First time I saw this hill. I was marveling at the full face helmets and the crop-tops with the wind-mills spinning in the background. It was on youtube, I was bombing the largest hills in Florida at the time. “Mount Dora”
25+ MPH on a Piece of Wood
I had to kind of start over how to skate when I moved to the pacific northwest (PNW). I had to learn how to “foot break.”
So this hill was designed to drive on. I am going down it above, on a piece of 8 layer ply-wood, “precision” cast/machine trucks, ceramic ball bearings made in by the Swiss, and custom poured urethane wheels from California. Taken in Goldendale Washington, USA
I’ve skated since before “Popsicle” stick boards were a thing. think late 80s Tony Hawk.
Building the Board
I had to train and build my skills and gear.
Mary Hill History
Maryhill Museum of Art founder Sam Hill was one of the Northwest’s first and most vocal advocates for modern roads. He was president of the Washington State Good Roads Association and spent much of his life championing the importance of highways in the Northwest. In 1913 Sam Hill convinced the Oregon governor and legislature to visit Maryhill and see the 10 miles of demonstration roads he had constructed over the prior four years, at his own expense, as a way to experiment with road building techniques and surfaces.
Things have been quite slow over the past few weeks. Working towards some larger goals and will update when it makes sense in this forum. Dearest reader, thank you for reading the change-log of my life.
Vegetative
I can (not always) tell where I am by what is happening in my garden. It is clear “where” we are in the yearly cycle. It grounds me. And like any garden, you must tend it. Nature will try and take back from you. What looks dead, just maybe dormant, waiting for a signal.
Like a plant, sometimes, you must grow down or around, before you bolt for the heavens. Life cycles of various plants are specialized to their ecosystem and timeline. Sometimes you just have to sit there and wait for an old tree to die, then the canopy opens up.
To grow you need certain environmental inputs like nutrients and temperature. But, I will (try to) end the allegory here.
Notes
Beware what you put in writing; there are lawyers awaiting to nail you
If you have the shot, take it
Listen, really listen
Touch grass (anon)
Bolting
As the vectors start to align, you should work to align the biggest vectors. If you have ever done a free body diagram, this is where we transition to physics. Or maybe like that nerd Ramsey, where he says pay off the biggest debts first…
Free Bodies
These are simplified models of the world, but they provide a valuable thing you can reason about and communicate effectively with other humans. It is a universal diagram.
Stick figures are best. Simple diagrams, simple language. Don’t @ me with your impressive words. I want clear communication and please bend to my level cause I’m trying to LEARN FROM YOU.
If you can remove any “friction” vectors. You will just generally float to where your biggest gazes are.
Summations in the Aggregate
Ruminating on this for a few hours, I came to the conclusion that optics and lenses might make a useful tool to dig deeper in to this phenomenon. It is waves all the way down, so let’s see what wikipedia has for us.
Light moves in a predictable way when it passes through a geometry of a material. We see the three beams coming in on the left side. They exit through the right, slightly deformed. Their angle has changed. And then, they converge to a focal point.
Are you about to burn some ants?
No, but it is excellent question. Magnification is how old?
Few thousand years old. I think this is bullshit, but I will not go on tangent about ancient advanced civilizations. This lens thing is what I’m talking about though. It concentrates energy and steers it towards a point that you can decide and predict.
I am currently shaping and polishing my lens’ so I can get a better understanding of the world. Sometimes the lens or the sensor behind the lens needs adjustment to capture the signal from the noise.
thanks to mr degraq for giving some (excellent) notes on this draft.
CommandPattern.org 
