I've got some interesting, but not scary (NOW!!!) stories
When I was a kid, growing up in Southern Idaho, I had a morning paper route.
One nice spring morning, I was out delivering the papers when there was this tremendous
green flash and colored streak overhead which disappeared to the west.
I don't remember how long afterward, there was a loud boom like a really close sonic boom,
Kaa-Whump!! Startled me so much I crashed into the curb.
I just sat there and cried for a while.
Somebody came out to get their paper and asked me if I was OK from my crash.
Remember, this was in the "Duck and Cover", Cold War era when we expected the big one any day.
Vietnam was in full swing, and NATO was was running the Reforger war exercises in Germany
Scared them too. They had heard the sonic boom, but not seen the flash.
They called my Mom & Dad to come get me.
Anyway, a couple of days later there is a little note
in the paper about a sizeable metorite that hit about 30 miles west of town.
Wow! Pretty terrifying for a 10 year old Idaho boy.
Second story has even more ominous overtones.
When I was at college in the late 70's, the local ski area offered
night-skiing where the slopes were lit by streetlight type lights.
As I was riding up the chairlift that went up the hill due north, there was a very fast,
very bright light that lit up the whole sky moving from northwest to southeast and went over
the eastern horizon aimed RIGHT AT Mountain Home Air Force Base!! only 25 or so
miles away to the southeast. As it got close to the horizon, it appeared to separate into 3 or 4 individual lights.
The guy I was riding the chairlift with turned to me and told me his name
so that I would know who I was going to die next to.
I told him mine too, and we finished off the wine I had in a bota' bag.
We waited for the sun to rise.......
I figured it was 3 or 4, 25 megaton MIRV's
Obviously, no nuclear detonation, but I was absolutely certain that it was the end.
Can't remember now what we talked about while waiting to get to the top.
Did have a hell of a last run down the hill with all the adrenaline running through my veins.
Next day, the news on TV described a Russian satellite that burned up over Canada.
Due to the elevation and angle, we got to see it in way too much detail without knowing what was going on.
Final story also from college days, more very bad thoughts here.
In May of 1980 my buddy Bruce and I were up in Northern Idaho rock climbing in the Selway-Bitterroot
mountains after finishing up with a grueling finals week. (engineering & chemistry)
Woke up one morning to find this gritty gray "fallout" all over the place, sometimes a quarter inch deep!!
We figured the big one had happened, and we were dead men walking around with the fallout
from what had been Hanford or Fairchild Air Force base, or maybe even Spokane too.
We climbed every nasty pitch we could, not using any ropes or any kind of protection at all.
After two days, we ran out of food and booze, so we went over to Missoula
figuring that would be an OK place to end up dying in, and found out about Mount St. Helen's.
Boy, simply dumb luck that neither of us took any kind of a fall.
I guess it goes to show just what you can do if you honestly believe that nothing will matter.
We climbed a couple pitches that I would have sworn were not climbable by humans.
But in 40+ years in the woods, some of it darned remote,
nothing that could not be explained. YET!
Hope you enjoyed my stories,
When I've got some more time,
I'll write down some of ones that are funny.
Big Mike
