Crabbiness and sleeping nerdery

That was one good crab feast.

DeLee with her mad crab skillz

I don't know what he's talking about but he looks serious

The view from my seat

I may never eat again.  Good gravy.  There's not even that much *in* a crab!  I can't be this full!

Before the carnage, I happened across some interesting links to sleeping pad information.

First, a completely new to me sleeping pad - tapered and ultralight.
The Taperlite pad.  Standard size is 32" long, 18-14" wide (head end widest), 1.75-1.25" thick, and 5.5 oz.  You can customize the size, and you can add insulation.  Base price is $70.  I would definitely customize it a bit wider, and add some fill.  Probably would add a little length, too.

Then, instructions on how to cut down a Klymit Inertia pad to torso length, saving several ounces.  The video is of the XL model - $130, 78" long, 26" wide at the widest.  Thickness depends on where you measure.  The Inertia has lots of wacky cutouts, which saves you weight and lets your sleeping bag loft down into the holes.  Which is good I guess.  (My pad generally protects me from shelter floors so either me or my sleeping bag would get dirty through the holes, or I'd have to carry a ground sheet to use in shelters.)  This pad looks the easiest to modify.  If you cut near existing holes, you only have to seal about 2" worth on each side, and you can do it at home with an iron.  I don't have an Inertia to play with so I don't know if I'll ever get to try this.

And finally, a video on How to cut and reseal a Thermarest NeoAir.  I have one of these now, so I'm interested.  Mine is 6 feet long.  I am 5'4".  There is an overkill factor.  However, I am most interested in cutting down a large size NeoAir.  Mine, the regular, is 72"x20". The large is 77" by 25".   The regular runs to $150, the large is $170. I would love to get a large and chop about a foot off of it. ( I don't need the length but the extra 5" of width is very appealing to a side sleeper. ) It appears to be a little harder to reseal than the Inertia - you have to cut out some internal material, and you have to seal all the way across the pad - but again you can do it at home with little more than scissors and an iron.

It's hard to tell without the models in front of me, but the NeoAir still looks to be the warmest and cushiest of the three.

The Dubarry Drunks ride drunkenly, again

Ah, the weekend.  It is within my grasp.  Or perhaps it is grasping me.  Somebody is getting felt up, is what I'm saying.

We started our weekend in our classic way, with a meeting of the Dubarry Drunks.  Crackers and cheese and wine and chatting.  I realize that it is trite, but I really like it.  There isn't anything I would rather do but sit with my family and neighbors and watch the world go by.

Tomorrow I'll go get Pluto his pedicure, which he won't appreciate, and then we will pick up a bushel of crabs and a whole lot of hush puppies, and we will party Maryland style.  (The beer is already cooling.)  And then after that?  A whole lot of slack.  If I don't get a nap this weekend, I will be extremely disappointed.  And unrested.

The only active thing I plan to do is strap on my backpack and hike the Billygoat Trail in my trail shoes.  I figure that this will tell me both how my back is doing and how well suited my trail runners are to hiking on rocks.  The Billygoat Trail has rocks'a'plenty.   Generally it also has too many families who should probably be on an easier trail, but I'm hoping if I get out there right around dawn, I should pretty much have the trail to myself.  Or to myself and DeLee, if she is feeling up to an early morning clamber.

Oh, and I made an appointment with a neurosurgeon's physician's assistant.  Wish me luck that she knows something about backpacking.  Or horseback riding.  Sedentary people do not have the first clue about what bodies can or should do, under normal or abnormal conditions.  I went to see a podiatrist years ago who normally treated eighty year olds, and honestly he could not have been less suited to treat somebody who actually walked.

Anyway, I'm hoping for the best.  Cheers!

Home, where the buffalo never, ever roamed

I've never really wanted to live anywhere but here.  I can't relate to people who pine for the mountains or the seashore.  I like it here.  I like the rolling hills and the grass and the trees.  When I go somewhere else it feels alien.  Hiking has helped me be comfortable in more environments, but no place feels like home to me but here.

I've spent short periods of time living in Minnesota and New York.  I've taken long vacations in Florida, Texas, Arizona, California, Maine, and Colorado.  They were nice enough.  But they weren't home.

I've been interviewing places to see if they'd be good retirement homes.  Some place a little less busy, with warmer winters maybe.  Maybe Virginia, Tennessee, or the Carolinas.  Much further than that and I don't know if I'd ever get used to the vegetation.  Even if I did, everything else is different.  Even the major chains change as you move farther away.  In our consumer nation, not being able to buy the brands you're used to is its own source of alienation.

Despite my love of this place, I'm also ashamed of it.  I'm ashamed of racism (both the regular and inverse kind), the lack of grand geological features, the lack of distinguishing characteristics.  One time a man in Texas asked me where I was from, and when I told him Maryland he thought it was a small town in northeastern Texas.  Maryland does not stick in people's minds.

I wish my home state would be kinder to pedestrians and bicyclists.  I wish I had more restaurants to brag on.  I wish our schools were better.  I wish there were more trails and fewer strip malls with empty storefronts.  I know I'm lucky to live on a street where I know my neighbors well enough to use their shower or their guest room if something goes wrong at my house, but I also know that's uncommon here.

But still, Maryland, I kind of love you.  You're cute, with your bifurcation and your blue crabs.  From your watermen to your farmers to your hillbillies way up in the northwest, you have diversity.  Your long history of horse racing means I can buy a new horse trailer a mile from my house if I want to.  You have four distinct seasons.  You might not have a bounty of ethnic businesses, but I can get Ethiopian, Malaysian, or Korean food if I know where to look.

Stay green, Maryland.  Keep those rolling hills.  Keep those generations of watermen safe, and keep those crabs safe too.  You know I can't resist you.