Gary_Yngve

It's not quite that easy. I'd have to take a late evening bus/train Thurs night, as opposed to Fri morn. And then I'd be stuck without a car in B'Ham trying to find a place to sleep and trying to figure out transportation to WWU at midnight. I'm not too concerned about going up there Fri morning and being without a car because then I'd be able to hook up with the other WFR folks. Andrew Cull is teaching it.

10 years old and bouldering that hard? that can't possibly be good on the connective tissues of someone still growing

If you purchased a Barryvox since August, you might have a model that could develop cracks in the casing, allowing moisture to seep in. Any older Barryvox (i.e. you didn't get a CDROM with it) is fine. Any Barryvox with a sticker "New Casing" on the box is fine. The following link has more: http://www.barryvox.com/productfamily/mammut/downloads/recallbarryvox_information_e.pdf

I have an S400 too. Low battery life is an issue, though Lithium-Ion batteries fare better than others. One time I might have had moisture freeze in the mechanical parts covering the lens. No problems with Compact Flash. In Winter, I keep my camera in a pocket of my jacket or in my sleeping bag. If my batteries are almost zonked and need a little extra zing for that one last picture, I'll stow the batteries in my underwear.

Any Seattlites doing WFR in BHam this weekend? I had plans to carpool and share food/lodging, but it turns out I may need to resort to backup plans. Would be great if I don't have to rent a car for 10 days.

Also important to remember that narcotics are inappropriate in cases of head trauma because they depress the CNS and slow breathing, which will already be slowed from the brain injury.

Climb: Maple Pass- Date of Climb: 12/5/2004 Trip Report: Nine of us ventured up to Maple Pass on Sunday, expecting this past weekend to be the last weekend that SR-20 would be open. As usual, we had plenty of good food, including hot tea, homemade brownies, and homemade apple pie. We encountered over a foot of fresh, but not quite as much beneath it as we hoped -- some of the steeper runs had the occasional rock jutting out. The most excitement came from descending the narrow steep switchbacking trail. We'd gain tons of speed on the straights and then have to pull super-sharp turns with shrubs and rocks on either side. Aside from a few sexy battle scars on our skiis, we all emerged at the parking lot unharmed.

I bought a GoLite 6-month-night for cheap, and I really like it. It doesn't pack down well, but I'm usually not too concerned about volume. It's super-warm -- I bivied in the jacket a few times this summer. I've also layered it over my old-and-not-so-puffy down bag when it's been really cold or when my down bag was soaked.

You're thinking of gifts in terms of utility. You should also be thinking about gifts in terms of romantic / sentimental value.

I go to Turns All Year. They have all the weather info hooked up.

Thanks to everyone who came, and to Steve, for doing an awesome show. I don't know the numbers yet, but we raised a few thousand dollars!

You'd think that would work that way. As it is right now, if someone goes bouldering and hurts themselves, they cannot sue the university because they weren't on a Climbing Club trip. But if they hurt themselves while using equipment owned by the university, all of a sudden the university is open to frivolous lawsuits. The UWCC just received a donation of 10 avalanche beacons. We're renting them out for free to anyone on campus, not just UWCC members. It would be so convenient to have them in the gear room, where we actually have a place to store them and a budget for someone to check them out, but no, the IMA won't touch them with a stick-clip. So we have to store them in our desk drawers and handle all the logistics ourselves. Then there's the fucking Daily. They could write incredible articles on the club, on Steve Swenson UW Alum, on EXTREEM things we're doing , on evalanches (and what the club is doing to make people safer)... but they're too busy writing lame articles on fashion and frat parties to care. I was talking to a gal last night who was a journalism major as one of her majors, and she said that they told her that she couldn't write for The Daily because she wrote too well.

The correct answer is to fund research for a better nonlethal weapon to replace stunguns.

If I didn't have to keep using them, I'd consider fucking them over. But I do, so I can't. This all wouldn't be bothering me as much if it weren't also compounded with the stress of dealing with Sandi at the IMA. She's one of those bureaucrats who wants to do things the same way they've done things for the past 20 years because change requires work. When I approach her and suggest that we do something racy, such as buy a new piece of gear for the club, she starts making up excuses and lies, and I have to disprove them one by one until she cannot think of any others. "Why should we buy a big bouldering pad? We don't carry them now." "That's because bouldering wasn't a hot sport 20 years ago." "Aren't they dangerous?" [This is the worst question, because I really want to answer it, "They're not any more dangerous than this piece of gear currently in the gearroom," but if I do that, we could lose that piece of gear...] "Does REI rent bouldering pads?" "No, but these other stores do." "Send me the weblink for the bouldering pad." "Here." "I lost it. Send again." "Here." "We don't want this pad. You can't carry it like a backpack." "It is designed to be carried on the back." "Where can we buy it?" "We can buy it online at the weblink I gave you." "I can't use the University credit card online." "Yes you can. In our dept, we use ours online all the time." "Well, the gearroom is too messy now. You need to clean it up before I'll buy it. Work with Cory on that." [When I forwarded this to Aaron, he was mightily offended, because he works the gearroom, and according to him, it's immaculate. He knows he's been the best worker at the gear room in the past few years.] And she's firing Aaron, who's working in the gear room because he's doing his job too well and he listens to me. That's right, the new person in the gearroom next quarter will be someone with less competence, and I can't find out who, because Sandi won't tell me. Maybe she's not telling me for a reason -- she knows she needs to brainwash them with the IMA Way before I have a chance to push my agenda.

Bookstore contacts me regarding getting a room for a show. They tell me that the author can do Jan 25 (through the publicist as the middleman). So I go to HUBRES, they tell me it's available, and I request a reservation. I then tell the Bookstore that we're good, and the info gets relayed to the author. Then I get an email from HUBRES that we don't have the spot -- it's taken. So I have to go through the chain again and tell them we don't have a room. Then I go to HUBRES to complain. They tell me that it's their "policy" to have reservations be tentative because they might have had older reservations that have been sitting gathering dust and haven't been processed yet. So I asked to reserve all evenings in the HUB for the two weeks around Jan 25 so that when I heard back from our speaker, I could have a guaranteed reservation and I could cancel the rest. They wouldn't let me do that. So I tried to explain to them the concept of race conditions and mutual exclusion and suggested a protocol to them so they could do their job better. They really didn't like that. Unfortunately, the University has a monopoly on room rentals, and they have no desire to make themselves more customer-friendly. And, there is nothing I can do about it to change it. Grrrrr.

An apology by BMFF could be libellous toward Mr. Bertulis. BMFF needs to tread lightly.

There are graceful ways for Mr. Bertulis to handle these matters if he were simply unaware of the otherwise existence of the film. It's not uncommon in technical fields to do research, only to discover after getting it published, that your results were indeed published in an obscure conference by others. But I don't know both sides of the story. As for BMFF's position. If they're getting shit from both parties, then they're going to take the least inflammatory course of action, which will likely involve a lot of keeping their mouths shut.

If I may, Let me expound some more on CAI's community-based effort. The CAI folks meet with the local leaders. They use local labor and local materials. They build according to the community's principles and the community's schedule. Let's contrast this to "We're going to invade and do stuff our way and set some firm date for elections regardless of the fact that the locals are mad and some are rebelling." Ironically, because of their efforts to work with the local communities (and win their trust), they cannot get any federal funding. Similarly, and sadly, after 9-11, hundreds of Americans wrote to CAI, calling them traitors. In the meantime, the CAI has received the blessings of the Ayotollahs in Iran and other Muslim clerics for their charity work. And the CAI's work is not without potential controversy. They require at least a minimum percentage enrollment of women in the schools that they build. Yet CAI's work has been well-received in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. I'm a big believer that education is the key to a freer and safer society, and that CAI is doing far more to making the world safer from terrorists than our current administration. (Sorry, this is my personal political opinion.) Anyway, this is a really good cause, and I hope you can make it to the show. Or if you can't, you can still donate some money to them. http://www.ikat.org/donations.html

Anyone know anyone who lives a few blocks from Schultzy's?

Ryan got a great pic of me lazing around up there.

I'm sorry to hear about your loss. Would you care to expound more on the fun times you've shared with him or his untimely exit? It might help with your grieving, and knowing how close and interconnected the climbing community tends to be, maybe others could share with you their experiences with Jim.

Personally, liquid-fuel stoves scare me in a tent. First there's priming it, which in my opinion, needs to be done outside or in a pit dug deep in the vestibule. Then there's the issue of water/soup falling on the flame and flaring it up. I have no problems cooking with a canister stove in the tent. But my own protocol is I cook on my sleeping pad and I keep a hand on either the pot or the stove most of the time. I believe Colin has stories to tell about holes burnt through their sleeping pads on their winter ascent of JBerg from stoves tipping.

NO If the number of voters who intended for their ballotw to count towards Rossi is greater than the number of voters who intended for their ballots to count towards Gregoire, then Dino won. But what we have now is a machine interpretation of voters' intents. And machines aren't perfect.

Thurs Dec 2, 7:30 PM, UW HUB Auditorium. $5 min donation. Steve Swenson will be giving a slideshow on his latest Himalayan efforts. He's soloed Everest without oxygen and summited K2 in the '90s; his latest trip involved an alpine-style push up the Mazeno Ridge on Nanga Parbat. Steve is a local and a UW graduate. You may remember him as the pancake flipper at the 2003 cc.com rope-up. All the proceeds from the show benefit the Central Asia Institute. They are dedicated to building schools in the mountainous regions of central Asia through community-based efforts. They also require that the schools enroll at least a certain percentage of women. The CAI has been very successful in the past several years, and furter donations will continue their success. Hope to see you there!

Climb: Philadelphia Mountain-Klenke Route Date of Climb: 11/26/2004 Trip Report: Concerned by the weather forecast of several inches of freshiez and freezing levels around 1500 ft, we chose a mellower objective that shouldn't have any road access problems. The weather dudes completely bungled the forecast, but no problem, I wasn't about to complain about the good weather! After a mid-morning start, we made good time up to Lake Serene (no snow). From there, the west ridge of Phillie was mostly open forest, though we spent most of our time weaving around or crawling through alder thickets. We got to the "top", unable to find a clear view of Index. The summit ridge is completely treed. My altimeter registered 100-200 feet below the summit, so we wandered along the ridge, going up and down, for about 10 minutes trying to find the true summit. When we thought we found it, we peeked at my altimeter... 10 feet higher than when I last checked. So we decided that it was a waste of time to continue searching for the "summit," and we made it back down to Lake Serene before dark. We brewed up some spiked hot cocoa and enjoyed a variety of leftover turkey, homemade hummus, homemade chocolate chip cookies, etc. The hike out was uneventful, though the last part of the trail always seems to take longer than it should. Gear Notes: we didn't bring snowshoes. didn't need them either.