Higuma
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Posts posted by Higuma
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I am sorry that the spelling in my previous post did not pass muster.... I will endevour in the future to do better....Quote:Originally posted by Ocean11:
A nice little bit of name-dropping there,
It was not my intent to have you think that I was name dropping... Instead ( after seeing you make a great deal out of people's statements - contrary to your own - without requisite back up information and sources ) I felt that it would be best to quote who my credible sources were before you took issue with me suggesting that you were wrong in your opinion....
On the issue of the psychoanalysis - I don't think you need to be a doctor to figure you out... My comments were not meant to upset you in such a way as to make you feel the need to defend yourself so strongly.... Truth be told, I find your posts and opinions quite refreshing....
Perhaps you could use your strong influences to have the Forum Masters upgrade the site to include a spell checker ?? -
Sorry Ocean but I have to call you on this one and I am afraid that you can not dispute my source...Quote:Originally posted by Ocean11:
In the Balkans and the Gulf, there was every chance that local diplomacy would work.
I freind of mine was the Commander and Cheif of Canadian Peace-Keeping Forces in the Balkins for over 18 months... His name is Col. Roger St. John (retired now and living in my hometown) and if you have the where-with-all you may be able to search this information and confirm it... Currently he and his company - St. John and Associates - are engaged in the management of the De-mining of a lot of that area for the UN... He is considred as a Balkins expert by many Governments and the UN both in the area of Logistics, Culture and Pseudo Governments (read as organized crime).... He has on three occasions been requested to give tours and information sessions in the region to senior UN officials in order for them to get a "lay of the land"....
From his prespective he would STRONGLY dissagree with t your above statement... His general comments are paraphrased as follows "The region had no chance of reconcilliation politically, diplomatically or millitarily (meaning their own millitary) because the whole region was being controlled by various levels of THUGS and GANSTERS and still is by the way"
Now you don't have to take my word for it, but arguing is a bit pointless - I trust that you would believe from my previous posts that I am not a bullshitter - and so if you feel inclined to engage in a discussion about the facts I would be glad to furbish you with Roger's home telephone number so that you can call him up and debate the subject with him....
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On another point, I always find it interesting to see and hear people discussing subjects like this while the events are unfolding... History for that matter, does not always reflect the actual facts....
I sorry I didn't respond to your comment in a earlier thread about you being confused regarding the point I was trying make.. My point was " we are all being hypocrits and - in order to be perfectly clear - I believe that you are among the worst of us"
I know that you may perhaps you will take that personally, but you are a big boy and you can handle it... Even though you have preached before about the Passive Agressive Society in which you live, I have found your posts on this issue to be antagonistic and agressive... In general I do not see you comments doing anything to help or change the situation - I have only frequented here sporatically lately but I have found your comments to be aimed at getting a reaction from those whose opinion is different than yours - or are you just being a Devil's Advocate because it's entertaining.....
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For the record - I side with my government's ( Canada ) stance that: although they agree that Saddam should be depposed, they felt they could not support the USA lead coalition without further or a different UN resolution ~ ~ ~ part of this I am sure is in responce to the Bush Government's numerous SNUBBINGS of Canada since taking office.... Oh yeah.. and the French are a bunch of Weenies too.... -
Ok - it's all well and fine for us to be engaged in this little freedom of speech excercise but - even though I'm Canadian - I'll be one of the first to cheer our "allies" in the event that they have to launch a US made Patriot Missle to avert a fizzle in my back yard....
It's always so easy for me to be rightously condemming of others when it has not much of a direct affect on me... And don't go starting that "Oh, but it does affect you Fred"... Every time Bush farts it affects the world economy and hence all of us...
Regardless I find the differing points of veiw here very interesting albeit a bit hipocritical on all of our parts... We represent a great crossection of ex-pats and all of our countries are not without shame, remorse for previous actions and skeletons in their closets...
Some of the most vocal of us are from Countries that have not in the past or currently seem to be serving the interests of world peace....
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SF & SFG...
I don't think that anyone asked "Who" you pray to and therefore your obvious and previously displayed anti-religious posture has raised it's head once again.
If you have hopes, dreams or asparations then you "pray".... Maybe not to "God", perhaps to yourself, perhaps to the Halle Bop Comet????
Regardless,, I think that we all have to endure and have faith sometimes in something if not anything other than yourself - This is praying...
If you and Sam settle down and have a couple of kids then "trust me" you'll learn to "Pray" soon enough.......
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Mogski,
Try this site Data Rescue
They have a free trial version available here Trial Version I am not sure whether you can save what it finds but at least you can see if it is recoverable or not.....
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Goretex was patented by the Gore Co. - per Milazooka - about 30 years ago or something like that....
Only recently the patent on the fabric technology relaxed - I think that this happens automatically after 25 years maybe ?? - which has allowed all sorts of copy-cat fabrics which do roughly the same thing...
My Phenix gear is made with Diaplex which is like Gortex except that as the internal temperature on the inside surface of the fabric raises the pores in the material get bigger allowing a "air conditioning effect" which helps regulate some of the heat build up that is prevelent in some Gortex.... The neat thing about the Diaplex technology is that they can "program" the temperature at which the pores open when they make the fabric - very techno.... read it on their website before buying the jacket....
Here's a blurb from their site...............
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Diaplex offers an ideal balance of waterproofing, and permeability - benefits that under normal circumstances are mutually exclusive. Equally impressive, however, is its ability to supress condensation. Thanks to the remarkable efficiency of its flexible barrier, Diaplex is able to offer extreme high performance in all three areas.
Waterproofing
The non-porous Diaplex membrane laminate offers excellent waterproofing performance, and can withstand water pressures of 20,000 - 40,000 mm H2O.
Permeability
When the temperature reaches the Diaplex membrane's activation point, micro-pores are created in the polymer, allowing water molecules to be expelled at the rate of 6,000 - 12,000 g/m2*24hrs.
Anti-Condensation
The Diaplex membrane also boasts a high absorbtion/emission rate. This allows it to absorb moisture within a garment before condensation can occur, minimizing the dangerous heat loss that condensation can cause in sub-zero temperature conditions.
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Also many jackets are multi-layer - cheaper ones single layer and some high end jackets 3 layers of gortex......
As stated seams and such are real important....
My Diaplex Jacket had no Pit Zips which troubled me when I got it but it is no less unbearable than my "Heli-tec (Gortex) Heli Hansen Jacket.....
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You can machine wash your gortex at home but DON"T EVER use Powdered detergent... The powder never fully disolves in water and then plugs the pores of the Gortex... You can - and I have - use liquid laundry soap, shampoo or dishwashing liquid but remember that all that stuff is SUPER sudsy and if you put more than about a 500 yen coins size worth in the machine the machine will overflow for about 3 days with suds...Quote:Originally posted by db:
What is the best way to wash a gortex jacket?
Better yet go to any reputable Outdoor shop that sells hiking stuff and buy the liquid gortex detergent... I know I have seen it in ICI in Sapporo... They also have a water repellent that is gortex safe I think... The best way to do a good job of waterproofing a non Gortex type fabric is to buy the detergent type repellents... You wash the jacket / pants in the stuff and they are nice and shiny as well as super waterproof because the stuff permiates right into the pores of the fabric. -
About 15 - 20 years ago American kids were getting a real tough go of it backpacking around Europe during summer holidays and so forth... Canadians however were enjoying a good international reputation and therefore were treated nicer by many locals...
In order to identify themselves as such, Foreign Affairs Canada suggested and even handed out Canadian flag patches to be sewn to their backpacks or jackets so they could be readily identified and not discriminated against...
Within a couple of years, however, this was all ruined by American kids who discovered they could get better treatment from the locals by doing the same thing....
The locals soon realized that the patches weren't a passport and soon started treating every english speaking "American" looking kid the same way.
Times have changed though and we all love each other now regardless of race, creed, colour, nationality, snow sport preference etc..,,,,
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Ocean,
Perhaps you could translate a rather nasty messege in Kanji for us and post it here, so I can paste it onto some meshi and pass them out on the slopes....
Maybe...... Dear ignorant Git..... Perhaps you are unaware of the dangerous and selfish behaveour that you are currently exibiting... perhaps in the future you might consider parking you bony ass somewhere where it will not endanger the rest of us serious snow enthusiasts - like on a park bench in Odori Park or better yet watching snowboard videos at your parents house...
Feel free to elaborate on the script.. but of course I don't need to ask you to soft pedal.. it of course should be polite but snotty and hopefully embarassing to all those who read it...
If you give me your name and contact info I can print it on the reverse side and maybe you will get some business out of the deal..
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I can't imagine ever eating salad again without chopsticks........
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Certainly not by North American standards or by any other for that matter...Quote:Originally posted by snowboard_freak:
On the whole was the mountain busy?
Lift lines were always less than 10 people... probably due to the fact that they don't load chairs here - lots of pairs and singles riding by themselves - and no such thing as a singles line....
The mountain it self wasn't to bad for people except ( putting on fire proof suit now... please wait..... ) for the amazing amount of lazy ass, poser, wanna be snowboarders who park their asses in the middle of the slope in groups like wino's around a fire in a garbage can... They litter the slopes sitting on their asses in the most dangerous places - converging runs, just over a crest of a steep section (I assume it's easier to stand up if you park it on on a steep slope) it is literally amazingly dangerous and the Ski patrol just goes on by and doesn't say a thing...
The beautiful thing about the snow as I mentioned earlier was the ability to throw up HUGE rooster tails of snow off of your skis at speed - I never looked back but it's just possible (from the screams I heard) that a few lazy ass wanna be's parked in the middle of the slope might have caught a little snow of my skis now and then........OOOOOOOOOOOOOPS.... Gomen.... -
Although it appears that Niseko is becoming a 4 letter word around here, I was just there - 13 & 14th - and offer the following brief report...
Having had 3 other overnight trips to Niseko this year already I was very surprized to find the snow to be the best that I have experienced so far this year..... Please account for the fact that I am NOT a powder hound and so the groomed runs, trees and wind blown steeps were absolutely amazing....
Weather on Thursday - partly overcast and some snow and wind, about -5 degrees - snow HARD with a touch of ice in spots but perfect for full on course wide high speed carving....
Friday - SUNNY & -2 degrees - GOOD overnight grooming, beautiful Corduroy & with the snow softened up a bit, it made for huge rooster tails coming off the skis... Off piste was real busy with a line of people hiking the summit off the top of Hirafu till early afternoon...
All I can say is that the weather & snow is a heap better up here than it was last year at this time....
I thought that this might be my last time out this year but now I'm confident that there will be some Great spring skiing this year....
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To this end and the utter embarassment of my wife I made quite a huge deal out of a J-freind's near perfect use of a fork the other night after they commented earlier in the meal on how well I used hashi.....Quote:Originally posted by Indosnm:
Why can you use chopsticks so well?
Funny - I thought... they didn't see the humor in it what-so-ever.... kinda like the Japanese Gaijin concept - " D O E S N O T C O M P U T E " -
Ocean,
I was somehow thinking that most of those semi-ilaterite posts, you where speaking of, where coming from keitai....
Which makes me wonder....
Do people sitting at there desktops think I'm SHOUTING when I send them mail from the phone ? ? ? ? ?
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That and the whole clapping at the gravesite / waking up the dead relatives practice...Quote:Originally posted by Ocean11:
I like to mooch around in the toilet slippers at a party...
Priceless.... -
Sorry to say it Drew but if you are waiting in the shop for your waxing - and if they are giving your board back to you already scraped and brushed out - then you have just wasted your money....Quote:Originally posted by snowboard_freak:
When i get my board waxed/tuned i just wait in the shop for it to done. No point coming back unless you have to.
If they are scraping the hot wax off your board without leaving it on for at least an hour or two to cool and adhere, then all they are doing is cleaning your base and not leaving much wax behind...
Certainly it's better than nothing - but not by much because you are removing most of the old wax with a hot scrape which will expose the bases quicker to dirt etc..,
I am certainly not an expert but that is what Toko, Holmenkol, Dominator and Swix wax companies all say. -
Does this not mean that by intentionally runnning into somebody while surfing to "cut their suit" or "teach them a lesson" could result in a DEATH ???Quote:Originally posted by Plucky:
When you deal with water, the stakes double. You wreck, you can die.
By posting such comments here you seem to suggest that this would be getting their " just desserts" !!!
I don't know the "rules" of the surf but I do understand the concept of "Locals Only" as is the rule on almost any surf beach I think....
So why not surf somewhere "Up North" and get to know a few people - hang a bit - chill with them - get some respect as a local and what comes with that..... I'll just betcha that these locals don't "drop in" on other locals...
A friend of mine who does surf says that Hawaii is the hardest place to surf because "everyone" who is local has ZERO respect for Howlees (Hawaiin Gaijin?)
My Brother in Law is a Island Police Officer on Kawai and he tells me that the highest incident of non-reported violence is with surfers...
"non-reported" meaning whitnesed, reported to police, seen, violence resulting in hospital or doctor vistitation - but no one will Swear out a complaint - - - very similar to problems with Gang related violence.....
"Draw your own conclusions from these facts"
As for the hitting someone with your Surfboard, SnowBoard, Skis, Baseball Bat, Dirtbike whatever... I figger - when you do such - you are using them as a "Weapon" and that is just plain "chickenshit".... -
Sorry DB - but read this....
Torn Rotator Cuff
What Is a Torn Rotator Cuff?
One or more rotator cuff tendons may become inflamed from overuse, aging
, a fall on an outstretched hand, or a collision . Sports requiring repeated overhead arm motion or occupations requiring heavy lifting also place a strain on rotator cuff tendons and muscles. Normally tendons are strong, but a longstanding wearing down process may lead to a tear. What Are the Signs of a Torn Rotator Cuff?
Typically, a person with a rotator cuff injury feels pain over the deltoid muscle at the top and outer side of the shoulder, especially when the arm is raised or extended out from the side of the body. Motions like those involved in getting dressed can be painful. The shoulder may feel weak, especially when trying to lift the arm into a horizontal position. A person may also feel or hear a click or pop when the shoulder is moved.
How Is a Torn Rotator Cuff Diagnosed?
Pain or weakness on outward or inward rotation of the arm may indicate a tear in a rotator cuff tendon. The patient also feels pain when lowering the arm to the side after the shoulder is moved backward and the arm is raised. A doctor may detect weakness but may not be able to determine from a physical examination where the tear is located. X rays, if taken, may appear normal. An MRI can help detect a full tendon tear, but does not detect partial tears. If the pain disappears after the doctor injects a small amount of anesthetic into the area, impingement is likely to be present. If there is no response to treatment, the doctor may use an arthrogram, rather than an MRI, to inspect the injured area and confirm the diagnosis.
How is a Torn Rotator Cuff Treated?
Doctors usually recommend that patients with a rotator cuff injury rest the shoulder, apply heat or cold to the sore area, and take medicine to relieve pain and inflammation. Other treatments might be added, such as electrical stimulation of muscles and nerves, ultrasound, or a cortisone injection near the inflamed area of the rotator cuff. The patient may need to wear a sling for a few days. If surgery is not an immediate consideration, exercises are added to the treatment program to build flexibility and strength and restore the shoulder's function. If there is no improvement with these conservative treatments and functional impairment persists, the doctor may perform arthroscopic or open surgical repair of the torn rotator cuff.
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Markie,
With Easter being April 20th I think the snow conditions will be a crap shoot most areas... but my best bet would be to pick a mountain that is high, has had a deep snow pack and as far away from the coast as possible....
I would say Kiroro is definitely out.... Niseko, Rusutsu, Sapporo Kokusai, Furano might be all marginal... the best thing is to do is keep a line of communication open with people who have been recently and then decide just before you go.... hotels should be no problem that time of year...
I would be warry of relying on "Official" Snow reports to plan a holiday for that time of year... they are only as accurate as the people submitting the information... maybe just plan to get to Sapporo and then decide... if the weather and snow is crap in the mountains then relax and enjoy Sapporo (romantic weekend??) and the spring time conditions in the city... we don't have as much culture as the bigger places but we make up for it with our charm.... (blatent tourism plug)
I am going on what will be probably my last two-dayer of the season on March 20 & 21st to Niseko and will let you know how it is there....
In the meantime, I woke up to 10 cm of fluffy fresh this morning in Sapporo and is still coming down... My wife - who loves to ski btw - just stood there moaning about how she wants to see cherry blossoms soon... Catch 22 I guess.... I told her to "Be careful what you wish for - you just might get it".....
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Kiroro is a very windy place and so subsequently some runs are hard as cement - which I happen to like.. I have been there only once this year (Jan 12) and found that the snow wasn't too deep... forget skiing the trees as there was still lots of brush showing through.....
Just came back from 3 days at Furano which, contary to popular opinion is one of my favorites... That said, the new 100 person gondola ABSOLUTELY SUCKS... it's akin to taking the Ginza Line to Akihabara on a school holiday... I rode it about 8 times over three days and every time I needed to score some Blood pressure medicine by the time I got to the top.... wait in a line for 15 minutes indoors, then jamb your ass into a gondala with 80 other people going wooooooooooaaaaahhhhh every time the swinging subway car goes over a tower... that's not even mentioning the hot, steamy, sweat your arse off conditions from the time you line up till you click in again....
After all that ranting though.. I still love the place but HATE the new gondola.... If you go, do yourself a favor and ride the quad to mid mountain from the New Prince side and then take the slow double to the top where the gondola drops it's load... it takes an extra 15 - 20 minutes but WAY less frustration.......
Sapporo Kokusai is usually the deepest and the first to open.....
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thanks zwelgen... please post anything further that you find out...
tragic stuff regardless.....
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Just caught a very short version on the tv this morning...
Does anyone know more about a report of an elementry school child's death at a slope here in Japan somewhere because they got tangled in a rope - like a rope used to "rope off" an area ???????
Sounds tragic and raises BIG questions about safety, chaperones etc..,
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Nat...
Snow banks on most streets in Sapporo about 1.5 meters high.. probably a good 75 cms accumulated in the parks etc.,.... Other areas like Hakodate have less - as always - but places like Futomi and anywhere past Iwamizawa north to Assaikawa are getting buried...
The snow in most mountain areas is getting to be quite remarkable - definately the best snow conditions my wife and friends have seen in many, many years....
Gear Review: Atomic Beta Ride 10.20 Titatnium
in Snow talk, trip reports, Japan avalanche & backcountry
Posted
I am going to demo the 2003 - 2004 Atomic Respections on Thursday at Sapporo Kokusai
Interesting new construction based on Beta Channels but with a new complicated Damping system - will post pictures and report upon return
Could have demoed 2004 SL Beta Race, GS Beta Race, Ambitions or Respections... The respections are the only "new" redesigned ski so I thought they would be a good choice... probably the last day for me this year....