On the Difference Between National Park and Forest Campsites

Our national parks and forests are a treasure. As David, a motorcyclist
I met while camping out in Yellowstone earlier this week said, "This is
the first national park in the world. While you're riding through the park
tomorrow think about that." I did think about that and it's huge, both
Yellowstone and the idea of national land set aside for the people.

The United States first established Yellowstone National Park in 1872. The
law stated, Yellowstone "is hereby reserved and withdrawn from settlement,
occupancy, or sale under the laws of the United States, and dedicated and
set apart as a public park or pleasuring ground for the benefit and
enjoyment of the people."

see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_National_Park

As a common user of our public natural lands, I can say, the establishment
of public lands is one of the best features of the United States.

Back to the subject at hand, I recently rode from San Francisco to Crater
Lake, Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, Lassen Volcanic National Park
and back, and camped out mostly the whole way. I stayed in state park,
national forest and national park campgrounds in California, Oregon,
Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Sitting now in the Summit Lake campground
located in Lassen Volcanic National Park, I can tell you I much prefer
the more remote national forest campsites.

Don't get me wrong, this place is beautiful, but the solo or small group
motorcycle trips come with a sense of solitude and remoteness that just
isn't matched by the well traveled parks during the height of summer
vacation season. I prefer the days be bookended by the same disconnected
feeling you have in your helmet on the road. The national parks have more
campsites closer together with kids running around screaming and babies
crying and that detracts a bit from the experience for me.  Give me
a quiet setting, off the beaten path, any night and I'm a happier camper.

Elevator Lobby With a View

  I sit in the 19th floor elevator lobby alone.  There are two chairs here and the backs shun the panoramic view of Ottawa’s unseasonably cold night.  Midnight is sneaking up on the lobby from the east and I have a liter of beer that’s worth at least two.  The beer was brewed not far from here.

  The elevator rings randomly but, so far, the doors have remained shut.  Sometimes I enjoy writing in a public space.  The thought that someone may chance by gives me a sudden sense of urgency and I forgot what I was going to say.

  On the plane ride to Ottawa, the man sitting next to me flipped through about five pictures of a motorcycle for about an hour.  It was a colorful cruiser sort of motorcycle.  The handlebars and forks raked back at a lazy 45 degrees.  A tiny teardrop of a tank sat on top of a mass of black and grey metal which was the engine.  The chrome and slightly trumpeted tail pipe shone out in front of an oversize chocolate doughnut of a back wheel.  I wouldn't buy such a cartoonishly designed bike, but I can’t say that is was unattractive.

  It was in good condition, I think.  I could only sneak a good peak now and again because I didn't want to give away how interested I was in what my neighbor was doing during his flight.   Nevertheless, interested I was.  I wasn't at first, but I had noticed that he was cycling through a small set of pictures of the same object for a while.

  What interested me was not so much that he was looking at a motorcycle, but that he was looking at the same four or five pictures of the same thing over and over.  What could he possibly be thinking about this bike?  Is it a bike he was considering purchasing or selling?  Was the bike stolen from him?  Did he total the bike on a road trip?  I could hardly focus on reading my own book, a pre-flight impulse buy, because of his obsession.

  It’s midnight, Friday morning, and two people have now walked by my writers outpost in the 18th floor elevator lobby of the Quality Hotel at Rideau and King Edward in downtown Ottawa. I've now decided to call this the 18th floor even though it’s labelled 19.  Sorry about that.  The 13th floor doesn't exist, so this is really just the 18th floor. Either way, It is still the top floor of the building and the view behind me is nice.

  I didn't talk to the guy with the pictures of the motorcycle at all.  Well, maybe a word or two about the logistics of our proximity, but that was it.  I mostly just read my book and noticed things about him as he existed so locally to me for about two hours.  The motorcycle did cause some introspection, but I’ll leave that story for another time.

  I like the feeling of the elevator lobby on the 18th floor (named 19) of the Quality Hotel in downtown Ottawa.  It feels comfy in this chair with my back to the intersection of Rideau and King Edward 18 metric stories below.  Rideau is all torn up down there from road construction.

  The security guard just told me that I needed a cup for my beer or he’d take it from me.  I went and got one.

Such is life.

Only by forgetting...

 It's late afternoon on the last full day of my seven-day trip to San Francisco. The night before I left Chicago, I watched one of my favorite movies of all time with a couple of friends -- David Byrne's True Stories. This quote has been in the back of my mind the whole time I've been out here:

 "I really enjoy forgetting. When I first come to a place, I notice all the little details. I notice the way the sky looks. The color of white paper. The way people walk. Doorknobs. Everything. Then I get used to the place and I don't notice those things anymore. So only by forgetting can I see the place again as it really is." -- David Byrne, True Stories.

 In that vain, I've attempted to forget as much about the first few days I spent here in order to see this place as it truly is. I'm unsure how successful I've been at this task; but, I feel like there is a certain freedom in this city that doesn't exist in Chicago. It's a freedom that I can't quite enumerate here, in words. Something about the people or the place or the combination of the two. The cool climate seems to subdue the blood. The topography of the streets seems to elevate expectation of what's around the corner. Unfortunately, even though I try, I still can't help but notice the doorknobs and the way people walk.

 Or maybe, I'm just externalizing my own freedom. The freedom of traveling alone and away from my milieu.

Aquaponics for fun

  So, my brother recently sold and gave away most of his worldly posessions and moved to Africa with his wife.  They're working in rural Ugandan medical clinic for a year and a half.  Among the dishes, towels and motorcycles they left me were a few living beings that I am now the owner... (owner sems such a strong word when talking bout a living thing...) lets say, "caretaker" of.

  Embwa, a swahilii word meaning dog, is a 70 pound mutt full of energy and love.  Joe searched for a good home for him in peoria, but it was not looking good for the "little" guy so I just told Joe that I wanted him.  I've never really wanted to keep a dog, but I have known Embwa for at least a couple of years already and couldn't stand the idea of him going back to the pound.

  I live real close to the city and my back yard is cement.  I live alone and work five days a week.  On top of that, I'm the sort of person that always has to be doing something.  I'm in a band; I'm in a community college guitar ensemble; and I'm always making up crazy random tech projects for myself.

  It's been about a month or two, and I think me and the dog have worked out a good routine and a few understandings that help us exist with each other.  I'm glad to have his company and think I may be turning into a dog person.  I have not gotten to the point yet that I enjoy picking up warm dog feces.

  I am also the caretaker of a dozen goldfish and a young koi that are part of a simulated ecosystem.  This aquaponics system was moved from Peoria, IL in August to Chicagoland -- gravel, plants, fish, and all.  I only wonder if any of my neighbors saw Kathy, Joe and I with flashlights in my backyard all night constructing the system until the early morning light.  They had to wonder.

  The system consisted of two large Plastic containers. One Above, full of gravel, and one below, full of water and fish. A water pump was running constantly carrying water from the fish tank, up to the grow bed and into a series of smaller "feeder" tubes that directed the water to where each of the plants were situated. The water would then, after running through the gravel and across the bottom of the basin, drain back into the tank below.

  This "Drip and Immediate Drain" system was hard to maintain. Plants needed to be sitated in the grow bed directly under a drip feed or they wouldn't neccesarily be getting much of the water. By contrast, in a flood and drain system, since we are filling the entire grow container, any plot in the growbed should receive equal access to nutrients.

  Anyway, the aquaponics system existed outside for a while, but it got cold.  So I moved the fish indoors for the winter and setup a small ebb and flow system in the south-facing kitchen window.  Besides using an autosiphon, this indoor system differs in other ways.  First of all, I can see the fish.  I like being able to see the fish, they look healty, and I think I am now caretaker of the biggest goldfish I've ever seen.  Secondly, and more technically, I'm using hydroton expanded clay pellets as a grow medium. I decided to use them because they're lighter and easier to work with.

  The plants don't seem to be growing especially well, and i'm not sure why. There could be a lot of different reasons for this:
Insufficient light.
Insufficient quantity or quality of nutrients.
Poor cuttings.


  I'll be performing some information gathering and experimental changes to attempt to discover the causes of lack-luster growth in the system.

Thoughts on the Subway

  When I'm waiting for the train I like to be close to the edge of the platform.  From there I get the the best vantage point for spying or hearing the oncoming transport.  However, as it approaches the station, I always modify my stance from parallel to perpendicular to the tracks.  It would be so easy for someone to come up from behind at the last second and transfer just enough energy onto my person as to propel me into a collision course with all the kinetic and momentus energy of the oncoming vehicles.
  Crazy, right?  While the modification of my lower limbs would slightly increase the prerequesite force to send me to my doom, it is by no means the best possible position to maintain to avoid such an occurance.  Yet, this small defence that I mount somehow makes me more secure in my up close preparation for boarding a crowded thorax segment on the millipede home.
  Upon entering the car, I look for a seat and something to do to detach myself from the reality and people around me.  On good days I write or read, depending on my mood; on bad days I try to stay awake.  Sometimes I do anything I can to distract mself from the intense desire to urinate on any light pole that I can see out the window flying in reverse as if it's heading back downtown.