Two Funerals and a Staff Meeting

This marks the second of two uninspiring weeks back to work. Last week was just the post-vacation sloth, a very typical response for me. This week just had several "special" events to make it sparkle so much more.

So, two funerals. Both were related to work (a good thing otherwise they would be family or friends and that would be really unpleasant) and I did not know either party. The first was the husband of my Cub Training chair who has been ill since before I moved here. I knew folks at the funeral and actually got a few things done while sympathizing with the volunteer. The second was for a person who had been active in Scouting here in the 60's and then moved away and became a professional in FL after retirement. I went to represent the council and profession and knew no one there. That was depressing. Equally uncomfortable is the professional uniform that I wore to both at least in the warm weather.

The staff meeting was a great item to sandwich between. It was actually only for the South Team--the ugly step-children of the council. I went with the intent of not being cynical or oppostional. That lasted about the first hour and a half and then slowly slipped away. I swear that I am not always ornery, but if you only saw me at staff meetings you might consider this to be the case. I did manage not to make the boss cranky even though I felt it my duty to challenge points I felt invalid. Meetings are a valid reason to accomplish nothing else the rest of the day.

To make life better, we went to Best Buy and Borders. I bought new component cables and audio cables so that I can wire by DVR box to the high def inputs on my TV. This made me happier. The rewiring is tomorrow's plan for the day especially since it is supposed to be too darn hot to do much outside.

BTW: Heat will kill your DVR box. Upon return from vacation I found the box frozen having not recorded 4 days of TV. It took 45 minutes to reset. Not good. I then tried to watch TV and the box decided to reset itself 20 minutes into the show. The cable guy came several days later and swapped the box out with a new one. Apparently I can't keep the box in the entertainment center or it is likely to die again so now it sits on a trunk next to the TV until I figure out what to do with it. I love poorly made technology.

Stay Cool.

Man Laws

This is the "Men of the Square Table" commercial series from Miller Lite. It is hilarious.

Man Laws Site

There was a great podcast from Charlie Sykes about it this morning. Apparently some feminists are all up in arms about them taking hidden meaning from them, once again attributing great depth to male thinking. Here is his commentary.

On the site, there are some of the commercials shown as well as a listing of man laws including user-submitted laws. There are something like 27,000 of them and the site has had over 13 million hits. Most of the ones I read rang true.

Check it out.

Pictures from the trip

I finally got around to posting my trip photos online. Here are the links:

Washington DC Pictures

Shenandoah Pictures

New River Gorge Pictures

There are more pictures with me in them than usual. Some are retouched in Photoshop to account for lighting conditions (you'll see what I mean).

The Rest of the Trip

Below this post you will find two of the musings I composed while traveling and before that is the travel diary for my road trip through visiting Tim in DC. I haven't gotten as far as posting pictures yet, but I will soon. Anyways....

I left DC on Thursday heading towards Shennandoah National Park via the REI and Target in Fairfax. The north entrance of the park is a little over an hour's drive from the city due west by freeway. For those unfamiliar with the park, it runs for 104 miles from Front Royal, VA south along the ridgeline of the Shennandoah Valley and was one of the first parks designed with auto touring in mind and thus centers on Skyline Drive which becomes the Blue Ridge Parkway upon leaving the park in the south. My trip there lasted from Thursday through Saturday morning.

Where did I sleep? In a tent, of course. It was not all that rustic as I stayed in the drive-in campground at Big Meadows which is about midway through the park. From here it was pretty easy to do some good hiking. Overall I hiked about 10 miles with a total elevation change in that time in the neighborhood of 6000 feet (up and down or 3000 feet of each). I was that happy post-hike sore when I left to the point of feeling almost immobilized. Some of the sights I saw (in order) were:

Hawksbill Summit: This is the highest point in the park at 4,050 feet. The view was awesome and the breeze felt really good after the hike to get up there. A Peregrine Falcon reestablishment project is currently in process at this site with the goal of reintroducing a viable population back into the area. It was awesome to see the birds soaring in the thermals and to hear their scream as they dove.

Lewis Falls: One of the many falls in the park, actually the third tallest at 81 feet. The hike was all downhill to get there which was great, returning was less fun. Finding the actual overlook for the falls was not exactly easy to do. No mention is made on the sign that you need to cross the creek above the falls to get to the viewpoint which is a really nice platform with flagstone walls.

Rapidian Camp: Camp David was built by FDR as Shangri-La. Before that presidents found their own retreats. Rapidian Camp was built at the orders of Herbert Hoover using Marine labor with materials he paid for. The standard for selecting the site was that it needed to be above 2500 feet (no mosquitos), within 100 miles of DC, and have at least two trout streams nearby. He did the majority of the design and engineering for the site which eventually included 13 buildings. Only 3 now stand including the Brown House where he stayed. It is not very easy to get to and was actually fairly cool.

Blackrock Summit: This is in the southern part of the park and is actually a fairly short hike to the summit. The last part of the way to the peak is a scramble up a pile of granite boulders. Sitting up on top was one of the most relaxing views I found in the park and it was a fun scramble.

The animals of the park were way too docile, especially the deer. One spent more that ten minutes watching me attempt to start a fire (I did succeed in time). Another buck in velvet was walking the roads of the campground being stalked by a 9 or 10 year old boy. I also saw two baby black bears crossing the road.

The part of the park most people see is from the numerous overlooks on Skyline Drive. They're pretty, but the mountains all start looking the same eventually.

I left the park on Saturday heading to Beckley, WV and New River Gorge. I stopped at President Wilson's library and museum. It was underwhelming.

New River Gorge is one of the deeper gorges in the country and has the largest single span arch bridge in the world over it. I stopped at both visitors center and did a short hike at one of the overviews. It was nice, but I was rather tired and decided not to hang around much on Sunday after visiting the bridge so I headed to Cleveland early.

While in Cleveland I visited Cuyahoga National Park which is in the south suburbs between Cleveland and Akron and is a relatively new park where no camping is allowed. There are some pretty cool falls that I stopped to see. Also on the itinerary was the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. It is not cheap to visit here, but I enjoyed it greatly and spent 5 hours there going through all of the exhibits and watching a lot of the video presentations. I actually found what I learned in my History of Rock and Roll class in college useful in going through the museum. If you like Rock, this should be on your visit list.

From here I went home and visited family and friends and spent some time relaxing. I got back to Sheboygan late on Saturday after a total of 2540 miles of driving.

Hiking Through Appalachia

Smartwool socks, check. Nike trail running shoes, check. USGS/National Geographic map, check. Camelback day pack, check. Pick a trailhead, drive down Skyline Drive, park the car, check the map; time to hit the trail and see Shenandoah from the trail. Time now to enjoy the view and spending time one with nature on a well-marked trail.

This is how I tackled the mountains ringing the Shenandoah Valley. Think though how our ancestors saw this range of mountains from the early settlement of the continent, the Revolutionary period, in the Civil War and throughthe Depression.

When the first white settlers landed in the early 17^th Century the land was an unconquered wilderness stretching from sea to shining sea. The priority for these brave folk was merely to survive the coming winter and make a home for themselves in this foreign land. They were woefully unprepared for the land they set out to tame and had to improvise and rely on the assistance of the natives. The mountains on the horizon were not an immediate concern short of a hope that a route to the Orient might lie beyond.

By the Revolutionary period white settlers had established the first homesteads in the mountains of Appalachia and roamed beyond to the West…Ohio and beyond. As our forefathers fight for independence for the Colonies, the mountains are seen as the natural boundary of the nation being birthed. Let the natives live beyond them, there is enough room between them and the sea for our citizens was the government policy of the day.

This lasts not so very long as settlers pushed on seeking their own land and fortunes equipped with the bare minimum or less to build on. Crossing unmarked mountains and rivers barely charted with shoes of felt or hide, leather if they were lucky they made new settlements and pushed onward. Living in canvas shelters or rough cabins, slowly they worked the stony soil by hand to build the farms to sustain them. These were the first wave in our Manifest Destiny.

Four-score and seven years later a war is fought for the soul of the nation and future of the Union. The prime battleground lies between Washington and Richmond, both fortified beyond any other city in American history before or after. Yet the most active campaigns in the east are in the Shenandoah Valley, the “breadbasket of the Confederacy”. Stonewall Jackson’s “foot cavalry” move at up to 25 miles per day on foot ranging through the valleys and mountains of the Shenandoah as a constant threat to Washington. His efforts tie down many troops of the Union Army in defense of the city and attempting to hunt down the Confederate armies of the Shenandoah. The campaigns last until 1864 when Union General Philip Sheridan finally succeeded in defeating Confederate forces in the Valley. The troops of the Confederacy managed all that they did ill-clad in homespun wool uniforms, suspect shoes, eating hardtack and salt pork and sleeping on the ground in a wool blanket and hauling the tools of their devastating trade.

Another several generations later, a great Depression sweeps the land and the unemployed are given work in the Civilian Conservation Corps. Using hand tools and the primitive machines of the time, they make a lasting impression on the landscape in building Skyline Drive through the forest growing back where farms once stood before their families moved West or into the cities seeking a new life.

One-hundred and four miles of road riding the ridgelines of a mountain chain that has left a legacy in American history of amazing feats and stunning beauty; once a place of labor and future building, now a place for peace and rediscovery of the soul and remembrance of those who came before.

Hiking Through Appalachia

Smartwool socks, check. Nike trail running shoes, check. USGS/National Geographic map, check. Camelback day pack, check. Pick a trailhead, drive down Skyline Drive, park the car, check the map; time to hit the trail and see Shenandoah from the trail. Time now to enjoy the view and spending time one with nature on a well-marked trail.

This is how I tackled the mountains ringing the Shenandoah Valley. Think though how our ancestors saw this range of mountains from the early settlement of the continent, the Revolutionary period, in the Civil War and throughthe Depression.

When the first white settlers landed in the early 17^th Century the land was an unconquered wilderness stretching from sea to shining sea. The priority for these brave folk was merely to survive the coming winter and make a home for themselves in this foreign land. They were woefully unprepared for the land they set out to tame and had to improvise and rely on the assistance of the natives. The mountains on the horizon were not an immediate concern short of a hope that a route to the Orient might lie beyond.

By the Revolutionary period white settlers had established the first homesteads in the mountains of Appalachia and roamed beyond to the West…Ohio and beyond. As our forefathers fight for independence for the Colonies, the mountains are seen as the natural boundary of the nation being birthed. Let the natives live beyond them, there is enough room between them and the sea for our citizens was the government policy of the day.

This lasts not so very long as settlers pushed on seeking their own land and fortunes equipped with the bare minimum or less to build on. Crossing unmarked mountains and rivers barely charted with shoes of felt or hide, leather if they were lucky they made new settlements and pushed onward. Living in canvas shelters or rough cabins, slowly they worked the stony soil by hand to build the farms to sustain them. These were the first wave in our Manifest Destiny.

Four-score and seven years later a war is fought for the soul of the nation and future of the Union. The prime battleground lies between Washington and Richmond, both fortified beyond any other city in American history before or after. Yet the most active campaigns in the east are in the Shenandoah Valley, the “breadbasket of the Confederacy”. Stonewall Jackson’s “foot cavalry” move at up to 25 miles per day on foot ranging through the valleys and mountains of the Shenandoah as a constant threat to Washington. His efforts tie down many troops of the Union Army in defense of the city and attempting to hunt down the Confederate armies of the Shenandoah. The campaigns last until 1864 when Union General Philip Sheridan finally succeeded in defeating Confederate forces in the Valley. The troops of the Confederacy managed all that they did ill-clad in homespun wool uniforms, suspect shoes, eating hardtack and salt pork and sleeping on the ground in a wool blanket and hauling the tools of their devastating trade.

Another several generations later, a great Depression sweeps the land and the unemployed are given work in the Civilian Conservation Corps. Using hand tools and the primitive machines of the time, they make a lasting impression on the landscape in building Skyline Drive through the forest growing back where farms once stood before their families moved West or into the cities seeking a new life.

One-hundred and four miles of road riding the ridgelines of a mountain chain that has left a legacy in American history of amazing feats and stunning beauty; once a place of labor and future building, now a place for peace and rediscovery of the soul and remembrance of those who came before.

On The Trail

Blood singing in your veins
Heart pounding the rhythm of a marching band
Legs straining to make the next stride forward

Forest full of riotous color and smell
Blue mountains crowding the horizon framed by great white clouds
Path strewn with rocks older than the ages

Pack riding about your hips and snug to your back
Sheen of sweat on your skin staining the shirt you wear
Eyes seeing all around through polarized lenses

Wildlife browsing for food or resting in the afternoon sun
River roaring over the falls down to the sea
Fish lazily swimming about in calm pools

Poles in hand, arms swinging in time
Skin warmed by the sun shining down and dappled by the shade of the overhanging trees
Feet scrambling for purchase over the carpet of the land

Mind at peace in tune with nature’s glory
Soul filled with a song of glory and wonder for the work of His hand and beauty of the land
Refreshed, revived, on the trail again

Of Fireworks and the Fourth

Settled with nearly a half-million other folks from this country and others, I gazed with rapt attention at the fireworks display performed above the Reflecting Pool. The show was alive with bursts of color, shimmering after effects, streams of glowing light over a backdrop of the Washington Monument being slowly obscured with smoke. The sound like repeated claps of thunder reverbrating from the tree-lined Mall and echoing chamber of Lincoln puncutated by the lull before the next storm of sound and light was propelled skyward by lines of lovingly placed and planned mortars. Why this burst of energy on a warm, humid evening in July, a scene repeated in many degrees of splendor across this nation and outposts of its citizens the world over? A love of country that has moved mountains and joined seas, led men to reach great heights and die to protect them, firm with the knowledge that there is no obstacle that cannot be overcome. This love celebrated on the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration that gave rise to the nation for which it is displayed is awesome in its splendor. The show is symbolic of this nation's stunning rise to a peak not seen since the glory of Rome's rule.

The show is even greater when set among the monuments to men and events that brought America to be where she is today. The Great Emancipator gazes solemnly down the Mall past the memorial to those who died in a World at War, past the monument to the man who led our nation from colonies into union, at the building where the representatives of the people of this nation make the decisions as to the future of it. Across a basin stands monuments to the author of the Declaration that set us free and a park dedicated to a man who felt mankind should have Four Freedoms and believed our mission to be to fight and die, if we must, for them. All throughout the grounds are other rememberances, large and small, as tokens to those who shaped our land. Overlooking it from the south are the graves of the many men and women that chose to serve and die to keep it free. Over these preserved lands many wander seeking to understand or just seeking to see often without understanding or feeling the meaning behind the symbols and memories.

Sadly, now that the day is done most will return to their daily grind with little thought of the celebration just past and the signifigance of the display. Why do we pick just one day to show our pride and love for this nation when everyday we reap its bounty? There is no need for fancy displays to catch the eye and ear and enliven the soul, but a simple expression of appreciation for the opportunities we have and are allowed. What is patriotism? Is this one day spectacle all that there is? While "Remember the Troops" is on the lips of many, do we really take time to appreciate what they are fighting for? I feel that few do. We take for granted so many things: the right to a difference of opinion, the opportunity to move freely in space and society, the right to think as we wish and the right to have input on the expansion or diminishment of those rights. Instead of appreciating these rights many seem bent on diminishing or redefining them to their own gratification not seeking to help others achieve those same rights whether here around the hearth or abroad.

I cannot expect that every person will take the time to appreciate the land that they inhabit, but I can hope that each who is able to live fully those rights it endows will remember how it came to be and strive to be worthy to carry on in the traditions of those who came before.

On Vacation

FYI: Parking tickets are cheaper than parking garages in D.C. After some debate, I chose to park without a permit in Tim's neighborhood rather than seek a parking garage. I got a decent spot a block and a half away in a safe spot, but easy to reach for the parking gestapo. Thus far I have accumulated 1 ticket at $30.00. The cheapest parking in the area is at the airport (40 minutes with one train change away by Metro) at $9.00 a day ($45.00) minimum for my stay here and it was much more expensive from there. Assuming I beat the gestapo to my car in the morning, I'll save 50% off of the minimum cost for actually paying for parking. Yes, I will pay the tickets.

As noted previously, I am in DC again for my second trip this year. I entered town on Sunday after an exciting 14-hour (over two days) trek across the Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania Turnpikes. Whoppee! Short of the half-hour I spent seeking a decent parking spot, the trip was uneventful. Julie and Sean arrived the day before I did by plane (the way to get here...unless there are other stops on the way). I led the whirlwind tour of the highlights on Monday including Arlington Cemetary (has a new monument to the Shuttle disasters), Museum of American History (President exhibit and Muppets display cases), Museum of Natural History (she wanted to see the Hope Diamond...so did many other women...much jostling occured), and paying homage to Teddy on his island. Tuesday was a bit more subdued with a lot of walking, watching a bit of the parade and ending with the fireworks and a nice night stroll around the monuments (the best way to see them). Today I got them on the train to the airport and visited a good used book store and the American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery which are in the same building and have some great pieces. I'll post pictures from the visit after I get home.

Tomorrow I am heading out to Shennandoah National Park for two nights followed by New River Gorge and then on to MI from Monday night through Saturday afternoon. So for you Michiganders who read this, I'll be in town with car next week expect a call seeking a time to visit.