Need Book Recommendations

I am in need of some good book recommendations. I've gone from having a laundry list of books to read (and actually not having read many of them) to not being able to think of any books that I want to read. My latest reads have been Deep Economy by Bill McKibben, Mastery by George Leonard, and right now I can't remember the one before that.

I'm pretty much up for anything. Mystery, novel, just fun reading, what have you. What are some good books that you've read lately that you'd recommend for me to read?

Who Are You?

Woah! Who are you and what happened to your hair? That's right I got a hair cut. Well I should say I pretty much shaved my head. It was that time. The hair had gotten very long and very unruly. I figured once the small mammals moved in it was time to cut it. While we were buzzing my head we stopped a couple of times to pay tribute to some of my past haircuts.

To little Eric from about the 1st to 3rd grade this one is for you:



For the Eric from 4th to about 9th grade, this is for you little buddy:


That's right folks, that is a rat tail.

Here's the remnants of what I had on my head yesterday afternoon:


Woah, is that a sink full of hair? Why yes it is. That was a lot of hair that came off.

You know the feeling of the first couple of steps after you take off your heavy backpack that you've been carrying for the past couple of hours when you are backpacking? The feeling like you feel so light and have an extra spring in your step? That's how my head felt this morning. I felt ultra-sleek and aerodynamic. It was a good time.

Ski Tour on Mt. Aire

A week ago from this past Thursday I went on a dawn patrol ski tour of Mt. Aire. I was invited by my friend Kendall to join him and a couple of his friends for the patrol. For those of you who don't know, Mt. Aire is the peak that you can't miss when driving east on I-80 from Park City to Salt Lake City. As you roll over Parley's Summit you can help but see Mt. Aire staring you in the face.

We started about 6:00 am and after 3100 feet of vertical ascent and 90 minutes of hiking we crested onto the summit just after the sun came up. Here's the pics of the surrounding area:


Looking down our skin track.




Looking at the sun.


Looking towards East Canyon.


The obligatory self-portrait.

It was great to look down at the highway every once in awhile and see all the people droning along on their way to work while I was breating the crisp mountain air and getting in some turns.

Backpacking Grand Gulch

This past weekend we went backpacking down in the Grand Gulch Primitive Area of Southern Utah. It was both Jessica and I's first backpacking trip in Southern Utah. It was amazing. First off we were able to drop Penelope off at Jessica's sister's house in Blanding for the weekend, second the weather the beautiful, third it's been a few years since we went backpacking together, and fourth the group we went with was awesome.

Grand Gulch is this huge canyon that was home to many Native Americans. The place is scattered with old ruins that you can walk up and check out (although there is only one that you can actually enter the buildings).

The trip was planned by my friend at work Walt and he invited us along. All I can say is it was awesome and I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. Here are some of my favorites followed by all the pictures we took.

Jess coming out of Perfect Kiva.

The group hiking through the valley.

One of the drops into the valley.


The rest of the pictures.

And the Winner is...

A winner has finally been chosen for the mystery substance contest. While I did say I'd pick a winner after a week there were only two entries so I let it run longer. It paid off and I got a third entry!

Here's the deal, no one got 100% of the ingredients, but the closest was Mrs. Olsen (Rachel) with her guess of banana, strawberry, kiwi, and avocado. Congratulations on winning one gallon of the 'mystery substance'. Let me know the next time you're in the Salt Lake City area and I'll serve it up.

The winner of the grossest guess would be Ghost Rider with blenderized red potato salad. You win one red potato salad smoothie. To redeem your prize go to the grocery store deli, get one pound of red potato salad, return home, put in blender with about one cup of milk and blend until almost smooth (there's gotta be some chunks).


The recipe for the smoothie looked a little something like this: pineapple juice, orange juice, orange, banana, red delicious apple, and blueberry gogurt. It was actually pretty delicious.

The Power of Being Honest

There's a lot to be said about companies and businesses actually being honest about their practices and the reasons why do they stuff. Most of the time I think the most accurate portrayal of what's going on comes from satirical writers and cartoonists. I found this short piece from NPR. I was going to post it last summer but it got buried and I just found it. It's about the horrid airline travel season many customers experienced this past summer. You can find the original and listen to the audio (the audio is much better) over at NPR.

"Hi. Welcome to our airline you poor fool. I'm going to ask you a series of questions, just to keep you occupied, shouting into the phone. But I'm a recording. I can't understand a thing you say.

"After you've been on hold longer than the Russians have been in Chechnya, I'll turn you over to someone on the other side of the world who also won't understand you, and thinks that Pittsburgh is Plattsburgh.

"Talk loudly and repeat everything six times. We find that hilarious.

"Plan on getting to the airport four hours early, spending five hours on the runway, and landing seven hours late. If you don't like that, maybe you should try walking to your destination on your hands.

"If you miss your connection: tough.

"If you're calling because we lost your luggage, join the club. Give us a full description of the contents of your bag so that we can distract you while we let it rot unattended in Yuma, Arizona for a week.

"Give us your credit card information. We'll add on several fees, taxes, and penalties to drive up the cost.

"Don't I sound friendly? Actually, I'm hugely indifferent to everything you say."

I found it to be quite enjoyable.