On Thu, Mar 5, 2009 at 10:56 AM, Dave Bishop <bishopd_at_jps.net> wrote: > With respect to your last comment, Craig, that ".....an MD.......would > know better than to not wear a life vest." How many well educated, > intellectual, people have you known who were smart in their particular > field, but who seemed to have little or no common sense? More than a > handful, I suspect. > > A long, long time ago I had a motto that went, "one-third of the population are bozos... but we take turns and if you meet me on the day that it's my turn you'll think of me as a bozo forever." This has always seemed to me to be a truism. We all get to make stupid decisions now and then. Of course, some people hog their share but basically no one is a bozo all the time. The trick, of course, is to manage to avoid being a bozo when it really counts. This implies an ability to recognize a situation that really counts. In terms of actually wearing a PFD, how many of us have paddled on a quiet lake with water and air temps both over 80F and either left our PFD on the back deck or behind us in the cockpit? Let me raise a hand here. So I'm not going to be too hard on him...even though the water temps were too cool not to wear a PFD he might have just caught his turn. When I flew airplanes a lot I developed a tactic of consciously thinking that "this flight could kill me... is there anything I've forgotten?" before takeoff. That might be a good tactic for paddlers, too. There's a good lesson in here for all of us. Training, planning, preparation, proper equipment.. all of this can be erased when it's your turn to be a bozo. Craig Jungers Moses Lake, WA *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Thu Mar 05 2009 - 11:11:40 PST
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