Dirty Ram for attention purposes. Over the weekend I went on a mini-adventure to an area called the Mower Tract. I find the story of the place fascinating. This was my second visit there, I discovered it last year while wandering around aimlessly.

To get there, you need to drive deep into WV. Past trailer parks that even Kid Rock won't associate with. Then past a prison that is surrounded by a government run cattle farm, and next to a little league field. The ballfield is the last piece of civilization before you drive up a road with some really nice switchbacks to the top of Cheat Mountain.

After you turn off the pavement at the top of the mountain, you travel through the forest on a road that kinda seems like exactly what you expect:

You might even see a forest chicken cross the road:

Seems kinda normal. Until you come across this:

...and this:

.....and this:

At first you think that some kinda tornado came through the area, because of the way that all of the trees appear to be blown down in a strip. But that's not the case. There's bulldozer tracks:

....and then you think that this is the work of a logging company, but it isn't. The forest service did this, and they have been doing the same thing over the past 10 years in sections:

The above pic is at the "edge" of one of the sections. In the foreground is a section that was worked over in the past few years, in the back ground more recently.

The area is a former strip mine. After all of the coal was mined, the mining company bulldozed the mountain back to look kinda normal, squashed down the dirt and planted some non-native pine trees. The theory was that this would control erosion and it would look like a forest again after the trees grew in. The problem is that the soil was borked from being compacted, and the non-native trees only grew for a bit and just kinda fizzled out. Lack of water retention caused issues - The compacted soil and non-native trees don't retain enough water, causing everything to dry out too much. Thus, the area didn't turn back into a forest like it was supposed to. It ended up being more of a tundra than a forest.

The solution is to re-introduce native trees to restore the natural order. The native tree for the area is the Red Spruce. The climate of this particular mountain is one of the few in WV that the Red Spruce will actually grow in. The Red Spruce drop needles that cover the forest floor to retain water, and also grow a form of truffles that are eaten by the West Virginian Flying Squirrel, a formerly endangered and nearly extinct species:

What the forest service is doing is basically conducting mass genocide on the non-native trees, then neatly spreading their remains about. After letting them decompose for a year or two, they are then planting native Red Spruce trees.

They're also making hillside "ponds" to turn into wetlands. This one hasn't filled up yet:

This one is filled though:

Eventually, the area will have the correct trees, the correct moisture levels, a buncha pristine mountain ponds, and squirrels flying all over the place. Until then it's gonna look like a disaster zone though. Fascinating.

I really had no intentions of selling my Jeep, but given current market trends, curiosity got the better of me and I shopped it around. The process was easy, just copy-paste the VIN into the various online tools. After seeing the offers that came back, I took the highest too-good-to-be-true one and now it's gone.

The thing is, if anybody is in the market for a Jeep and can find mine, you're an absolute moron if you buy it. Not because of the options or condition, it was perfectly configured and spotless. Not because of how much I farted in it. The pleasing aroma of my exquisite flatulence has permanently permeated the plush cushion of the driver's seat. I have great farts, the best farts!

Rather, I was paid $6k more for it than it cost to buy new. That's before the dealer adds their profit margin to it. For something that's 2 model years old. If you want one, you can order one exactly the way you want and have it built in a month or two, and save several thousand $$$ in the process.

I enjoyed our time together and will have fond memories. Honestly I might order a new one for delivery in the spring. I already miss doing u-turns and how easy it was to park. However:

Car design is very much subjective, but at the same time the design spectrum usually ranges from universally attractive designs to normal looking to the odd ugly duckling. Sometimes the designs that weren't well received at launch age rather well (Bangle-butt BMWs), and sometimes they become permanent jokes (Pontiac Aztek).

Except in current times, where the industry is producing the largest collective of aesthetically bad designs in memory.

This inspiration for this is the new WRX that's hitting the media rounds today and searing retinas everywhere in the process. It looks like the designer took their inspiration by checking out all of the pickups in the parking lot at Tractor Supply, then vigorously studied the Bushwacker catalog after taking a horse-sized dose of dewormer, and this is what they shat out:

It's not just that. From elsewhere in Japan the Civic has looked a diverse range of stupid since ~2006. Its various iterations since then have taken design inspirations from things such as a spaceship, spaceship that took the short bus, poisonous toad, and what the lead character drives in tentacle themed adult entertainment. The newest version looks like a 50 yr old wearing pants from Hot Topic. The Acura counterpart adds a tramp stamp, and is so embarrassed that it has to hide its droopy rear end in press photos:

It's not just the Japanese that have missed. So have the Koreans. Such as this Hyundai, where when drawing the grille they tried to use the bucket-fill-paint option without closing in the edges and the black spilled over to the rest of the front end.... and then they just left it like that.

The British have somehow made the new Range Rover look like a Chinese copy of a Range Rover:

The Germans, who have traditionally made attractive cars have.... GAHHHH

Also, BRING ON THE FLUGGEGECHEIMEN!!!!

Even pickup trucks aren't safe. A pickup truck is super easy to design. Step one: Draw 3 boxes (front, cab, bed). Step two: Add manly grille. Done. The new Maverick gets this right. Others get it very wrong, such as...

Gas station sushi:

"We outsourced the design to the same people that handle Dell tech support. We told them to draw three boxes to make a pickup truck. Due to a language barrier they drew a triangle instead. When we tried to call back we got caught in automated-menu purgatory for hours and gave up. We're never buying anything from them again. (We'll totally buy everything from them again if they are the cheapest option)."

13 steps to nowhere!

The solution to this disturbing trend is simple: Vote with your wallet and don't buy ugly cars. Whenever people buy ugly cars it gives validation to the designers and they will continue to do more dumb stuff in the future. Do your part to prevent it!

Happy spring!

Whatever you want to call the weather pattern that happened last week, it froze some of the pipes in my house. They stayed that way until today, when it warmed up enough for them to un-thaw. However, instead of simply unthawing, they exploded and blasted water all over the goddam place. Fortunately I caught it in time to limit how much water let loose.

These are the pipes that feed the 2nd story bathroom, and I can't really tell where the breakage is, so my plan is to simply replace the entire length of pipe going down to the basement. As soon as I realized what happened, I shut off the main water line and immediately drove to the closest home improvement store, expecting a large number of others in the same position. I have emerged victorious from the crowd of dads and plumbers looking for the same things, and picked up everything needed to replace the broken pipes.

However, the problem is that I don't know where to cut a hole in my bathroom in order to access the pipes. I know the general area that they enter, but not so sure what happens after that. The toilet is the closest, and I can see the water line feeding that, so my plan is to trace backwards and start ripping & tearing until I find the source. Fingers crossed the entire bathroom doesn't need replaced once I'm done.

Ugh.

So I decided on a whim this past weekend to take a trip to the Frederick Watershed to do some bicycling. I'd been told that it was worth the trip by a few others that I've met at enduro races but never had the chance to actually go there. "If you can ride The Shed you can ride anywhere", so they said. The timing worked out that I could drive there Friday, camp out, and then ride Saturday under near-perfect weather conditions before driving back home.

In the interest of fiscal conservation I wanted to be as cheap as possible, so that meant finding a free campsite. After some searching the most convenient place would be a state forest in PA, but that didn't work out because you need apply for a free permit and those take a few days to get. So I went with the backup plan of an undisclosed location in the middle of the woods in WV. It was a little out of the way but there was nobody else around so that was pretty sweet. I also used the opportunity to test out a recently acquired teepee tent with a wood stove, which it turns out is amazing in cold weather:

Anyways I looked up the trail maps in advance and decided that if I was gonna drive all the way down there I might as well skip all of the weenie trails and go straight to the double blacks (red on the map). They're all fall-line trails on the same hill, and I looked up the steepness and the grades at the steepest parts are in the 40% range. After comparing this to some other trails that I've ridden and consider steep, this is right at the edge of my ability levels but doable, maybe.

I managed to only make two runs. The first was the Evolution trail. Everything was going great until I hit the first feature on it, a gap jump of about 10ft. Again this is something that's right at the edge of my ability levels. In hindsight I should have stopped after seeing the jump to make sure I could hit it properly. In reality I was going too slow but unwisely tried to send it anyways, only clearing about 8 ft of the 10ft gap. The end result when my front wheel jammed into the landing and came to a sudden stop was basically this:

I got launched forward and my face hit the ground first, followed by my knees. Fortunately my full-face helmet and pads did their job, but I still hit pretty hard and was a bit shaken up. Nothing broke so I kept going. I did manage to ride most of the rest of the trail. No pics of this one but I did need to skip a few parts.

The 2nd trail I did was Creampie. It was super fun at the top, a little steep and lots of rocks but surprisingly easy with a little speed. Until the last chute, which looked like this:

The camera does not do the steepness or the rockiness any justice. It was difficult to walk down. I suspect the only way to ride it is to full-send and skip over the top of the rocks, which I just did not have the confidence to do, especially with all of the leaves and after a big crash.

I did make it to the bottom though:

And did catch a sweet sunset on the drive back:

Counting the parts that I skipped on the two trails I probably only got a combined 1 1/2 runs done, but I still consider the trip a success. The challenge and the difficulty make it super rewarding, and honestly there's nothing like it on my local trails. I am definitely planning on going there again, but not until next spring when things warm up and the leaves get cleared off.

@limitedtimeonly Ask for a raise at the current company. Don't mention having another job offer, just say that you think you're worth more. If they say yes, then great. If they say no, accept the other offer and resign.

Don't get emotionally attached to a job. The proper amount of loyalty to have to your employer is zero.

With just a few simple tricks, it transforms from a girly bagged mulch mover to something much more respectable and classy.

We are currently experiencing prime Jeeping conditions. Roofs, doors, and pavement are frowned upon as a result. Other Jeeps displaying a proper degree of nudity are encouraged.

@chariotoflove

...........

@Turbineguy-Nom-de-Zoom I'm gonna use this as the topic for my next truck selfie rant video.

Daggum hippie EVs cost more just to have fake sounds and fake gear shift steps when MUH TRUCK already had that since forever and it was fine.

@HFV_Junkyardin I'm reminded of having last Monday off of work due to a guy that said, to paraphrase, "Only love can drive out hate, you can't drive out hate with more hate".

The general concept applies here.

Also, buy higher quality plain t-shirts, they look better than cheaper ones with words.

@Mr-Ontop Meh. Prices change. The same people complaining about buying just before they dropped would be celebrating if they went up by $10k.

People buying today are also possibly getting an extra tax credit that didn't exist a year ago.

Teslaa are very competitive in their price & class, even compared to gas engine'd cars. The Model 3 & Y outsold everything in their class last year, and most likely will this year now they have become more affordable. I'd still buy an Alfa instead, but I understand the Tesla appeal.

@orneryduck My personal experience is with a small (25ft) toy hauler and a diesel truck. Used about half and half for hauling a bike to trackdays / races, and standalone campground camping. Sold the trailer last year for about what I paid for it (thanks inflation!). Total miles according to my truck's trailer-mile-o-meter are about 12k. Most trips were in the long-weekend range.

Advice based on my experience:

• If you're actually planning on traveling with it and racking up miles, get a bigger truck and smaller trailer combo. The trailer weight isn't an issue, it's aerodynamics on the highway. A bigger truck will control side winds and passing tractor trailers better, a diesel will make the pulling a non issue. Fueling in truck stops is much easier than regular gas stations.

• You'll pay for RV quality on one end or the other. Cheap trailer won't last as long with more use, better built will cost 2-3x or more up front. I went low-mid grade, had a few minor issues but nothing terrible.

• Get something with a good bathroom and big water tanks. Learn to conserve water on showers and washing dishes, as that tank fills the fastest.

• State campgrounds were my favorite, that will likely be a regional thing though. Smaller trailer is key there. Rest areas weren't bad for the few times I needed to stop & sleep during a long drive.

Have you put a budget in place yet? Timeframe? RV and auto inventory levels are rising along with interest rates, which means the discounts will be coming soon.

@RacinBob

Cars to drive just because

I'd add a nekkid Jeep (no doors / roof). The newer the better. The new ones still drive crappy enough to be different than a regular car or SUV, no need to subject yourself to the extra-crappy nature of the older ones.

And a modern GTI. I don't think there's a better car for a daily driver from a combined enjoyment and practicality standpoint.

@Peter_Black said in new mini series: The motorcycles you must ride:

What do YOU guys think is a bike or style that MUST be ridden by everyone?

My top 3:

• A modern race prepped leader bike on a track (bonus points if you get to use launch control in an actual race). Why? It will reset your opinions of speed and physics.

• An old POS that is cheap and you have zero emotional attachment to on a track (SV650 with double digit owners and no title). Why? Sometimes you just need to flog something.

• A comfy touring or touring-adjacent bike wandering aimlessly through a remote area. Why? You get that kinda peaceful and relaxed high that comes from escaping reality for a bit.

@MidEngine I try to give a quick professional response to the ones that sound human and approach me like a reasonable person, and ignore the robots or blatant copy-paste spam. Pretty sure they have activity targets to meet.

I'm convinced that both HR / recruiting and sales will be better off if they de-technify and go back to making it personal. Those that resort to spam and things like pre-employment personality tests and recorded video will lose.

@Nicky-Chagrin-Janitor-of-SHIELD said in Mini rant: if you hire people make it appealing:

Weirdly, for a while my local market had a lot of recruiters who were working hotel counters or host/hostess (the person who seats you) at a restaurant 6 months earlier.

The Labor Shortage, Great Resignation, Quiet Quitting - Whatever buzzword combo you wanna call the series of events impacting the job market over the past ~2 years, it lead to companies hiring a bunch more recruiters and lowering their standards. Thus more lightly trained warm bodies rather than professionals, and all of the dumb stuff that goes with it.

I feel bad for the people that took it on as a short term career, as they are all getting whacked during the Great "Let's Wait Until January To Lay People Off So It Doesn't Look Like We're Evil For Doing It Right Before Christmas" Job Massacre.

@MidEngine The problem with recruiters is that they're all pretty much just sales people that couldn't do actual sales. My profile is set to open so I get all sorts of weird stuff that isn't remotely relevant. Last week was one for a 50% pay cut.

How to get a response:

"Hi, I'm recruiting for "..." and think you'd be a good fit. Pay range is $$$. Interested?"

That's it. Instead they send a wall of text that doesn't even get read. Or immediately ask for a resume after you respond, as if they can't see your profile, which is your resume.

@tysmagic What's the title status? Can you check the VIN and see if it's stolen?

Be realistic about what it is - You're not buying a new $20k+ leader bike here. Go for it as long as it isn't stolen, and don't get emotionally attached to it.