The Blog Of Seth Fogg

I’m Really Happy Right Now.

tonightilive — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 02:24:10 +0000

Just, happy. Life is uncomplicated, and things are moving in a good direction. I have some good plans, good friends, and good ideas about what I want in life. I’m planning a Canadian and US tour with my noise group. I have a job again, I’m talking with all my old friends. I built an amazing igloo today and made a list of the ten things I would regret if I died today. I’m young, free, and life is full of adventure. I might go to Iceland on a small trip at some point, but first I need to buy a car and find a place to live. At the very least, I’m going to hike the hundred mile wilderness again this summer. I’m excited for life. Genuinely.

The Plan

tonightilive — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 23:18:30 +0000

So, here’s my plan. I’m going to be working at the Granary again, the restaurant I used to work at in Farmington. They offered me a place if I wanted to come back, and I accepted. So, I’m going to be saving up money, with one of two goals depending on how things go around here. Plan one: save up, buy a new car, apply to grad school. Plan two: save up, sell my car, move to Iceland for a year, apply to grad school. Both of these plans involve copious amounts of backpacking, hiking, snowshoeing, rock-climbing, canoeing, sailing, and all things outdoors and memorable. A lot of people will hear the Iceland plan and say “Not another crazy plan”. These are the people that make these plans difficult in the first place. If you find yourself thinking this, keep it to yourself. I don’t need to hear it. Doubt your own dreams, not mine. It would be perfect for the outdoors, exploring a new place and culture. Maybe learn a new language? Play a lot of music. It sounds like so much fun, and I’m young and have no ties. Pretty much, I want this:

Something new and strange.

I’m Waiting

tonightilive — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 00:01:55 +0000

Waiting on a response. Something to spin things around. Time for some action.

Happy New Year Everyone!

tonightilive — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 22:58:40 +0000

Here’s to the new year. I’m secretly prejudice against odd numbered years, but I have good feelings about this one. Also, I made a huge step today towards my ideal philosophical state. I was driving past the empty corn field and there was a strip of cloud fifteen feet off the ground running the entire length of the field, almost like the tail of a ghost. It was amazing, and I now realize that I need to focus on the beauty of the world around me more. This means less media, more outside. The change has been easier so far. More to come…

Last Flowers – Radiohead

tonightilive — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 01:52:37 +0000

appliances have gone berserk
i cannot keep up
treading on people’s toes
snot-nosed little punk

and i can’t face the evening straight
you can offer me escape
houses move and houses speak
if you take me there you’ll get relief, relief, relief, relief

and if i’m gonna talk
i just want to talk
please don’t interrupt
just sit back and listen

cos i can’t face the evening straight
you can offer me escape
houses move and houses speak
if you take me there you’ll get relief, relief, relief, relief
relief, relief

it’s too much, too bright, too powerful
too much, too bright, too powerful
too much, too bright, too powerful
too much, too bright, too powerful

Siren Nihlist

tonightilive — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 01:28:14 +0000

58,6,57,57,86,87,78,97,48,55,98,98,76,60,77,77,76,74,68,56,54,88,
56,58,33,87,78,97,48,55,86,66,84,30,76,98,87,77,46,86,86,86,97,50,
68,98,88,64,26,84,94,66,95,15,54,85,10,57,48,47,86,78,97,50,76,98,
6,57,26,64,94,6,53,68,76,66,70,73,29,47,58,66,84,26,75,58,89,
75,59,56,58,97,76,28,58,86,55,97,48,48,58,69,53,27,75,58,66,67,15

Today

tonightilive — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 02:13:50 +0000

I decided to look at Grad Schools, and now I have a plan. Step one is the GRE’s, step two is to visit Dartmouth and try to impress the pants off them, and step 3 is to apply. I’ve been looking for the right program for the past two or three years but they’ll all been in Europe. Today I found this program and a few on the west coast, but I would love to stay nearby. I just feel like I need to move into the next step, and it just has been difficult so far. I now have the time and energy, so it’s time to go for it. Things are just falling into place in strange ways.

On my way back from babysitting today, I was thinking heavily about my life. Amid sorting out a lot of confusion, a song started playing off of some mixed CD my mom had in her car about making huge decisions. And the license plate of the car in front of me was “What Iff”. Strange in a cosmic way.

Also I stumbled upon this, enjoy:

Today Was Weird in a High School Way

tonightilive — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 04:59:28 +0000

I went with a friend to my old High School today and played saxophone with the concert band. It was so… surreal. Not so much playing music but more the tidal wave of memories that instantly rushed back to me. Much of it involved teenage romance, and most of that seemed to be negative memories. None of it matters now of course. If you happen to be in high school and reading this let me repeat, none of it matters. They’ll all be memories. The whole “High School Sweetheart” thing is just a bad idea. I have a college degree and my life and future plans are all still radically shifting. There’s no way I could have held a relationship through high school to now and still have grown as a person. Most people I’ve watched try it have simply progressed slower until they realized what was happening. It’s important to remember that you are free. Free to make yourself happy and follow your own dreams. The goal is to find someone to share that freedom with. Someone who’s dreams just happen to follow nicely next to yours. “Twin Kite’s on Separate String’s” is a quote I constantly remember from my High School english teacher. It makes so much sense to me now, but at the time it did not. Just follow your own idea of perfection and grow along the way. If you find someone heading in the same direction, stick with them. If not, see #1 in the previous post.

Of course other great things came back to me. There’s an old viking statue in the school where I used to stash spare change in case I needed it someday for lunch. There were the old classrooms where some of my favorite teachers once resided. I talked with old teacher’s and vice principals and got the usual advice for the future coupled with a friendly smile. It was nice.

After wards the friend and I stopped at Cafe Nomad in Norway only to run into two classmates. We were never close, but always friendly in high school. We ended up spending a whole hour talking about where we had been the past four years and where we were now. It reminded me of the one thing I do miss from High School: the constant social contact. It was something we all took for granted. Some of us hated it, or we grew bored of it. We wanted some more mature college version, which doesn’t really exist. You might make a group of friends, but things never seem quite as solid.

That’s all for now I guess. P.S. wine tasting Wednesday at cafe Nomad.

Right and Wrong

tonightilive — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 00:30:35 +0000

All our lives we make choices easily numbering in the trillions, every single day. How we make these choices comes down to the philosophies we choose to align ourselves with. Of course, these are constantly changing. Say you watch, I don’t know, “Forrest Gump” or “the Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, and come away thinking life is short and you should always do what makes you happy. Later in the week you watch some movie about family and the delicate balance it’s in, one where the family is split up or loses a member like “Home Alone” or “Apocalypto” (I know, but the last one did make me want to protect those I love and hold them closer). This new film changes your dominant viewpoint to one interested in keeping close to those around you even if it means forgoing your own personal happiness.

These constantly changing philosophies on life also affect our feelings on our past. Looking back on events in our lives, we compare our philosophy at the time to our current one and may feel regret at acting under our previous convictions. For this reason, many choose not to look at their pasts’ with much frequency, which would outrage most history buffs (“Those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it!”). But is this really true? Do we learn anything from the past since what we really learn is which philosophies did or didn’t work for us at certain moments? Maybe we then write off those ways of thinking we see as failures and praise the new as “Superior”, but who is to say which is which? Maybe the failures of the old thoughts simply did not fit the situation? And now we’ve written them off altogether for a new one which may not fit all situations. Does this mean we should constantly switch philosophies to suit our moments? But how do we choose which philosophy to use in this new situation? Do we need a higher philosophy? Alright, this seems cyclical now which is what I expect of all philosophical endeavors. But I guess my point is, I’m choosing to write down my philosophies and sticking to them. Here they go:

Nothing is Permanent (Buddha)
Life is Short, do what makes you happy.
Cause no unnecessary suffering.
Always put yourself in a position to be lucky, but never count on luck.
Always think for yourself.

Streaked Mountain

tonightilive — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 04:34:48 +0000

I climbed Streaked Mountain today. I’ve hiked it so many times before, we might actually be close to triple digits now. But today was different. The whole thing was coated in ice. Every step I had to work for, plotting and planning my way up. The ice was so thin it was invisible. You didn’t even know it was there until you slipped. The air was frigid and still. I love the feeling of cold air in your lungs as you make your way to a goal. And at the top, all the trees were covered in ice as well. It was in the form of icicles, and the wind had been blowing hard when they formed so they stuck out of the tree, completely parallel with the ground. It was just amazing. I love winter hiking so much. I even love waking up in the morning and having to leave a warm sleeping bag for a cold world. It just acts at the perfect setup for an amazing day.
A friend of mine is talking about hiking the hundred-mile wilderness this summer and invited me. I would love to, but I’ve learned a few things from last time. Aside from money and other social issues, I’m more worried about pacing. See, I don’t take breaks except for lunch. I hike with a bottle of water in my hands so I can drink on the go. I also move at a faster pace. This makes it difficult to find hiking partners. Often, you just wait at points at let your partners catch up if you’re not matched, but for a hundred miles that becomes a mental burden like walking with a gash on the bottom of your foot or a tack in the sole of your shoe. You just can’t handle it. What I did last time was simply arrange meeting points for lunch, and a point for camp at night. This worked out fine, but it’s dangerous. In the hundred-mile wilderness, you are so far away from any chance of help or rescue and there is little to no cell phone coverage. You NEED to stick together at all times. While reading an excerpt from “Alpine Climbing: Techniques to Take You Higher” by Mark Houston and Kathy Cosley (which I hope to get for christmas ) they lay down this great philosophy for Mountaineering. Paraphrased: put yourself in a position to be lucky, but don’t depend on it. This phrase seems to make sense in so many areas of life. In this instance, you NEED to stick together because you can’t depend on luck. If someone does get hurt, and you’re two hours ahead of them (which happened on my last trip) at lunch time, wait an extra hour before deciding to go back and find them, and then hike back, they’ve now been injured for five hours. That is a long time to have a broken leg, and the elements can get to you quickly if you’re covered in sweat and laying down without cover.
Going back to the quote, it’s easier to understand the “Don’t depend on luck” part. The other half, “Put yourself in a position to be lucky” seems strange and difficult to understand. The idea is this: if a situation has low risk, but a chance for a beneficial stroke of luck, go for it. This proves to be the harder part to understand, or at least to find applicable situations. My goal for my next few trips will be to try to find situations where this applies. Also, to see if my pace and my friends pace are close enough that we could do it together.

I have no idea who this kid is. His name is apparently Jared, but he has the idea.