No, You Don't Have to Use It Just Because It Came With the Hat

That little lanyard thingy that hangs from some hats to cinch around your neck and chin?  It is called a stampede strap.  For good reason.  If you are chasing a herd of stampeding cattle and your horse is galloping along at 25 miles per hour, you are permitted to engage it.  If you are strolling along a 1 mile nature trail loop in 85 degree weather with nary a leaf rustling, you might want to tuck it up under the crown.  If you are on a bi-hull racing sailboat doing 35 miles per hour in an America's Cup qualifying run, you can use the stampede strap.  If you are cruising along in your Hyundai with the windows rolled up and the air conditioning on, it is not okay to have the stampede strap in play.

When it is picture taking time at the summit and there is no wind, lose the stampede strap.  If there are 40 mph gusts at the summit, take the hat off for the photos.  It is never okay to have the stampede strap activated during a photo shoot.  Unless it is a publicity shot for the Pony Express and you are galloping along on your mustang on the Wyoming prairie delivering letters to the homesteaders.  Rounding Cape Horn on a windjammer?  Stampede strap okay.  Rounding the 18th hole at the public links?  Not okay.

What about the brim?  Floppy brim, bad. Those Outdoor Research Goretex rain hats?  Who cares how dry your head is if you look like a dork.  If your brim is not shaped correctly with a natty curve, don't bother stopping me on the trail to ask for directions to the summit.  I will assume you are a tenderfoot and my advice will be to return to your car before you get caught in a lightening storm on the summit.  It is a well documented fact that unless it is a yarmulke, God does not appreciate lifeless headgear.  Check out your local Hasidic neighborhood on a Saturday morning if you don't believe me:

Why should our standards be any less for the trail than for the synagogue?  I don't know.  If covering ones head in the presence of a higher authority is so important why drop the pomp in the woods?  Or at the beach?  Or on the golf course?  You spend $1000.00 for a set of titanium golf clubs and then you buy a $12.00 straw hat with a bandana hatband at Target?  Not in my foursome amigo.

And the visor without a crown?  All I can say to that is, your hair may or may not grow back after they remove the melanoma from the top of your scalp.

A few more thoughts; If you must buy a hat with the strap, make sure the holes are through the headband and sides, not the brim.  Poking holes in the brim for the stampede strap is a rookie milliner mistake.   Holes in the brim of a hat are like buttons on a Goretex jacket.  The rain will get through.  Also, don't remove nor handle a good hat by the crown.  It softens it and distorts the shape.  Always handle a hat by the brim.  And if you do find yourself at the trail head with a shapeless hat and useless stampede strap there is hope as I have illustrated below:

I will leave it for you to decide who you would rather have lead your hike.

It Was Just a Joke........Not.

If the fact that Mitt Romney tortured a kid in high school doesn't totally vindicate me for my obsession with high school, then nothing will.  Regular readers of this blog will remember that I have written several screeds on bullying, high school cliques, and the fact that adult life is but a pale extension of the high school pecking order.

I am sorry to have to inform my friends across the isle, but holding down another kid and cutting off his hair while he screams for help and cries is not a high school prank taken to the edge.  The behavior puts one well off the side of the cliff.  Even judged by the more lax understanding of bullying and high jinks that marked the era in which the baby boomers grew up, the mindset that would allow one to perpetrate this "prank" demonstrates such a massive lack of empathy for the "others" that it borders on pathological narcissistic syndrome. Of course the idea of a presidential candidate being highly narcissistic is not a revolutionary concept but one needs to at least be capable of empathy.  Until I read about this latest personality quirk of Romney's, I thought the dog on top of the car incident was nothing but a humorous anecdote about a stressed out father trying to make it all work out.  Now I am not so sure.

Being a relentless "practical joker" is nothing but a form of dominance along the bullying spectrum scale.  Exactly like the autism scale.  We might say "Oh, he's just a practical joker", much like we would say "Oh, he's just a weird kid", but we all know there is trouble lurking beneath the surface.  If you think I am being overly dramatic, think about tickling someone past the point of pleasure until they are begging for mercy.  That behavior, all psychologists agree, is bullying pure and simple.  As is relentless practical joking that demeans the victim for being "different". 

The bullying incident happened almost 50 years ago, so the details are obviously questionable. But Romney did not specifically deny the circumstances.  He proffered a lame apology and his supporters chalked it up to his "jokey" nature.  Apparently the poor kid was singled out because young Mitt didn't feel any one should be walking around with that hair.  Many boys, myself included, who grew up in the 60's and 70's would have to admit to the liberal use of such barbs as fag, douchebag, gay blade, and other assorted verbal grenades that would not be considered PC in today's high school hallways.  And perhaps a wedgie, or a rat tail towel fight was perpetrated against the less athletic of us in the boys locker room.  But holding down a classmate and cutting off his hair crosses the line, in my view, to assault and battery.

Perhaps I am less likely to forgive Mitt Romney because he is a Republican who is pandering to the Tea Party.  I would have to agree with that assessment. It has always been my feeling that the Tea Party should more accurately be called the Me Party.  I can't help but feel that Libertarians and extreme Tea Partyers lack a certain sense of empathy for the "others".  Sam Harris, in his book  Free Will describes a similar sentiment toward conservatives.  They don't seem to have an understanding that not every one is capable of being like them.  Some of us are different and some of us will need help that only a compassionate society can provide.

A person's behavior may evolve and mature over time but rarely do basic personality types shift.  A bully may change his behavior from physical attacks to strong arm tactics in the boardroom, but both behaviors are bullying none the less.

"You unlock this door with the key of imagination"

In order to become a dentist I had to prove that I could look at a schematic drawing of a flattened box and then decide what it would look like if folded into its 3 dimensional shape.  Like what you see the guy at the pizza shop doing to put together the pizza boxes.  Only I had to do it in my mind and the resultant boxes could be very irregular with a different graphic on each side.  And I had to get those sides correct as well.  So I don't understand how I could be so terribly confused by the layout in those parking garages with ramps that make me feel like I am in an M.C. Escher sketch.  (Pun intended).

The other week, I accompanied Tammy to Atlantic City for a two day NJ Hospital Association Meeting.  The room was free (for me) and, I don't know if you are aware of this, but A.C. has some great outlet shopping.  Given the choice between doubling down on a $100.00 bet at the black jack table or scoring a $200.00 down parka at the Eddie Bauer outlet for that same Benjamin, I'll take the goose down every time.  Besides, the warm feeling I'll get from a new jacket will far outlast any warm vibes I get from a pert cocktail waitress serving me free drinks while I watch my money disappear.  But when I was pulling into my parking spot on level 4 red, row 8 at the Caesar's Palace Colosseum South parking garage my full attention was on remembering this data and then locating the elevator in closest proximity to the walkway bridge over Atlantic Avenue.  Because if you have ever been in one of these garages and you wish to exit at the southeast corner of 3rd and Atlantic, you invariably end up on the northwest corner of 4th and Pacific instead.  So as we were heading toward the elevator trying to avoid being killed by the Nascar idiots doing 35 mph around the parking garage ramps, Tammy prophetically called out to me, "remember we are walking downhill".  As will become clear later on, she neglected to take into account the fact that we had first walked uphill to find an elevator and then walked downhill along another ramp to finally locate the proper elevator.  And, I will swear to this on a stack of Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species, we entered the elevator on level 4 red.  You may be starting to get the picture at this point.  Of course, all of this was dutifully recorded on a scrap of paper-uploaded here for your close examination-which I carefully stashed in a pocket away from my wallet.  Because even if my wallet was stolen and I lost all my cash, credit cards and photo ID, at least I would remember where my car was parked.

  
So the next day, while Tammy was finishing up at her meetings, I was charged with checking out of the hotel and loading up the car with our two suit cases, laptop case, SLR camera, and my fourteen shopping bags.  I'm exaggerating of course, there were only three;  Eddie Bauer, Under Armor, and Clark's Shoes. I only mention this to satisfy your creepy voyeuristic interest in my sartorial tastes.  Lugging all this, I made my way through the entire casino floor, across the walk bridge, past the Temple North garage, into the elevator for Colosseum South  level 4 red and trudged up the ramp all along row 8.  To the very top and back down again......three times.  And even around the bend to level 5 row 1 just in case.   No car.  So I hold the remote door lock over my head and start pressing buttons straining to hear the comforting sound of my Subaru beeping to me.  Nothing.  Except the smug laughs and judgmental stares of other hotel guests because I have obviously forgotten where I parked my car.

At what point do I retreat back to the front desk and suggest to the concierge that my car has been stolen?  Will they drive me around the 15 levels and 2 garages in hopes that perhaps I just wrote down the wrong coordinates? Before I succumbed to these thoughts, however, I decided to text Tammy in her meeting and solicit suggestions for a more reasoned approach.  Because at this point I am totally freaked out.  I have that feeling you get when you wake up in a strange bed while on vacation and you are totally confused as to where you are for a few seconds.  Only this time it has been a half hour.  And I am sitting on my suit case, next to the elevator, trying to act nonchalant as the other guests walk confidently past me to their cars.  Tammy suggests walking up the first ramp past the elevator and then walking down the next ramp.  I have no idea how this will be any different from what I have done, but there in row 8, level 4 red is my blue Subaru.  Only this is a different row 8 level 4 red than from where I had looked.  And when I got back on the elevator, after packing up the car, to go meet Tammy, I was on level 3 yellow!  If I heard Rod Serling's voice coming over the elevator speaker at this point and announcing, "next floor, The Twilight Zone", I would not have even twitched an eyelash.

So if you are wondering how I could have been so confused, here is what we eventually figured out.  The ramp design at The Caesar's Palace Colosseum South parking garage in Atlantic City looks something like this:

MC Escher inspired parking garage ramp design.
With the nightmare enhanced by poor signage design.

And, I am not making this up, there are two level 4 red, row 8's in this one garage.  Because of the interlocking zigzags, each level 4 intersects in the middle as you can see.  At least I think that is what is occurring.  I still am not totally clear on it.  But I eventually did see signs on different ramps of the same garage that specified level 4 red, section 8.  And where you end up depends on how you got there.  Think about it.  I still am.