Aside from making my ears bleed from listening to the Counting
Crows a little to loud, I have accomplished very little today. Well,
aside from finally writing some code after doing research for over two
weeks. And it works (mostly)! IT WORKS!
Climbing
Ahem. Ok, moving on. Saturday saw my ass on yellow wall at
Barrier Mountain in Kananaskis Country, future site of the 2002
G8 Summit. Kananaskis is the future site that is, not Barrier
Mountain so much. I started the day by leading a super easy 5.7 to set
up a top rope for our beginner climbers, then lead a 5.10b, a 10c, and
I also got to work on a 5.11a that stumped me last week.
I had to try to crux move about five times before I was able to
stick it; it was a crimp with the left hand, a gaston with the right,
outside edge of the right foot on a little ledge, left foot to the
left and push up fast and reach up with the right hand. I still have
trouble keeping myself close to the wall, so the first couple of times
I just peeled right off and didn't even come close. I had to shut my
eyes and visualize myself getting it, reminded myself to stay close,
and slapped it good with my right hand, but slide off. I got it the
next time though. That was probably one of the most rewarding thing
I've done climbing in a while...
Climbing is really good for me. It will probably lead to a more
social me, but I've still got issues to overcome there. The best thing
about climbing is that when I'm on the rock, I'm not thinking about
anything else but what I'm doing.
I took about half a semester's worth of Akido, but I always had a
hard time letting go of my day. If I was stressed out this was
especially difficult, and I ended up not concentrating enough and it
wasn't very much fun. With climbing though, it's just all gone, and I
have a nice clear head.
While at Grassi Lakes last week, my climbing partner and I ran into
a guy that we recognized from the bouldering wall which is a passable
substitute for real climbing during the winter. He's talked to my
climbing partner before, but refused to acknowledge him when he spoke
to him. He was climbing alone. "He's even less talkative than I am," I
said.
"Must have forgotten to take his medication today. No wonder he's
climbing alone."
Helping
On another note, an eighth grader from Arkansas came across a web
page of mine that has a bunch of math formulas and stuff on it from
when I was working my way through undergraduate calculus. She
requested help with a linear equation, which I gave step by step
instructions on how to solve. This apparently helped, which is
nice. That's the magic of the internet for you; helping random people
with their math homework.
The G8, government, society, values, and Star Wars
On a final note, I hope that the Search and Rescue teams have
trained up for the G8. Knowing the weather around here, we'll get a
freak snow storm that week and we'll have people trying to hike
through three feet of snow in the back country wearing shorts and
sandals. On the other hand, it could be so bloody hot that they'll be
getting sun stroke and passing out. City hospitals are gearing up.
Add to this the extra fun of having protesters mauled by bears,
trampled by elk and/or moose, stalked by cougars, and so on. Plus
ranchers and farmers will not appreciate trespassers stomping all
over the land (it's surprising how delicate the prairie and mountain
pasture ecosystems are). And of course we'll have the Canadian
military (such as it is) out and about, and lot's of RCMP and City
Police.
I don't mind a peaceful protest, and there are certainly issues
that need attention, so it's good that there are people motivated
enough to get things organized and get people out to voice opinions on
issues. However, the G8 is not an excuse to be blocking traffic,
disturb the peace, vandalizing things, and otherwise breaking the
law.
If you are going to be summit hopping your way to Calgary, do
yourself a favor and check out the provincial and municipal laws, and
if you are coming from outside of Canada, check the federal laws
too. Make sure you know why you're coming; if you except a party, stay
at home. If you are coming to terrorize the citizens of this city, no
matter how just you think your cause, stay at home. If you want to
address some issues and voice your opinion in a peaceful way, by all
means.
Last winter I ran into a guy who wanted to go to the airport and
watch world leaders come and go. He was griping about not being
allowed to do so. "We just want to go look at them. We aren't going to
do anything." Well buddy, it's not the observers they care about keeping
away from leaders, it's the doers. It's pretty tough to tell what
someones motivations and plans might be, so caution demands that
measures are taken to prevent acts of... for lack of a better word,
terrorism.
In the past few weeks, we've see a great deal of rhetoric come out
of Washington and out of CSIS about the growing threat of terrorism
against both the United States and Canada. Although there are
clearly great wrongs in the world causing people to feel that they
need to strike out at the western world, to a certain extent this
feels to me like an excuse to increase militarization and move more
and more power into a few hands at the top level of governments. Think
of Palpatine using the threat of worlds breaking away from the
Republic and forming an army as an excuse to manipulate a certain senator into motioning for "temporary" powers to form
an "army of the republic" and so on. Star Wars is a cautionary tale,
not just about personal values (resist the dark side), but about
society and government as well. My point with this is that I hope that
this rhetoric is not an excuse for the upper levels of government to
weasel unnecessary power away from the people.
Anyway, I think the cops will probably be able to keep themselves
restrained, and use reasonable force when necessary, judging by how
well things went during the
WPC. Of course, post 9/11, Alberta
could be a police state. June will be an interesting month.
If this daylog gives mixed impressions, well that's because there's
no perfect solution. Society, government, and economies are all complex
arts of balance and compromise, and they're never quite right.