Bug

What can I say. I'm a happy guy.

Your snowcave should come with instructions but as a general rule of thumb, one skipole basket vent hole per person and one per stove. two people and one stove = three vent holes. This is conservative. I have usually had one vent hole in a cave and cooked in the opening. If you are spending a lot of time melting water etc, you might want to add ventilation.

There is also the fact that by having the floor of the sleeping area a little higher than the top of the opening, you will trap the warmer air and stay much warmer than in a pit or horizontal hollow. It always puzzles me that so few snow caves I see out there are made this way. Eskimoes used this practice with their igloos. The caves I have made this way were dripping wet in the morning. So you also have to make the roof as smooth as possible and have drainage ditches around the outside of the sleeping area. Also, make at least one high vent hole with a ski pole and poke it open a few times during the night. Pile the packs in front of the door. Erect a pillar or cone immediately in front of the opening as far away as the opening is wide and the same diameter. The area around the pillar will remain clear of blowing snow. One candle will light up the cave like a lamp and a stove will require extra ventilation.

dude. i hope you left the windows cracked a little and some water. The windows fell out long ago.

On the other hand, not getting in any climbing can be unsafe. After a long weekend of my wife and kids in Icicle canyon I left them in the van watching Snow White while I free soloed the R&D route. That was much safer than driving home without having climbed anything. Yes honey. No honey. OK honey. See you in a few honey.

I know I am getting off topic a little here but there are a few off hand comments made above that kind of threw me. First, I offer a discaimer, I have been backpacking in winter conditions since I was 5 yrs old. That's forty years. When I am preparing for any trip, I am assessing which gear I will need, and how prepared my partner will be, or wether or not I know, or that I am on my own. I pack with complete confidence that I have everything I will need for the given undertaking. I have it down. And about 1/4 of the time I forget something important. Shit. That always hurts my pride. OK so now what. Well I stopped in Gold Bar and bought a vinyl rain coat once. Another time I left the empty fuel bottle and stove in the car and dug under the seats until I found a couple extra water bottles. My wife is always after me to clean the car but SEE, I have a purpose for my methods. And then there was the time I forgot my sleeping bag and didn't know it until I was at the bivy. (OK. Drugs were involved). But did I stop what I was doing? Would it have only taken one more thing to cause me to turn around? Or, to be exact, How much tenacity am I capable of mustering and will it be enough to keep me alive? This is a huge question that overrides a lot of missing gear. Otherwise known as "the will to survive". Read 'Desperate Journeys and Abandoned Souls'. It is an anthology of TRUE ship wreck stories from as far back as the editor could find. Some are from the 1300's. Why do some people survive where others died? To ruin the ending for you, it boils down to the underlying will to survive. Dane's boulder is one thing. An objective danger on Rainier took Willi Unsoeld after he had survived a tentless bivy at 27000 on Everest. But "How many people would have survived the North Face?" is my point? Or the North Ridge of Stuart, or Liberty Ridge when the shit hits the fan. (By the way, Line your pack with a plastic garbage sack. It weighs an ounce and saves pounds of water weight and your shit stays dry. If you forget your raincoat, cut arm holes and you have a life saver.) The human body can take incredible abuse. The mind can be a different story. Sometimes, the slightest thing can put you in an off mood. Maybe the partner you thought you liked turns out to be like Capt Caveman. Or you invite me by one of my other avatars (sucker). So there you are in the mountains you love with an asshole, two gear items short of a good setup, one bad bean burrito bursting in your gut and your partner is absolutely adamant that you will forge onward. It's his car. Are you screwed? Or will you have a good time - all be it, an epic? What you do with your mind will a bigger determining factor than most missing gear items. (OK I drove back from Index once and got my climbing shoes off the kitchen table).

Hopefully, your hubby can walk? Or do we need to ask how the fire started? no longer an issue Oops!

Hopefully, your hubby can walk? Or do we need to ask how the fire started?

at least i didn't have to work today....fun in the rain and sun at disVantage.... You too will be old and responsible some day. And I will be retired and climbing every day. Great TR guys. My favorite route in WA.

When I "Yo Dude " someone for doing something bold, it is because I have been there and felt very alive and incredibly free. Hearing someone else's account puts me back there for a fleeting moment and I have to smile. When someone dies and the shit flies, it is inevitable that someone out there would have done it differently and can tell that at a glance. That they are brash and disrespectful is not a good thing but to rehash a worthwhile point most certainly is. If the style of it stirs you to think about it more, then you are all the more edified by the encounter. As we explore this medium and define our social norms, we will find ourselves changing. That can only happen if we step outside of "acceptable" boundaries now and then. Experiment. We do need to change or find a new planet. Beem me up.

Yeah. Party if I die in the mountains. Chances are better that I will die on 405 on my way home. THAT would suck. Of course, I do not WANT to die in the mountains because then my wife would stand over my grave and say "I told you so." Only my friends would know that I had lived a good life. But if I had a choice, and I guess I do but we could all live in Oklahoma too, I would rather die in bed having climbed everything my body was able to, right up to the last day it was able to. And while I am laying there in bed dying and my wife asks me what I would like her to tell our children, I will say "Climb hard. Breathe deep. Dive into a high lake and dry off in the sun. It doesn't get any better than that."

Or, is it that the media we are communicating on has a tendency to make our words abstractions that do not readily connect to a human and therefore are more acceptable to attack?

your girls will admire whom ever they admire... that is not the point. The point is that britney Madonna and Tori are shoved down our throtes by the media.... frankly I think Steph Davis is a far better climber, more beautiful and more interesting... but I am 31 not 7 So is it Tori you are down on or the media? Do you watch TV etc? I am just curious where you are coming from. Do you promote getting rid of media? Cutting kids off from it? Partially? etc. no... I don't watch t.v I don't have one. No I don't promote cutting your children off from anything.... life is all about balence. I never once said there was ANYTHING inhaerntly WRONG with yoiur kids admiring tori. I just think there are better more interesting WOMEN to admire... but again... I am a 31 year old woman... not a kid. your girls will like who they like and do what works for them... my only sugestion would be to balence that with introducing them to admirable people who touch your everyday normal life OK. What's your address? Just kidding. Good response.

your girls will admire whom ever they admire... that is not the point. The point is that britney Madonna and Tori are shoved down our throtes by the media.... frankly I think Steph Davis is a far better climber, more beautiful and more interesting... but I am 31 not 7 So is it Tori you are down on or the media? Do you watch TV etc? I am just curious where you are coming from. Do you promote getting rid of media? Cutting kids off from it? Partially? etc.

Lambone, I answered your question then moved on. Didn't make that clear. Sorry. Special Ed, maybe if my little girls weren't the best humans to hit the planet this century I wouldn't be so biased. But from a totally different angle, I have to say that anything that promotes an activity increases the voting block that will help ensure the long term survival of the requisite resources. Muffy, who do you think little girls should look up to?

Re-read her email. Your answer is in there. What I don't know is bigger than what I do but when my girls see other people doing things, they want to get involved "because everybody else is doing it". They own several Barbies apiece. Makeup and sexy clothes are in high demand (they are 5 and 7). So if you think I am going to discourage them from fawning over Tori, I have to doubt that you have any idea what it's like to raise girls today. But you are still entitled to your opinion regardless of what it is based on.

Hype is out there all over everything. She is probably mostly climbing and letting her agent handle the hype. Why not let it be for something like climbing? What is the "bad" that is going to come out of it? I am confused about where the anger is coming from.

Olivia was my first. She is seven now and born 10 yrs and seven hours after my stepson Drew who is 17. Drew is not interested in climbing at all. Meredith is 5 almost 6. To say they climb is a stretch but they climb better than most kids their age. They are trusting of the rope but still do not like to get too high. Olivia often proposes climbing to the top of various mountains but her stamina is not quite there. Meredith would prefer to be carried but is getting too big for me to carry her far. It is a good workout tho. We spend a lot of time together and we are very close. Nothing has ever given me this much satisfaction. Having kids changed my perspective on climbing a lot. I initially dropped out of climbing just due to time limits. It has taken me a long time to get back into serious climbing because I have more incentive to be absolutely sure that my systems are bomb-proof. At the same time, my edge is gone and I have a lot of doubts about perfectly good systems and placements. That got a lot better this year as I climbed a lot more than previous years since Olivia was born. I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel and expect to be in good form next year. Not back to where I was before kids, but back to where I can climb challenging routes and not be worried about dying and leaving behind two kids. When I went to Denali two years ago, I was considering soloing the cutoff to the Rib. In previous years, I know it would not have been a question or even much of an exertion. With kids, I did not do it and ended up not summiting. It was a good trip and my kids still have a father. When I go back next year or next year.... I will be better prepared for the phsycological impacts.

yeah no shit! such a nuissance. too bad i love the little monster so much That was the part I was not prepared for.

1973 or 74. Alpine, Camlocks never "worked like tri-cams". I know.... They were supposed to. But they were one of the most dangerous gimmics to ever be put on the shelves. They slipped out of any camming situation with any force not pefectly aligned. I still have one that I carry sometimes as a leave piece. But I would only use it like a static stopper, wedged in tight.

I emailed Tori to get her take on things. I am very impressed. Here is her response. Hello, Thanks for thinking of letting me respond to the questions. The problem is that I have found that no matter how much I say the truth, people want to believe the worst-maybe it makes them feel better about their own lives, maybe they just don't like to see others succeed or be happy, maybe they have just never learned that if you can't say somethng nice don't say it at all...whatever it is, I have decided to let others live their lives and if they want to use their time trying to live mine too, all I can hope is that they will eventually meet me and will find something positive to take away from the experience. As for why I climb, I just plain love it. That is it. There is nothing more or less. Yes, I win and get money, that is cool. I lose too but I would climb even if I lost all the time. As for my parents, my "career" is really not easy on my family and we'd be a lot better off if I was a normal teen. My mom is a full time student getting certified to be a high school teacher and she is a full time substitute teacher too. She is a mom to me and my brother who is a normal teen and my french"sister" for the year. My dad owns two small businesses and tries to really be there for my brother. so he doesn' t feel short changed due to my crazy life and schedule. They have a life that invovles a lot more important things than just "being famous" or having a daughter who is. Anyone who ACTUALLY knows them (funny how many forum people say they know my parents but don't) can tell you that they are completely laid back and totally indifferent to my climbing decisions. My parents are currently planning their life around the day when my brother goes to college and they can go back overseas and work helping people there(in si x years). Why would people who live their life serving others all of a sudden become money hungry, fame seeking, kid pushing, psychos? It doesn't make sense. They are the last people to care about the things climbing has brought me. They just want me to grow up to be a good person-and honestly, from what they have seen and experienced in the climbing world, I doubt they would consider climbers to be "good" people at the moment. The funny thing about the opportunities that climbing has brought me is that I have gotten mostly opportunities to speak to youth across the nation and just be a role model. I am very proud of that. I am honored that people outside of climbing see the kind of person I try to be and they encourage me to keep on striving to be that person. My goals in life are so much bigger than climbing. I want to go to college and be an advocate for the rights of young female athletes and be a teacher and a wife and mother and coach and, and, and....I wish people out there criticizing me would use their energy to go and do something good for someone who needs encouragement or a helping hand or kind word. Imagine if all that negative energy was put to a positive use. Then climbers would really have good reputations. Unfortunately, as long as climbers sit around and criticize kids and do drugs and complain...then they will continue to not be respected by the mainstream world. I kind of think that is the point, though, they don't want to be mainstream and that is why they criticize me. Sorry to go on so long, It was so kind of you to ask for my perspective. I hope your little girls grow up to be their own heroes- confident, happy, strong, dedicated, and smart no matter what they do in life. Sincerely, Tori Allen

There may be three stages of hex design then. Because I have a solid #11 and a drilled #11. The drilled one is clearly thinner walled. It also has a asymetrical hex (to enhance "camming" but it cams like a cantelope)whereas the old hex is symetrical . So maybe that is why there used to be only three ways to place a hex.

Escorted the larvae to Evans lk. Burned many small sticks in the stove but no fire resulted as the wood was all wet. Threw rocks at fish. Yelled at echo repeatedly. Introduced the larvae to bushwhacking in devils club. They liked it. Must be hereditary. 5 yr old sunk to her knees in bog mud. Returned to bank with minimal whining. Still insisted on "leading". Star gymnist too. I see a ropegun in my future. Maybe two.

Are these custom drilled or were they commercially available at one time? If custom, how does one know whether strength is compromised? I do know that many structures can have material removed with almost no compromise on strength. One example is aluminum booms on sailboats. An aerospace engineer friend cut out panels from the side of the boom on his San Juan 30 and claimed it was actually stronger. I had to take his word for it. They were factory drilled. At the time, you could get a template for the drill holes but I didn't trust myself to do it right. I still have a solid 11 hex. Don't cross me.