Finally got some trail time.....

Saturday was goooood. Went hiking up Cold Spring Canyon trail on Saturday. It's been awhile. Hiking in the front country has been pretty screwy the past year because of the brushfires around Santa Barbara. Lots of closed trails, plus the fact that I'm kind of a wuss about hiking during fire season. I don't relish the possibility of getting crisped.

Still, it was a perfect day for it, sunny but cool. Just warm enough so that a jacket wasn't necessary.

I gots pics! Clicky to embiggen....

You can see where the burn areas are. They're pretty much closed off right now, to keep the erosion down to a minimum.



More burned areas.



It's not all burned out though. The photo from my little pocket camera doesn't really capture how cool this view was.



These clouds popped over the range in just a few minutes time. Temperature dropped and I could feel the humidity rise almost immediately. Felt great.





Nothing really to say here, I just like the sort of crenellated nature of this ridgeline.



Creek crossing deep inside Cold Spring Canyon, about a mile up from the trailhead.



And from the trailhead, a reminder that not everyone in Santa Barbara is a lefty fruitcake.

Never Forget, Never Forgive

As we all know, it's the 8th anniversary of our darkest day. There are millions of Americans who can speak to this day more eloquently than I. My remembrance can simply be stated as:

Prayers for the fallen.

Ammo for the warriors.

Never forget.

Never forgive.

Killing the Planet...one EarthHour at a time.

Well, you've probably heard about EarthHour, where on 3/28/09, 8:30pm local time, all of the enlightened neo-Luddites are supposed to switch off all their electrical appliances and spend an hour in the fucking stone age. Well, it's over. And I celebrated EarthHour like a true AoS moron. I cranked up the outside lights, the washer and dryer, two area heaters my TV, cablemodem and computer. I'd even managed to pop a breaker in the process.

Walked outside to check out the street right after EarthHour started. The college student-infested apartment building across the street was mostly dark. Received some dirty looks from folks on the second floor while I was basking in incandescent light from the porch light.

Then I got to wondering if there was a website to monitor energy usage in real time.

Sure is.

It's constantly updating, so you won't be able to see the power spike that happened during EarthHour after tonight. But I've got a screenshot!


Note the time for the power spike. Peaks right at 8:00pm, and slowly ramps down. It's 10:15pm right now and it's still higher than that day-long energy usage plateau.

Heh.

Seattle Post Intelligencer Fun

Last night I had some fun with the scary-smart journalists at the Seattle Post Intelligencer. Start with this thread at AoSHQ for the proper background. Apparently, the soon-to-be-homeless journalists at the PI are trying to jump-start an on-line venue for their smart, hard-hitting, integrity-drenched reporting. They're doing the organization VIA A WEBSITE WITH OPEN EDITING PRIVILEGES AND OPEN ENROLLMENT.

A truly kind and caring person would have gently informed the moderators that their website was open to pranksters....

Seattle Post Post-Intelligencer Home

Business Models

Examples in other cities

Links for more information

Videos

Seattle PI Reader Plea

Site To-Dos

Staff organization

Who is talking in Seattle

*Edit*
The images are just fine if you open them in something like the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer and zoom in. If you try to view them in Firefox, they won't be readable. Still trying to work out the screencap thing on large web pages.
*End Edit*

Most of the "improvements" have been scrubbed by now. Most of them. You'd think that they'd do a thorough washing of the site to scrub it of that eeeeevil rethuglican juju. It seems that "washing" and "scrubbing" are still beyond the abilities or inclinations of liberals. Not to mention the peculiar weakness in Seattle lefties for running their activist sites without any notion of security at all. Don't change, Seattle lefties. Please don't change.

Big thanks to genghis for the original posting on Ace of Spades.

Chaos, fear and paranoia...my work here is done.

WOOF, WOOF!

Hello Morons!

Hey there, fellow cockholsters, morons, hobo-hunters, Amish nuc-u-lar engineers, Ewoks, humpbacks, midget Thai tranny hookers and Methodists. A little explanation is in order, I guess.

I'm not really getting into the blogging business, I just needed my own personal online trophy room and dumping spot. Lots of scalps, can't forget to count coup on the assorted retards and douchebags on the American Left. I'm one of the AoSHQ regulars, although I just do the commenting thing. I'm not nearly smart enough to be worth a damn as one of King Ewok's co-bloggers.

So c'mon down to the HQ!