Baboons are typically ornery creatures, fighting a lot, fiercely competing amongst eachother, and raiding other groups. A study in the Masai Mara of Kenya however, showed that when the most aggressive males of a particular troop were coincidentally killed off by tuberculosis, the remaining troop members (including new males who arrived later) evolved a more relaxed and pacific culture that persisted even 20 years later with mostly new individuals. Pretty fascinating.

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Just got back from an amazing trip into Canyon de Chelley, in the Navajo Nation with Charles. It's an incredibly beautiful canyon that is usually impossible to hike into due to the restrictions put on outsiders by its Navajo caretakers. Nonetheless we got lucky and were invited in by some friends.

Among the highlights were the most amazing petroglyphs I've ever seen, the most interesting of which depict Spanish conquistadors on horseback.

We also turned traditional cuisine on it's head by created an extradorinary, groundbreaking camp food concept - the unthinkable burrito - featuring chedder cheese, granny smith apples, italian salami, and canned herring with jalapenos. Yep, that's right. It was delicious.

There's a really long article in today's New York Times which basically attempts to describe and respond to just about every current trend and force in the physical shaping of America today. Check it out. My favorite quote concerns "living in the cultural shadow of golf" - "The perfect human being, defined by golf, is competitive and success-oriented, yet calm and neat while casually dressed"