Occupation of Independence

I just got back from an unusual mountain bike ride, that is, one in which I was successfully miserable. It started going downhill. Oh what a sinking feeling that is, literally and figuratively! It is so easy to dig a hole for yourself so deep that digging out of it will be pure misery. The same could be said of hiking down into a canyon at the beginning of a hike. Consider for a moment how unnatural it is: when you were a child, your mother trained you to finish off your carrots and peas first -- bleah! -- before you earned dessert. That is the feeling you get starting a mountain bike uphill. You can get so addicted to the rhythm of depleting yourself on the ascent and to the smug satisfaction of resting at a scenic high spot, before turning around and whooping it up on the descent. Now consider the opposite: descending at the beginning, and being chilly. When you turnaround now, it is later in the morning, and you are digging out of your hole in warmer air. That is just plain perv

The forests in Colorado are no longer merely worrisome. They are well on the way to complete destruction. Here's an example of what I saw near Little Texas #1: I asked the visitor's center if the Rio Grande national forest was the worst. Surprisingly he said that it was worse elsewhere. Bark beetles. Believe it or not, there is something good to talk about. I saw pickup trucks going up my road everyday to cut up and haul out a load of firewood. They are my heroes.  I asked one about the catalytic converters in the chimney of wood stoves. His experience was bad. In fact he removed it. But catalytic heaters, oxygen sensors, and computer-based control of automobile engines are pretty reliable. So why couldn't the same be true of wood stoves. (Please don't complain about the cost. Wood stove customers will squander an extra thousand dollars for a stove that is nostalgic or fashionable, so what is wrong with a few hundred dollars for something that works?) Why doe