From a recent email correspondence with my sister Stacy, who's in the army and currently in Iraq: 

Me:  What's the plan when you get home from Iraq?  Leave the army, move into the woods, and live off the land? 
Stacy:  Wow - who told you about my future plans?!  I AM going to live off the land!  But only if that land has pizza bushes and beer trees :-)

In stark contrast to the email from my other sister.  But seriously, wouldn't pizza bushes and beer trees be awesome? #psychology

A few years ago, right after I graduated college, I went to the church I grew up in.  I was recently engaged, and I remember seeing a guy there who I hadn't seen or talked to in a few years, and I heard he was also engaged.  After the service, I went over to talk to him.  At the moment, he was talking to someone, likely about how he recently graduated from college and/or had gotten engaged.  I waited patiently for a chance to have a word with him, seeing that we had quite a bit in common.  I remember trying to make eye contact with him as a silent "Hey, good to see you; we'll talk in a few minutes."  I waited for an uncomfortably long time and finally reached the point where I couldn't care less whether I talked to this guy or not.  So I went home and didn't think about it again. 

But a similar experience last week reminded me of it.  I was standing in line to sign up for a graduate class, and two people ahead of me was a guy I had previously traveled with for work.  At one point, he turned around and started talking to the person behind me.  My plan initially was to avoid him altogether, not because I didn't like him, but because I literally don't enjoy human interaction, especially when we have so little in common and therefore so little to say to each other. 

Him:  Done any more traveling lately?
Me:  Nope.  You?
Him:  Nope.

But since he turned around, I felt obligated to say hi.  I attempted to make eye contact with him, again as a silent "Hey, good to see you; we'll talk in a few minutes."  What would normally be a simple endeavor turned out to be a massive internal struggle about how long it would take to stare at a person before things got weird.  I decided the length of time I had already stared was plenty, so I looked away and thought about other things.  We both signed up for classes and left the building without talking to each other. 

Moral of the story:  I refuse to wait in line to talk to people.  If it's really important, I'm sure you'll come find me.  Otherwise it's just not worth my time or effort. #psychology

The following is a list of places I've traveled to and the date of my first visit.  A visit counts as driving through and/or stopping off, not just getting a connecting flight through an airport. 

US States:
Alabama - 2001
Alaska
Arizona - 2007
Arkansas
California - 2002
Colorado
Connecticut - 1982
Delaware - 1988
Florida - 1988
Georgia - 1988
Hawaii - 2007
Idaho - 2007
Illinois - 2005
Indiana - 2003
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky - 2005
Louisiana
Maine - 1993
Maryland - 1988
Massachusetts - 1993
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana - 2007
Nebraska
Nevada - 2005
New Hampshire - 1993
New Jersey - 1983
New Mexico - 2010
New York - 1990
North Carolina - 1988
North Dakota
Ohio - 2002
Oklahoma - 2012
Oregon
Pennsylvania - 1992
Rhode Island - 2007
South Carolina - 1988
South Dakota
Tennessee - 2003
Texas - 2004
Utah - 2008
Vermont - 2000
Virginia - 1988
Washington - 2006
West Virginia - 2003
Wisconsin
Wyoming - 2007

---

Total: 

International:
Antigua - 2009
Aruba - 2009
Bahamas - 2005
Barbados - 2009
Bermuda - 2008
Canada - 2000
Cayman Islands - 2011
Curacao - 2009
Dominica - 2009
Dominican Republic - 2009
Germany - 2008
Italy - 2011
Jamaica - 2004
St. John - 2009
St. Lucia - 2009
St. Thomas - 2009

A parasite is defined as "An organism that grows, feeds, and is sheltered on or in a different organism while contributing nothing to the survival of its host."  Most definitions also mention that the parasite, usually the smaller of the two, often benefits while the host is harmed. 

Human beings are, quite literally, a parasite to planet earth.  They use it, burn it, dig it, crush it, and destroy it.  Then they scatter all their waste products (created and bodily) on the ground and in the ocean, further harming themselves and other creatures attempting to live symbiotically on the planet.  Every part of the planet is made worse by human interaction.  Humans make use of the earth for their own well-being at the expense of the earth's well-being, thus perfectly fitting the definition of a parasite. #psychology

Public bathrooms that don't have paper towels invariably have electronic hand-dryers that blow hot air.  It's a painfully inefficient process, but hey, anything to save the environment.  Despite their fool-proof design and operation, instructions are necessarily, and they usually go something like this: 

1. Push button.
2. Rub hands under warm air.

I've been in public bathrooms all around the country and in all kinds of venues.  I don't think I've ever seen hand-dryer instructions that didn't have some variation of the following graffito (singular of graffiti ... c'mon, keep up): 

1. Push button.
2. Rub hands under warm hair.

I've seen this in schools, workplaces, public attractions, everywhere.  Either this specific graffito is so obvious that it practically writes itself, or there's a nationwide band of hoodlums systematically vandalizing public bathroom hand-dryers.  You decide. #entertainment

Having a website/blog means there will be spam comments, just like having an email address means getting spam email.  I could very easily disable the ability to leave comments, but I sometimes like to hear what people have to say.  Currently, I have a very simple yet effective method of preventing spam involving basic arithmetic.  It works great at filtering out (a) people with math disabilities and (b) robots who leave spam comments.  Every once in a while, a spam comment gets through, either because it was left by a real human (which I find surprising, seeing that most spam is done by automated means) or because the robot happened to guess the correct number to type into the box. 

But what I find most surprising is how much spam I get while I'm away from my computer.  I spend a good 9 hours per day at a computer, so I can quickly delete spam comments that get through.  I might get one or two spam comments per week normally, if any at all.  But as soon as the weekend rolls around, I suddenly get three or four.  And if I'm on vacation like I was last week, I suddenly get all kinds of comment spam.  It's like the robots know when I'm not around, so they all gang up and abuse my website.  Be careful robots, I might disable commenting altogether.  Don't ruin it for everyone. #technology

Faceball is an "office sport" played by throwing beach balls at fellow employees' faces.  Opponents sit 10 feet apart and try to hit each other directly in the face.  Glancing blows don't count, and ducking is not allowed.  The one with the most points after 5 rounds wins.  (via Neatorama) #sports

I just spent a week on vacation in Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming, stopping off in Missoula to visit a friend from college, the National Bison Range to check out some roaming buffalo, Glacier National Park to see some snow-covered mountains, and Yellowstone National Park to visit the nation's first national park.  Here's a list of interesting things I learned: 

1. Glacier National Park doesn't have many snow-covered mountains during the summer.
2. Montana stays light until around 9 or 10pm during the summer.
3. Most, if not all, Montana towns have a large white letter painted or somehow otherwise emblazoned on a nearby hillside, representing the first letter of the name of the town.
4. Most, if not all, Montana farms and towns have irrigation ditches (essentially a small stream of fresh water), which carry water to plants and lawns.  You can use water from the irrigation ditch, but only if you have rights to it.
5. In the mid- to late-90s, Montana's speed limit was "Reasonable and Prudent", which essentially meant "whatever you want".  This was changed in 1999 to be slightly more reasonable:  75 on interstates and 70 on most other roads.  Montana is the first place I've ever felt unsafe while going under the speed limit.
6. Meth is a big problem in Montana, or at least it was assumed to be big enough to attract the attention and advertising dollars of billionaire Thomas Siebel for something called the Montana Meth Project.  The weirdest example of this was driving hundreds of miles on a state highway and seeing nothing, until suddenly coming to a barn whose roof had a large painted message reading, "Meth ... Not Even Once".
7. Wildfires are essentially good, unless they get too close to houses and cities.  Many plants and trees actually depend on fires to survive, so most fires are allowed to burn.
8. Yellowstone National Park is essentially a national park located inside the crater of a volcano, complete with hot water springs, geysers, bubbling sulfur, and boiling mud.  All these phenomena are caused by underground magma, which, like all those Discovery Channel disaster shows talk about, will eventually erupt and cause the biggest natural disaster in the history of the universe, likely ending all life on earth.  In the meantime, it's a pretty cool place to walk around.
9. Moose (plural) sometimes eat by standing fully submerged in a lake and nibbling plants off the bottom.
10. Bison (plural) stick their tongues out when they roar/moo.

Here's a list of interesting things I experienced:

1. I ate an almost completely organic, all-natural, and, more importantly, sustainable meal with my friend's family, complete with garden-grown vegetables, lake-caught fish, and gun-killed deer and antelope.
2. I ate fresh kohlrabi, a garden-grown vegetable that looks like a head of cabbage and tastes like a radish.
3. I/we drove 1700 miles in 8 days.
4. I ate a buffalo burger right outside the National Bison Range.  This was later proven to be morally acceptable because many of the bison from the range are sold to local breeders and herders in order to further purify the bison currently living on the protected range.  The breeders and herders can do with these animals as they wish, which most likely means killing and eating them.  Bison meat is relatively low in saturated fat and cholesterol, but tastes surprising similar to beef.
5. On the flight home, I had to fly from Spokane to Seattle to Newark.  My flight out of Spokane was a little delayed, but I had no problem making my connecting flight out of Seattle.  My bag (which was checked in Spokane), however, was unable to make the connecting flight.  But don't worry, it caught the next flight, which was 4 hours later.  I was unaware this was possible, and I was surprised no one in any of the three airports told me about it.  Airports are weird.

Pictures:

[gallery /img/2007/08/mt01.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt01-150x150.jpg:::A view from somewhere in Idaho, on the way to Montana.:::/img/2007/08/mt02.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt02-150x150.jpg:::Rolling golden fields somewhere in Idaho, on the way to Montana.:::/img/2007/08/mt03.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt03-150x150.jpg:::A view from Coralynn's family's house in Montana.:::/img/2007/08/mt04.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt04-150x150.jpg:::Coralynn and Wendy in a tepee.:::/img/2007/08/mt05.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt05-150x150.jpg:::A view from Coralynn's family's house, this time with smoke from wildfires.:::/img/2007/08/mt06.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt06-150x150.jpg:::National Bison Range - A chipmunk resting comfortably on a road.:::/img/2007/08/mt07.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt07-150x150.jpg:::National Bison Range - Big bison, little bison.:::/img/2007/08/mt08.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt08-150x150.jpg:::National Bison Range - A bison sticking his tongue out while roaring/mooing.:::/img/2007/08/mt09.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt09-150x150.jpg:::National Bison Range - Wendy watches a bison from a safe place.:::/img/2007/08/mt10.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt10-150x150.jpg:::National Bison Range - Rolling hills and mountains of Montana.:::/img/2007/08/mt11.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt11-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Entrance.:::/img/2007/08/mt12.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt12-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Wendy standing in a lake with some smoky mountains in the background.:::/img/2007/08/mt13.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt13-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - A glacial stream carving its way through rocks.:::/img/2007/08/mt14.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt14-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - So many trees!:::/img/2007/08/mt15.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt15-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Mountains and waterfalls.:::/img/2007/08/mt16.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt16-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - A chipmunk nibbling on an almond someone gave him despite all the signs that say not to feed the wildlife.:::/img/2007/08/mt17.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt17-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Waterfall down the mountain.:::/img/2007/08/mt18.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt18-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Mountains with a little snow.:::/img/2007/08/mt19.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt19-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Wendy and me with a view.:::/img/2007/08/mt20.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt20-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - A chubby ground squirrel trying to get me to give in and fork over some food (I didn't).:::/img/2007/08/mt21.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt21-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Mountains and rocks.:::/img/2007/08/mt22.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt22-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Thumbs up!:::/img/2007/08/mt23.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt23-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Big-horned sheep.:::/img/2007/08/mt24.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt24-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Mountains, lake, snow.:::/img/2007/08/mt25.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt25-150x150.jpg:::Glacier National Park - Big goat, little goat.:::/img/2007/08/mt26.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt26-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Entrance.:::/img/2007/08/mt27.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt27-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Rolling golden hills (a view from Gallatin National Forest).:::/img/2007/08/mt28.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt28-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Sulfur pots stink!:::/img/2007/08/mt29.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt29-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Sulfur pots look cool!:::/img/2007/08/mt30.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt30-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A grizzly bear (and her unseen cub) take a nap on the side of a hill, as hundreds of people get out of their cars and watch.:::/img/2007/08/mt31.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt31-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A butterfly stopped flapping its wings long enough for me to take its picture.:::/img/2007/08/mt32.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt32-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Looks like a foreign planet.:::/img/2007/08/mt33.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt33-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A field we hiked through.:::/img/2007/08/mt34.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt34-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A huge waterfall carving its way through the rock.:::/img/2007/08/mt35.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt35-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A view from the top of the waterfall.:::/img/2007/08/mt36.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt36-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Bubbling muddy water, caused by carbon dioxide escaping from below the ground and heated by magma.:::/img/2007/08/mt37.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt37-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A beautiful blue pot of water about 10 feet deep, probably hot enough to melt your skin off.:::/img/2007/08/mt38.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt38-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Hot cocoa makes Wendy happy when it's rainy.  That's Old Faithful in the background.:::/img/2007/08/mt39.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt39-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A bubbling pot of hot water broke through the surface.:::/img/2007/08/mt40.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt40-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A geyser near Old Faithful.:::/img/2007/08/mt41.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt41-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - A bull elk, easily the size of two or three deer combined (the picture doesn't do it justice).:::/img/2007/08/mt42.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt42-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Don't swim in the river because there's boiling hot water flowing into it!:::/img/2007/08/mt43.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt43-150x150.jpg:::Yellowstone National Park - Cold air + hot water spouts = disappearing Wendy.:::/img/2007/08/mt44.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt44-150x150.jpg:::Wendy and I stop off for a lunch break on a road near a lake in Montana.:::/img/2007/08/mt45.jpg:::/img/2007/08/mt45-150x150.jpg:::Coralynn, Wendy, and I on our last day.:::]
#travel