chucK

Can't you just take a rest on one damn thread? Yes it was in spray, but RuMr's post was serious, and cool. Why you need to drip your crap on it too?

Sunshine Wall and Feathers areas are trashed. Bolts are probably the indirect cause. They have brought hoardes to the area that has beat it down and, with the exception of a few hardy pigeons and aone or two dying sage bushes, cleansed it of non-human life. That sucks sorta. The bright side may be that the concentration of routes there will draw the crowds to one (now "hardened") site. Motorbikes are analogous. As noted, there are plenty of other ares close by for the bikes to ride and have fun. Respecting a wildlife sanctuary is the least they can do, and should do. The desert is a fragile ecosystem. If the numbers of bikers get big, or the few just get more regular, they'll destroy a lot more of the ecosystem than climbers have done.

Nice post man!

type this in: [img=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3013/2329097341_ddc543b093.jpg] to get this The reason northwest's pictures don't show up is because he used the URL's of the pages that contain the pictures. What I have put inside the IMG tag is the URL of the actual picture file (has a .jpg or .gif suffix). That said, some servers don't allow other websites to link directly to their content for posting on other sites. Sometimes they'll insert a different image with some snotty note about "hotlinking is theft of bandwidth". Other times the link just won't work. It appears that Comcast homepages do this now. Suck. Example:

Better be a good article. He lost his job because of it. link

"oops, I meant Mary Ann." "Step out of the car please ma'am."

I brought it in. They couldn't reproduce the sound, but the boot was trashed on the CV joint (Middle Fork Road?). Funny thing is that it was the left joint, not the right one (where I thought I heard the sound). Could be because the parked cars (off which the sound echoes) are on the right??? Anyway. Hopefully that was the problem. Although what they did fix would've probably been a problem eventually anyway. I'll try your guys' diagnostics on it tonight. Thanks again!

practice

Five days in jail for reckless driving! Holy Shit! Dannible, stay away from Idaho. With your luck you'd get life.

Jebus! Talk about a nightmare partner!

Would any of these problems (except for the herpes) be consistent with the fact that when I tapped on the brake the sound went away?

'preciate it fellas

I have a 4WD truck, standard transmission. This morning it started making a rhytmic clacking/thunking noise. AFAICT sounds like from the vicinity of the right-front wheel. Does not make the noise when stopped and gunning the engine. When rolling and noise going, noise does not stop when I put it in neutral and coast. Tapping the brakes DOES seem to interrupt it, sometime for a while. I parked, put it in 4wd, drove for a few yards, then took it out again. It didn't make noise for a while, then it did. Then it stopped again and would make the noise anymore, so I didn't take it in to the shop ("It was making a noise, I swear it!"). Any ideas? Wheel bearing? Brake issue? Would you drive it to Alpental? To Vantage?

Backpacking where? Around here or elsewhwere? The reason this is important is do you have glacier-travel experience/skills. You'll want to learn those before venturing up on Rainier or Baker. Mountaineers is a pretty good way to get started learning about glacier travel. They are very regimented though, so I would say use them as a base for your knowledge and be open to new ideas after you get your grounding there. Better would be if you had a group of experienced friends to instruct you. But chances are if you posting here to a bunch of anonymous strangers, that option is not available.

Climbing is all a contrivance, with various artificial constraints meant to keep the game interesting. Raindawg's usual schtick is to loudly espouse his belief that his version of the rules is best, along with some supporting reasoning. Shouldn't be that big of a deal...until one's heard it a thousand times. Then one tends to get testy. This latest incident has more to do with Raindawg's history than anything he wrote on this thread. Say you were at a party and a similar thing happened. Someone gushed about Beth Rodden or Barack Obama or Radiohead, and then another party-goer, dismissively disagrees with the adulation. Would the whole party start shouting this guy down? Would you be calling this guy a fucking cocksucker and spitting in his face? If yes, then .... nevermind. It's Raindawg's history of being a pest that is bugging people. It's not anything special he says anymore. Why let it ruin your best threads? Why encourage him? Why soil someone's "Go Beth Rodden" thread with a bunch of useless Raindawg hate? If the answer is "because it's fun", then .... nevermind.

We were a party of three. We had gotten up early, super early, mountie early, to get a jump on the crowds and tackle the Grand Wall. Arrived at the base. We were in luck. No one on the wall. No monkeying around with Apron Strings. We scrambled up the bypass. We wanted to bag the route proper. We didn't want to get stuck behind the hordes. As far as I remember, Merci Me went fine. I lead the traverse and short bolt ladder. I must have been slow because another party was catching. Their leader had asked to clip in at the belay atop Merci Me with P1 and P2. The request was refused. Back at the base I had offered P1 the lead of the famous Split Pillar. At the time I thought I was being gracious. Now I was sorta happy, in a bad way, that I had deferred. That pitch was intimidating from below. Loomed straight up. Looked strenuous as hell. Below the looming Pillar P1 also had second thoughts. We went through a Chip and Dale politeness battle. "Perhaps you would prefer to lead this wonderful pitch after all." "Oh no. I couldn't possibly. After all, I had promised it to you." "Oh, I couldn't I would feel absolutely the cad, depriving you of this beauty. You must have it." "Don't be ridiculous my fine fellow, I...." We decided on a coin flip. I'm not sure who won or lost, but fate handed P1 the sharp end. He asked if I'd like to do two out of three. P1 did fine for about 60 feet. Then he got pumped where probably everyone does, and unfortunately went sailing for a 20 foot, headfirst whip. I was not inexperienced, in this sort of thing. Thinking straight would have told me that when someone takes a 20 foot whipper because their hands melt off of a layback, they are NOT going to be revitalized with a short hang and shake out. But the past experiences I was focusing on were those of taking over other people's leads. The lovely task of climbing while toproped by a single placed-while-pumped piece to get to the point where you can transition to the sharp end at the emprically determined crux (so far) of the pitch. I was resisting this duty, and P2 was sure as hell not going to volunteer. He had never wanted to be here in the first place. So we exhorted P1 to rest and give it another go. All this time the Saturday morning Grand Wall conga line was compacting at various belay stations below. A couple on Merci Me, maybe one on Cruel Shoes, with followers. A very cold guy in shorts and t-shirt shivered next to us on the ledge, trying hard to be polite. Well P1 obviously did not complete the climb and after another attempt (with much waiting for everyone below), I took over the lead and got the rope up there. Now I needed to belay the others up. As we were at that point well aware of holding others up I put P1 and P2 both on belay with my ATC. P2 was cruising on up. P1, on the other hand, still not recovered from successive super-pumps ended up hanging again. The astute observer will note that with one climber hanging, an ATC will be locked. Unaware of this phenomenon, P2 had continued climbing until quite upset with the amount of slack in the rope. "Up rope" he called repeatedly, each iteration with increasing venom. We eventually got all of us to the top of the Split. The plug was released. Climbers (more competent than us) were once more free to ascend. The circus was almost over. We had only to endure the indignity of rapping down through those that we had stalled. I'm glad they had no bottles or rotten fruit. Oh no! We were the nightmare newbie plugs on the trade route!

The traffic system is really shaping up. Soon Sonics-related backups will be long gone! If you live right next to the North side of the airport, you'll be able to take mass transit to downtown. What's the traffic like in Beantown?

Big D that is the most words you have posted at one time ever..... I did not even read it....did not have to....I am sure its mostly drivel anyway.....way to go! Pure beauty can come from the most unexpected sources!

You don't think accusing the "far" right of "hijacking" is attacking?

Smaller than the pinky! Cool. Best to think of those little guys as disposable though. Good luck getting them out if they get weighted.

tee hee, that was sorta funny the first couple times somebody posted it

What would be really interesting is if the government used all it's extra-legal new anti-terrorist stuff (maybe a little wiretapping, a dash of torture lite, a little refusal of counsel) to find the culprit and get evidence and a confession. But now the twist in the tale is that turns out to be an insurance scam, so not terrorism. Smart lawyer for wealthy developer/arsonist figures this out in 10 seconds and gets his client off by questioning constitutionality of FBI actions, and it GOES TO THE SUPREME COURT BABY!!!!!!! how will it turn out?

Hey Fairweather is that actionable?! Should the Feds (or Texas State Troopers) take in Rush? (yeah right) Let's hear your outrage Fairweather, man of principle!

Makes it hard to tell who to rant about! Does this mean Rob is an ELF? Oh and by the way, good job guys! I think you have come from behind to overtake the nwhikers.net thread. I knew you could do it.

Guys on nwhikers.net are talking up the insurance scam part more than here. One guy claims only one house has had a bid and that was the only one not torched, plus reports that the company is in financial trouble. Whoever torched the houses is surely to be condemned, but maybe you guys oughta hold off for a little bit before blaming ELF (though ELF do seem to be missing a few screws). Sorry boys, but NWHikers.net is making us look bad on this one in terms of our usual forte (extreme speculation and rants). Billcoe, King County has some fairly restrictive policies regarding land use. Lots of landowners up in arms about it. So I don't know who you're talking about in terms of us folks in Washington. And blaming people for simultaneously encouraging and burning down is inane (hint: There are different opposing groups at play. Some are pro-development, others are against. Usually works that way. It is not one unified entity making contradictory statements.) Or are you accusing the Woodinville City Council of doing the torch job?