There and Back Again, Nostalgic For Camping, Hobbits Beware of the Twin Towers

Let me start by saying that a few hours on the beach in Malibu is as much camping as I could handle anymore—however, in August. I had a wave of nostalgia for what I grew up calling camping. I flew up to Seattle for a family party. I had to laugh. As we drove out to the party there was a sign for Granite Falls. That town was on the edge of the wilderness and the North Cascade forests and mountains. As kids, our parents would stop there and get us hamburgers as a treat. Never did I ever think civilization would extend this far out.

My Brother TD and his wife Katie picked me up at the airport, and we drove to a family party in Arlington, Washington. My Brother was pointing out all the infrastructure projects along the side of the freeway. While on the freeway I was startled by the completed projects connecting on ramps and off ramps that confused us as children in the 1960's, because the over passes hung like hot wheels race tracks but disconnected all these decades later they are attached to new freeway routes. Things are looking up in the city.

My Seattle has been paved over and built up beyond recognition. After two hours of driving, I needed a rest break. It's longer than I usually travel in a day, and I had already flown from Los Angeles that morning. We turned off the highway. Our destination was finally close, and then I saw it. A sign for Granite Falls: As children, we knew you had reached bear country once you hit Granite Falls. It's a logging town we passed through as children on the way to our camping grounds. It was on the edge of the wilderness and the North Cascade forests and mountains. We would stop there and get hamburgers as a treat. Never did I ever think civilization would extend this far out.

We reached the home of my nephew's extended family. I want to thank them for hosting the family they hardly know, who I mostly know as Facebook friends. Once my parents passed, I spun off alone and missed opportunities to connect without Mom and Dad's house as a meeting place.

What I am reading this week.

Seveneves | by Neal Stepenson

This is an epic tale of survival. The Earth is heaving a sigh of relief. An Asteroid with our name on it has hit the moon instead. But the damage is inevitably coming to get us. The impact has cracked the moon into pieces that will rain down on Earth in a slow burn. Everyone is going to die. The story spans thousands of years.

Ron Howard will make a movie version, or it is in the works.

There is a plan to put some people into Orbit, avoiding the rain of death. Some other people dig down into bunkers to wait out the rock fall. Others make a play for Mars without ever having been there. This story has the most to do with the orbital folks.

As time passes, the people in Orbit appear to have created a society among the new rings around the Earth made up of the broken pieces and dust left over from our broken moon. The people are waiting for conditions on the planet Earth to stabilize before making landfall to check on habitability.

There is a SpaceX-type guy who shows up. The International Space Station becomes a lifeboat. The crew is there to make sure the seeds and genetic material survive the event so life can start again on the planet. I like that there is no supercomputer of advanced technology beyond what we have right now in the book. People cobble together whatever ICBM rockets they can to put supplies and time capsules into Orbit in the time they have left before the rock falls burn up the atmosphere.