Gary_Yngve

Yeah, guess I'm a top-stepping weenie. I'm comfortable tensioning with the fifi through the gear placement, but having to tension with the fifi through the daisy scares me.

Here's a few: Gary leading the Lithuanian Lip. Ania jugging past the Lithuanian Lip. Ania at the hook move on pitch 3. The hammered-in nut on pitch 3. The copperhead with a tied cable. Gary stemming on pitch 6. Inverted cam left by a previous party. We cleaned it [and it held body-weight] -- it's pretty mangled. Crowded belay higher up. Shadow of the Early Winter Spires.

Josh, I need to call you on this one. Swapping (when you don't have enough RAM) is slow. At least 1000 times slower than using RAM. So a harddrive that's twice as fast is still going to swap really slowly. If you're worried about swapping, the real answer is to get more RAM. My laptop has 1G of RAM (I do development on it), and it is probably the most crucial piece of hardware in it (I could get by with lesser HD or CPU).

It all depends what you're doing on the laptop, as well as how old the batteries are. If I dim the screen and don't do anything too harddrive- and CPU-intensive, I could probably get four hours on one battery, but usually it's 2-3 hours.

The same Republican goons who are trying to trash Kerry's military record now are the same ones who trashed McCain in the Republican primaries and who trashed Max Cleland (double-leg amputee Vietnam vet from GA) in his Senate campaign. I have absolutely no respect for those Republican goons.

Ramuta did a good job on my shoes. Got a rand replaced last year. My other rand is pretty shot this year. Luckily I'm going out of town next week, so I have an excuse to send it in for repair. I tend to blow out the rands before the soles... If you know folks who climb at VW, they can drop your shoes off at VW for Ramuta (maybe same deal at SG?)... turn-around time is a week or two, depending on exactly when you drop stuff off and pick stuff up.

Looks like a Reverso. Which reminds me of an important lesson I learned the other day... make sure your ATC isn't in the wrong place when you go to sit down on a ledge.

And how many more cals for shivering through the cold, unplanned bivy?

Mussorgsky !

BE SILENT oh yee of tender years and little fat. I've had the calorie conversation with many of my climbing partners, and I think they were all in the context of, "I'm morbidly curious how many calories I burned, because I don't think there's any way I can eat enough in a day to replace them."

Dru, I wasn't following your e=mc^2 suggestion. My math was calculating the potential energy of an 80kg mass at a height of 2500 meters. If you could measure weight lost that was independent of hydration, you could potentially do some calculation with the calories per gram of glycogen or something. Dangit, I have a picture somewhere of a kangaroo on a treadmill wearing a gasmask so that researchers can measure its CO2 output... but I can't find it.

From what I remember about the 2nd pitch, there was a small ledge up and left of a bolt, and from standing on that ledge, I was able to reach the next bolt. The bolt was significantly further apart from the previous bolt than any other adjacent bolts in the bolt ladder. The hook move is on the 3rd pitch, and the hole certainly is enhanced...

I've wondered about this too. Comparing weights won't work because most of the weight loss is loss of water. Assuming we were 100% efficient, it would require 80kg * 10 m/s^2 * 2500 m = 2*10^6 J for an 80kg person to ascend 2500 meters.* Convert the joules to kilocals, and it's under 500 Calories. The way biomechanists measure calories burned is by measuring CO2 emissions from respiration, which isn't practical to do with climbers. btw - check out the latest Natl Geo... article on why Americans are so fat, and an article about a sick icecap traverse in southern Patagonia. Rowing, climbing, rappelling with sleds down icecliffs... took them around 50 days. * Assume a spherical cow.

Liberty Crack is turning into the cc.com flava of da month! Ania and I climbed it in a day yesterday. Only piece of beta I can think of is that there's a creaky flake between the 2nd and 3rd bolt from the top of pitch 2. You can't reach the next bolt by high-stepping, so you need to bust a free move or use a hook. When I slowly weighted a hook behind that flake, it creaked. If you were to fully weight the hook or yard on the flake during a free move, it would probably blow. Regarding Clint's topo, his ratings are different from Beckey's and Nelson's ratings... maybe Clint is rating the pitches as if they were in Yosemite? Some of the pitches felt stout for the grade on Clint's topo. (Or maybe my internal ratings are skewed, having just come back from three days in Squamish?)

Sweet! I'll have to remember that about Rampart Lakes. Last time I was up there was in December, and the water wasn't exactly warm... I love the airy ridge going up Alta!

Great Northern Slab is a perfect place to start. Google for Clint Cummins and you can find scanned topos for GNS.

What song is that? I'm notoriously inept at recalling song lyrics.

Does that mean Nature is a MILF?

Rapping off of Split Pillar, I pulled the ropes, and as they whizzed down, they nailed my wrist, leaving a heart-shaped burn.

I don't remember anyone knocking off any shit from Angel's Crest. Maybe it happened before we got there. Or maybe it was the dudes behind us who didn't feel like waiting and rapped off. Wednesday we did have a little mishap with a nectarine.

The Grover pictures crack me up! Nice job!

Climb: Squamish-Angel's Crest, Split Pillar, Ultimate Everything Date of Climb: 7/28/2004 Trip Report: Scott Whitomb wanted to go to Squamish for his first time and was looking for a partner. Not scared off by the first impression I gave him over a year ago (an embarassing episode at Smith), he called me back when I sent him an email, "Angel's Crest makes me horny. Call me." This would be Scott's first time in Squamish, and my first time with a partner who could swing leads. After some home-cooked Thai at my apartment, we were off to the Great White North. We were wishing for some heavy firepower at the border when we saw jackasses who didn't want to wait in line like the rest of us cutting through the Nexus line and then idiots who didn't know how to drive letting them in. But soon enough we were across, and we pulled into the campground a little after dark. We got a late start the next day, not expecting many crowds, as it was Monday. Boy, were we wrong. At least seven people ahead of us on Angel's Crest. The party right in front of us was a friendly group of three from Seattle (shoutout to BJ, Jen, and Lonnie -- thanks for the ), who were cruising -- for the first few pitches, they were having to wait behind the party of two in front of them. When a stuck rope cost them some time and gave the party of two ahead of them a little extra room, they offered to let us pass. Anyway, the route was great, and next time we'll need to check out the 10b offwidth and the 10b/c crack on the higher pitches. The second day we got a late start and headed to the Grand Wall. Saw some folks on the Black Dyke who were drilling and drilling... and running into some loose rock. Heard a blood-curdling five-second-long shriek, "ROOOOOOOOOOOCK!" followed by the sound of boulders crashing into the talus below. We climbed Split Pillar via Merci Me (scrambled up the Flake -- long line for Apron Strings). We let some locals who looked fast and had done the route before jump ahead of us. Merci Me was fun -- if I hadn't done a lot of stuff at Darrington last year, it probably would have messed with my head. Split Pillar is fabulous... burly, not many good rests. I should have just powered through the thin part at the bottom instead of burning energy trying to place extra pro. We had thought about checking out the Sword, but after getting worked on the Split Pillar (I was a dumbass and had a thrutchfest in the final chimney), we rapped down. We then met up with Becca, who was enjoying life as a climbing bum and was looking for some partners. Scott then impressively led Exasperator as a single pitch -- quite exasperating, given how the rock was baking under the afternoon heat. Scott and I were both tired, but Becca offered to lead Seasoned in the Sun. We couldn't refuse the opportunity to TR it. Fun climb. The third day we decided to get an early start for a change. 7 AM we were at the base of Diedre, with no one at all above us. Hallelujah! Climbed Diedre in three pitches with a bit of simuling, got to the Squamish Buttress trail by a route that I'd describe as 5.3 with a move of aid (we weren't looking too hard for Boomstick Crack). Found the start to Ultimate Everything without too much trouble. The route was a blast, with interesting and varied climbing. Because the route tends to have a hard pitch followed by an easier pitch, we led in blocks of two, which seemed like an enjoyable way to do it. Aside from the occasional climbing past a bolt we didn't see and the accidental linkup of two pitches with a bit of simuling, routefinding was pretty straight-forward -- good job to the folks who put up the route and made the topo! The 10b finish is stellar, and we'd recommend that to anyone over the 5.9 A0 finish. We climbed the route entirely in the shade, which was a real treat. I got all sorts of weird looks as I ran down the trail (in my sandals) like a bewildered banshee because the black-bean burritos I ate the night before were begging to be paroled. I picked up a pair of those sweet striped longjohns at Valhalla Pure. The woman at the register had a hard time believing that I wanted them for myself. The drive back was uneventful, though we had probably about a half-an-hour wait for the crossing (driving back later may have meant a faster crossing, but it would have meant that we would have been driving back in the dark). The border guard was way cool though: "Where have you guys been?" <We get all big-eyed and simultaneously say, "Squamish!"> "Climbers, right on!" <He peeks into the back of our truck and sees gear strewn everywhere.> "Welcome back!" <and he waves us through> Approach Notes: The trail with the rock cairn goes up to the Sheriff's Badge. The next trail up the road goes to Angel's Crest. You can still take the Sheriff's Badge trail to Angel's Crest, though it's not as pleasant. Seemed like everyone was falling for it (approaching Angel's Crest via Sheriff's Badge). The new Bourdon book is far superior to the McLean book for identifying trails and routes.

Rex and Gary, The experiment was a repeat of the very old Eotvos experiment. The purpose was to look for non-1/r^2 dependence of gravity. I think this is the experiment that Rex was referring to, which I don't think was next to Prusik Peak. There may have been more than one experiment of this type at Index. The two people involved were Paul Boynton and Eric Adelberger. I think the experiments were quite a while ago - more than 10 years ago. Their results were null, meaning that gravity did indeed behave as 1/r^2 within the limits of experimental error. I would contact Adelberger if you are really interested. The exisitence of the tunnel is due to testing of a hydraulic boring machine built by Flow Industries in Kent. Such machines were used to bore the "Chunnel" between England and France. You could probably do an INSPEC or Google search on Adelberger and Boynton's names to see what they published on this. Bob On Mon, 26 Jul 2004, Rex Andrew wrote: > Hi Gary > > I actually don't know. Probably gravitation. I believe there > was an experiment quite a few years ago adjacent to Prusik > peak to try to detect the influence of gravity of a large > object (i.e., a mountain.) > > I've forwarded this important email to Bob Odom here at the > lab who is our expert liaison between APL and UW/physics. > Bob is also a top-notch rock climber. > > Bob: Gary is the president of the UW climbing club. Therefore, > this is clearly a pressing matter of high importance. Thanks > for any insight you can lend us! > > -rex > > On Sun, 25 > Jul > 2004, Gary David Yngve wrote: > > > > > Hi Rex, > > > > I was wondering if you knew anything about the tunnel at Index or know > > someone that does. I know the UW folks do some sort of crazy physics > > research in there, but I talked to a buddy of mine who just got his PhD > > from UW Physics and he hadn't heard of it, so maybe it's the APL > > folks? Just curious what kind of cool stuff is going on in there... some > > sort of gravitation experiment or something? > > > > Thanks, > > Gary

Yay! Now I have a transription of the cello solo and piano accompaniment for the Touching the Void theme! Too bad it's in F minor... that's a tricky key.

He did have some interesting stuff to say about NUSEL in Cashmere: Impact on the environment and the locals will basically be just during construction. Afterward the facility will be a boon to the local economy because of researchers living fulltime in Leavenworth. Because of issues with having to ventilate exhaust, no gas-powered vehicles can drive into the facility -- there will be electric-powered shuttles. The facility will not be used solely for physics research. Hydrologists may want to study water seepage through the bedrock. Biologists may want to study how certain species adapt to low light. And it's funny how they clean the neutrino-detection facility in Japan. They drain the water chamber and some dudes in an inflatable raft scrub the photoreceptors at water level. Then they raise the water level to the height of the next ring of photoreceptors, and so on.