John Scalzi’s idea, but I like it so I’m putting it to use here. Is this a meme? Maybe. I don’t usually do memes but this one seemed fun.
- Scaled the exterior surface of a 1735′ radio tower. To the top. Really (pic at right is at 1100′ level). (I’ve been to the top of a 2000′ tower, but it was via an elevator. Still.)
- Captained a sailboat and sailed with my wife in the Caribbean sea. This would have been much more interesting if I’d have had a run-in with the Pirates of the Caribbean, but, alas, no pirates. (Before that I was in the Navy and sailed (if you can call it sailing when you’re on an aircraft carrier with 5k other “sailors”) throughout the Mediterranean Sea, Atlantic Ocean, Persian Gulf, Indian Ocean, Arctic Sea and Red Sea.)
- Read the entire Patrick O’brian canon.
- Jumped out of a perfectly good airplane.
- Ate the still-palpitating heart of a diamondback rattlesnake and wrote a story about it.
- Went horseback riding in the Carmel Mountains in Israel.
- Had a dinner cruise on the Nile and the next day visited the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt. Entered the tomb of a long-dead king. Was suitably fascinated.
- Caught, grilled, and ate 8 lobsters in Key West, just off Boca Chica Key, while Hurricane Andrew loomed over the horizon.
- Enlisted in the Navy because of a song.
- Heard the voice of my dead friend warning me of danger. Twice.
The really sad part of this is that all of this happened at least ten years ago (except numbers 2 & 3). A steady job, marriage and kids have considerably slowed the part-time adventurer lifestyle I was once accustomed to living. And though I know most of you have children as well (which makes that adventure one that can’t be included on this list) I maintain that parenthood is so far the greatest adventure of my life. Besides, once these little ones grow up a bit more, I’ve already got more than a few adventures planned out for us…
Now; feel free to add your own list.
If you liked that post, then try these...
One more last day of freedom on December 17th, 2006
Habitat for Humanity on October 7th, 2005
Ode to a Bud on February 5th, 2008
King Mingus on a Scoot on October 15th, 2005
Excitable on October 12th, 2005
January 17th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
(No particular order)
1. Drank Sakai with strangers at a castle in Northern Japan during the Cherry Blossom Festival.
2. Visited Toyko Disneyland. (Small World just as annoying in Japanese) Although, C-3PO was more interesting.
3. Lived in Korea for a year while my wife had my first born son at home in the states. (Not fun.)
4. Worked as an Assistant Cameraman for several low budget films.
5. Learned to fly in a Cessna 150.
6. Earned my Ham Radio license.
7. Spoke to someone from Mexico on the 6 meter Ham band from Boise. (A rare band opening on Field Day a few years ago.)
8. Watched the Shuttle Challenger blow up in person.
9. Watched the very first Shuttle flight in person.
10. Been in a small plane crash on take-off.
January 17th, 2008 at 6:51 pm
I loved grabbing lobster in the Keys and eating them immediately! People who have never eaten super fresh spiny lobster don’t know what they are missing. None of that oily Maine lobster for me!
(for those who don’t know, Red Lobster refers to them as ‘rock’ lobster)
matt–did you have a job changing light bulbs on those towers or were you just causing trouble?
My greatest adventures these days occur when I play Assassin’s Creed with the kids. Some of the scenery in that game reminds me of my days in Turkey and Iraq.
AL
January 17th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Al: yep, I used to climb those things for a living. I did it for two years, and it segued into the job I have now (thank God).
January 18th, 2008 at 10:41 am
Matt, go read of my Mystery novel - Null Pointer. It’s about someone falling off a radio antenna. Aside from the actual falling part, was it real enough? Because, I’m scared to death of heights and I could only imagine it. ;)
January 18th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Ok I forgot to use the title attribute. Chapter 0 http://www.w0pht.org/npch0.php
January 18th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Ken, a couple of things:
1. Towers and buildings don’t move that much. They move, and it is a sickening feeling, but they don’t move enough to drop over the side of a building. It would be nice if it did, for your story, but they just don’t. Still, this doesn’t have to hurt your story. I’ve been on a lot of building-top towers that are upwards of 200′ tall, which is still plenty tall enough to kill you if you fall, but even with the thrashing winds at that height, most likely you would land on the roof of the building: it may look tiny from where you are, but it’s still a substantial surface to be able to support the structure on top of it. Now, as far as the height, he would feel every foot of it from the ground all the way to where he was hanging, and if it’s the tallest building in the world it’s got to be around 1800-1900 feet, plus two-hundred for the tower, so he’s going to be near 2k feet in the air, and he will feel every inch of it. It’s amazing the way line of sight changes when you’re up that high; reality seems to warp on you sometimes, especially in high wind and darkness and cold. Anyway, with your description it felt like I was reading that he was swinging through the air, but it’s really more of a slow sway, even in high wind.
2. The face of a tower like you’re describing wouldn’t have bracing every foot. It would have a ladder, likely on the inside, made of iron, but the bracing would be horizontal, zigzagging up the tower. And on a 200 footer the face would be about six feet wide (sure, sure, from the ground it only looks a foot wide. I know. But it isn’t–I once was contracted to bring down a 12′ high-performance microwave dish from a 300′ tower. Once I got it to the ground a guy came up in a truck and asked me if I was putting that up on the tower. I said, “No, just brought it down.” He said “That thing was on this tower?” I said “Yeah. At the top.” He looked up for a minute and then said, “I thought that thing was only about this big,” making a circle with his hands about the size of a basketball :-). The bracing would be either steel pipe or angle-iron, and built to withstand high-altitude winds, so a pipe that high would probably be at least 3″ - 4″.
3. You’re dead on about the cold. I’ve crossed the Arctic Circle in winter, but I’ve never been as cold as I was one November night on a 500′ tower on Cheaha Mtn in east Alabama. The winds are vicious–50 MPH and steady, persistent, strong, frigid…God I’m so glad I don’t do that any more. It’s agonizing. There aren’t enough clothes to put on. You have to take your gloves off to twist nuts and you almost cry… anyway. You get the idea.
4. For someone afraid of heights to wake up on the side of a tower like the one on top of a building, you’ve got to understand he wouldn’t be able to let go. He wouldn’t be able to do anything until he was unconscious. As soon as his eyes opened and his mind registered where he was he would lock up tight as a drum. His entire body. His toes would even try to grip steel. His knuckles would be white, his fists gripped as tight as they could grip, and he would literally wrap himself around the first thing he was holding onto–likely a six-foot horizontal bracer. Probably he would shrink down to the bottom of the bracer, get squished between it and the tower leg, which would likely be 12″ of solid steel, and wrap everything he had around that leg, keeping his body as close to inside the tower as he could.
I’ve seen this behavior a lot. Only about one of every ten applicants to a tower company can actually climb and still function like a human being. The rest freeze up and you have to figure out a way to get them down; it usually takes a while. We always laid odds against how quickly a guy would quit and it never failed, if the guy came in saying that he wasn’t afraid of heights, he would be the one who quit as soon as he was above the trees. NEVER FAILED. Cocksure doesn’t score any points in working high steel :-)
Finally: As for the fall, I’m convinced he wouldn’t be able to just let go. He might hang there for awhile before realizing he was going to freeze to death and then try to climb down and then fall, but for someone who is truly acrophobic, every muscle in his body from his sphincter to his fingers to his jaws to his toes would be ramrod tight. He’d get really tired, really fast though, especially in that kind of cold, and just from being clenched up so tight, he might even pass out after a few minutes. But when he fell he would probably land about ten or twenty feet from the base of the tower–and that would be on the roof, which may be domed, sure, so he would just go sliding on down to the street…but, you know, I can suspend disbelief long enough to believe a 50MPH wind would blow him the forty feet or so away from the tower he would need to plummet clear of the roof to the ground. Sure.
Anyway, that’s my take. Hope this helps.
January 18th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
Thanks Matt, imagine finding a writer and someone who has climbed such towers? I copied your comment into my notes for the rewrite, hopefully the next version of the story will be a little more scary and real because of your input.
I get nervous above a second story building. The thing with me is that I don’t trust that I would not jump. Part of the reason I fear heights is that I would not trust myself not to jump. It’s like someone handing you a loaded gun and you don’t dare pick it up, because you would immediately want to point it at your head and shoot. It’s very suicidal feeling. Maybe I’m just wacko. But that’s why I can’t get very high up on things. Too afraid I WILL jump.
Thanks again.