So on my way home from work today, I wondered: do more people die on average each year trying to summit Mt. Everest, or jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge? According to 2 random websites: the Golden Gate Bridge generally averages 19 suicides per year, though the number has spiked recently. In 2006, 104 people tried to kill themselves by jumping off the bridge, but 70 of those attempts were "thwarted" and only 34 people actually succeeded. That's a lot more than usual though.
I wonder what it is now that the economy is so shitty?!
Anyway, it looks like the deaths on Everest average about 7 or 8 per year in the "Modern Times" (1973-present), out of an average of around 60 summits per year (way over 100 per year these days!). I suspect that as far as the Everest community is concerned, the use of bottled oxygen on the mountain is what separates "Modern Times" from erstwhile times.
So it's not really a contest. Probably because its REALLY EXPENSIVE to even set foot on Mt. Everest. Last week, I found out that (regrettably) it costs at least $7,300 to buy even an airplane ticket to Kathmandu. At least we can see what it looks like at the summit.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
several square miles
I took this picture (with the "widescreen" pheature of my regular ass digital camera), because I phigured that it would probably be the widest area of land that I would ever be able to phit in a photograph.
I don't think I'll ever phly in space, so I don't know how else I'd ever get above 38,000 pheet. (Not even iph I climbed Mt. Everest!)
Plano Bologna Sandwich
Until recently, I believed that somewhere between the villages of Plano, Il and Sandwich, Il was a town called "Bologna" (aka Baloney). This is because John told Eric and I that when we were little because it was a good pun on his part, but we were too young to get it. (Right? Plano Bologna Sandwich.)
Anyway, I've never ever gone out of my way to make myself a plain old baloney sandwich, because apparently it's a feature of American culture that I consider myself to be above. I am in the middle class after all har har har. When I opened my lunch bag in grade school, I found packed for me: whole wheat bread PB&J, applesauce or cottage cheese and carrots (to clean your teeth afterwards!). Brenda tried making me eat these nasty healthy fruit leathers for a while, but E-Train and I both refused so I think she gave up.
BUT, elitist as I might be, American I still am. When the Seattle Kindergarten went on field trips, the lunch ladies would pack plain old baloney sandwiches, a cookie an apple and a juice box. I would always manage to eat at least 2 or 3 baloney sandwiches, between the extra lunches and the sandwiches not eaten by their child. Guiltily, I ate them, paranoid about getting fat arms.
AND, recently we were at Robert Hines' house when the Jones Big Ass Truck Movie got a million hits, and his wonderful thoughtful wife brought down some snacks for the 8 or so boys who were in her basement drinking beer and talking fanatically about how they were going to get famous or something. She brought down some goldfish crackers, some chex mix and she brought down a tray full of bit size bologna sandwiches on white bread with plenty of mayonnaise and American cheese.
I must have eaten a whole sandwich worth.
I salute you, plain old bologna sandwich. You remind us all how hopelessly boring it is to be American, but damn are you tasty.
Anyway, I've never ever gone out of my way to make myself a plain old baloney sandwich, because apparently it's a feature of American culture that I consider myself to be above. I am in the middle class after all har har har. When I opened my lunch bag in grade school, I found packed for me: whole wheat bread PB&J, applesauce or cottage cheese and carrots (to clean your teeth afterwards!). Brenda tried making me eat these nasty healthy fruit leathers for a while, but E-Train and I both refused so I think she gave up.
BUT, elitist as I might be, American I still am. When the Seattle Kindergarten went on field trips, the lunch ladies would pack plain old baloney sandwiches, a cookie an apple and a juice box. I would always manage to eat at least 2 or 3 baloney sandwiches, between the extra lunches and the sandwiches not eaten by their child. Guiltily, I ate them, paranoid about getting fat arms.
AND, recently we were at Robert Hines' house when the Jones Big Ass Truck Movie got a million hits, and his wonderful thoughtful wife brought down some snacks for the 8 or so boys who were in her basement drinking beer and talking fanatically about how they were going to get famous or something. She brought down some goldfish crackers, some chex mix and she brought down a tray full of bit size bologna sandwiches on white bread with plenty of mayonnaise and American cheese.
I must have eaten a whole sandwich worth.
I salute you, plain old bologna sandwich. You remind us all how hopelessly boring it is to be American, but damn are you tasty.
Tuna Steak
Last night I had a dream where there was a woman who was pregnant and also dying. So I and some other, more qualified people were trying to rescue the babies inside her (there were 2).
It wasn't going so well, and when we finally pulled them out of her blood-and-gutsy abdomen, the babies were really just raw tuna steaks. I image googled "raw tuna steak" and this is pretty much exactly what it looked like.
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