Date: 2010-05-15
From: Damascus

To: Damascus
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: few clouds

15 May 2010, Damascus   I went to the fire department for the chicken BBQ but did not see any thru hikers there so I did not bother going in. I just ended up walking around town and socializing.   I ran into Charlie in town today. He said he was in Atkins but was getting off the trail now. He had a heart bypass last fall and he explained that he was having trouble on the uphill¢s now and needed to get it looked at. He also said if it was as easy as getting a stint put in than he would get back on the trail.   I came back to the room and we filled 100 water balloons to get ready for the parade. At 1:30 I grabbed my water gun and three bags of balloons and headed for the parade line up area. In the past years the parade always seemed to be organized so the thru hikers were lined up in a progressive order. The current thru hikers were always in the lead followed by the lastst years thru hikers and then on. This year¢s parade was no organization from anything that we could tell. Everyone was just all thrown in together. It was more like a big mob walking down Main Street. At the start there were not many water guns or balloons being thrown at us but that changed as soon as we turned onto the main drag. That was when we all got bombarded. We were prepared through. I had bought some water guns and attached our water bladders to them. I had a three liter water bladder on my gun, I had plenty of water. We also had plenty of water balloons. We had a lot of fun with the kids on the sides of the road that were trying to soak us; we returned fire and double teamed them. I had a great time. I look forward to coming back next year. In the past I have never marched in the parade. Anyone can march in the parade but I choose not to. It is my personal opinion that I felt that I should be a thru hiker, current year thru hiker or a section hiker that had completed the trail to march in the parade. This is just my personal opinion but not what is required.   After the parade I went back to the room and cleaned up and went back to the park for food and the hiker talent show. I had never been able to do that in the past because I was always in a vendor¢s booth. It was really nice to be able to enjoy everything from a thru hikers perspective this year.   I went to the Billville Useless gear contest in the evening and entered my useless gear entry into the contest. It was an AT guidebook that was written on a toilet paper roll. I gave my little explanation about leave no trace and the layout and design.My presentation went something like this.   We are working on a new line for a guidebook. I am here to show and explain the proto type.   We are calling this new book Ass Pages. As hikers knows, that if you can find a piece of gear that has multi purposes then you will help eliminate excess gear and lighten your load.   This is what we have done with Ass Pages. We have now created a piece of gear that serves two purposes.   The first purpose of course is a guidebook. I don¢t think I need to explain the purpose and need of having a good guidebook. So I will move on to the secondary feature.   As you can see here I have what looks like a roll of toilet paper.   We have designed this roll to work as we think most hikers would use it. We are still open to suggestions so if anyone has any ideas or suggestion please send them to attention@asspages.com.   As you see as you open the roll we have what looks like guidebook pages. That¢s because they are guidebook pages. Now remember this is the proto type, we have not come up with the technology of how to print on toilet paper sheets yet but we are working on it.   We have design this so that each page covers two sheets of toilet paper.   Keep in mind now that one page covers two sheets of toilet paper. Each page covers 20 miles of the Appalachian Trail. This gives you enough to take one crap a day if you cover 20 miles. The reason we did this was to give you encouragement to pick up miles right off the start. If you cannot do 20 miles right from that start then you will learn real quickly that you better pick up pace or you will be carrying around the used pages of your guidebook and that will not be pretty. I took first place. I was very surprised. I had entered the contests in the past but had never won. Next year I will have to come up with another entry. I don't know if I can top this year¢s entry though.