Gary_Yngve

Whoever said that there's gonna be some fucking raging punk rock the next four years is right on. Speaking of being all bummed about the election, some good punk music will let me channel all of my negative election feelings into a productive workday.

I think Osama bin Laden believes that what he's doing is the best for the Muslim world.

And Bush had the brilliant (though despicable) strategy of accusing people of not supporting our troops should they question if he was truthful on Iraq.

Sadly, yes. Proof that Americans can be swayed by deception and scare tactics. Proof that Americans can ignore the war, the environment, etc., just because they have a strong viewpoint on a religious issue.

How much damage would have to occur before people would protest against the government by marching on the White House, going on strike, etc.? Or are Americans content to have their country fucked over as long as they get their big TVs and shiny SUVs?

One hope I have for this country is that if things get bad enough, Americans will do something about it. Things would have to get a lot worse, but there are still chances for things to be fixed without waiting until 2008.

Likewise, scientists have discovered much from years of AIDS research, and have applied what they have learned to other parts of medicine. Even if they don't solve the problem that they're throwing the research money at, they'll still discover some nifty stuff.

I didn't see a single Jailbird Martha this year. The standard gal costumes were cats, cowgirls, and ballerinas. I was feeling abstract this year (and devoid of an idea until a few days ago) so I went as red tape (a collage of red duct tape and bureaucractic paperwork). It was ok; I've had better costumes before. My favorites this year were: a clownfish Kronos, the timegod

Three days in a row of partying after 2 AM. I'm pooped.

One of my all-time faves was when a Goth guy in our lab showed up wearing all white.

Here's an even edgier idea for a costume: suicide bomber (fake explosives and wires taped to you) I'm not responsible if this idea gets you kicked out of party, arrested, and deported to Guantanamo.

Just as last year was child-molesting priests.

I think many Israelis would appreciate a Palestinian leader who has not had a long history of terrorism and who is better capable of controlling his own people. I haven't been following things enough to know who will fill the void left by Arafat and if there will be a power struggle. I was hoping for better from Arafat in the past ten years. I was thinking that maybe since he was getting old, he wanted to leave the world knowing he did something really good and left a lasting impact. Arafat was off to a decent start, but I think things totally went afoul with Sharon came into power (actually before then, when Sharon basically spit in the face of the Palestinians by entering a contested mosque). I think the ill-timed assassination of Rabin (by some fucking rightwing Israeli assholes) derailed much of the peace process. Anyway, Israel's kinda of between a rock and a hard place. Peace isn't going to get any easier as the years go on. The impoverished Palestinian population is growing rapidly , and they're only getting poorer. That isn't making them happier.

I know I've shown up at a Halloweenish Pub Club before dressed up as the stereotypical Mountie. There might even be a pic of it somewhere (or maybe Slothrop has a picture from elsewhere?).

The tent wasn't perfectly taut because our tree branches weren't perfectly adjusted, but it was pretty good. However the tent does have a saddle point on it, where snow will locally accumulate. And when it gathers weight, it pulls the two poles (branches) towards each other, allowing even more snow to accumulate. Once it collapsed once, we had two choices: 1) jury-rig the collapsed pole (branch) back to its former position from the confines of the tent, knowing it will collapse again 2) brave the storm and re-rig everything properly You can guess which option we chose. (for that matter, I was thirsty all night but didn't drink anything because I didn't want to deal with having to pee) The snow on granite wasn't that bad. You just had to get used to what would grab and what would shear. And a few times we slid on our asses down the granite slabs. That was all in the path from Gnome Tarn to Vivian. There was no snow (just dripping wet rock) from Vivian to Snow Lake.

We ran into a bunch of fine friendly folk, but not your description. Most of the larger parties we encountered were a roughly even guy/gal mix.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to snow and ice. Maybe some aid at Index before then. The forecast to us looked like clouds and scattered rain, but nothing as strong as what we experienced. And the model forecast was low reliability, so I guess we were hoping the errors would be toward better weather. Regardless, I had only five hours of mountain air in the past three weeks before this trip, so I was going through withdrawal.

Climb: Enchantments- Date of Climb: 10/18/2004 Trip Report: Kev and I had high hopes of doing the WR of Prusik this weekend. We hiked into Gnome Tarn Saturday afternoon, remarking how nice it was that everything was nearly dry and there was no snow to be had in the Enchantments. We wolfed down a dinner of cheese ravioli, pesto, and freshly picked boletus edulis. Tasty stuff! Then the storm came. Our Betamid collapsed early in the night from the weight of the snow accumulating in the saddle (our poles were less-than-ideal tree branches -- we accidently forgot them at home). The rest of the night was a continual fight with the tent and the snow; we didn't get much sleep. By morning there were six inches of freshiez on the ground and no end in sight. We bailed on trying Prusik and hiked out in the snow/rain. Halfway down I realized I had left my water filter next to our tent, and it had been buried in the snow. Doh. To top things off, the tool ticketed us because we accidently put last year's pass on our car (this year's was also in the glove compartment). We quickly drove to the ranger station to protest the ticket with pass in hand, and we bumped into the infamous Larry* who wasn't being very helpful. Anyway, the weather sucked, and we amassed $85 dollars in tickets and lost gear, but I got some much-needed mountain air, and Kev was great company as usual. *Larry was sitting in some shiny new truck equipped with laptop, video camera, digicam, etc., for the purpose, as he said, of gathering evidence to prove in court that a car didn't have a forest pass. Who wants to bet that your fee demo dollars went to that equipment?

I'm gonna climb some alpine rock, rain, snow, or shine! Now I need to get to sleep... gotta wake up in four hours...

What a buggy piece of $@!*. I got it to crash within 10 seconds of using it.

UVillage.

Jon, the IMA gym, unlike the IMA pool, is required to be monetarily self-sufficient. They can't afford expanded hours (either that or raise prices). I'm hanging out there late afternoon or early evening Mondays and Thursdays. Lately there's been about six of us UW Climbing Club folks (several of whom post on cc.com too) there during those times, and it's been a lot of fun.

About the door and tunnel: http://www.cascadeclimbers.com/threadz/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/372509/page/0/view/collapsed/sb/5/o/all/fpart/1/vc/1

Bush was stumbling and fumbling and bumbling. And poking fun at himself for it. The sad thing is these actions endear him to a dangerously large portion of Americans.

WA has the absentee ballot thing too. It's nice to be able to vote when you want, with a full Internet of resources in front of you. Election Day a natl holiday would be cool too, especially if it's during a cold dry spell that had been preceded by warm and wet.