Domo Thinks the Appalachian Trail is Pretty Cool, and here he is on a little trail-side break in Shenandoah National Park.

20.4 miles

It was too cold to write last night. Seriously. It was in the 30's, which, frankly, is beyond the limits of my sleeping bag, but just barely. That's all it takes, and if it's happened to you, you know exactly what I mean. As a result, I slept poorly, and this is the only time I've been warm (it's about 9am, and I'm in my tent). It practically rained in here when the sun hit the air in the tent.

Walkabout coerced me to do 20 miles yesterday, and I have to admit, it was far easier than I thought possible. Furthermore, as soon as we stepped into the campground, there was a nother hiker talking to a ranger about 12 feet away. Turns out he was looking for other hikers, so we all shared a campsite (they were $15). I was very happy with the campground facilities but for one thing: they don't have enough bear poles. The bathrooms were heated and had hot running water, which was bliss, after sleeping outdoors the night before.

I camped here with Walkabout, a friend of Walkabout's that came in a car, and the original hiker that picked the campsite, T-Snake. T-Shake turned out to be very proficient with fire building, and he also found a cache of seasoned fire wood that was abandoned at another site. Without the fire, we would have been huddled against the wind in our tents and bags. It was 45 even before the sun went down.

I intend to eat breakfast at the Wayside and hike to Hightop Hut.

7 miles

It certainly wasn't a heroic distance to here, but it was kind of interesting. I saw a turkey which seemed totally unafraid (more about turkeys in a minutes), and I saw many, many rabbits on Bear's Den Mtn complete with hawks circling overhead trying to eat the little rabbits. No bears, however.

It was kind of weird, all the rabbits. I've only seen them at night in the past, and I had assumed they were nocturnal.

When I was nearly to the shelter, I saw another turkey, but this one charged and chased me down the trail about 8 feet. I assume there are little turkeys (what are they called?) in the bushes, but you really haven't lived until you've been chased by a psychotic turkey.

There is another girl in the shelter with me, also a long-distance solo hiker redhead aussie trail named Walkabout. Otter is also here, and he is tenting. In addition to them, there's a veritable sea of one man tents up on the hill. I'm in the shelter because it's going to rain and because all the tent sites looked crappy to me.

Hope there's no mice.

FoxNews claims there is a hijacked truck full of cyanide on the loose. That *can't* be good.

The truck was commandeered by three hijackers armed with handguns last Friday in the Mexican state of Hidalgo, some 500 miles south of Brownsville, Texas. Mexican federal authorities alerted U.S. law enforcement to the situation on Monday, due to the volatility of the truck's cargo, and the FBI then joined the search for the truck.

I don't know about you, but I'm not going anywhere near the National Mall on July 4. The amazing thing about this is that I didn't see this reported anywhere on my normal news channels -- I found it on conspiracy central, whatreallyhappened.com.

P.S.: this story is now everywhere as 80% of the cyanide is missing, but the truck has turned up. I feel so much better now.

While this [link requires free registration] is coming from the Congress, I'm sure the prez will rubber stamp it since he seems to be a Protectionist, despite vigorous campaigning to the contrary in 2000.

I think it's disgusting that we are going to use what amounts to a trade sanction on the Philippines to *supposedly* give people better jobs in countries that grow drugs. This will, without a doubt, punish Philippinos and will almost certainly make no difference at all in who choses a career in the drug trade in Ecuador and Columbia.

Shouldn't it be abundantly clear that we can't save the world from the dangers of drugs? We can't even save ourselves, so what *are* we thinking trying to manipulate the behavior of people in other countries? We surely cannot save the world from drugs and "terrah" at the same time.

Man, I am really turning out to hate this administration. Except for Rumsfeld. I like him.

He [Colonel Robert Maginnis, a U.S. government adviser on drug policy] says the bush administration is alarmed by a recent Senate study that says Canada’s marijuana laws are ineffective. [story on canada.com]

Hah! Show me one study that says U.S. marijuana laws *are* effective.

I think this is a fantastic move on the part of Canada. We tariff soft woods, they legalize marijuana. That sounds like fair retaliation to me. We are now threatening "trade sanctions." Gee, we already put in some of those for *no* reason, so why should the Canadians feel threatened?

Justin Raimondo

Jean-Paul Belmondo

I don't think that's actually possible (based on supposed birth dates), but Tino and I developed this whole scenario under which Justin is a 13-year-old kid passing as an adult with a rakish photo taken from &diety knows what.

Hey, it could be true. Ironically, that's often the best thing you can say for his essays.

C'mon, can't you just see him doing that thing with his thumb?

...I think this is so amazingly cool. This is representative of links I use at whatreallyhappened.com, which is a strange place indeed.

11.8 miles hiked, 9:15 - 3:00

Between Peter's Mtn Shelter and Clark's Ferry Shelter, the terrain is quite benign. For about one mile after Clark's Ferry, there are classic PA rocks. The trail was planned quite well around them, but I do hate going up and down and up and down when I'm supposed to be either climbing or descending...dunno. In hindsight, it doesn't seem bad at all and seems maybe a little fun. At least this club managed to blaze the rocks well enough for southbounders.

If I had hit those rocks walking out of Duncannon, my attitude would have been worse, so I'm glad I did this SOBO. In all, the whole trip worked out really well for me, and I can't complain overall...except about the blazing.

Once I got across the Clark's Ferry Bridge and on to PA849, the blazes disappeared again. I walked down Market Street in Duncannon instead of High Street, but hey, they are only a block away, and it wasn't my fault I missed the turn -- the northbounder blazing isn't visible from that point and there is NO BLAZE for the southbounder to know to turn...well, you see what I mean. In any case, it's the AT corridor, so I'm counting it. I didn't know I went wrong until I got to my car at High St and saw all the northbound blazes continuing down the street.

I may not do the Swatart to Port Clinton walk this coming weekend. I may do the south section of SNP instead. I hate to tempt fate since in all, I think things went quite well in PA. For once.

17.5 miles hiked today, 9-5:45

I guess I did 17.5 miles today, but id didn't seem like quite that much. The climbs here are mercifully short. I did stumble over many a rock today, bruising myself and abrading my shin at one point, but I will have no problems getting into Duncannon tomorrow afternoon. Can one drink in PA on Sunday?

The registers are claiming bear sightings left and right. Oh. And rattlesnakes, but I haven't seen either. I did run into Lightfoot who said that he'd just seen a mama bear with three cubs, and that the cubs may still be up the trees. He was quite excited about it. I know I didn't want to find myself between a mother bear and her cubs, but since he'd had a good experience, he didn't seem to see any danger.

There have already been mouse sightings in this shelter, and a bird is nesting in here. I don't think the bird will be any trouble, based on my experiences with the bird at home. The dog is also now between me and the mice, which might be worth something.

I'm here with Tiger Paw and Blue Water and BW's new dog Nakita. She's a great dog, and he got very lucky on a stray, IMHO. There are more coincidences with these two as I met both of them in and around Pearisburg also. I even met Tiger Paw's wife and sister while lunching at Laurel Creek Shelter.

about 5 miles hiked 9-11:30am

I completely forgot about something in my earlier entry: there was helicopter traffic for hours at the shelter. It is near a Military Reservation, and I also heard one jet take off. It didn't seem to bother anyone else, as I heard no fidgeting but me. There were some other weird noises I could not identify. They sounded like big bugs hitting a zapper outside the shelter, but quite near by.

4.6 official miles hiked, 5:45-7:45

I hiked in from Swatara Gap, and within 5 minutes on the trail, my feet were soaked due to a bad judgement call. There was a stream with a missing bridge and a rock path across. The rocks had water running over them, but I thought it was only an inch or so deep. Did I take off my shoes? No. NO. I did not. I suppose I should be grateful I didn't fall in, but in short, the water was high enough to come in over my boot laces. Damn it.

Two hours later, I missed the turn off for the shelter. That's never happened before but, but I was SOBO and it seems that, default direction or not (it's supposed to be ME to GA, not vice-versa), trail associations hate southbounders. When I say I missed it, I mean I missed it by a mile, literally, and had to go back and look for it. It is clearly marked for Northbounders, of course.

I also slept in the shelter, which I almost never do. I got here, and it was quite dark, and the only good tent pad was taken by a family that brought a sledge to pound stakes, if that tells you anything. And pound they did.

The shelter people were already in bed at 8:30pm, but by coincidence, I KNEW one of them from War Spur Shelter, Candy, a German guy who's been living in rural Georgia for two years before this. As always, 'packers made room for the lone girl. They always do, but I only rarely ask.

(a.m.)
No MICE! I can't believe it. Candy proved his trail name by eating PopTarts and a Mars bar for breakfast. I grossed him out by eating ramen noodles. :)

per Bob Herbert [link requires free registration]:
A new and potentially tragic initiative by John Ashcroft's Justice Department will put more guns in the hands of more Americans.

Good.

Seriously, we are at war. Maybe more Americans need guns.

I know the anti-gun crowd hates the arguement that if a few people on those planes had had guns, the WTC would still be standing and 3000 people would still be alive. You know why they hate that arguement? Because they can't refute it.

Between 1990 and 2000, there were eight deaths from food allergies among children aged 0-15 years (incidence of 0.006 deaths per 100,000 children per year), four of whom died from an allergy to milk. There were no deaths from peanut allergy in children under 13 years.

None. For 10 years. I think we have this peanut allergy thing licked.

Maybe people like Jane Brody [link requires free registration] should get on with their lives and find some new thing to bitch about.

Maybe this time they can pick something that's actually dangerous to more than the tiny, tiny number of people who are misfortunate enough to be allergic to peanuts.

I never go to Salon on my own any more, partially because I don't think their content is worth money, and partially because I almost always find the reporting sub-standard. Hm, I guess that's one reason. Anyway, I found this one on Plastic.

If politicians really wanted to help farmers, he argues, they'd eliminate every last dime of assistance from the farm bill's budget and fight harder for free-market reforms.

Farm subsidies are no small part of why Americans are so fat.

Per the National Research Council on how to eliminate internet pornography's influence on children:

The report compared the problem of protecting children from online risks to dealing with a more mundane hazard of daily life. "Swimming pools can be dangerous for children," the authors wrote. "To protect them, one can install locks, put up fences and deploy pool alarms. All of these measures are helpful, but by far the most important thing that one can do for one's children is to teach them to swim." NY Times [requires free registration]

Who is the National Research Council anyway?

I'm sure they'll be drummed out of town soon following a report full of such obvious logic. I mean, they aren't even calling for any legislation or invention of new gadgets or more intrusions on adult privacy!

per the Guardian, on obesity in the U.S.:
Dr Alan Penman, an epidemiologist with the Mississippi department of health, prefers not to use the word epidemic. "That implies something that comes and goes," he says. "What we have here are normal adaptations to the kind of environment we now live in. It's Darwinian. Everyone is at risk, if not actually affected, because we have created what some people have called an obesogenic environment. The Americans have done it very well, better than anyone. And it's not going to go away for generations."

It's sad but true. It would take generations to undo the bad zoning (no sidewalks, no town centers, no where to walk to, even if you could) and the farm subsidies that have made the U.S. so incredibly fat. (a big plate of corn fed beef and high-fructose corn syrup for all my friends!)

The question remains: will we fix the problem (undo the above) or will we simply tax high-sugar and high-fat food? I know which one *I* think will happen. Especially with Big-Gubmint-Boy in charge.

"You can't just put out messages saying, 'Eat Less. Exercise More,' " says Penman. "That only works for the worried well. You have to create an environment where people make those choices without thinking."