Giving up my attachment to the computer

I didn’t call the solar guy about my malfunctioning solar system. The charger is dead. The batteries aren’t taking or holding a full charge.

My laptop battery has been blinking with a code that means “replace soon�; it only holds ½ the charge it used to.

I just can’t make myself buy new stuff. The winter is about over and I don’t know if I’ll be here next winter so I’m not going to throw a bunch of money at the system. I’m not even sure I want a system.

My son is setting up everything on my two-watt OLPC laptop, and will send it back to me for my birthday.

When the sun shines, I can use my laptop. If there is something, I want to do and the sun isn’t shining, I can run the laptop off the generator. Just no more days spent aimlessly wandering on the computer; do what I want on it and get off.

I feel relief, like I’m getting my life back. Once again, I have time.

Prosperity sucking computer

This morning when I was charging up my storage batteries my battery charger started to smell and  smoke and flashed and….quit.  I have been told, by a reliable source,  that once the magic smoke escapes, it’s all over for electronics.

I don’t know if maybe my problem all along has been with the charger and not the batteries.   The solar guy opens up his business for a few hours today, I’ll call him and see what he thinks.

Stupid computer–Again, this computer sucks prosperity from me.    Electronics are right up there with animals and big old gas guzzling vehicles as one of the top prosperity suckers.

Tools for your feet

I carried a foot file for the entire Pacific Crest Trail(PCT). Foot files are not all created equal. The ones you get in the bath stores are much better then then ones you get at a drug store. They are paddles with what looks to be sandpaper on them. The problem I had with mine, was that its wide paddle made it hard to target the calluses IFlowery Swedish Clover fot fil most wanted to lose– the one on the ball of my foot and the one between my toes from wearing Chacos with the toe strap.

I found a better one then the one I carried. Better because of it’s narrow shape and courser file. It called the Flowery Swedish Clover Fot Fil * #530

Microplane Foot File Another file I used, to get rid of the remnants of my hike, is one made by a company that makes wood rasps and vegetable peelers. It is a sharp metal rasp. It works amazingly well but you need to exercise a little restraint or you may take off too much skin. It’s called the Microplane Foot File.

I used a hacksaw to remove the handle off the one I carried on the PCT. It weighed .5 ounce (14 grams) after I removed the handle. The Flowery Swedish file weighs 2.20 ounces(62 grams) with handle and the Microplane foot file weighs 2.10 ounces(56 grams) with handle. I would guess half the weight is the handle.

A pumice stone is not in the same league as a foot file. A foot file sands away callouses on dry feet in one sitting and there is no need to soak them first.

Related Posts:

Foot Care

Cracked Feet

Hacksaw improvements

Cold (I think)

iced windowI think it’s cold here. I’m not sure because my digital thermometer quite recording outside temperature and I haven’t got around to finding the manual to reset it. The woman at the little store said it was -17F (-27C) a few days ago.

This morning seemed cold because I couldn’t raise the temperature of the cabin past 45F(7C) and all the windows were iced over. I put the thermometer outside to see how cold it was, but after it was outside for awhile, it quite registering numbers…just figures that looked like L’s. I brought the thermometer back inside and now it doesn’t work at all. It’s just a blank screen.

The little dog is back with it’s owners. She is smarter and stronger from her visit with me.

My batteries for my solar system are failing fast. I don’t care. I think I would be able to use my laptop as long as the sun shines and when it doesn’t, I could still use it if I started the Honda generator, so no big deal.

When I got my solar system and I looked at all the ugly wires, batteries, and generator, I told the solar guy, “You see that little spinning pinwheel you have attached to the solar panel outside? That’s what I want my solar system to be like.”

Update: This just in from tecno-wizard Laen Finehack. LCD screens can be destroyed by below freezing temperatures of -4F( -20C). So if ever you’re thinking, “I bet it’s really cold outside. Let me put my digital thermometer outside and see.� Don’t.  That includes your watch that tells the temperature.

Why I don’t carry a plastic water bladder

leaky water bottle1) They will always eventually fail.

2) It will always be when you need them.

In 2001 when I first hiked the PCT(Pacific Crest Trail), I had one of those plastic bladders hooked up to a hose system to drink out of as I walked. Even though I bought several of them while I was on the trail every one failed. On 2 of them, the bags leaked, on one, the bite valve leaked and water dribbled down my shirt, another the bite valve came off.

Good water bottleI shucked the hose system for “disposable” Aqua Fina bottles. However, I did buy a new 2 liter platypus in case of a long waterless stretch.

After the first 700 miles of desert on the PCT, water becomes more plentiful until you hit Oregon and then it dries up again. I carried that platypus for probably 800 miles until the day came that I needed the extra water capacity. I filled it with water and…. it leaked.

Sure Platypus will replace your bottle if you send it to them but that’s of no use to me when I’m sitting at the last water source for 33 miles with a leaking plastic bag.

Related post: Water Treatment and Containers


Buying shoes

I good place to shop for your shoes whether you are out on the trail or at home is Zappos. They have free overnight shipping and free return shipping. You can order as many pairs of shoes as you want, try them on, and return them for free, if they don’t work out for you. I once ordered 5 pairs of shoes and returned all of them with no hassles. You need to be able to access the Internet and a printer to print the return labels.

Their phone number is 1-800-927-7671.     They take orders 24/7 and they will ship, Fed-ex, UPS, or USPS.

Croc questions.

croc.jpgI thought Crocs were just camp shoes and since camp to me is usually a wide spot on the trail to sleep on, I figured they weren’t much use. Then I read this article on the Happy Feet blog that said people are running marathons in them.

I’m investigating Crocs. Can anyone answer these questions?  Does anyone have first hand experience long distance hiking in Crocs? What is the best style for hiking? How many miles does a pair last?

Hiking with two pairs of shoes.

My hiking shoesOne of the gear decisions I obsessed the most over, for my last PCT (Pacific Crest Trail) hike, was the decision to carry two pairs of shoes: a pair of Chaco sandals and a pair of running shoes.

I spend a lot of effort to get my pack weight down, to add a pound and a half was tough. Also, everything has a place in my pack, adding a pair of shoes took an adjustment to my packing.

I brought them because of two realizations: I like to do 30-mile days and my feet hurt after 25.

I thought maybe once I was on the trail for a while, I could send one pair home, but a day never went by that I didn’t have both pairs in use. Some days I would switch shoes at every break.

I never got any blisters and I never spent a night moaning from the pain shooting through my feet, like I did the first time I hiked the PCT. I think it was a pound and a half well spent.

Save weight–eat your garbage.

I usually take some fruit with me on the trail, if it’s available. Fresh food is worth the weight to me. It’s power food.

I’m all about “leave no trace,” so I would have apple cores and orange rinds in my garbage sack. For awhile now I have been eating the apple cores. This winter I have discovered the joys of eating orange rinds. Orange rinds are tasty; I don’t why it took me so long to discover them.

Show me the land and I’ll show you the people.

I met a guy at the Gila Cliff Dwellings who had a theory that it is the land and the climate that shape the inhabitants. He said, for instance, people that live in Seattle, now, are like the natives who lived there–introspective and interested in art and culture, because they can’t be more involved in the outer world because of all the rain. Put anyone in a different land and climate and they will begin to change and resemble the people who live there.

He said to understand who inhabited the Cliff Dwellings you would only need to live in the area and hangout at the dwellings, because you would essentially become them.

This worries me, as if it is true, it won’t be long before I’m packing a gun, reading the American Free Press, getting the truth from the Art Bell show, and hanging up a “No government official has the right to come on my property and I have the right to bear arms” sign.

Bonsai dog

img_2527-2.jpgMy neighbors dog is staying with me this week. She gets cold easily. I take her for walks and in a quarter of a mile she is shaking. I put a little coat on her and then I put my balaclava over that but she is still cold. At night if she isn’t under the sleeping bag with me, she starts shaking. There ought to be a law against breading a dog that wimpy.

On the up side, she is smart and a quick learner. I have taught her tricks that I learned on http://www.loveyourdog.com/tricks.html

This works out well for everyone. My neighbors get someone to watch their dog, I get a temporary pet, and the dog gets to grow from living in a more harsh environment with good mental stimulation.

Waterproof socks: A bad idea

I thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2003. It was a wet and cold year. I hiked exclusively in Chaco sandals. To keep my feet from getting too cold, I often wore neoprene socks. My neoprene socks were wearing out and all the seams were splitting. In one small town, I tried to replace them at an outfitter. He didn’t have neoprene, but assured me that waterproof socks would work just as well.

I bought the waterproof socks and discarded my worn out neoprene in his trash. It wasn’t long before a horrible odor started emanating from the waterproof socks. After aimg_2556.jpg week or so, the smell was enormous and putrid.

I was meeting up at nights with another hiker. In the mornings, I would start hiking before her and by the end of the day; we would meet up and camp together. One afternoon she said to me, “I knew I was getting close to you; I have been smelling your socks for awhile now.

One night we were camped under a huge open covered area. I placed the socks as far as I could from us without throwing them out in the rain, probably 35 feet or so. Once we laid down, she turned to me and said, “Where are those socks? “Way over there, I pointed. “Well, I still smell them. she scowled.

When we got in town, we visited the Appalachian Trail Society. She felt bad because they didn’t want to take our pictures for the thru-hiker wall and they shooed us out of the hiker box. I said, “Don’t feel bad, I think it’s the socks they don’t like.

She was meeting her husband in town. After we did laundry, where I washed those stinking socks twice, they gave me a ride to my motel. In the car, he said, “What’s that smell? With a voice and face that conveyed the message, “Do you see what I put up with?  she sighed, “It’s Crow’s socks

After a night in the motel, where I kept the socks encased in a plastic bag and still they stunk up the room, I decided I was going to send them back to the manufacturer and ask for a refund. I had to hitch a ride, though, and I had visions of the ride stopping and kicking me out because of the stink, so I threw them away.

To the manufacturer of waterproof socks: You owe me 40 bucks.