Hiking in the mountains is no escape from the distractions of electronic gadgets. It used to be that you could throw some gear in the back of your truck, roll out into the hills, and completely break out of the buzzing and bleeping grasp of the telephone and the TV for a few days. That was long enough to let the ringing in your head silence out and to get a few coherent thoughts through. Of course for that we would have to go back quite a few years to truly be without portable electronics. For a long time we have had things like radios, video games and now even cell phones that can work way out in the boonies. Now we have GPS, XM radio and satellite phones to keep us wired into the rest of the world from no matter where. For many of us that leaves less willpower to force ourselves to break away from the chatter of the world. You would have to go to great lengths and personal restraint to distance yourself from all the temptations of checking in on your office emails and to hear innovative doublespeak vocabulary terms from our clever political leadership.