shirt, so I redid it while waiting for the starting call. The sun wasn't too high yet, and the early morning sunlight threw long shadows from the houses and trees of my old hometown. People in running shorts and shoes mingled and stretched on the pavement. I made small talk with a few people-- mostly making plans for later in the day-- but the thought of being at the starting line of my first race in fifteen years lingered in the back of my head.

It wasn't going to be a long race, really; 4K. Why not a 5K like most races? Having it short didn't bug me too much since I had the rest of the day to do whatever afterward, and I'd only slept a couple hours the night before because I'd gotten off work really late so I wasn't a huge ball of energy to begin with. I wasn't worried about placing anything significant either, since my goal was "better than second to last place" and easily attained if I even just walked at a brisk pace. Success was just giving it a go as far as I was concerned, so hanging out in Independence, California, a couple doors over from Dehy Park was enough of a win for me.

The announcement was made that the race was going to start, and the list of places of where the proceeds would go, the explanation of the track, and thank-yous was stated. The countdown started from three, two, one--

Go.

And I began to run. I overtook some people but figured I'd see them again soon enough. I made my way through the streets of town, listening to some tunes from my high school years to bring back some nostalgia of when I used to explore the side streets and alleyways as I retraced one of the many paths of my younger days. At the first mile the shin splints I'd decided to ignore before the race decided to make themselves known and make every slap to the ground pretty painful, so I slowed down a little bit. The people I'd passed passed me, and I watched them sweat and go while I sweated and went.

After a little while the race went through the woodlot. Making my was around a corner, enjoying the shade of the trees in the quickly warming day, I saw a man walking in the opposite direction. Behind him was a collie dog walking along and a six-year-old boy walking and taking a breather from the race. The dog thought the kid looked interesting and decided to run up to smell him. The kid freaked, considering a dog he didn't know that was twice his size was getting a bit too close for comfort, so I stepped in and shooed the dog away before the owner finally called it over to him. The kid stood for a second, looked at me, and asked, "Why didn't he try to attack you?"

"I dunno," I shrugged, "I'm a bit taller than you are I guess."

The boy and I walked for awhile, him wondering why a dog would just run up to him like that one had, me wondering why an unattended six year old was running a footrace. He asked questions about the weather, how long it'd take to run "a million billion miles" (his answer was "about ten days" which, y'know, good for him, he's got gumption), and how much longer the race was because he was tired. I told him we were just about done, so when the threat of any unleashed dog was gone, I tuned to him and said, "I'll see you at the finish line, bud," before running off.

After getting back onto pavement and on the last quarter mile, I thought about why I bothered doing the run in the first place. I could have saved my money and ran my usual track back home, but I remembered; I had redemption to think about. It's not like it honestly mattered, and it's not like I really cared that much about it, but it was something to do-- something easy to succeed in, and if I was going to be active I'd might as well have lazy goals to go with it. I crossed the finish line, a number of people who were actually in shape cheering me on, and I got a gift bag with a bandana and an Independence Day pin.

16th place with a time just over twenty minutes or so. Not stellar, but not that bad considering I smoke, had shin splints, and spent a chunk of the race walking with a six year old.

It was fun, I wouldn't mind doing another short race sometime.

Hydrated

The morning provides little comfort from the heat of the day this time of year. Even before the sun crests over the eastern horizon it begins to get hot, and before long the burning ball of light in the sky and the unforgiving wind sap the life out of a anyone stuck outside. Dust kicks up in the breeze, the suns rays stab down to the earth, and a person ends up feeling dirt-peppered beef jerky if exposed to it too long, salty with sweat but not very tasty. The simple act of being outside is bad enough; in this kind of heat I don't mind shutting myself up inside, under the cooler, with a cold drink and Netflix, or maybe retreating into the high country to have it a little more pleasant.

But, of course, I've been running in the oppressive heat because I have a thing I want to do in a couple of days (a 4k, one whole k less than expected) and I'm an huge idiot.

Sweating bullets like a perspiration pistol has been reminding me to keep hydrated, especially while I'm kicking up dust trotting through the desert in 80 to 90 degree heat like a moron. I know I don't drink enough water under normal circumstances, and I know I'm usually kind of dehydrated anyway, so exerting myself in natures big convection oven has me very conscious of my water intake. Between a Camelbak, a couple Nalgene bottles, and countless glasses of water, I'm taking in a LOT, and if I wasn't sweating it all out I'd probably be in a constant state of peeing. Luckily for me, I feel pretty good despite the heat and the sweating, because there's been at least one instance where I've been hospitalized for not drinking enough water.

A number of years back I'd gone hiking in the Inyo Mountains with my father. The mountain range is notoriously arid, and I was younger and dumber than I am now, so I didn't drink nearly enough water. The day itself was a lot of fun; seeing the Sierra Nevadas off to the west, quality time with my dad, and poking around the desert was a hoot, but after doing that all day, spending most of the evening drinking soda and eating salty foods at the movie theater, I ended up having to go to the ER. They ran a full battery of tests, from blood work to a CT scan to a freaking spinal tap at three in the morning, just to be certain the headache and nausea I came in with wasn't anything serious, but I think it was simply dehydration from being stupid in the desert and loving junk food.

We'll never know.

It's going to be hot for a few more months. It makes me wish for winter every year because I'd rather curl up with a cup of coffee by the fire than desperately guzzling a gallon of water and a couple liters of Gatorade under a cooler vent. I have to relent to obsessively maintaining proper hydration, being soaked in sweat like I've been sitting in the worlds grossest splash zone, and wishing for sweater weather to come around again for the time being, but the challenge of not feeling mummified will at least keep me occupied.

Monsters

Some horrors are closer than one would like to think. They lay in wait, unnoticed, in the darkened corners of your home while you sleep. When you're fixing the morning coffee... they're waiting. When you're grabbing a beer out of the fridge after a long day at work... they're watching. When it's one in the morning and you're after a snack in the fridge... that's when those horrifying nightmare beings are most dangerous, because in your tired state of mind and desperation you might just draw out one of the terrors that hides in the shadows.

I remembered that, of course, while I cleaned out my fridge this afternoon.

The amount of questions that arise while cleaning out the fridge outnumber the amount of freezer bags and plastic containers that become Petri dishes and Lovecraftian horrors. Certain colors shouldn't occur in nature, let alone sprout on top of a mysterious pasta dish that sat in wait for the last month or more, but I stare through the hazily transparent plastic box at the rainbow from the fridge because opening the container might release the kind of spore that starts a zombie apocalypse. Why I find it necessary to save one slice of provolone cheese for three months, a few slices of salami until they become close to fossilized, or milk that is no longer liquid, is something I can't figure out.

It's kind of fun to see what sorts of foods don't actually go bad, though. A package of hot dogs I had open for a few weeks still looked like new, but the can of sauerkraut-- already fermented cabbage-- that I opened at the same time as the hot dogs was DEFINITELY spoiled. It makes me wonder what sort of toxic crap I willingly put in my body; if bacteria won't even survive on it, how do I? Why do I knowingly ingest food-like substances that don't follow laws of nature? I know I won't be able to eat the technicolor fuzzfest in that Tupperware, but should I attempt to eat the processed lunch meat from a bygone era?

Of course, I tend to forget about the horrors of food that refuses to spoil and the food that grows furry mold, get hungry, go grocery shopping, eat most of a meal, and save the scant few leftovers for another few months until terror strikes again.

It's finding Frankenstein's monster frankfurter that makes cleaning the fridge exciting and mortifying.

Stargazing

Outside of the town of Big Pine is the Owens Valley Radio Observatory. I'd visited it a few times as a kid, and aside from the badass liquid nitrogen demonstration they have at the end of the tour (dude, they straight up froze a rose and made it shatter like glass! 7-year-old me was like, "THAT'S RAD!") it got me interested in the night sky. The giant radio telescopes they have detect bodies in deep space using radio waves, and the results are images of colorful blobs representing different collections of interstellar gasses and matter in the void of space. It's a heavy concept for a little kid; there's stuff way, way, way out there in space, and the world is really small compared to the grand scheme of the Universe. It's one thing to go to a planetarium and another to stand in the place where scientists look into space daily, and it's one thing to see models and another to see actual images of deep space bodies that we will never be physically able to go to ever. 

For an small town boy in elementary school, realizing you're an insignificant speck on an insignificant speck floating around in an insignificant speck in a cluster of insignificant specks is kind of heavy.

As I got older I got into the habit of wandering into the desert and staring at the night sky. The beautiful thing about growing up in the middle of nowhere is the lack of light pollution and how easy it is to escape it, so when I wanted to do some introspection as a teenager I could walk or drive a short ways and be in complete darkness with nothing but the inky blackness of space with its Milky Way and countless constellations above me. I started thinking about being a particle in the universe made up of smaller parts, which were made up of smaller parts, and so on, and thinking about being made up of particles that were made up of other smaller stuff was enough infinity to keep my geeky high school self stoked on everything. Finding me stargazing and thinking about stuff was a pretty big hobby of mine once upon a time.

I still do the stargazing-and-thinking-about-stuff thing today. Whenever I'm camping, or walking around town at night, or hanging out at an outdoor party in the desert, I usually find myself looking up at the infinite expanse, and the completely unknown volumes space holds. I think about the atoms that make up my physical being like the amazing technicolor dream gasses of radio telescope images. I remind myself that the universe is a pretty big deal, and me being like my own universe makes me kind of a big deal too, and that everyone ever is like the universe and a big deal, and that sort of connection to everyone and everything that comes from stargazing tends to make me feel a lot better about life.

There are two things I can say for sure since I'd visited the OVRO; even though the universe is massive it doesn't mean we're all too insignificant, and that liquid nitrogen is hella cool.

The X Files, Then And Now: An Observation

(DISCLAIMER: This post has some spoilers for a 21-year-old television show. If this sort of thing bothers you... well, you should probably reconsider your priorities of things to be mad about, but to each their own, so don't say I didn't warn you.)

The other night I watched a few episodes of The X Files. My family used to watch it all the time when it was on the air, so for the sake of nostalgia and good television I decided to revisit it. Mulder and Scully were household names when I was a kid, and the theme music queued a night of bad dreams for me and my overactive imagination, so from the time it aired in 1993 until it ended in 2001, it made itself a fixture in my life. It's still an entertaining show, and I can see why my parents watched it back in the day, but it's very obviously from the '90s.

If Agents Mulder and Scully were conducting their investigations into the X files during the 2010s instead of the 1990s, they probably wouldn't have run into the same roadblocks they'd faced in the first few episodes of the series. For example, toward the end of the very first episode, a bunch of evidence was destroyed when Scully's motel room was burned down. If they were conducting this investigation nowadays all of her field reports, her photos, the x-ray images from the autopsy, and research materials would have probably been saved to a cloud account somewhere. Her report on the case would have been in Dropbox before she ran off to see Mulder. Little snippets of information she'd have jotted in a pad of paper could have been saved in Evernote. Hell, the pictures and x-ray images could have been saved to the camera roll of her iPhone if she'd had one.

That's another thing; if Mulder and Scully had smart phones, there would never be any question to the credibility of their reports. Some creepy contortionist cannibal crawling through the vent in your bathroom? Scully could film that with her phone! UFO sightings over a secret airbase? It'd be on Instagram for the world to see before anyone was the wiser. Delicate information needs to be conveyed? Snapchat destroys the evidence within ten seconds. Need to silently get a hold of someone while hiding from some supernatural entity? Texting. Having a smartphone alone would make solving Mulder and Scully's problems exponentially easier.

You know what else would have helped them? The internet. Since they work for the FBI, they have access to a lot of government databases, one a federal level to a local level, so the amount of time spent looking through physical archives in dramatic dark libraries would be cut way shorter. Google would make a lot of questions they have a lot easier to answer, like searching "UFO sightings near Iowa" or whatever they happen to be working on. The combination of smart phones, the internet, and cloud storage, probably could cut a conveniently timed 45 minute episode of investigation and spooky stuff in half.

Then again, one thing about modern times is government surveillance. The NSA could swoop in and swipe up anyone tweeting "omg just saw sum dude eat & puke out a healthy FBI person. #gross #wat" or someone searching Google for Cthulhu-like nonsense that doesn't seem normal. Any bizarre findings being saved to Scully's Drive account could be theoretically be seized and destroyed by the NSA if they really wanted to. Hiding identities or going undercover would be impossible if anyone found Fox "Spooky" Mulder of Facebook. A lot of cases would probably be pretty obvious if some blogger somewhere decided to talk about how his cousin wrote a bunch of binary code and the government got involved... unless the government saw that blog post and got involved.

Really, the only way to keep that sort of secret stuff secret and out of the hands of the wrong people would be to have it all in physical forms; notebooks, film photos, physically documented information, in-person discussions and first-hand-eyewitness accounts... like they did in the show, I guess. Hmm.

Either way, while there would be some pitfalls for Mulder and Scully working in the 21st century, cases would probably still be way easier than doing so by communicating via land line and car phone, losing evidence to fire and exposing undeveloped film, and not having the worlds knowledge accessible from a device that can fit in a pocket. The 1990s were a simpler time, despite confusing shows like The X Files and Twin Peaks, and it's fun to think about them from a modern perspective.

Swimming

There's a pool at the hotel I work at that I can access whenever I want. On weeks like this, where it's in the 90s during the day and stays around the 70s at night, being able to take a dip is a huge luxury. Since it's open 24 hours I can theoretically go swimming whenever I want, so a dip after I get off work at 11 p.m. is totally doable. I can spend part of my days off relaxing in the cold water and doing laps! How cool is that?

The only issue, though, is that I don't really know how to swim. I kind of did a long time ago, but I'm a little out of practice for a few reasons.

When I was a young kid, around four years old or so, my Uncle Bill had a pool. My cousins, siblings, and I would swim around during the summer when we visited my grandparents dairy and my uncle's house outside of Greenfield. One day one of my cousins convinced me to jump into the pool without any of the grown-ups around. I vaguely remember it being a great idea, as I was four and exceptionally stupid, and I also remember that moment of panic when I realized I had no real clue how to swim. I flailed around a bit and eventually got plucked out of the water by my granddad (thanks, Opa), but it didn't really dissuade me from getting into the water.

No, that moment came a bit later, when I was in kindergarten I think. The school had a pool, and once the weather warmed up the students had the option to swim for PE. One day it got overcast and a bit chillier than it had been, so most of the kids opted to just sticking their feet in the water. Continuing to be an exceptionally stupid child, I was the only kid to actually swim around. I thought I was really cool and gutsy until I realized I was also really scrawny and not good at retaining body heat, so by the time I got out of the pool I was blue-lipped and hypothermic which didn't please the teacher at all. After that, I had a little shakier of a relationship with the water, but it got even worse later on.

In junior high I'd gone to the big swimming complex in Minden-Gardnerville, in Nevada, with the school. Half the school would do swim lessons while the other half had free swim, and I ended up getting swim lessons from the crazy ex-Marine guy who wanted to push every one of his students to do better in the water. When he told me to get the sinking toy thing from the deep end I tried to get it-- I really did-- but I ended up needing air before swimming all the way to the bottom, so I had to surface. The only problem was that I gasped for air before getting there, so I inhaled some water, started hyperventilating once I got out of the pool, and the next thing I know I'm waking up and getting CPR, end up on a stretcher, with an oxygen mask on my face and an IV in my arm, and I get wheeled off to the emergency room not long afterward. I missed free swim time, but I didn't die, so that was cool.

From that point I decided that swimming might be my thing and I haven't gone out of my way to go to a pool since.

However, part of me wants to try getting in the water again. It's been a long time since I've actually tried to swim (I've been in pools, sure, but only standing and freaking out in the shallow end for the most part) and it's probably been long enough to get over my fear of it. Besides, it'll probably help me build up lung capacity and some endurance for running a 5K this July, so it might be a good idea for that reason alone. Maybe sometime this weekend I'll go swimming-- or drown, or at least have a panic attack. Either way, it's been hot and I have access to a pool, so I should give it a shot just because I can.

A long string of near-drownings couldn't possibly last forever, right?

Walkin' Around (and a Horror Game)

There's a video game series I'm a pretty big fan of called Silent Hill. It takes place in the dark, foggy, abandoned town of Silent Hill, filled with nightmarish monsters representing personal flaws and fears of the main character. In order to get through the game the player has to solve puzzles and traverse maze-like streets and buildings, all while avoiding the hellspawn that dwells in the shadows that make up about eighty percent of the game world (the other twenty percent being blood and rust, it's pretty nuts). Throughout the various incarnations of the games, from the greats like Silent Hill 2 to less well-received titles like Silent Hill: Downpour (and the atrocities that were the Silent Hill films), the general concept remains the same: walk around, find stuff to help you get un-lost, and don't die while doing it.

The thing that really struck me about these games-- especially when I started playing them-- was the setting; a small, empty, stereotypical Americana tourist town. Walking around my old hometown, or even my current place of residence, in the middle of the night can give the streets a feeling of being deserted and haunted. The early 20th century architecture of homes and businesses, with chipped paint and lonely glowing neon signs in dusty windows, puts out a kind of eerie vibe. Dimly lit streets devoid of cars or people makes a person wonder who or what is waiting to strike from the bushes. After walking home through the dark so many times, and after watching so many scary movies and playing so many games in the Silent Hill series, I've had some pretty fun moments of freaking myself out.

The other night, for example! I was hanging out with some friends on the far north end of town, a couple miles away from my apartment. Everyone that had been there either left or was going to bed, so I decided to walk home. Of course it was three in the morning, and of course the path of least resistance would be to walk through the desert by moonlight, so I made my goodbyes and set out into the dark. To break some of the silence in the middle of nowhere I decided to play some music on my phone. The only problem, though, is that I decided on the Silent Hill soundtrack, so every shadow and every noise in the bushes became something jump-worthy.

The moon was covered in hazy clouds. The crunch of dirt beneath my feet and the ambient music from my phone echoed through the trees along the creek I crossed while walking along the dirt road. Streetlights buzzed on the corner of the street as I made my way back into town. Walking along, hearing no noise from the highway, seeing no lights on in any of the houses along the way, I started to spook myself. I knew nothing was "out to get me" or anything, but that paranoid feeling of god knows what watching me still sent chills down my spine. By the time I got home to my dark and quiet apartment I realized I'd forgotten my keys at my friend's place, so I used my "finding keys in ass-backward places" I learned from video games to get my spare to get inside and away from the creepy crawlies that didn't actually exist.

I got a little bit out of video games (even more than just learning to accept "There was a HOLE here. It's gone now." written in blood on a wall). I can find things I need, use some things toward unintended ends, and get un-lost while making my way through the dark. I learned this skill through a lot of different video games, but Silent Hill got me to use these skills in a place like home.

Shorts

The approach of summer means the weather is warming up. Sweaters get packed away, electric blankets get unplugged and tossed in the closet, and the anticipation of sweltering temperatures and sweating to death builds up. Most people bust out the summer gear; Coronas, Ray-Bans, tank tops, flip flops, summertime sadness (if you're Lana del Rey from what I've heard), and, of course, shorts.

I rarely wear shorts. I already get charred to a crisp as it is, and exposing my pasty white legs is both asking for temporary blindness from the light reflected off them and the intolerable pink suffering from UV radiation. I've spent many, many summers sweating in blue jeans while my contemporaries sweated slightly less thanks to the draft that board shorts provide, though, so I've been slowly getting sun on my legs while I go running and hiking. By doing that, not only have I not died of heat stroke, but I've also managed to get my legs from nearly opaque to almost having some semblance of color by wearing shorts in my adventures in the boonies.

I don't think I'll be able to have tan legs, to be honest, but not having corpse-colored calves would be nice. I'd like to be able to wear shorts like a normal person when I go to the coast this summer, and I'd like to not hurt anyone with the sheen from my whiteness. If I can achieve a skin tone a couple shades darker than "European Tourist" I think I'll be satisfied rocking skinny cutoff shorts like a hipster jackass, but if I can't... I'll just fake an accent, I guess.

I usually dread the hot weather, but it might not be so bad if I show off my gams.