Have I slipped back in time???

I've been a satellite radio subscriber for several years now.  I spend a lot of time wandering the channels but I have several that are favorites including one called Margaritaville.  You can guess who the mainstay of that one is.  It turns out that Jimmy B and I have a number of things in common, including (a) being old (b) we're both pilots (c) both members of the airplane crash survivor's club (d) we've both been shot at and (e) both are writers.  I have to admit, he's had a bit more success at publishing his works that me but still, we're obviously kindred spirits in this nutty world that expects more adherence to convention than either of us have been able to adopt.  Oh, ond we both like the odd and sometimes offbeat musician.

So last night, while doing my best to confirm to a common sense approach to life and driving to Famous Project Manager's school, the folks at Margaritaville popped on a tune by a band called "The Explorer's Club".  That caught my attnention because, of course, the Explorer's Club - the real one not the band - is an extra cool bunch of adventurers the likes of Robert Peary (first to the North Pole), Roald Amundsen (first to South Pole), Sir Edmund Hillary (first to the summit of Everest), and Neil Armstong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins and if you don't know what they were first at I think you might be hopeless.  Anyway, the "new" Explorer's Club seems to have decided to channel the Beach Boys.  These South Carolina guys stopped me cold when I heard them sing. 

Check this out - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgLiYy5uYhw

Then, just to show you I'm not really nuts - give a listen 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QB2Ck00YZ8&feature=fvst

Game Seven...What a Series!!!

Game Seven for the cup....

At times I find myself comparing life to a hockey game, or more correctly comparing life to a series such as we are seeing played out now.  Some days I just don't want to get up and keep pushing, I'd rather lay around and watch a little tv, read the paper and then maybe go for a hike.  I don't think it works that way either in life, or in hockey.  It certainly hasn't for the teams from Boston and Vancouver, who somehow manage to keep finding the strength to skate one more time.  Maybe those plus one million dollar salaries help, but still, after being pounded for six hours, I think I might just drift off to the side and try to be invisible.

Tonight is the final meeting of the teams for the 2011 Stanley Cup when Vancouver meets Boston in Rogers Arena in Vancouver.  I'm hoping to see a bit more of what's pictured in the attached photo with the puck somehow managing to slip past the incredible wall of Tim Thomas.  It's hard to wish defeat on him given the completely unbelievable performance he has had in this series, but I do wish the best for the "almost" hometown Canucks.

After this, no more hockey until October.  Grrr.

The Stanley Cup

Hockey. In my opinion there is simply no other sport to rival it. The speed, the intensity, the barely contained violence, the grace, the skill - all these things combined into one high speed, high-def, tecnicolor expression of the most elemental competitive spirit exhibited by man.  And the Stanley Cup represents the culmination of all those things. 

The Stanley Cup - The Cup, Lord Stanley's Cup, or even the Holy Grail it's sometimes called - is the reward for a season of skating and hitting and, ultimately, winning more than any other team.  The original cup was awarded to the top ranked Canadian amateur team - the Montreal Hockey Club - in 1893.  Since then it's passed to the professional teams in the NHL - starting in 1926. 

In the NHL each team plays 82 regular season games.  That's 82 games of intensity and pain.  The reward for the teams with the best records at the end of the regular season is the chance to play more.  The top eight teams from the two conferences - East and West - have three playoff rounds of best-of-seven series to qualify for the Stanley Cup game.

Tonight - May 12 - the San Jose Sharks and the Detroit Redwings face off in game seven of the Western Conference semifinals.  The winner advances to play the Vancouver Canucks in the Western Conference finals.  In the Eastern Conference it's between the Boston Bruins and the Tampa Bay Lightning.

The last few games of the year will dial up the intensity of an already intense game.  Take the time to tune in for some of these contests and see for yourself if you can imagine what it takes to invest the energy required into this line of work. 

Tired of the Big City??

There was mention in the paper last week about a dispute between the citizenry of Lost Springs Wyoming and the Census Bureau.  It turns out the official count was wrong - Lost Springs has tripled it's population to 3!!!!

That got me to thinking about small towns.  I mean REALLY small towns.  After a bit of exploring thanks to Google (bless you Al Gore) here is a collection of fascinating information you can use when planning your move to the quiet, rural paradises we didn't know about.

Other towns in the US with a claimed population of 1 from the 2010 census:
Criehaven, Maine. 
Hibberts Gore, Maine
Keil Township, Minnesota
Township 157-30, Minnesota (should also be awarded something for the weirdest town name)
Dix's Grant, New Hampshire
Greens' Grant, New Hampshire
Bonanza, Utah (wonder what Little Joe Cartwright things of this one?)
Hanks, North Dakota (only one town in this state?)
Hobart Bay, Alaska
Holy City, California (this one surprised me - California??)
Laurier, Washington (I've even been here but must have blinked)
Monowi, Nebraska
and the oddly named Oil Springs Reservation, New York

The winner of the smallest town in the US is Hoot Owl Oklahoma.  They actually claimed a population of 0 in the 2000 census.  That's zero, down from a high of 5 in 1990.  By 2010 it has returned to a crowd of 4.

Next time you're feeling overwhelmed by traffic as you try to drive I-5 into Seattle, just remember Lost Springs.

Japanese Tragedy

I hardly know what to say about this.  Obviously there has been plenty written already along with hours and hours of video coverage on television and on youtube.  I look through the videos and can hardly comprehend what I'm seeing.  Makes you wonder just how good a grip we actually have on our lives when you see how quickly it can all just go away.

Obviously we need to help these people.  And just hope we aren't the next in line to live through a horror like this.

Do what you can to help and do what you can to prepare yourselves.

The Wolverine Way

For some odd reason, wolverines have been getting my attention of late, with a recent lecture by a USFS biologist regarding research in the Cascades and then this book, which I stumbled onto in the local library. I have to admit, I'm baffled as to why this is the first book by Doug Chadwick I've read. It was not, however, the last. Let me sum up this work by saying it is an incredible read with information about what is clearly one of the most interesting animals on the planet and by quoting Mr Chadwick on his summary of this animal.....

"If wolverines have a strategy, it's this: Go hard, and high, and steep, and never back down, not even from the biggest grizzly, and least of all from a mountain. Climb everything: trees, cliffs, avalanche chutes, summits. Eat everybody: alive, dead, long-dead, moose, mouse, fox, frog, its still-warm heart or frozen bones."

Douglas Chadwick

I'm glad I'm not a frog in Indonesia....

When I was a young and idealistic university student of Wildlife Biology at the time when the term "ecology" was just being invented, there were still salmon and swordfish aplenty. Not only could you order either fish at a restaurant and feel no anguish over impacting a population, we didn't even grasp the concept of impacting a population. If there were farmed salmon, I'd never heard of them. If there was a dramatic decrease in the size of swordfish taken in the Atlantic fishery, it hadn't been realized yet.


Fast forward a few years and I still won't order the sword at dinner - although I have given up criticizing those who do. And not only has sportfishing for salmon fallen on hard times, the commercial venture from California to Oregon has all but disappeared. Alaska is feeling it as well and as we all know, there are salmon species that travel the Columbia that are still listed as endangered. So what do you suppose we have learned from our years and years of overfishing and the stunning impact it had on the marine fishery? Apparently nothing.

It seems that somewhere between 200 million and 1 billion (that's with a 'B') frogs are eaten every year. Indonesia leads the export market, so being a frog there makes it a real challenge to live a long and prosperous froggy life. While I am not a particular fan of frog legs and feet, it would seem there are plenty of folks that are. Having eaten them, I can confirm that they taste like chicken - as long as the chicken spent it's life in a pot of water. So it's sort of like eating a wet, fishy chicken.

It might be worth trying to remember the lessons we've learned in the world's oceans. Or maybe our froggie friends really will croak.
For more details on this whole unpleasant amphibian disaster - read this - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28876555