Mudder

About seven years ago I had a job where I drove several times a day past a dirt Motocross track built into the side of a hill. There were the usual Moto track rutted turns, low spots, steep banks, and abrupt mounds where the riders could catch air, and this track was built alongside a freeway. Every weekend in the summer riders would converge on this rural location and compete, which was entertainment for the bored freeway drivers, you bet. 
But then early on one summer weekend day I saw something else. A horde of dirt-covered people were running along the motocross track! WTF? So I checked it out, later, on the internet. They were doing a thing called a 'Mudder'. 
What a Mudder is is basically like signing up for a day of hardcore boot camp. With a bunch of other contestants you run an obstacle course and yes, some of the obstacles are the sort of thing you have to get through that will get you very muddy in the process. This is apparently great fun, becoming physically and mentally tormented for a day.
Right off I could see that this was only something that people that worked in offices would do, because believe me, the average Joe what holds a day job ain't no way gonna exert himself in no mud pit on the weekend. He'll be on the sofa watching the game(s) with a bowl of high calorie, high fat feed close by. In his hand will be a bottle of suds, and many more of those will be in the coolerator. 
Gotta rest up for the week ahead! 
But no, such is not the case for those that hold office jobs. These are the ones that you see getting in their early morning jogs, bicycling to work, hitting the gym after work, and competing in Mudders and marathons on weekends. 
I've never ever held an office job, my constitution is totally incompatible with being confined in a building throughout the week, but there are plenty of people that gravitate to such environs so there is a huge market for these Mudder-type events. 

“What are these people doing on my track?!”

Koen Van Ginkel- Unsplash.com

"Rah!" goes the Mudder cry, and they're off! Bounding up the muddy track, climbing up and over the rope/wall, dunking themselves in the ice pond, dodging their way through the maze of hanging wires that give them electric shocks, traversing the monkey bar obstacle, the bars slicked with butter and grease, trying to get up and over the similarly greased half pipe obstacle, etc., etc., all of this an improvement on boot camp!
Competing in a Mudder is also a teamwork event. The participants are encouraged to help each other along the way and so yes, doing that sort of thing is always boss-approved and so doing a Mudder may even be a company sponsored activity. A perk! (Just alla you come back to work on Monday in one piece, okay?)

  Well, seems this Mudder idea has taken off and of course with that has emerged sponsorship, prize money, TV, and the inevitable stars of the 'sport', strapping lads and sinewy lasses making money by working the circuit. 

Surviving a Mudder course is touted as being invigorating in the extreme. You really haven't lived until you've crossed this off your 'must do' list. 
Okay. All right. Say what you will you ain't getting this hombre far away from the sofa on a Saturday (or on a Sunday). That's what weekends used to be about, before two guys, one a former counter-terrorism expert, the other a former corporate lawyer (think 'office job') came up with this crazy 'Let's sell agony (boot camp) as fun’ idea. 
But I can't say it doesn’t look like extreme fun, I can't deny that. Running wild in the woods like a ten year old kind of fun. Were I in my twenties with energy to burn, and there were some hot babes around as fellow competitors, I might give participating in a Mudder a go one weekend- maybe. 

What I do know for sure is this- if I had to sit at a desk all day and take my breaks near some coffee setup/water cooler, I'd be praying for Saturday's Mudder to come so I could burn off the calories I'd been accruing from eating all those doughnuts in the breakroom. 

It'd also give me something to talk about around the water cooler come Monday.

The Great British Bake Off

Is a TV show about baking and thank God it’s set in Britain, the land of impeccable standards. Maybe not in everything, but they do know how to set an example. This show is tailor-made for furthering the education of unpolished wannabe bakers and I've seen many episodes by now.
Apprentice bakers vie for the title of 'Best Baker' in this show. They are tasked with creating all manner of baked goods, many of which I didn't even know existed. They're given the ingredients, the tools, and a set amount of time in which to do this, and none of these apprentice bakers are ordinary people off the street. They are vetted somewhat, I don't know how extensively, but enough so that they can compete with others at a high level of baking skill.

In the spirit of Fall and upcoming Halloween, pumpkin scones.

Priscilla Du Perez- Unsplash.com

Every measurement they make is foreign to me, they measure in millimeters and liters, grams instead of ounces, they use scales instead of measuring cups a lot of the time, the vernacular is different and the ingredients are mainly the same though in the ingredient department there exist variations of what Americans might know of as 'flour' and 'yeast'  and fillings and icings, etc. But hey, close enough. 
  The camera follows them all through their 'bake' and records their wrestling with and fretting over their creations and then 'Ding!' the timer signals them to stop doing any more work on their bake and for the judges to appear.
One by one the bakers come forward and hand off their bakes to the two judges, or all the bakes are lined up on a table to be blindly tested by the judges. One judge is a guy named Paul who knows how to bake so well he is considered a master baker, and the other is an elderly but spry and witty woman named Mary, who knows what a properly baked item should look like, taste like, crumble like, etc.
Again, thank you Brits for doing this because I too know what a proper scone should taste like and crumble like and the variation I experience in store-bought baked goods is huge. Cornbread should be dry-ish and crumbly, not sweet with bits of orange (?) in it, scones should be super dry and crisp on the outside, never should they be soft inside or out, and biscuits should be hefty, with a crunchy crust and a flaky, buttery interior. Everything should be baked thoroughly- never any “Hello, what’s this?!” undercooked interior portions (or the putting of lemon zest in Almond Poppyseed Muffin batter!).
Same with donuts, pies, cookies, cake, the list goes on. There's a lot to be said for experimentation, it is necessary to expand the boundaries of possible creations that flour, eggs, sugar, butter, salt, yeast, fillings, and toppings can produce. Yea for that. What a happy accident donuts must have been! But- standards are necessary too because without those donuts become scones become biscuits and nary should those definitive lines be crossed. Not on my watch! (or Paul & Mary's either!)
So go ahead, Brits. More episodes please. Show the semi-civilized bakers out there what passes for acceptable. I want to see Mary inspecting the interior of those cinnamon loaves for flaws, and I want Paul giving feedback on crunch. 
Proper good this is, and well done!

In The Dark

They are in the dark on this. Let's keep them in the dark on this. What is our cover story? We have to put a positive spin on this. I want everybody in this office on message. Now let's get out there and inspire the troops. Who's our point man on this? I don't want anybody breaking rank. Solid wall of denial. Counterattack with reverse psychology. Misdirect. Paint the other side as the instigators. Vehemently deny assertions of misconduct. Establish plausible deniability. Keep 'em guessing. That was the way my predecessor did it. I did not know that was going on within my department. Rogue elements. Apologize profusely if caught. Claim it was an error in judgement and vow to move forward differently than before. Claim that you did not know about it, even if it was very, very close to you. Meet in secret. Push through legislation. Downplay the opposition. Smirk. Laugh. Ask for absolution from the church. Be forgiven. Entrust the process to your acolyte. Step down, be pushed aside, be forced out, accept a lesser role within the organization. Return to public life. Have your lawyer appear to be outraged, claiming that his client will be absolved of all these nonsensical allegations. 

Never ends. The avoiding and evading.

(On cell, inside limo) “Who’s in the loop on this one?”

Andre Benz- Unsplash.com

The more I observe the behaviour of politicians and our two political parties the more I start to see that they really represent two ordinary factions, the ones that this country and all others are built upon, which is ages old. Management vs. employees. 
Managers claim to promote jobs but will never work at one. They espouse the nobility of work but will always be the ones leaning on the golden shovels at the groundbreaking ceremony and will disappear until reappearing at the ribbon cutting ceremony. No way are they going to get their hands dirty, strain their backs, or work a shift. That is for the lesser people, the ones other than management. 
  Now managers are necessary in a properly functioning society, somebody has to oversee the process, the operation, the system, the event, in order for it to run smoothly for decisions have to be made. People have to be in a position to make decisions because if things are left to a committee forget about anything getting done in a timely manner. 
    But, managers, being close to the decision making process, have temptation after temptation thrown at them. They have foreknowledge aplenty, which can be used for personal gain. They can get in on the ground floor and set themselves up in the catbird seat quite easily, the only thing standing in their way being pushover things like morals and ethics which they claim to have but (look to what was written above) as to how they handle that. 
'Watchdogs' are touted as countermeasures put in place to curb appetites and ‘ethics councils’ are sometimes present to oversee things but really, in the present political climate, what a joke. 

So, expect more of the same from the same public figures, some of whom claim to have God on their side. Well, if GOD can't fix this, what can ordinary mortals do? seems to be the issue facing us 'employees'. More like God Help Us. 
But methinks the present-day brash behavior is actually the end of a long lifting and peering under the rug period, where We The People are witness to what's been lurking there all along. So let it all hang out, governors, managers, go hog wild! Disgust the populace so much that accountability will be demanded by the employees because nobody is going to buy your multitudinous excuses anymore and those precious votes you need won't be granted at any price.

Cure All

       I have discovered, to my delight and dismay, that there is a substance in the world with amazing magical properties. This substance isn't found everywhere, only in certain places. With it you wield the greatest power. Without it you are as nothing. 
      Those given this power are ordinary mortals, just like you, who seem to be just like you, but once they have this substance in their possession they are changed by it. Nothing is ever enough for them once they have it, and nary will they give up a dram of it to those in need. Beyond all comprehension they act as despots, rulers without mercy, employing their new-found power to satisfy every desire it can possibly fulfill. 
      Those without this magical substance are ones bereft, shivering in dark places, relegated to dank environs, and looked upon with pity. To these afflicted the rest of the world is mainly unaware (and thus unable) to come to their aid. The local governors, those who are aware and in position to render aid, gaze with unflinching eye upon the distress of the afflicted for the governors only employ this magical substance to achieve their objectives. They do not themselves possess it, but give it to others, bestow it upon them, as reward. These boons, granted, are highly prized. The governor's blessing "Do what thou will with it!" is then given the fortunate whilst those lacking the substance are treated by the same governing forces with a disdain bordering on villainous and unchristrian. How can such a thing be?

The churlish look you get when you ask a favor

Rod Long- Unsplash.com

 "Is it not unfair that ones should have so much, and others so little?!” beseech the greatly displeased. “After all, are not people equal in the eyes of God?".
      "No!" say they, the possessors of the alchemical elixir. "'Tis fair that we have a greater quantity, for we are special! Different. Above and beyond the rest. No one can save you". 
      "But you can!” plead the lesser-than. "You, who have this astonishing potion, can show us mercy!"
"Nay!" say they, and the door slams shut. 
  Decades of this unfair and unethical treatment can pass, the powerful growing ever the more, the wretched slowly accruing, but never will they be able to match the power of those above them, who lord over them still (and undoubtedly will) until the bitter end. 
  No misery is greater than this, no offense more grievous, no chance at respite more hopeless, no cruelty more pronounced. 
  Those that have the fairy dust would argue that it is not so, things are not as bad as they seem. They downplay the impoverished one's suffering and ofttimes jest about it, telling them that they once knew of the astounding bleakness they're experiencing, the lack, the lesser chance at life, and survived it. 
    "But (if you ever did) that was so long ago!" howl the afflicted. "You, who claim to understand suffering, bring to us ever the more of it! We are not blind to your smirking at our travail, passing us by with thinly-veiled aversion, treating us with condescending air, and overall despising our very presence as if we were lepers. You once had no Golden Ticket! You once knew of pain! How can you be so heartless, so desensitized, so monstrous? So... ....inhumane?!”
    "We hear you not. Go away!”
    And again, the door slams. 
    Muttering, the disenfranchised shuffle away, only to dream, to scheme, to plot, to hope, to wonder when, or if ever, enough of the wondrous, strategic, and fabulously potent resource that the exalted have will come their way. Glorious, it’ll be, that day when they’ll see bright daylight again! On that day where they'll walk proud amongst their fellow men, heads held high and with confident hearty laughter, be enjoying life again!
  But alas, alas! 'Tis not yet!

Another night shift looms. Another night to only fantasize-

       -about having SENIORITY.

Ratt Rod

    I spent some time living in a medium-sized but rather vanilla Colorado town and there was this guy.
I used to see him here and there, because my job had me driving around town a lot. I'd be waiting three deep to make a left turn at the speed camera controlled intersection, or driving along any of a number of busy arterial drags that fed traffic to the freeway, and spot him. And he was always easy to spot. 
His vehicle of choice was a slightly lowered, apocalyptic-looking, yellowish/rust-orange colored mini truck that had sort of warrior-themed, black stenciled skull on the driver's door. A hint of a powerful engine peeked out above the hood and if you were within a few cars of the thing you could hear it rumbling. 
The driver looked like D-Day from Animal House, with his slight snarl, wrap around shades, and dark, thinning, slightly greasy hair. 
Nearly every other car in town was stock, right off the factory floor, accessorized but not modified, climate controlled, emission compliant, whisper quiet, and boring. 
D-day's snarl probably was one of contempt for people driving company vehicles and ordinary commuter cars because the souped-up mini truck he was driving had to be serious fun. Cops didn't see it that way, oh no, they wanted to be the only ones in town driving the performance cars, tearing off down the road in pursuit, which they had a license to do, but there were times I wondered what their hustling was all about because I couldn't see any reason they were driving so fast. Maybe it was the end of the shift and they were racing back to the yard to park it or they were bored and it was time for a little driving excitement. 
Something I and the masses were never allowed to have. 

License and Registration not required!

Koen Van Ginkel- Unsplash.com

There was a passenger in town I picked up once that told me that he had twelve points taken off his license because some cop said he had pulled away after the light turned green ‘as if he was racing’. Twelve points! He showed me the ticket- 'Intention To Race' was written on it. Said he was going to fight it in court. Twelve points on your driving record in Colorado was four points more than getting caught for drunk driving! I thought this way over the top unjustified.

Motorcycle cops with their radar guns lurked at the trouble spots in town, places I knew about, this simply due to plying every damn street in town over and over, so I knew to look out for them, and then these speed trap/speed camera vans started showing up and driving became about as fun as if the damn driving instructor at the DMV was sitting beside me at all times. 
Not that I (or most of the people in town) was a speeder, drove erratically, was prone to fits of road rage, or was in any other way a menace to other drivers or pedestrians but the overwhelming and constant police presence the local governing body was financing (the police department was one of the biggest and newest government buildings in town) highly suggested that left to ourselves, the streets would become drag strips filled with drunks, road ragers, and other such out of control menaces to society.
So it was a relief to see D-day bucking the trend. Every time I saw the guy he reminded me that driving- and especially commuting- used to be fun. Cars were never meant to be the cookie-cutter, closed cockpit, sensory deprivation chambers that they unarguably have become. Cars are machines built to serve humanity and machines that serve mankind have personalities. 
Now I know a lot of people don't believe this, but cars, like everything else, have consciousness. Not the same that people have, but they do. Ask anybody that drives for a living. Like your car, it'll like you back. Appreciate your car and it'll like you back more. And nobody appreciates cars more than car enthusiasts. 

I’ll be taking the yellow one home

Marc Kleen- Unsplash.com

So there's a bonding there. You're one with the vehicle. It knows you and you it. Let that fresh air come in! Feel the rumble of the engine! Know how she handles, how she responds to the throttle, how the tires bite on the curves. Pilots know planes, captains know ships, engineers know trains, and real drivers know cars. 
Car designers have gotten away from that. Cars used to be hand made, not made like toasters. Oh, I'm straying here..... 

Dig- there is a show on Netlix right now called Gotham Garage. If you wanna see how it's done, how driving can be made fun again, that's the show to watch. Whatever this team builds for their customers is guaranteed to be the only one of its kind in town. Fun to drive? No question. Headturner? You bet.
So it is possible to reverse the unfun car trend. Getting from point A. to point B. doesn't have to be as boring as sitting in a laundromat and maybe by making driving fun again people won't be in such a hurry to get from here to there, which they are now, because the cars they're driving aren't fun to drive!
D-day understood this sort of reasoning. Speed cameras, motorcycle cops, and speed camera vans be damned, he was gonna drive his ratt rod anyway and enjoy his time behind the wheel.

Top 100

   Got on the ol' internet last night and explored the musical offerings. "Why not see what's out there?" I asked myself. "It's been awhile".
    Settled on a 'Billboard Top 100' songs (of 2018) You Tube playlist. Now whether this was the actual list compiled by Billboard magazine or something that a guy put together in his garage and posted on You Tube was questionable. You can't be sure anymore and it looked legit so what the heck I dived in. 
    Well......
    Somebody thought these were the top 100 songs but it certainly wasn't me. I was astounded at how utterly bland and repetitious just ten of them were and dreaded listening further. I tried to imagine myself duty-bound, like a guy sentenced to community service or something, in order to muster up the will to push through to the end but I could not find it in me to try and go all the way. 
   The first ten I viewed featured the likes of Drake, Ariana Grande, and some others who I can't remember the names of. Please don't think I'm some old fogey dissin' modern day music and pining for the old days because, brother, music is either listenable or it's not. Visual video fluff might dazzle you, and slick instrumental and voice (re)production might be a sign o' the times, but as far as bein' ear candy, this stuff is not. 
      I wanna plead with the young people that they're being duped and to turn away from this, because most of it is junk. But what the hell do I know? You oughta see the views these videos are compiling!

Now I know the 'artists' out there don't want to hear that their product is shoddy. They probably could care less because they're makin' bank on their ‘music’ and just like at any business, whether they put out good product or not, as long as people keep buying the stuff they'll make more of it. The music industry used to have quality control but man, those days are gone and now the masses are being fed some serious cattle fodder. 
There's good stuff out there somewhere but it's daunting to have to plow through tons of material to find it. A lot of the videos I watched and listened to had handsome lads and lithe ladies, the men were smooth crooners and the women songbirds, Ariana Grande seemed to be a nice person and Drake as well (he was handing out wads of cash in “God’s Plan”, bless him for that), but if I was blind and just listening to this I would be suffering. Young uns', it wasn't always this way!
There used to be mainly good stuff out there as a rule, and the bad stuff was kept on a shelf a fair distance away away from whatever device might be able to broadcast it. Safeguards were in place. They called that shelved kind of music 'B sides' and late night DJ's would only play it at two or three a.m.. 
Why did they do that? Advertisers! Audience! People listened to the radio because that's where the music came from and if it wasn't good, they'd turn to the next station or turn the damn thing off. But the system doesn't work like that anymore. You are now the filter, saddled with that onerous role, one in which you are asked to give the artist a thumbs up or down, a ranking, a 'like', or to subscribe to their feed, and man, that is work! Who wants to work at listening to music?

To be fair, and to silence any critics who say I haven't tried, I have tried. I've gotten on Spotify, searched You Tube, perused Pandora, and scanned the playlist of the best local (and very eclectic) radio station in town. In addition to that, I have tried in many other ways to seek out good music with the intention of restoring and refreshing my playlist but how much torment can a man stand? Song after bad song I suffered through the last time I went all the way through a top 100 list, thinking that at least ten of them might be good (I set my sights very low) and then at the end of that excruciating ordeal, none of the songs were deemed to be sufficiently satisfying enough to be worthy of being listened to again! (As far as building a playlist with marginal material, I have tried that before and have rued making that decision). Going all the way through that last ‘Top 100’ playlist and coming up dry was traumatizing and made me extraordinarily hesitant to attempt to (ha!) do what used to bring a great deal of joy to me, which was to spend hours filtering through albums and tapes and CD's.

Like a gold mine, coming across this (except for Feliciano!)

Joseph Pearson- Unsplash.com

    Maybe I just don't get it. Maybe I don't like the beat, rhythm structure, lyrics, or the voices that make up the peculiar flavor of modern music. But if that's so, how can I listen to Classical, Jazz, Funk, Rock, Pop, and Reggae stations on the radio and damn if not every song but every tenth or fifteenth song is good? 
  DJ's have saved me from having to filter, that's why! They have gone through the filtering process to the best of their ability and are presenting me with a playlist that they think is good, or good enough. It's a dirty job but somebody has to do it, they have to have a passion for music driving them because, music lover that I am, I have found that I’m just not up for that degree of sifting.  
You know, in some ways the internet has been a godsend. When it comes to doing research, finding out information on how to fix your make and model of car’s door handle, or checking out new recipes for a Keto diet, internet sites are invaluable but in other ways the portal has backslid on us and saddled us with unwanted and time consuming tasks. Seems that many times when I initiate a project on the internet and am using a new app or program that is proclaimed to be 'intuitive' and 'user friendly' it ends up being more painstaking an endeavor than building a highly detailed scale model of the H.M.S. Agincourt, complete with sails and rigging. 
   Music sifting is just one glaring example of this sort of backsliding. I'm frustrated as hell about it. But what comes to mind in dealing with this issue is an old Chinese saying:
  "Give a difficult job to a lazy man and he'll find an easier way to do it"

I’m that lazy man and I will find a way, because I can listen to my top 100 songs for only so long!

Irons In The Fire

      I like to keep a lot of things cooking. Sometimes things I don't like to keep cooking keep cooking. So I always have multiple scenarios playing out. Right now I have my job, which is a temporary one, slowly winding to its end, I'm dealing with getting rid of an old car, and for some reason I have taken up drawing pictures with pencil and have been learning about that. Plus, there are others, but that sheds light enough on the subject.

    You could call all of these scenarios dramas. Big ones, small ones, the soap opera of my life playing out.
    And then, like in all dramas, there is suspense and wonder at how things pressing will play out, when, and with who. The "Why?" question will be answered in some cases, when the drama comes to its conclusion, and in some cases, I'll never get that answer.
     It's muddy, it's incomplete a lot of times, it's life, and it's messy.
      But I love it.

     In the absence of drama there is restlessness within me. Things get too quiet, my mind is still, and I become aware of bigger questions left unanswered, questions that have always been there, hiding behind all the mundane, worldly issues that have been vying for my attention. I shall explore these deeper issues here and there in upcoming posts, that seems likely, because I like to go there a lot. But not today. I have foreshadowed the scene, in writer's terms, but as to what exactly I will be bringing up I don't yet know.

    There. That feels like what I wanted to put forth this day. Cryptic? Perhaps. The time is not yet ripe to talk about these subjects, I feel, but that could change by tomorrow. Until then, adieu!