It’s been awhile. I’ve been washing a lot of dishes and thus been absent. The festival is up and running and we just finished the poster for it today so I figured I’d post it so you could all preview(if I even have any readers left). You can read all about the festival at the website provided on the flyer. Adios for now mis amigos.

….for the record I have no idea why it isn’t showing up. It should be…I’ll try and fix it later.

Well last night I posted some videos from youtube, but apparently they don’t work this morning so I’m going to just leave the links instead….Ryan Adams…one great fucking musician.

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…Rip Ali-gator. 1998-2007

She suffered an injury as a puppy, and had the ball of her hip removed. However, she went on to live a full, and happy life. She is survived by her brothers Moose and Cordell, and her sisters, Shadow and Sadie. She loved playing with the puppies, and sitting watching the leaves change, as she did this year. She also loved playing in the woods, hunting varmits, climbing the hill behind her house, even as her legs were giving out she’d still struggle to the top. I know she is up in doggy heaven with all the kitchens and couches she can possibly have to dirty up. It might be cold and wet outside, but in doggy heaven she can lay her big ass wherever the hell she wants. We’ll miss you Ali. Shadow might have just lost a happy pouch today…

I know I’ve been an asshole for not posting something worthy myself lately. I’ve been shortcutting by linking articles I want you all to read. Oh well, it’s all the same I guess, as long as you are doing my reading assignments you will be somewhat prepared. Here’s another one.

Apparently the Daily Show did an episdoe awhile back in 2000 when they covered my hometown region. I don’t remember it, but apparently as you will see they did. The video loads awfully slow, or at least did for me and I almost didn’t post it because it’s practically not worth the time or trouble if you aren’t from where I’m from…anyway there it is.

One more great read from Orion Magazine, which seems to just churn out these though provoking and insightful essays and articles. This one is one condo building on the waterfront. I live in a condo, near the water…hmmmm…..

I just saw a commercial on tv by Bill Saffo the current mayor of Wilmington. The election is Oct. 9th, and I won’t be voting for him. Not only is he a real estate guy, here’s a link to his company, all his buddies and donors are real estate guys and developers. Bill wants to make Wilmington great he says, after all, according to him it is the best place to live. We’ve got to fix our ailing sewers system, acquire more empty space and have some jobs for people in town rather than just having Wilmington be a large retirement home. Oh, he wants to improve our quality of living too. Are you kidding me? I assume by what I’ve seen of your work so far Bill, that “quality of life” means having a 500K home in a development and driving a Chevy Suburban. No sir, that is not the quality of life we need. We do need more open spaces and less development. We need bike lanes and good developmental planning so you can access stores and restaurants by bike or on foot. Instead you’ve created a clusterfuck where you’re likely to get hit on your bike or on foot. Nothing is easily accessible with your, build now, plan later scheme. You’ve done an awful job for this city and I haven’t even mentioned the sewers spills which were and are absolutely ridiculous. When a pipe can only hold the volume of 30K people, you should try putting 50K people’s turds floating down it. It’s basic math and science. So why don’t you take all that donor money you’ve received and go buy a house somewhere far far away, because if you really cared for the city you wouldn’t run for re-election.

Today at work I tried telling my boss about peak oil. I was confronted with an arrogant amount of ignorance and stubbornness. I told her about peak oil and that down the road it’s going to be major trouble. To that she replied that these so called “experts” can’t be trusted. Look at Greenland, it’s called “green”land because it used to be a very fertile and livable place. So obviously these global warming “experts” must not have a clue. She also said it was “arrogant” to think that we as people can have that much effect on the world. Excuse me? It’s arrogant to believe we can change the environment? She then told me that we’ll just drill somewhere else. It was very obvious at this point that I was not getting my point through. The conversation progressed from the science to the economic difficulties we’ll encounter. To that she replied that we need to worry about China. Ok, fine, China is becoming a powerhouse, but who is helping them? I told her that if she didn’t like the idea of China becoming powerful, then we only have ourselves to blame. She of course disagreed that we had that much of an effect on their economy. All you need to do is go to the U.S. Census Bureau’s website on foreign trade statistics and you can see that trade with China has gone up every year for the last 7 years. But after all it you can’t rely on these experts. I mean why trust someone who has devoted their entire life to the study of a particular field, obviously a lady who drives an Lincoln Navigator and runs a restaurant must know more. On the pollution front she said that we don’t have do try and curb out pollution because compared to China we can’t do anything. That is one of the most arrogant and retarded arguments I’ve heard in a long time. If someone else is stealing, it doesn’t make it right to keep doing it because they are. So, I tried explaining it to her in terms of population growth. It’s simple if you have a shrinking supply of resources and a growing demand there will be tension and the resource will become more valuable, thus causing it to be more expensive. I said we need to conserve and think ahead. All I got out of her was that “The U.S. will only keep getting bigger and better.” I was dumbfounded, mad, frustrated and disappointed all at the same time. How can we as a people go on with such ignorance. Oh, and I think she threw in a comment about the Democrats too somewhere in there. I can understand if you look at the information objectively and come up with your own ideas and opinions, but to discount something as significant as this because you can’t trust “experts” is just asinine and dangerous. Sirbikes might be right, we’re heading over the cliff and no one’s willing to check and see if the brakes work.

I just got out of a film put on by the school as part of their “sustainability” series. it was called The End of Suburbia. I gotta say this was a really cool film. It brought up many good points which include, peak oil, unsustainable housing, over consumption and the downfall of the American dream. Essentially the jist was this. Peak oil is the idea that oil production will peak somewhere around NOW or the near future. With production from then on decreasing and the demand only increasing we will be in serious trouble. Natural gas has the same problem. The Northeast almost ran out of it last winter. Some would say “why don’t we just convert everything over to electric so we won’t have to rely on oil.” Well, how do you get electric? Coal and Natural gas along with some other ways such as Hydro.

The film covered the history of the suburbs from when it was for the affluent who wanted to get out of the city, to when it because a way for more middle class to live away from their jobs and the grime of the city. Back then they had rail cars much like buses that would stop and pick the workers up. Company’s like Standard Oil and GM bought those railways and tore them up to pave roads for their automobiles. Thus started the American dream. Living far from your job and taking a highway to get their in your new car which you were encouraged to by along with other cheap shiny stuff for your new house which eventually have become the McMansions. There was a wide array of speakers in the movie, one even included a former Cheney energy adviser, Matthew Simmons and he adamantly said that peak oil is real and we aren’t doing anything about it except running full speed ahead off the cliff. However, 20-50 years from now oil will become so expensive it won’t be economical to buy it. What do you do when you can’t afford to buy gas to drive your car to work? Or how about heating your home, or even transporting food from southern California to New York so you can have your salads in December. It will all go out the window. Such little things that we all take for granted because of cheap oil. Suburbs will become the new slums because there won’t be a way to support that type of living. Instead multiple use housing will have to start. However, if we don’t start that now it might be too late to begin it when everyone wakes up and realizes this is a problem. What energy will we use to build these homes so it’s affordable. It just won’t be possible to go on living like we live now. Everything as we know it from air condition to driving over to grandma’s house will either have to change or become non-existent. Yet we insist on oil as a cure all. Dare I say we might even be trying to secure all of the untapped oil in Iraq? There are a lot more oil wells in Texas than there are in Iraq…strange. Of course all this doom and gloom doesn’t have to happen. We can start conserving. The UNCW teacher panel tonight insisted that even by little things like turning off lights or turning the ac down or washing with colder water, all are small steps. If we all did that we could make a sizeable impact. They did quite a good job at not only educating but entertaining. We will need to start making an impact or this doom and gloom will come true. We can’t just wait around for some technology to be handed down by Jesus to free us of oil. It’s going to be a hard road full of sacrifices made by everyone. In the end it’s everyone who will suffer so we have a responsibility to start living smarter. Here’s a link to the film’s website. I encourage people to check it out if at all possible. It really gets you thinking.

This is off topic but just as important as all the environmental and political stuff. The Buffalo Sabres and the Pittsburg Penguins will play an outside game in the Ralph. In other words we’re having a hockey game in the snow, in the stadium where the bills play on January 1st. Every game should be played this way. GO SABRES.

Quick post - Yesterday I rode my first century with my buddy Justin for an MS fundraiser. I’m not burnt to a full crisp anywhere outside of where my bike shorts or shirt was covering. Somehow I managed not to be sore, probably used up all the lactic acid in my legs just riding. I’m glad I did it, at least I feel some sort of sense of accomplishment. It wasn’t that it was ever really hard at one point, it’s that you sit on the bike all day and after awhile boredom and just plain being uncomfortable sets in, as you realize that you have 40 more miles to go. Anyway it’s done, over - good. I’d like to link a post by sirbikesalot here because I’m too tired/lazy to post. He makes a lot of good points, about the waning oil supply, alternative transportation, and the attitude it’s going to take if people want to change anything so here it is, give it a read and see how you can apply it to your own life. CLICK FOR LINK

The “Economic Growth Index” study gave an ‘F’ to Erie, Niagara, Orleans, Genesee, Allegany and Chautauqua counties, while Cattaraugus and Wyoming counties received a grade of ‘D.’

I completely feel for the folks back home who feel like they can’t get a break. However, when I look at the alternative, a economically thriving area such as Wilmington, North Carolina, I can only shudder at the consequences of a “thriving” economy. The problem seems to be that our economy works on growth. Stagnation is a cancer of the economy. The world we live in is not unlimited. We only have a limited amount of land, water, air and animal/plant life. If our economy aims to keep growing forever and ever there will come a point where there is nothing left to sell but the ruins of old condos and bottled air, presumably owned by Pepsi or Coke. You can preach about it all you want, but to some people it just won’t sink in until it’s too late. They won’t wake up until the last tree has been cut down for a gated development called something like “Long Gone Forest.” I still have a bit of hope people will stop being blind to it, and with the hope feel the responsibility to bring it to people’s attention. It’s the ones that are most blind and careless when it comes to protecting our world that we must give the most attention too. I’ve found more often than not it’s not that people don’t care, but rather they just don’t understand. It’s like when you tell someone of the genocide in Sudan, they might say, “oh that’s horrible” and then go back to watching Jeff Foxworthy’s new game show. But, if you could show them first hand the devastation, I don’t know a single person who wouldn’t try to contribute in some way to stopping it. People do care, they just have to much other junk in the way. Like my buddy over at Jackburnslives.com says, “it’s not the earth that’s in trouble, it’s us.” We’re only a blip on the timeline of earth. We may off it just as soon unless we wake up and start being proactive about protecting the earth and our resources. So today as I went around snapping photos that thought ran through my head and so did and old poem I had to write for class.

A lot can change in twenty years
even a simple cable repair man can see that much.
My view from the top of the telephone pole used
to be refreshing. A flat sand worn landscape
brimming with sea birds and evergreens.
Now plastic condos litter my view
from my crows nest of telephone wire.
They stand in the footprints
of stamped out copper roofed homes.
The four lane road down below hides
the old two lane “county 21.”
The same road that used to carry beat up chevy’s
now fills up with Mercedes and BMW’s.
Hell, you can’t even see the ocean
unless you’re standing on the shore!

They call it “progress”, I think not.
Long ago a man wrote, “the woods are lovely, dark and deep.”
So, with no longer to go before I sleep
I hope to dream of creeper vines reaching over concrete
of trees to shadow the shore
and gulls to roost in the apexes
of mansions long abandoned beside the sea.

As some of you know I’m spearheading the first annual “Cape Fear International Environmental Film Festival.” It’s a long name I know. The point of the film festival is to bring awareness to global and local environmental issues through different media outlets such as photography, poetry, and mainly film. This will be happening next spring through UNCW’s facilities, if all goes as planned. Well, today I met with UNCW’s film dept. chair, Dr. Buttino. He finally gave me the go ahead even though nothing is final until it gets approved through the school. Now I’ve got to meet with a group of academic advisers to lay out the blue print for the festival. This way, Dr. Buttino can take the semi-concrete plan over to his friends in the Environmental Science departments and see if they want to get on board. In the end I’m hoping the school will sponsor it, and with help from the students and faculty it could become something really big for the area. More importantly I hope it just gets the message out there. Anyway I’m open to taking suggestions or ideas for the festival. So if you live in the area or just have an idea, feel free to leave a comment of email me at seancarr54@yahoo.com. Thanks.

http://www.repamerica.org/….I had no idea such a thing existed. Republicans that acknowledge global warming? Wow. Cheers.

My Buddy Mike emailed this to me, and i must say I agree with it quite a bit and wanted to share it with anyone who’s reading this.

I grew up in Australia. Australian men generally accept masculinity far better than American men, and I understand why this is. In every country on earth where boys play, there is a ritual of selecting members of each team, whether the game is soccer, cricket, football, baseball, kickball, mammoth-hunting, what have you. Most boys, at some time, have experienced the humiliation of being picked last, and it hurts. Even being picked second-last is much more tolerable than being picked last. It hurts— what is important, and culturally distinct, is how the boy deals with that pain and humiliation, when he’s the one picked last.

In Australia, boys strive to be an asset to the team that picks them. They actually care more about how their team does than how they feel. This isn’t ego annihilation, and it’s not fascism. While playing the game, the game is what’s important, not one’s own petty issues. If a boy can table his own issues sufficiently to make a good catch, or kick a goal, he’ll get picked sooner next time. He knows this. It’s a question of priorities: the team wants to win, and they will pick those kids who will make it more likely that their team will win. How each individual feels during this process is irrelevant to the overall goal. Be dependable, be an asset to the team, and the rest of the team will take care of you.

In Australia, there is the concept of mates. The word loosely translates as “friend”, but the truth is that Americans lack the concept completely. Your mate has your back, and you have his. Your mates help define you, and accept you unconditionally. Once you’re in, you’re in for life. It’s not easy to get in. When I was nine, I had a kid who used to annoy me mercilessly on the playground. One day, I had had enough of his picking on me, and I knocked him over with a punch. He got up, shook himself off, and shook my hand. “We’re having a party this weekend. Here’s where it is.”

I was still really angry, and I didn’t immediately understand what he was doing. He wanted to know that I would stick up for myself when provoked. He needed to know if, after he was my mate, I’d stand up for him. Once he found out that I’d stand up for myself, I was in. At that party, everyone there treated me like a mate, and I felt more included than I ever did before, and I never got selected last for any game again at that school.

American boys don’t have this. The best have a much weaker version of this, but the commitment is conditional and halting, the bonds constantly tested by vicious games of conformity and obedience. Maybe men at war have the real thing, but I have no experience of this. Coming back to the USA, I had to teach my male friends to be mates, and it never came naturally to any of my new friends. I have American mates now, some of whom I’ve been friends with for twenty years, but it took an enormous amount of work, and included really rocky periods, and a lot of struggle. New people I meet, especially younger people, have no understanding of what it means to be a mate. Friendships, especially among young people, are temporary, fleeting, strategic. They exist in order to jockey for social position. American men seem treacherous, insecure, and ungrounded in comparison to Aussie men. It’s killing us as a society. It’s one of the great tragedies of our time.

When an American boy gets picked last at a game on the playground, he gives up on ever being selected by the other boys, except last. He retreats into self-pity and misanthropy. This is encouraged by the adults, especially his parents, doubly especially when his dad made the same choices about being picked last himself. This boy tries to create a new playing field where he is the top of the selection. Because he knows he cannot compete on the playing field, he tries to compete in intellectual pursuits, or in a fantasy world, or in fandom. He collects comic books, or plays Dungeons & Dragons, or plays video games. Maybe he learns science, or literature, or art, or music. It never occurs to him to strive to improve himself, to make himself an asset to the team that might choose him. It never occurs to him that a drama is unfolding on a level bigger than that of his individual ego.

When adolescence hits, this boy tries to be cool. He creates a new pecking order based around musical taste, or fashion, or obscure knowledge. He tries out for the school play, or joins the debate team, or starts a band, or joins the school’s literary magazine, and tries to win approval through his creativity and intelligence. There is nothing inherently wrong with seeking approval through these channels, but the boy still has a chip on his shoulder about rejection. He strives to create not merely a new selection where he is on top, but a new selection where the kids who are successful at the old games are rejected here. He seeks to be even crueler than he thinks those other kids are— to cut them down before they can hurt him again. He doesn’t realize that being rejected from the alternative he has just created doesn’t hurt at all, really. His ego depends upon being top of some pecking order, even an imaginary one, and he will viciously defend his new status, especially by being cruel to those who are lower down on his new pecking order. He becomes an asshole, but it’s everyone else’s fault but his.

Ultimately, this is what it means to be cool, to be indie, to be avant-garde, to be hip. As a young punk rocker, I was saved from this insanity because I grew up in a small town where weirdos got their asses beat. In order to be weird, you had to band together and watch each other’s backs. We had to trust each other in a fight, or we’d all get stomped. It was ugly, it was nasty, and it was exhausting, but at the end of the day, you really knew who your friends were. A realistic selection sprung up based on whether you were worth saving when everyone got jumped by rednecks. You sized up new potential friends for their value in dragging you out from under a half dozen pairs of steel-toed Doc Martins when the Nazi skinheads broke up your hardcore show. (I like traditional skinheads, but the Nazi skins suck ass). When the bored, redneck small-town cops harassed us for being weird, you needed to know your friends had your back when you split up and ran.

The point is that every boy and every man needs to know his friends chose him. It’s hard-wired into our brains. We need to know that we were worth picking, that we’re valued for what we contribute to the people around us. We need it in our jobs, in our friendships, and in our relationships. Those boys and men who never get chosen, who never become the people anyone would want on their side, are damaged goods. They’re not really cool, they’re undeveloped. No tattoo or piercing, no leather jacket or pair of glasses, no boots or records or novels or comic books or mp3s or posters or t-shirts; no commodity of any kind is going to make a pair of balls occur where they wouldn’t anyway.

We live in an advertising culture where we are constantly told that the only thing that stands between our current state and wholeness is a particular commodity. It’s the central lie of our culture, and the people who hate mainstream culture the most seem to cling to this lie the most intensely. Notice how many “alternative” people define their non-conformity by how readily they conform to an alternate standard? How they buy objects that articulate their rebellion for them? It has become so ingrained in our culture that the current crop of teenagers makes no distinction between consumption and expression. They are frustrated that consumption alienates them from their own feelings and desires, but they express that frustration by consuming more commodities. It’s a vicious circle. Let go. Quit being cool.

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I’ve completely stolen all of this from Beau over at Jackburnslives.com/blog. Please read it, then if you like what you read stop over to his place for awhile. I’d elaborate on my feelings of all this and how it connects to Wilmington, but for now just read it and mull it over for awhile. Then do something that doesn’t involved selling you’re soul for a profit, that is if you have one left.

I recently returned from an out of town trip that I hoped would recharge the batteries, reinvigorate the senses and inspire me to say something worthwhile. Something positive, informative and of interest.

Instead, I returned even more despondent about the world than when I left.

Is it only me? Am I the only one that sees the world over flowing with self-serving, duplicitous leeches, people out to take advantage of every situation and pad their pockets at the expense of all the living things around them? Or, am I entirely too cynical and negative, failing to see enough good in people?

I’m beginning to suspect my values and mores are very different from the rest of the country. I value all life. The little sparrows that were on my patio this morning. The bears in the Smokies. The spiders in my garden. The poor and less fortunate in the inner city. The illegal immigrant trying to cross a ridiculous man made border to find a better life. The red rock of Utah. The aspen of Colorado, the majestic redwood of California, wilderness and all of the environment, which by the way, is all habitat were something is attempting to live. All of it has worth and all of it deserves not only protection, but reverence.

I don’t see myself as all important. I see myself as just one part of a complex system that’s not entitled to more than my share or to use resources at the expense of others. To the degree that it is possible, I try to live within sustainable limits. I think about such things and wonder why more people don’t.

The notions that life is a “struggle against all” in a continual war of mutual aggression and it’s the “survival of the fittest” are both not only idealogically distorted but factually wrong. Life doesn’t have to be that way, and in fact it is universally not that way.

I’d give my last dollar to a friend or even a needly stranger. I’d defend my friends, my family and my home with my life, if necessary, but only against threats that are real, not nefarious threats invented by our government. I basically find joy in life through service to others, in defending the voiceless and the weak and in challenging the status quo. I stand firmly opposed to those that would bring harm to the weak.

“I would never betray a friend to serve a cause. Never reject a friend to help an institution. Great nations may fall in ruin before I would sell a friend to save them.”-Edward Abbey

And to those that run the world, you that see limits to growth as an anathema, I stand opposed to you, too.

But alas, most people won’t sacrifice for others, especially non-humans. Most just blithely go along their merry way, sucking up resources and exploiting whenever possible. Yes, there are a growing few that stand in opposition to the dominant meme, but not enough. And that’s my problem. So few of “us,” and so many of “them.”

Is there any hope?

(here’s where I start to talk myself out of my cynicism and return to sanity)

Thus sayest Edward Abbey:

“But they have everything. They have the organization and the control and the communications and the army and the police and the secret police. They have the big machines. They have the law and drugs and jails and courts and judges and prisons. They are so huge. We are so small.”

“Dinosaurs. Cast-iron dinosaurs. They ain’t got a fucking chance against us.”

“Four of us. Four million of them, counting the Air Force. That’s a contest?”

“Bonnie, you think we’re alone? I’ll bet-listen, I’ll bet right this very minute there’s guy’s out in the dark doing the same kind of work we’re doing. All over the country, little bunches of guys in twos and threes, fighting back.”

“You’re talking about a well-organized national movement.”

“No, I’m not. No organization at all. None of us knowing anything about any other little bunch. That’s why they can’t stop us.”

From “Duologues,” The Monkey Wrench Gang

This isn’t a call to violence. It’s a call to action. Community based action. The Monkey Wrench Gang didn’t launch a national letter writing campaign. They didn’t march in front of the White House. They didn’t make a contribution to the Sahara Club. They got involved locally, in their community.

Get involved in community groups and schools. Start a community garden. Protest. Quit buying unnecessary junk. Park the car. Help a needy neighbor. Talk to people about the importance of preserving the remaining open spaces in the community.

Quit worrying about things you can’t control and focus on the things you can control. It’s the only hope we’ve got, and action is the sole cure to hopelessness.

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.

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 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.

Well Jeremy and I have been in Fairbanks now for 2 days. It is not a very nice city. There’s alot of crime and it’s really run down. So after leaving our hippy commune like hostel in the heart of Denali country this is like a rude awakening. We tried to get over it though and rented a car for two days so we could get around easy and not be stuck in the city entirely. Today we went to Chena hot springs which is a 60 mile road that dead ends at a hotsprings resort. It wasn’t that great and you had to pay to get in the over touristy pool so we didn’t stay. However, out there we met a man who lives in the bush about 20 miles in by a river. He uses a dogsled to get around and lives in a tent all year including winter which can get up to 50 below. Apparently, this man has a car he uses to get around and it’s the most photographed car in Alaska. On top of that he was in the movie White Fang. We also saw a bunch of moose out there which are all on my flickr account. We went to an old gold dredge today too. I panned for gold and got approximately twenty dollars worth. Overall it was a pretty good day but it still doesn’t compare to where we were in Denali. That place had such a good vibe and you’d walk out your front door and look straight up into the mountains. In Fairbanks you walk outside and don’t see anything of the sort. The last night we were in Denali I met some guys who do the flying tours around there. One of them owned his own plane and told me that they flew over Chris Mccandles bus to find a good place to hike to it. If you don’t know who that is read the book Into The Wild. Sean Penn was up right where we were last year filming for the movie version of the book. Apparently, the film and Sean Penn still owe the bar we frequented acrossed the road over 10 grand. To hear first hand knowledge about not only the place where it took place but where the film was shot was a nice surprise because I had no idea until I started talking witht the locals. Tomorrow Jeremy and I are heading into Fairbanks to see the museum and such but like I’ve said we already spent time in Denali so it’s all downhill from here.

I’m finally here in Alaska. Yesterday wasn’t the most fun. We took off from Buffalo around noon. From there we flew down to Atlanta to get on our connecting flight to anchorage. Seems real smart to fly all the way south before flying all the way north. Anyway we finally got here at almost 8pm Alaska time which is midnight back east. I just woke up at 7am and it’s almost lunch time for you guys. Anyway Conrad and Lyde, the folks were staying with, are really nice people, and smart too. So staying with them for a few days is going to work out really good. Conrad asked me and jeremy if we want to hike a mountain around here. It’dbe 4 or 5 hours up and then a few hours back down. We’re not sure yet, but I think it’d be stupid to pass up the opportunity. I just thought I should mention I got stuck in front of an old irishman and a rich construction company owner from Alaska on the way here. For 7 hours it was nothing but republican politics(from the Alaska man), family stories and a good irish accent. They didn’t shut up once. However, The guy from Alaska knew alot and therefore was my own personal travel guide after I secretly intruded on their converstion. Today Jeremy and I have to go down to Whittier to catch our day cruise ship. Conrad and Lyde are letting us use their older car which is awesome because otherwise we’d be completely out of luck since it’s over an hour drive. Though, I mention to Jeremy that we could ride a moose. Ok that’s all for now, I have to take alot of photos today.

Newly added photos to a newly updated flickr…Here they are…. CLICK

And away we go. I’ve been home for just over a week now and haven’t done too much. I mean I have, mostly seeing the family and relaxing. I’ve yet to get out to allegany state park and do some hiking and riding, although when I mentioned it to my dad today he seemed half interested in going. I really do love the area here. It’s beautiful. Nothing but small towns peppered throughout rolling green hills mired in early morning fog and afternoon haze causing the hills to disappear after only a few miles. I drove out to Salamanca the other day which is on the Indian reservation. The state park is adjacent to the reservation and right near the Allegany River. It just astounds me how much natural beauty we have in this are. What pisses me off about the whole thing is that people complain about how it sucks here and there’s nothing to do. I guess I can only say, appreciate while it lasts. Although to be fair, I was saying how much I hated it before I left for college. It’s one of those situations where you have to get out and see the world and realized how things are away from our quite rural section of the state before you can really learn to love it. I know one day this area like the rest of the country will turn into the overdeveloped south. With the population of America booming and the natural resources and land being used up, it’s only a matter of time. My point being, I wish the people around here would start appreciating the land while they have it, instead of putting the area down all the time. Sometimes the simple life is the better life. You don’t need a huge house and SUV to be happy. I can understand the economic situation though, but that’s a societal problem and not so much a local problem. People need to put more emphasis on collective growing and local foods. As my friend Beau over at Jack Burns Lives.com says, “bioregionalism.” In other words work within the land and ecosystem you have locally. It’s a great idea, and I think that could spur not only environmental awareness but also a higher appreciation for what this are really has, instead of worrying about what it doesn’t have.

Anyway on a brighter note…my town put up these 3 foot fiberglass squirrels all around town. They are painted after certain themes or businesses which sponsored them. I remember hearing about them last year. I thought it was a really bad idea. Apparently they did it because we have a large population of black squirrels in the town and they are somewhat rare…I guess. Anyway the fiberglass squirrels are a real hit, and they look pretty good. I made my mom take a photo of me with every squirrel today, and of course giving the thumbs up in every photo, a trend I started back in Italy. I’ll have those photos up soon. I have them on my new Mac, but I have to transfer them to this computer to put them on the internet because we don’t have wireless and I lost my flash drive. Speaking of flash drives, I just bought a 300 gig external hard drive. Along with final cut pro suite and a panasonic prosumer camera. All in all costing me somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 grand. Plus I bought a new sleeping bag for my trip to Alaska which is only about a week away.
I guess I could go on and on about what I’ve done this week, but I’ll save you that information because I know it’s not really that interesting to most of you. In the mean time I’m going to go down to the river and take some photos and dip my feet in.

I posted a new link…www.masonwinfield.com, he’s a local author that writes about regional folklore and paranormal things. I encourage you to read his website. It’s got a lot of good information and interesting stories. Hell even buy one of his books off amazon. It’s local stuff, but if you’re into paranormal and folklore you’ll get a good read.

Here’s some photos of my trip home, just a few. Like I said I’ll post a lot more when I can switch them to my moms computer which has “the internet.”

…”grandma” Paar, grandma Carr, and me eating at one of the best restaurants in town, the beef and barrel.

…Driving down the road and thought this would be a nice photo. Luckily ’round these parts you can stop in the middle of the road, get out, take a photo and hop back in without worrying about any traffic.

…View of Rock City Park scenic lookout. Sure would be scenic if there wasn’t so much haze.

…and old video I found on my friends computer today that I got a slight kick out of.
Anyway today me and a friend went to New Bern, NC. He’s looking or a job up there, and I thought it to be a good chance to get out of the rat race in Wilmington. New Bern beyond the new influx of fast food restaurants and shopping plazas is a beautiful city. perhaps one of my favorite I’ve seen on the coast. There’s a few reasons for my liking of this town. The first is that it doesn’t have any of the pretentiousness that Wilmington has. The guy who ran the coffee shop, and subsequently explained to us the lowdown on the area said he moved from California to New Bern to get away from the “rat race.” He thought people were too caught up in seeing who could have the more expensive car, or bigger house. These statements rang very true with me. The coffee shop along with many of the buildings in New Bern or nothing more than revitalized buildings from the city’s earlier history. The Coffee shop for example was wide open, the doors at the front were inviting and it had look that I could only describe as a brick barn. Laid back, comfortable, and as I’ve said not a hint of pretentiousness. There’s also a slew art galleries and little shops that definitely reflect the low key, creative vibe of the city. I for one really relate, and find that aspect very inviting. The most important aspect of New Bern however, is a little shop on the corner where Pepsi Cola was invented. Anyone who really knows me well, knows that I can easily go through a 12pack of diet pepsi, or diet dew a day. I probably could drink upwards of 20 a day if I’ve got them around. So not knowing ahead of time that the city I was visiting was the birthplace of the drink I thrive off, well what could be better. Beyond all that, the town is right on the water. It has yet to be really developed, but like I told the guy at the coffee shop, “give it ten years.” So what I can say is that it is a really nice town, one that I could even see myself living in if I ever decided to stay the east coast(literally). Since I have no plans for that though, I guess all I can say is that I imagine Wilmington was like that once. In fact I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said, “You think you like Wilmington NOW? You should have seen it before you came here!” Anyway, great day, good road trip all in all. I’ll drop the links to a few photos below.

Gas is now 3 dollars and then some. I say good. Nothing hits home like a swift kick in the pocketbook for us Americans. I would say that cutting down on your driving should be motivated by things like the environment and all around fitness. Don’t tell Suzy Q soccer mom driving her brand new Suburban though. If gas prices going through the roof is what it takes to get people talking about other forms of transportation than I’m all for it. I’m in the process of buying a touring bike as we speak. Something that will get me around town and that will be it’s only purpose. I’m looking at buying something older, steel frame(aluminum is for pussies), 21 gears all that jazz, but definitely something that is meant for transportation. I’ve got my road bike and mountain bike, and I’d like to keep them as they are. Back to my point though. It just strikes me funny that the only good way to get our attention is to hit us where we are always focused, on the money. Don’t get me wrong, we need money to get by in the society we live in, but I think lately people have become so focused on material possessions and having more than the person in the house next to him that they’ve lost the focus of what life is really about. It’s not about earning over 100K a year and having a nice car. Let’s face it, we’re all going to be dead one day and then those things will be meaningless. People need to focus on what really matters, friends, family, keeping the earth healthy for future generations and teaching the right values to those people. Hopefully, and there’s a lot of hope in that, we will start focusing more on the things that matter, instead of the materialistic rat race that is inevitably going to be the doom of the human race(not the earth though). The more and more I ride, the more I think bikes are a great way to do that. Hell, they may even save the world. ….oh ya, GO SABRES!!!!!

This is a post I thought my friend should write. It was his idea but I encouraged him because he’s a much better and wittier writer than myself. Anyway I recently got him into biking and he’s been riding as much as he can instead of driving. Believe it or not he only spends about 20 bucks on gas a week now. Anyway here’s the post and I’ll provide the link to his blog because he often has witty posts that some of you more cynical people will enjoy. ———————–

Boycott Gas, Save the World! (yea right)

I saw on CNN today that there’s some massive chain e-mail going around suggesting that everyone boycott gasoline on a certain day (I think it’s May 15 – but that’s not important). Unfortunately, I did not receive such a message myself, probably because I had to block the newsletters the American Family Association was sending me a while back due to my inbox being assaulted like bombs over Baghdad with their anti-homosexual/anti-abortion/good-golly-I-just-love-Jesus-and-my-brand-new-SUV chain mail. I’ve a feeling folks like them were at the root of this stupidity (for a definition of “folks like them,” look up Dr. James Dobson/other Christian® literature/supporters of Geroge W. Bush/people who are onto the liberals’ conspiracy commonly known as “global warming”).

Whew – that was a mouthful. I think I should consult my local union about how to get welfare/WIC since I feel like I have carpal tunnel syndrome … or at least the mere whiff of it.

Let’s talk about the positives of this whole notion. Ready? I’m going to list them here:

1). Their intentions are good.

Thankfully, the good folks at blogger.com have supplied me with ample bandwidth to accommodate such a long list of good things about this idea. Seriously, though – how is not buying gasoline on one day going to do a damn thing – especially since the majority of the participants in this scheme will just top off their tanks the day before? So the gas companies will lose out on a day’s profits – somewhere around a couple billion dollars. Is that going to put a dent in an industry that will make about that much more the day before? I know I got a free calculator from that Land Rover dealer the other day – where did I put it … I’m going to get to the bottom of this.

Here’s the thing – and why the drive for such a gesture comes from a beautiful place filled with butterflies and lambs – we just arrested six would-be militants in New Jersey who are suspected of plotting to shoot up a military base. Plus, in some little shit hole Muslim country, video was released of a children’s program where a Mickey Mouse-wannabe told its toddler-comprised audience to kill Jews in the name of (one of) their Gods. There was even a four-or-so-year-old singing along and reiterating his aspiring message. We definitely need to cut WAY back on our dependence of oil – especially that which comes from these countries!

Are the orchestrators of this oil-boycott mission seeing this? I don’t think so. They’re just pissed at the thought of gas jumping to over four-dollars a gallon – that’s the “evil” they’re trying to prevent. Could you imagine what it would be like to drive one of those new GMC Diplodocuses with two 30-gallon gas tanks and actually have to pay four dollars a gallon? That’s an expensive way for real estate agents to get to work or doctors’ wives to take their children to tennis practice at the entrance of their gated communities – but they’d pay it anyway since you just can’t put a price on safety. There are all kinds of unsafe drivers out there, like hybrid owners, pedestrians and even bicyclists. The potential for danger on the road is almost unspeakable … it’s best to equip our loved ones with wheeled-bulldozers. Besides that, Benjamin Franklin said it’s our American right to boast all the money we make.

Once again, I’m off on a tangent. Here’s my point.

If you want to make a dent in the outrageous profits companies like Exxon-Mobile, Texaco, and Shell are making, you have to actually stop using their product. Don’t just stop buying it. Utilize public transportation, walk, carpool, or even – God forbid – ride a bike to work. Today I witnessed the culmination of why we Americans have got ourselves addicted to oil like David Hasselhoff is to alcohol, the exact reason why we prefer to either imagine global warming doesn’t exist or blame it on China. Two women outside my work (on Wrightsville Beach, of