I’m getting rather creative with how and where I get Internet connections in town. Final thoughts on wifi-radar: It doesn’t work all that well on this system. Frankly, it’s alot better to go to system-config-network and tell the system to connect automatically to whatever is nearby.
With regards to the Zoom modem, that won’t work either. I don’t know if it’s hardware or what; it worked before on Debian after much work. You’d think things would improve. Ah well; there’s a driver now for the ancient ESS modem on the combination card. Hopefully that will work; although the system fully acknowledges and configures the Zoom modem, it still fails to dial when plugged in. I always get a NO CARRIER error message when plugged in; othewise when unplugged it states there is no connection. Since the drive is listed as generic, I suspect a driver problem, and I don’t wish to try fixing it now that I’ve found an ESS modem that looks like it might work for my exact model. Only problem is the driver is for 2.4.x kernel; we’ll see if it works. And now onto logged posts!
10072006T2355: I’ve been keeping nicely busy. Over the weekend, Mrs. Russell kindly invited me to stay the weekend at their house on the outskirts of Odessa. We ended up seeing Pirates of the Carribean 2, which I thought was alright except for the ending, which seemed a huge plot hole. I will refrain from saying anything more lest I spoil it for the reader.
Yesterday, I wrote up a section for the Outback Ranger Guide that the High Adventure Director, Jenene, gave me. She had given it to me on Sunday along with the menus and other information for next week’s crews, and asked me to read it and offer input. I think she was somewhat surprised when I presented her with my writeup for a section that was missing, the stream crossing section. I am now waiting for her review of the draft; in the meantime, I will copy and paste the draft here for any comment. It is quite technical, perhaps involving too much detail for the purposes of the Guide, which is supposed to be a review of technique more than anything else. Some parts might be cut as well if they can find a nice drawing too, but I’ll leave that to the editor. I am now working on the conflict resolution section, which is untouched but for a very basic outline of situations to review and instruct the Ranger on. I am perhaps one quarter done with it, and I must say it’s definitely fun, because the section touches on my serious pursuit and study of leadership techniques and people manipulation skills. It is a section that calls for a serious academic discussion and application of knowledge and experience, and I like what I have so far. Rest assured when I am finished I will post it for comments here, and I will be extremely interested in feedback and discussion.
Here is the text of the draft. I specifically wrote it to give a very institutional feeling, such as you might get when reading an organizational technical manual; thus the tone is one of solid competence, professionalism, and brevity. I don’t know yet if this is desirable, or if a slightly more personable approach should be taken; I think this is right. All I really know is that Jenene likes to substitute pictures for words whenever possible, under the old concept of “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Let me know what you think:
13072006T1655: Yesterday was quite an eventful day. In fact, it was really only last night that was interesting, but it was so interesting that on average it made up for the rest of the boring day. Basically, we got rain. ALOT of rain. And, I saw interesting weather phenomena, the kind that causes massive property damage when it gets big enough.
It started after dinner, with dark clouds rolling in from the southwest. A number of staff were sent to secure tents throughout all the camp sites, tying them down and closing them up because the campers were at dinner. Then we finished dinner, and when I got outside, that’s when the cool stuff started happening. Towards the northeast, just up the canyon, and almost overhead, the clouds were moving in two different directions, coming together, and SWIRLING. It was the neatest sight I’d ever laid eyes on. It was really visible, with tiny wispy cumulus bits doing the swirling, rotating round and round, and they were really obviously moving to my naked eye, which is pretty fast for clouds. Scott, the business manager and a former Army officer, was out there and when I asked him about it, he said it was the result of two weather fronts colliding. He also told me that where all the interesting stuff like tornadoes like to form. “Hey, that must be why the stuff is rotating!” was my thought at the time. Then, off to the southwest where the nasty stuff was, the sky took on a decidely greenish cast. By this time, lightning was going too, from the southwest also and approaching camp, because the flashes were getting bigger and the flash-noise time interval was shortening. Since I’d never seen this stuff before, someone told me that the color meant hail was coming in towards camp, and sure enough, we got hail. By this time, I was in the OFH with only Jerrod, another staffer that I’ve got a friendly chess competition going with. He’s about my level although he’s never played tournament, which is really singular. The score goes back and forth between us, but so far I’m up 14 to 13 wins. We both had a Red Bull out of the stocks I’d gotten for Outback, then watched the show. I really liked the Red Bull; it’s got a licorice taste, alot like a Monster energy drink. Many people have told me they’re nasty, but it wasn’t all that bad, although nothing to lose sleep over. At any rate, I was a bit hyped on the Red Bull when it started hailing, and between that and the exuberance at seeing hail for the first time from the back balcony of the OFH, that might explain why I yelled, “Whoo! Hail, motherf_____, hail! Whoo! I wanna see golf balls!” And then Jerrod reminded me that this stuff destroys cars, and I remembered what Scott had told me earlier about how you need to get inside when it hails to protect your head, and that sometimes cows die in hail storms too. Then it didn’t seem like such a good idea to egg on the hail anymore, because I’d have to pay for new windshields. Then the wind shifted yet again as it had kept doing over the past half hour or so, and we went inside. The storm was blowing and acting like a tropical storm in my opinion; it was a strong one. The wooden frame of the screen door of the OFH even warped; it no longer fits its doorframe because the wood has swelled tremendously. It was about this time that Ranger Dan called in over the radio to all of camp and declared a weather emergency, and that you’d better be indoors if you still wanted your job.
Then things started going nuts. Troops were all under cover in various buildings, and some tents had failed with major leaks. To our credit, few if any fell because of the extra reinforcements staff had put in place as we saw the weather come in, but with troops scattered about in various buildings, there were missing person concerns. So, radio traffic picked up as reports came in from various places with headcounts and troop numbers. A boy with Down’s Syndrome in particular was missing. Eventually, Jerrod and I as the only people on our side of camp in the OFH got tasked with checking out the Chapel, the pool building, and the Upper Goat Cave camp site where a troop was encamped. I got to test out the new boots and equipment I’d got today in the harsh environment.
This very day I’d received my new boots, the latest generation Altama desert combat boots, to replace my jungle boots, the soles of which are almost worn away entirely. I’d also received a new wrist compass and two pairs of polypropolene undersocks, to wick moisture and serve as a frictionless blister preventitive. The boots have Vibram soles, drain holes, and they weigh about a pound less or more than the jungle boots. I’ve christened them the Wanderers III; I’ll have to start oiling them. Here’s a link: http://www.altama.com/Tp1/item_detail.aspx?ItemCode=4158
At any rate, we checked our sites, got headcounts and troop numbers, and did our part. Then Jerrod and I got the chess set out and we played some games to pass the time. Power flickered on and off the whole time, and a message on radio eventually came in from Mountain Man Bob, out of camp and up the canyon a ways, informing us that he’d seen a four foot flash flood coming down the creek bed in his location towards us. Then there was a big concern, because the camp is crisscrossed with creek beds, and this particular one cut between the camp proper and a few large campsites with many Scouts. Isolation was a very real issue that had happened before.
Staff and radios went across to keep control if the worse should happen and the creek rose. Otherwise, things were uneventful for me and Jerrod. We rode out the storm playing chess, running all kinds of crazy neat stuff against each other. Cavalcade reported in, and even they were just fine on a mountaintop. A relief expedition went up later to bring them extra blankets.
Today, I ended up taking 65+ lbs. of food up to Whiskey Bottle Tanks, centered at (coordinates), the campsite where the Cavalcade had been. It’s the supplies for next week’s Outback crews we’ll be leading. Another load of ~50 lbs. still needs to go. I ended up taking back by myself all the warm fuzzy stuff that four people had taken up there the previous night, which wasn’t much above 20 lbs. I’ve really surprised myself with the feats of strength I’ve performed; it’s come to me rather naturally from many hikes out here. I had a good laugh at one of the Cavalcade guys, who told me he would take a pack horse up there to haul the blankets down; why a full horse for just 20 lbs. of stuff? Put it in a bag and carry it, yeesh. It isn’t a Superman thing like carrying 60 lbs. is.
It still bothers me that somehow I’m able to carry such weights in my pack now. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. It’s something I’ll have to think about carefully and try to minimize. Otherwise, I’m just fine and fully capable of doing it.
Lastly, camp has finally started the installation process for deadbolt locks for the outer office and gear room doors. Now, the gear room really needs the deadbolt on account of the stuff in there, but to deadbolt the office is madness. The main camp radio as well as the phones are in there; what do we do if we have an emergency and the door is deadbolted? Break down the door, or break the glass window the office people talk through to people outside to get at the thing? Besides, how about people who want to call home on the weekend? It’s not a good idea. The staff I’ve talked to are a bit pissed about it, and word is they can get in if they need to. I rather expect the entrance methodology will be somewhat destructive; the machine shops are unlocked 24/7 and have bolt cutters and other nifty things in them somewhere. Even the gear room door is a bit of a question as to whether it should be deadbolted, because the SAR packs are in there. If we get the call and no one has the key, then what? That room has no windows; we’d have to out and out kick the door down unless the lock could be picked, and both options are time consuming when a life is on the line. These concerns have been raised before; supposedly there’s a solution for the phone line issue, but not the radio or the gear room. Writing about the issue just now has got me thinking a bit; the doors open outwards, it may be time for me to buy myself a steel crowbar. We’ll see. I’ll consider such things later in better detail; it’s Thursday, staff night off! w00t!
This is way too long.