Yes.

I did carve them.

Click the picture for a detailed view.

The ironic thing is that I have so much to say.

And yet, many of you would look at this blog and have no idea.

I have so much I want to say, but it is more than just typing out a bunch of words. It’s not words that I am trying to get out here.

It’s ideas.

And that is harder. At least for a no talent hack like me.

I could just sit down at the keyboard and start typing what’s in my head, but that would not give me what I’m looking for.

I’ve learned a lot over the last two years about writing and expressing myself. It’s a hell of a lot harder than I thought it would be.

But still, I have to.

It’s why I do this. I’m not looking friends or a sense of community.

I’m try to get these ideas out of my head and out to some one. Anyone.

And let’s be honest, I’m looking for a little feedback.

Sometimes I think that if I could just get my thoughts across, clearly… If I could do that just once, I could stop. I could stop writing all together.

Maybe that’s the thing. Maybe I’m just trying to get a piece of me out there for you. And I keep failing.

Or maybe all of this is just pretentious bullshit.

An inaccurate and incomplete history of Mango Radio according to me.

I’m going to start my own Radio Station. It’s going to be great!

That was the announcement that Marc made. It’s been two years now, I guess. I don’t even know this guy. Just some dude on the Internet. He does start it. Mango Radio, he calls it. That’s his nickname, Mango. It’s a play on his last name. It’s long story. I’m beginning to learn this about Marc. It’s usually a long story.

The station is up. It plays music 24 hours a day. But that alone wouldn’t make it worth writing about.

“Hey man.” Marc IM’s me. “I’m live on the air. Come check it out.”

And I do. I listen as he talks about other people on the Internet. And his job. And growing up in Buffalo. It’s captivating. Listening to this dude just talk about shit. While I listen. Not just me. There is a couple from Ohio. And a chick from Vegas. And Karl.

“Hey Jeck. I’d like to dedicate this song to Finslippy.” He says. And he plays “Somebody Hates Me” by Reel Big Fish. I find myself laughing out loud. It’s funny. An inside joke. I love it.

But after a few months of this it gets stale. I mean, how many times can I tune in and listen to the same songs. Maybe he’s running out of stories. Hell, I could be watching TV. Okay, I couldn’t do that. But you get my point.

“I’m making Big Changes at Mango Radio.” Marc announces. “I’m bringing in other DJ’s to do their own shows. To mix it up.”

A good idea. He announces the DJs. Monogodo. Will Thrasher. Joe. Crash. And Webkittyn. Will Thrasher and WebKittyn have real radio experience and Monogodo has thousands of songs in his library. Crash is Karl in disguise and Joe… Well I don’t know. They will pre-record their shows and Marc will play them at pre-designated times.

“You can do a show if you want, Jeck.”
“No thanks.”

I mean… hell. I’m out classed here. But…

But I want to do a show. I know I can do it. But I don’t want to be laughed off the Internet. I read discussions on the Mango Radio Forum board. The DJ’s are having Technical trouble. Trouble Organizing their music just right. Trouble finding free time. Trouble making their shows just right.

The thought nags in my head. I can do this. But what to do for a show. I don’t know what the fuck to talk about.

An audio companion to the Shitty Blogs Club. That’s it. I recorded 30-some minutes of me babbling. I edited the worst of it out and threw in some music. I mixed it into an mp3 and sent it to Marc.

Ironically, it was the First show to get submitted. And the First to get played. I cringe as I hear my voice on the Internet. Marc says he loves it.

“I had no idea what to expect.” He keeps telling me.

Other Shows follow. Webkittyn Wednesdays, an 80’s music Show. Monogodo’s show. Will Thrasher. They all have some degree of popularity. Some more than others. Some lasted. Some did not. New names were added to the line up. Doom, Utopia, Riss, Chaos Radio. Some lasted. Some didn’t.

The ironic thing, to me, was that almost all of this shows had that same format, talk about this or that and play some music. Sure we each put own stamp on it, but it was variations on a theme.

The thing is Mango still wasn’t happy. He was hoping for the big time. Maybe even get picked up by XM or something. Oh, I’m sure that deep down he knew that was a pipe dream, but still he hoped.

He quit doing a show. And the station kept trucking with out him. He started his show again and nothing much changed.

But in the end, when it came time to renew the contract on the station and to renew the domains, he decided it wasn’t worth the money. And, of course he’s right.

So it’s over. As of Thursday.

But I think that someday, that format will catch on. That psuedo-audioblogging combined with music. I hope when it does, they call it Mango Radio.

Some Pictures from Saturday. Click on the thumbnail to embiggen.

The Mountain.

Looking Back from the Mountain.

The Trail to the Top.

The View From the Top

The Foliage

In case you don’t know… I have been doing this dumbass ‘Internet Radio Show’ for the last year or so. The imaginary Internet Radio Station that it aired on is going off the ‘air.’ If you want more information go here.

I guess all of this has me thinking about the nature the Internet, as I know it, and the nature of blogging. Which has been an ongoing theme for me. Who knows, maybe I’ll write something about this soon.

The Family and I went on road trip to the Lehigh Gap in Pennsylvania. We climbed the mountain and I took a couple hundred pictures. Maybe someday, I’ll find the time to organize and do something with all of these pictures I keep taking.

I still like my truck. It isn’t very fuel efficient and I guess that makes me a bad person, but I don’t drive far on any given day and I’ll gladly pay more to drive the vehicle I want to drive.

On a related note, I passed an SUV with a bumper sticker that said “High Gas Prices Stink!” I hate them.

I think I will carve a few pumpkins this year. I’m not half bad at it. I was going to link to the photos of last year’s attempts. But it looks like they were lost when BlogCafe went down. I’m sure I have them on this computer somewhere, but… Anyhow. I’ll find ‘em and include them.

I had no idea I liked the Grateful Dead so much. I’ve recently got a bunch of Dead to listen to. I like it. I wish I would have realized that while Jerry Garcia was still alive.

I have a headache.

I used to think that maybe I could be a writer. I got over it.

I am still struggling to figure out how I am supposed to do all the things I want to to do, in the time that I have to do them.

I think that North Korea possessing Nuclear technology may be the single greatest threat to the stability of our world.

I am glad I discovered the Sleuth Channel. Miami Vice is better than anything that the networks are offering these days. Between that, M*A*S*H on Hallmark, and Star Trek on G4; I have all the TV I need.

And as they say on M*A*S*H…

That is all.

Sunday was the big day.

Sometimes, when planning a hike, you just look at the map and say, whoa! You see a climb or mountain or something that grabs your attention. You look forward to it (or dread it) as the hike gets closer. On this hike, we would cross the Lehigh Gap. A 1000 foot descent, followed by a 1200 foot climb. That in itself isn’t that extraordinary. But 700 feet of that ascent are climbed in less than a quarter of a mile. I was looking forward to this challenge. The Uber-Bot was dreading it. She hates steep climbs.

I made myself a quick breakfast, and packed up my gear. We headed back up to the shelter and filled our bottles at the spring. And then we hit the trail. We descended through the trees. The sunlight shining through the leaves was quite a contrast to the overcast skies of the day previous. The temperature was comfortable and the trail was easy enough to walk. It was a good start to the day.

We descended until we came to a break in the tree line. Ahead of us we could see the Blue Mountain slope down to Lehigh River. Mist still rose off of the river, where shade had prevent the morning sun from burning it away. On the far shore, a mountain jutted up from the river. The top third of the mountain was completely bare of trees. There was nothing but rocks and cliff. I challenge to be sure.

We descended to the river and crossed the bridge, along side the Sunday morning traffic. We started up the other side, which quickly became a series of steep switchbacks. I pushed ahead, although I had stop to catch my breath a number of times. Finally, I came out of the trees and stepped on to a rock field that led to the base of, for lack of a better word, a cliff. As I looked up I saw those familiar white blazes painted up the side of the rock wall.

A closer look did show a place to step here and a hand hold there, and soon a was standing on a narrow ledge 10 feet above where I began. We continued like this, climbing to the next ledge, soaking in the view, continuing. Eventually we gave up on our trekking poles and strapped them to our packs, to free up our hands.

We climbed till we reached the crest of the ridge. We stopped and surveyed the view. We could see clearly the mountain we descended early that morning, the Lehigh river snaking between the mountains from Palmerton down to the south and then around a bend and out of sight. I took out my camera and snapped a few shots, even though I knew that would not, could not, do justice to what was before my eyes. After a while, we moved on. Because that is what you do when you go backpacking. You move on.

We made our way up the ridge, until it leveled out. I sat down. My legs were screaming from the exertion of the climb. Once again the gnats were on us. The Uber-Bot pushed on to keep the gnats off of her. I mixed up some Gatorade in my water bottle, dug some Jerky out of my bag, and then headed down the trail myself.

The ridge was wide and flat across it’s crest. The trail followed what might have been an access road. On either side of the trail there was nothing but rocks and the occasional skeletal remains of a long dead tree. The landscape was completely desolate. As I walked I speculated on what could have caused this. As I walked more sign of life began to appear. Small shrubs and grass mostly. I caught up with the Uber-Bot after a mile or two. We compared notes and decided that it must have been a forest fire. But one that happened long ago.

We walked down the road until the trail went away from it to the left. We wandered down the mountainside into Little Gap. We sat our packs down and waited by the side of the road. We were early, but we knew Captain Shutter would be there soon to pick us up.

I’ll finish the Perfect Walk story in a day or two.

I’m sure both of you on the edge of your seats with anticipation.

Meanwhile… a bit about me.

I’ve been sick.
It started as your typical viral cold/flu kind of thing, but it never got better. Eventually that infection allowed a bacterial infection (Sinusitis) to take up residence in my head. The good news is that I’m on antibiotics and seem to be getting better.

The bad news is, I’ve been sick for a month.

A month of going to work, feeling like shit, dragging all day, trying to think straight while running a fever.
A month of coming home from work eating dinner and then passing out in front of the TV.

A quick aside here…

If you work with a help desk/network tech/whatever and it seems he is very busy, please be informed that telling him that all of those call are job security will not make him feel better. Just in case you were wondering.

Anyhow…

Not only have I lost a month of my life to this, I’ve not been at my best during that time frame. Of course, I have good reasons for it. Of course it is understandable. But this is the real world, and no one gives a shit.

The events of the last week or so at work have put me in a very foul mood. I won’t detail them here, but let’s just say that my distaste for people in general (and a few in particular) has been re-enforced

As usual, there is no point.

Just take away this, I’ve been sick and that is why I haven’t been updating.

I woke up to the sound of the Uber-Bot packing up her tent. I’ve never been a morning person. I hurried to get myself packed up before she was pacing around ready to go. I fired up my campstove to have a quick breakfast and some coffee. The coffee was great and the clearing we were camped in was beautiful. I think I would have been content to just sit there all day. But we had 10 miles to cover, so i tossed the dregs of my coffee into the underbrush and packed up the rest of my gear as my partner filled her bottles from the spring.

Soon we walk along the AT again. The trail was a little rockier than the night before, I was grateful that I hadn’t had to walk on this trail the night before. The air was cool, but the walking kept us warm. The gray skies were uninspiring, but at least it didn’t look like rain.

Each State has it’s own ‘personality’ on the trail. The personality of Pennsylvania can summed in one word. Rocks. Thousands of them. Large boulders that must be climb over. Stretches of trail that run over boulder fields, where you have to step from boulder to boulder. And miles of trail with sharp pointy rocks coming out the dirt with such frequency that you cannot avoid them. I’ve kicked, tripped over, slipped on, fell on, scraped against and banged into more rocks than I can enumerate.

We hadn’t walked long when the trail turn up on to a pile of boulders that led to the crest of the ridge known as the ‘Knife’s Edge.’ The ridge literally narrows to a point only a few feet wide, and the trail ran right along it. We stopped at the highest point and looked out over the patchwork fields that spread out below us under the cold gray sky.

The day went by easily, we came to the view at Bake Oven Knob we took it in for a few moments, but the wind blowing on us forced the break short. We scrambled down a rock descent and before long arrived at a shelter. We stopped and had lunch. After cleaning up from lunch, we went to the spring and refilled our bottles. Then we were back on the trail.

The afternoon continued smoothly. The ridge broadened and the trail was level and easy to walk on. Eventually the trail began to descend marking the end of the day’s walk. We came to the shelter after a short descent. There was a lone hiker already camped out there. I scanned the area, but saw no where to pitch a tent. I approached the hiker.

“Good afternoon.”
“It is, isn’t it?”
“Is there a tenting area around here any where?”
“Well… there is one a little bit back the way you came…”
“We saw that one.”
“… or you could go down that trail, ” he pointed to an unblazed trail to the right, “and there is a nice little field down there. at least there was. I haven’t been down there in a while. I guess some one could have trashed it.”
“Cool, we’ll check it out. It’s not to far down, I hope…”
“No about Five Minutes form here.”

Five Minutes?

We walked down the trail, no more than a quarter of a mile, an came to a nice little clearing with a fire ring. We started pitching the tents and getting our equipment set up. We were hassled the entire time by nasty little biting gnats. I would have thought that there wouldn’t have been any insects to speak of this time of year. Once my tent was pitched, I headed back up the trail to the shelter to locate the spring. The Uber-Bot retreated to her tent to escape the gnats.

As I approached the shelter I was greeted by the hiker.

“Find what you needed?”
“Yeah…”
“Nobody’s trashed it?”
“No, it’s good. Perfect actually.”
“Good.”
“Is there a spring?”
“Yep. Just down the trail. About Three Minutes from here.”

Three Minutes?

I headed down the trail assuming that the spring couldn’t be far off, if this hiker’s standard of measurement was consistent. And it was. I filled my bottles, drank one of them and filled it again. And then headed back to our campsite again.

We built a campfire to drive of the gnats. It worked like a charm. We spent the evening lounging by the fire. Relaxing. Sometimes in silence. Sometimes we talked. We watched the moon make it’s way over the trees. So bright that the trees cast shadows under its glow.

Something rustled in the brush not to far off from the campfire. We peered into shadows trying to make it what it could be.

“What do you think?”
“Probably a deer.”
“Yeah.”
“They’re nocturnal…”
“Or a raccoon.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m glad our food is already hung.”
“Yeah…”
“Besides, there aren’t any bears around here.”
“Should we shine our lights over there?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Cause, I could be wrong about the bears.”

After a while, we hadn’t heard any more noises so we shone our lights at the brambles, but we couldn’t see anything.

The fire had died down, so we to our respective tents, and laid down for the night. And with no concern for what was crawling around out there, I went right sleep.

Are you sure you want to do this?
Of course.
But you’ve been sick. You should rest.
I’ve rested, and I’m still sick. I’m well enough to go work.
You have to go work.
I have to go backpacking.
Be careful.
I will.

Another trip. I’m not even sure as I plan this one that it is even for fun anymore. I’m on a mission. I’ve walked 170 some odd miles of the Appalachian Trail in Pennsylvania. I have just over 50 miles to go to reach New Jersey. Pennsylvania has been a mess of ankle twisting boulders and toe bashing rocks. I don’t know that I believe in a bad backpacking trip, but I’ve had it with Pennsylvania. I just want to make to New Jersey. New State. New Trail.

This trip will have us walking about 20 miles. My companion on this trip is the hiker we call the Uber-Bot. She’s unstoppable. She walks for hours with out need a rest or a drink or anything. She never seems to get tired or hungry or frustrated. She is just like a robot.

Friday night we hope to go four miles to the New Tripoli Camping Area. Construction on the interstate delayed our arrival at the trail head. By the time we walked away from the truck and in to the woods it was after seven. And quite dark.

Night hiking is, as you can imagine, quite different than hiking in the day. As we started out the moon was low in the sky and a mist hung in the air. The haziness gave you the impression that is you’d just squint maybe you’d be able see better. We used lightweight head lamps to light the way. The head lamps were good for lighting the trail and exposing rocks and roots that hid waiting to trip the unsuspecting hiker. At the same time, they mad the surrounding woods even darker. The effect was very much like walking in a tunnel.

I was tired. It had been a long day at work, hell a long week. The drive was long and it was late. We hadn’t walked far when we came to a tent site off the trail. I wanted to just stop there and make camp. The Uber-Bot pointed out that the trail was in good condition and we should take advantage of it. And she was right. Every step that we did not take that night, would have to be walked the next day.

So we walked, in the dark and the mist. The trail stayed well defined and easy to walk on, and I let her talk me out of a few more tent sites. To our surprise we passed a few campers who set up camp alongside the trail. As we walked I mentally tallied the distance. I knew we had to be close. But close is a relative term. A half mile is a long way to walk we you are exhausted.

I smelled the smoke of a campfire first. Then heard voices. Finally we could see them. A dozen or so bodies milling around half as many tents. Boy Scouts. As we neared them, one of the adults came over to see what we were about.

“Hi there.”
“How’s it going? Is this New Tripoli Camp Area?”
“We’re not sure. There is a Blue Blaze just beyond that may go down to the camping area. But we didn’t go down, this was nice and level so we just made camp here.”

We thanked then and went on our away. As promised we found the blue blazed trail just a few hundred yards down the trail. My friend may be untiring, but she doesn’t not care for climbs. She looked in the darkness at the descent to the campground and said, “It’s nice and level where those scouts are.”
“the last the ting those scouts need is a women around.”
“I’ll be good.”
“Let’s go see what is down there.”

We headed down after a quick check of the map (just to be sure that the trailed did not go all the way to the bottom of the mountain.) The blue blaze led to a level clearing next to a spring. Even in the darkness, it was very beautiful.

We went to work setting up our tents. Once our tents were struck. I set up my camp stove and heated some water for coffee. I was tired, but my throat was a bit sore and something hot to drink sounded good. We relaxed for a while and enjoyed the quite of the woods. I especially enjoyed it, because I knew that had we set up camp near those scouts we would not have had this kind of tranquility.

With our beverage consumed and the temperature dropping we retired to our respective tents. And reviewed the map for a few moments and then turned out my head lamp and fell asleep almost instantly.