Living the Now

It has occurred to me that I was totally obsessed with the Pacific Crest Trail in January.  That's when I began reading the Pacific Crest Trail Association's web site, looking at photos, and reading blogs.  That's because it was forty below zero for weeks on end and I was dreaming of the warm days that await me in the future.  Days where not only could I stand to be outside for more than 2 hours, but where I would be living outside for months on end. Now, in March, I'm finding that the PCT is this imminent yet distant undertaking that I will be embarking on sometime soon.  The reason for the lack of attention, failure to even have a single permit in hand, and nary a resupply box packed is that I'm too busy living in the now.  In January I had ample cause to be studying, dreaming, and planning for a trip that won't begin until April, but for now I'm armpit deep in Alaska springtime fun.  

It turns out that habits are very warm and don't allow for a full range of motion while skiing.  But it's a very good conversation piece....

  Last Saturday I drove 100 miles to the neighboring town of Talkeetna and participated in my first 25 Km ski race.  Lest I mislead anyone into thinking that I'm very competitive I will tell you that during the race I was wearing a nun's habit and wimple (and by the way, wimple is my new favorite word...replacing Atchafalaya, though that is a very close second) .  It was St. Patrick's Day and although many participants seriously raced the course in their sleek and wildly colored spandex, at least half the folks were wearing prom dresses, anything and everything green, tutus, wigs, crowns, and were stopping to have a shot of Irish whiskey along the way.  As I herring-boned up a steep hill behind a chicken and Princess Leia, I thought to myself, "Now this is my kind of race...."  The entire Alaska Range was visible and fun was had by all.  Following the race, though I could barely walk, I played bluegrass and old-timey music with my friends in the historic Fairview Inn while sunburned skiers compared stories from the race. As night rolled around the bluegrass band fired up and it was dancing until the bar shut down....nothing to think about but the now.
  The following day I drove the 100 miles back home to Cantwell and promptly packed for a camping trip with my good friend, neighbor, and local mule wrangler, VB.  Instead of traveling via skis we would be venturing out on snowmachines.  Monday morning arrived and I met with VB at the Windy Pass Mule Barn.  We loaded up two snowmachines and a sled onto a trailer and traveled 9 miles up the road to poise ourselves for an expedition up the Yanert River and on to the Wood River.  My previous experience with snowmachines has been limited driving, some riding double, a little being towed on skis like water-skiing, and some riding behind on a sled, like a dog musher.  So having my own ride for 3 days was a learning experience, super fun, and more of a work-out than I anticipated.  As a skier, it was fascinating to cover all those miles so quickly.  The power was fun and intimidating and I learned a lot about how to move with a machine.
  The camping was also far different than my typical outings.  Normally I've got all of my gear on my back and take advantage of the modern materials that are light and warm.  VB skimps on nothing. He's old school and has been making a living in the backcountry of Alaska for 40 years or so.  He's traveled this country on dogsled, snowmachine, mule, and horse, he's run trap lines, lived in a remote trapper cabin with his wife and newborn son, guided countless clients on hunting trips for caribou, bear, and sheep hunts, and is a true Alaskan cowboy.  And he sure can sing a song around a campfire too.  Anyway, when VB goes into the backcountry he is well prepared and traveling in relative comfort.  In the sled behind his machine we had with us: 2 canvas wall tents with small wood burning stoves, a cooler stocked with delicious morsels (bacon, eggs, asparagus, burger, Oreos, apples, and more),  a bottle of wine, a chainsaw, about 15 gallons of fuel, among other useful things.  The first camp was located near the Wood River and was just outside of a cabin made of stones and built into a hillside.  The cabin is gutted inside, so VB has a tent site right outside.  The pole frame was already set up so all we had to do was slide the ridgepole through a sleeve, tie some corners off and voila, home for the night was ready to go. Well, after the woodstove was set up.  There were two old military mattresses stashed under a spruce tree that I dragged over to put in the canvas abode as well as an old, heavy canvas tarp to lay down.  After VB removed the snow from that area I had to decide if I wanted to put my sleeping bag directly on top of the mattress which looked like it had been used as a squirrel brothel/birthing center/end of times food cache or on top of the tarp which was heavily stained with old moose blood.  I opted for the blood tarp.  Camp was set up so it was time to get some heat going.  VB fired up the chainsaw and set about bucking up some logs that were already at the cabin. I split the rounds into small pieces for the tent stove and larger pieces for the fire pit outside.  As darkness fell we had two warm spots to relax, an extremely cold glass of wine, and dinner cooking on the campfire.  Much different than huddling around an MSR waiting for water to boil for a no-cook meal and I might add that the barbeque ribs were delicious.
  Another day on the trail with eye-popping views of Alaska and we decided to camp on Cody Creek.  I use the word camp despite the fact that we stayed in a cabin because it was the coldest, leakiest cabin I've ever been in and the Yukon stove in it shot heat directly into the -30 night via the chimney.  We practically had to hug the stove to stay warm.  We did have to put the bottle of wine 3 inches from the stove to thaw the remainder of the delicacy.  Somewhere in the world, the vintner at El Gaucho is cringing for what we did to his life's work.  But we enjoyed it nonetheless.

VB, my trusty guide

  This 3 day adventure was a trip into the past.  Going out there with VB was like going with a walking, talking, spitting piece of history;  I heard stories of old trappers of days gone by, who built which cabin, bitter feuds and rivalries in the Wood River Valley, who hunts there now and how the animals are getting chased farther and farther away.  It's a totally different experience and perspective than I will get when I head back out to the Wood River tomorrow with the Denali Ladies Ski Club.  Only 2 days between trips (and one of those was spent doing a 280-mile grocery run to Fairbanks), and I'll be out there skiing for 9 days.  Seeing the same country from the near silence, only the swoosh-swoosh of my skis to listen to, and slow pace of human-powered travel.  As much fun as I had with VB with the snowmachines, I will be glad to be traveling slowly, watching the scenery change in glide-length increments, listening only to my own thoughts rather than the buzz of an engine, and savoring each and every simple meal that is so hard earned after a day in the cold skiing.
  As you can see, I don't have time quite yet to think about the PCT despite my sheer excitement about it.  I'm taking advantage of my last few weeks in Alaska and of the unmitigated beauty of spring.  Permits will happen, a plane ticket to California will happen, taxes will get done.... but not today.  April.  April is time for that.... gotta go pack!! 

Zooming through the Alaskan wilderness

 

An Unorthodox Approach

 From what I can gather, the motto of the Pacific Crest Trail is "Hike Your Own Hike," meaning don't try to keep up with the proverbial Joneses.  Hike at your own pace, experience your own version of the trail.  I'm generally good with doing my own thing, living my life at my own pace, and feel confident in the decisions I make.  And then I started reading other peoples' blogs about the PCT.  Holy crap.....
 January was brutally cold for a brutally long period of time in Interior Alaska.  While wiling away hours and days at a time with brief, bundled excursions outside, I had plenty of time to start thinking about the Pacific Crest Trail which, until then, had been this faraway goal:  something I told myself and others that I was going to do, but had not researched or planned.  It's just a backpacking trip, right? The extent of my research for the PCT had been to ask my friend Scott, who thru-hiked it in 2010, if it was safe to do as a solo woman.  He said absolutely, go for it....my decision was made with no more thought.  So with more than enough time on my hands in January I thought I'd browse the interwebs for pictures of the trail to get glimpses of the country I will be walking through and to remind myself that it would not always be so barbarically cold and dark and snowy. 
 I went to the official Pacific Crest Trail Association's website and found some awesome photos.  Now it's starting to feel real, I thought.  Then I noticed a "journals" tab and thought I'd peruse some peoples' reflections of their trail experience.  I found some well-written chronicles from years past as well as some narratives that freaked me the f@#k out.  The alarming compositions I found were journals written by people who are also attempting the PCT endeavor in 2012.  They hadn't even set foot on the trail and they were already blogging and the start of the hike was yet 4 months away!! What??!!! I'm not kidding you I read (read: skimmed) accounts of ounce by ounce gear purchases and considerations.  Menu tests.  Physical training regimens designed for professional athletes.  Weight loss tactics to pare down before kickoff.  Equipment tests designed for the Navy SEALS. I thought I was doing some early preparatory measures just by looking at a website........
  Those of you who know me well know that I am not a planner.  I'm an outliner.  I like to have a loose stratagem of what is going on, but I do not need to know what is going to happen on a day to day, hour by hour basis.  For example:  my vacation planning consists of buying a plane ticket.  I mean, I know I'm going to be in Louisiana (for example) what more do I need to know?? How do I know in advance if I'm going to want to stop at the boudain shop and who I might meet there who might tell me of a Cajun band playing down the road at a speakeasy?? You just never know what opportunities life will present you, particularly if you are open to them. Last year I packed all my food and gear for a 15-day ski trip in the Arctic in one day.  I'm not necessarily promoting this approach to life, just trying to explain that this is the way I function.  I tend toward procrastination.  I tend toward unscheduled adventure.  I tend toward seeing what happens along the way.  I tend towards going with the flow.
  I realize that different people are going to have different approaches to the same undertaking.  I know my style and I know plenty of people who are planners and preparers.  I don't feel either approach is right or wrong, I just think people function within different comfort zones and there are different degrees of these modus operandi.  I can get frustrated with planners just as I probably can drive them crazy too.  That's just life. 
  Maybe it was the -40 degree temperatures.  Maybe it was the incredibly short days.  I don't know how to explain it, but somehow reading the blogs of all these planners, dieters, detail-oriented fellow hikers I began to get worried.  I became paranoid that I wasn't doing enough to get ready for this hike.  That all my gear was way to heavy because I could have shaved ounces here or there.  That I didn't research every piece of equipment thoroughly enough.  I should be freaking out right about now.
  But then I came to my senses.  I've been walking this Earth long enough to know that this is how I function.  That, for me, I am planning, thinking ahead, and ready for this epic adventure.  I know my experience and my physical capabilities.  Barring injury or insanity, I can totally walk 2,650 miles this summer.  Maybe my pack will be heavier than Joe Blow's, but it will still be lighter than what I'm accustomed to carrying.  It's all relative, right? I can adjust my situation once I'm on the trail too....I'll just see how it goes.  As usual.

Cajun Mardi Gras run in Eunice, LA: a costume, chasing chickens thru sugar cane fields, and beer for breakfast.  Not your typical PCT preparations.

 SO, my training regimen for the Pacific Crest Trail has consisted of a 3-week vacation to Austin for honky tonkin',  Louisiana for Cajun food, music, and Mardi Gras (I gained at least 5 pounds), Seattle for Wintergrass bluegrass festival, and Juneau for more music and good times.  The most exercise I got was on a dance floor and walking to the drive-thru daiquiri shop in Lafayette.  Now that I'm home in Cantwell I'm back to daily cross-country skiing and the general physicality that it takes to live here, have a ski race planned to participate in, and a week-long ski trip with the Denali Ladies Ski Club at the end of the month.  I'm not, however, walking everywhere I go with a 25 pound pack on my back, just for practice. It's just not how I roll. And I'm not going to feel paranoid about it.  I'm going to start the PCT with a few extra pounds on my waistline and a blank slate.  To each our own and to each our own hike.

How I Can Afford to Do What I Do

You may be wondering how I can afford to take a year off of work and how I'm funding this crazy journey. Did she win the Nenana Ice Classic?? No, not yet.  I'm going to recycle a story that I wrote a couple of months ago to explain what ManCamp was. And it is the job that allowed me to take this year off and hike the Pacific Crest Trail.... thank you sweet baby Jesus for inventing ManCamp..... here you go: 

I've had several comments recently along the lines of: "I think I know what ManCamp is....but, what is it?" and "What do these Men do at ManCamp?" I've been so immersed in it for a year now that I forget that some of you may have no idea what my updates are referencing and perchance even envision me at some sort of retreat where Men come to get in touch with their feelings, wear white pajamas around a zen garden, eat organic food, and practice vinyasas near an eternal flame. This image mixed with the actual Men I work with brings me to my knees with laughter and amusement. So, now, I will do my best to present an accurate portrayal...albeit incredibly skewed by a female perspective...of ManCamp.

Before I dive in to what ManCamp is let me tell you how I ended up here. My entire adult life has been spent working seasonal jobs in Alaska. When I first came here in the summers of 1995/96 I endured the slime lines of cannery work in Seward. In 1997 I moved to the Interior of the state and began working in Denali National Park as a Backcountry Ranger. After 5 summers spent with the NPS and establishing my year-round home in the Denali area, I knew that government work was not for me but I wanted to support local business and friends of mine who are business owners. The next 8 summers were spent making sandwiches, driving shuttle vans, and serving fine food and wine for tourists in Denali Park. My job descriptions for the park service were more dreamy, but I was treated better, had more fun, and didn't take my job home with me working to support local businesses. Plus, my schedule was ideal: 4 months of work per year (mid-May to mid-September) and 4 days of work per week (10 hour days or restaurant gigs). I had my winters to ski, travel, hunker, and build a cabin. WeeBeeEconomics will be another story but it's based on the no debt principle: spend only money you have. But I digress.... this lifestyle suited me just fine until about 2 years ago.

Two years ago I ended a relationship with a boyfriend, with a boss, and with a city I'd been wintering in for 3 years.  It was time for change and I just didn't know which direction I wanted to go. Some people feel like they have no options whereas I felt like "the world is my oyster" was a bit of a daunting recourse.  Long story short, I deviated from my normal work schedule, such as it was, and was happily unemployed for 14 glorious months. I traveled in the Lower 48, reconnected with winter in Alaska, spent 6 weeks in India becoming a yoga instructor, did my first backpacking trip in the Arctic, toured with a band, and was generally up to my neck with LIFE. In the back of my mind I kept thinking, "I should start working." But that is just when Opportunity would tickle me with her feather boa and smile that seductive smile and I would find myself dancing in Louisiana, a daiquiri in one hand and a Cajun boy in the other.  I'm just that easy.

Toward the end of those 14 months of footloose and fancy free, I felt it was time to restock the coffers and get a little bit of a schedule in my life. I think it's good for me in spurts...schedule or routine, that is, particularly heading into an Alaskan winter where going for a ski and hitting the box of wine at 3 pm is not uncommon during these long nights.  The problem was was that it was October in Alaska and I'd only ever worked during the summer [read: tourist] season. There are no jobs available in the area where I live during the winter. I would be hard pressed to even get on a construction crew and they work *outside* in *Alaska* all *winter*. So I began thinking outside the box and turned to the internet for options.

I had the idea to find a job in the oil industry mainly out of curiosity and what I consider to be a pretty great schedule: 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off. Of course drilling is a huge industry in Alaska and employs scores of us, but living in the rural Interior region that I do, we all just happen to work in the tourist industry (by and large).  My curiosity stems from my study of anthropology. I love seeing how people live, where they live, hear what they talk about, compare what we have in common and what is completely different, and generally immersing myself in a place/people.  I experimented with city life in Austin. I've been to Cajun country of Louisiana about 9 times in the last 4 years. I've spent a year and a half in New Zealand. I spent 6 weeks in the same town in India and went nowhere else barring airports. I thought that immersing myself in the drilling culture of Alaska, a culture within a culture if you will, would be so interesting at the same time that it could be profitable. Such a very large employer of Alaskans and yet I knew nothing about it. So I perused the internet for job opportunities.

Long story short, again, I answered an ad on Anchorage craigslist that simply read: Remote Camp needs Housekeeper (West Side of Cook Inlet). I'd been looking at all sorts of sites from generic "find work in the oil field" sites to catering companies specializing with jobs in the field. This ad particularly caught my eye because it was on craigslist and was brief and to the point. Contact was made, job was secured, I went to Blackpot, and then I began work.... totally open to and not knowing what I was getting myself in to.

ManCamp is a place where Men working in the drilling industry (I've learned that even if you're drilling for natural gas, which is what goes on here, it is generally still referred to as the oil fields) live while they are at work. The Men live at camp on varying schedules: 20 days on, 10 days off. 3 weeks on, 1 week off. 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off. 103 days straight. You never know. They have job titles like roustabout, driller, operator, rigger, Company Man, tool pusher, and the like. Depending on what company is leasing our camp the Men are either from Alaska and specifically from the Kenai Peninsula for the most part, or are just working here from the Lower 48. There are drastic differences in the two types and that I will leave to my anthropological dissertation.  The Camp I work at is converted ATCO units put together and is called Cottonwood. By all accounts it is a nice, clean facility. There are 8 rooms in the main Camp; two cabins with 2 bunk beds in each; plus one ATCO unit about 2 miles down the road which can hold 12 Men (three rooms with 2 bunks in each room). On top of that, the small company I work for has a house where 3 our our employees live. I drive 4 hours from Cantwell to Anchorage and then fly 25 minutes from Anchorage to Beluga to get here. I live in a place that is on a bluff overlooking the Cook Inlet and the entire Chugach Mountain range. I live in a place where helicopters take off and land in the yard. Groceries come by plane. Graders, plows, dozers, and all manner of large truck and equipment signal their backing up procedure with loud beep beep beeps. The sunrises are out of this world. I fall to bed every night knowing I've worked hard, done my best, and am appreciated by those I serve.

My job is to take care of everything and everybody at Camp.

I am housekeeper and kitchen assistant and innkeeper. My creative outlet is being in charge of the salad bar which has become legendary among Camps. I make beds, launder sheets and towels, make reservations, keep track of comings and goings and bed assignments (oh the power..!), do dishes, clean bathrooms (using my anthropology degree as a squeegee), stock pretty much everything, pick up groceries at the airport, unload hundreds of pounds of supplies, clean every inch of all of Camp all while being funny and sassy and smart and thoughtful and welcoming and intentionally dumb and saying things that make the MenFolk blush. I try to make this Camp feel like a home. Because let's face it: I spend half of my life here right now. It might as well be as fun as possible.

When I took the job I had my defenses up: I was going to be the only Woman in a Camp with 40 or so Men. I worked hard, was friendly, but mainly kept to myself. I was suspicious and wary. But the more I learned the ways of Camp and the Men here, I owned it. This was my territory.  I'm a strong, confident woman; something all Men fear or at least do not understand. The sassiness invaded and no one questioned me. It's been a roller coaster ride since then... I've laughed far more than I've cried, but it hasn't all been a bed of roses.

I've been working with another woman, the cook, for about 7 months now and we are a force to be reckoned with. We create a homey atmosphere (as much as a ManCamp can provide one...) by learning Men's names, finding out a little about them, joking with them at meal time. Sometimes we get laughing/cackling in the kitchen and the Men go quiet, wondering what we could be laughing about. I can feel the power we have around here at moments like those....

Depending on schedules I work from 12 to 16 hours per day. Some days I want to put a knitting needle in my eye just to do something different. Other days just fly by.  Last summer was totally crazy: 15.5 hour days where I was lucky to have 15 minutes to go in my room and sit. I go for 2 weeks at a time without sitting down for a meal. I'm always doing 3 to 7 things at a time. People always need something from me. Want me to show them how to do something. Get something for them. Honestly, sometimes I feel like I'm like a den mother.

The rewards have been 3-fold: financially I've set myself up for a good long dose of unemployment in the year 2012. I made and banked real money, got my first ever health insurance, and have been able to replace gear and work on my cabin at the same time. Anthropologically I hit the jackpot. I lived among my study group. I infiltrated their world. I became one of them. One morning I made a crude joke in front of two Men and I apologized saying, "Oops..sorry, I'm kind of awkward like that." One of the Men didn't even look up from his breakfast and said, "Nah...you're just oil field." Biggest compliment ever. And thirdly, I've come to tolerate, understand, like, and even become friends with people I never thought I'd meet let alone like. Namely, Ronald Reagan worshiping, FOX news watching, Bible thumping (even if just on principle), Obama hating, pro life Republicans. I know, I know. But living among them, and not being here to be on a pedestal or change anyone's mind.... just to be here to see what life is like at a ManCamp, to fit in... made it possible to focus on what we all have in common: the day to day challenges of long work hours, the simple joy of a delicious home-style meal, a joke, being exhausted beyond belief, having time to play horseshoes, playing practical jokes on each other.... just living together. On the whole, as a Group, I can't fathom the ideology. But when it came to just being people together...well, let's just say that maybe Congress should live in a ManCamp-style situation (including the intense manual labor!) for a few months and see if they can't come together on some things. We are all just people trying to live a good life, provide for the ones we need to take care of, and be happy. Yes, our ideas of how this happens are vastly different, but there is always the option of focusing on what we have in common rather than what is so extremely incompatible about our lives. That was an eye opener for me...

Sooo, that's ManCamp in a nutshell. An Austin Powers-sized nutshell. I could go on, but I think this is the gist of how I got here, what I do, and what the MenFolk do here.... it's a crazy world.
WeeBee with actual Man.

And Unto Them A Blog Was Born

This is where I am right now. I made it.

This is my 40th year on Earth.  It's true. My birthday is not until December, but when I turned 39 three months ago I locked myself in a room, did some advanced math and algorithms, reproved the probability theory, and consulted a psychic hotline.  All of these cutting-edge techniques led me to believe that although my numbered age is 39, it is indeed my 40th year of living and breathing.  I guess it just means that I have 39 years under my belt.  Well done, Self (more so for the math, not the living and breathing....that part is actually pretty instinctual).
  As this milestone approached I kept thinking to myself that I don't feel 40.  What does that even mean?  I don't dread 40 or having a major milestone in my life or the fact that I don't have a husband and babies or any other kind of conventional life at this point.  We all have choices and make choices that lead us to exactly where we are today, wherever that is.  I happen to be living in a remote area of Alaska in a cabin by myself.  Would I change anything about my life? Absolutely not. OK, maybe I'd have a Cabin Boy to help with firewood chores, construction projects, heavy lifting, reaching things from the top shelf, and snow shoveling.  But I get by just fine and more importantly I'm really happy! I travel when I want, I work where I want with whatever bizarre schedule I find, and I have wonderful, genuine friends.  So rather than shudder at growing another year older, think about the things I haven't accomplished by this age, or start looking for crow's feet and gray hair I have decided to CELEBRATE!! I will revel and mock age rather than succumb to the notion that I "should" be doing something more grown up by this age, that I "should" be acting a certain way, that I "should" be dreading the aging process.  Aging, I fart in your general direction.  
  My idea of a celebration is to do something monumental.  Take a trip that I'll never forget.  Splurge on something.  Do something unusual.  As I began thinking about this a year or two ago I started to realize that this would merge perfectly with another dream of mine: to thru-hike the Pacific Crest Trail.  Having typically worked summer seasonal jobs in the Denali National Park area of Alaska, I always had about 8 months of unemployment every year, but they never coincided with the functional hiking months of the PCT which is April to late September/early October.  So I coveted the idea of a six month long, 2650-mile hike from Mexico to Canada and put it in the "Someday" category.  Until....
  About two years ago I decided to go to India and bend myself into pretzels at a yoga teacher training school.  This school was from late May until the end of June.  Which meant for the very first time in my adult life that I wasn't going to take a summer seasonal job (gasp!).  I went, had a lovely time, and assumed I'd get a job upon my return home.  And then I was offered an opportunity to go backpacking in the Brooks Range for 8 days.  Then friends from Austin were coming up for a band tour of the state and sure, I'd love to be your roadie.  Then it was already late summer and....well, I never did work that summer.  Under duress to work, I found my first ever year around job (gasp!).  Once I was working in the winter in Alaska I figured out that things could be different.  If I worked hard for a year, I could take a summer off!! That's when I decided that I would do exactly that: work for one whole year so that I could take this, my 40th year on Earth, off and make my dream of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail come true.
  Fast forward to tonight:  I'm sitting in my strategically cluttered cabin, listening to Tom Petty, and realizing that in about a month from now I'll be flying to California to stage for my hike.  I'm going to fly to Salinas where I was born and raised and where my parents still live in the house I was brought up in and do all the final packing for a 6-month journey on my feet.   I'll be putting packages together to mail to myself on the trail containing food and any sundries I think I'll need along the way.  I'll be hitting up REI for my last minute purchases.  Checking things off my list.  I'll be removing myself from my normal life (though few call it "normal"), all my friends, my home, my state, my routine, my comfort zone.  But much like traveling to India by myself, I'm going to just take it one step at a time.  I find that when I take myself out of my regular regimen, no matter how unusual it is in the bigger scope of society, that these are the times when I learn the most about myself.  I will not be traveling with anyone who has expectations of how I will act, react, or make decisions.  I find that when introducing myself to new people in totally new situations and tell them about who I am and what my life is like, things I believe in, and what I consider normal, the information I choose to reveal, how I portray myself, and the honest facts of my outside-the-box lifestyle provide me with new perspectives on myself......'n shit. (Had to take it down a notch.)
  So anyway, I'm starting this blog because....I know some of you will not believe it,...but not everybody I know is on Facebook [insert One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest screams, pulling of hair, weeping uncontrollably, and rocking back and forth here].  Once I start hiking you'll have to read about nature, how uncomfortably hot it is in the desert, how much my feet hurt, how much I love to eat, and whatever random thoughts and adventures happen to me along the trail.  Until then, I'll think of something.