Well I’ve been working everyday for the last two weeks so I haven’t had a lot of time off. I’m either at the gym, work, or editing my Alaska video. However, I didn’t have to work until noon today, so last night I drove up to New Bern to hang out with Justin and his parents who had come down from NY. New Bern is a great little town. One of the oldest in North Carolina, it’s fought to preserve the historical beauty and keep downtown full of small shops, art galleries and in general really cool places. I must note that it is the birthplace of Pepsi, which is my main source of life giving caffeine. It’s also the home to Nicholas Sparks, the author. Apparently he’s around town quite a bit. There is some new development going on there, but it’s away from the riverfront for the most part which keeps the city really beautiful. It’s also quiet. Justin and I went out to get a beer last night around 11 and couldn’t find any place that was open. We drove away from downtown a little bit and found this dive called “The Ice Cooler” which was about as redneck and awesome as you could get, but thanks to stupid alcohol laws down here you have to be a member to drink. We finally gave up and bought a six pack of “Mackeson XXX” at the Hairy Peter(Harris Teeter). This is one of the best beers I’ve had in a long long time. It’s like a Guinness, but has a different taste. It’s hard to describe, but definitely my go to “relaxing” beer now. Of course I’ll still buy the Schlitz for getting drunk. Back to my point though. I always thought I hated the coast because, well it’s flat, sandy and hot. I don’t think that’s true anymore. I’m always going to be a lover of the mountains, but the thing with the coast is that it’s not the geography, its what people have done to the geography. New Bern is only a little more than an hour north of Wilmington. They’ve preserved the waterfront and made it into a park instead of throwing up condos and businesses everywhere. It’s almost as if they take a little pride in they’re antiquated architecture and natural environment. Wilmington is just trashy, not as trashy as Jacksonville, NC, but trashy enough. It’s a plastic town, mostly full of plastic people all in a race to see who can get rich the fastest. They lose sight of important things, and instead focus on material goals which drain all meaning from life. Don’t get me wrong, money’s great, just not when it’s the motivating factor in your life. Basically I just want to let it be known, that I think there was a chance I could have liked Wilmington, but the fact that they don’t take advantage of preserving the natural environment around here and instead try to profit from it by stripping the land and building on every square inch really puts me off. What’s next? throwing all your trash into the ocean because the landfill land is too valuable to have trash on? I’m sure the turtles won’t mind, I hear they love plastic bags…which is a whole other blog entirely.

Every hour of every day, someone is diagnosed with MS. That’s why I registered for the MS Bike Tour, and why I’m asking you to support my fundraising efforts with a tax-deductible donation.

The National Multiple Sclerosis Society is dedicated to ending the devastating effects of MS but they can’t do it without our help. It’s faster and easier than ever to support this cause that’s so important to me. Simply click on the link at the bottom of this message. If you prefer, you can send your contribution to the address listed below.

Any amount, great or small, helps to make a difference in the lives of people with MS. I appreciate your support and look forward to letting you know how I do.

Here’s the deal folks, my friend Justin and me are doing this ride in September. It’s a two day ride, of variable lengths. We chose to do a 100 miles both days. My ass is going to hurt by the end of that second day, so the least you can do is go to the link below and donate. I need to raise at least 200, but 500 is the current goal seeing as how I only have about a month. Hopefully this won’t turn out like the Tour of Hope in which we got rained out and all participants were sent packing.

http://www.nationalmssociety.org/goto/seancarr54

P.S. If you would like more information about the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, how proceeds from the MS Bike Tour are used, or the other ways you can get involved in the fight against MS, please visit http://www.nationalmssociety.org.

quick story. Tonight I was at walmart returning an item. On the way out I noticed a nice Volvo with he vanity plate which said “blessd.” I had to take a photo of it with my cell phone and sent it to my friend via text message.. I then went unloaded my groceries I purchased after returning my item. As usual, I put all the stray carts into the cart area because people are too lazy to take the 2 extra seconds it takes to do it themselves. A lady came up to me and said, “you must be Christian!” I replied, “no, just a decent guy.” We then parted ways. I saw her walk back to her car and she got into the Volvo with the vanity plate. I’ll still never understand the whole Christian thing. Even after growing up with a minister stepfather and studying religion as my minor, I feel like it’s something you have to have you’re blinders on to believe. This is not to say I’m an atheist, on the contrary I believe there is life after death, I just don’t presume to know what it is and exactly how to get there. If the only way to “heaven” is through Jesus, heaven’s going to be an empty place. But hey, after Wilmington, that might be a welcome change. My AC has also quit on me tonight so I’m drinking beers to get to sleep, meanwhile pouring alcohol out my sweatglands. Just fyi.

Another reason to hate housing tracts. I wrote about this place awhile ago, but the paper just did a story on it. They’re taking our riding road and destroying reason we ride on it. Nothing new, but a reminder of how this place is going in the toilet. They’re taking one of the last nice places to ride and relax and bulldozing it over for over a thousand homes and some commercial businesses. Hey, the economy is growing though!

Just another quick note. Well two actually, first, The county next to ours Brunswick county, is having a price increase in houses. For a long time my county, New Hanover, has been the place to live. However, since our county is getting what I’d call a little bit crowded, newcomers are forced to live farther out causing the bordering counties to increase in population. Thus, the price of houses goes up. Well, the price has gone up so much that a police officer on his yearly salary can’t even afford a house. Since Brunswick county has been one of the fastest growing counties in the country housing prices have boomed with the building. There’s been a shift from normal houses, to more expensive and larger homes. That to me equates to rich fuckers messing up the land with a house too big for them. Either way, there’s always a trailer for those police officers. I just think it’s ridiculous that people who play one of the most important roles in our society can’t even afford a normal home. This is a nice segue to my next point. My friend Eric called me tonight and said we need to be entrepreneurial on some green technology/business. I said here’s a green idea, “don’t consume so much.” Plain and simple. With an economy based on growth there is no way to go but down. As we build economy and use up our resources, I can foresee a day when the only wilderness left is a local park. It’s a sad but true reality that most people turn a blind eye to. We’ve got to get off this idea that the only good economy is one that is growing. Eventually there will be nothing left to grow into and it will be a vast concrete wasteland where trees are more valuable than gold.

My friend’s blog…. Please take the time to read it. Normally i’d warn you about too much sarcasm and cynicism, but I think he’s about as honest as it can get without stepping over the bounds of being cynical or pessimistic. These people are really something else. I’m sure it’s this way in a lot of places, but us coming from a nice little section of NY, never had to deal with these things, or people.

I tried to sleep in this morning and I just can’t do it. So I figure I’d write a post after last nights exhausted scribble. The other day I was reading in Outside Magazine about keeping the places you like a secret. For example many people have outed some of their favorite hiking/camping/surfing spots and now they’ve turned into mob scenes. I’d like to apply that logic to back home in good ol’ western NY. See the problem with Wilmington is that too many people know about it and want to move here. When that happens a relatively cool little beach town gets turned into an overpopulated, chronically congested tourist trap. So when talking with people and friends about the economy back home, I always say I hope it stays shitty. The idea of my home possibly gaining prominence as a great “outdoors recreation area” or retirement location would destroy not only the small town feel, but cause bastions of housing developments to sprout up in what would be once nice places to take a hike or just sit and look at the scenery. It is my feeling that housing developments are a cancer on the land. They spread out destroying all habitat, and once that’s finished they put up houses and alien grasses that will look nice for all the happy people to see. I’d much rather have apt. complexes because at least with those you don’t have as much sprawl. the people are compacted into a smaller area, although they aren’t by any means a nice thing either. I just realize that I’m not a city guy, never have been never will be. You’d think living at the beach would be a nice place that relaxes you. For most people it probably does. However, for someone like me, who loves the outdoors, mountains and fresh air, this place drives me nuts. I wake up to drunks screaming outside(I’ll forgive that), dodge cars on my bike, dodge cars in my car, and probably waste more gas sitting at lights in congestion than I do actually driving. In fact sometimes I get so fed up I just turn my car off altogether at the lights. The reason for all this? Someone a few years back said, “Hey all, Wilmington is a great little town with a lot of potential, and it’s at the beach!” I’m sure at that time it was a great little town with a lot of potential. Though, many years have gone by and that potential has slipped away. With every drained wetland giving way to a housing tract, that potential silently slips into oblivion. With every 20 something, driving a huge Yukon a mile to the store by themselves, it slips a little more. Everyone seems to love the beach, but they forget it’s part of a system. There’s long leaf pine forests have have been essentially wiped out compared to their original range. Wetlands are constantly in danger from pollution, sewage spills or being drained to build upon. As much as people love the beach they forget it’s a part of that system, one they’re knowingly or unknowingly destroying. Once they’ve accomplished completely destroying the local ecosystem, we’ll see how many tourists come to town to enjoy local seafood or relax at an eroded beach. This is what I want to prevent, not just at home, but everywhere. I don’t want my kids(I’m not planning, but I’m not saying it won’t either) to grow up in a world where housing developments, huge cars, and technological junk, takes precedent over a walk in the woods or playing outside. I heard on the radio(Neal Boortz) that kids spend 60% less time playing outside today than they did just 6 years ago. I think it’s an overall trend of slowly moving away from our connection to the natural world and advancing towards one completely void of any natural interaction. My point is that if there’s housing tracts going in back home, I might try my hand at some monkeywrenching. It’s not that I want people to run around naked and eat granola bars. However, I would like for people to consider things a little more, whether it’s just trying to think what the land was like before you’re house was built upon it, or that the steak you’re eating came from a cow that had to give it’s life. So be thankful for what you have because of the natural world, and try to give back a little more than just always taking. Because, not too many years down the road at this rate, there will be no more left to take.

Today I took the bike out for nice cruise. I left at 7am, rode to my friend Justin’s apt, and off we went. We did about 50 miles total. Only 30 of them were together towards the end we went different routes because I had to ride into work and he was going home. About ten miles from work I got a phone call that they needed me in. Today was supposed to be my day off, and last night they told me I had to come in at noon. I got a phone call at 10. So after riding 50 miles my friend picked me and the bike up on his way to work and I went and worked 7 hours after a 50 miles ride. Nothing like washing dishes after a nice long ride…So, after I got out I was eager to enjoy what was supposed to be my day off. Justin and I drove down to Southport to get some seafood and get out of town for a few hours. It was a nice trip, but I’m extremely tired and feel like shit from riding and working. There was nice sunset photo op on the way back, so I forced Justin to turn around and let me grab it. It turned out alright but would have been much better about 2 minutes before I took it when we initially passed. That’s all I really gotta say. I’m tired and on my day off I’m probably just going to bed early.

Just found a cool new site tonight while surfing the web. WWW.LOWBAGGER.ORG ….That’s it for now. Other than that I’m getting this whole film festival underway. Talking to the head of the film dept. at school and probably then the dean and other faculty in the environmental science depts. Started a myspace page too for the fest. It’s taking for slowly but surely.

I just wanted to point out to everyone that I added a Richard Dean Anderson fan page to my sidebar links. Why?, you ask. Well, because RDA, also known as Macgyver, is the man. Yes, there’s Lance Armstrong, and Walker Texas Ranger, but at the top of the pyramid is RDA. Not only was he possibly the best tv character ever. I mean THE BEST tv character ever. He also protests the slaughter of seals in Canada. Which is why I have an autographed photo of him with a baby seal as the centerpiece of my wall. If I’m ever a director, I mean when, he will be in one of my films. I don’t care if he’s a homeless looking extra. The mere fact that RDA is in a movie makes it watchable. Ok, thanks enough RDA banter for one night. I bid thee farewell.

Link about sea level rise here in Wilmington. I can’t even imagine what the Jesus freaks down here will do when they see this. Probably pray that those liberals at the newspaper find salvation and realize that global warming is a conspiracy by left wing, gay rights supporting, child eating banshees. Oh well, good article.

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Just started messing with the Alaska footage some more and put some small clips together to some music. Hopefully I can get start on the whole thing this week sometime…meanwhile check the video out.

I just returned from a few days out at Linville Gorge and Chimney Rock in the mountains of North Carolina. I needed it. I don’t know what it is about Southeast North Carolina, but I just can’t wait to get out of it. I’m really more of a mountain and freshwater guy than flatland and saltwater. Don’t know if that has much to do with it, but I’m sure it plays its part. Anyway I decided to get outta town on a whim the other day. I told my friend I was leaving early in the morning to drive out to the mountains. I had no real plan or even any idea where I wanted to go. So he said he’d come along. I had a party. We drove I-40 west until we saw signs for Linville Gorge where we pulled off and got a hotel room. When the southern lady at the desk saw two guys asking for a single room, she got “suspicious.” The single was just to cut down on the cost even though the room was still 70 bucks. The bed however was the biggest one I’d ever seen and was more than enough to accommodate us and possible a couple of homeless vagrants. After we got the room we drove out to the gorge and started hiking. At first we went to a very tourist filled area and just saw some scenic vistas along with kids trampling the ground in front of us. Soon after I got the photos I wanted from there we drove up to “Table Rock” and started hiking. You drive most of the way up the mountain, but still have a good 30 minute hike straight up after the parking area. That hike was well worth the effort, as the view rivaled some I’d seen in Alaska. The best part was nobody was to be seen. I could have stayed up there and camped out for the night. If I’d been by myself and not already gotten a hotel room I’m sure that’s what I’d have done. The solitude was pretty amazing. There were also little bowls carved out of the rock. Some were filled with water and some were dry. I came to the conclusion that over thousands of years these bowls were carved little by little by the rain they held. I don’t know if I’m right, but I’d like to think I am. After Table Rock, we went back down and to the hotel to change and grab some dinner. The lady at the hotel told us that the Brown Mountain Lights were nearby. I’ve heard about these lights ever since I was a young kid introduced to a haunted North Carolina book. I had to go being so close. So after dinner Justin and I drove out to where you were supposed to be able to see them. Of course, we saw nothing. Disappointed, but not deterred we stayed out there and looked at the stars for close to an hour. It was so dark and clear that I saw more stars than I’d seen in a long long time. It was well worth the effort even if the Brown Mountain Lights didn’t want to put on a show for us. Of course, it could have been that Justin was calling them names like “cowards” and pussies” because they wouldn’t show. I don’t know if going out to see what may or may not be imaginary lights or calling possibly fictitious lights names is worse. After that we went back to the hotel and promptly passed out. Today we woke early and drove down to Chimney Rock. On the way we stopped at a roadside gem mine and bought a bucket of dirt. The bucket unearthed some really cool gems. From there we headed to Chimney Rock where I was forced to face my fear of heights climbing on the side of cliff the entire time. It was beautiful but sometimes annoying because of all the people. Table Rock was by far the highlight of the trip, and had I known about it earlier I would have planned the trip to be a solo camping mission to the top, although the company was nice to have for the ride. Now I’m back in Wilmington, and watching Scott Coady’s films because if I’m helping the guy in October it’d probably be a good idea to see what he’s made already. Tomorrow I might take the kayak out for my first plunge into the water for the year. We’ll see though, I’ve never taken it out, don’t have a rack and don’t have a life preserver. Plus I don’t have health insurance. Safety first.

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…..Rocking out Huey Lewis in Alaska. I’m trying to start getting some of the footage put together. Unfortunately I don’t have my external harddrive yet and I had to save this file pretty small in order to upload it because I haven’t figured out how to embed it straight from my blog. Anyway, in time. Enjoy some Huey.

Today I went to Croatan National Forest. It’s about 2 hours north of Wilmington along the coast. I wanted to do some hiking so my friend came with me and we headed out early. I was pretty disappointed in the whole thing. Although, it was great to get out of Wilmington as it always is, the hiking wasn’t anything fulfilling. Instead we tramped our way through high brush along a lakeside and eventually into the long leaf pine forest. The forest was nice, shady, and quiet except for the birds and bloodsucking flies zipping by my ears. It’s that kind of experience I’ve figured that I require to stay sane down here. After Alaska, I was filled with this internal giddiness. Something that you couldn’t tell on the outside, but my insides were smiling whenever I thought of it. Being out there among the trees and animals, away from all the stuff that doesn’t matter was a religious experience in every sense of the word. It’s begun to fade a little bit, but I know how to deal with this place, and the traffic and Jesus lovers. It’s to get out into the primitive landscapes away from all of that. To be among the trees and water, the ticks and flies, being among the here and now. No deer or bear thinks about it’s investment portfolio. All they care about is getting the next meal and surviving the season. There’s something to be said for only concentrating on the essentials of life. So here I am stuck in the material world, craving my daily internet dose, all the while trying to cut ties with it all. There’s gotta be balance. I remember last year when I went 4 hours west of here to Hanging Rock State Park. It was just me and my camera and my trusty Jansport backpack I’ve had for 7 years. I climbed and exhausted myself on the hardest 12 miles of my life. It was awesome. Walking back to my car at the end of that day, feet sore, eyes weary and my face stinging from sweat and sun, I knew thats what I needed. I find myself searching for that every weekend now. To get out into the wilderness and push myself. Maybe I’ll kayak the Cape Fear River, or go looking for alligators in the estuaries. I don’t know for sure where its all going to lead, but I have a pretty good idea about the direction. Alaska brought me piece of mind that has managed to stay with me so far. With the mountains west of me, I seem to be called out there…only time will tell.

I’m back in Wilmington finally. My excitement to be back couldn’t even be described. Of course I’m kidding. Being back is really kind of just blah. I’m trying to harbor no ill will towards this place this time around. It’s been pretty easy just letting stuff that would normally piss me off slide by. On the other hand there’s just nothing here that captures my interest. Today I went mountain biking with my friend. There’s nothing to look at but sand and pine trees. It’s all flat, and quite frankly just boring. I guess that’s the best way to describe being back, boring. I’m trying to plan things to take up my time, kayak trips, bike riding, selling photos…etc. Back home or in Alaska I could walk to the river or hike up the hill/mountain down the road. Down here there doesn’t seem to be anything I want to do besides leave. 3 or 4 hours west gets you into some nice country where the foothills start, but from there eastward it’s pretty flat. I’ve been to some other areas around the coast and never had any problems with them. North Carolina really is a great place, but Wilmington and the surrounding area just doesn’t have the spirit and comfortable vibe the rest of the state does. Maybe I’m biased after three years of suffering from constant bombardment by rich, dumb blondes, huge SUV’s with only one occupant, and the widespread deforestation that gives way to the housing developments named “Silent Oaks” or ” Pinegrove Forest.” I think Alaska helped me deal with that stuff though. Before I’d just get fed up and not want to have anything to do with it. At least now I’m able to shake it off and try to be proactive about it. The Environmental film fest is slowly taking form, and I’m working on what to do to get the Waste Management people to pick up recyclables in our apt. complex. We’ll see how it all goes, one step at a time. This place does suck though. Give me some grizzly bears, moose and a heaping mountain range. Aight brah, I gotta go kick it at the beach…surfs up!