DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

Back when I was an Ander-clone, one of the few diversions of the day was a contest we called the “Coke Game.” The manager who introduced it timed it strategically to interrupt the food comas that set in around 2:00PM. (In those days, I’d frequently cope with my job dissatisfaction by stuffing down a Grilled Sourdough Bacon Cheeseburger and XL fries for lunch. The mere recollection of that meal makes me wish for a hot flax enema.)

The Coke Game required three players. We usually had five; with more, it becomes too expensive, for reasons that shall become apparent. One player starts the game by privately selecting a number between one and 1000 and recording it on a scrap of paper. The rest of the players take turns guessing. With each guess, the person who selected the number says “higher” or “lower;” subsequent guesses have to be higher or lower, respectively. The game ends when someone picks the written number. That person, the loser, has to buy sodas for everyone. The goal of the game, then, is not to guess the written number, but to guess the number one higher or lower, so that the next player is forced to say the number and buy the drinks.

For the first few weeks, I lost as often as you’d expect — maybe once a week. Then the planets went out of line, or something, and I started losing big, days in a row. It gets demoralizing quickly, having to buy sodas for the team over and over again. I didn’t even like soda. I’d played just for the camaraderie, although that faded too when I realized I was getting milked for Coke (in a manner of speaking).

So I stopped participating and felt immediate relief. Over the cube wall I’d hear the guessing and again feel relief when the loser turned out to be someone other than me, as irrational as that was considering I wasn’t even playing.

Eventually someone goaded me into playing again. I’d had a week or two off, and I reasoned that even if I did lose, it would have been acceptable, the only loss that week. So someone picked a number and wrote it down. I was the first to guess. “Ahh, 874,” I said, picking the most obscure number I could think of.

“I’d like a Mountain Dew,” the guy said, holding up a slip of paper with “874'' inexplicably written on it. I resolved to never never ever play the Coke Game again.

A few weeks later, the same guy who’d goaded me before leaned over the cube wall. “Siege?” he asked, pronouncing the initials of the game in the way we used to do. “No, thanks,” I said. Never never ever. “Oh, come on, it’s been weeks!” he said, goading goading goading, and then “I’ll tell you what — if you lose, I’ll pay for it.”

I considered that. On the one hand, if I lost again, it would prove that I was doomed to fare badly in games of chance for pretty much the rest of my life. On the other hand, if I lost, this irritating guy who I sort of disliked anyway would have to buy sodas for everybody. Tempting… but no. I didn’t bite.

“Oh, c’mon,” he urged, “what have you got to lose?” He didn’t understand is that losing cost much more than the round of $0.75 sodas. I admit now, with the perspective of many years’ distance, that I was overreacting, but my emotional burdens were heavier then, e.g. I had a lot more years’ worth of pointless jobs ahead of me. So I joined the game after all. Someone wrote down a number, and let me guess first. I had 999 chances not to pick the wrong number, so I thought about it for a few seconds, finally selecting the most obscure number I could imagine that didn’t happen to be 874. “319,” I said.

The person with the number didn’t say anything. He just held up a scrap of paper that said “319” on it.

I built a compost heap a couple of months ago. After repeatedly checking the moisture level, poking and turning and fussing over it every second day, I concluded that just like all previous attempts, this heap had failed. It stayed cold. It got buggy. I dug out whole, recognizeable chunks of bell peppers and other food waste from inside the heap.

Then it rained, and I abandoned the effort. We stopped saving kitchen scraps. Every time I drove by the compost, I felt annoyed. I mean, if I can’t make food scraps rot, what the heck is wrong with me?

I consulted with a friend who has deep experience in the art of making food rot. The thrust of her advice: “size matters.” The bits have to be small, and the pile has to be big. “You can’t make compost in a teacup,” as someone once said, or maybe that was me.

So over the weekend I pitchforked the heap onto a level patch of dirt and ran over it with the lawnmower. This was tedious, dusty work, but in the end I had a small mound of leaf bits, chopped weeds, and the occasional celery stalk (the mower was unsuccessful at lifting some of the bigger food scraps off the ground). I was surprised at the change in volume. I think some rotting must have taken place inside my cold heap, because what I had left after chopping was about one-sixth as much as I had when I built the pile two months ago.

Today I pressed a tentative hand into the pile. It was warm! I felt like I’d made life. Or at least, like I hadn’t suppressed life through some gross error in procedure. I was cheered in any event.

If you’re ever lost in the wilderness, and night falls, you can use what you’ve learned here to keep warm: shred brown and green vegetation in roughly equal amounts to create 12-18 cubic feet of material, wait two days, and then climb inside. For best results, run over the pile with a lawnmover first.

Given our recent disillusionment with Annadel, we took today’s hike in Sugarloaf Ridge State Park, which is about 45 minutes’ drive from home. (Forgive the sloppy panorama; my camera has unique ideas about color correction, even when the color-correction feature is disabled.)

I was surprised to realize how jaded I’ve become by all these weekend park outings. Today I hiked to the summit of Bald Mountain, 2700+ feet, looked around and thought “it’s not even worth taking a picture.” I see a glorious redwood-forested vista every weekend… this time it didn’t seem that glorious.

It might have been due to the heat. Most of the ascent was exposed; we’d come up on a paved fire road in the mid-day sun. Also, the summit was crowded with more people than I prefer. I was feeling grumpy.

My malaise may have been due to the fact that we’d spent the entire climb bathed in microwave radiation from this antenna array on Red Mountain.

The Bald Mountain climb rises ~2100 feet over 2.8 miles, which comes out to a 14% grade. It did not seem very difficult, perhaps because the (asphalt) footing was so even. But I think I’m becoming a stronger hiker, too. And I’ve learned something about my motivations — I hike faster when I see tourists ahead that need to be passed.

The park rangers have posted great signs at the summit. Each shows a panoramic reproduction of the view from that point, with arrows and names so you know what you’re looking at. The sign facing south claims it’s possible to see the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge, about 60 miles away, on a clear day. I find that to be irrationally cool. I will have to return on a less hazy day.

I realized today that I’ve begun consuming “healthy replacements” for most of the staples of the 20th century American kitchen: sugar, wheat, milk, butter, and salt. (Respectively: stevia, spelt, rice milk, Earth Balance, potassium chloride.)

Isn’t that weird? I’m having a food-pyramid moment, i.e., everything you think you know is wrong.

By the way, this Earth Balance product finally lays to rest the butter/margarine debate. It tastes more or less like butter, but contains neither saturated animal fats nor trans fats. Another way to say that: when eaten in enormous quantities, it will kill you somewhat more slowly than either butter or margarine.

(Of course, the best answer to the question “Which is safer to spread on my bread?” is “You shouldn’t eat the bread in the first place.” Take it from me — I’m a baker.)

Last Sunday, we returned to Annadel State Park to find out if we could circle Lake Ilsanjo without getting lost. Upon arrival we were pleased to find that the rangers had set out a stack of updated trail maps, diminishing the possibility of getting lost, although in general one should never underestimate my ability to misread a trail map.

Now that we have a few dozen miles of local park trails behind us, I can pass the following judgement with the authority of experience: some of the trails in Annadel really suck. The route we’ve been using is apparently a favorite destination for regional horse owners; the first hour of the hike requires careful picking through minefields of horse-bombs, by which I mean, crap, shit, dung, feces, excrement, turds, and poop. I didn’t photograph every one — I just ran out of words.

Climbing further into the park, we got away from some of the horses, but faced a new threat: mountain bikers. There has been controversy over trail usage by bikers for years; I never paid attention because the issue seemed petty and remote. But I have an opinion about it now that I’ve nearly been run off the trail by some of them.

We were hiking up a narrow trail that had turned into a slow, muddy stream by recent rains. Two bicyclists rounded a corner a hundred feet ahead. These guys were flying low, heads down, butts up in the air. They yelled out a warning (“hikers up”) to the cyclists behind, but did not slow down.

I was on the right edge of the path, trying to keep my feet out of the muck. I’d paused when I saw the bikes coming so they wouldn’t have to navigate around a moving obstacle. I guess they understood this as permission to zoom past at speed and spray mud at me. So much for standing to one side, I thought — I stepped back onto the path and continued hiking, when a third bicyclist flew past within ten inches. I wasn’t playing “chicken;” I didn’t realize that I was within a foot of having my arm broken by his handlebars. That was enough for me. I spun around and yelled at them, “You’re supposed to fucking yield!” I was ready to shove somebody’s head through their sprockets.

Bicyclists really are supposed to yield to hikers. And to horses. I bet these bike-ninja guys don’t zoom around horses; the risk of getting squashed is too great. I guess I’ll have to start carrying a big walking stick, sideways. Hmm, and if I put a shovel on one end I could solve two problems at once.

On a more positive note, the park offers awesome vistas and pastoral settings. I make no qualification there. It’s even worth the hazards of hiking in to find them.