November 16, 2008

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Our journey of however many thousand miles this will be, started with a trip to the Blackfoot rest area. By the time we got everything ready to leave, had a nice visit with Lexie's grandmother and then her sister Katie's family it was pretty much time for bed. We had been planning on driving to my mom's house to park for the night. After leaving Katies house we discovered it was raining really hard. Between the rain and the darkness we both concluded we'd just as soon not be driving, so we kept things simple and slept at the Blackfoot rest area.

In the morning my mom invited us over for breakfast. We had a great visit with her and a wonderful breakfast. It was a little odd saying good bye to grandma because I am not sure when we'll be back and hence didn't really know how final the good bye was. I really doubt it was the last good bye but you never know with things like that.

After visiting with my mom we drove over to the Dredge's house so Lexie could visit and see Melinda's new baby. Based on previous displays of more energy than control by the children I stayed with them in the car for the visit.

We had a short day of driving with a final destination of Antelope Island State Park just west of Layton Utah. I am sure I have been there before but I haven't ever appreciated it as much as I did on this visit. Something that made our visit extra special was that we got the entire camp ground to ourselves. In the evening we tried to get down to the water to collect a sample of the water. I have been wanting for quite a while to do an experiment with the kids where we boil out sea water and find out how much salt is left. I had been disappointed that I had failed to think of it at an appropriate time when we were by the ocean. The Salt Lake of course was all the more promising because it has about five times the salt concentration of the ocean. Walking at David's two year old pace we did not make it to the water but did have a nice time on our way toward it. As part of their Junior Ranger activity the kids were collecting litter. Among the litter Tyrell found a working laser pointer which he had a lot of fun with on the walk home in the dark. I couldn't resist begging a turn from him to try and hit the reflector of our trailer as we were approaching it.

I was very surprised to learn that there are bobcats on Antelope Island. I would like to go back sometime on an extended stay and try and find one. Even without that I would simply like to go back to Antelope Island, it was so much fun.

Antelope Island was great.

This was the view from our camp site.

We had a nice walk as a family in the evening.

Wednesday Morning we drove into Salt Lake where Lexie's parents are serving a Mission in the translation department in church headquarters. There is a KOA campground on North Temple about 2 miles from her parent's apartment that is a very comfortable place to stay. I was happy to finally have a chance to get back to work. The transition of the move had been pulling a lot of time from work. It was nice to see Lexie's parents. On Thursday Lexie and her mom took the kids to a candy factory, then on Friday we all went to the Disney on Ice show at the Energy Solutions Arena. While we were in the arena I took the opportunity to pick up a couple of nose bleed seats to the Jazz vs. Suns game for this coming Monday. I have heard psychologists say that people first make a decision and then do thinking to justify the decision. With that in mind I have decided not to waste my energy trying to justify why I bought the game tickets but just accept that I have made the decision.

The Disney on Ice production was great. I was bit of a wet blanket when first presented with the idea of going to watch ice skating but consented to the idea knowing it was something Lexie would really like and it promised to be a great experience for the kids. Lexie told me by the end of the performance I would be wishing I was ice skating. She was right, although I would like to skate without wearing a duck suit.

Saturday morning we did a little geo caching. It really is a shame how little of it we have been doing. Not having been geo caching in a while made it difficult to get started and I forgot how helpful it was to print out the clues before looking for caches. As it was we had time to find one and fail to find another.

The Disney on Ice production was fantastic.

We did a little geo caching.

Dead guy duty

Those of you who have seen the movie Nacho Libre will likely recognize the reference in my heading. Those of you who don't are invited to pollute your cleaner thinking through exposure to one of my favorite movies. In addition to the obvious point that the movie is pee your pants funny, I think the thing that carries the movie for me is the plot line that passion and desire will eventually win. I like that idea that a person feeling an inner burn will succeed if they are willing to follow their feelings. Oh yeah, back to the dead guys...

Lexie has always had a fascination with human anatomy. There is a museum display which shows plastisized cadavers in various positions to display the inner connections of the body. We first learned about the display last year when it was in Phoenix. We were standing in line for the exhibit and then left the line because the kids were misbehaving. The result of the decision to leave the museum line has been a bit spooky to me, in that it is easy to think that had we not left the line, we would not have been where we were when that dizzy lady in Flagstaff ran us off the road. I am not being quite as facetious as I might sound when I call her dizzy. At the accident scene she claimed to have partially passed out as a result of cold medications. The next opportunity we had to see the exhibit was this summer in Edmonton. When we tried to get a camp site we found that they were all filled because it was the Canada Day weekend. Up to that point we didn't realize Canada even had a day. There were some camping accommodations which would have been possible but expensive and inconvenient. After giving it a lot of thought we decided again to miss the museum with the thought we would be able to see the display in Salt Lake, which we finally did.

Speaking as a person with a strong belief that a person's insides are better left inside, I was delighted with the display. I would even venture to say that I have gained a real interest in human anatomy through my experience in the display. The human body is absolutely incredible. I was pleased to see several graphic displays of what an iliotibial band looks like. I have been having ITBS (Iliotibial Band Syndrome) issues causing trouble with my running. It was interesting to get a better view of what was causing the trouble. I was surprised at how much I learned in such a short time. If we were not running so short on space in the trailer I am sure I would have bought one of the anatomy books they were selling at the end of the display. I fully intend to buy one later after we have a bigger trailer or have jettisoned some of our other books. I was pleased to gain a new understanding of the heart as it relates to physical performance. I always knew the heart was a muscle but I didn't really ever think of it as behaving like one. There were several hearts displayed. I was impressed with the variance in size. Like other muscles as the heart gets stronger it gets bigger. Athletes develop larger hearts than non athletes. A display claimed that Lance Armstrong has a resting heart rate of 30 beats per minute, less than half the heart rate of an average man, because his heart is so large and so strong. Another interesting tidbit I picked up was about the nervous system. I think I had learned this before but had forgotten it. In routing signals for items that need a quick response such as a reaction to touching a hot stove the signal response sequence bypasses the brain with the action response getting routed from the spinal cord. I would guess that people acting without engaging their brains extends well beyond hot stoves.

I think this is a legal picture, it is a picture of a picture. We weren't allowed to take photos inside.

Circles

I imagine I have put in some similar conversation to the following somewhere else in my blog. The topic lends itself to repetition so well I am sure I will put it in again sometime in the future. I am facinated with the circles we make in life. In today's case I am thinking mostly about travel. We are back in the KOA where we were last November. It was our trip here last November that accelerated our decision to take to the road full time. I remember last November how badly I wanted to go south after our stay here rather than north. It feels really good to be heading south this time. Something I find geometrically interesting about getting back to a place where one has been before is that in mathematical terms ignoring orbital position (which is another circle in itself) continental drift, and erosion the sum of all of your displacement (motion) is zero. You have gone exactly the same distance up as down, exactly the same distance north as south, exactly the same distance east as west. Returning to a place puts you at a point of balance in your life. It also lends a great opportunity to reflect on the significance of the zero sum journey. How are you different for your travel? What has transpired on the journey?

In this case for me it seems quite a bit has transpired. If nothing else we need to count to five instead of four before getting in the car. I also know that I feel a lot different. I have solidified some view points that were just beginning to sprout last year. Last year I know I was feeling a lot of need for change where as this year I am feeling a lot of intensity for persistence on my course. Last year I felt like my limits were externally imposed where as this year my limits are all internally imposed. It is a day to stand and find out who I am.

All Hail Obama!

I don't think it is mandatory to have a political section but lately I've been in the mood to do so as I have had a small sprinkling of an increase of political awareness. This is the kind of writing that is almost guaranteed to leave me embarrassed, fined or imprisoned at some point in the future but all the same it's fun, I'm young and why not? I don't have enough knowledge to actually know or do anything useful, but I feel like I am getting to the point where I can almost tell what is going on, sort of like when I was six years old and hearing grown ups talk about relatives over dinner.

As I watch the american dream and our fundamental freedoms give way to institutionalism, laziness and fear I am discouraged. The tax payer funded economic stimulus packages are an outrage. They are a shift of power from the populous to the elite. The elite will continue to grab power until the populous is finally beaten and starved enough to pick up their pitch forks and revolt. The shame of it is the pain, suffering and loss of life that will happen in the transition. It isn't time to pick up pitch forks now but it is time to at least question a system that is accelerating our movement in that direction.

I have found a couple of things to like about our next wanna be king. First he is in favor of a college football playoff. He suggested an 8 team playoff whereas I would like to see at least a 16 team playoff if not a 32, or 64 team playoff. That aside the man is thinking correctly. In fact I think it would solve a lot of problems if he would leave the economy and abortion policies alone and focus on college football. I find the BCS commissioner's statement that a college football playoff would not best serve the needs of the colleges, the players, and their constituents laughable. The statement is so transparently translated as, I have power as the BCS commissioner and if you change the system, I and my cronies loose that power, therefore it is a bad idea. Power maintaining its power for the virtue of it having the power and not for the merit of its position is one of the fundamental problems we have in the country now. Another thing I like about Obama is that he is increasing the use of technology in his political interaction with the populous. I understand he has a database with e-mail addresses of his supporters. He uses the database to send messages directly to supporters without having the message first filtered by the main stream media. He also claims he will take input collected through his website in evaluating political policy. I believe technology offers some very interesting options in bringing us closer to becoming a true democracy. While I am not sure a full democracy really is a great answer, I think a few large steps in that exact direction are great.

Here in Salt Lake people are having more fun than they realize with the reactions to the results of the H8 definition of marriage proposition that passed in California. I understand the proposition passed with 52% voting in favor of it. I think it is really interesting to think about the many factors that put a person on one side of the issue or the other. Whether people realize it or not I think they like having an issue as exciting as sex to argue and think about. The down side is that people are people and they don't always discuss their disagreements nicely. There are a lot of feelings getting hurt and people feeling a lot of extra internal anger. I find it interesting how each side of this disagreement seems to feel the same emotion of moral self righteousness over their position. I know I do, I am right after all! :-)