Maple Hike: III

Hey, I hiked Maple a third time! 5 hrs up, 2.5 hrs down

The group this time was Alex and Eric Mageno, Eileen, Allyssa, and Tori and Taylor Strohecker (Alex's cousins from Colorado).

It was a blast as always. It was fun to get to know Tori and Taylor and hear about their super-exciting hometown. It was also fun to get to know Eric a little better. Allyssa can finally cross Maple Mountain off the list. Eileen can look up at the mountain and say, "Yeah, I climbed that thing. Piece of cake!"

The flowers were beautiful! Oh, and at the summit a plane buzzed us twice before doing a spin and flying away! It was awesome! Scott should've been there!

..and now Alex is gone away. I really wonder how Alex and I didn't hang out much until the final months before he left! He's such an outstanding man.

So, who's coming on another hike up Maple Mountain?

1/2

I said goodbye to Eric on Tuesday...







...what more was there to say?

How did we get here?

We finally found a bank that would change our euros for dollars.

Shouldn't most any bank be able to do that?

The clerk told us they don't take euro coins, "You can't exchange coins anywhere in the U.S., consider them a souvenir."

Really? Lame. Well, let's just exchange these bills then.

Then she told Evan he needed two forms of I.D.

What? Why? It makes absolutely no sense that I should need I.D. to trade money with you. If we came in with a dollar and asked you to trade us for quarters you wouldn't need I.D.

Will my German student I.D. work? No.

scheiße

But it wasn't the clerk's fault. It probably wasn't even the bank's fault. It is most likely a federal regulation to 'fight terrorism'.

"Yes, I'd like to exchange my Iranian rials for dollars, I'm shopping for an airplane --a BIG airplane...."

Really though, there is no reason for us to be so bass ackwards about things. Evan tells me that in Germany he could exchange money virtually anywhere, and he certainly didn't need bloody I.D.! Evan visited Germany,Austria, France, Switzerland, and Turkey without any trouble at all. But to get into the United States he had to empty out every single item in his luggage and send each through the metal detector one at a time. He nearly missed his flight because TSA thugs enjoy flexing their muscles and knowing nobody can do anything about it.

I'm not advocating open borders E.U.-style, I think people ought to show passports when coming into the U.S.. But the intimidation practiced by the TSA is violation of property rights and privacy under the name of 'security'. Requiring two forms of I.D. for something as simple as exchanging money is no different.

I don't know why anyone would want to come to our nation.

Maple Hike: The Sequel

Evan, Kimberly and I hiked Maple Mountain today. We went with the First Warders: John Gay, Eric Evans, and Scott Evans.

Until this week it hadn't hit home that Eric was leaving. Today felt like a farewell hike.

Of course, it was also the annual Maple Hike, which meant Jeremy should have been there. But Jeremy is in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. And soon Eric will be somewhere in Connecticut or Rhode Island (after consuming large quantities of chocolate milk in the MTC)

We made really good time today, 3:15 up and 2:00 down! The snow Alex and I encountered was almost completely gone, though we still found the ridge-line trail to be much easier than the woods.

A great hike, as always. Really, it never gets old.