Maybe I’m just thinking about hubris, but I think there’s a better term for this…
Let’s just agree that there are places you shouldn’t take an ordinary road car. And that you can sometimes find one of those places without notice.
This guy’s day probably went from “pretty nice” to “Oh, shit” pretty abruptly.
I actually met this guy, shortly after his little oopsie. He’d already called for help, and really really didn’t want to talk about…
…how he screwed up and made Greta Thunberg cry.
They say that Louis XIV had the inscription Ultima Ratio Regum cast into all the cannon of the French Army. It means “The Ultimate Argument of Kings,” and that always struck me as one of the most honest and up-front things any ruler or would-be ruler ever said. “We can dress it up prettier than this, but when it comes down to the unvarnished truth this is what it’s about: You’ll do as I say or I’ll send my goons to kill you.”
I thought about that for a long time. If there’s an ultimate argument, it seems only logical that there must be an ultimate answer. For years I thought the ultimate answer must be the bullets in my rifle, but it never seemed quite right. I’ve got bullets – he’s got frigging Cannon Balls. I mean, if there were three hundred million rifles throwing bullets at him, then maybe. But we all know that’s not going to happen. So if there’s an ultimate answer to his ultimate argument, it sure as hell ain’t bullets.
It finally came to me – and that’s when I abandoned the city and most of my stuff, and gave all that was behind me a good stiff Randian Shrug.
The ultimate answer to kings is not a bullet, but a belly laugh.
Little Bear 2009-2018
Laddie the Amazing Torso Boy 2011-2020
"Freedom Outlaw. It’s not what you do; it’s how you do it. It’s an attitude — from which actions always follow. It’s a do-it-yourself occupation. And a lifetime vocation."
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I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite.
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"If every Jewish and anti-Nazi family in Germany had owned a Mauser rifle and twenty rounds of ammunition and the will to use it, Adolf Hitler would be a little-known footnote to the history of the Weimar Republic."
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"You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs." The sophistry of villains - Bah!
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I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself
A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself.
- D. H. Lawrence
Aristippus passed Diogenes as he was washing lentils.
He said, “If you could but learn to flatter the king, you would not have to live on lentils.”
Diogenes said, “And if you could learn to live on lentils, you would not have to flatter the king.”
Sandy Hook was a Gun Free Zone. So was the Westroads Mall. And the Aurora Theater. And Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Should I go on? They were all Gun Free Zones.
– Reality
“Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”
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"Civilization is the process of setting man free from men."
- Ayn Rand
If ever a man should ask you
For your business or your name
Tell him to go and fuck himself
Tell his friends to do the same.
For a man who'd trade his liberty
For a safe and dreamless sleep
Doesn't deserve the both of them
And neither shall he keep.
- Frank Turner
Don't be afraid to try something big, just because you're an amateur. The Ark was built by amateurs. The Titanic was built by professionals.
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We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.
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The free man will ask neither what his country can do for him nor what he can do for his country.
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“We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.”
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There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.
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John Moses Browning - The most badass Mormon who ever lived.
"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are 'I'm from the government, and I'm here to help.'"
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The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose.
- James A. Baldwin
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Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master.
- Sallust
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- Lazarus Long
Read, every day, something no one else is reading.
Think, every day, something no one else is thinking.
Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do.
It is bad for the mind to continually be part of unanimity.
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-Frederick Douglass
ESSE QUAM VIDERI –
To be, rather than to seem
– Marcus Tullius Cicero
“A Winchester rifle should have a place of honor in every black home, and it should be used for that protection which the law refuses to give.”
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Do what thy manhood bid thee do; from none but self expect applause.
He noblest lives and noblest dies, who makes and keeps his self made laws
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Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
– Winston Churchill
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― Father Alfred d’Souza
What’s the word for when you overestimate your capabilities?
A learning opportunity. Or, the last thing you ever did.
An ordinary road car will go a lot more places than anyone would think. Just look at the vehicles used in over-land exploring back in the 1930s.
The biggest factor is not the vehicle’s capability but the skill set of the guy behind the steering wheel and the equipment he has to get out of any messes he gets into.
I’m curious, what kind of car was this person driving and what did he do?
It was a little Toyota, and he didn’t notice that little washout until he was into it and jouncing onto the rocks. Tore out his oil pan, from the looks of the spill.
As Dirty Harry sez, “A man has to know his limitations”.
Sadly, most drivers nowadays go down the road with zero situational awareness, likely zoned out on the radio or cell phone.
I’m with Mike on this. I have taken 1960’s and 1970’s station wagons (heavy tanks) down many a dirt road or logging path without getting into trouble, but it takes full attention to the path and judicious avoidance of obstacles,
Even drove across SW England on sheep paths (they are marked on Ordnance Survey maps as viable roads, the operational word is “barely”.. The sheep have the right of way too.
Same as you Terrapod, Big wagons, I love and use to take them hunting and fishing out of the way places in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Northern California and never had problems because of situational awareness. Now, I have dug many approaches and inclines by hand so I could continue or remove myself from areas.
“didn’t notice that little washout until he was into it and jouncing onto the rocks”
It sounds like he forgot the first rule of driving on back roads: “When you are on unfamiliar terrain in an area you don’t know, the first step is to slow down and give yourself more time to react.” I think that if the guy drove to his abilities and focused on what he was doing, he would have been fine.
“Driving to one’s abilities” requires “knowing one’s limitations” . . . and accepting them. 😉