JayB

You can be in love without being a doormat. Pussy-whipped equals a doormat in love.

"I posted on cc.com at a cafe with 3 armed guards out front as well as an impromptu goat slaughter market and a nasty case of the runs back in January." Someone's been all the way out there and heard the siren's song of civiliation. The Call of the Mild. ....... I feel it every time I'm particularly uncomfortable in the woods, and don't take my access to world class healthcare, soft-bed, running water, and warm apartment for granted for *AT LEAST* 13.4 hours afterwards...

"Germany Cracks Down on Forced Marriages By KIRSTEN GRIESHABER, Associated Press Writer Monday, October 29, 2007 (10-29) 11:46 PDT BERLIN, Germany (AP) -- Chancellor Angela Merkel has joined a growing movement to criminalize forced marriages in Germany, which is growing less tolerant of practices among Muslim immigrants that clash with the nation's liberal social values." Kumbayah, my Lord.....

Yet here you sit. Too bad you weren't there when the locals got a load of the starry-eyed young man who went off to live unarmed, in a tent, amidst the polar bears....

I'm not sure that the person responsible for either work actually envisioned the person at the center of their stories as some kind of a Rousseau/Kerouac hybrid that would serve as a vehicle for such a tired and played narrative that's been recycled continuously since the enlightenment, and I'd wager that societies constituted of people who had much more direct and intimate contact with nature on a daily basis would be far less charitable in their estimation of either person. It's only because civilization has managed to render either starvation, being eaten by large animals, freezing to death, or the gazillion other ways that nature can fuck you up and finish you off with a sublime indifference that anyone can afford to romanticize the pathologies of either McCandless or the Grizzly Man.

How do you feel about beaches? Better keep a safe distance from the shore anywhere in Australia or Euroland in the summer...

Many laps on Fall Creek... One of the few places I'll miss...

Hate the city/team/fans. Bummer.

Late-fall early spring is prime time for kayaking. Diversify the recreational pursuits and take advantage of all phases of the hydrological cycle... If not kayaking, then Tieton, Tieton, Tieton...

From what I've heard, Bozeman's generally a tough place to make a living, but since you are in a profession that you can take pretty much anywhere, this might not be so much of a concern for you. I actually think that when you look at all of your factors, Seattle scores pretty well. Colorado was pretty sweet for pure rock climbing, and is a great place to live if you're into the outdoors, and I miss CO a lot when I'm not there, especially the Platte - but I still give the edge to Seattle/WA in terms of across-the-board appeal.

If you are worried about ingesting compounds that mimic estrogen, I suggest that you lay off of soy, flaxseed, and other staples of the right-wing diet...

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, MCS, Fibromyalgia, and The Vapors round out the list.

Is that a special format? .mp4, .mov?

I had a rude awakening myself, but it occurred between the ages of 12-16. I remember it being kind of a shock that no one cared about how I was feeling, what kind of a day I was having, or what I'd rather be doing - all that they wanted was for me to STFU and get the job done, end of story.

Nope. Looked all over the place for freeware before giving up and spending the dough. If you can figure out how to upload the files to a file sharing service, and send me your account info, I could probably convert them for you and send them back over the said service. You'd probably have to figure out how to break your files into 100mB chunks in order for that to work, though.

Digital Media Converter. Use it all the time for converting between formats. http://www.deskshare.com/dmc.aspx

www.mint.com I have to confess that I've never had the discipline necessary to keep all of the receipts for every purchase and plug them into Quicken/Money/Etc in order to track my/our spending, so this site seemed kind of like mana from heaven. Great tool for anyone that wants to automate these functions, IMO.

Count yourself lucky if this is foremost amongst your worries in life, or if it's the trace quantities of BPA leeching out of plastic containers that does you in.

That's sweet Carl, but I don't think he'll need it with all of the job-offers that come flooding in amongst the letters of praise and encouragement that are sure to materialize in response to this column. I mean, the kid's right in the heart of the New York rust-belt, where no one has had to contend with hard times or make any adjustments in the face of adversity, so I'm confident that the sympathy that the readership feels with him on account of his plight will be both vast and profound.

I'm sure that he has a paypal account that you can contribute to if you feel so moved, Carl.

Ellensburg. Nothing's right next to town, but there's quite a bit of stuff 1-2 hours away, and the cost of living/job-prospects/etc are probably better than most resort towns.

"Desperate times called for desperate measures, and I had no intention of living in a society that was as unfair as this one. To seek a haven devoid of the ruthless 9-to-5 ebb and flow of contemporary America, I moved to Alaska." I hear that Sean Penn has optioned the rights to his story.

nice catch! The irony is so perfect it makes me wonder if this "letter" is in fact a troll (better check snopes.com) http://www.buffalonews.com/opinion/myview/story/191803.html

C'mom, they're busy educating themselves while the folks you are talking about are wasting all of their time studying.

You aren't spending more on groceries? The Phinney-downtown-Capitol Hill and back circuit seemed to require at least a meal's worth of energy every day, and that was about the cost of the gas it would take to go to and fro, so for me it was a wash on a day to day basis. Did spare wear-and-tear on the vehicle, parking fees, etc.