I solved a mystery...hooray!

Hi,

So I finally figured out what that odd grinding noise was. There's this plastic plate on the underside of my car that's come loose and is scrapping the ground. Here's hoping I can find a body shop open tomorrow with enough free time to help me zip line the plate into place.

darn it!
Tom

I solved a mystery...hooray!

Hi,

So I finally figured out what that odd grinding noise was. There's this plastic plate on the underside of my car that's come loose and is scrapping the ground. Here's hoping I can find a body shop open tomorrow with enough free time to help me zip line the plate into place.

darn it!
Tom

Jungle Reading Room Reviews

Hi,

So in the past couple of weeks, I've gone through a pair of books describing two wildly different amazonian expeditions.

The first book True Hallucinations by Terence McKenna. True Hallucinations is an account of Mr. McKenna's foray into the Amazon from the Columbian side back in the early 70's. The purpose for his trip was to study how the native peoples of the area tripped out. In particular, he was trying to find out more about something call oo-ko-he, but instead they wind up taking a hell of a lot of mushrooms. His brother gets very, very high and McKenna sort of shepherds his brother in the style of a shaman's assistant.

From this experience, Terence begins formulating his grand theories of time which eventually stabilizes around the idea that history as we know it will end in 2012.

The "science" such as it is, is pure crackpot fringe stuff. It is however, particularly fun crackpottery since in order to understand where he's coming from, you have to get a bit of a contact high off of his narrative and that's quite possible. It's a very clear picture of someone deep in the throes of a hallucinogenic trip and if it weren't for the fact that you can get conned into writing reams of complete nonsense, it otherwise seems like a pretty nice place.

About 60 years before Mr. McKenna and his hippie friends went chasing dragons in the jungle, Percy Fawcett was busy turning large blank spots on the map of South America into meticulously charted areas. A tall rangy man with Victorian sensibilities, he'd made dozens of trips deep into Brazil and Bolivia. Although he had no interest in magic mushrooms, he did have an appreciation and respect for the native inhabitants and began to suspect that there was perhaps a lost city deep in the jungle with wonders and riches. He called the place "Z" and The Lost City of Z: A tale of deadly obsession in the amazon by David Grann charts Fawcett's career, his mysterious disappearance, and the many people, including the author, who have set out to find him (and many of the rescue attempts themselves went missing).

The author ranges back and forth between the chronicle of Fawcett's life and modern day explorers who've searched for him. It works pretty well to illuminate the man and the people who've been inspired to go looking for him. There's also a fair amount of detail at how the amazon and its inhabitants have been mistreated and how that has (or in some case) hasn't changed through the years. It also describes the agonizing effort required to stay alive when exploring the jungle. The accounts of insects and parasites are particularly good at satisfying one's desire to travel deep into the jungle.

At any rate, two very different books about going on a trip into the jungle and the different kinds of magical places you might hope to get to.

later
Tom

Jungle Reading Room Reviews

Hi,

So in the past couple of weeks, I've gone through a pair of books describing two wildly different amazonian expeditions.

The first book True Hallucinations by Terence McKenna. True Hallucinations is an account of Mr. McKenna's foray into the Amazon from the Columbian side back in the early 70's. The purpose for his trip was to study how the native peoples of the area tripped out. In particular, he was trying to find out more about something call oo-ko-he, but instead they wind up taking a hell of a lot of mushrooms. His brother gets very, very high and McKenna sort of shepherds his brother in the style of a shaman's assistant.

From this experience, Terence begins formulating his grand theories of time which eventually stabilizes around the idea that history as we know it will end in 2012.

The "science" such as it is, is pure crackpot fringe stuff. It is however, particularly fun crackpottery since in order to understand where he's coming from, you have to get a bit of a contact high off of his narrative and that's quite possible. It's a very clear picture of someone deep in the throes of a hallucinogenic trip and if it weren't for the fact that you can get conned into writing reams of complete nonsense, it otherwise seems like a pretty nice place.

About 60 years before Mr. McKenna and his hippie friends went chasing dragons in the jungle, Percy Fawcett was busy turning large blank spots on the map of South America into meticulously charted areas. A tall rangy man with Victorian sensibilities, he'd made dozens of trips deep into Brazil and Bolivia. Although he had no interest in magic mushrooms, he did have an appreciation and respect for the native inhabitants and began to suspect that there was perhaps a lost city deep in the jungle with wonders and riches. He called the place "Z" and The Lost City of Z: A tale of deadly obsession in the amazon by David Grann charts Fawcett's career, his mysterious disappearance, and the many people, including the author, who have set out to find him (and many of the rescue attempts themselves went missing).

The author ranges back and forth between the chronicle of Fawcett's life and modern day explorers who've searched for him. It works pretty well to illuminate the man and the people who've been inspired to go looking for him. There's also a fair amount of detail at how the amazon and its inhabitants have been mistreated and how that has (or in some case) hasn't changed through the years. It also describes the agonizing effort required to stay alive when exploring the jungle. The accounts of insects and parasites are particularly good at satisfying one's desire to travel deep into the jungle.

At any rate, two very different books about going on a trip into the jungle and the different kinds of magical places you might hope to get to.

later
Tom