Occupation of Independence

  What changes will occur with You Tube or with viewers' habits over time?  It is quite a guessing game.  As a viewer I am turning off channels that offer heavily accented English, tedious talking heads, interviewees that go into a 15 minutes speech, cacklers and frustrated comedians, and people who won't give a straight answer to a legitimate question.  Perhaps vaunted AI technology will someday do a better job of translating heavily accented jabbering into normal American speech. It is easy to be a critic of You Tube screw-ups, and I certainly do my share of criticizing.  But today let's praise a You Tube channel.  Anybody who has been to an animal shelter to adopt a dog knows how important it is for the dog to audition well.  Some dogs are terrible at auditioning.  They are fearful and hide at the back of their pen and do not even make eye contact or wag their tail when a prospective customer approaches.  What happens to dogs like that?  Don't ask! That is why I love

 What is your favorite landform in the Utah area?  The "monuments" (aka, buttes) of Monument Valley made a big impression on movie audiences in 1939 when John Ford's "Stagecoach" came along.  They have been icons ever since.  Or maybe you prefer steep canyon walls, mesa edges, hoodoos, arches, or just plain ol' mountains.  Some people go crazy over rock that is reddish. All well and all good.  But what happens when you aren't a newbie tourist anymore?  How do you maintain a long-term love affair with the landforms of Utah plateau and canyon country?  This is the time for my annual advertisement for a little book I bought years ago in the visitor center in the Escalante region.  (Kanab, UT)? Not sure where to get this book by William Lee Stokes. The trick is to stop thinking of these landforms as a static tourist postcard, and try to imagine how they formed.  For the most part, land was uplifted a long time ago because of collision between tectonic plate

 The gravel road seemed in pretty good shape.  And that made me suspicious.  I vaguely remembered some wet arroyo crossings on this road. Sure enough.  We soon came upon a wet crossing with tire ruts over a foot deep in the muck.  I stopped and walked the ruts.  They appeared to have good traction.  I got so much satisfaction at being patient with this crossing!  Why does it take so much effort for a driver to 'look before they leap?'  Of course there is a big off-road 4WD industry out there who pushes just the opposite approach: be in a hurry, be on a macho and noisy rampage, and solve your transportation problems by spending huge amounts of money. Further on, there were hopeless wet spots as suspected.  I didn't even challenge them.  Instead I used another road that resulted in one of the most satisfying bike rides in years.  It was satisfying because it was close enough to see some marvelous scenery, but not too close, where the road gets too steep and rocky. My mapping

People who are new to camping must think that coldness is the main issue with camping in winter.  But actually coldness is a secondary issue.  The real problem is short daylight hours.  Some people -- myself included -- start thinking of going to sleep when it gets dark in the evening.  Well, that is fine if you are capable of sleeping that many hours.  But most people aren't, especially older people. How do you break this habit of letting darkness lure you into going to sleep?   1.  Use lots of electrical lighting.  This is easier than it used to be, because of better batteries and LED lights. 2.  Make an effort to walk around more.  Don't just sit in a chair.  People who have larger RVs must have an easier time with this.  Van people must have a terrible time. 3.  Put on a headlamp and do chores at the tow vehicle or just outside your RV.  What about walking the dog at night?  Concern about night-time predators has kept me from this in the past.  But maybe a headlamp would fr