OK, I so I've spent the past week being unhealthfully digital, webbing an intense amount of stuff for the new DS website. Today I played a four hour chess match against Arthur Bacon, my photo prof, in which I fell from definate victory to definate defeat in one move. It was a choice between two possible moves, and I chose the wrong one. I forgot how intense Chess was.

Sooo, I hereby invite anyone who wants to to mail me a postcard to start a chess-by-mail game. We've all read about them, but I just think it would be awesome. Sure, a match could last a year. But it would be a fun way of continueally staying in touch. And chess is an excellent way to sit back and think something out with excrutiating methodology. How bout it? anyone...

no time to talk, back to work...

This is rushed, because amoung other things, I have to read th Odyssey by Monday.

Eli is cool. Eli sends mail. Eli sends long mail. Don't you want to be cool?

My philosophy on outgoing stuff. I've sent two big packages to people, which have meant a lot of effort. They have gone to (suprise) those people who took time and sent me something cool or wrote me coolness.

Now, I'll probably send out some postcards made from photo's I've taken soon, but who is going to get the next package?

I guess I'm a jerk since I'm asking people to mail me first. Deal, I'm worked off my ass and not exactly partying... so I figure I can ask people that much.

I spent most of this week securing the fencing on the bull pen. They broke out three times, including today (saturday), which meant I had to go spent 2 and a half hours when I really needed to read. And I tore my overalls. I've also been weeding the garden as we prepare to till for the winter, and worked a bit on roofing one of our larger tool sheds.

Tomorrow I'm cooking lunch with Jeff, who is currently butcher, and we're making some mean sausage.

I wrote a really cool paper this week on the elements of oral tradition in Gilgamesh.

I made a speech about the distincitions between physical isolation and emotional isolation, and the dangers of the latter.

My photography is really coming along.

On friday, after the student body meeting, we had the most extreme (from here on, X) competition ever to be had.
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The setting was a rope swing.
pivot: 27 ft
launch point: dorm roof (17 ft)
clearance: 1 ft


There was a loop for a foothold, the was a foot off the ground at the lowest point, meeting up with the roof so it was taught. (The rope had more unused slack)

And so the freestyle competion began, accompanied by Guns and Roses, Apetite for Destruction.

Dave pulls a superman, fully extended with only one hand and foot on the rope. Totally looked like he was going to fall off.

Phillupus goes for the invert, getting his legs up along the rope. awesome. Later imitated by Myer and Dave. Dave drops his had trying this, which he then manages to pick up.

Myer pulls off mad style, tweaking out the rope taught between his hand and foot (in loop) with his free foot.

Kelly gets the highest score for the night, a 9.9, with a tarzan transfer to another rope that hangs from the tree, used to climb it. Woa. Single most X move, but his other runs were pretty lame.

Etay does a "Psyco Elevator," jumping off the roof backwards, nearly losing his grip.

I toss myself into a whirlwind rotation with a 360-in. Tweak out some grabs.

Final showdown for Most X.
Dave vs. Phillipus vs. Myer.

Dave goes for the high five with Justin, who is sitting in the roof of the opposite wing of the dorm, but he's just short. (As a sidenote, dismounting onto the other roof was deemed automatic win, but nobody tried it.) Rest of ride is tainted with this failure.

Phillipus goes with no foot loop! Shear arm strength. Gets full sideways extention at the first apex, followed by amazing invert, and because his feet are free he goes into a inverted V. Looping around, he manages to get the rope as a thong, which he cartwheeled out of, landing on his feet on the grass. woa.

Myer's turn. He uses the footloop, and amidst a whole lot of tweaks and exentions, manages to pass the rope behind his back.

But Sillypus wins, crowned "most X."
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After that I watched "Endless Summer II."

Crazy stuff.

Today I spent apast half hour looking at Nathans Portland, Oregon HS yearbook that just arrived. Man was out school lame. Man was our yearbook lame. Man he graduated with an attractive bunch of females. sigh.

I'm sitting here wearing my Carhartt overalls with my hair held up by my quintessential bandana, having spent the better part of the week walking around the desert tightening barbed wire fences, memorizing epic poems, and making self-portraits with my camera. Started work on redesigning the Deep Springs website (I'm on the Communications Committee, KomKom). Spent last night in a KomKom meeting, preceded by a DS Fire and Rescue meeting. The bureaucracy that is DS has begun to flourish...heh.

The photo class is un-fucking believable. Our professor (sounds so formal and authoritarian...yuk) is the bomb-diggity. Arthur Bacon (Arty B) studied under Ansel Adams, and is just so damn beatnik, the way the class is going, I wonder if it will springboard me out of civilization and into a lifetime of photographing the world's eccentricities. like woa.

Epic Literature is amazing as well. Gary Gossen, long term social science prof. / dean, is quite the knower. He's really bringing the cultural and performance-art aspects of the genre to the table, singing Irish folk songs with his guitar. Just so cool.

Writing Composition is making sense, and is cool, and is mandatory. It doesn't exactly light my groin on fire, but it's awesome none the less. I'm procrastinating an assignment for it right now.

There's a whole lot of stuff flying through the air here. Almost as much as flying through my mind. I've put a lot of thought into balancing DS life, family life, jersey life, and Sweden life. Quite the bulbous shitload of connections, none that I can imagine losing.

I need people's mailing addresses. If you don't want to post them, email them to me: johan [at] ugander [dot] com. right. I'm sorry if I haven't replied to some of you. I will in time.

Damn this is a frustrating conundrum. I love letters, but to a certain extent I want to throw myself into Deep Springs wholeheartedly and not daddle on the outside while I'm here. But nooooo...

The big question right now is if I go to Boston during October. December break is looking like home for a week, DS for a week [to help out on the ranch...milk the cows], ski mammoth for a week with joel/dave/eli/jay/whoever else is hardcore enough. I think that will work. If I don't get dairy boy, then I guess things might change. We'll see what labor position I get. But I think I want to go to Boston...there is love there...

That said, I love you all.