I May Need An Extension...

This past November I was sub 200 lbs and I predicted that by January 31st I would decide if I would be racing Clydesdale or Sport during the 2008 summer. Well, I may need an extension on that.

I'm currently more involved in my cycling than in previous years, but the time between Thanksgiving and New Years brought with it a lot of celebrating and of course the celebrating brought a lot of drinking and food, which brings me to my point. I'm no longer sub 200 lbs and I'm at a cross roads on whether I want to drop below 200 lbs this summer or not.

My reasons...

1) I'm a tall guy and I actually look pretty healthy between 200-210 lbs. I have no dreams of going pro so I'm not sure I want to starve myself to get sub 200 to compete with the little guys.

2) I've made several good friends in the Clydesdale pack and they are fast. I had a lot of fun with the competition last year.

3) I have a buddy that has just gotten back into racing after a several year hiatus. I have no doubt he'll be racing Clydesdale and I'd love to race with him this summer... Just like old times.

So...

I'm going to extend my January 31st deadline to decide if I want to keep on the weight or try to loose it. If I do a lot of riding there is a good chance I'll drop below it anyways, which means I'll need to bulk up at the gym to try to put on some extra weight. Something I'm not against doing, but the extra effort may be more than I want to commit to.

Ah, decisions, decisions. Hopefully, I'll figure it out in the next month or two. The important thing is that I'm planning on racing in 2008!

Small Details Can Make A Big Difference

I never use to be a person who was patient enough to deal with the details. When I was younger I worked construction. I was a framer because when framing the only thing I needed to worry about was the measurements. If the the wall was a quarter of an inch off or a bit out of plumb it only took a few good thwacks with the hammer and it was good.

I'm getting older and the muscle is starting to be replaced with patience. I can no longer rely on brute strength to put up the wall. Now I must plan things and focus on the details before I attempt to start putting the wall together. In doing so I've learned something; it makes the work a lot easier!

All the time I thought I was getting it done quickly by using force, but I learned with a small amount of planning I'm now able to execute a plan in a fraction of the time with half the work.

For example...

Last night I spent a negligible amount of time converting my copyright information on TrailCentral. A month into 2008 and the copyright still read 2007. I could have done the quick fix and simply changed the hard coded copyright, but then in eleven months I will need to remember to do it again. No thanks.

By simply making my copyright year a variable instead of a hard coded value I am able to save myself from the hassle of dealing with this same change next year.

It seems like such a minor detail, but I'm learning that when you are building it isn't just the functionality that makes something great, but also the peripheral details which work together to enhance the experience of the functionality through the eyes of the user.

For this reason the details should be purposeful and not overused. Otherwise, the details will overwhelm the functionality and hinder the users experience; something I plan to address this year.

"God is in the details."

~ Mies Van Der Rohe (architect)

Websites and Wine

I've gotten into the habit of working on TrailCentral while enjoying a glass of red wine. Maybe it is because both TrailCentral and red wine require enthusiasts who have good taste. Or maybe it is because TrailCentral is driving me to drink... The jury is still out on that one.

In either case, I'm looking for red wine suggestions. There are plenty of great red wines out there with a price under $20. Keeping my $20 limit in mind; I'd like to know what you would suggest?

Great Day... Broken Toe And All

I wasn't planning on riding today. I heard on the Saturday evening news that the weather was suppose to be pretty nice but windy.

I had dealt with enough wind on Saturday and figured Sunday would be a good day to do nothing.

That plan changed after I woke up this morning and the thermometer read 60 degrees with no signs of wind.

I spent the morning playing with my son and as soon as he went down for a nap I ran down the stairs. Yes, I truly ran, which is most likely why my footing slipped. When I slipped my foot landed on the next landing in an awkward position and I heard a crack from one of my toes. At first I didn't think anything of it. I continued getting ready and jumped on my bike.

The ride was awesome! I always love the short ride the day after a long ride. My legs felt great and without the wind to fight I was able to get a better reading of my cruising speed. It isn't fast, but a hell of a lot faster than it was yesterday.

I felt some discomfort in my shoe while I rode, but I figured I just popped a knuckle or something. It wasn't until I took the shoe off that I realized that it was indeed broken. Swollen with a redish, brownish, black kind of look. As I write this I look down and it isn't pretty. Whenever I walk somewhere I'm limping like I should be manning the bell towers of Notre Dame.

Let me give it one more check. Yeah, it's definitely broken... bummer.


Today's Ride:
Time: 1:18
Distance: 21.1
Elevation: 1,034'

Week Log:
Time: 7:55

Total Elevation:
4,691'

I've Become That Guy...

I've been riding the indoor trainer for the past three weeks. On Friday I looked at the weather report for this weekend and was pleased to see the warm temperatures, but knew the wind would be a factor. None the less, I got the idea on Friday that I had to ride Lookout this weekend. There was no training purpose behind it. I just got it in my head that I needed to. Once something gets in my head there is nothing I can do but submit and do as my head tells me.

The thermometer said it was in the 40s when I started my ride. However, factor in the wind, which was blowing like crazy and it felt like it was somewhere in the 30s.

The wind has been a real bear lately and and it is even getting to others who seem to love all riding conditions, like Chris. I personally hate the wind. Nothing makes me feel weaker and can break me like a little twig easier than a 45 mph head wind.

In any case, the first 17 miles of my ride was spent fighting wind; at times with a rolling speed of a mere 8 mph on the road... but as I said, little can stop me when I put a plan in motion.

When I reached the bottom of Lookout I stopped for a couple minutes and took a bite of my energy bar and relaxed a bit. At least that I what I wanted the pack of 15 road bikers to think I was doing. In reality, I just didn't want to start the climb and have those same 15 riders fly past me while I was drooling in between gasps of air. Each one greeting me with a "Hello" and forcing me to use what little oxygen I had to greet them in kind.

When I started to roll up the hill I felt pretty good. I had no expectations of my climb other than I needed to save enough energy to get my sorry ass home after the summit.

As I climbed a guy rolled past me. Soon, another rider passed by. Then another... Then it dawned on me. I've become that guy.

You know the guy. The one you lock your sights on and tell yourself "I'm going to catch that guy before a certain point." Yep, That's me. At that moment I felt like Seabiscuit*. No, not because I was a champion. I felt like that because each rider that passed was able to gain a bit more confidence at the expense of my own self esteem.

Well, when the geriatric lawyer, or doctor, or whatever the hell he was passed me on his $10,000 road bike I said to myself, "Enough is enough. Don't let him get away!" We climbed Lookout together for about 30 feet when he started to slip away. By this time I was getting hungry and I chased that guy like he was the ginger bread man and his bike was made of chocolate. I gave it a good fight, but the fact that I had previously eaten 40 other ginger bread men in December who where now attached to my ass didn't help and gravity got the best of me. I watched the old guy fade into the distance ahead of me...

At that point I learned my place on the mountain. I was Seabiscuit before he was a champion. Honestly, I'm OK with that. Back when I was hard core into riding I use to set my sights on that guy too. It's interesting being on the other side of the fence for a change.

Lookout Ride:
Time: 3:37
Distance: 46.2
Elevation: 3,657'

Week Log:
Time: 6:37

Total Elevation:
3,657'

*Do you remember the movie? If not, they describe the history of Seabiscuit and at one time the horse was used as a confidence builder for larger racing horses. They would run the horses side by side and at the end they would purposely hold back Seabiscuit so the larger horse could win and thus gain confidence.

One of these things is not like the other...

Can you guess which one of the pedals in the picture is not like the other?

hmmmmmm....

Yeah, you got it! the one on the far right has all four wings and the other three pedals only have 3 wings.

No, I'm not trying to save weight by removing one of the wings on each of my pedals. Though, I'm sure this is giving some of my riding friends a good idea on how to save a few more grams...

Fact of the matter is these pedals have fallen apart with only a few months of riding and racing. Last year I ended up buying three new pairs of Egg Beaters to get through the season, making these the biggest equipment disappointment of 2007.

The strange thing is that I'm still a big fan of the CrankBrothers Egg Beaters. I love the design, I love the weight and for these reason I'm going to continue riding the pedals even though I had such a bad run of luck with them in 2007.

Besides, I've heard pretty good things about their customer service. Since I purchased these pedals within the last six month I called CrankBrothers. They said they would fix or replace the pedals so I'm please with their customer service, so far.

Although it sucks that I went through so many pair of pedals in 2007 it is good to know that I'll have a couple extra pair to fall back on 2008 if the need arise.

Trainer Challenge

A year ago today I wrote about how I completed my indoor trainer challenge. It was an elaborate way of breaking the winter time training blues. I opted to ride my trainer in the pitch dark with no clock for a minimum of 90 minutes. If I checked the clock before the 90 minutes was complete I would penalize myself with more time on the trainer. Full details about my challenge and why I did it can be read here.

Well, I have been completely outdone. A year after I posted my own indoor challenge I catch wind of a rider far crazier than I was. He may not have been riding in the dark, but he rode his new rollers for 100 miles! It is a great write-up and worth reading.

That got me thinking... I was planning on doing a century before the end of February. I could do it on my rollers... Maybe in the dark??? Yeah, right! The hundred miles... maybe. In the dark... I'm not that crazy!

We'll see what the next few weeks bring.

Trail Pages Get Right To The Point.

This last week I've been working on new functionality for the trail pages which will show point-to-point driving directions for most trails in the trail directory.

Previously, if there were trail head coordinates a form would be available on the trail page where a user could enter a starting address. Upon submission of the starting address I would redirect the user to Google Maps where driving directions were available.

Now, thanks to the Google Maps API team, I'm able to display those same directions on TrailCentral.com.

Let me break down the new functionality with the following example:

1) A user visits the White Ranch trail page. White Ranch is near Golden, CO. When they look at the driving directions they will now see two new links.

2) The first link will default to the nearest city to the trail. In this case it is Golden, CO. When the user clicks the link the page expands and shows both a map and driving directions from the center of Golden, CO to the White Ranch trail head.


3) Well, if the user is driving from Boulder, CO that isn't much help, which is why the user can then click the "Change Start" link. A form is then displayed for the user. Here they can choose to cancel or update their starting location.

4) If the user enters "Boulder, CO" and clicks the "Update Starting Location" button the page is reloaded and they are again able to choose between updating their starting location or showing driving directions to White Ranch from Boulder, CO.

5) When the user clicks on the link to get directions from Boulder, CO to White Ranch in Golden, CO the map and driving directions are again displayed. This time from Boulder, CO.

The cool thing about updating a starting location is that the new location is stored as a cookie and is now the default starting location whenever the user loads a trail page that offers point-to-point directions.

6) Sometimes the user may be on a public machine and does not want their starting location stored in a cookie. In that case, they can simply click the "Forget Start" link. This will destroy the cookie and once again the default start location will be the nearest city to the trail.

It is as simple as that. In hindsight I did the best I could when writing the original directions, but even I get confused with my directions when looking at them months or even years later. This new functionality will eliminate that confusion for me and others since precise directions from any location you specify to the trail head will now be available.

I hope you will enjoy this new functionality as much as I do.

If you are interested, go ahead and give it a try by visiting the White Ranch trail page.

Finally Using The Feedback Scale

I've had a Feedback scale sitting in my office for the last year. To be honest, I never found a need for it. I'm not a weight weenie. I'm not the type that will spend a bunch of money to save a gram. I figure, I'm a guy of over 200 lbs; who am I to put judgment upon my bicycle and try to cut weight from it when I could stand to loose 15 lbs...

These last couple weeks I've been putting a lot of time into my basement to get a spot set up to work on my bikes. I now have an area to work on my bikes and hanging from my ceiling is the Feedback scale that had been sitting in my office for so long.

The first thing I weighed was my mountain bike wheel set. I nearly shit myself when I saw how heavy my wheels are. That started the landslide and soon I was weighing everything... including the amount of mud I scraped of my single speed bike.

This thing is addictive and thankfully I'm thus far keeping my senses about me. I have no doubt that bike weight will become a more conscious part of my maintenance, but the focus is still on losing the weight on me before becoming too obsessed with what the bike scale says about my bike.

Sort Added To County Trail List

This past week I've added a rather simple, but much needed addition. Each county page (ex. Boulder County) in the trail section shows all the trails that are available. In the past the list of trails was not dynamic and the trails were sorted by Trail Type, City, then Trail Name.

Now the visitor is able to select what column they would like to sort by. The list will default to the previous sort, but now visitors will see links in the upper right hand corner of the trail list. By clicking a link they will see the trail list sort in order of their selection. Trails are now able to be sorted by Trail Name or City or Difficulty or Rank.

For instance:
If a user clicks 'Rank' the trail list will re-sort the trail list by rank from lowest to highest. If they click the 'Rank' link a second time the trail list will re-sort by rank from highest to lowest. In the upper left corner users will see the current sort that is being displayed.

I think this makes for a more interesting glance at the county trails and will help visitors locate trails quicker as well as offers a quick glance at how visitors have ranked the trails in the county from favorite to least favorite.

I got new shocks!

For those cyclists that read this blog the first thing you probably thought of was some tricked out pair of shocks for my mountain bike. I'm sorry to say, those are not the kind of shocks I purchased.

My upcoming weekend will bring with it the opportunity to give my truck some much needed attention. I purchased new shocks for my truck and those are the shocks I referred to in the title.

I don't know if you are like me when it comes to spending money, but a lot of times when I spend it on non bike related stuff I think about what I could have purchased for my bike with that same money. It is even harder when the non-bike related item has the same name and function as a part on my bike that desperately needs attention. I really need to rebuild the front shock on my mtb, but believe it or not, the shocks on my truck were a higher priority. Bummer...

In any case, I'm looking forward to the smooth ride! Even if it is in my truck instead of on my bike.

Scope Creep... It Happens To Us All

What the hell is scope creep, you ask? In the IT world it is used to describe the features and functionality that hangs on the fringe of requirements. It isn't a phrase that is used a lot when the project is on target, but when there is a risk of missing the deadline this phrase is tossed around a lot!

Basic requirements are necessary for any developer/tester to get an idea of the scope. Those requirements are what ground development because there will always be something cool to develop or a new feature that can be added. These requirements, which should be derived by a business need is what allows us to understand the needs of the business and satisfy their request. It also helps when there is a need to estimate the amount of time it will take to finish a project.

It seems simple enough, but when the basic requirements are missing or vague it becomes very easy for the scope of a project to loose focus. Without requirements the developer is free to code whatever they like, the tester doesn't have a clue what they should be testing, and Product keeps asking for more, which inevitably causes the project to loose scope and everyone who is a part of it to loose focus. Suddenly new functionality and enhancements are being added and so starts scope creep.

Here is a super simple look at how scope creep can be avoided from each perspective

Developers:
1) Before you code it, ask yourself, "Is this necessary to meet the requirement?"
2) Ignore the Product people buzzing in your ear about additional functionality. OK, maybe ignore is a little harsh. Entertain the idea and if it has merit, include the appropriate people to discuss it.

Testers:
1) Before you allow anything into test, require requirements!
2) The moment someone asks about adding a requirement ask yourself "Does this fit in the scope of the originally outlined project?"

Product:
1) The moment you think to yourself, "It would be nice if..." or "Can we also..."; shut up, unless you are willing to risk the project deadline not being met or are willing to trade out previously assigned and estimated functionality.

Back to the reason I originally started writing this:

Scope creep happens to all of us. Lemme give you a for instance. I recently sat down on my computer to work on a project on TrailCentral. On TrailCentral I assume the roles of Product, Developer, and Tester so you would think all three degrees of my personality would be on the same page, but you'll see that wasn't the case.

My original requirement was that I wanted to add the ability for people to sort the county trail list by name, city, difficulty, or ranking. Seems simple enough and I started to develop it. Since I recently started to program using AJAX, I decided that I would do this using AJAX. Seemed reasonable and well within the requirement so I kept on programming. Then I got an idea in my head. I thought it would be cool if visitors could use this page to get driving direction to each trail listed. Suddenly, my focus shifted and so started my scope creep.

I'm new to developing with AJAX and Javascript in general so this idea was good on paper, but I wasn't having much luck making it work. So instead of refocusing on the original requirement, I buried myself in trying to figure it out. I read all sorts of Google API documentation and read countless javascript tutorials. Two days later I continued to beat my head against the wall. Finally, the tester in me took over and I asked "Does what I'm trying to do fit the original scope of the project?" The answer was simply, "Hell no!"

So after two extra days of work I pulled all the code I was working on for the driving directions and I started testing the code I had added to allow users to sort the trail list, which was working a couple days ago with only a couple hours of work.

This is just an example of how scope creep happened to me. If it happens to me this easy when I have control of Product, Development, and Test; it is easy to understand how scope creep can work its way into projects that have multiple people working on the project.

Bicycle Tire Down-Cycling

This past racing season I rode on three different sets of tires. Each had a primary use during the season and each served their use well.

Those three sets have been sitting in a heap on my basement floor since I removed them from my wheels. They are not bad tired, but are not tires I feel comfortable racing on.

Yesterday, I got the bug to get rid of stuff that I no longer needed. The tires, which have been collecting dust in my basement, were on the top of my list.

As I picked up each tire I felt a bit of guilt throwing them away. They still had some good life in them. I tried to reason through it knowing I would never use them on my racing bike again, but I then remembered I have other bikes that could probably use them.

I never think of my other bikes when it comes to maintenance because I ride them so seldom. Besides, it is expensive enough to keep one bike in top shape; never mind three. I looked at the tread on my Surly and Specialized and noticed the amount of tread left on them would make them comparable to racing slicks. Since I had the spare tread laying around I decided to down-cycle my tires.

So began the great tire swap in my basement.

I have three mountain bikes. I have a DEAN, which is my racing bike. I have a Surly single speed and a Specialized Stump Jumper that is really old. The amount of riding time each one receives follows the same order they are listed above.

In the heap were three sets of tires that still had life. I had some commuter treads, which I put on my racing bike. I opted to do that because my road bike is currently out of commission and I plan on putting a lot of road miles on the DEAN this winter/spring. When the racing season comes I plan on buying a new set of racing treads. In the meantime, the commuters will work out well.

The Surly gets limited use, but I need a meaty set of tires for it since it is a full blooded trail bike. I have no desire to ride this bike on the road or bike path. I enjoy it for what it is and I believe this bike should live on the trail. One of the sets was bought specifically for the 24 hours of Moab. I bought a meaty tread design knowing the 24 hour course was going to be sandy. A single race later and they now look great on my single speed.

The old Specialized Stump Jumper got the set of tires I used for the Winter Park series. They got a lot of use, but they still had some good tread left and with the amount of riding the Specialized sees the tread will last a long time.

So now I still have a heap of tires in my basement, but these tires have seen their day. I still feel guilty throwing the tires in the trash; It seems so environmentally unfriendly. However, these tires have been worn to the belt and there is no bike I would down-cycle these tires to.

This new heap of old tires will be going in the trash unless someone wants to save me some guilt and knows of a place where you can recycle bicycle tires.

Into The Wild and Eddie Vedder

Last night I stopped spinning Easy Tiger by Ryan Adams and put a new CD into the player. The new CD is the soundtrack for Into The Wild featuring songs by Eddie Vedder. I'm loving it.

I really enjoyed the book, I'm loving the soundtrack, and now I'm wishing I had seen the movie. Oh well, I've watched a few trailers and now I have something to look forward to watching when the DVD comes out in March '08.

For those that haven't heard any of the CD, here is the video of my favorite song called Hard Sun.

Shining the SIDI

There is no denying that I am rough on my equipment. I ride it hard and put it away wet. The problem is that I'm not made of money so I'm not able to replace stuff as quickly as I wear it out. For this reason most of my equipment is in a fragile state of being nearly broken, but still usable.

Take my shoes for instance. I've been riding these shoes for nearly three years and have gone through four pair of pedals and the same number of cleats, but I've given these fine shoes zero attention since I purchased them.

Matter of fact, the buckle on my left shoe has been broken since mid summer. meaning I rode half of the Winter Park Series and the 24 Hours of Moab in shoes that still worked, but barely.

This evening I was pretty bored and I opted to give my shoes the attention they deserve. I got online and ordered a set of new buckles and straps. Those will be shipping shortly, but in the meantime I opted to give the old leather a nice polish.

I gotta say, once the new buckles and straps are put on the shoe it will be hard to tell that I've had these shoes for 3 years. I wish all my equipment was so easy to maintain...

Two old shoes, a can of polish, and an evening with nothing better to do.

A little elbow grease and these are already looking better.

I think I'm going to have to make this a habit.. A few more shines and I'll be styling! Look for me on the trail. I'll be the guy with the shiny shoes hauling ass down the mountain...

Thin Ice

"Three feet of ice does not result from one day of cold weather."

~Chinese Proverb

Cleaning Up Trail Pages With AJAX.

As I mentioned in a previous post; the 2008 season will be all about website usability. As a baby step I have revamped the way the user is able to post comments to trails on TrailCentral.com.

Here is a breakdown of the changes I have made to the trail pages:

• Comments are now paginated.
• Visitors are required to login before posting a trail comment.
• If the user has previously rated the trail they will be unable to rate it a second time.
• Users are able to edit comments previously submitted.

Now for a bit more detail...

Comments are paginated:

Previously, all comments were displayed when loading the screen. If their were a lot of comments the page would be pretty long. I changed it so only the 10 most recent comments are displayed when the page is first loaded. If visitors would like to see more, they simply need to select a link to the next page. The cool thing is that this doesn't require the entire screen to reload. Instead, only the section of the web page that displays comments is reloaded with the next 10 comments. This makes for a much more compact and efficient method of viewing trail comments.

Visitors are required to login before posting:

Visitors are able to view any comment in the trail directory. However, to ensure that we continue to receive the best reviews possible, I am requiring visitors to be logged in to post a comment. Once they login, they will then be able to see the form that allows them to add a comment.

If the user has previously rated the trail they will be unable to rate it a second time:

The purpose of this is simply to keep people from rating the same trail and skewing the results. Once the form is used once to submit a comment the form will not be seen again. However, some people will change their mind about a trail rating, which is why I allow comments to be updated.

Users are able to update previously submitted comments:

If a user has previously submitted a comment for a trail they are now able to update it by simply clicking on a link that appears under the comment, which is labeled "Edit My Comment." By clicking the link the comment is replaced with a form pre-populated with the previous comment (page refresh is not required). The user is able to modify any part of the comment and submit it again. The page rank is then recalculated and displayed in the comment list. The comment is updated with the current date and the next time the first page of comments is loaded, the updated comment is displayed as the first comment.

These changed have been implemented using a new method of coding that Google made popular called AJAX. This allows only certain areas of the web page to be modified without causing the entire page to reload. This makes for a much more efficient and usable means of leaving trail feedback.

I look forward to many more changes as I clean up TrailCentral using AJAX.

Usability Will Be The Focus in 2008

When you are the only person working on a website you are required to wear lots of hats (i.e. Webmaster, Product Manager, QA, Customer Service, etc.). When you wear all these hats at the same time it is very easy to get off track in terms of development.

Coding is done by the seat of your pants and what gets your precious few hours each day is usually decided by what sounds cool or what you feel like working on at that moment. This means that areas truly needing your attention can easily be overlooked. For years I've added a lot of new areas to TrailCentral, but it has come to a point where the number of hours I dedicate to the site does not allow me to properly maintain them all.

Well, in 2008, that is going to change a bit.

During the winter months I will be spending a lot of hours on TrailCentral. That time will not be dedicated to new development. Instead I'll be looking back at what I've created and work to make it better.

Making it better may come in different forms. In order to make some things better I may need to re-write the code or it may mean that I have to remove an entire section of the website. Don't worry, I won't be doing this willy-nilly, but with a close eye on usability.

For instance, when looking at TrailCentral analytics I can easily see a trend. Visitors really enjoy the trail information on TrailCentral.com. However, uploading photos does not interest them much. So my initial reaction is to spend time making my trail pages and GPS maps as usable as possible and possibly removing the photo gallery. Truth be told, I've had this goal for a while and I have already started to make changes.

I'm taking a much different approach to my development this year and I'm really looking forward to the end result. I truly think by the end of 2008 I will have a paired down version of TrailCentral, which is incredibly interesting, and more importantly; relevant and usable.

The way I figure it; I can create a good website that covers many areas or I can have a great website that focuses on a couple areas. I choose the latter and will post to this blog many of the changes you will see in the days/weeks/months to come.

Happy 2008!

What I'm Reading Now... "Into The Wild" by Jon Krakauer

Several weeks ago I started reading a book called Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer that will interest most people that pride themselves on their outdoor experience.


Based on truth, this book's central character is Christopher McCandless (a.k.a Alexander Supertramp) who for no apparent reason depletes his saving account by giving $25,000 to charity and hitchhikes his way to the Alaska wilderness, where he walked into the wilderness with nothing but a gun, a few books, and a ten pound bag of rice. Four months later he was found dead.


Chris's story was first told in an article in Outdoor Magazine, written by Jon Krakauer. This story got a record number of responses. Readers comments ranged from people who tried to defend Chris's action to others that thought he was no more than an inexperienced crack-pot who not only met his fate, but a fate he deserved.


The book traces the journey by McCandless, introduces you to the people he met along the way, and speculates on what his final months were like by piecing together events written in a journal kept by Chris. At times this book seemed to be a defense of Chris; trying to explain to readers that he was not a crack-pot, nor deserving of the fate he met. However, Chris's story was only one of several in the book.


Into The Wild included stories about the Alaska wilderness and those who have fallen victim to it. Plus, the author parallels his life to the life of Chris, which gets any reader that enjoys the outdoors to do the same.

It is suspected that one of the authors that influenced Chris's walk into the Alaska wilderness was by his favorite author, Jack London. Jack London wrote The Call Of The Wild, which was one of the books Chris took into the wilderness with him.

I must admit, while reading this book I had not yet read The Call Of The Wild , but from what I read in this book I can assume that I do not have the call to the wild that Chris obviously felt from deep within. Although I pride myself on my outdoor activity; I have no illusions that I am fit enough to depend solely on myself for survival.


Reading this book has made me curious about the ideals that were written by Jack London. My next read will be The Call Of The Wild. Hopefully, I will have a better understating of Chris's actions after reading it. However, I do not feel the understanding is necessary in order to enjoy this book and would recommend it to anyone.

Happy New Year!

As I reflected on the past year of my life before falling asleep, I came to the conclusion that 2007 was a pretty uneventful year. Don't get me wrong; that isn't a bad thing. Although it was not a year to brag about, I would rather have an uneventful year than a bad year.

So here we are in 2008. I'm almost 9 hours into it and so far it is going pretty well. I have a sneaking suspision that this trend will continue. Time will tell...

Happy New Year! The best of luck to each of you in 2008!