It's too true...

http://joannarenteria.com/2011/12/13/i-was-considering-grad-school-and-then-i-saw-this-hilarious/

Nothing like a little reality to make you laugh, then burst into tears because it's too close to real...

Goings on

I'm in Idaho.
Yup, taking advantage of the current shutdown to work on my Paramedic clinical internship.
I'm 109 hours into my 250 hour internship and I'm tired.
That's all for now.

How to Get Flat Abs, Have Amazing Sex and Rule the World in 8 Easy Steps (re-post)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kate-bartolotta/happiness-tips_b_3956114.html

Dangit if this isn't right on...

How to Get Flat Abs, Have Amazing Sex and Rule the World in 8 Easy Steps
Posted: 09/20/2013 3:21 pm

The covers of most men's and women's magazines have similar headlines: "Get Great Abs" and "Have Amazing Sex."

From the looks of it, these two issues have been recycled over and over (with some other stereotypically gender-relevant articles thrown in) on every Men's Health, Maxim, Cosmopolitan and Glamour cover since the dawn of time. In fact, I'd bet that if we could get a better translation of cave drawings, they would read something like "Grok get flat belly. Make girl Grok moan with joy."

And we keep buying them. We keep buying this lie that these things will make us happy. I've had washboard abs (past tense) and I've had some pretty phenomenal sex. Neither one made me a better person. Neither one completed me or made my life more fulfilling.

We chase this idea of "I will be happy when... "

I will be happy when I have a new car. I will be happy when I get married. I will be happy when I get a better job. I will be happy when I lose five pounds. What if instead we choose to be happy -- right now?

If you can read this, your life is pretty awesome.

Setting aside our first-world problems and pettiness, if you are online reading this, you have both electricity and WiFi or access to them. Odds are you are in a shelter of some sort, or on a smart phone (and then kudos to you for reading this on the go). Life might bump and bruise us, it may not always go the way we plan and I know I get frustrated with mine, but here's the thing: You are alive.

Because you are alive, everything is possible. So about those eight tips...

1. Stop believing your bullshit.

All that stuff you tell yourself about how you are a commitment phobe or a coward or lazy or not creative or unlucky? Stop it. It's bullshit, and deep down you know it. We are all insecure 14 year olds at heart. We're all scared. We all have dreams inside of us that we've tucked away because somewhere along the line we tacked on those ideas about who we are that buried that essential brilliant, childlike sense of wonder. The more we stick to these scripts about who we are, the longer we live a fraction of the life we could be living. Let it go. Be who you are beneath the bullshit.

2. Be happy now.

Not because The Secret says so. Not because of some shiny happy Oprah crap. But because we can choose to appreciate what is in our lives instead of being angry or regretful about what we lack. It's a small, significant shift in perspective. It's easier to look at what's wrong or missing in our lives and believe that is the big picture -- but it isn't. We can choose to let the beautiful parts set the tone.

3. Look at the stars.

It won't fix the economy. It won't stop wars. It won't give you flat abs, or better sex or even help you figure out your relationship and what you want to do with your life. But it's important. It helps you remember that you and your problems are both infinitesimally small and conversely, that you are a piece of an amazing and vast universe. I do it daily -- it helps.

4. Let people in.

Truly. Tell people that you trust when you need help, or you're depressed -- or you're happy and you want to share it with them. Acknowledge that you care about them and let yourself feel it. Instead of doing that other thing we sometimes do, which is to play it cool and pretend we only care as much as the other person has admitted to caring, and only open up half way. Go all in -- it's worth it.

5. Stop with the crazy making.

I got to a friend's doorstep the other day, slightly breathless and nearly in tears after getting a little lost, physically and existentially. She asked what was wrong and I started to explain and then stopped myself and admitted, "I'm being stupid and have decided to invent lots of problems in my head." Life is full of obstacles; we don't need to create extra ones. A great corollary to this one is from The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz: Don't take things personally. Most of the time, other people's choices and attitudes have absolutely nothing to do with you. Unless you've been behaving like a jerk, in which case...

6. Learn to apologize.

Not the ridiculous, self-deprecating apologizing for who you are and for existing that some people seem to do (what's up with that, anyway?). The ability to sincerely apologize -- without ever interjecting the word "but" -- is an essential skill for living around other human beings. If you are going to be around other people, eventually you will need to apologize. It's an important practice.

7. Practice gratitude.

Practice it out loud to the people around you. Practice it silently when you bless your food. Practice it often. Gratitude is not a first world only virtue. I saw a photo recently, of a girl in abject poverty, surrounded by filth and destruction. Her face was completely lit up with joy and gratitude as she played with a hula hoop she'd been given. Gratitude is what makes what we have enough. Gratitude is the most basic way to connect with that sense of being an integral part of the vastness of the universe; as I mentioned with looking up at the stars, it's that sense of wonder and humility, contrasted with celebrating our connection to all of life.

8. Be kind.

Kurt Vonnegut said it best (though admittedly, and somewhat ashamedly -- I am not a Vonnegut fan): "There's only one rule that I know of, babies -- 'God damn it, you've got to be kind.'"

Kindness costs us nothing and pays exponential dividends. I can't save the whole world. I can't bring peace to Syria. I can't fix the environment or the health care system, and from the looks of it, I may end up burning my dinner.

But I can be kind.

If the biggest thing we do in life is to extend love and kindness to even one other human being, we have changed the world for the better.

That's a hell of a lot more important than flat abs in my book.

More Funnies 'cause I need them

http://themetapicture.com/things-are-somehow-different-in-canada/
 ah, Canada, how I miss thee...

 http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/11/dogs-dont-understand-basic-concepts.html
 dogs.  dogs moving to a new house.  and cartoons.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1tB0DalWJ0
(mormons have superpowers)

http://www.eharmony.com/dating-advice/about-you/15-reasons-to-date-a-paramedic/
cannot get to this one at work, but seriously need to spread the word

Part-Timers Losing Health Insurance May Want To Thank Their Companies (really? really.)

Part-Timers Losing Health Insurance May Want To Thank Their Companies
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/the-exchange/part-timers-losing-healthcare-insurance-may-want-thank-210354500.html

Interesting article, and a calculator for those who ask, "What will it cost me?"
http://kff.org/interactive/subsidy-calculator/

Things that make me laugh

http://thebloggess.com/2013/09/i-doesnt-take-much-to-make-me-happy/
(BTW, I want one of these heads)

http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2013/08/06/nothing-to-see-here-just-a-cat-dressed-as-a-shark-riding-a-robotic-vacuum-cleaner/
I never get tired of cats riding roombas - particularly when they are dressed as sharks...

The coolest, and scariest thing EVER (and the reason we should CONTINUE COLLECTING LANDSAT!)

http://earthengine.google.org/#intro/LasVegas

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/technology/2013/05/terrifying-fascinating-timelapse-30-years-human-impact-earth-gifs/5540/

Since the 1970s, NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey have been amassing satellite images of every inch of our planet as part of the Landsat program. Over time, the images reveal a record of change: of cities expanding, lakes and forests disappearing, new islands emerging from the sea off the coast of rising Middle East metropolises like Dubai.

If you could thumb through these historic pictures as if in a flip book, they would show stunning change across the earth's surface, in both our natural environments and our man-made ones. Now, the digital equivalent of that experience is possible – three decades of global change as GIF – in a project unveiled today between NASA, the USGS, TIME, Google, and theCREATE Lab at Carnegie Mellon University.

Landsat images taken between 1984 and 2012 have been converted into a seamless, navigable animation built from millions of satellite photos. As Google wrote this morning on its blog: "We believe this is the most comprehensive picture of our changing planet ever made available to the public."

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

REPOSTED FROM: http://www.bspcn.com/2012/02/03/30-things-to-stop-doing-to-yourself/

 

And no, these are not THOSE things (get your mind out of the gutter - OK, mine went there first, too...)

 

30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself

Leave a reply

Written by marcandangel

When you stop chasing the wrong things you give
the right things a chance to catch you.

As Maria Robinson once said, “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”  Nothing could be closer to the truth.  But before you can begin this process of transformation you have to stop doing the things that have been holding you back.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

1. Stop spending time with the wrong people. – Life is too short to spend time with people who suck the happiness out of you.  If someone wants you in their life, they’ll make room for you.  You shouldn’t have to fight for a spot.  Never, ever insist yourself to someone who continuously overlooks your worth.  And remember, it’s not the people that stand by your side when you’re at your best, but the ones who stand beside you when you’re at your worst that are your true friends.
2. Stop running from your problems. – Face them head on.  No, it won’t be easy.  There is no person in the world capable of flawlessly handling every punch thrown at them.  We aren’t supposed to be able to instantly solve problems.  That’s not how we’re made.  In fact, we’re made to get upset, sad, hurt, stumble and fall.  Because that’s the whole purpose of living – to face problems, learn, adapt, and solve them over the course of time.  This is what ultimately molds us into the person we become.
3. Stop lying to yourself. – You can lie to anyone else in the world, but you can’t lie to yourself.  Our lives improve only when we take chances, and the first and most difficult chance we can take is to be honest with ourselves.  Read The Road Less Traveled.
4. Stop putting your own needs on the back burner. – The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone too much, and forgetting that you are special too.  Yes, help others; but help yourself too.  If there was ever a moment to follow your passion and do something that matters to you, that moment is now.
5. Stop trying to be someone you’re not. – One of the greatest challenges in life is being yourself in a world that’s trying to make you likeeveryone else.  Someone will always be prettier, someone will always be smarter, someone will always be younger, but they will never be you.  Don’t change so people will like you.  Be yourself and the right people will love the real you.
6. Stop trying to hold onto the past. – You can’t start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading your last one.
7. Stop being scared to make a mistake. – Doing something and getting it wrong is at least ten times more productive than doing nothing.  Every success has a trail of failures behind it, and every failure is leading towards success.  You end up regretting the things you did NOT do far more than the things you did.
8. Stop berating yourself for old mistakes. – We may love the wrong person and cry about the wrong things, but no matter how things go wrong, one thing is for sure, mistakes help us find the person and things that are right for us.  We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past.  But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.  Every single thing that has ever happened in your life is preparing you for a moment that is yet to come.
9. Stop trying to buy happiness. – Many of the things we desire are expensive.  But the truth is, the things that really satisfy us are totally free – love, laughter and working on our passions.
10. Stop exclusively looking to others for happiness. – If you’re not happy with who you are on the inside, you won’t be happy in a long-term relationship with anyone else either.  You have to create stability in your own life first before you can share it with someone else.  Read Stumbling on Happiness.
11. Stop being idle. – Don’t think too much or you’ll create a problem that wasn’t even there in the first place.  Evaluate situations and take decisive action.  You cannot change what you refuse to confront.  Making progress involves risk.  Period!  You can’t make it to second base with your foot on first.
12. Stop thinking you’re not ready. – Nobody ever feels 100% ready when an opportunity arises.  Because most great opportunities in life force us to grow beyond our comfort zones, which means we won’t feel totally comfortable at first.
13. Stop getting involved in relationships for the wrong reasons. – Relationships must be chosen wisely.  It’s better to be alone than to be in bad company.  There’s no need to rush.  If something is meant to be, it will happen – in the right time, with the right person, and for the best reason. Fall in love when you’re ready, not when you’re lonely.
14. Stop rejecting new relationships just because old ones didn’t work. – In life you’ll realize that there is a purpose for everyone you meet.  Some will test you, some will use you and some will teach you.  But most importantly, some will bring out the best in you.
15. Stop trying to compete against everyone else. – Don’t worry about what others are doing better than you.  Concentrate on beating your own records every day.  Success is a battle between YOU and YOURSELF only.
16. Stop being jealous of others. – Jealousy is the art of counting someone else’s blessings instead of your own.  Ask yourself this:  “What’s something I have that everyone wants?”
17. Stop complaining and feeling sorry for yourself. – Life’s curveballs are thrown for a reason – to shift your path in a direction that is meant for you.  You may not see or understand everything the moment it happens, and it may be tough.  But reflect back on those negative curveballs thrown at you in the past.  You’ll often see that eventually they led you to a better place, person, state of mind, or situation.  So smile!  Let everyone know that today you are a lot stronger than you were yesterday, and you will be.
18. Stop holding grudges. – Don’t live your life with hate in your heart.  You will end up hurting yourself more than the people you hate.  Forgiveness is not saying, “What you did to me is okay.”  It is saying, “I’m not going to let what you did to me ruin my happiness forever.”  Forgiveness is the answer… let go, find peace, liberate yourself!  And remember, forgiveness is not just for other people, it’s for you too.  If you must, forgive yourself, move on and try to do better next time.
19. Stop letting others bring you down to their level. – Refuse to lower your standards to accommodate those who refuse to raise theirs.
20. Stop wasting time explaining yourself to others. – Your friends don’t need it and your enemies won’t believe it anyway.  Just do what you know in your heart is right.
21. Stop doing the same things over and over without taking a break. – The time to take a deep breath is when you don’t have time for it.  If you keep doing what you’re doing, you’ll keep getting what you’re getting.  Sometimes you need to distance yourself to see things clearly.
22. Stop overlooking the beauty of small moments. – Enjoy the little things, because one day you may look back and discover they were the big things.  The best portion of your life will be the small, nameless moments you spend smiling with someone who matters to you.
23. Stop trying to make things perfect. – The real world doesn’t reward perfectionists, it rewards people who get things done.  Read Getting Things Done.
24. Stop following the path of least resistance. – Life is not easy, especially when you plan on achieving something worthwhile.  Don’t take the easy way out.  Do something extraordinary.
25. Stop acting like everything is fine if it isn’t. – It’s okay to fall apart for a little while.  You don’t always have to pretend to be strong, and there is no need to constantly prove that everything is going well.  You shouldn’t be concerned with what other people are thinking either – cry if you need to – it’s healthy to shed your tears.  The sooner you do, the sooner you will be able to smile again.
26. Stop blaming others for your troubles. – The extent to which you can achieve your dreams depends on the extent to which you take responsibility for your life.  When you blame others for what you’re going through, you deny responsibility – you give others power over that part of your life.
27. Stop trying to be everything to everyone. – Doing so is impossible, and trying will only burn you out.  But making one person smile CAN change the world.  Maybe not the whole world, but their world.  So narrow your focus.
28. Stop worrying so much. – Worry will not strip tomorrow of its burdens, it will strip today of its joy.  One way to check if something is worth mulling over is to ask yourself this question: “Will this matter in one year’s time?  Three years?  Five years?”  If not, then it’s not worth worrying about.
29. Stop focusing on what you don’t want to happen. – Focus on what you do want to happen.  Positive thinking is at the forefront of every great success story.  If you awake every morning with the thought that something wonderful will happen in your life today, and you pay close attention, you’ll often find that you’re right.
30. Stop being ungrateful. – No matter how good or bad you have it, wake up each day thankful for your life.  Someone somewhere else is desperately fighting for theirs.  Instead of thinking about what you’re missing, try thinking about what you have that everyone else is missing.

The "new" hospital plan

http://www.livingstonhealthcare.org/

Our new "level 4" hospital...eventually
http://livingstonhealthcare.netreturns.biz/Client_Files/livingstonhealthcare/CM/System/News%20Articles/Plans%20for%20New%20Hospital%20Unveiled.pdf

Alum fire (and others)

This is what I have to look forward to.  Made it through paramedic school, Boston Boot Camp, and flying back home to 16 hour days of work.
Summer in Yellowstone.  Never a dull moment!

Big Fish

Not big news to most, but we have a Lake Trout problem in Yellowstone Lake.
They were introduced and have thrived.  Unfortunately, they eat the Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout.
Lake trout are not a good substitute, as they spawn deep in the lake.  YCT spawn in streams and feed something like 30 species.

So we kill Lake Trout.

200,000 last year, and on track to kill more this year.  Future LiDAR to be flown to find more.

I went out with Jessi on a contract boat in 2010 and we caught a big one:

I thought it was pretty big (about 33 inches, we didn't have a scale).
Then I saw this monster in the daily newsletter:

I need to get back out on the lake.  Soon.

Looking at the past...beer making

So I was sitting around, procrastinating studying looking at Jessi's blog, and realized that her beer posts were awesome.
And how much I miss being her next-door-neighbor.
Hard to believe how 5 miles of visitor-clogged roads can keep you from spending more time with your best buds.

http://ssejig.blogspot.com/2010/06/one-beer-ha-ha-ha.html
http://ssejig.blogspot.com/2010/06/two-beer-recipes-ah-ha-ha.html
http://ssejig.blogspot.com/2010/06/three-beer-recipes-ah-ah-ah.html

Baby rattlers loose in downtown Livingston - 'nuff said

Thursday May 9, 2013
Like Snakes on a Plane, only better. This is one of those “only in Montana” moments!
Baby rattlers loose in downtown Livingston
Published: Wed, 05/08/2013 - 2:02pm | By Rose Brown - Enterprise Staff Writer
One baby rattlesnake has been captured, but there could be 10 or more on the loose in downtown Livingston after
about a dozen others escaped from a cage in the back of a pickup Tuesday afternoon.
The pickup was parked in the alley behind the Whiskey Creek Saloon at 110 N. Main St. around 4 p.m. Tuesday
afternoon when some of the bar’s customers noticed that a couple of snakes had escaped from their cage and were
loose in the back of the truck, said Whiskey Creek bartender Lori Munroe Wednesday morning.
Then one customer spotted a snake that had escaped the truck and a group set out to capture it. Grabbing whatever
tools they could find in their vehicles, they hunted down the rattler and one man pinned the snake’s head down
with a fishing pole. He then picked it up with his hand and put it in a cooler. Later they transferred it to a different
plastic container. The snake was about a foot long, Munroe said.
“It was kind of a show-and-tell day here,” she said about the atmosphere at the bar.
The owner of the truck, who has not been identified, left the scene, but returned an hour later to say that he was
missing a total of 12 snakes, including the one captured, Munroe said.
It’s not clear if the snakes escaped in the downtown area or in other locations, she said, but she and customers
searched the area without finding any of the missing rattlers.
Only the smallest snakes were able to escape because the gauge of the mesh in the cage was wide enough for
them to squeeze through, Munroe said.
The actual explanation for the snakes’ escape is still unknown.
The mesh size of some snake cages will hold adult snakes but not babies, according to local rattlesnake consultant
and enthusiast Michelle Becker.
Becker, who has been capturing and handling rattlesnakes for 23 years, warns the public that baby rattlesnakes
can actually be more dangerous than adult rattlesnakes.
Immature rattlers don’t have the ability to regulate their venom and are inclined to strike and release all of their
venom in one strike, which can be extremely poisonous, Becker said.
Also, they can’t be heard, because their rattles are not developed yet, she said.

Intriguing links from toxicology:

"Under our Skin"  2009 PBS documentary on Lyme disease.  It will open your eyes (1:45 long).
http://www.hulu.com/watch/268761
or
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=2JgR_Jfbhv8

Some great videos by a paramedic friend:

Respiratory System and Pulmonary Edema
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5rhjTeBhsM

The Pump - CHF
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVWdnftP2RU

Electrical Conduction System of the Heart
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bALlIYO6LdA

Pneumothorax
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzIfiU0obKg


NOW SERIOUSLY I am not one of those people who does not believe in vaccinations.  I think people who don't vaccinate are nuts, BUT we can do it more safely.  The mercury-based preservative is the big danger.  Why can't we do better?

Safe Minds - the dangers of mercury
http://www.safeminds.org/

Smart Vax - vaccines and mercury
http://www.smartvax.com/

Google Book - Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic
http://books.google.com/books?id=JlCS2A9WkuoC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

Needing to be better

a better friend
a better student
a better employee

These are things I consciously have to work on.  They do not come naturally.

I am tired of being constantly down, stuck in a hole, struggling to get out.

It was everyone else, you see, that was getting me down.


Truth is I need an attitude adjustment.

And a ladder.

Days like these

Or maybe weeks like these?
It's been a few weeks of ups and downs; feeling good about myself and feeling like crap; considering changes and abandoning them; studying hard and working hard; feeling fulfilled in my work and hating it; and an endless bounty of frustration.
Yep, that's where I am.

What does it take to remove 185 ton dock washed up in a National Park?

Turns out, a lot of work and money.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRHV_Ekc84Q&list=PL8BmI4b96dKbvCW0Z1J0fU_kDIviNqrbZ&index=1

Japanese Dock Removed From Olympic Coastline By Rainey McKenna April 02, 2013

Workers prepare the dock for removal from the park's coastline. NPS photo. A 185-ton dock that washed out to sea during the March 2011 tsunami in Japan has been removed from a wilderness beach within the boundaries of Olympic National Park and the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary. The dock was first sighted by the U.S. Coast Guard on December 18th.  Grounded on a remote stretch of beach, it could only be accessed via a primitive three-mile trail. Removal of the dock was critically important to resource protection goals of both federal agencies.  If left in place, it could have done significant harm to the coastal environment. Most of the volume of the 65-foot long dock was a Styrofoam-type material, which was encased in steel reinforced concrete. “Although the dock stayed in the same general location since its arrival on the beach, there was potential for changing tides and waves to move the dock and batter the coastline,” said Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary Superintendent Carol Bernthal. “The intertidal area of the Olympic Coast is home to the most diverse ecosystem of marine invertebrates and seaweeds on the west coast of North America. By removing the dock, we hope to minimize damage to the coastline and marine habitat.” The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) contracted with the Undersea Company of Port Townsend, Washington, earlier this month to remove the dock. The Undersea Company worked with the both federal agencies, as well as local partners in Washington, to dismantle the dock on site. The dock was sectioned into small pieces, airlifted to an upland landing zone and then trucked offsite for disposal. This was determined to be the safest and most efficient method for removal in light of concern that the dock was no longer seaworthy. "This operation was challenging. Imagine opening up a 185-ton concrete package filled with foam packing peanuts while standing near a helicopter on an extremely remote coastline," said John Nesset, president and CEO of The Undersea Company. "We wouldn't have been successful in removing the dock without the hard work and dedication of everyone involved." The removal effort was supported by many state and federal agencies, including Washington's Marine Debris Task Force, the U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "Removing a piece of marine debris of this magnitude is possible only through the coordinated efforts of many agencies," said Olympic National Park Superintendent Sarah Creachbaum. "Without the support of our state and federal partners, the quick and effective response and removal of the dock from our wilderness coast would not have been possible." The cost for the $628,000 removal effort was paid by NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and the National Park Service and with funds provided to NOAA from the government of Japan to help with cleanup of marine debris from the tsunami. Additional information about marine debris and the dock removal is available on the NOAA Marine Debris Website, http://marinedebris.noaa.gov/tsunamidebris, and Forks Docks Incident Website, http://marinedebris.wa.gov/incidents/ForksDock.html. Photos of the dock are available in the Washington Marine Debris Task Force photo gallery, http://www.flickr.com/photos/ecologywa/sets.  Time-lapse videos of the removal and other videos are posted on the Washington Ecology YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8BmI4b96dKbvCW0Z1J0fU_kDIviNqrbZ.

For you geospatial dorks out there (and everyone else)

Nothing is correct.
Sorry.
GoogleEarth is wrong
Bing is wrong
Tectonic plates are moving
The earth is rotating
NOTHING IS WHERE YOU THINK IT IS!!!!
(did I just blow your mind?)

The following is a long, well-written editorial about why datums are so important.
Enjoy

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nightmare on GIS Street: Accuracy, Datums, and Geospatial Data (editorial)

BY:  ERIC GAKSTATTER

Geospatial Solutions Monthly

05 March 2013

This subject scares me. I’m not a trained geodesist. I’m not a mathematician. Yet, I’d be derelict in my duty if I didn’t write about this subject. I know enough to be dangerous, and enough to know this subject is going to be a nightmare for people managing geospatial databases.

Headache today, nightmare tomorrow

The only reason it’s not a nightmare today is because most of you don’t know it’s even a problem. Or, you know it’s a problem, but let it slide because dealing with it is not easy. It’s going to get worse in the future, much worse. It’s going to get worse because sensors (GPS, GNSS, imagery, etc.) are getting much more accurate. The cost of acquiring high-precision (centimeter-level) data, whether it’s via GNSS, scanning or ?? is falling hard and fast. As I’ve written before, high-precision GNSS receivers are getting much cheaper. Geodata 2.0 is coming, and it is making existing geospatial databases look like my kids’ coloring books.

It reminds me of an experience I had nearly 20 years ago.

I was traveling through the southeastern U.S. demonstrating a new GPS mapping handheld that I helped develop. Mind you, this was in the early days of GPS mapping. WAAS/SBAS didn’t exist, sub-meter receivers didn’t exist, CORS didn’t exist, and real-time corrections were only a dream so almost everyone post-processed using a local base station, if they could find one — and achieving 1-3 meter accuracy was pretty dang good.

I was showing this new GPS mapping receiver to a forestry company that owned a lot of land in the southeast. We traversed a ~40 acre parcel of land, brought it back to the office and post-processed the data against a nearby GPS base station. After post-processing, the data looked very clean and I was eager to see it inserted into the company’s GIS, hoping it would slide into the right spot in the GIS and they would purchase a bunch of GPS units. No dice. When it was inserted into their GIS, the perfectly shaped polygon fit imperfectly into the GIS. It didn’t match up with the orthophotos and it didn’t match up with their existing vector data (point/line/polygon). It was offset enough to make you raise your eyebrows and think to yourself — hmmm, that’s a problem.

Of course, I did my due diligence by checking the integrity of the GPS base station data I used and verified its surveyed antenna location. Everything checked out. I was confident that my data was accurate. I started questioning the GIS manager about the horizontal datum used in their GIS database. It quickly became clear to me that the enterprise GIS database was referenced to something different than the modern horizontal datum of that era. It was also clear that there were varying types of accurate and less accurate data in the GIS. A mish-mash of geographic data with some of it based on the legacy NAD27 horizontal datum that was transformed to NAD83/86 using NADCON or something similar.

After discussing this a bit with the GIS manager, he admitted that my GPS data was likely more accurate than his GIS database, but he was clear that “I’m not going to readjust my entire GIS database for your GPS unit.” My counter-argument that “you’re going to have to do it eventually anyway” was met with “I honestly don’t see this happening anytime soon.”

I may have won the battle, but lost the war.

Later that same year, I had a similar experience in California. A major environmental consulting company wanted to delve into using GPS for mapping. I sent them one of my GPS units to try. After a few days of the company collecting GPS data and post-processing, I got the call.

“Your GPS unit isn’t accurate enough for our work.”

Whaaaat? From the outset, I was clear to them that the GPS unit would deliver accuracy within 1-3 meters, and they stated this was acceptable accuracy to them. I looked at the data. It was clean and point averages were tight. It looked very good. I verified the GPS base station they were using. No problems there.

“What are you comparing the GPS data to?” I asked.

“USGS 7.5’, 1:24,000 scale topo maps,” he replied.

Ruh roh.

Me: Wellllll, you know that USGS 7.5’ topos are referenced to NAD27 and have gross errors up to hundreds of feet in some places, especially rural areas, don’t you?

Him: We’ve used 7.5’ topo maps for many years and feel good about the accuracy they provide. Your GPS data is on the wrong side of the creek.

Me: Hmmm, how about you go occupy a survey mark with known coordinate and compare the GPS data to the survey mark coordinates? That will tell you how accurate the GPS is performing.

Him: We need it to work where we work, and it’s giving us data on the wrong side of the creek. Thanks for your time. Click.

Sigh, lost the battle, and lost the war.

After nearly 25 years in the GPS/GNSS and GIS industries, data mismatch (“my data doesn’t line up”) is still the #1 question I get from people.

The problem is two-fold.

People, even educated geospatial professionals, have a general lack of understanding of the different horizontal datums being used (not to mention vertical datums).

Software vendors (even the major ones), have generally done a poor job of keeping up with modern datum transformations. While most software makes it easy to transform data from one horizontal datum to another, they mostly do it wrong.

The errors can vary from a few centimeters to a few meters to tens of meters. In the world of GPS data collection, the most common datum transformation error is when software considers WGS-84 equivalent to NAD 83 and applies no transformation when, in reality, the difference between the latest version of NAD83 differs from the latest version of WGS-84 by more than a meter in most parts of the USA.

In this day of ever-increasing availability of public GIS data, it’s soooo easy to download an orthphoto (ortho-rectified aerial photograph), or GIS vector data from a public website and import it into your GIS. When importing, you’ll likely be asked to select the horizontal datum and the measurement units of the new data. More than likely, information about the new GIS data (metadata) isn’t readily obvious or available so you make your best guess from the list of choices presented. Is the data referenced to NAD83/86? Is it referenced to NAD83/HARN? Is it referenced to WGS-84? If so, which version of WGS-84? Your selection might significantly affect the accuracy of imported features of your GIS. What if you make the wrong selection with an aerial photo, then months or years later you have someone digitize (heads-up with a mouse) road centerlines, fire hydrants, manhole covers, etc., based on that aerial photo? Any transformation error you introduced when importing the original aerial photo will carry through to the digitized features.

The good news is that GIS software makes it very easy to import raster (images) and vector (points/polylines/polygons) data. That’s also the bad news. With a few clicks of a mouse, your GIS database can be infected with data you think is accurate to a certain level, but it’s really not, maybe due to the way you imported the data. I’m not saying that every piece of data imported into a GIS needs to be a certain (or the same) accuracy level. The problem is if you don’t keep track of the metadata for items that you import into your database, you will quickly lose a grip on the accuracy integrity of your GIS. As GIS data becomes more accurate, as I discussed above, the accuracy disparity among different layers in your GIS will increase. In other words, the problem will become bigger than it is today.

I’ll give you a scenario I’m involved with now that highlights this challenge. I used a pseudo-name for the company and have embellished a bit to emphasize some points, but the basic facts are correct.

ABC Company has tens of thousands of small infrastructure assets in the field across the U.S. It already has the desired location accuracy on some (within 30 cm, or 1 foot) on some of them. For the remaining assets, the company wants to improve the accuracy of the features. To do this, the company plans to use GPS/GNSS receivers to collect position and attribute information on the assets. A second requirement is to deploy GPS/GNSS receivers capable of sub-meter accuracy to navigate back to assets when necessary.

They are now in initial phase of testing various GPS/GNSS receivers.

Their first try was using a handheld GNSS receiver capable of “sub-foot” accuracy and post-processing against GPS CORS. It didn’t take long for them to figure out the workflow was a headache. I agree, the whole GPS post-processing workflow is so last decade (and mind you, I helped design one of the first Windows-based GPS post-processing software programs back in the 1990s).

For the second iteration, the workflow was much smoother. They used a GNSS receiver that utilized real-time WAAS corrections for sub-meter accuracy. The workflow was smooth due to real-time GNSS data being brought directly into ArcGIS Mobile in the field. The problem was accuracy. All of the coordinates collected during the testing were offset to the northwest by about 3 feet. Precision was great, but accuracy was unacceptable. Was it a problem with the GNSS receiver? No. When GPS/GNSS data is shifted consistently in one direction when compared to other data, it is almost always due to a difference in horizontal datums. In this case, it didn’t take long to determine that the difference was data referenced to ITRF (WAAS) vs. NAD83 (basemap). However, we had to do a little more investigation to understand which version of NAD83 was being used in order to find the best horizontal datum transformation choice in ArcGIS Mobile. It wasn’t obvious, not by a long shot. In fact, it was downright cryptic. There wasn’t a datum transformation labeled “WAAS” or anything close to it. As an example, one of the transformation names was cryptically named NAD_1983_To_WGS_1984_5. What does that mean? Which version of NAD83? Which version of WGS-1984? What does _5 mean?

With some investigation and experimenting with different transformation choices, we finally got it dialed in to a reasonable level. Remember, we were only looking for sub-meter accuracy so ~10 cm of datum transformation error here or there wasn’t significant. Even if we didn’t make the perfect transformation choice, we were close enough. However the investigation and experimenting drill was painfully time-consuming (locate a high-integrity survey mark nearby and occupy it), more than it should have been.

The next step, setting up the workflow for the “sub-foot” mapping GPS/GNSS receivers, wasn’t as easy. First of all, instead of using WAAS as a correction source (not accurate enough), they used an RTK network. The network base stations were tied to the latest version of NAD83, which is NAD83/2011. They really wanted to dial in the correct horizontal datum transformation. The challenges were a bit different than testing the datum transformation for the sub-meter equipment. They wanted to dial in the datum transformation as close as possible. Again, the datum transformation selection choices in ArcGIS Mobile were cryptic. But, this wasn’t the only challenge. Since they were using RTK GPS/GNSS receiver capable of 1-2 cm accuracy, errors within the different GIS layers emerged. Some layers were referenced to NAD83/2011, which was perfect, while other layers were referenced to much older versions of NAD83. To the software’s credit, an alarm popped up noting the difference in datums of the older layers, but didn’t give them any guidance as to how they should proceed. In that case, Cancel is the normal response and is what they selected.

After experimenting and testing the different datum transformations in ArcGIS Mobile, they found the one that seemed to produce the best results (confirmed by testing against a high-integrity survey mark). All in all, a very time-consuming process spread out over a few weeks.

A challenge that still remains is “hot-swapping” between using the RTK Network (NAD83/2011) or WAAS (ITRF08) as a source of GPS/GNSS corrections. ArcGIS Mobile doesn’t seem to deal with switching GPS/GNSS incoming datum changes very well on the fly (in the field).

If, after reading the above, you’re confused or feel the need to read it again to understand it, welcome to the club. Plenty of brainpower was spent sorting out this problem and verifying the solution. When your GIS has plenty of slop in it, no worries. When you start dissecting it at the centimeter level, you’ll really be forced to take a microscope to each data layer and all of the sudden metadata becomes very important.

This article is just an introduction to the challenge of dealing with disparate horizontal datums in your GIS. As the programmer for datum transformation at a major GIS software manufacturer said, “We are moving into a new era” in dealing with datum transformations. Although I mention Esri software in this article, other leading software vendors aren’t doing any better. I discussed the issue of supporting the 14-parameter transformation between NAD83/2011 and ITRF08 with another major software vendor late last year. Their CEO’s response? “Yeah, we just had an internal meeting on that and need to support it.” Whaaaat? I wonder how his thousands of users utilizing WAAS as a source of GPS corrections have been  handling this in the past 10 years. Not surprisingly, they aren’t the only major geospatial software that is falling down in this area. More than likely the software you use isn’t handling this correctly.

Lastly, in speaking with Michael Dennis at the U.S. National Geodetic Survey, he said that while the 14-parameter transformation algorithm is important, the step that people are leaving out is reconciling epoch dates of the data. Why is a date stamp of the data important? That’s the focus of my next article on this subject.

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We will miss you, Bob

I considered him a friend, and some of my best days in the field were spent poking around for his sites.  Even when he couldn't manage to walk out with us, Bob would drive down and sit patiently waiting as we crossed the river.  He wanted to be with us every step of the way.

Losing Bob makes me cry, but I will always remember the stories he told and the places we went.

I will find that cabin on the Madison, Bob.  Promise.

Passing Of Bob Flather

http://inside.nps.gov/index.cfm?handler=viewcommunityarticle&type=PeopleNews&id=3865

On behalf of Yellowstone National Park, the staff of the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center (HRC) would like to mark the passing of Robert W. “Bob” Flather  on Sunday, January 27th, in Santa Barbara, California.
Bob was born in 1925 in Nashua, New Hampshire. He and his family relocated to Indiana during his childhood after the decline of the family business, Flather Lathes.  Bob attended Phillip Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. He enrolled in the ROTC when he was in Princeton University and served as an enlisted man with the Marines.  As a Marine, Bob participated in the Pacific invasion of Okinawa in WWII. When he came home from his tour of duty, he enrolled in the electrical engineering master’s program at Stanford University.  After graduation, Bob worked at Hughes Aircraft until Yellowstone called.
Bob started his NPS career in the park in 1971 as a fire guard (today’s wildland fire crew) in the fire cache. He worked as an LE ranger at Old Faithful, starting in 1972.  Bob was on call and responded to the tragic death of Harry Walker in 1972 in the Old Faithful area. In the mid-70s Bob received a Lee Commission.  At that point he started a near ten year run as a backcountry patrol ranger in the Upper Lamar area until 1982.
Bob once said he would have “chucked it all” if he had known about backcountry work in Yellowstone 20 years earlier. His interest in backcountry management was legendary and he was determined to curb the illegal elk antler trade and its associated poaching and trafficking of wildlife parts. He could swear like the ex-Marine he was and hated the notion of resource thefts from national parks. He went to extraordinary effort and sacrifice to protect Yellowstone. He was directly and indirectly responsible for the apprehension and conviction of many resource violators.
Between seasons Bob returned to California for the winter. He pioneered surfing in southern California and, by his own account, was the first person to surf a 14 foot board there. He enjoyed returning to California each winter to surf and play beach volleyball.
In 1982, at age 57, Bob began his volunteer service in the Tower area of the park. He had a brief hiatus from volunteering when he worked in fee collection in the 1990s, but he soon returned to volunteering, this time in the Yellowstone Fire Cache. He helped to pinpoint the locations of several culturally significant backcountry cabins where the cache could focus their efforts in the case of a wildland fire.
Bob’s HRC volunteer career began in 2003 and he came back every summer through 2012. Notable projects with the HRC staff were identifying people and places in the museum’s photo collection, specifically a set of subject specific albums begun as a CCC project and carried through the 50s, and identifying the Bannock Indian Trail. 
Bob’s steel-trap memory and accuracy with dates made him invaluable to staff as well as the many researchers he helped. He will be sorely missed.

Yes, let's cut the National Parks! That will fix everything!

Looming sequestration threatens national parks budget

http://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/looming-sequestration-threatens-national-parks-budget/article_1ea87315-2906-5e92-93d0-45c7cbc3c546.html