Thank You for Paddling

Several years ago a fellow lobbyist, Teresa, encourage me to read the book Thank You for Smoking which was turned into a film this year. Since I thought the book was very entertaining I was anxious to see the film so I caught a matinee today. Overall the film was true to the book as I remember it. Granted this book/film is a comedy but there was an underlying serious discussion regarding what is freedom and what is the proper role of government in our lives. Using my "1 to 5" restaurant review rating system I would give this film a "3.5" due to great lines and the tobacco lobbyist - Nick Naylor - character who was very entertaining.

My idea of freedom and escape from government intrusion is a canoe trip such as my planned September 2006 trip to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) in Northern Minnesota. In an effort to help protect the great outdoors I am a volunteer for the Mississippi River Challenge which had an information booth at today's "Outdoor Adventure Expo" hosted by Midwest Mountaineering in Minneapolis, Minnesota. While promoting the River Challenge at our booth today I met the person in the booth next to ours -- Kate Williams, Executive Director of the Northern Forest Canoe Trail, http://www.northernforestcanoetrail.org , (NFCT) which is based in Vermont. If you live in or are traveling through New England please consider visiting the NFCT.

Until today I had never heard of the NFCT but their organization was formed in 2000 with its primary purpose the management and promotion of the "historic 740 mile waterway through New York, Vermont, Quebec, New Hampshire, and Maine..........." Mrs. Williams told me the NFCT is very similar to Minnesota's own BWCA consisting of various bodies of water connected with portages which is an ideal way to travel via canoe.

Let me close with this haiku inspired by today's Outdoor Adventure Expo:

Lake to Lake Portage
Mother Nature Welcomes Us
Silence is Golden

See you on the water,

Todd