Operation Boomerang…

The other day I was thinking, why don’t we hack the Russian military and more specifically its guided missile, nuclear warhead, get them under our control and send them back to the folks who launched them or to a strategic city in Russia? 

This would of course be a seriously bad surprise for the perpetrator and would bring a stop to any attempt to use its nuclear arsenal to one unfortunate and self-flagellating try. Obviously the question that we should ask ourselves is whether a guided missile be hacked? It would seem possible in theory depending how the weapon is guided. 

If it’s “wire guided”, and the communication link between the firer and the missile is a long, thin wire that unspools behind the missile. That makes the launch hard to take over. Many missiles are designed to lock on their target and once they’re fired, there is no communication going on between the missile and its source and it would have to be destroyed externally. 

To make things more difficult, most missile flight duration is very short, and would make it that much harder to “hack” between the moment it’s fired and the time it reaches its target. If there is more time available or its a cruise missile and if there’s a way to electronically hijack the missile this might work. Instead, what’s more frequent is to try to decoy the target with an alternate heat signature or jam it with radio frequency interference. 

As far as nuclear missiles are concerned, defense systems that have nukes try to reduce the risk of hacking by relying on manual inputs since any computer connection could be vulnerable to a compromised network. This is why Russia and the US make sure that targeting data is manually uploaded via a floppy disk or thumb drive and avoid using any kind network or at the very least work with closed network. 

This said, I’m certain that some good thinking from smart and astute people could potentially create a “boomerang effect” and send the nuke back to its sender or to prioritized target in its neighborhood. The Ukrainians would love it!

Images seared in the brain…

Often, my sharpest memories are a succession of special or vivid images and moments that I can see as if they just had happened today. Many of these them are tied to a certain music or to some powerful feelings that have contributed to my remembering them so realistically. 

One of these images goes back to 1972 or 73, when I was driving between my home village of Montriond to visit my friend Michel Duret who was living in the village of Habère-Lullin, about 45 minutes away, just over a bunch of passes and through winding roads in the Haute-Savoie mountains. 

It was before I would be smart enough to call in advance and make sure the person I was visiting was indeed at home. Sure enough, as I cleared the “Col de Terramont” a small pass leading to the “Green Valley” where Michel’s ski factory was located, his brand new blue Porsche 914 came into view and here we both stopped.

My brother Gaston was accompanying me, Michel was with his young wife, Nadine, and both were on their way to Châtel, another ski resort, home to Nadine’s. 

I recall the fancy license plate he got for that convertible that said “914 NM 74”, In which 914 was his model car, NM stood for Nadine and Michel, and 74 the Haute-Savoie department number. France never had and still has no vanity license plate available, so my friend or his family might have had some pretty strong connections at the Annecy Prefecture!

Feeling life’s vibrations…

As I have continued to meditate daily without missing one day for nearly 3 years now, I have experienced some pleasurable sensations that strongly validate my practice. 

These sensations are somewhat hard to put into words, so please try to feel and imagine what I’ll be attempting to explain. It is in fact a most pleasurable sensation that run through my whole body, quite similar to sexual climax but that can last as long as manage to keep it going, as it is quite fleeting a sensation. 

It’s quite tricky to get into that kind of groove and requires some breathing and other bodily adaptations, it’s also pretty hard to keep going, but much pleasurable. Is it Chi or Prana, the energy of life itself, that flows through everything in creation? I’m not sure, but I would be tempted to say yes. 

I have discovered it randomly as I began to meditate and what I can say is that if feel like a subtle, special electrical current that invade the entire body from what I would think is the wide, huge universe or cosmic space. I brings body and mind together and both become one. 

When I decide to let it seep into my whole body, I feel that it mental as well as physical strength flows into me to fully replenish my energy, and is just out of this world enough to keep me hooked on it for good!

The gift of human communication

I see communication as the greatest gift that was given to us, humans, and this is the reason I value it so much and try to use it positively and constructively as much as I can. 

Some go as far as preaching that communication was an invention from God. Since I’m not into religion, I think that like the rest of what makes us human today, communication has over the millennia developed into us and luckily evolved to our benefit giving us that “glue” that brings us together and often time make us really “tight” with one another.

Sure, there’s good and bad or positive and negative communication. I’m interested in the communication that’s helpful to one another, not the one of the “fake news” type or that is calumnious or is meant to manipulate people and drive wedges between them. 

Just like breathing or muscle power, communication is a live matter that needs to be sought for, nurtured and used as frequently and as kindly as possible. It’s also the gift that keeps on giving. As we communicate, we learn more, we become more creative and we positively influence the folks we come in contact with. 

Not using communication enough isolates us from our human brethren, bringing and keeping all the focus we’re capable of on ourselves and pushing us into a narcissistic spiral. By using it just like we use our other bodily functions, it can get better, more adapted, stronger and much more effective. 

As long as it remains benevolent and if we let it grow, our ability to communicate, will become more powerful, influence more people, may even change society and move mountains. It’s never to late to embark on the communication spaceship; let’s have a conversation!

Alternative to snow for skiers

It’s amazing what kind of options trees offer to skiers. 

Starting for the wood that was used to make most of the skis and still in many cases, are used to make the core of modern boards, forest bring a natural environment of trees that I love skiing into, but there’s more to it. 

I had heard about Pine needle skiing that was introduced in the 1930s in the US and in France, not far from Bordeaux in the Arcachon region. in an attempt to make skiing a year-round activity. They were annual races including French Ski Team members, like Annie Famose or Isabelle Mir, and it survived through the 60s. 

What I had not seen, nor never heard of, was the possibility to ski on leaves (right, from fallen pine needles to leaves this was just a logical evolution!) I just stumbled on this video posted in November of 2016 that was shot at Le Lioran, a French ski resort located in the French volcanoes region smack in the middle of the country. 

Between pine needles and dead leaves, we seem to have found an alternative to snow if we ever need it in a near future. 

The resort that boast 2,260 ft of vertical has what appears to be some good tree skiing in the lower section of its slopes, and with it, plenty of dead leaves to allow for great autumn skiing as attested by this video, in which edge support seems to be fleeting, but where the name of the game remains tree-avoidance! 

Vail Resorts financial performance in a video

On September 28, Vail Resorts (VR) reported that for its fiscal 2022 year, ended July 31, 2022, overall revenues were up 34 percent and EBITDA rose 54 percent, thanks to fewer Covid restrictions in 2022 than in the prior year. 

The same story held true for individual departments, with major increases in revenue from its ski school (55 percent) food (77 percent), and retail/rental activities (36 percent). Following a major 42 percent increase in Epic Pass unit sales in fiscal 2022, sales for the upcoming 2022-23 season have grown significantly less as they’re up only 6-7 percent compared to the prior year to date. 

This information was cleverly summarized through PeakRankings’ YouTube video that can be found just below. Aside from the impressive numbers and the information contained in that video, it is quite clear that VR’s success is achieved at the expense of customer satisfaction, against the wishes and best interests of the communities it operates in, and is also hugely and precariously exposed to what global warming has up its sleeves. 

Even though this is my own belief, it should always be emphasized that VR doesn't understand skiing and doesn't show any desire to learn more about it. In summary and beyond its glowing financial numbers, VR seems to prefer ignoring all of the crucial elements stated above, a bit as if it knew that the future of skiing is doomed anyway, and what counts is to press the fruit as fast and as completely as possible in order to extract everything it possibly can now. 

The only good news are the image in the video; enjoy them! 

Fall color festival…

Park City and its region definitely lack the majesty or sheer beauty of places like Chamonix, Banff or even Jackson Hole. 

Yet, at times, our outdoors can be stunningly beautiful. Not so much when they’re snow covered; many places and mountain settings look very similar under new snow, but if there is a time of the year when our surroundings become an irresistible attraction for the eyes, it just now when leaves change color. 

Early this week we took a road trip around our mountain passes closer to home and were stunned by the beauty and richness we discovered at each corner of the road. 

It is frequent that we miss this spectacular show because late September or early October is the generally the time when we travel to Europe or at least out of town, and miss these precious and fleeting moments when our mountains let their natural beauty explode to our heart content!