I read about this man when the story first broke and found it extremely fascinating. I can relate to wanting to be alone and living an isolated existence. I love being in nature, away from the world and have often thought about pursuing such an existence permanently. But I just cannot comprehend his methods. Move to Alaska. Learn to hunt. Carve out a place for yourself somewhere. What he did tells me he was just insane - live near people and steal. To put it bluntly, this is fucking nuts.
His methods aren't insane. They're rational for survival in human society/civilization without participating in it.
Think of a rat or other mammal pest. They effectively survive off of civilization in the same way.
And since he got away with it for the entire time...successfully...it seemed effective, too.
>alaska
Living fully alone isolated from civilization in terrain as hostile as wild alaska isn't realistic. See Christopher Mccandless. It's simpler to just scrounge off of civilization.
Nod, I've been more prepared going car camping for a weekend in the summer in a campground within walking distance of a resort than Chris Mccandless was going into Alaska for the winter.
Moving to Alaska doesn't work either. See Chris McCandless. Of course, where he chose to live (and, eventually, die) didn't have nearby houses to steal from. He just thought he could live off the land. In Alaska. In winter. Without the necessary tools or skills. That, my friend, is truly nuts.
I think Richard Proenneke is a better example of someone who survived in the vastness of Alaskan wilderness for decades. His survival story is truly fascinating and level-headed compared to McCandless who was a hippie vagabond more than anything else.
I've seen those films of Proenneke. Unlike McCandless, he had mad skills in a seemingly infinite number of disciplines. He also planned things out but, and here's the kicker, he had friends on the outside who'd arrange to have supplies flown in to him so he was hardly living in isolation. Even so, he was a pretty amazing guy.
I love that I have been able to send in a few things to get repaired over the years. They encourage it and make it so easy to do. I have memories connected to that stuff - being in the Weminuche Wilderness above the tree line and my down jacket making the difference between a somewhat uncomfortable night and total misery. Their stuff is made well and has been good to me.
I've programmed VB3 to VB6 and then when .NET arrived, I unfortunately had to do a few large apps in VB.NET. Let this fucking dog die. There's nothing worthwhile in this language. MS originally was not planning on bringing the retardedness in VB into .NET (I had access to pre-releases of it and message boards where VB.NET was being discussed). A bunch of whiny cunts who no longer matter in the world of programming at all, bitched and moaned about the poor VB programmers who would be soooo confused, that MS conceded to their demands.
The interest thing about this app is that it allows you to pull material from almost anywhere and make it sonically interesting. The first track I made was sourced from 2 seconds of Love is a Battlefield and a few seconds from an anti-depressant commercial. The fun part of this app is trying to turn the most mundane sounds into something interesting.
