Blackcap Blog

Published at 19:19 on 12 December 2013

It is time again for the yearly ritual of copying my contacts from this year’s Slingshot Organizer to the next. It’s something of a chore, but it also forces me once per year to do the necessary task of purging old and obsolete information. Moreover, I keep all the old Organizers and use them as a sort of back-up device to the current one I am using.

Yes, I’m old fashioned. I’ve rehashed this several times before and won’t bother doing so again. Suffice to say I’ve considered a smart phone and concluded it just doesn’t suit me as well as more traditional technologies.

Published at 14:59 on 11 October 2013

So, there’s this new option available where I work called a “Health Savings Account”. The one offered by my employer is actually a very generous plan. And it sucks less abjectly than the ironically named “flexible” accounts, which you have to use within a calendar year or lose, forever.

But, there’s still a whopper of a catch. In this case, it’s called “You must save your receipts. Every last one. For seven long years.”

Good heavens, I can’t even keep one week’s worth of notes on a project straight. I could not fathom what would be required to care for hundreds or thousands of slips of paper for seven long years.

And note that these aren’t pieces of letter-sized paper one gets delivered by mail; they are randomly-sized small slips that get handed to you at the pharmacy or the clinic, ones that you must not, ever, leave in your pockets when doing the laundry. You must not let one fall out of your wallet unnoticed, ever. You must not forget and leave one on the sales counter. You must not toss one in a sidewalk waste-basket by mistake. You must not leave it in the bag then toss the bag in the recycle bin. Ever. Or woe unto you if you are audited.

Obviously, there’s people in the world who are intrinsically organized. My parents, for one. When they work on a big project, every item on the desk is at a neat 90-degree angle with respect to the other items and in order, always. It’s just the way they’re wired.

It’s also just not the way I am wired. Even if I make conscious effort to organize my things during a project, within a minute or two after said effort is ended, a significant degree of chaos and disorder will have emerged. It doesn’t bug me; in fact, I never even try to achieve strict desktop order anymore. It’s just not the way I work.

Sure, there needs to be greater cost control in the medical establishment, but I’d much rather get it like, say, the Canadians do, by having a Medicare card that I can just use, with other people (you know, the intrinsically organized types) being paid to professionally do all the receipt-tallying minutia that I am personally so ill-suited to do.

And I don’t think I am the only one. Really, now, saving every last medical receipt? For seven years? This is someone’s idea of “reform?” Seriously?

Published at 19:30 on 7 October 2013

Oh, sure, you can spends hundreds (or even more!) on a literally gold-plated Montblanc or Waterman. That’s no secret. But I’m not into status symbols, and I’m simply too thrifty to consider blowing that kind of money on a mere pen.

The pleasant surprise is that they still make reasonably-priced ones intended to be used for routine writing instead of as snob-appeal devices.

Years ago, I bought an inexpensive Sheaffer cartridge pen in college. I had always been intrigued by the bits of older writing I had run across; the letters weren’t pressed into the paper as with a ballpoint pen. The imperfections were different, too. Ballpoint writing is marred by tiny little semicircular skip marks where the pen fails to deliver ink. The old fountain pen writing had its imperfections in the form of ink density that varied gradually instead of abruptly (darker at the end of each stroke where the ink had pooled more). It looked more appealing to me.

I soon discovered that the fountain pen tended to tire me much less, because I didn’t have to press it into the page to write. It became a favorite of mine, despite it having a tendency to come uncapped in my pack and sometimes make inky messes.

After college, I lost it, and because I was no longer a student who spent many hours per week writing, didn’t miss it. Until fairly recently, that is, whenever I would happen across some sample of my writing from my college days.

I was in the neighborhood for a dentist’s appointment, so on a whim I decided to check to see if the University Book Store (which has one of the best school and office supplies departments in Seattle) would have any such thing as an inexpensive fountain pen.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that while Sheaffer is basically defunct, in Europe many countries require students to learn how to write with a fountain pen as part of the public school curriculum, and as a result there’s still very much a market for inexpensive fountain pens in Europe. So I came home with a shockingly lime green and modern-looking Pelikan Pelikano.

Best of all, despite its modest price, it’s made in Germany and exhibits the typical German quality control; it writes much better than I remember that old cheap Sheaffer ever writing.

Published at 18:41 on 22 September 2013

It happened again last week. One of my co-workers — this time, one of the smartest people in the company, in fact, though most everyone where I work is above average in intelligence — was in the basement garage retrieving his bicycle at the same time I was retrieving mine.

He started walking with it in the direction of the elevator. To which I remarked:

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Oh, you have a door opener? I don’t.”

“Yes, I do, but that’s irrelevant. You can get out without one. There’s a button.”

“Really?”

It was one of the first things I checked on my first day riding a bike to work, because: a) I had no garage door opener at the time, b) it’s easier to exit from the garage door, and c) I was at least 99% certain there was some way to exit without an opener. The latter point was because of two reasons a) fire codes typically mandate that all doors be usable as exits, and b) the building management’s own self-interest is to allow drivers whose door openers fail after hours (batteries do die, after all) a way to get out that does not require them to go to the expense of dispatching someone to free the entrapped vehicle.

And sure enough, there it was: a standard, commercial-grade up/stop/down garage door control. A quick push on the “up” button, the door opened, and I was on my way significantly faster than if I had taken my bike up to the first floor on the elevator. I thought little further about the matter.

What floors me is that people who are smart enough to get advanced degrees (far more advanced than mine, and probably with a far better GPA than I managed as well) never even seem to go down that same train of thought. It’s not as if it’s a very complex or difficult one; it’s all pretty basic facts and logic.

It’s related, I think, to how badly I cope with advanced capitalist society’s demand that one hyperspecialize in one small area such as writing computer software. It’s one reason most of my spare-time pursuits are decidedly non-software; I crave the variety. I start going nuts if I have to do almost the same thing all the time.

It’s one reason my career path has generally been so rocky: simply because it’s a career path, and any such path falls afoul of my need for variety.

So maybe it’s not a surprise that someone who’s done better than I in the career world (and the academic world, for that matter, which also demands hyperspecialization) wouldn’t realize he could almost certainly use the garage door to exit. It’s something he can easily ignore as off-subject.

I wouldn’t trade the way I am, however. It’s probably the biggest reason why I’m an anarchist: because I have, over my life, felt compelled to dive into various diverse areas of knowledge. I know enough about enough things that standard propaganda tends to not work that well on me: I can come up with counterexamples and see the logical fallacies hiding beneath the rhetoric.

Published at 20:17 on 10 September 2013

I’m definitely quite sore from it all, made worse by my not breaking out the arnica oil until today. Still well worth it.

The year of my previous visit was probably 1996. I had my Dad’s old Minolta X700 with me then. It broke within a year of my getting it, and I replaced it with another of the same model which proceeded to get stolen in short order. I used either the old one or its replacement to photograph Comet Hale-Bopp, which peaked in 1997. That makes 1996 the most likely year of my other trip there.

I managed to locate a print of the photo of my standing atop the summit spire and added it to the gallery. There is unfortunately no date stamp on the print, so the year 1996 remains an educated guess.

Published at 18:51 on 9 September 2013

After an absence of about 20 years, I finally managed to re-visit Da Klagwats (aka Mt. Pugh) yesterday.

The mountain had been repeatedly and increasingly haunting my imagination in recent years. Was it really as spectacular as I had remembered? Even the names had acquired a haunting quality to them: Lake Metan, Stujack Pass.

In this on-line era, it’s easy to find accounts (such as this one and this one) which attest to the general correctness of those old memories. But those are but pixels on the screen, a poor substitute for being there.

A related factor is that the age clock is ticking. I’m 50 now, and I tire much more easily than when I was younger. If I kept pushing off returning to the mountain, eventually the day would come when I couldn’t return. So getting back there this year was one of the goals I set on my birthday last winter.

As before, the first test the mountain does on you is the one with your patience. It’s high enough that dry weather is critical. The weekend I had originally scheduled in August came and went (not only was it rainy in the mountains, I was still recovering from an illness and not back in peak shape yet). Every subsequent weekend was also rainy. All in all, not so different from 20 years ago, when it was late September when I finally summited Da Klagwats (late enough that it had been snowing the week before and I ran into melting snowbanks in the high country).

I took a leap of faith Saturday and loaded my truck with camping gear despite the thick overcast threatening to drizzle. All the weather forecasts had been predicting dry weather Sunday, and unlike some times, the forecasts had been very consistent instead of flip-flopping around. I camped near the trailhead so I could get an earlier start.

Amazingly, Sunday dawned mostly clear. Unfortunately, it wasn’t completely clear; the peaks were still shrouded in mists. However, the mists came and went, so I figured I’d at least get some peek-a-boo views from on top, and at that stage I had already spent enough effort getting to the area that it would be a pity to waste it.

The trail leaves from a low/mid elevation forest and persistently goes up, up, up. I made sure to pace myself because Pugh tests one’s endurance After an hour you come to small Lake Metan, which feels sort of like a halfway point. Hardly; at this point only 1,200 of the 5,300 vertical feet have been gained.

Onwards and upwards through old-growth forest the trail presses. The fall rains came early this year, so the forest floor was populated with multitudes of mushrooms. Took a picture of a few of them, but no time to dally, this is a hike with a goal in mind. Keep up a steady, moderate pace.

The forest seems to go on forever. The trail is on a south-facing slope, so the transitions to higher-altitude vegetation happen slower than they normally would. Eventually the spicy pungency of Alaska Yellow-Cedar is evident here and there, but despite that, the forest is still mostly of the huge old trees one sees at lower elevations.

Then, suddenly, the forest ends and one is at the base of a steep, open slope. Pikas are whistling. It’s a good place for a needed rest break. At this point, I’m a little over halfway up.

Press onward through switchbacks in the alpine sunshine now, zig-zagging up a steep slope between two sheer cliffs to the notch that is Stujack Pass. Lunch at the pass with a view of a snowfield below. It’s a spectacular place, rivaling most other hikeable summits.

But this is Pugh, and you ain’t seen nothing yet. At least that’s what my memory and the pictures I’ve seen online say, though it’s hard to believe both. Onward I press, with anticipation.

I am not disappointed in the least. It takes longer to reach the knife-edge ridge section than I remember; somehow the bonsai-filled meadow above the pass vanished from my memory. Maybe because I was faster back then and sped through that section, maybe because it pales compared to what follows.

And then it begins. Suddenly, you’re in a land of ice and bare rock. There’s a glacier below you on the north side of the ridge, and the sheer cliffs you saw from below on the south. The trail alternates between a narrow ledge above the glacier and the top of the ridge. Put away the hiking poles for now; hands are needed for scrambling.

It’s simply breathtaking. Views in every direction, and just like the first time it’s hard to believe one can get to such a place without technical climbing gear. But every time one gets to a spot where one is certain one has gone as far as one could go with mere hiking gear, an easy route onward and upward appears.

Past the head of the glacier, rocks shift to granite. Good; I remember granite at the top, it means I’m getting closer. More scrambling across bare rock, following the path from one cairn to another.

Ah, the summit meadow. I remember it getting easier near the top, and indeed it does. It’s still by any standards a very steep and rocky trail, but it’s a proper trail again. I check the altimeter: 6,900 feet, almost there.

The meadow is full of crowberry (Empetrum nigrum); this is the first place I saw that plant, and the only one I’ve seen it in so much abundance. It was good to see it again.

Mists come and go. Onward.

Tangles of old, rusting cable run across granite boulders. That means I’m basically there; the cables used to anchor a fire lookout. Sure enough, there’s the summit a few dozen feet ahead. Back again after 20 years.

Mists shroud both where I am and the nearby peaks, but I do manage to get a few good views of Glacier Peak during the times that both are clear. That settles it: when I return, I’ll be a 100% stickler for absolutely dry weather, even if it means postponing to the next season.

And then it was time to go down, down, down, down.

I normally eschew close-toed shoes and hike barefoot or in sandals, but the sheer amount of rugged downhill trail before me motivated me to don boots for the return trip. Despite the discomfort factor, I’m glad I did; I was much more steady on my feet in the steep spots (and there were many of them).

In the alpine zone, monitoring my overall progress was easy, because the landscape lay before me in plain sight. No such luck in the woods, but I had counted switchbacks on the way up (32 total before one hits the treeline), and counted backwards on the way down. Turns out I had missed a few on the way up, though, so the Lake Metan didn’t come into view through the trees when I expected it to. And then I missed a few going downhill below the lake, so I thought there were two more when I hit the final one.

Saw several obvious edible mushrooms (boletes, some young Hericiums, and one large chanterelle) on the way down, but collecting fungi wasn’t the purpose of this hike so I had nothing suitable to put them in. The exception was the chanterelle, which was only about 1/2 mile from the trailhead and thus easily survived being jostled around in my pack a bit. It went in tonight’s dinner.

As the sun was was slipping below the ridge, the road and my parked truck suddenly came into view. No need to break out the headlamp I had with me.

What an incredible place. Yes, it was every bit as magic and spectacular as I remembered it.

I’ll download the pictures I took soon.

Published at 17:45 on 29 July 2013

Random observations in no particular order:

• I last drove I-84 east of Pendleton just under 26 years ago, when I was moving to the Northwest for the first time.
• I remember the countryside around Meacham was the last place that appeared halfway decent before I descended into the Columbia Basin. This time, that same region struck me pretty much the same way.
• Then, I was filled with dread at having to live in that unappealing place. Now, I’m glad I don’t live there anymore.
• The Columbia Basin may not be that appealing a place for me to live in, but the views of it as one descends into Pendleton are great.
• The Old Emigrant Hill Road is a much-recommended alternative to the freeway grade on Cabbage Hill, provided you’re not in a big hurry. It has plenty of big looping curves to give one great views of the basin below and almost no traffic. Heading west, the exit to take is well-marked. Heading east, take the exit for the casino but drive past the casino and down the hill, then turn right at the blinking light.

Published at 09:54 on 8 May 2013

I think I had my “I think I’m staying” moment on Friday of last week. It was another day of working indoors at the home office as usual, and I neither wanted to waste a sunny evening indoors nor make a big production of things, so I got on my bike to the Hawley Cove trailhead and took this route along the beach to Wing Point.

It was low tide and I saw colonies of sand dollars (living ones, covered in dark fuzz, not bleached skeletons) exposed near the water line. There were also a few tide pools teeming with baby hermit crabs.

I could have had such a walk along the beach in Seattle had I gone to Golden Gardens Park, but that’s a good 30 to 40 minute drive along congested arterials from where I lived. Forget mass transit; the buses get stuck in even worse traffic because of the routing they take, and there is no established, comprehensive rapid transit system in Seattle. Forget riding a bike, that would take even longer; not worth it for a quick hike. And I haven’t added in the time I’d have to spend circulating looking for parking (because everyone else would have had the same idea on a warm, sunny Friday evening) yet. I would have known all that ahead of time, of course. So I wouldn’t have bothered going; the time and frustration cost wouldn’t have been worth it.

Instead, I was at the Hawley Cove trailhead inside of ten minutes on my bicycle. No fighting traffic, no competing for scarce parking, just decide to go on the spur of the moment and get there with no fuss.

I think I’m staying.

Published at 08:35 on 30 April 2013

Most people who just met me assume I must have a smart phone, probably (a) because most people do, (b) I have plenty of technical know-how, and (c) I can easily afford one. They are mistaken in their assumption.

I really cannot see how having a smart phone would represent a net improvement in my life.

First, smart phones almost universally use touch screens, and I hate touch screens. They have abysmal tactile feedback (essentially none at all, in fact), and they force you to mess up the screen with fingerprints. Blecch and double blecch.

Second, I’ve never really “gotten” text messaging. If I want to send somebody a textual message, I’ll send them an e-mail. It will have no length restrictions, and I won’t be asked to pay a patently ridiculous per-character rate to transmit it. Moreover, my cheap flip-phone can receive (and, in a pinch, send) text messages on those rare occasions where I desire such functionality (generally related to interacting with someone who’s big on texting).

Third, I have little interest in a phone that also sends and receives e-mail. E-mail is for less-critical messages that can (and in my case, probably will) end up waiting for a response. If it’s really urgent or demanding of real-time interaction, make a phone call instead. I don’t want to be continually disturbed by incoming e-mail alerts wherever and whenever I am. I’ll get to it when time allows me to check my inbox, thank you very much.

Fourth, I have no interest in a clock or GPS which also sends and receives e-mail and phone calls. Most often, I don’t want to be pestered by either when I’m out in nature or even out and about in town, even though I often want a clock with me (and I’m about to start doing volunteer botanical survey work for which a GPS will be useful).

Those last two objections can be answered of course by configuring the smart phone to disable e-mail notification and to not ring for incoming calls. The problem is, those configurations are hidden away in a menu, and I tend to forget such things. So I’ll either forget to disable them and have unwanted disruptions from my watch or GPS, or forget to re-enable them and miss an important contact I was expecting.

It’s far simpler to just keep such devices separate, and to have one device serve one function. If I want to be in phone contact, I take my cell phone with me. If I want to know the exact time of day, I take a watch. If I want to know my geographic coordinates, I’ll buy and take a GPS. The technological functionality is mirrored by what I choose to carry. Simplicity itself.

Published at 07:23 on 24 April 2013

I often wonder if the attractiveness of Seattle, particularly to young adults, is not based in part on those attracted being unaware of what large urban areas typically offer.

I guess that’s because in my case, it’s true. I first moved here from the Southwest. I hadn’t lived there all my life, but I had never lived in an inner city. So I could be wowed by the city things that Seattle does have, and not notice things like the sub-par mass transit or parks systems.

Such awareness came only later, and only got truly driven home when my first and only romantic relationship turned out to be a long-distance one which sparked many trips to another metropolitan area.

Naïveté doesn’t explain it all, of course. Seattle is in an unusually spectacular natural area for a big city. That’s a big part of the reason why I came back. But the region is more than the city, and if the city is dysfunctional and a poor match for my priorities, why not live elsewhere in that region if my job situation allows?

To that can be added, how, as I have gotten older, I appreciate more and more how much more important being in nature is to me than big-city cultural things.