Geek

My workplace has a wide tea selection in the breakroom.  I always choose the green tea.  Everybody chooses the green tea.  So occasionally, like this morning, we'll run out.  At that point, I'll usually choose the Earl Grey.  Not because I particularly like Earl Grey (green tea is the only type I really enjoy)... but because Captain Picard drank it.

No joke.

I mean, if I had to pick a tea from a selection I'm not crazy about, this is as good a reason as any, right?

Right?

p.s. If you've never heard of Captain Jean Luc Picard, it's a wonder that we're even friends.

Reason 42 Why I'm Not So Smooth With The Ladies...

"What IS that perfume you're wearing?"

"Tiger Balm"

It Makes My Blood Boil...

... that we have teachers in this country who have to deal with hostile blind religious fanaticism in the classroom.  As if teaching biology to teenagers isn't hard enough already.  I swear.  It's like some people in America are still living in the friggen Dark Ages.

I'm pretty agnostic when it comes to this stuff, but even I can see that science and the existence of God doesn't have to be mutually exclusive, people!

Arrgh!

Number Two

Usually, the general procedure for when you need to do a number two out in the wilderness is to: 

1)  Hike completely out of your way to find a spot where nobody can see you 

2)  Dig a 6 inch hole in hard, rocky ground with your flimsy plastic trowel

3)  Do your business

4)  Cover it back up

5)  Pack out your used toilet paper

I hear ya.  It's not the most pleasant activity in the world.  In fact, it's my least favorite part about backpacking – dealing with this crap.

So I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there was going to be a pit toilet within walking distance of our campsite last weekend.  A pit toilet is basically an outhouse… a big pit in the ground topped by a commode.  You know what outhouses are.  They usually have 4 walls and a door… only this one didn't.  Instead what it had were remnants of walls, scattered all around the general vicinity of the toilet, which was now sitting out there in nature in all its naked glory.  It was quite a site.

It had quite a view too.  With the walls now gone, toilet visitors can now do their business while looking out over an alpine lake overshadowed by a 12,000 foot peak.  Not only did I watch a family of deer graze by the shore at sunset as I sat on my throne, one even passed within 20 yards of me like it was the most natural thing in the world. 

For reals.

No shittin'.

A Life Lived

So there we were, sitting in our rafts at the pushoff point, waiting to begin our 3rd and final whitewater run of the day.  A lady comes paddling up in her solo kayak, asking us if we saw her friend up river.  Which is well and good, but what really struck me was her age.  Judging by the lines on her face, she must have been well into her 60s, if not 70s.  And here she was, kayaking class IV rapids on the Kern on a perfect summer day.  When our guide complimented her on her sweet looking carbon fiber paddle, she said thanks, and that she got it for her birthday.  

Can you imagine that birthday party?

Happy Birthday Gramma!  We all chipped in a got you this insanely high tech paddle.  It weighs less than air!  We hope you like it!

Dude, if I ever get to the point where my grandchildren felt like I could get really jazzed over a carbon fiber paddle on my 65th birthday... I'd consider that a life lived.

You Know What I Hate?

I hate bugs that come and bite you for no good reason.

So there I was standing by a stream, waiting for my friends to cross, minding my own business... when I experience what feels like a hot needle being jabbed into my pinky finger.  I instinctively shook my hand like a spastic monkey, and saw something fly off out of the corner of my eye.  So I wasn't exactly sure what it was.  What I do know, is that now my left pinky is all red and puffy, and currently about double the size in volume of my right pinky.

I also know that I had done nothing to provoke that little son of a bitch, whatever it was.  It just decided to come and ruin my day for no good reason.

Bastard.

You Know You Should Start Doing Some Pushups...

...when your shoulder muscles are sore after throwing a Frisbee only 39 times the day before.

So all day yesterday, I was wondering to myself, "Why the hell is my right shoulder sore?"  I mean, it's not *sore* sore, but there's definitely something going on there.  I began recalling all the activities I did the day before.  Okay... there was that hike to the gold mine that required some rock hopping/scrambling, but that was mostly leg muscles.  Then we pigged out on pastrami sandwiches at Langers.  Then... ah, right.  We played Frisbee Golf, or as my Canadian friend Dave likes to call it, "Disc Golf".  Of all things, my shoulder is sore from playing Frisbee golf.  And I know I only threw it 39 times because that was my score.  12 over par 27.