A story from the trail...

So, a group of nine decided we'd best hike from Max Patch to Hot Springs along the Appalachian trail over three days using a couple of tarps and a bit of common sense. This stretch is a little north of Asheville (Western North Carolina) and quite the best to escape the Piedmont's (Central North Carolina) blazing summer heat.

Well, if you see that wonderful view above (totally not my pic, but from 'Visit Madison County's' site so I figured they wouldn't mind), you'll notice the wonderful views and endless meadow and then you'll notice the clouds. Oh they seem so white and fluffy, so harmless. Right.

As soon as we left the bald, the storm hit, the thunder rolled, and the rain poured down... for three days.

The greatest moment was approaching the tarps on the final night after eating dinner and finding a shallow stream running through the center of the tarp and over most of our backpacks. So, we left in the dark and the rain and slept in the shelter. Nine of us slept in the shelter. There was much spooning.

Check it out.

Oh, and there were only two guys.
Tales from the trail.

Maps/charts. Two interesting discoveries the internet gave to me.

This may just be the most interesting map search I've ever seen. It nearly shows the history of a place by its maps... Thanks so much to the David Rumsey Map Collection for its sublime interesting-ness.

http://rumsey.mapranksearch.com/

Oh, and heres a chart history of the world, divined from the same site. How interesting. I want one for my wall.

(I also found it on Slate... which is sortof cheating.)

See it BIGGER

I bussed/expodited your table

I bus your tables my friends. When you finish your especially delicious Italian cuisine doctored up by my boss, a Gordon Ramsey look-alike, I gather up your crumby dishes into my arm and take them back to our all-Hispanic kitchen staff, who roll their eyes and laugh. "Ahhh Rammboo," they say. Who knows why I'm Rambo to them. Then if there's hot food with a ticket on it, and a bell rings, and the chef yells, "Why the fuck is no one running food?!", I'll speed walk over and gather up two or three plates frowning and cursing cause they're burning my arm, check the ticket table and number, pray that I run into no one as I pass through the door, then the curtain as I go into the dining room and smile pleasantly asking who had the Pollo Ripiedo with the pasta side and the gluten-free dairy-free chicken parm (which makes no sense because typically you use bread-crumbs and also cheese in chicken parm, so its like, naked).


Then, if I'm lucky, I'll take a sip of my one-third ginger ale, one-third sprite, one-third coke, add lime and a shot of grenadine drink. But of course, after a sip the bread is ready and I rush back to the kitchen where a lounging/texting server tells me table three needs bread and outside two tables have just sat and have no water. So I'll pull bread out of the oven, put it in the bread warmer, gather a couple buns to walk to the table where they want butter. So, I'll go back to the kitchen, get butter, hear the ding of the bell which means food is ready to be run and I'll face an option... Shall I deliver butter, water, or food? I'll suffer the wrath of the waiting customers, lounging servers, or angry chef. 


Anyways, its a wonderful job to have and I make $8/hr after taxes and I pray to God I can quit as soon as I start school because I hate it and am convinced I could make so much more money doing a thousand different things.


But, truly, it has taught me a thousand invaluable life skills. Like, after waiting for 30 minutes for food, understanding that everyone in the restaurant is probably just as frustrated as myself, cooling down and loving this 20 year old kid who is in charge of getting me my food. It has also taught me I never want to bus tables again.

Taken with the last great wilderness...

This Alaska captures more people in its grand green net than anywhere else I've seen or been. Take me there again.