Toe Is Better

My infection has gone away with the help of anti- biotics, rest and cleaning. Much better.

It's Bad You Know

It seems my toe is infected. If antibiotics do not work, the toe nail will have to come off. Butch, one of the guys at the Mayor's House, has volenteered to remove it. It will take a bottle of bourbon and a needle nose pliers. Ouch! Go anti-biotics go!

Sad News

Several Hikers have died since I last had access to a computer.

In Washington

A
Mukilteo man reported missing on Tuesday was found dead on Cedar Creek
Trail, west of Mazama.
Cory A. Hubbard, 48, drove across the Cascades
Mountains for a day hike Saturday. When he did not return home or report to work
on Monday, his family called the Okanogan County Sheriff's Office, said Sheriff
Frank Rogers.

In The Grand Canyon.

Grand
Canyon, Ariz. – A body, presumptively identified as 69 year old Robert (Bob)
A. Williams, was found today by park search and rescue personnel in the Hermit
Basin area of Grand Canyon National Park.
On May 26, park rangers received a
report that Mr. Williams was overdue from his Memorial Day weekend plans which
had included hiking in Grand Canyon National Park. On May 27, after finding Mr.
Williams’ vehicle on the South Rim, park rangers began searching a broad
area—from Hermit Basin to the South Kaibab area—that could easily be accessed on
foot or via shuttle from the point where Mr. Williams’ vehicle was found. On May
29, park rangers were able to narrow their search to the Hermit Basin area based
on information received after issuing a public request for assistance to anyone
who had hiked in the park’s back country during the Memorial Day weekend.

Also in Washington.

Medical
examiners have identified the hiker who fatally fell from Rattlesnake Ledge
near North Bend on Saturday.
Officials say Ruben Maldonado, 28, of Snohomish
County, fell more than 100 feet from the popular hiking area above Rattlesnake
Lake about 12:15 p.m. Rattlesnake Ledge is in Iron Horse State Park, in the
Cascade foothills southeast of Seattle.

In California.

As
many as 30 horrified onlookers saw a male hiker plunge hundreds of feet to
his death Saturday as he was climbing Yosemite's world-famous Half Dome, park
rangers said.

In Arizona.

The chief pilot for the New Mexico State Police and a lost hiker died when a rescue helicopter crashed in stormy weather high on a mountain near Santa Fe late Tuesday, authorities announced today. A second officer was seriously injured

My condolences to their friends and families.

I can not figure out the html to fix the way this post looks. Sorry.

Chance Meetings

In Delaware Water Gap, I ran into Mary from NH. I had not seen her since Damascus, Virginia, during my 2001 thru hike. We are both still hiking the Appalachian Trail In large sections. Althogh her sections are linear. When she ends one section, she starts again at the same spot. There is no method to my madness.

Moving Slow

I am not in great shape. My feet and ankles hurt more than they have on other trips. I am currently staying at the Mayor of Unionville, New York's house. I am going to start writing up stories and posting them. Short internet time now.

Update: I had a nice long talk with the Mayor. He is no longer the Mayor, but was when he started taking in hikers. He takes in hikers as a labor of love. His wife was sick for many years, and died in 2006, if I recall correctly. He would tell his wife about the hikers he met in town and how interesting they were. And his wife would always say wouldn't it be nice if some one would show us kindness on our travels. If we were far from home and needed a shower or laundry. Wouldn't it be nice. Of course the Mayor said it would be nice. Out of love for his highschool sweetheart, a lady he was married to for 44 years, he takes in hikers.

It is really his story to tell. If you find yourself on the Appalachian Trail in New York, stop by the Mayors house. It will bring joy to your life and his.

Stinky Boy Rides Again!

Yellow Indian Springs, originally uploaded by cheflovesbeer.

Stinky Boy(my pack) will be riding on the Appalachian Trail starting tomorrow. Starting in Port Clinton, Pennsylvania and heading north.

Sad To Hear

A hiker falls to his death near Niagara Falls, New York.

A man hiking in the Niagara gorge fell to his death Sunday evening near Devil's Hole in Niagara Falls. State Park Police say 33-year-old Michael Cooper of Niagara Falls was heard screaming for help just before 6:00 p.m. roughly a quarter of the way down into the gorge where he had landed on some rocks. Other hikers led first responders to Cooper who was still conscious at the time. He was taken up and out of the gorge on a backboard with multiple injuries, rushed to a nearby hospital where he died in the emergency room.

My condolences to his friends and family.

Packing Heat In The National Parks

There is no good reason for this.

WASHINGTON — Here's a list of stuff the typical American family can legally carry into national parks this summer: sleeping bag, toothbrush, change of underwear . . . loaded guns.

Thanks to a 279-147 vote Wednesday in the House of Representatives , visitors to the nation's parks and wildlife refuges will be able to carry weapons there if they abide by state weapons laws.

The bill is on its way to President Barack Obama , who faces a dilemma: Gun rights advocates attached the provision to a sweeping overhaul of the credit card industry, an initiative Obama strongly supports, so he has little choice but to let the gun section become law.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said only that Obama "looks forward" to signing the bill "as quickly as possible," and didn't mention the gun provision.

Gun control advocates howled Wednesday, but to little effect. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy , D- N.Y. , protested "the bill has been hijacked," and Rep. Maxine Waters , D- Calif. , maintained, "American taxpayers ought to be incensed."

Scot McElveen , the president of the Association of National Park Rangers , predicted that the measure would provoke problems at the parks.

"Members of the ANPR respect the will of Congress and their authority to pass laws, but we believe this is a fundamental reversal from what preceding Congresses created the National Park System for. Park wildlife, including some rare or endangered species, will face increased threats by visitors with firearms who engage in impulse or opportunistic shooting."

The people with guns will not legally be able to use them. You can not shoot the wildlife in a National Park. You can not shoot the other park visitors. You are not allowed to fire guns in the National Parks. I have never felt the need to have a gun in the wilderness. This will allow people who are scared to bring guns into the parks where they will be used illegally. Nothing good will come of it.

Ouch!

Four hikers are injured by lightning on the Appalachian Trail in New Jersey.

Rescuers in Warren County are working to remove the last of four hikers injured tonight when lightning struck nearby during a severe thunderstorm in Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area.

Three had been removed from the Appalachian Trail in Worthington State Forest by 7:30 p.m.; a fourth hiker with a head wound had yet to be taken off the mountain, said Deb Nordeen, a public information officer with the National Park Service.

Rescuers reached the group at 6:15 p.m., about an hour after the National Park Service's emergency communications center received a report of the lightning strike.

"They were not directly struck by lightning," Nordeen said. "Lightning apparently hit the ground near them and they subsequently received injuries."

Nordeen said she was uncertain of the extent of the injuries or the ages of those involved.

They were about a mile south of Sunfish Pond in Hardwick Township, which is about two to three miles from the Pennsylvania line.

Hope everybody recovers well.

History Of Weed

Kind of fun.

Sad To Hear

A hiker dies in California.

A hiker died Sunday after he was found unconscious earlier that day on Skyline Trail in Palm Springs, a fire official said Thursday.
The man, whose name was not immediately available, was 28 years old and from Orange County.

He had been hiking since 6 a.m. and rescuers arrived at 1:30 p.m. to find him 100 feet up on the trail.

He was unconscious, unresponsive and had a core body heat of 108 degrees, officials said.

Rescuers transported him to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Sunday's death was the second incident in just over a week in which a hiker on that same trail apparently misjudged the Coachella Valley heat.

My condolences to his friends and family.

Do Not Feed The Animals

Most bear humans encounters occur because humans are careless about food.

No national numbers of conflicts were presented at the Nevada workshop, but participants said the number is growing. They said more regulations requiring bear-proof trash containers and improved public education of people living in bear-prone areas is needed to avoid potentially deadly encounters.

In the East, more than 70% of jurisdictions are reporting an increase in black bear populations, said Hank Hristienko, a big-game biologist for the Canadian province of Manitoba. And from Florida to New Hampshire and into Canada, there are increasing problems, he said.

"On almost 80% of the eastern part of the continent, you have an increasing trend of human-bear conflicts," he said.[...]

Bottom line: "People need to lock up their trash," said Carl Lackey, a Nevada Department of Wildlife biologist. "People really don't take notice until a bear is knocking on their front door."

Bears do not always knock on your door. When I lives in Truckee, CA, I had a bear come through the screen door. No knocking just ripping and tearing. Not really much of an impediment to a full grown bear. Let me tell you, a bear looks a whole lot bigger when your cooking breakfast in your boxers and it is less than five feet from you.

And then there is this idiot, feeding bears in the Alaskan wilderness.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — After 20 years of enticing bears into a remote compound tucked away in a little visited corner of Alaska’s Yentna River valley, retired Anchorage school teacher Charlie Vandergaw said last fall he was ready to end his bear-taming shenanigans.

Filmmaker Richard Terry, the man to whom Vandergaw made the statement, didn’t know whether to believe it or not.

Now skeptical state officials have taken action to make sure it happens. They have charged the 70-year-old Vandergaw with 20 counts of illegally feeding game. Two friends accused of assisting him were also charged.

Wavy Gravy

Today is Wavy Gravy's Birthday. Happy Birthday Wavy!

Good!

US to burn less coal.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. power plants will burn about 2.3 percent less coal in 2009 than they did last year as the recession trims electricity demand, the government's top energy forecaster said on Tuesday.

Power plants will burn about 1,017.49 million short tons of coal in 2009, down from 1,041.6 million tons burned in 2008, the Energy Information Administration said in its monthly short-term outlook.

This month's EIA forecast called for the burning of a bit more coal in 2009 than last month's outlook, which expected U.S. power plants to burn about 2.6 percent less coal.

Hopefully, we will build solar and wind.

Sad To Hear

A hiker dies on the Florida Trail.

COLLIER COUNTY — He was a beloved son devoted to his twin sister, an Advanced Placement scholar who was planning to enter the University of Florida, and a determined Boy Scout striving to attain the rank of Eagle Scout.

Today, his parents and twin sister Elisabeth struggled to deal with the tragedy of Michael Sclawy-Adelman's unexpected death this weekend. The 17-year-old Nova High School senior died Saturday during a sweltering, 20-mile hike on The Florida Trail in Big Cypress National Preserve in Collier County.

"He was a sweetheart. He was everyone's dream kid," said his mother Judith, of Weston, choking back tears. "He was the kind of kid everyone would love to have."

The cause of his death is pending toxicology reports, according to the Collier County Medical Examiner's Office. The teen's family requested no autopsy be conducted.

The Collier County Sheriff's Office said his death may have been the result of a medical condition but his family today declined to discuss any possible cause.

It could be heat related.

My condolences to his friends and family.

Get Up Stand Up!

Bob Marley died on this day in 1981. He is missed.

Sad To Hear

A hiker dies in Arizona.

The 52-year-old woman, whose name has not been released by the Surprise Police Department, was reported missing by family at about 11 p.m. when she didn't return from a hike. Officers searched a nearby mountain near 157th Avenue and Dynamite Road that the woman was known to frequent. They found her body about 40 minutes later.

It is believed to be accidental.

My condolences to her friends and family.
The hiker has been identified as Sharon Berman of Surprise. Police believe it was an accidental fall.

I Will Act Selflessly This Afternoon

All for the good workers at the Sierra Nevada Brewery.

"Sometimes when I reflect back on all the beer I drink I feel ashamed - Then I look into the glass and think about the workers in the brewery and all of their hopes and dreams. If I didn't drink this beer, they might be out of work and their dreams would be shattered. Then I say to myself, 'It is better that I drink this beer and let their dreams come true than be selfish and worry about my liver.'"
-Deep Thought, Jack Handy

Green Chill

How green is your grocer?

Last night Keilly Witman from EPA's GreenChill Advanced Refrigeration Partnership, the program that attempts to get grocery stores to reduce ozone-killing refrigerant leaks, talked at EcoTuesday in DC. What I thought might not be our most exciting topic turned out to be one of the most interesting I've heard in the 8 months of co-hosting these events.

Ozone-depleting refrigerants are also potent greenhouse gases. One pound of the most commonly used HFC refrigerants has the same impact as about 4000 lbs of CO2. This is why Witman calls the reduction of refrigerant leaks the low-hanging-fruit of emissions control. There are 35,000 supermarkets in the US and each typically carries about 4000 lbs of refrigerant and leaks about 25% of that. So, you do the math: 1000 lbs of high global warming gas from each of 35,000 supermarkets = 35,000,000 lbs leaked each year. And its pretty simple and cheap to cut that number in half, which is where most GreenChill partner markets come in.

According to a 2008 GreenChill press release:

Compared to the rest of the supermarket industry, GreenChill partners are already emitting fewer ozone-depleting refrigerants and greenhouse gases than their competitors, and saving money at the same time. The partners’ savings in operating costs equal almost $13 million.

If every supermarket in the nation joined GreenChill and reduced their emissions to the current GreenChill average, the industry could prevent the release of 13 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent and 157 ozone-depleting potential tons annually.

Click on the link to find out which chains participate.

Full Moon!

Full Moon Over DC, originally uploaded by jbhaber.

Full Moon!