ScottP

Crossing the summit plateau on Baker with my partner in a near white-out (maybe 10 of vis) with howling winds, I'm spacing out on the sastrugi and tinkling of ice crystals when all of a sudden a field mouse goes running past my boots. My partner says, "Hey! Did you see that!?" "Yeah." "Man, I thought I was hallucinating." We figure the mouse is miles from anything green and will surely die, so we make an effort to catch it. After a few minutes we give up and as we turn to begin heading to the summit, we see a couple of guys standing at the edge of visibility watching us. As we straighten up to proceed, they turn and walk off into the wind and snow. I can only imagine what they were thinking watching two figures dancing around on all fours on the summit plateau of Mt Baker.

A few years back I skied and climbed up Aasgard. On the return trip (below the outcrop mid way down and center in the picture), we came across the top of a slide that was 2 feet deep and probably 40-50 meters wide at the top end. We had skied up the center of it, before it slid, that morning. I think the picture shows a sluff at about the same spot.

Claudetooleystooleyschooleydoggydooleyvictorooleydrooley.(Claude for short) Each one of them had a meaning, but I sure as hell didn't bother memorizing them, except for Claude which stemmed from accidently breaking something with a big pair of boots.

5.8 hands/fists/chimney thrutchfest Ughhh!!! I remember it being kind of fun, but truthfully, I don't remember the grade. (It was 5.9 with a pack?)

WA Pass-5th pitch of Liberty Crack Darrington-3rd pitch of Ginsu Index-Godzilla Leavenworth-The Bone

"That's right wankers, I'm just about all tapped out. If anyone is interested in my password to carry the flame, let me know and we can discuss terms."

and then he drank a glass of his own piss. As did John Lennon, Jim Morrison, Keith Richards and Steve McQueen

Hey, not bad, but there a few too many lines and you need to work on the rhyme scheme a bit. Don't get me wrong, it's got promise.

There once was a man named Ray Who beat off in a fistfull of clay But the heat of his prick Turned the clay into brick And ripped half his four inches away.

When asked what he thought of western civilization, Mahatma Gandhi responded, "I think it would be a good idea."

Is there a driving range nearby?

It is if it's got his prehensile tail.

"What a stupid thread."

Dude, you forgot the

It's Pat!

I'm sorry: The LAST thing SCW needs is a rap route. If you can't get up, or off a low angle, 600 foot crag in a day, you probably shouldn't be up there. As for the erosion perpetuation argument, almost 40 years of walk-off descents has made how much of an impact?

On lead, by hand. With that said, learn as much as you can. and then learn some more.

It does feel good to clear some of the cobwebs.

Good luck Dog.

Common understanding: Ratings are largely subjective i.e. existing only in the someone's mind i.e. opinion The more people supplying ratings (major increase in climbing population in the last decade), the more variation in opinion. i.e. the wider the range of ratings for a comparative type of climbing. Finis: Yosemite Ratings? Go to Tahquitz, where the YDS got its start, and climb those routes as a baseline. Then go to the Valley to get the a, b, c, d subset. Anything else is conjecture. Best comment yet.

Yeah, there's that famous picture of a guy about to get his brains blown away in Life Magazine. The officer was South Vietnamese and the prisoner was a traitor. But it kind of goes to show you, "what goes around comes around". The pic

It's now a wine tasting room.

12 to 24 hours is how long it takes for a tick to start feeding after it takes hold. Once it starts to feed, the bacteria can be transferred.

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