Confessions of a Climate Agnostic

There were a lot of pomportant people in Paris and they seemed very self-congratulatory after signing a climate treaty.  Other than the smiles, hand-holding and comments like, "this is historic," it should be noted how little coverage the final agreement actually received.  The day after signing, it wasn't even mentioned on the evening news.  Even NPR had only a tacit story on it.
After learning more about the agreement, the lack of coverage probably makes more sense than should be admitted.  The final agreement has a lot of "shoulds" in place of "shalls" and there are basically no ramifications, other than global shaming, for non-compliance.  No country other than Luxembourg seems to really care about public shaming - there is always someone else to blame.  There is also very little in the way of objective measurements across the globe, making compliance with the suggestion even more doubtful.
The should versus shall should not be downplayed.  I should eat healthier and exercise more.  The law says I shall not walk out of Walmart with Twinkies without paying for them.  The former is a suggestion, the latter has consequences.  While the scale of a global environmental agreement is much bigger, the binding of the language is the same.
Reportedly, some of these "shoulds" were put in place at the urging of the US since the Obama administration was fearful that "shall" would then require Senate approval of the agreement, and this would not be a requirement if the agreement is merely a suggestion.  So rather than face the difficult political work at home, John Kerry pushed for a, largely, vapid agreement.

What the Paris agreement will allow, is for a lot more finger wagging.  Al Gore has been finger wagging for quite some time now.  And, frankly, something does need to be done.  However, even Mr. Gore does not agree that anything drastic needs to be done.  He is quite content living a lavish 1%er lifestyle while earning his living as a professional finger wagger.  He has attempted to address his oppulence, but his response is actually more dangerous than the problem his lifestyle creates.
I could almost admire his honesty if he said some form of, "I'm imperfect, and like everyone else, would like to do better.  But alas, I'm human so do as I say, not as I do."  What his response is really saying is, "I'm very wealthy, so I can live an extravagant lifestyle with only some guilt and an insignificantly small additional expense.  Those of you who are not rich must make real sacrifices."  (and he says this with condescension).  Elsewhere, the referenced "10 geothermal wells" are noted as being under Al Gore's driveway.  Just How friggin' long is his driveway?
I shouldn't pick on Al Gore too much.  It is just too easy to do and if the environmental movement ever does take off for the non-Birkenstock crowd, he would have to find something else to prognosticate on.

Expanding in a minute, I do see climate change as a real and growing threat.  What is almost unbelievable is how little population is discussed as part of the issue and solution.  As soon as procreation is mentioned, eyes get wide and hands are thrown up - having seven children, even if you can't afford three, is a basic human right!  Sadly, in the first world through the third, the people having seven children are too often the ones that can't raise them in a more sustainable manner.  The lack of including population changes as part of any solution, or even any discussion, of the environment in the future is further evidence of the (lack of) real importance of the issue.  As Al Gore has taught us, real sacrifices must always be made by someone else.

The question most of asked around the issue is, "Do you believe in global warming?"  This question itself is wrong and unfortunate.  The branding of the phenomenon as "global warming" was a huge mistake made decades ago.  Branding it as "climate change" allows for more honest discussions without including anecdotal observations of a frigid winter in Dallas.  There should actually be three questions:
So, is the climate changing?
Yes.  This is fact, and there is data to support this.  Denying this is, frankly, wearing blinders.
Is the climate change caused by human activity?
Somewhere between probably and almost for sure.  Scientific fact is hard to come by, but the vast majority of climate scientists are not dumb and while modeling the atmosphere is notoriously difficult, most models together point in generally the same direction.  Even the most conspiracy-minded skeptic must admit that, at best, human activity is not helping since, as above, the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is fact.
What should be done about it?
AAAHHHHHHHHHH, here is the real question.  The difficult one.  The question even Al Gore doesn't want to live by if he really believes what his prophet persona says.
The question of what to do about it must not be based exclusively on hard climate science, since any changes shall take into account economic theory, social changes, etc.

As much as I've spent much of my adult scientific life poopooing the "social sciences," they play a bigger role here than what anybody wants to admit.  Until the Joe and Jane six-pack crowd sees a short term benefit to changes that might improve the climate situation, it will never take hold.
Witness how when gas was $4/gallon a few years ago, the sale of small cars began to noticeably creep up, while in our current oil-glut environment, larger vehicles are again making a strong comeback.

Great, so the answer is to make not being a granola really, really expensive, right?
Wrong, economic theory must also play a role.  As resilient as the atmosphere may or may not be, the global economy is a fragile glass figurine in comparison.  Any attempt to affect a large change quickly will result in catastrophic consequences, even if the long term result is good (and modeling the economy long term is harder than the environment).  Negative changes in the economy moves people, business, and government into preservation mode and the climate will quickly become an even lower priority.
Similarly, it is ludicrous to expect advanced economies to digress - the economy must grow or die and any politician who suggests a decrease in lifestyle for the next generation will be railroaded out on a log.
We also should not expect developing economies to do anything other than pursue the lifestyle that the developed world has.  Suggesting otherwise is borderline evil.  I do sometimes wonder if the developing world is not in a better position to move ahead of the developed world - without the entrenched infrastructure in places like the United States, France and Germany, is it easier to put a different, more sustainable infrastructure in Subsaharan Africa? If environmentally friendly solutions are such a no-brainer and so much better for the long term economy and technologically advanced to the point everyone should have them, how come they are not becoming the norm in places like China, India or Brazil?  Maybe not quite as much of a no-brainer as the solar crowd would hope.

The difficulty of individuals making changes can be illustrated by what I do to help and hurt the globe.  I do this not to flog myself, or to be self-congratulatory, but to illustrate that almost everyone does things that help and hurt.
I recycle nearly everything I can, but I also realize that much of what is recycled does end up in a landfill.
I have a longer-than-average commute, but I chose my truck as the highest mpg open-bedded 4wd vehicle available at the time.
I drive very little on the average weekend, but pursuing mass transportation is not something I have much interest in.
I could buy a more efficient 4-wheeled vehicle, but then I would have yet another vehicle which is not really helping.
In the summer I do most of my commuting on a motorcycle which uses much less fuel than most cars, but my bikes are not really built for fuel efficiency and, frankly, I ride motorcycles because I like motorcycles, with any environmental benefit a tertiary thought at best - do motives matter?
I heat and cool my house with geothermal and keep it at a cool 64F in the winter, but if the house wouldn't have had geothermal when I bought it, I probably wouldn't have put it in myself.
I've looked into solar panels, and even ran full electric to my pole bard with that in the back of my mind, but any payout for solar panels, using realistic estimates, would be at about the anticipated lifetime of them, so I don't think I'll do it anytime soon.  To be clear, it is getting closer to being cost effective if subsidies are maintained, but looking at the actual cost, it is not.  And I can think of better uses environmental or otherwise for that money.
I see water scarcity as a potentially much larger problem in the future, but water use minimization is almost silly living in the Midwest.
I have planted many trees on my property, but they keep dying.

Everyone of these things has a "but" in it.  Nobody wants to destroy the environment or return to the days of burning rivers.  Everyone could be doing more and probably should (even Al Gore), but...
And that is the real answer, there are no easy answers to this.

Dad's Christmas Cookies

For at least the last decade, Dad always sent Christmas Cookies.  These were large cookies decorated with copious amounts of frosting to look like Santa Claus, at least mostly like Santa Claus.  While the gesture was nice, most were never eaten - something I always felt a little guilty about.

Dad was diagnosed early in 2015 with pancreatic cancer.  He had some unusual issues, and after a few misdiagnoses, late stage four pancreatic cancer was confirmed.  I knew pancreatic cancer wasn't "a good one" to get, but until doing some reading, I didn't understand the degree of badness to this, especially at the stage he was at.

Dad was always a rock.  He was never flashy, never flamboyant or loud, or boisterous.  There were prayers for the miracle-cure which wasn't to come; my Dad and his wife said those prayers were answered in thousands of small miracles after his diagnosis, which was yet another lesson I needed to learn from that man.

In the classic sense, I guess we weren't close.  Our interests were very different.  I usually (only) saw him once or twice a year.  I communicated with him 10-20 times a year in addition to our visits - yet his diagnosis and the realization that his life would likely end, and soon, from pancreatic cancer hit me like a boulder.
All of my Dad's kids got together about a month after his diagnosis for a rally-around-Dad weekend.  On one evening, Dad showed a slide show of 35mm slides from our youth on his father's very antique slide projector.  Dad assumed this would be, at best, tolerated.  It was probably one of the highlights of my year.  We all really enjoyed watching the pictures and reliving childhood memories - creating new memories in the process.
We all had a great time that entire weekend - and it wasn't until the drive home that I realized why his diagnosis hit so hard.
Time spent thinking and putting thoughts to paper helped me put into words how with a strong foundation, Dad was able to help raise five interesting kids that were able to develop freely into their own very unique and independent selves.  I ultimately sent this to him for Father's Day - almost too late - and read it at his funeral.

I saw Dad a few more times over the spring and summer, watched the ever-healthy man deteriorate.  He never complained, never lost faith.  Just like his whole life, he was accepting and enjoyed every single positive second.  Early on, there was a lot of communication, but that waned as his condition worsened.  Updates, both good and bad, came mostly from his wife - a woman who showed the strength of Samson and compassion of Mother Teresa.

Dad died on Father's Day.  Maybe because I saw him the day before, I see his death on a day to honor dads as inexplicably non-negative.  His funeral really was a celebration of his life, as well as a roller-coaster of emotions since there were many people there who I hadn't seen in years.

Since Dad's death, I miss him in ways I never could have imagined.
I miss how he would read something I would post on Facebook, and then email me about it.  I'm not sure if his lack of Facebook comments was that he didn't totally get it, or his deference to my being a somewhat private person.
I miss how he would always have some reason to email me after I saw him, and asked if I made it home OK.
I miss how he would always send me a really cheesy online birthday card.
I miss realizing that my habits and mannerisms had grown to match his more than I was comfortable with.
I miss just knowing ... he is there.

And I miss those Christmas Cookies I didn't eat.
To be honest, I have a hard time seeing Dad make and decorate cookies; there is a lot I learned about him in his last few months that is difficult to picture.  But the cookies would come every year, very near, sometimes shortly after, Christmas, when my taste for sweets of any kind was diminishing.  There would always be an email preceding the cookies that "something was coming" for me.  A rumpled box would then show up, with cookies wrapped in cellophane and bubble wrap.
It hurts a little knowing that that box will never show up again, and I will still feel guilty about not eating those cookies.  Maybe this year, I will make some cookies, and I will frost them to look like Santa.  But I will not eat them - because whether it is Christmas, or Father's Day or any time in between, when I think about my Dad, I don't ever want it to be without a little bit of ache.

Nostalgia and Old Photos

I bought my first digital camera in 2008.  I actually bought three that year.  This was shortly before the motorcycle trip to Alaska, and I decided a very small digital camera made a lot of sense given the premium that space was going to be on the trip.  I loved my tank-like Pentax K-1000, but carrying it and a couple lenses was out of the question.  The first camera was a very small Leica that in some ways was form over function.  It broke en route to Alaska and was replaced by the much more capable Nikon CoolPix, purchased in Fairbanks.  The screen on the Nikon camera recently quit while going to The Keys this year, but the camera still functioned.  The Leica should have been discarded long ago; both the Leica and the Nikon were disposed of after the Keys trip, replaced with a new Nikon CoolPix that I can only hope will last as long as the 2008 model.
The third digital camera purchased in 2008 was a Kodak P850 and is still functioning well.  While low resolution by 2015 standards, the optics are actually quite good.

Prior to 2008, all my photography was 35mm.  As a result, I, like many others, have several boxes of developed pictures.  Some of these are semi-organised, but there are two boxes that were just a scattering of photos ranging from my infancy (very few) to sometime around the year 2000 when I got much more organized in photo storage.
Earlier in the year, I had uploaded most of my digital pictures to Google Photos.  The ability to have unlimited storage of pictures at a size that is reasonable for all but the most optimistic artistic uses is quite a valuable service.  Yes, I suppose Google can paw through them and they could get hacked resulting in my fishing pictures from 2009 being exploited, but I'll take the minor risk of that in trade for the service.  After loosing many pictures to a hard drive crash several years ago, I believe strongly in redundant storage.
With time available around Thanksgiving, I recently spent a few hours selectively scanning in older pictures to be uploaded, borrowing a very convenient Go Doxie scanner for the task.

Looking through the pictures brought back a lot of memories - which is I suppose why the pictures are taken in the first place.  What I was struck by, was the nostalgia the pictures brought.  Some negative, but most positive.  Even pictures which came from times that in retrospect were difficult, maybe even unhappy, seemed smoothed over in a way I didn't think was possible - especially looking back at that time.
The most evocative pictures were taken of my first two houses.  I only had a very small number of pictures taken of my first house, with slightly more of my second.  Both of those houses were moved into after stints in apartments which I hated, so the positive memories of being on top of the world on moving into my own building on my own piece of the planet is perhaps understandable.  It is easy to look back on the first house and try to construct a memory of how simple things were then.  But in reality, it was far from simple.  I was working two jobs, basically living paycheck to paycheck.  I was in school with very little time for anything else.  The memory of things being simple is just a mental construct.
Similarly, my financial situation on moving into my second house was far from rosie.  I was unsure of my job choice and there was a general, but intense, unease for the future.
Despite (seemingly) significant financial, work, and personal issues, I remember the energy available to clean, repair, improve, rebuild the first house as something special.  I see that occasionally in other people moving into their first house.  Over the last 25 years, that energy is easy to replace with contentment (not complacency).

There were also several pictures of various vehicles I owned that brought on nostalgic memories.  Digitizing the few pictures of my first car, I know the rose colored glasses were on as I thought about life at the age of 16.  I had to try to put it in a more realistic perspective; I'm somewhat surprised that the pictures are tinted in a red hue, given how awful the mid-teens were.  But I guess that first car was a bright spot, and even quite important to my eventual future.
I was also surprised about some of the things that I could not find any pictures of.  In 2015, there are multiple digital pictures of just about everything, no matter how trivial.  I could not find any pictures of my first motorcycle, something I see as quite depressing now.  I could only find a few images of my favorite truck, a 1994 Ford F-150 purchased as a graduation present to myself after college.  But these images are just in the margins of pictures of other subjects.  Several other vehicles are completely non-existent, seemingly erased forever from photographic memories.

There is probably a genetic reason for the more generally positive view of the more distant past, but I'm not sure why that would be.  It is likely quite dangerous, as it could easily lead to discomfort or discontent with the present.  The Germans have a word for this, weltschmerz:  World weariness or discomfort with the present, especially in relation to an ideal state.

This nostalgic view of the past could also lead to dire atavistic behaviors.  Quitting the job and trading everything for the relive of the college lifestyle would appear, and be, quite reckless.
"Degeneracy can be fun but it’s hard to keep up as a serious lifetime occupation."  -Robert Pirsig
Still, there is that ever present current...

I have the pictures to temporarily relive events like my first house, first car, first deer, but while the pictures are real, the memories will be somewhere between distorted and created.  The rosie nostalgia is evidence of this.
And that ends up being the real reality of the pictures.  The pictures, like the memories, like nostalgia, only show a single snapshot in time.  This snapshot, whether in silver halide/gel form, ink on paper, digital, or grey matter, is edited by the brilliantly feeble brain to be something that never was, even though it seems so real.  The shutter of a camera lasts a fraction of a second and the reality captured is just that brief.

It is easy to look at pictures an assume, maybe even hope, that the memories are just as real, but they are a modern personal mythology.  They are reality completely assimilated with Aesop's Fables, Zeus and Apollo and Harold and the Purple Crayon all combined into one narrative.

“It is difficult to live in the present, ridiculous to live in the future, and impossible to live in the past." — Jim Bishop

The Sound of Sleeping Dogs

As I write this, I should be deer hunting.  I'll say I feel guilty about not hunting, only because I can't think of a more relevant term other than guilt - I'm sure there is a long German word to describe it that I don't know about.
Past years have taught me that one deer is a reasonable goal, and usually I'm scraping vacation days by now to get that.  This year is different since I have not used many vacation days productively and I've got time to burn.  Since I can be hunting, I somehow feel I must be hunting - one of the reasons I made the decision to no longer bow hunt several years ago.

After getting a deer opening morning and spending the following day getting him in the freezer, I haven't acquired the energy to go back out.
I'm on the edge of getting sick, or maybe getting better.  While restorative, sitting in a treestand may not help what could be a ferocious cold - and hacking out a lung is counterproductive to waiting for a deer.

I picked up True Story by Michael Finkel from the library.  As I paused early in the morning, putting the book down while reading, I realized part of the reason I was so content to stay indoors.  It is more than just because there is now fresh venison in the freezer, or sickness.  I put the book down and the only sound I could hear was the therapeutic sounds of dogs sleeping.
Many of the books I've read this year have been listened to while in a car.  I do like audiobooks, but I'm not sure that listening and reading are equivalent.  Of the books I've actually read, many have been hurry-up-and-read before something else comes up.  I've read some at work this past year - very likely the worst possible manner to read anything.  All the preparation for uninterrupted deer hunting has created some much needed space.
This year has been more than hectic.  Dad's illness and death.  The cycle of work early and sleep early.  The formerly mentioned misuse of vacation allocation.  Even the vacation time used, while restorative, has seemed somehow rushed.  There have been down times, but much of that has been consumed watching TV - a past time I find simultaneously enjoyable and mind numbingly painful.

True Story is a gripping book.  It tells the story of Christian Longo and the murder of his wife and three children.  But the book is about the author, Michael Finkel, nearly as much as it is Longo, as the critical events take place shortly after Finkel is fired from The New York Times and disgraced from the profession of journalism due to fabrication.
What is terrifying about Longo's story is how absolutely normal it seems at times.  But, for a few poor decisions, things might have turned out very different.  There but for the grace of God go I.  Poor decisions are added to poor decisions and things spiral out of control - a train wreck in slow motion.
I looked up what Finkel is doing now, and it appears he is back in at least tepid relations with the field of journalism (not at The Times).  There is some criticism of this, but at least he fully admits his mistakes, and publicly.  The rarity of admition should be somewhat restorative in itself.
Underneath the book is the magma of half truths and small lies that are easy to rationalize and may help smooth over wrinkles in the short term.

Much like my time deer hunting, I thoroughly enjoyed the time reading True Story.  And I know there will be more time for both reading and hunting before the end of the year.
After pausing to listen to the dogs contented breathing, some appliance fan came on somewhere, ending that serene, brief moment, and I returned to reading.

What Happened?

"At 36, the world is our oyster.  By 44, we’re trapped inside the oyster, gasping for air." - Jacquelyn James

How did I get here?

I think my memory after the age of around 13 is reasonably good.  My preteen memory is a disaster, consisting of a scattered group of semi-organized snapshots and movie shorts.  I remember the sand box in the back yard, I remember finding flash bulbs at the base of the Mexican pyramids, I remember walking with the old lady who always walked her dogs by our house - first Tosse, then Erie (or maybe it was the other way around).  I even have one very early memory, from before I was two years old, of eating in our kitchen while my younger sister was being born.  I probably remember the more tragic events better, or at least more vividly.
After about the age of 13, my memory comes close to approaching a more linear narrative.  But I'm sure there are some very serious flaws.  I recognize that the same events visualized by different people, especially siblings, will be remembered differently.  Both memories will be both wrong and right.
So if memories can be imprecise, is it also possible to have them be completely fabricated?  Almost certainly.

I often wonder how memory works.  How in the organic chemical goo between my ears are memories stored.  Anytime I try to read what is known about this, I get technical answers that, even as a chemist, I don't understand and I think the authors don't either, or I get rehashed:  Short term memory is stored in the frontal lobe, long term memory in the hippocampus.  I guess I really do not like biochemistry now any better than I did in college.

Buy the Ticket and Take the Ride
Jerry: "What did you wanna be?" (when you grew up)
Elaine: "I don't remember , but it certainly wasn't this."

What happens to life goals as we get older?  Our youngest life goals are ludicrous, but the most aspirational.  Becoming a superhero or a princess isn't going to happen, but those are some of the loftiest goals that anyone will ever have.
Things change as we get a little older to something slightly more realistic - cowboy (whatever that is and probably still unrealistic), fireman, principal, race car driver.  If we could all just stick to those goals, there would be a lot less paper pushing bureaucrats and middle managers.  Still, there is a phenomenal amount of us who end up as faceless people doing jobs that, frankly, blend into obscurity.
All this makes this commercial from monster.com appear very funny, when in reality it is scary and absolutely tragic.

As years go by faster, the older I get, the goals change too.  Adolescent goals of "being the boss" or "become and astronaut" seem to evolve into "getting a job in the pharmaceutical industry" or "working in a technology job."  The reality is more likely "working in an office" - a nameless, faceless office where Friday afternoon is anticipated by noon on Monday.
Maybe the problem of demoralized expectations littering the floor lies in their origin in employment.  Little kids get asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?"  We don't ask them, "Who do you want to be when you grow up?"  That may be because it can be too painful of a question to ask internally.  A waiter at a chain restaurant can always aspire to start his own business.  A person who is financially successful, but is really an asshole, will probably always be an asshole.
And time does seem to pass that much quicker with each year - something I've only recently begun to understand.  At the age of eight, one year is 12% of life, and summer seems to stretch on endlessly.  At 44, one year is just over 2% of life so far; that year goes by much quicker than the eight-year-old's summer.  At 15 years of age, almost everything is new.  Every year older makes it harder to experience anything novel.

Life IS good.  But I'm not sure this is the ride I paid the price of the ticket for...

Thoughts for the Next Year
Tim Kreider wrote something recently in the way that only Tim Kreider can.  There is a small quote in this that resonates deeply:
"...the life I ended up with, much as I complain about it, was pretty much the one I chose."
This might be tough to stomach, but is probably true.  I'm here (we're all here) because of every decision that has been made, both the good and bad.  Some of this is out of personal control, but much of it isn't.  It is a pretty good place, but it is hard not to compare it to some mythical idealized state.  Sitzfleisch.

David Brooks talks about this but not loudly.  He whispers it.  Instead of worrying about whether a tin pot shines or is dented and faded, what is the interesting story, that ends up with a dented and faded tin pot?

As another year has gone by, my hope is that I define myself less and less by what my employment happens to be.
What is important should be what I've done, even things which might seem trivial.

So what will I be when I grow up?  I don't know.

But...
I am a person who loves travel, prefers the company of dogs, loves being outside and living in a rural area, enjoys riding bikes and long contemplative dog walks as well as learning through reading and writing...

Douglas Coupland's Generation X

I resisted reading this book for a long time.  I may have even unfairly disliked it before I picked it up.  There are several reviews of the book which are quite negative, but that alone isn't a reason not to read it since everything has at least some bad reviews.  A bar of gold could probably be offered for free on amazon.com and someone would complain that it was too yellow.
The content of some of the reviews was more troubling.  That and the idea that this book, and the author, was somehow supposed to be speaking for Generation X - a group I fall in the middle of.  This was not the apparent goal of Douglas Coupland, but a role that seems to have been handed to him.  The author was born in 1961, putting him outside of the window of Generation X, or on the raggedy edge between Boomers and Gen-Xers depending on the definition one wants to use.  It is troubling that Mr. Coupland has become "the voice of a generation" he didn't belong to - this is supposed to be a novel, not a documentary.
Perhaps more than anything, I've waited too long to read this, as I may have had different eyes at the age of 22 than I do in 2015.  I wonder if the same situation could be encountered by someone who was a teen in the 1950's, but waited until the late 1970's to read On the Road by Jack Kerouac?

The book is also set in Los Angeles, which is a world away from anything approaching real life.  This is a little unfortunate, since the author is Canadian and hadn't lived in LA very long before writing it.  I actually think the book would have been more interesting if it was set in Toronto.  There is subplot for the book in New York and the last thing the world needs are more books set in LA and NY.  At least a minor portion of the book takes place elsewhere.
While the LA experience probably does not approximate that of most Gen-Xers, I was in Palm Springs for several weeks of the summer before the book was published in 1991.  I was only supposed to go to California and drive a car back, but one thing led to another, as can happen if one is lucky enough as a late teen.  This doesn't bring me closer to the stories of the book, but it actually did help with context.  What I remember most about those weeks, was the absolute dichotomy of the area.  I was staying in a large house in the shadow of Bob Hope's Palm Springs house, while also spending time in a small, poorer, working town called Banning.  This dichotomy is touched on in the book, especially in relation to consumerism and its rejection that the main characters espouse.
Going through some old pictures recently, I've been struggling to envision what my world would possibly have looked like 10 or 15 years ago - or now - if some seemingly minor choices had gone differently in the early 1990's.  Unquestionably, things could be vastly different due to some decisions at the time which seemed minor and almost arbitrary.  But history can only be rewritten once there is a victor.

The book revolves around three main characters, Andy (narrator), Dag and Claire.  A synopsis can be found elsewhere so I won't rehash it here, but the important thing to note is that there really isn't a plot to the book.  This in and of itself is not a good or bad characteristic for a book.  A plot can help push a book along.  Generation X is a very quick read and the book is more about character development than anything else; generic characters to represent a generation.  The lack of a plot does make sense in the context of a book set in the 1980's - there is no plot or narrative that can be distilled from the decade that birthed sport motorcycles, Miami Vice was on TV, Reagan was president, The Breakfast Club was filmed, and big hair bands ruled.

In 2015, the book reads like a conversation with an old acquaintance, possibly a conversation where two people have grown in totally different directions in the ensuing decades.  There are awkward pauses and the discussion is somewhat forced.  The stilted nature of the book isn't totally off putting at times since it allows thoughts to go back to a time of Sony Walkmans, family portraits with awful plastic backgrounds, large shopping malls, and Yuppies.  Do families still take formal portraits anymore?  Is there a 2015 synonym for Yuppies?  The book is completely devoid of cell phones and the internet, let alone Facebook, making the lack of a plot that much more enjoyable.
I wish I had read this book shortly after the book Ready Player One by Ernest Cline.  Ready Player One isn't a terribly memorable book, but in some ways speaks to and about Generation X in a totally different way than Douglas Coupland's book.  When video games were huge wooden boxes that required quarters, who didn't want all that wasted money and skill to go to saving the earth?

Spoiler Alert!
The book ends with an odd bit about a "cocaine white egret" and a burned farm field with some mentally retarded children.  It is too bad that Mr. Coupland didn't start with this descriptive bird as it may have made him eligible for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest.  Despite reading and rereading the ending a few times, it feels like a complete non-sequitur.  I have yet to see any explanation of the ending that I think actually makes sense with the rest of the book.  So if the 1980's didn't have a plot, as the book does not, maybe a nonsense ending out of nowhere is appropriate?  I ... found it lacking.
End Spoiler Alert!

Beyond the end of the text of the book are a series of statistics without context.  They seem to want to imply that Gen-X is screwed compared to the Boomers and the Silent Generation.  But few people I know actually lived these statistics, and then it was most often by choice.  Again, LA is not real life.  Looking at the statistics now, they look frightfully similar to what could be compiled about Millennials right now.
And maybe that is the point - the book rails against consumerism throughout the pages, just as Millennials now attempt to do, stating emphatically that, "Advertising doesn't work on me."  Yet ... once Generation X figured out how to sell to Generation X and Millennials are figuring out how to easily sell to Millennials, "consumerism" really isn't going anywhere.  This is despite every generation since World War II vilifying their parents and arguing consumerism's last gasping breath.  Even the subtitle can be transported between generations, Tales for and Accelerated Culture - "Everything happens so much faster now!" opines the Millennial.

Perhaps what really needs to be understood and taken from the book is that while we can recognize collective deviance in others, deviance is much harder to see in the generational mirror.

"You see, when you're middle class, you have to live with the fact that history will ignore you.  You have to live with the fact that history can never champion your causes and that history will never feel sorry for you.  It is the price that is paid for day-to-day comfort and silence.  And because of this price, all happinesses are sterile; all sadnesses go unpitied." - Douglas Coupland

Road Trips and the Return to Work

I recently got back from vacation.  It was a (motorcycle) road trip to somewhere tropical.  Late summer/early fall isn't the typical time to go to these places, but the down season is the best time to travel.  Things are cheaper, hotels more empty, roads less crowded, less kids - there is no down side.

I've toured through 49 states and there have been innumerable stops in towns of all shapes, locations and sizes.  My preference is for moderately small towns.  The really small towns rarely have hotels, or at least don't have a couple hotels and restaurants to choose from.  Bigger cities have very little to offer other than higher prices and maybe ... maybe something more interesting to do.  Smaller areas might require more searching, but the reward is unique sites or discovering hidden jewels.  Historic oddities are everywhere.

One of the things I like about road trips are the longer term connections it creates to places I've been.  Even if it is just a short stop for a meal.  These connections can be tenuous at best, but it makes things more personal when I hear about them, often years later.
Flooding in Minot, North Dakota?  I've been there.
Monkey loose in Valdosta, Georgia?  I've been there.
Wildfire in Lolo, Idaho?  I've been there.
Flash floods in Hilldale, Utah?  I've been there.
Yoga and Beer in Farmington, New Mexico?  I've been there.

Some of these things are not necessarily pleasant, but hearing about these events is more real having been there, even if only briefly.  Hearing about these things also brings back memories of the trip.
A meal in a small cafe in Minot while returning home from Alaska.
Overnight in Valdosta, staying a a great motel, which had questionable reviews, and with a surprisingly good sushi place within walking distance.
Lolo pass has to be one of my favorite motorcycle roads and nearby Missoula a granola paradise.
Being leered at while looking for a restaurant in Hilldale - I guess I asked for that one.
Nice conversation with a cashier in a Farmington convenience store while buying soda and Zingers.

Having driven through areas others avoid also brings serendipity.  Northern Nebraska is extremely pretty.  Situated near the black hills and the badlands, it has some character of both in areas without the dreaded RV traffic.  The vacation paradise of Florida, is surprisingly plain outside of the overcrowded coastal beaches.  I still enjoyed it though.

I was able to mentally break away from work on my recent trip.  The week before was somewhat slow, which made this easier.  There have definitely been vacations where thoughts frequently and painfully returned to work.  I have one candid picture from 2012 which was taken when I am both mentally and physically completely removed form the humdrum of day-in, day-out.  It is probably one of my favorite pictures of me.

But the day before returning to work after the recent tropical vacation was one of near dread.  I could almost see the bureaucratic pettiness of work on the horizon and as I watched reruns of Castle, which would normally sequence the end of a weekend; the end of vacation was imminent.

I've been back at work for a full week and it wasn't too bad.  A few issues piled up and a few unreasonable demands were waiting.  Still, it is amazing how many crises were resolved without any of my involvement.  Manufacturing problems does seem to be a way for some people to justify employment.

I haven't effectively used very much vacation this year.  I've got several more days I have to take before December 31, with more to be carried over to 2016 - and if I ever lose any of it, I'll know my life has gone to a place I don't approve.
That ... will not happen.

Ontario, Oregon?  I've been there.

Orion Rising

We're starting to see the first few tastes of fall.  Daylight is noticeably shortened relative to the summer solstice in June; daylight is predictable, and while temperature is not, the hysteresis in average temperature means we're well past even the typical highs in late July.  Average highs in late August are still solidly in the 80's and the humidity can be oppressive, but there have been a few early suggestions of the impending equinox weather.

I rode the bicycle a few days ago on a morning ride to a town about 20 miles away.  Leaving at the first sliver of the sun, the morning was almost cold, with fog clinging to the fields of soybeans.  A few fields showed touches of yellow leaves already forming in the otherwise dark green sea.  The bike ride, especially the first half, was stunning.  A recent article tries to paint this area of the country negatively, but I'll take the rolling rural agricultural landscape over many of the highly (over)rated and overpopulated areas.  The article propagates the myth of flyover country in graphic form.  Which is fine.  Those in New Jersey and Manhattan are welcome to stay in their natural environment.

Another year is continuing on its relentless march towards its end.

Last year's hunting was better than average with a bear, a deer and a wild boar making it into the freezer.
The bear was very large and there is still some left.  His fat didn't freeze too well, so most of what is left will be carefully trimmed and used for strong dishes like spicy stir fry or with red beans and rice.  Deer seems to last forever.  Most of my 2014 deer was ground into burger and while some slander ground venison with domestic fat, I almost always leave it native.

My early-year 2015 wild boar is now gone.  He was about average size, maybe 150 pounds.  Of all the game meat I've eaten, the wild hog has to be my favorite.  Most of the animal is very lean, making it slightly-less guilty pork.  A wild hog has most of his fat concentrated around the rib cage.  This makes the ribs difficult to cook and eat, but tasty.  It also makes them very messy.  The wild ribs were finished off much earlier in the year.

After the ribs are eagerly finished, the backstraps are finished, followed by the rest of the meat - either through steaks of varying toughness or ground wild pig.  My final wild boar meat was grilled after marinating with olive oil, pepper and ranch spices.

It is a little sad to see the wild game meat begin to be depleted, but it is better then waiting too long for it.
And after eating almost exclusively wild game for many months, the move to domesticated meats is actually a nice change, if a bit less mentally gratifying.  Regardless of origin, fall-off-the-bone ribs, cooked to perfection and finished on a smokey grill are extraordinary.

The constellation Orion is making an early morning appearance to the east just before sunrise.  Soon enough, meat from the deer and bear will be gone.  I find myself looking forward more than most years to the change in season but not for any particular reason.  Or maybe after a summer of days that passed with monotonous similarity, any change is going to be welcome.

Fresh Cut Queen Anne's Lace

I enjoy mowing the lawn.  At least I enjoy mowing the lawn when I have the time to do it.  It is a good thing that I find enjoyment in mowing, as I mow between three and four acres.  My lawn mowing has a split personality between the laughable Weed Eater push mower (cost?  $20) used for the fenced dog area and trim work, and my tank-like, aging 61-inch Snapper zero turn.

While I have always enjoyed mowing, I can vividly recall one of my lows when trying to sell my old house was a lawn mowing episode.  I had just mowed the lawn at my current house, then drove to my old house, despite the threat of intense weather.  With less than half of the lawn mowed, torrential rain moved in, drenching me and making mowing more difficult.  This deluge spawned the death of my rickety riding lawn mower, resulting in needing to finish the now sodden mowing with the slightly less rickety push mower.  This was unfortunately at the same time when selling the old house was seemingly futile - being drenched while finishing upkeep was pouring vinegar on the already distasteful.  I finished, but left the for-sale property feeling defeated.
Every problem has a solution and the riding lawn mower was eventually fixed with a very used ignition coil from Ebay.  I gave that rider away with the house when it eventually sold.
I took better care of the lawn at the old house, at least by accepted US standards.  I used selective herbicides and dutifully fertilized a couple times a year.  That house was near a creek, so the "better" care of the lawn may not have been the "better" choice for the overall ecosystem.
In my current house, the only fertilizer is what the dogs contribute and it is far to expansive to pay for even selective use of herbicides.

My neighbor takes his mowing much more seriously than I do.  He mows a similar overall amount to mine and seems to mow a section of his yard every few days.  This approach probably makes sense, but I can't stand having only part of the lawn mowed.  It is likely a character flaw, but when I mow, I wait until it really needs it and mow the whole thing.  This approach is probably more economical as well.

Thankfully, the area where I live is very tolerant of many mowing lifestyles - so the fact that my lawn is sometimes long, sometimes scalped, isn't met with any visible disagreement from my few neighbors.  Since I often mow when parts of the lawn are very long and potentially wet, it can sometimes "frump" - this is the technical word to describe how the lawn mower will push out a big ball of cut grass, rather than evenly discharging the cut grass.

Even with my tepid care of my grass, I do like the way a freshly cut level lawn looks.  And the smell can be intoxicating.  The scent of early spring cut onion grass brings faith that winter is releasing its grip.

By this date (August) in most years, rain is diminished, taking frequency of mowing along with it.  There have been years when I mowed in late summer, not really to cut the grass as much as to knock down the few high spots of weedy grass and to cut down the Chicory and Queen Anne's Lace, which continue to arrogantly grow long after the lawn has given in.
This year (2015), there seems to be no shortage of rain, and consistent rain.  Mowing this year has been a nearly weekly affair.  The consistent rain has also created a constant quaggy area in my yard's low lying area.  I suspect that old drain tile has plugged as well, resulting in my neighbor's run-off nesting in my yard.  I haven't decided yet, if this could be a long term problem or not.

This swampy area, which is impossible to cut, makes me question why I mow at all.  In a suburban area, social pressures push to maintain a certain standard, but my far back yard is a hay field, with corn growing north of me and soybeans to the southwest.  I suppose keeping the grass cut down for the dogs and to keep ticks and insects at bay makes sense, but I could foresee letting the property go wild, just to see what would happen.

But maybe not.  The few nearby vacant houses have turned to mostly stalky weeds, which is unpleasant at best.  Areas which are not routinely mowed, or at least brush hogged, end up getting choked up with invasive plants like trumpet vine (attractive, but hard to get rid of), bush honeysuckle (can make a decent screen, but I'm sure this stuff could take over the whole earth), and morning glory (an evil plant if there ever was one).  The previously mentioned chicory and Queen Anne's Lace, while not native, do at least have some redeemable qualities.
I have planted many trees in one section of the property, with the hope that one day a forest canopy will evolve, meaning mowing will be only a rare spring need.  Realistically this is some way off.  My tree care mirrors my lawn care and as a result I have a large group of sad-looking trees that desperately wish to survive beyond their current height of several inches.  Many have died, been cut down, only to regrow anew from some remaining roots.  The unbelievably strong will to live does not seem to be something possessed only by animals.

Internet searches on the subject show no shortage of sites which suggest the history of lawns go back to elite European estates and lawn care in the United States currently costs billions to maintain.  Many of us in our area of the township have donated parts of our yards to local farmers who cut and bail it for hay.  I've thought about doing this with more of my property, but indiscriminate agricultural cutting may harm my baby trees, which I do have some emotional attachment to despite their lack of care.  I'd also rather not have excessive vehicle pressure over the geothermal or septic system.
I guess I could use some of the property to grow more of my food, but I must be realistic with myself.  As much as I like to plant things like tomatoes or pumpkins, my care of them mirrors my lawn and tree care.  Once summer turns things hot and humid, nurturing plants with activities like weeding, watering and pest control are less alluring.

Ecologically, a lawn is a pretty dead place unless you include the field mice which make tunnels in the grass in the winter.  Along with the rain, the rabbits seem to be doing quite well this year as well.

Despite the expense and questionable utility, mowing acres of grass serves as a satisfying recreational activity.  As a task which takes little in the way of mental capacity, it is also good thinking time.  And any negative it carries is, frankly, a small price to pay to be away from the concrete jungle of the city or the punky, traffic-infused jungle of the suburbs.
Winter will be here all too soon, bringing with it nostalgia for the past summer's green mowing.

Meteors and Coyotes

The 2015 Perseid Meteor shower occurred this week, with the predicted peak on Thursday morning.
Most of this week has been quiet with clear, cool, cloudless skies.  Mornings are, frankly, one of many great benefits of living in a rural area.  Compared to other places I've lived and many I've visited, things are typically quiet, dark and serene.

I left all the outside lights off as I let the dogs out on Thursday.  I stayed outside several minutes and for part of my morning ritual coffee.  I did see a few short-lived meteors move across the sky.  At the peak, the expected number of sightings was forecast to be in the 50-100 per hour.  This is about 49-99 more than an average morning, but minutes staring up is a long time to wait between meteors, especially since every one will not be seen.  Many will be faint and there is still some light pollution from nearby populated areas and from the few house lights.  Thankfully, nobody nearby had left large flood lights illuminated overnight.

I suppose it was eventful seeing the Perseid Meteor Shower.  But like most astronomical phenomenon, it was a bit anticlimactic.  This is especially so when compared to some historic observations like what is depicted in the wood cut print of the 1799 Leonids.  While accounts from 1799 made it sound impressive, and there was very little light pollution then, it is hard to know if this is a real depiction, or if it contains a bit of historic embellishment.

I've seen a few solar eclipses which are dramatic, the erie light cast by a sun shrowded by the moon on a clear day is something everyone should see at least once.  It is a ways in the future, but I hope to plan to be in totality for the August 21, 2017 solar eclipse that will cross the United States, maybe even at the epicenter in Carbondale, IL or Hopkinsville, KY.  I'd love to plan to see a dramatic meteor shower someday, but luck plays a big part in that ever happening.
Many other stellar occurrences might be rare and of interest to the avid sky-gazer, but planets briefly aligning with stars or objects passing behind the shadow of the moon is interesting only in rarity, not in observation.

The brightest meteor I saw this past week was actually on Tuesday, well before the predicted peak, when I was driving to work.  Headed south, the meteor briefly, but brightly, shot to the north.  It was only chance that I happened to see it and if I hadn't been on my motorcycle, with an unobstructed view up, I likely would not have seen it at all.

One event Wednesday morning was almost more awe-inspiring than the Perseids.  I was letting the dogs in to feed them and two groups of coyotes started howling.  One group to the Northeast began, followed by a group much closer to the Northwest.  This continued for several minutes, as I paused in the cool morning to listen.  The howling, barking and yipping coyotes make is nearly magical.  Thankfully, the beagles are now hard of hearing enough not to have heard (and they probably just wanted inside to their food).  A few years younger, they would have joined in, their canine instincts are not far removed from the cousin coyotes.

While celestial events may often not be all that dramatic, there was one meteor that was unbelievably amazing to observe.  This probably happened somewhere around 1988.  It was in a summer during high school, vacationing with my friend Nathan near Lake Michigan.  In all of our teen-wisdom, we decided to take a canoe out on the lake, very late in the evening.  While in retrospect this was probably not very smart, at the time it seemed perfectly acceptable.  Sitting in the canoe, an unknown distance from shore, a positively radiant meteor shot across the horizon, north to south leaving a brief dim trail it its wake.  Nathan and I were quiet for a few seconds after it, before looking at each other and asking, "Did you see that?"  I don't think the question was as much if the other saw it; it would be impossible not to.  But it was so dramatic that the question was more asking - Was that real?  Sometimes, questionable decisions result in amazing outcomes.

I suppose I'm glad the weather this week was clear and my morning routine has me up early enough to see a few of the Perseids.  It is awesome to think that the light streaking across the sky is a clump of early galactic material from the tail of a comet that elipses around the sun; a reminder how insignificant we are, when we allow ourselves to be.  These clear, cool, quiet mornings should be hallowed for everything they proffer.

Belated Edit (10-22-15):
While not as numerous as the Leonids, the Orionids occurred with a nearly cloudless sky.  On my way to work, an unbelievably bright meteor appeared directly overhead, right out of Orion's belt, and streaked to the south, ending in an bright burst.  Amazing.

That Lion

"But one thing that never changes from decade to decade, century to century, or millennium to millennium, is the struggle between human beings to convince others to follow their vision of the world." - Mark Matthews

Thanks to one human and one lion, hunting has been in the news at an unprecedented level recently.  The human's name was Walter J Palmer.  As an undomesticated animal, the lion did not recognize any name, Cecil or otherwise.  The question must be asked - What is being saved when the 'wild' that some seem so devoted to includes lions so tame that people try to name them?  Are the whitetail deer so immune to predators that they can be photographed from 10 feet away in Cade's Cove really the outdoor legacy that should be left to future generations?

Since the much publicized events, there have been many attempts to demonize and threaten Mr. Palmer.  There have been a lesser amount of attempts to justify hunting, without justifying Mr. Palmer's immediate actions.
I'm not really sure hunting needs to be justified, and it certainly doesn't need to be justified in the context of Walter Palmer any more than my donation to a charity requires justification after your armed robbery of a convenience store.  They both involve transferring of money, but the former has nothing to do with the latter.

This is not really a discussion about hunting as much as it is a discussion about being human, being civilized, and being in touch with who we are and who we might want to be.
In the dystopian future where we are all wearing the same skin-tight, v-neck jump suit and eating soylent green, hunting may leave the conversation permanently.  Until then, those wishing to demonize all hunting need to see hunting remains a necessary part of life, visceral with parts that are unpleasant, but as important to living history, to real health as calcium is for bones.

Johnny Sain writes one of the few sane articles I've seen on the subject.

Beyond that, what needs to be critically understood, is that hunting is not about killing.  If hunting were only about killing, it would be the most painfully boring pastime ever conceived.  For every 10 bears killed, hundreds of hours are spent in preparation and in search of the right bear.  For every 100 deer killed, thousands and thousands of hours are spent in a tree stand.  For every 1000 ducks shot, hundreds of thousands of hours are spent sitting in a cold duck blind.  Individuals who participate only for the trigger time are quickly disappointed, and usually quit soon after starting.
Hunting is not just one thing, yet it is meat.  It is antlers or horns.  It is watching small animals while waiting for the larger ones.  Eating meat from the hunt brings a satiation that goes beyond ending hunger.  Hunted food creates an intimate connection to survival - a recognition that in order to live, something must die.  Mementos of the experience, the entire hunting experience, may come from taxidermy.  Taxidermy is the ultimate in participatory art.
Hunting is a theology - just as veganism is among a different, but just as ardently presupposed group.
And whether that time hunting is spent alone, or as a communion of like minded people, the time is sacred.  Most of it is quiet time for reflection, a chance to take a step back and look at the world as a whole.  A chance to ponder the reason for life, from beginning, and yes, to its end.
Hunting is not a bygone relic, any more than walking or paddling is merely an ancient curiosity in the age of driving and flying.

A disservice is done when we constantly split ourselves into smaller and smaller warring factions.  There is little delusion that the vegan will sit down with the hunter as the lion has done with the biblical lamb.  But once the vegan starts hurling raw beets at the omnivore and vegetarian for their sins, a line has been crossed into fundamentalist intolerance.

It is unfortunate that this conversation must come from one publicized event.  I doubt many of those hurling threats and vulgar insults at Mr. Palmer will be doing much to really help any lions in another 6 months, let alone 18 months.  I doubt that the politically charged atmosphere and international pressure will do much to alleviate suffering in Africa - zoological or human.  I doubt justice will be served by sending Mr. Palmer to face a level of corruption, notable even in the third world.  And I doubt the media, which is good at sharing the same talking points, whether true or blatantly false, will do much to help a more honest conversation about any of this.

What I don't doubt, is that our survival as a species depends on oxygen, water, and food.  And any discussion about future civility first requires civil discussion.

Hard to Dispose, More Difficult to Discard (Government Doesn't Get It)

I saw a news story a few weeks ago that the City of Cincinnati has set very strict rules about what can be thrown in the garbage, and more importantly, how this garbage must be attractively displayed for pick-up by what must be very discerning Solid Waste Engineers.
Most people will probably try to comply.  But with significant fines for violations, the laws of unintended consequences means that alternate disposal methods are likely.

When I get in the mood to clean and purge, I really get in the mood to clean and purge.  Since moving into this house nearly five years ago, there was quite a bit of electronic paraphernalia that I had never used, and other sundries which were likely never going to be used again.  Having a few hours last weekend, I went through much of this stuff to do a cathartic purge.
I had several storage areas where old computer hardware and software was collected and it was time to get rid of it.  After deciding what to keep and what to get rid of, I had a few piles to throw away, recycle, and unknown.  In the unknown pile were things like my palm pilot - I was unsure if it still had my information on it.  A hammer solved that dilemma, and it went into the trash pile.
I similarly destroyed the dual hard drives in my old desktop computer.  One saw several death blows with a hammer, the other was disassembled and the magnetic platter removed and shattered.
While destroying the hard drives, my memory was brought back (pun intended) to some relatively inexpensive Sun Sparc stations that the federal government was selling about 18 years ago.  These were such a good deal, that the research lab I was working in at the time looked into them.  As government computers, they had to have the hard drives removed which was understandable.  However, the bureaucrats also required the volatile RAM to be removed.  I can only surmise some ignorant government idiot manager was worried that RAM may secretly retain information.  Unfortunately, Sparc-compatible RAM was very expensive and cost nearly as much as the computers were worth.  Our lab chose not to buy these very expensive, cheap computers.

In my piles of electronic stuff to get rid of were two CRT monitors.  These went along with my older desktop computer.  I really don't see value in a desktop computer anymore as I don't play computer games.  I used to be an avid gamer, but like a quantum switch, one day I couldn't take it anymore and stopped, nearly overnight.
I also had several computer games to get rid of.  Some of these go back to Windows 3.1 days (Sam n' Max Hit the Road).  There is minimal value of these on Ebay, and I'm not sure that a disadvantaged kid somewhere will have his life improved by a good copy of Outlaws (circa 1998), so these were discarded.  As so much of my life was spent playing Doom II, Quake, Quake II and Unreal, I kept these - likely to be discarded at some future purge...

Which brings me back to my CRT computer monitors and what is the "right thing" to do with them.  There is a very limited market for reuse as monitors.  The world is now flat.  The CRT market is probably on the same scale as reuse for artistic purposes.  While creative, I'm not sure how many monitor fish tanks the world really needs.
The best option for these monitors was to recycle them appropriately.  I went to the county's website to see what options are available.  There were several listed options for computer monitors, even specifically denoting CRT monitors.  Sadly, the website is, at best, very out of date.  After traipsing around with two heavy monitors, nobody would take them for recycling, despite my willingness to also accompany them by a nominal fee to dispose of them properly.  One place listed on the county website, which may have been where I dropped off an old TV a few years ago, was apparently not quite as conscientious as they claimed to be...

After trying to do "the right thing," for quite some time, I was frustrated.  I (thankfully) do not live under the authoritative regime of Cincinnati.  I called my local refuse company and they said they will happily take and landfill CRT monitors and televisions.  I won't know until I get my next solid waste disposal bill whether this option came with a charge for it, but the nice woman I talked to on the phone said that if there wasn't very much trash and they weren't that big, the monitors would be picked up for free.  I'm often surprised at the mountains of trash some people leave out on garbage day; at my house, I usually have one very nearly empty, skinny, plastic garbage can.  The cost for this seems ridiculous compared to my neighbor's piles, as the garbage company charges a set fee per week per house.  I guess being able to throw away mountains comes at a cost.

I really don't feel too good about landfilling two old, working computer monitors.  But my options were limited.  I could:
a)  put it in the basement where it will be harder and more expensive to throw away some time in the future.
b)  continue to drive these monitors all over the world trying to find somewhere to take them, while realizing they still may never be taken care of appropriately.
c)  legally dispose of them in the landfill thanks to the benevolence of the solid waste company that serves my rural township.

I suppose there is also a d) option.  I could, under the dark cover of night, throw them into an adhoc dump.  There is a ravine created by a small creek about two miles from where I live.  Jack-wad disgusting people dump all manner of stuff there.  About a year ago, the county government cleaned it all up and put a sign telling people not to recreate the pile of garbage (with apologies to Arlo Guthrie), but it is growing once again.
I never even thought of choosing this option, but this WILL BE  the result of Cincinnati's new Draconian garbage policy.  Nearly all people want to do the right thing, but every barrier put in front of the right thing will lower the relative energy needed for people to do the wrong thing.  When it is easier and cheaper to risk dumping that old ratty couch behind an abandoned building, it will happen.  It is sad that high and mighty city government, such as Cincinnati City Council, is too blind to see this irrefutable law of unintended consequences.

I remember when I got my first really big CRT computer monitor.  I had just built my computer system after researching and buying all individual components.  It was a dual boot system - OS/2 and Windows NT - I guess I was really a glutton for punishment then.  I spent countless hours staring at that monitor while I played Quake II and Unreal.  That first large monitor died many years ago and was recycled at a time when it was relatively easy to do so.
Now, I can't imagine ever buying another CRT screen.  My personal laptop is an old derided netbook, but it is small, robust and does everything I need.

The two monitors will likely live on under a mountain of garbage.  If there is any solace in this poor, but legal, option, it is only that they may be resurrected one day when we turn to mining landfills for the materials they contain in a future post-apocalypse.  And maybe that future will look just like Quake II.

MGB Rod Bearings and Toyota Spark Plugs (why doing vehicle service myself is preferable)

I normally do most of my own vehicle service.  There are some things I don't do because they require special tools or are frankly to much of a pain to do.
There were several recalls for my 2009 Toyota Tacoma that I hadn't bothered to do.  There was also an extended warranty on the truck's headlight lenses which the vehicle showed poster child issues of.

This warranty was going to expire in November, so it was a good time to get it done while I was thinking about it and before December rolls around and I kick myself for not getting it done.
I'm relatively busy at the moment, so I decided to do other maintenance at the same time:  spark plugs, coolant change, oil change, etc.  These are things I would normally do myself, but it just made sense to do them all at once (and despite the county's suggestion that coolant can be recycled, there is no one willing to take this, and I hate disposing it locally).

After the truck was done, I drove home and popped the hood open.  The three bolts that hold the air cleaner "connector" to the top of the engine were missing.  I don't mind using the Toyota dealer for service, but since there is a slight price premium when taking it there, there is an absolute expectation that work be done 100% correctly.  While the air connector bolts are probably not the three most critical bolts on the vehicle, not having them there is completely unacceptable and it makes me question the competence of all the work done.  It was late Saturday, too late to do anything about it, my frustration must wait until Monday.

The oil pressure on my 1972 MGB has slowly been dropping with general engine wear over the years.  The vehicle isn't in the danger area yet and there was  no rattling or rod knocking, etc.  There was around 25 pounds at idle and at speed oil pressure was 60 pounds on a good day, but sometimes 50 when really warm.
This is really a case where "a stitch in time saves nine" and rod bearings with the engine in the car is not too heinously difficult, if a bit messy.
I dropped the oil pan and was pleasantly happy with what I found.  In the bottom of the oil pan, there was a bit of gasket material (pretty common) but only a trace of sludgey goo.  When I was working as a mechanic at a British car shop, it wasn't uncommon to drop an oil pan and find an inch of thick grey sludge, suggesting much in the way of metal erosion and general contamination.
Pulling the rod caps revealed 0.010 over rod bearings with just a taste of copper showing on three of the four top bearings.  This is "good" engine wear and suggests no significant issues, especially since the rod journals looked nearly perfect.

The oil pump looked quite bad with clearances well in excess of what should be expected.  I almost suspect that on a previous rebuild/repair, the oil pump was not replaced or rebuilt.  I ordered most parts from Moss Motors, with an oil pump rebuild kit from Engel Imports.  I've read various reports on the quality of the new oil pumps, but replacing the guts almost always works satisfactorily.  I actually had a new oil pump of unknown origin which I decided not to use - due to the unknown origin part.
Since I think engine work must be done with scrupulously clean parts, I was scouring the oil pan when I noticed the pan was cracked.  This explains at least part of the reason why the car leaked so much oil; it is British, so some leaking just serves as rust proofing.  I'm actually surprised it wasn't leaking more with the crack in the pan.  Ebay to the rescue, I was able to find a good pan at a fair price, although it was mislabeled on Ebay, saying it was an 18G pan, which would have had 19 mounting bolts instead of the 18GB-on 18 bolts.

It has been a few years since I've been waist deep in an engine, so I was extra careful reassembling everything.  But everything went together well and it was only a short time until I refilled the engine with oil, pulled the spark plugs out and spun the engine over to get oil pressure prior to starting it.
Once oil pressure was achieved, I started the engine.  Happily, but with a twinge of worry, the oil pressure topped out near 100 pounds - a bit more than I would have wanted.  I let the car idle before driving it, and as the oil heated, the pressure dropped, but not by much.
I had all sorts of conspiracy theories as to why the oil pressure was so high, but Occam's razor suggests the simplest explanation is almost always right.  I had previously (maybe a year ago?) installed Moss' "uprated" oil pressure relief valve (329-235) to help push the lowering pressure up.  With fresh rod bearings and, more critically, a rebuilt oil pump, this might have been too much.
I removed the oil pressure relief valve and removed the shim.  Installing this valve, especially with the uprated spring, is a bitch with the engine in the car, but after a little cursing I got it back in.  The oil pressure is still a bit high, but now at an acceptable level.  I'll need to drive the car for a couple hundred miles first, but I may replace the oil pressure relief spring with the standard one in the future.

On the Monday after my Toyota Tacoma service, I got an automated email from the dealership service supervisor that he expects 100% satisfaction and to email him if I wasn't 100% satisfied.  I don't expect he really wants any emails, but I let him know, in very polite terms, I was displeased.  I never heard back from him.
I returned to the Toyota dealership after work and showed where the three bolts were missing.  The first reaction of the service writer, and it was the wrong reaction, was, "We weren't even anywhere near there."  When I pointed out the spark plugs were directly underneath the bolts, she just made a funny face and got the mechanic.  The mechanic looked at it, walked back to his bench and said something about rusty bolts but replaced the three prodigal fasteners.
I would have preferred if the service writer would have looked at the missing bolts, looked back at me and said, "We screwed up."  But I guess this is too hard to admit even a minor mistake.

I've got a few tens of miles on the MGB at this point.  I won't claim success yet - it is always possible a piece of dirt will end up being in the wrong place or a bearing will spin (or something), but several hours of time and a very messy oily garage floor gives the engine on the MGB a new lease on life.  I did notice that the oil cooler lines have some suspicious cracks in them, along with minor weeping of oil.  This is not due to the recent work, but more likely is exasperated by the higher oil pressure.  I suspect the oil lines are original to the car, and I'll be happily replacing the 40-something year old lines shortly, before an extended test drive is in order.  There is no reason to do this much work to an engine, only to have it undone by an exploding oil line.

One of the Rules of Life is "If you are very concerned with how something is going to be done, do it yourself."  Doing the engine work on the MGB was fun.  There is always a risk something inadvertent may go wrong.  Yet, I'm quite certain that everything was done well and there are not three bolts missing on the top of the MGB engine.

At least my shiny new Tacoma headlights are nice...

Not a Drop, Day 1826

I've thought a lot about whether I should even write this and, subsequently, a lot about this disjointed, non sequitur blog in general.  I've pondered what five years means, and what five years does not mean.  I've ruminated how unscripted events could have come together to reach 1826 days after day 1 with a different outcome and the possibility I could have been in a different place.
Perhaps, I should be thinking about the future.

"It is difficult to live in the present, ridiculous to live in the future, and impossible to live in the past." - Jim Bishop

I've been reading about various individuals' experiences in quitting drinking.  These weren't the writings in some of the excellent books on the subject like Neil Steinberg's Drunkard.  These are the average Jane and Joe writing about quitting drinking or cutting back.   
I'm not sure it is healthy to perpetually (or for years) write about the topic.  If it remains something constantly at the forefront, then the "new normal" won't ever have been achieved - and I believe strongly that a new normal is required.  Years writing about one subject also seems painfully trite.  To be fair, years writing about anything and everything might seem almost manic.  If nothing else, writing about anything and everything is a good way to remain contentedly anonymous.  Anonymity is highly underrated.
I'll separate the experience from quitting from what is written as a "how-to."  The change can be difficult, so no fault for attempts to help.  But, any one way to stop will likely only work for a very small amount of people.  Lay-person or even uninformed expert advice runs the risk of being unhelpful.  Some would almost be funny if they were simultaneously so dangerous.

The 2-year milestone seems almost delusionally real.  2012 in general was an odd year.  The old house had sold the previous fall;  the new house was still new enough that it was a natural euphoria, although that exhilaration was tempering.  The four worst months of my career had been survived - "efficiency experts" are the two most terrifying words in the corporate language.
But, reaching two years felt real, maybe not as normal as I wanted it to then, but real enough.

One writer talked about a milestone I hadn't ever previously thought about.  She wrote about approaching a point where more of her life was spent not drinking, than drinking.  I'm not really sure where that mark would be for me, since I'm not really sure where to start the time zero point.  After the first time I drank, it was a looooonnnnggggg time before I could even smell booze again without getting queezy.  That evocative saccharin scent of schnapps probably remains to this day.  Some rough estimations suggest I'm probably near the half-way point as well.  It was interesting to contemplate the half life as a milestone.  It was also a little depressing, so much of that time was spent in infancy through childhood.

I didn't think much about the 3-year time point.  Year 3 was a phantasmagoria, everyone takes a twisted contorted path to where they are, but where we are is just another stop in twisted contorted path to where we will be.
The lessons from year 3 demonstrated that even though more of life was under control, much of it remained unchained.

There were several people writing about the slip-ups as much as any successes, or about xx drinks as a positive (implying less than normal).  There is empathy in reading these; because there has to be.  A few of these alternate between brief periods of well-written prose discussing the repeated early efforts of quitting, with long periods without postings.  The saddest blogs are the ones that start out sincere and intense, but are very brief.  The end writes a final assumed chapter of failure.

Reaching 4 years was as much about the break I took from the online writing for other writing I wanted to do.  This points to the ongoing normalcy of not drinking.  Which leads to this 5-year posting; very possibly my last dedicated to the subject.
The last year has become normal in a way I previously would have had a hard time imagining.

One other writer calculates the time regained by not drinking.  The amount of time was pretty fantastic in his/her case (I couldn't tell from the blog which sex the author was).  In my own case, the number may be surprising only in the aggregate of five years.  I still squander much of that time in front of the TV, but enough of it is spent doing things that are fulfilling in a very real sense.

I've been putting fingers to keyboard, thoughts to digits, over the last few weeks as I knew this 5-year milestone was imminent.  In that same time, my Father died.  This was not unexpected as he was diagnosed with what almost assuredly was a terminal illness early in the year.  But it was unexpected as the end seemed to come very quickly; maybe it always does.  I can't image going through the emotional roller coaster of my Dad's passing with the mental distention of alcohol hanging over me.
Over the last several months, I got to know my dad in way that I hadn't previously.  I believe he would have said the same about me.  I don't know if we become omniscient in death.  But if we do, then I am slightly comforted in knowing that I am more honestly the person he knew.

There are still times I miss it a little bit but in the same way as I miss lots of things that are gone forever.
"Once you experience nostalgia, the thing you are nostalgic about is long dead." - Jen
Alcohol is the great equalizer for introverts in an extroverted world.  Where the last five years has brought me to is caring much less about that extroverted world.

Quitting drinking has enabled so many of the other positive changes over the past years that any negatives seem more and more like unnecessary footnotes:
I have never, ever - even once - woken up on a Saturday morning and wished I had a hangover!  Never...
I already touched on the time I've taken back by stopping, but the positive repercussions of this shouldn't be understated.  Time is one of the few fixed commodities in life.  I don't know if I'll die tomorrow or 60 years from now, but my time on the earth is absolutely fixed.  This has become unquestionably personal recently.
Much like time, the amount of money I would have spent on various consumable bottled liquids is quite real.  On the small scale this isn't much, but aggregated over five years (and more in the future) it amounts to real money.  Add in occasional questionable purchases from Amazon or Ebay after drinking and the number gets frighteningly larger.
I'm writing more, even self-published my book.  Yeah, it was excessively simple and one chapter is even about a guy who quits drinking.  But, this is just one example (of many) of something which probably never would have happened without the changes over the last five years.
Once I unlearned some of my bad habits, my time away from work is infinitely better.  No more do I look forward to vacation as a time to cope and unwind.  Yet, I probably need vacation more now than ever; I crave it because it is now my own time.  It doesn't belong to something else altogether.

I look forward to mornings now.  I like waking early and having time, sometimes just minutes and other times hours, quiet contemplative time to stand back and look at everything with some clarity.  Early morning with a book is better than late night with a glass.

Arbitary though it may be, five years does seem like a milestone.  As a reminder of all the changes over the last five years, I got a tattoo of a broken bottle.  Unlearning the habit of booze was only one slow, deliberate life change, but it was an enabling change.  The permanence of the tattoo has significance.  There is also significance in the placement on my upper arm where few others will ever see it (you'll never see me in a wife-beater and I'm not a lay-around-the-beach kind of person).

When Steve was giving me the tattoo, we were talking about why I made the design that I did and he asked me if I had quit drinking.  After responding positively, he paused and looked up at me, "How do you sleep at night?"
"Much better ... much better."

The bottles continue breaking.