I have been frequenting Topanga State Park at night this past week. Partly due to the oppressive heat, but additionally because I am fascinated with all of the nocturnal animals that seem to come out and greet me on the trail. Unfortunately, my only camera is connected to my I-Phone, so there is no way that I can adjust it to a night setting. I would have very much liked a picture of the large male Great Horned Owl I saw on top of a yucca stalk on Thursday night.

Knott's Berry Farm

From a thrill ride standpoint, Knott's Berry farm sucks and it just does not make any sense that the same company owns Cedar Point. Cedar Point is like the Mecca and Medina of roller coasters and thrill rides. There are some problems with Knott's that cannot be overcome. The small size is perhaps the greatest liability, and if they really wanted to be contenders, Knott's would have to be six or seven times larger. I wonder if they keep statistics on people who shit in their pants on rides here. I am sure that it happens less than at Cedar Point. But after all is said and done, Knott's feels cheap and run down. It reminded me of the Pike but instead of filthy dirtbags running the place, it is staffed by friendly pimply-faced adolescents who seem ill suited to operate such high, fast, swinging machinery and even less suited to administer first aid if the shit ever hit the fan. I saw an aspiring actress in a Linus costume walking around and interacting with the guests get beaten down by a drunken hick. I guess he must have thought that there was a dude in there or something. My friend played Briar Bear at Disneyland in the early 1980's and said that adults and children alike were always walking up to him and kicking him in the nuts. He soon got tired of that, whacked the person, and was immediately fired for Un-Disneylike behavior. He told me that there was an entire network of tunnels underneath Disneyland designed to shuttle garbage out of the park away from the eyes of guests. I hate Disneyland. I would only return at gunpoint. The Accelerator is a high speed roller coaster that is supposed to go from 0-90 in a few short seconds and go up and down a vertical section of track in no time flat. The cable underneath the ride snapped and ripped through the fiberglass front of the passenger car and came dangerously close to severing on of the guy's feet in the front row before aborting and closing for the evening. Take a look at the picture I posted and look at what a close call that was.

The suspended roller coaster Silver Bullet was a fun ride similar to the Ninja coaster at Six Flags but without the advantage of being built into a hill. The ride was smooth but had some pickup. I liked it better in the evening than in the afternoon sun. Ghostrider is a nice looking coaster and has a great first drop, but is jerky as all hell. It is one of those rides that has a few surprises, but due to the feeling that you are in a slam pit, makes you reluctant to ride more than once.

Boomerang, although it has been pieced together from a couple of older coasters including the Corkscrew has some things going for it, but in comparison to Six Flags, it is total amateur hour.

The animatronic men in the log ride looked like exact replicas of the meth heads hanging out in front of those filthy motels lining Beach Blvd. cooking their stuff up in the bathroom using either the "Nazi" method or the "Shake and Bake" process. If one of those guys were programmed to open the blinds up in room 203 repeatedly to see if the coast is clear, your eye could not tell him from a real man. The best ride in the park was this swinging contraption that hurls riders over a water fountain and spins the fuck out of them. I felt safe knowing that the ride was manufactured in Germany in a factory without one-armed men and guest workers.

Buena Park and neighboring Stanton may very well be the anus of Southern California and have little going for them except funnel cake, meth, Thai Nakorn, and the freeway out. This area is just filthy. There is a motel called Chester's Motel on Beach Blvd. across the street from a strip club and and a Taco Bell. Mrs. Knott has been poisoning people with her shitty chicken dinner for a whole century but now its gonna cost you a hundred bucks. You can also roll the dice at Pink's where you have a greater than one in six chance of getting food poisoning and soiled drawers on the log ride. Finally, as if that is not enough, there is a Cinnabon.

Photos of Baldy

Yesterday, I went up the Ski Hut Trail and got to marvel at this beautiful mountain once again. It is approximately 10 mi r/t from the parking area north of Manker Flats with a bit less than 4000ft elevation gain. The trail begins about 1000 feet on the fire road past San Antonio Falls on the left. It is now marked with a small sign that says Mt. Baldy Trail. The ascent begins with a view to the left of San Antonio Canyon and you can hear the falls for a little while as you walk up. The trail is well marked except the rocks after the Ski Hut segment. Stay to the top of the rocks. Watch your step. If you crack skull here you would really be Munsoned. Bring a water filter, there are several places to fill up. This is a very good time of the year to come here and do this trail. You may see rattlesnake, deer, the feisty Stellar Jay, Robin, Finch, Blue Belly, Bees, Ants, Chipmunks, and Squirrels. Please don't leave trash in their home. You will definitely see WILDFLOWERS and they will fascinate you and overwhelm you with their beautiful colors and patterns. Additionally, you will see several types of cone bearing trees in abundance growing up here. There are some unforgettable flowers just before the Ski Hut and in the area about a 1/2 mile before you get to the summit and some great meadows. When I get to the top of this mountain, I feel as if St. Peter has handed me the key to heaven. Ravens soared over my head and life was good. The run down is nothing more or less than sublime. When I was a foodie (read: fat piece of shit) a few years ago, I was completely lacking the capability to make it to the top. Praise the lard.

Brief Thoughts on Van Halen

Recently, I was watching the Van Halen Story on Hulu, and I realized that I have quite ambivalent feelings towards the band. I reject, at the outset, the concept of Van Halen without David Lee Roth, and whatever you say about the Van Halen brothers, they were just Diamond Dave's backing band. The first time I heard Van Halen was in 1978 and I was in 6th Grade. It failed to make an impact on me, and I did not revisit it again until 1985. It was at this time that I listened to Diver Down, and while I enjoyed it, it was not my favorite. David Lee Roth is without a doubt one of the biggest douches ever to dance on stage, but he has an inherent coolness about him as well. I ran into Dave a couple of times at a sushi bar in Glendora. He was rip roaring drunk and extremely friendly. I remember thinking that he must have to ice one of those women he was with down to make like he was fucking a corpse to get turned on. I did not envy him too much. After all, how many pieces of sushi can you eat in a day? How many chicks can you ice down in your jacuzzi and tell them to lie still while you pound their cold hard bodies? And then what are you going to do? To sum up Van Halen music consisted of way too much wheedling on the guitar, and Dave was like a coked out Jim Dandy. They were no doubt talented. The people who liked them were the conformists. Their was nothing rebellious about Van Halen fans. A few months ago, I listened to Hang Em High which is one of their best songs. But for each Hang Em High, there are five turds of songs like Jump.

Motivation

The murder of my brother in 2011 made me determined to get my life back from the things that were siphoning off my health and happiness. Diet and drug consumption were the biggest culprits besides lack of exercise. Do not think for a moment that I am advocating sobriety, but prescription drugs and alcohol are not going to be part of any fitness program. By prescription drugs, I am specifically talking about benzodiazopines, narcotic painkillers, amphetamine type stimulants, and z drugs. You must sever your relationship with your doctor feelgood. No doubt he will still be around later on if you come a looking. Alcohol must be eliminated entirely if you do not have a healthful relationship with it. For sure, you know what kind of relationship you have with alcohol. I do not advocate AA which has a terrible success rate unless you are attempting to get laid. Stop it now, and don't look back. The drugs are more tricky and benzos should be tapered off slowly over the course of about a year. You can die if you try to be a hero and do this too quick. Painkillers need to go right away. They will only set you back. Stop taking Adderall, Dextroamphetamine, and Ritalin. These drugs can cause you to stay up all night, have a stroke and masturbate compulsively. I hear. You don't need that in life. The endorphins you will feel and get addicted to during exercise are much better than anything you can get from a Medical Doctor. Unless your doctor sells MDMA, LSD and shrooms. I can't remember where the fuck I left off on the other blog entry, but I think it had something to do with being formerly fat. I think I would like to comment a little about the current growth of the food culture and what it means to our collective health. I love reading about food on Yelp, and dig it when a young person is really into food. I am overwhelmed with emotion for these knowlegable and enthusiastic young people who really get into it. But I have to say, everything in moderation, but especially fat and delicious food. Vegan diets work well and are sensible for long term weight loss. You do not have to be 100% vegan, but it will serve you well to eat a lot of beans, rice, and vegetables and very little dairy or meat. There is nothing wrong with fish in my book. Sardines are a great food and I eat them daily. But it is the vegan dishes that are going to power you up the hill. You cannot eat meat and dairy all willy nilly without feeling sickness. All of that stuff is going to slow you down. I believe in allowing yourself the Double Double at In n Out Burger or the kalbi at Parks BBQ. All I am saying is that you can only afford to do this a couple of times a month. I applaud you for being so into food. Finally, it is probably sensible to get rid of your TV. Nothing they sell or try to sell on there is necessary and you will get on the trail more.

FF-Formerly Fat, Part One

Back in 2009, I vividly remember a visit to my Primary Care Doctor over at Cedar Sinai wherein I was told that I was obese and pre-diabetic. I tipped the scales at 215LBS that day but it still did not dawn on me that I had a big problem and that my unhealthy lifestyle was killing me. In fact, when I went to Vegas later on that week and was laying out by the pool, I had no idea that I looked like a fucking manatee out there in the desert sun. I had reckoned that I was a Gourmand and a connoisseur of fine beers. I had been watching the Food Network and had convinced myself that a terribly destructive unhealthy diet was normal behavior. It took years of exercise therapy to realize that this unhealth thought process asserting that big is beautiful or "health at any size" is a form of mental illness. This is a photo of me lounging at the MGM pool in the Summer of 2009:

In addition to a high fat, high sodium, and high cholesterol diet that involved mammoth portions of food, I was also drinking myself into oblivion and taking a handful of dangerous pills on a daily basis. My drugs of choice were Vicodin, Xanax, and Dextroamphetamine. I washed ten vicodin pills, eight xanax bars, and 30mg of Dextrostat down the hatch with Bourbon every day for two years although the actual number of pills I took must have been far higher because when you are abusing prescription drugs with alcohol, you are in such a haze that the last thing you can do is count. I used to eat a lot of carne asada burritos at El Taurino Restaurant. They are pretty tasty, but what they do to your body is simply insidious. Vegetables, well, I did consume them regularly, if macaroni and cheese is considered a vegetable. Or scalloped potatoes. Or fucking potato chips and sour cream dip. You get the picture. I was a fucking pig. But in reality, most American men of middle age are at least as fat as I was. Around this time, I started to realize that all this abuse was causing some heavy damage to my cells. I found myself waking up several hundred times per evening because I was suffering from sleep apnea. The shock of being constantly woken up, and the deprivation of REM Sleep that it was causing created a dangerously high situation with my blood pressure. Instead of 120/80, it was regularly 153/115 and sometimes 153/120! Furthermore, I have a history of stroke in my mom's side of the family. I did not get much exercise, and had all but ceased using an elliptical machine that I purchased a couple of years back. My excuse was a ruptured cervical disc at c6-c7. My doctors had told me to take it easy and prescribed me a never ending bowl of vicodin to kill the pain. In addition, I had steroid injections in my cervical spine on several different occasions. These pills and injections did nothing to improve my condition, and in fact, set me back several years. I did not complain, because I was addicted to hydrocodone and did not want to kill the proverbial pharmaceutical golden goose. All of this caused me to be angry 24/7. I felt seething with hate and venom at every waking hour. My sex life did not have a life. I seriously don't think I would have made it another year at the pace I was going. One foot was in the coffin, and the other foot was halfway in there as well. TO BE CONTINUED...