Wisconsin sits smack on the agonic line, so over most of it magnetic north IS true north - oh, wait, was I supposed to keep that secret from the uninitiated?
Nevermind…
Pffft, thats nothing. My friends dad lives at 11,480 feet in Evergreen, Colorado. He has the most amazing views from his back porch that you will ever see!
On the Western Plains of New South Wales, there are places where it’s so flat that spilled water will run four directions at once. One of the towns out there has an old pile of dirt and rocks on the edge of town. It’s large in area, but is only two or three feet high. Locals call it “The Hill”.
techchick, others may think you’re silly, but you do have a point. I don’t think that 3,360 feet even qualifies as “high altitude” on the Pillsbury cake mix box! (IIRC, the cut-off is 3,600 feet, but I’m not quite sure.) If it doesn’t impress Pillsbury in Minneapolis at approx. 100 ft., it’s just not impressive.
However, “the world” does live at low latitudes. Why else is the boiling point generally expressed as 212 degrees Fahrenheit or 100 degrees Celsius? You, techchick, know that water boils much sooner than that! Why doesn’t Pillsbury market their cake mixes with special “low altitude” directions? Why aren’t there tennis balls and “low altitude” tennis balls? Why would businessmen stop in the small Montana cafe where my mother worked as a teenager and order “three-minute” eggs? She’d ask, “Are you sure?” and try to explain, but they’d insist–and then later complain about the nasty, runny, undercooked mess they got. Face it, their order was probably fine most anywhere else they went! Can you buy a five-minute “egg timer”? Well, can you? Some people live in high altitudes, and that is fine, but the majority live in low altitudes, and the majority rules, I’m afraid.
Are you sure that you were supposed to be “impressed” with 3,360 ft.? Perhaps they were just stating it as fact. Maybe it’s a selling point–“Wow, I can ski there and not fear altitude sickness or undercooked soft-boiled eggs!” Oh, and being from Wisconsin enhances your ability to drink and to bowl. This effect is stronger the closer you get to Milwaukee. If someone who calls a drinking fountain a “bubbler” asks you to bowl, watch out!
That explains so much.
You said it.
Meredith Small was just on NPR reviewing recent theories that the reason human’s brains developed to be such an advanced state is that as they migrated, they tended to populate the areas around the oceans and ate a shitload of fish with those important fatty acids. So yeah, lots of people have always lived at sea level, and we might even feel some gratitude that they did so we can find our ass with two hands.
Now, of course, having acheived our big brains across the species, I guess it doesn’t matter where we live. Most assuring since I grew up in a landlocked state and abhor all fish and seafood.
But that said, I guess I am not permanently on your loser list because I’m a low lander. My relatives live in Colorado and on one of our trip there we tried to go to Pike’s Peak. My uncle saw I had signs of altitude sickness and they had to get me down. Now, when I fly to Denver or Albuquerque, it takes me a couple of days to get myself feeling okay. The rest of my family was fine. It’s just me.
I’m not arguing that 3,600 is high altutide. I’m just raising my hand and putting myself in the wimp category.
That would make more sense if I have accurately typed that I am NOW on the loser list. as opposed to NOT on the loser list. Talk about a typo changing the fundamental meaning…
Okay, this thread is cracking me up…God what a pitiful rant I have eh? Not my best but better than what I have posted in the past, this is progress?
Anyhow, here’s the scoop:
Billy Rubin – God you are hiliarious, even enjoyed the email from you!
yosemitebabe – Umm, you are one of the few that I could call a soul sister…you know altitude and you know that it’s better than marshmellows in a smore. 
tomndebb – Giggles abound, God now wouldn’t that be embarassing…but what exactly would the hieght in feet be anyway? Mount Everest? LOL
GingerOfTheNorth – well you are north of me and you are on a mountain, you are one cool chick…besides I knew that anyway. See you in chat baby, and hugs to you. It doesn’t take hieght or latitude (or is that longitude) hell I am just a 'tude…to be my friend.
stormy652 – Um stormy, if memory serves me correctly, Evergreen is NOT at 11,000 or even close to that. That’s just outside of Denver and I don’t imagine that’s it’s much more than 8,000 feet. Alma is, if I remember correctly, is the highest town in Colorado (just west, south west of Evergreen) and is just above the 11,000 mark. I could be wrong but I have been to Evergreen many a times and I don’t think it’s that high.
Tamex – if Pillsbury says it aint so then it aint so, I am at high altitude baby! < giggle > I had a major giggle over that!
Miller – Yep, you know it
RickJay – I did, and I realize it was a stupid rant but oh, the knowing it was stupid is enough for me. Not my typical rant but hey we all gotta bitch once in a while?
CrankyAsAnOldMan – Eh don’t worry about it, my best friend who lives at high altitude has high altitude headaches when she goes back home for a day (in Denver) to visit her parents. I don’t think you or anyone is a loser, I just had a panty up my ass for a sec for calling 3600 feet to be high altitude. Eh, if you are ever up here again, look me up I will take you for a cup of water (sorry, altitude sickness and alcohol or caffiene are serious issues…not something to play with if you are succeptable to altitude sickness. You can become gravely ill.) I just had to laugh at the show.
Anyhow, this was probably my best Pit Rant ever, filled with whining, comedy and drama. There aint a show on TV that can beat that.
I still think ya low landers (except you Wisconsinites) are big bunch of wusses though. 
< okay, where’s my Bloody Mary? >
Hey TechChick68
I have been thinking of opening a MPSIMS about altitude. I live at 11,200’. Have for 10 years. 3,360’ ooohhh they must be getting nosebleeds. I’m surprised it wasn’t something like 3362.48’.
Your favorite ski area wouldn’t be Breckenridge would it? The base is at 9600’.
14,110 feet, actually. (I once rode a Yamaha 650 to the top, BTW. Felt dizzy up there.) Mt. Whitney in California, tallest point in the 48 contiguous states, is only 14,495 feet high.
Thus endeth the geography lesson.
3,360 meters would be 11,020 feet.
3,630 meters is a respectable, but not ostentatious, 11,909 feet.
Sorry. Didn’t realize this thread had rolled to a new page.
(Nor that I had mis-typed the figure. Gee, I ought to go get drunk to justify these posts.)
I don’t want to alarm anyone but I believe that tomndebb making a dumb mistake is one of the signs of the Apocalypse…
Okay, so most posters seem to agree that Wisconsinites are born with a second liver? So why is our school ranked as only the #9 party school in the nation? My theory–most of the schools above us are in warm climates. We may have to tone down our drinking in the winter months, because we have to fear death by exposure should we pass out.
enipla – Yep it is, it’s my second home (or was till my father sold the house up there.)
And jab – you are completely correct, it is 14,110 feet, still pretty darn high.
Now, in my days of smoking pot, oh man, what a buzz you could get at the Pikes Peak Hill Climb. I remember my last Hill Climb and WOW was I one messed up woman! LOL between the beer and the pot and lack of sleep with little oxygen, I was a cheap date.
Makes me wish I had been there.