Sarah Palin?

My intuitive flash of inspiration about McCain's VP pick was dead wrong, but I don't think many pundits would have chosen Sarah Palin. She's an interesting 44 year-old woman, governor of Alaska, with 5 kids (the youngest one has Down's Syndrome).

And to top it all off, in the world of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, I'm only two steps removed from her. Daughter Megan met her on one of her trips to Alaska!!

Obama's My Man

Having watched Obama giving his acceptance speech tonight, he's rekindled some hope in me that he can actually pull this off. He hit all the right notes, even attacking McCain (but not too vigorously), before a crowd of what, 80,000 people??!! He had people in the crowd in tears. (Bush and McCain can move people to tears too, but for totally different reasons.) It was truly a historic moment, coming 45 years after Martin Luther King, Jr.'s I have Dream Speech. He is the first man of African descent to have a real shot at running a country in the western world.

And finally, a quick prediction... McCain will nominate Huckabee as his VP tomorrow.

Lying around with a sore back watching the Dems

The whackopractor has done absolutely nothing to make me alter my low expectations and opinion of the profession. I've had four sessions with this guy, and if anything, I'm in more pain now than before I let him "adjust" my spine and manipulate my hip. When I first went in I had some pain in my lower back that was migrating to my left hip because of the limp I was developing to ease the pain in my back. Now I have the worst of both worlds; the original pain in my lower back, and new sharper pains in my hip. Instead of concentrating on the source of the pain, he concentrated on the secondary pain. I questioned him about this, but he did not have any good answers. I have one more session with him tomorrow, but barring some dramatic developments, the experiment is over. I start physical therapy next Tuesday.

The Democratic Party convention has been OK so far. Michelle Obama gave a great speech on Monday. I'm always amazed that the Republicans can paint the Obamas as "elitist." Michelle and Barack are the embodiment of the American dream with their rise from less than ideal circumstances to Ivy League educations to the height of American power. And this was all done without any of the cronyism and family connections so common on the right. Tuesday was Hillary's night, and I think she did what she had to do. Her best lines occurred when she asked her supporters whether they were in it for her or for what they believed. I must admit that I have developed a grudging admiration for her even though I still think she is a shrill, manipulative, and power-hungry woman.

Last night was a pretty good night. Bill (my opinion of him is at or below my opinion of his wife) did what he had to do, but the highlights came with John Kerry, Beau Biden, and Joe Biden. If John Kerry had shown the passion he showed last night four years ago, he might have won and spared us the last four years of Bush. He came up with a pretty good line when he listed McCain's flip-flops and then said that McCain was against these things before he was for them. Another good line came from someone who modified the line about Bush One from the '88 convention. In that convention someone said that Bush was born on third base and thought he'd hit a triple. In this convention one of the speakers said that W. was born on third base and stole second!

Joe's son Beau gave a loving and moving introduction to his dad, and Joe himself did a pretty good job. Before the convention I had no idea that Biden's first wife and daughter were killed in a car wreck right after Biden was first elected to the Senate. I also didn't know his net worth is only $150,000. Maybe that figure is missing a zero, but even so, no one can accuse him of cashing in on his 35 years in the Senate.

My biggest complaint is that every time someone gets up to attack McCain and the Republicans, the attacks are always prefaced by a tribute to McCain's POW time and his service as senator. Somehow I don't think that the Republicans' attacks next week on Obama will be prefaced by a tribute to Obama's rise from a single parent family to the heights of academic and political success.

Sea Dogs and Whackopractors

Saturday was a good day for a cruise south. I hadn't been to Gig Harbor in ages, and I hadn't been under the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge since it opened a year ago, so off we went.
As I had hoped, Farley is becoming a great sea dog. Angus was never all that comfortable on my boat, having had his first boating experience relatively late in life.

On Friday we raced in the second-last race of the series. I think we're solidly in fourth place in our class. We might be able to move up one place if we beat 3rd place Wings in the next race. We've kept the basic crew together all year, and we're getting pretty good at the basics. On Friday's race, to round the downwind mark, we set the jib on the approach, tacked around the mark, and dropped the chute, all in quick succession. If we would have tried that maneuver a couple of months ago, we would have ended up with a giant mess of tangled lines and frayed nerves. I even felt confident enough on this race to take my camera on deck to get a couple of shots during the race.





It's hard to get any perspective on the spinnaker from the deck of the boat, but here it is. Mike's spinnaker is affectionately known as Frankenchute due to the many repairs and patches it's had to undergo over the years.
















Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I went to a crackopractor or whackopractor or whatever you want to call the practitioners of that arcane and mysterious art. Even though lots of people swear by these guys, I've always considered them just a cut above witch doctors. Group Health couldn't get me into see a physical therapist until next week (I wonder what the waiting time in Canada is), so in desperation to do something about my aching back, I made an appointment and got in to see one yesterday. The "doc" took x-rays in the morning, and later that afternoon I went back to see him after he'd had a chance to evaluate the results. As I expected, my spine, hips, back and neck are contorted pretzels. (Has a chiropractor has ever found anyone with a relatively straight back?) Quasimodo's got nothing on me. The next step was my "adjustment." The way that the "doc" had me wrapped up in his arms, I thought that he was practicing a submission hold for his next wrestling match. Then he threw his weight into the hold, and instantly realized the difference between a "force" and a "non-force" chiropractor. This guy is definitely in the former category. The crack in my back and the resulting pain did not result in an instant cure. In fact, I had a hell of a time trying to get comfortable enough to get to sleep last night. I have another appointment this afternoon, and I've given the otherwise-pleasant witch doctor a week to work his magic.

I'll keep you posted.

Lying around waiting for my back to heal

Lying around waiting for my back to heal is getting old. It's been almost two weeks now, and what started out as a minor back-ache isn't getting any better. Nothing seems to be working: massages, a doctor's visit, muscle relaxants, Limbaugh-style pain killers, exercise, no exercise, hot packs, cold packs, stretching, and lying around doing nothing at all. Even Farley is getting annoyed with me. He hasn't been on a decent walk since I got back from Edmonton.

The only good news is that I've been able to watch more of the Olympics than I otherwise would. I've never been a huge fan of the Olympics, but I can easily get wrapped up in things I'd never normally watch. Like beach volleyball. Amazing stuff! Especially 6'+ women wearing next to nothing while playing for the gold in the pouring rain like the US and China did last night. That was a lot more fun to watch than the super-heavyweight women's weightlifting I saw a couple of nights ago. This morning I flipped on the TV to see women's handball. I thought that women's handball was like racquetball without racquets, but no. It's a combination of soccer and basketball with some hockey thrown. I didn't know the sport existed, and it's an Olympic sport, no less! I do get a kick out of the American commentators talking about how the US is winning the medal count. Yes, indeed, they have won the most medals, but the last time I looked, China had won 46 gold, versus 29 for the US. You'd think that would count for something.

Obama didn't announce his VP yet. I still hope it's Biden, but I've even come around to thinking that Hilary might do more good than harm. She and Bill would make great attack dogs, and it could satisfy her urge to occupy at least part of the White House again. I am gratified to see that Obama and his surrogates have finally turned up the heat on McCain. When McCain doesn't even know how many houses he owns, it's hard for him to argue that he's in touch with the common man. Of course his excuse is his all purpose excuse. He was a POW. One of his staffers showed indignation at the question, saying, "Here is a man that occupied only one house for five and a half years - a prison." I think the Obama campaign could (and should) make McCain look like Mr. Magoo with a montage of the gaffes he's made in the last few months. If they don't turn up the heat, and keep it up, Obama will end up like John Kerry.

Obama's VP Pick

Obama appears to be poised to announce his VP pick soon, probably on Wednesday. I'm pleased to see that one of my favorites, Joe Biden, has made the short list of three. The other two are Tim Kaine (governor of VA), and Evan Bayh (senator from IN). I think he should choose Biden for several reasons. Biden is an old Washington hand, and knows how the system works. He's a foreign policy expert who knows what he's talking about, even though he probably talks too much. But above all, he'd make a great attack dog, and since Obama seems to want to set himself above the fray, he desperately needs someone like Biden to do the McCain-bashing for him.

McCain is getting really annoying. He attacks Obama at every opportunity, and everything he says about himself seems to be prefaced with, "... and did you know I was a POW?" As if 5-1/2 years in the Hanoi Hilton is somehow a qualification to be president. And now the news is surfacing that his famous "cross in the dirt" story is the equivalent of an evangelical urban legend. Variations of the story have been around for years, including this version attributed to Solzhenitsyn in a sermon from 1997. McCain's first versions of the story, in which the Christian POW was anonymous, came out in 1999. In later versions that POW miraculously became McCain himself. Someone fearless has to take on McCain and expose him to be the pandering liar he really is. Maybe in this particular case, that exposure is better left to reporters or the blogosphere, but I think that Biden would do a good job on the day-to-day BS of the McCain campaign.

I'm still very disappointed in how Obama is running his campaign. Maybe he's keeping his powder dry till after the convention. Maybe his idea of a new kind of nuanced politics will take off. But maybe not. He getting hammered by McCain in the meantime, and if he doesn't get more aggressive soon, he will lose this election in what should be a Democratic landslide year.

Congratulations Caroline!!!!

She made it! Caroline made it to the summit of Mt. Rainier on Sunday morning, even though conditions were less than ideal. It is one hell of a long hard slog to get up there, and as shown in these pictures, it's more than just a walk up a glacier. She did the final ascent with River and Jeff, a couple of very experienced climbers. It looks like the only ill effects will be the loss of the toenails on her big toes. (This isn't from the cold or anything like that. It's from the constant pressure on the toes, especially going downhill.)











River and Jeff are experienced climbers who gave Caroline the confidence she needed.












And beer, don't forget the beer. A beer at the top of Rainier must be one of the most satisfying beers ever!












Here's the crew at the top.



























Here are shots of Bryn, Lee and River at base camp. Like several others at Camp Schurman, they decided not to go because the conditions were "sketchy." Several parties started up and turned around without summiting. It is my understanding that all the warm weather lately had created more crevasses and icy conditions that made the ascent more dangerous than normal. Bryn and Lee deserve a lot of credit for making it that far. I don't know if I'd have gone for the summit or not, but I would have like to have been there and have to make that decision. In any case, I'd have been proud to be there with them.

I'm not there :(

Caroline, Lee, Bryn and River left for Mt. Rainier this morning without me. Caroline was kind enough to send me a picture from Camp Schurman where they'll be spending a day getting acclimatized before heading up to the summit early Sunday morning.

I'm at home having my own pity (and pain) party. I wish I was there with them, but there was no way I was even going to attempt the climb when my back is making it hard for me to take Farley for a walk.

Well, the mountain has been there for millions of years and probably isn't going anywhere anytime soon. I'll get another shot at it sooner or later.

EFMF 08

I've posted a bunch of photos from this year's Folk Music Festival, but as usual Blogger makes it difficult to post the pictures in a reasonable order, and I'm too lazy to screw with it, so what you see is what you get.

This year's festival was blessed with uncommonly good weather. It was even hot at times. Amazing, considering all those years that I've shivered in the rain on the hill. An EFMF wouldn't be complete without some rain however, so we did have a bit of a thunder shower on Saturday night. Here's Tom taking shelter under what used to be his shade umbrella.




As usual, there was lots of good music, and even though I hadn't heard of most of the musicians, this year's even was better than most. One of my favorite finds is Outlaw Social, a group from Victoria, BC. Pictured here is Kendall Carson the hot blonde fiddle player. I thought she looked a lot like the HBFP from the Paper Boys, a Celtic rock group that plays at The Tractor regularly. I Googled her, and sure enough, they are one and the same. The Paper Boys are OK, but I think that Outlaw Social is exceptional. I hope they make it to Seattle as often as the Paper Boys do.






This is the apparent leader of the band, Oliver Swain. He's got an amazing voice and a good stage presence.

Outlaw Social plays an interesting blend of folk and roots music, with a few jazzy licks thrown in for good measure.








Here's the view of the main stage from the hill at night.












This is Serena Ryder, a rocking energetic 24-year-old with a great voice. She can do anything from Janis Joplin to classic country. I'd never heard of her before either.










Eliza Gilkyson is a performer I've been following for years. On my Broken Ankle Tour a couple of years ago, I went to her adopted hometown of Wemberley, TX to see her perform. She's got a great voice, and she's a fabulous song writer. She's written some of the most biting anti-Bush songs I've ever heard, and yet if you don't listen to the words, you'll still love the music. I'll go to see her anytime, anyplace.







This a view of some of the crowds near the food area. They've always had a good variety of exceptional food at reasonable prices at the EFMF. You can get any kind of food, from Cajun to Korean to Ukrainian.











The Beer Gardens are always fun, and this year were an especially welcome respite from the heat. Here's a shot of some of the gang, with a special guest, the pie-plate girl. This effigy is a stand-in for the daughter of the guy on the right. She was a regular attendee of the EFMF with her dad, but this year, she's on a Rotary student exchange in Brazil. Since both Megan and Caroline are Rotary exchange alumni, they had lots of stories to tell her dad about what the "cultural" exchanges are really all about. Anyway, since she couldn't be there this year, he was going around with this stick version of her, getting photographs of "her" with musicians, and even one of her on the ground in the beer garden, surrounded by empty jugs of beer. It will all appear on some Facebook page, but I've already lost the name and address, so I'll probably never see the finished product.


Here's a shot of Marian and me under the tarp during the rainstorm. The tarp was not totally waterproof, but we didn't really get wet enough to dampen our spirits.










Edmonton's skyline, especially at night from Gallagher Park, is a sight to behold.












I took a bunch of telephoto pictures of Outlaw Social's HBFP at one of the workshops. I hope she wasn't directing this killer look at me.











I really should be running around doing last minute stuff for the Mt. Rainier climb, but I'm not sure I'm going to do it. On Saturday morning in Edmonton I woke up with an ache in my lower back. I didn't think much of it, believing it was just a matter of sleeping in an odd position. Unfortunately, it's not going away. In fact it's getting worse. I have no idea what I did to myself, but I'm sure sitting on a motorcycle for 2000 miles might have something to do with it. Right now, I have a hard time taking Farley for a walk to the PCC, let alone trying to hike up 14,410'. I've got a massage appointment for tomorrow, but I'm not optimistic.

I'll keep you posted.

On the Road Again

Hal and I left on Tuesday for our annual motorcycle pilgramage to the hallowed Edmonton Folk Music Festival. For a change this year, the weather was (and still is) gorgeous! We had a long day on Tuesday, driving 560 miles to Revelstoke, BC. We arrived after 10PM, and I learned how Mary and Joseph must have felt all those centuries ago, because there was no room for us at the inn. We went to every motel in town before finding a bed in a motel that wasn't really a stable, though it certainly smelled like one.



Wednesday was a relatively short ride (maybe 200 miles) to Cochrane, where we once again took advantage Keith and Carmen's hospitality. Special thanks to Colin for sacrificing his bed.

Here's the view from their kitchen window.



Today we'll have another relatively short ride to Edmonton. and should arrive sometime early in the afternoon. I lived in Edmonton for close to 10 years, and even though I wouldn't want to live there again, with Mom and Marian and Pete living there, it's like home. Who was it that said, "Home is where they have to take you in."?

August Vote

As a new US citizen and newly registered voter, I'll get to do my civic duty and exercise my franchise in the Washington State mail-in primary elections on August 19th. Every office from governor to congressman to Superior Court judges are on the ballot. By the rules of the WA State primary, the top two primary vote-getters, regardless of party affiliation, make it to the general election ballot in November. That means that it's possible that two Democrats (and no Republican) will be running for congress in my district in November. This is a new system that has arisen out of various court challenges to the old party primaries, and this new system is itself under challenge in the courts. But in any case, I will go through the voters' guide and make the best choices I can. Somehow, I don't think that I'll be voting for Goodspaceguy Nelson (yes, that really is his name, and he really is running for Congress) for US Congressional district #7.

In November, I'll get to vote for President for the first time. I'm still firmly in Obama's camp, but without the enthusiasm I had for him a couple of months ago. I just don't understand what he's doing. McCain is running a lackluster gaffe-filled campaign, and yet he's closing the gap in the polls. Obama is running way behind the Democrats in general, and McCain is way ahead of the Republican brand. I'm constantly receiving email messages forwarded by friends or acquaintances questioning Obama's patriotism, his arrogance, his religion, and even his weight and his fussy eating habits. That whispering campaign is having an effect. McCain runs cheesy but very effective ads saying that Obama is an empty-suit celebrity or that he has a God complex. Obama is not responding well. He could be hammering McCain for his stupid gaffes (Phil Gramm's mental-recession-nation-of-whiners comments, the non-existent Iraq-Pakistani border, confusing Shiites and Sunnis, etc.) So what does he do? He panders to the ignorant multitudes about compromising on offshore drilling! He's beginning to look like an ordinary, not very effective politician, but with great oratorical skills.

A week ago, he was making points about US withdrawal from Iraq, even getting Maliki to essentially endorse his position. But Obama has to be careful about what he wishes for. He talks of sending more troops to Afghanistan. That is an even dicier conflict than Iraq, with even less chance for success. Obama could well be caught in a hopeless situation with two ongoing unpopular un-winnable wars. I think he should stick with his original plans and try to withdraw with some shred of dignity.

I am disappointed, but not yet disheartened.