Have you noticed that forest rangers are becoming more militant in their enforcement of minor infractions? Last weekend at the Empire Ranch Score-O, the Tucson Orienteering Club was fined about $120 because one of the meet directors forgot to bring the event permit. Um, why do we even need a permit? One of the laughable truths about public land: it's not really public, and you can't really do what you want, even if it isn't hurting anyone else. I'm against public land "ownership" -- and this is just one example of what goes wrong when land is in the commons. Everyone wants to use it for widely varying purposes, most of which are not mutually exclusive, but many of which are
perceived to be mutually exclusive. In the end, the group with the most money and/or political pull usually gets their way. And the groups who get beat up the most in the mainstream media (e.g., dog owners, quad riders, shooters) get screwed. Back to the militant rangers. Maybe it can be expected in southern AZ what with all the illegal immigrant and such, right? Well, isn't that primarily the job of the Border Patrol? On that note, during my 2-hour Score-O competition, I got ogled by a BP agent. I crossed a dirt road and headed up a hillside looking for control #30. About 300 meters off the road I hear something behind me, turned and saw a BP pickup checkin' me out. Yep, I looked pretty border-crosser-esque with my Tilley hat, blue gaiters with Ex Officio khaki shorts, and medium black dog on a retractable flexi-leash... I still haven't gotten to those militant rangers, though. A few years ago I was in Eugene, OR and went up to Cougar Hot Springs (?) with a few friends who will remain unnamed (not nameless, because they do have names). They went up to the springs (maybe 1/2 mile from parking area?) and I hung around the vehicle and walked up the road a bit. A ranger came and waited for friends to return and ticketed them (we didn't pay the parking fee). Ok, I'm in favor of user fees if we have public lands. We should've paid. But this guy got militant when he tried to ticket me, for sitting in the parking lot. Um, ok... I didn't get a ticket, but the guy was a real ass about the whole thing. He ruined the whole experience, and the whole point of having public lands to "enjoy". Also, isn't there something more
important to do? It seems like the most resources get allocated to some of the smallest problems. Thank goodness that most government land-management agencies (Nat Forest Service, BLM) are so underfunded they can't do much law enforcement. However, NPS may be an exception. I've already noted that law enforcement in popular National Parks is wayyy higher on a per-capita basis than outside the parks. "Welcome to your national park, where you're very likely to get busted for speeding and possession of anything illegal! Most of your rights are stripped away here!" Another unnamed friend (who knows) says that NPS rangers look for "natural products" in vehicles at trailheads, especially certain types of vehicles with certain types of stickers (I'm guessing Grateful Dead, Phish and the ilk). So if you've got some natural leafy substance, don't have other natural products (e.g. pinecones, rocks) on display in your car in a National Park. Also, it's a good idea to have NO stickers on your car.
I get a kick out of throwing things away. (And don’t tell me the landfills are almost full. They aren’t, we’ve got tons of space, and trash compaction methods are getting better, blah blah. In the future it will make more economic sense to reuse more stuff. Then we will.) When the stuff is actually removed from my property I imagine the land rebounding like after the glaciers melted away from the Midwest. Some areas are still rising at rates up to ~1 cm per year. That doesn’t really happen here, on a scale as small as one house. But less junk means less to worry about, store, clean, and pack next time I move. Somehow I’ve accumulated about five containers of hand soap. Gradually I’m using them up, beginning with the emptiest one first. When gone I get to toss the container and remove those 75 grams from my life. Constant readers of Encounters with Stupidity will remember one of the first entries, where I discussed the dissolution of a tenacious bar of soap. Now I’m working on the replacement of that bar, a scented bar I bought in Cyprus. Behind it are a still-wrapped bar of Lava soap (79 cents at Fry’s, I couldn’t resist) and a lovely Chamomile-scented bar from Body Works that I got from Erik and Sara as a thank-you for watching their dogs. I fret that I won’t be able to use up both bars and the five hand soap bottles before I move on next year, but I'm going at full speed, sometimes washing my hands twice just to use more soap.
How many different substances go into the trash? Every time I toss something, I think about how many compounds it contains. I like to get as many different chemicals as possible into the trash. Right now there are various types of plastic, eight or ten different minerals (from some gravel I had in the cuffs of my pants), plant material, thorns from Sabkha’s fur, fur, various foodstuffs...
On another subject:
Do Americans ever learn to spell? I’ve been browsing around on some online dating sites, and I’m appalled. Not by the pictures – by the writing. If you are going to introduce yourself with a 400-word write-up, don’t you think you’d at least use spell check? Or consult a dictionary? Or go back to third grade and learn to spell? And it’s not tough words like “piece” or “misspelled”. Those give me trouble too. The problem is, I don’t think people ever learn. One of the symptoms of our failed government-run (aka “public”) schools.
