mattp

Yes, Capp, I climbed your buttress. As I said, I climbed both that one and the one to the right, in the 1980's. I climbed the main one first exiting via the obvious escape gully that you avoided, and a second time I climbed the "rib between the gullies" and then hopped over to the left to finish at the summit. Look at the photo above: the central buttress is the one that is left of center in this view, with the left hand buttress as your pal Rat notes ending at the tower just on the edge of the frame. There are actually at least six or seven distinct buttresses on that wall. I have an aerial shot that I'll see about uploading so you can take a look.

Pardon my error, Peter. As you and I and everybody else who has been paying attention knows, we are talking about a reported attempt to purchase Uranium. That is the allegation that the President made more than once. It was untrue. The White House had been told to take it out of his speeches. They did not. That is what this whole debate is about. Not whether Wilson was recommended by his wife, or whether his report was tanked or whether he conclusively proved anything. At least as early as January, the White House has acknowledged that they had been told to take it out of the State of the Union Speech and they have apologized for "those sixteen words." Any attempt to focus on whether Wilson was inaccurate, or whatever other smoke you are trying to blow is just that: dodge and weave. Have a nice day.

Dodge and weave. HELLO! Jay,Puget. Consider this: Nobody is saying that Wilson was incorrect. Nobody. There never was any attempted Uranium purchase. And this: Wilson says he concluded that there had been no Uranium purchase. We haven't read the report, but apparently it has been dissected and misrepresented a bit. For example, it was reported in the Post that it said the Iraqi's tried to purchase uraniium in 1998, but it actually said it had been the Iranians. If the conclusions or teh specific words of that report are important in this debate why isn't it published? And this: The White House has acknowedged that the President continued to make the charges about the Uranium purchase after they were told it was, at best, questionnable. Remember their rationale: it was ONLY 16 words? And this: In all of the smoke, even your fantastic editorial admists that the Valerie Plame leak, whether first published by Armitage or not, actually originated in the White house at a time when they were in fact talking about how to discredit Wilson. Remember the Memo? I ask again: do you think Wilson should not have spoken out? And I'll ask: Do you think his wife deserved to be outed? Do you think the White House had nothing to do with it?

"Liar" would be closer to the mark than "apologist." Wilson did pretty much debunk the Niger Uranium story and, although his report may not have been circulated to the Whitehouse, they received a phone call and a memo from Tenet, the Director of the CIA, asking them to remove the matter from the President's speeches because it was probably false. Our man Bush continued to make the charge. The OpEd is not apologizing for anything, it is actively trying to deceive the reader. Were you, Jay, actually convinced - at any time - that Wilson should not have brought his knowledge that the President lied about the Uranium to the public eye?

Sadly, someone might read Jay's editorial and find it convincing.

Right on, gents. Nooksack Tower is just plain gorgeous and also one of the hardest summits to obtain in the State, as well as attached to what is probably THE quintessential Cascade peak. This is one of my favorite Cascade climbs - all things considered. From what I've gathered, you made a good move heading right to the "strenuous cracks" instead of taking the tempting cracks heading up and left on that "headwall." You didn't need those crampons anyway.

Chuck's picture shows the first two pitches of Safe Sex (pretty close, anyway), and this variant as well as the original start of Dreamer both start at the base of the Botany 101 dihedral just to the right of the lowest red dot in this photo. You will have a hard time missing this spot if you aim for it. The best approach is to scramble up bushy flakes to reach that location from below and right as opposed to what most parties do, which is to follow an obvious dihedral that leads more directly to the base of the Botany 101 dihedral, reaching it from the left, and which causes most climbers to get a little scared and break out the rope in an awkward spot. I'd recommend starting as shown here, on Safe Sex, or starting 150 feet - 200 feet lower and to the left where you may want to start with "Dreamer Direct" and "Urban Bypass" to reach the 4th pitch of the original Dreamer. Of the available options, I'd say the original pitches 1 and 2 of Dreamer are the least attractive.

It goes all the way to the very top. article about President Bush's sense of humor

Why is the world so cruel? The Bugs are twelve hours' drive from here.

Aha. Thanks, Ross. Good rock the whole way?

According to their webpage: Oregon: Kellie Rice Portland, OR kellie_rice _at_ beavton.K12.or _dot_us Oregon - West Tony Holmes Welches, OR nwwilderness _at_ aol _dot_ com

Furry Pink is on the W. Face of Snowpatch, somewhere on the wall below the left-hand summit as shown in this photo:

The Furry Pink Arete seems to be getting some attention lately, and your pictures look pretty good. How was it?

If you think he's a bonehead, Fox, and if that makes you disinclined to discuss this issue with him, simply ignore the discussion. Maybe this is a tired old topic for many of you. Fine. But maybe there are one or two people around here who might actually like to discuss it. Why not let them? Maybe there is nothing wrong with a thread where everybody tries to one-up each other with new ways to bash each other. There are certainly plenty of them, and lots of you folks enjoy it all. Maybe this is and should be "one of those threads." Maybe not. Maybe it was nothing but a troll in the first place. If so, I still say: why not let somebody take a stab at the matter?

Oh gosh. I'm so confused. You mean Rove is a bad guy after all? And Corn even said so? Fairweather: Help! I peed on myself and now it seems you didn't have your facts straight after all, nor did I. Any advice? How do I get the stain out?

He said "not to worry." I think he's a really nice guy, and very sincere.

Thanks for the warning. I called him to apologize for maligning him, and he said not to worry - then invited me to a little barbeque at his place.

Fairweather, if you scroll back through some old threads you'll see many places where I've admitted making incorrect assumptions or factual errors. The above excerpt includes a clear admission that prior assumptions were wrong, but if it will make you feel better I'll roll on the ground and pee on myself. I feel so small about having been so terribly wrong. Rove is really a very nice guy and I've misunderstood him all these years.

The Nation

It seemed to me that it was one of those awkward 5.9 cracks that you really were not at all likely to fall out of so much as struggle a bit to make upward progress. I am no off width expert nor a particularly bold leader and I didn't have any trouble leading it without any extra large gear.

What I think he said is that with the relatively low angle nature of the offiwith, the fact that it is in a corner, and with the existence of face holds, it is not as hard and scary as advertised. If you've recently lead a real 5.9 offwidth like the last pitch of GM at Index, you will laugh your way up it without having to bring along a #5 to slide up above you. Otherwise, borrow the #5.

You don't necessarily need a new device for skinnier ropes. If your rappel device doesn't create enough friction, you can run the rope around your leg, with or without a keeper biner on the front of your harness, and depending on how you rig it you can get as much friction as you want. Alternatively and maybe in addition, I find that using a 24" sewn runner on my rappel loop of the harness, so the rappel rig is high enough that I use my guide hand below the friction device, also contributes to easier control.

Yes, there was a reason for all the warnings about this particular malevolent flake.

In the case of the rope eating flake on pitch four of Dreamer, paying attention and trying to pull the ropes back out has failed many parties in the past -- it is not visually obvious before you toss your ropes unless you know about it in advance and that is why so many people warn of it here and in guidebooks. By now, however, it may have eaten enough ropes that the jaws of hell are clogged.

Yes, you should bring two ropes -- though I know people have made it with just one. I usually rappel via Safe Sex because it avoids the rope eating flake below the diagonal pitch four of the original Dreamer route and the additional sometimes troubling flakes on the Blue Crack pitch (pitch six), but getting over to Safe Sex from the upper rappel at pitch eight of the original Dreamer route is a bit of a pain and there are some bushes to contend with when you rap pitch four of Safe Sex. It is possible to walk off the back and make one or two short rappels with a single rope, but this is a nuisance. There is also a reported descent route down the crest of the buttress, north of The Fast Lane, but I have not verified this. Supposedly, it involves a couple of shortish rappels, but is much more efficient than rappeling the ascent route.