ivan

far from it, i assure you sir

i've sentenced boys younger than you to the gas-chamber. i didn't want to do. felt that i OWED it to them...

there's no reason, there's no fucking reason, dude!!!

the cat i had when i was a lad - dusty - holy shit, that pussy could slide up any tree man could condescend to hurl her at getting back down, on the other hand....

"ever notice how people who don't believe in evolution usually look really fucking unevolved?"

you lie!!!

i object!!!

1/15/14 - day 1 - what better way to mark mlk's berfday (and my inaugural beacon ascent of this foul year of our lord two-ought-fourteen) than to "climb to the mountain-top?" the national wedder service promised portentous skies, a bold moon, a hero-ascent, but mike n' geoff n' i settled for much less - cloud murk on the evening drive - a shaft of bright sun at cope horn, than all gone, sucked down into a cloud vortex, a river of moist, cold air motoring on down to portland the rock super slobbery gob-smacked wet n' drippy n' perspiring beads of putrid moss-muck - soon full dark and just cans of flowery beer n' bike-bottles of sweet-wine to pass the time waiting for one warrior-poet-god-king or t'other to Put the Rope up there to the new season and to the storms that will not settle until they have shit all they have to shat upon us!

i could be down for a second lap i bet - sounds like it'll be a 3-some for the first one at any rate and we oughta be out there around 4.

full moon fever on the bacon wand tomorrow night - temps above freezing n' clear skies - anyone wanna come guzzle beers w/ mike n' i n' savor the last moonlight ascent of the (legal) winter season? kickoff round 430 i reckon....

in russia, trigger fingers you

never leave a tauntaun behind!

hero shit. congrats

wise sir do not grieve it is always better to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning for every one of us living in this world means waiting for our end let he who can achieve glory before death when a warrior is gone that will be his best and only bulwark

as opposed to christie-style r-rats, who are gargantuanly vicious creatures?

there was an alpinist years back about all the quality ice-climbing to be had there beware the white-walkers! extra points for spotting bjork while there

Trip: Rouge Rocks - The Scarab Scuttles South Date: 12/28/2013 Trip Report: "so, the seattle-dane, in days gone by, had heart-break and malice aplenty he knew what wicked magic this weather plays hard-upon the harp-springs of the soul when clouds grow fat on fools' tears and the tides of time tear at the moorings of this, our most maligned season" for time past counting, pat and i had ample reasons to want to ambul-fuckoff away from this cursed region for a mort of a long-spell, too many i assure you to go into now and many of them of course still on-the-books, as the bastard-kapos would contend, and thus inadvisable to utter in so common a clutch of freaks as this - foul weather, fouled lines connecting us to the Others, the sun grown dim and thin as the souls the Shaved Men foisted upon us when we were too weak to resist so a plan was shaped and blotted out and reset again - to sail south in this new contraption of his, a great amber Scarab - to scuttle over the silent frozen floors of our great western desert, to descend like a scabrous infestation upon Campganistan and its outlying districts, to scamper upon sandstone until fickle fate or more fleeting-still fortune shoved us off, even as men wrecked upon a sand, to the debasement of our Seasonal Affective Disorders christmas came and went as fast as grandpa after his "sevensies" - good times for sure, board games and shenanigans with the little ones for awhile - fine wine and board of fare, so rare it seems in september and else-when - a trip to silverton with the family to the brother's country estate to brood with cattle and goats on st. stephen's day and after - dogs dashing about the pastures, plunging in and out of the seasonal pools - a creditable display of canine capers - baby niece growing up quick, tow-headed and portending a terrible wrath when future-vexed i fear then xmas was 2 days gone by and it was tvash the man at my doorstep and the Big Trip upon us - we clapped a rocket-box to the roof of his rather remarkable rig, stuffed it full of shining war-gear and camp-clutter, then retired for a quick Sampling of the Road-Candy and red-eyed nap of a few hours before casting off how to encapsulate an 18-hr shifting of space and deportment? a slow birth, bitter in the first few hours, when fog-shrouded near idaho - Inside the Ping-Pong Ball - 40 mph the best i could do, pat snoring away as i sweat out the guilt of my impending death - but soon enough the sun rises, the hoar-frost of the thorough-fare gleans like quicksilver, pat takes the helm and holy-shit aMMMMMerica music raises my spirits immensely - we blunder down through the land of the famous potatoes, pierce nevada, stopping as regular as rain for petrol n' pestilential prole-fare, savoring it though - endless cups of coffee, snatches of naps strangely when they finished - my final stretch of road a doozy - the 2nd night of my day, the road ruler-straight and the speed-limit a very immaterial reality coming upon vegas at night out of the northern desert! the shaft of the luxor laser-beam a bold truck-stop beacon to the broiling masses of aliens rambling by this particular reach of the cosmos - the countless forlorn lamps of the city culminating into One Great Glow - the totality of its lights like the spread legs and bedazzled titties of a tin-lady, all leisurely stretched out n' summoning you in but not for us was this to be - we hit that atavistic cluster-fuck like a comet bouncing off the atmosphere, glancing out west and back into the desert - off to the red rocks and all that it offered - the campground was stuffed, so sad, so we settled for that night, and indeed everyone after, with must crude supplements, cast out into the arid, frozen waste to make common-cause with scorpions n' meth-tailings n' the brickabrac of countless desert-washes and dried-up hope - shit, we feasted upon it, incorporated it - Made it Home Again! sunday commenced our red-rocks-fest, which contained in total: day 1 - birdland on the the brass wall day 2 - tunnel vision on the angel food wall day 3 - solar slab, classic route day 4 - horndog/sundog on the solar slab day 5 - beulah's book/sunflower on the solar slab day 6 - calico hillz clambering for a half day, then head on back the scarab at dawn - burgundy for breakfast after a long day of fasting - we packed n' dined n' i smoked incessantly, hepped up on a hazy desert-vibe mescalito n' the brass wall, where we broke off for our first adventure, expecting crowds but too excited at the sunshine n' the pleasant short walk to be displeased the base of birdland, parties all over it like pederasts on playgrounds after lights out - the first pitch a varnished slice of the hereafter after all that traveling pat at the top of p1 we chased the crowd on up the route, reveling in the radiation of our fair high-cousin, helios - pat on p2 atop p3 confusion came down w/ parties still coming up even as others rapped down through us, ropes all entangled and cluster-fucked - eventually we tagged the top too and started our descent, finding, oddly, that our 70 meter rope really seemed more like a 60, requiring unstoner-friendly downclimbing to each anchor - pat managed to make peace w/ his predicaments as we took in the pleasures of sharing stone w/ felicitous femmes we had in mind that next day a trip to windy peak, which i hadn't visited my previous pilgrimage - we trundled over dale and desert wash before winding up lord knows where and settled down to nap for the night - the frigid rising sun found us rather uncertain as to where even the peak we wanted was located, how best to get there, and even if we had enough daylight so near the solstice to salvage the inevitable loss of time due to all that cluelessness - we figured on just returning to the dog-damned loop and taking a look at the angel food wall tunnel vision on the angel food wall we were in a rude state and rambled along, me heel-hurt n' broody - pat pushing ahead to reckon the way - we ended up a bit bewildered, frustrated at shitty pictures n' directions, but eventually found the right place p1 a bouldery delight just 10 feet off the ground - it was pat's lead n' he hemmed n' hawwed awhile before dispatching it w/ poise, whereupon i cleaned his one cam and he proceeded sans rope-drag following p1 a debacle for me, with gear raining off my gear-loops like aluminium hail as i ratcheted meself into a claustrophobic chimney-section - ultimately i had to lower all the way to the ground to recover two pieces and thus got to climb the pitch twice p2 was ho-hummish and easy, but pat's p3 a no-nonsense unprotectable chimney or a 5.8 alternative - he had the later, and i can't imagine anyone doing elsewise p4 was very fun and riotously easy, after escaping a short chimney w/ a roof, a ramble up an amazingly featured face, eschewing an ugly crack who's protection was utterly unnecessary once out on the big huecos - it dumped me onto a pleasing ledge just below the infamous tunnel-pitch, and in time to see yet another desert-shiela wiggling her pleasing girl-shape on up into the dusky shadows pat on p5 - quite easy n' great fun by headlamp i did 6, hard on the heels of our new friends, they in a rush to enjoy their first red-rock route sans a post-dark stumble-off - we had a snack and a smoke and a smile and started down ourselves pat on top a stimulating down-clamber, rarely just simple walking - a bit hard on my mangled soles in climbing shoes, but what i deserve for my sins for certain pat getting in touch w/ the Mother-Ship on the dusty walk out - we had chores to settle afterall - he to find a fine scion dealership to Cast Away the Demons, me to finagle a new pair of 5.huge climbing shoes to replace the ones that had me big toes all bulging out through the seams - it worked wonderfully, both our needs met in 20 minutes and time still to stop by the baja fresh for a dos manos motherfucker this night was new years eve eve, and in our endless search for new dirt-bag camping, we slouched into a strip-dozed doozy of a wasted, soon-to-be-developed stretch of desert just west of town - streetlights diminished the ambiance of busted glass and blown-up fireworks, but it was late and freezing and we settled into the shade of a big boulder and made it work - round midnight some scantily clad teenie-boppers made an appearance and i started hooting our approval, but was roundly silenced by the Man new years eve dawned bright and true, and we played at words w/ a most fashionable bum, jeff, who happened on our hobo-camp in the crepuscular glow - he was clad in the livery of a bellagio bell-hop, and his plastic cane and safeway bag really set a scene of comic delight, done one better by his railing against corporate overlords and promises to monkey-wrench-gang-this-mother-fucker-come-midnight! all that shade the day before made us determined to visit the solar slab, maybe leave all our shit out there and keep coming back until it was time to go i'd done it before, but enjoyed it so much it seemed a great warm-up - johnny vegas! pat following p2 as i cooled me heels, not so smitten w/ the new shoes pat on top of the first tier somewhere shy of 420 - mt wilson goading us to return someday and be Real Men like last time the upper tier was cock-blocked ten ways to sunday, but we still got in all but the last half pitch before heading back down pat finishing the first pitch of the upper tier we managed to get back before the cop-o's got pissed at our late departure - we heaved out into the way-back hills and settled into a discreet wash, me to build a mini-fire out of our waste papers n' howl at the fresh fingernail moon my new year's philippics - i guzzled budweisers n' sucked down camels and generally forgot all about dinner in my ebullience for my sins i was a wee-bit hung-over on new years day, but whatever - we waddled back down the way to our cached packs and took up The Russian's suggestion - horndog/sundog - pat impaled himself shifting our shit from one base to another, and there were some hard feelings n' Bad Signs for certain, but hey, here we are! base of horndog - not such a trade-route it seems - no fixed anchors, big old sketchy holds in some parts, a rather ramble-fuck traverse atop p1 i got p1 and ended up a little waylaid after the technical crux, no idea where to end the pitch nor even where we were going from there, there being no chalk nor obvious signs of passage, and the whole wall rather uniform and uninspiring eventually i found something that seemed rightish and built an anchor of ill-fitting horizontal cams and brought old-boy up p2 a joy, jugging on up big old varnished holds to an arching easyish finger-crack - we had lunch at the big slab up there, then shifted the belay to the base of 3, a blast fo'shiz, though sadly lacking the 5.8 slab predicted on the topo for the top next was moving the shit-show up to the base of the route on the upper tier - we didn't hold out much hope for making the true top as the day was waning and our wall already in the shade took some time to find the single bolt showing our line true, but then it was easy rambling on super-varnished goodness - pat on p1 p2 had some thought-provoking bits but not so bad and i was eager for what would have been the last pitch, but the jig was up and we had to fly back down - woulda made the car in good time but, waylaid by darkness in the solar slab gully rappels, both of us managed to lose the proper rap station halfway down - eventually we resolved to rap off a small tree, but even as pat disappeared into the gloom i gasped to see there, just 3 feet away in the pissant glow of my weak-ass headlamp, the very fucking rings we'd searched for our last full day to climb and we were back to the solar slab, this time intent on buelah's book and the sunflower pat's turn, he got p1, after we waited in line a bit and i breakfasted on budweiser and black tobacco p2 was everything i wanted it to be - a lovely lass to drink in w/ mis ojos as i Overcame the Fear of the wideness, settling on the arete instead - it went smoothly, feeding me back into the wonder-fuck of the steep lie back exit crack pat on p3, easy but ill-protected and w/ grand views - the sun insensible n' schizophrenic, darting in and out of the contours of mt wilson walking up to the sunflower, just right of solar slab proper and still int he sun at right - an alternative every bit as wonderful as that clibm's 1st pitch p2 of sunflower the creme de la creme, and a fantastic link-up w/ buelah's - friendly 5.9 and good gear, the only regret being that our later start (plum missing the parking lot, requiring a complete repeat of the loop) and the long lines didn't leave us time to finish the route, nor wander up higher as the first belay made it clear there weren't going to be rap stations to allow only a partial ascent our final night spent noodling in the washes once again - pat played chef quite capitally - i read and rued the day when we had fire hard at hand - the morning come and coffee supped up by the earliest time we'd yet managed, we winged back to the outskirts of the vegas-world to look for showers but were steeply disappointed, me finding comfort at least in the crappy cans of coors i still had along to the calico hills for some smokes n' some scrambling in the sun i find a diving board to devote my banalities to we made it to the mesa-top n' made our lunch in site of the scene of our weeks' cavorting the dregs of red-rocks and our final moments before heading back deep into the western wastes of Interstellar Space a fun drive back starting that afternoon - the black wabbit wun amuck - predator drones dancing in play-labs just north of las vegas signs to shame you signs to please you n' signs to tease you that's nevada for you - ever the same vistas - the road straight as the sinner's path to peril - the shoulders non-existent - the promise of sudden death Sweet and Now a frozen, frosty, forlorn night it was by the time we made the oregon border, north of winnemucca - we set up shop in a frigid field n' bedded down, me after sucking down my forty, forbidden as beer was on the road 730 AM, 17 degrees, 70 mph "we can't stop here, this is basque country!!!" a pop-in to the parents in redmond on saturday afternoon - cold beers, hot showers n' fresh chili - bullshitting, car-cleaning, then off again and home by evening to binge on boxed wine, to feel the wonder of a warm room and a soft-bed, a willing-woman and a fleeting wish for this hibernal vacation to hie along awhile longer, if it please! "hear me, half-lords! let there be more vegas adventures in my time to come - let me die not now in this dismal country, but creep one time more at least to that land of lizard-ladies with their darkening tattoos ..." Gear Notes: lit-er-ray-tur for getting all book-smart on the interminable drive - my prime take-away: slight wonder why economists are the first put up against the wall when the Revolutions come

at least he's a republican w/ a sense of humor?

indeed, back from a grand week in the true desert, soaking up sun n' clambering on sandstone sheeeit, reckon tomorrow afternoon after work will suffice for a lap? it must be nice n' dry?

makes sense, santa is a deep socialist afterall...

another year of beacon summaries - 59 total days, a meager average of but one day a week flogging the beacon-wand - 54 solo laps total - not too many new beacon routes for me this year, just grunge book and the full wild turkeys - thanks to all the fine folks who tied in w/ me: pat, mike, geoff, bryan, ben, bob, tim, kenny, dave, kyle, steve, rick, adam and all you other mother-fuckers i done forgot to a better 2014! THE YEAR OF 2013 1/1/13 - day#1 - curiously cold and icy and windblown lap on the corner w/ that powderhound chap, clad in a goddamn gordon's fisherman jumpsuit w/ tight matching-colored gear - wondrous ice-curtain on the slab pitch, under the roofs, and frostcicles on tree ledge - a frozen gully choked w/ gravel up on grassy ledge - sand-storms out on the island, carrying grit all the way across the water to the docks - the boat landing slammed w/ waves, breaking across the ice-clad pier - many tourons on the trail - a fine, quick lap - the first day of Beatardia 2013! 1/12 - day#2 - strange day - freezing fog on the wakeup, car shackled in ice at the dawn - geoff at the burger king - high-speed jet through the quiet lull of the gorge, the road dry n' gentle - beacon becalmed, all door discipline disregarded - a great gut-laugh at the peach allah had gracefully cast into our laps - i get all the leads down low - consensus conditions S5 (our ascent of 12/21/12 in recent memory a retard S9, damn near pegging the limit of the possible) - challenging lead conditions for sure still, with sheet-freeze all over, slowly peeling off in the relatively tropical conditions - runnels of run-off bubbling underneath the ice - the sun bursting through the clear air - rumbles of gunfire, pap-pap-pap-pap, a militia-action for certain on the oregon shores - slip-sliding away all over from grassy ledges up - glimpse of the bonneville crick draining into the river, all jizzum-milky, the vas defernes of the columbian cock- exited the long way, the Great Coward wending all to Starboard where he could - a walk down all bathed in rays of a riotous golden orb - jim at the base w/ an old boy - oaths and auguries, threats and Aggravated Assaults considered - an easy orbit back through the steaming warmth of the gorge-winter disbanded, if only for a bit 1/22 - #3 - annealed by two recent days at smith in the Big Fridge of the bivy site, mornings traversing the phantasmagorical formations of frozen sludge, mike and i had an evening run up the bacon-wand in a big olde freshet of gaudy coldness a big dry had beaten off the vast damp of days gone by - barely any ice on route - half the digits of my right foot right numb by grassy ledges, i unshod and rubbed hardly any life back into them - toes throb as i type booty nut on p2, should the original owner wish to claim it from a massive pile of such things i have growing in my garage not even a fort-night of fucknoodling about the sunny-side left - full moon fever this weekend for any half-wit warriors who might feel the urge to come w/... 2/2 - day #4 - ground hogz day, a swift demise to deadly winter predicted - 'twas the day after a wander up the hood-wand w/ an interesting feller to dispatch the doldrum of the beacon s side closure - ya never stop learning in the mountains, this time 2 Ore-e-gone Snowboard'nBoyz taught me how to inhale green weeds through green apples using nothing more than a glorious bright winter sun and a magnifying glass - a good invention for the stiff breezes off an open glacier - much thanks for them that rock the Van Damme stone soup w/ geoff today - despite the distinct sense of early spring setting in as the Great Hamster foresaw, it was a mort cold and savage breezy - geoff did p1, and i managed to mangle meself on p2 - found a fixed nut at the start of the eyebrow traverse and was hanging out on it for awhile, had just plugged the next cam in when suddenly i was falling - fell/slid into a slab, instinctively grabbing an edge to stop the fall, sheared off the flesh of my pinky-tip and sprung the sprockets in the other fingers' knuckles, then went heads'o'er'tits and continued on down, getting entangled in the rope running up through the gear and ultimately arresting hanging upside down looking straight at the olde boye, who looked frankly startled blood pouring from the flensed n' flapping finger, i wrapped my balaclava about it n' took stock - had a good gut laugh upon recalling that last time i climbed on this side, last spring, i'd ended up in the e.r. too - maybe i'm just not getting the message? geoff was my hero - not only did he finish the pitch, he also figured out how, after 10 minutes, to get my damn knot untied by pounding on it w/ a jug - the big breeze blew itself out as dejected would-be hiking trail ascenders milled about the parking lot and i howled at the sky in mock musical appreciation - the climb done, we went off, each to his saturday night debaucheries and me to keen my wound w/ wanton drunkenness 4/25 - day 5 - holy shee-it muslims, it's been 2 months - lovely spring day - many olde boyes humping the o-zone on the way out - on the north side, the sun peaking over, one hand washes the other, i fear nothing - 3 peregrines screeching n' flopping about - green grass - crisp n' crunchy moss - had time to stop by and yack-yack w/ jim n' sal n' steve n' wes n' a whole motley crew of misfits n' misogynistic fucks on the way back - did a couple solo laps on the jacobs ladder and drank some beers, then boogied on back home for "house of cards" w/ the wifey jesus-h-christ, why are they doing more construction on the 14?!? 4/30 - beacon day 6 for the year - only 2 days at the baconwand this month, but spring seems to be here fo'shiz, even if today it was right blustery and overcast - scrambly, scrambly on the n side for a while, then a satisfying hike to the summit - the 70th anniversary of an intelligence coup - "mincemeat has been swallowed" - peregrines apparent from the uprising exit, swooping and screeching and having a ball it looked - kenny in the lot, horrifyingly still set in his hate-tobacco way, but w/ rainier-beer as always 5/2 - day 7 - all my pardners bail - the pearl is in the river - john has a long mustache - freedom is slavery, war is peace!!! 5/4 - international star-wars day, may the fourth be with you beatard day 8 for 2013 - stoned stupor w/ bryan n' bob - bryan styles following p1 and leads p2 almost all clean - breezy n' balmy - eyes scuppered w/ dust-scum as i type - stooooked for a fine day in the sun - olde boys climbing below us on the spike route, a fine view from the phone booth - miker stops by for a chat even - summer's upon us! 5/6 - day #9 - afternoon sprint up the sun-baked monolith after union meetings and whatnot - pilgrims at dawn - days gone by and dead men ghosts - great gashes in the highway - asphalt scars and concrete wars - the red devil turns over 190k even as the cd player craps in the bed, carrying nico blue into the way blue yonder - the pearl is in the river 5/8 - beatard day 10 of the year - jesus christ on a cum-stained cushioned couch, this'er fine weather just won't fucking quit! out to slouch and lounge around the bacon-wand once more, scrambly-scrambly here and there along the north wall - figure its about time to scoot up the spike route sans rope i reckon - on up to the slumit in rude circuitous style, but all the beauty on the scamper back down - a buxom couple encountered cruising on up the packinko-portion of the trail, dressed appropriate for a warm day - i cast down mine eyes, unworthy as i am, only to be brought up sharp by a strange question from the sultry lassie - a great gaping grin, "oh no, heaven's no, how could you think that and who might you be" - claimed to know me and my sorcerous ways, but most surely she must mistake me for some other beatard cunt? "you were that guy guzzling boxed wine and chain-smoking camels last summer!" - goddammit, i must stop meeting ladies of quality in my long aestival blacked-out ambulations, it augers poor for my alternate-reality amors! "AF is having problems w/ its fresh-water condensers" 5/10 - day 11 - linked strong arms w/ der phuzzy, all phresh from phucking himself good n' proper last burn'n'man, flensed scars from incisions all about his satellite-parts - to the n side we did fly, me w/ the big wall dumpster full of wine n' hammers n' what have you...beers n' butts at the base - the spike route ensconced in scum n' villainy - we scamper up the right side first, when ole'jim w/ a jingus-voice arrived n' whisper-hollered up at us - to the tree n' the site of new natural destruction wrought all around, stone-fall n' swathes of moss scoured off in flight - we rap back to the big boy for bitter conversation and big Olde Tymes - intolerance for them a week earlier w/ their wire-brushes - gut laughs n' tyranny gestated - adam n' i up genesis to the tree again as the sun glows low - i above that, but bailing on a bolt too steep to suss out in the gloaming - the base again, shade-slumming w/ pall malls n' precious beer w/o end - the stumble-fuck in the dark, the way-back-bent in style - departure n' parting - kevbone no doubt kluster-fucked, i conklude 5/11 - a dozen days so far - 5 days this week - junuary kicked square in the nuts, but waiting in the wings it seems - good thing really, i'm on the verge of tweaking out my fingers already - dogs in my dreams, feeding on my feet - terror at daybreak, broken in the bone yard - the ringing of bells at all hours, the horror of home-coming gone wrong - dust, dust, dust - the bloody angle when the walls fell - spotsylvania on a warm spring evening - they sing the body electric, and then they too Pass Beyond 5/14 - lucky #13 - gray and gaunt at the dawn, dim-minded and mopey - when the world dies in an orgasm of heavenly-fire, how i fucking hope it's a tuesday, and early in the morning to boot, to spare me the whole gory goddamn details of the day - tuesday, the red-haired stepchild of the torrid week - hitler was conceived on a tuesday - it's true, you can google that shit man sun breaks around noon, life reviving, rock drying, seniors shuffle in and out in a hyperstatic hepped-up euphoric hangover - the red devil galloping east through the gorge, growling at these goddamn men in their machines gouging out the concrete and showering everything in gravel - the tyranny inherent in giving any man a blaze-orange vest and sign, too gross to contemplate in the golden sunshine searing through my senses RIP william fetterman, you awful fucker - "give me 80 men and i can ride through the whole sioux nation" - yeah, how'd that one work for ya, son? 5/20 - day 14 - a week of piss wedder, sunday's window spent wrangling kidz and wrestling w/ the garden n' chores n' what-have-you - union bidness at the close of day, my wits as always confounded n' humbled by the human machinery of government made flesh - the ghost of winston smith haunts me, but it's a special merry kind of fool who can't make lemonade out of a luscious afternoon of sun and rushing warm air gusting down the gorge - get on your fucking horse, dr rick marshall! kenny's rig in the lot, him and sneezy-jim already up the spike route i reckon - i settle for a sleazy saunter up the big rock, lost in the gauzy thoughts gamboling through my thick head - the moon waxes great, will the wedder-gods set me up a solid? fosters on the falling back, cops holed up n' counting donut-holes at cape horn - thank christ i don't have a cigarette to shit on this wondrous scene 5/31 - day 15, 9 dayz this gentle may - heartbreak for days gone by - memorial day weekend at tieton a near total bust - communiques pist upon for tr's w/o pixels - a week with pouring rain and occasional piercing sun w/o rainbows ain't seen mike since a far long time it seems - set out in the afternoon for a ramble up the spike route, him not having had it he said - the base gross n' baking - thick drip and damp on the rock like it'd been sprayed w/ horse-semen - genesis after nearly shitting a kitten on the klutchy-klutchy start - mike made p2 not so sad, but like me needed to stand on the anchor bolts whilst thrutch-fucking into the danky mcdankerson pod there dug leading the 3rd pitch spike-part proper, but this time w/ a stout old black cock of static death to bat-man on up the slab beerz n' gut-laughing n' music up in the woods - mike does p4 and dislodges a big old panel to come whiffling down my ways - i do the last bit up to the trail wading through thick-glades of oak, oily and fresh and full of fear bongos at the summit, guitars n' young ones yodeling - jesus-harold-christ, children I Know up there doing god know's what - ruins my summit celebration, but what can you do - wizened age equals patience equals wisdom? rolling rock n' reefers on the ramble on down - the new Man meandering around, tending the meters in the lot - don't seem like too fearsome a feller... "something seems wrong w/ our bloody ships today!" 6/3 - day 16 - sweet green first peaking from the new berms of the road-cut west of ozone - a throaty breeze when work is spent - the day beams brightly, i jet down the well-worn highway - apples n' ass-ended hits n' horrid cigarettes - jimbo in the house, somewhere high up the hell-side, waging war on moss i'll warrant w/ that nefarious Other Feller - a raucous ramble up the boring old way - teens on the summit w/ their elders, teeming w/ the airs of methadonia unleashed - tails grown tepid, they rocket down the rock to the grinding of gears, knees shivering in the sea-gale "and, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright; The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light, And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout; but there is no joy in Beatardia, the south side is still closed out" d-day - b-day plus 16 for me - machines shitting out soil on the road cut - long lines of traffic - sweating in the sun - a book and a beer for the beacon run - trains rumbling - falcons screeching - shade and wind - the island in the grips of the Drowned God - sweet tension released in seconds, the searing heat of summer upon us, the seniors soon to be flown and my professional sun setting 6/17 - #18 - grass bowing gently in the slight gusts of the western gorge - cool and sunny, scraps of clouds here and there - the highway gloriously free of frenetic machines fouling the thoroughfare - hawks and gulls hollering - hordes of dim-wits dashed all over the trail - the Usual Suspects - the Siegfried Oath issued all over again, the same all ways and in every weather - one day of classes left, the solstice hard upon us, sweet Summer is feeling rather tipsy and falling out of her panties in her haste - the Time is Right, my brothers "well, i got in a quibble, shot a door - i'm reading the bible by a 40 watt bulb - what price freedom? that is my rub well i sleep like a baby with the snakes n' the bugs" 7/31 - day 19 - first street legal day on the riverside in a rare ould time - mike's at 7 in the morning mist - bleary eyed, jesus christ, i'll be back at work in 4 weeks - knees too weary to start on cruising, we start up the corner and i somehow pinch a nerve in my back - electric lights dance when i move my head, so i learn to climb w/o looking anywhere 8/10 - XX pro anno diem - whiskey-sick at 7 a.m. - rough roll out of bed, down the steps and out the door - pat snoring on the couch - did i really smoke my fist-full of smokes in 30 minutes last night? geoff @ the b.k. - cruis'n n' warriors n' right gull - choppers landing on the wildlife reserve, ferrying in fucking wind-boarders - dick synonym for the day: "snatch-ratchet" - long drives off the land of the little people, thank you mysterious stranger - old larry for fucks sake rapping in for an evening alone - pbr's n' passing showers on the way back 8/20 - day 21 - beaconben at the b.k. past dawn - lonely morning at beacon, the rock to ourselves - dodd's jam to big ledge, then ben did a tr-lap on blood, sweat n' jizzum as i wallowed in bird-filth (do them damned peregrines suffer from perrenial bladder infections or do they just binge'n'purge on peptobismal? the pink-hue to their ubiquitous turds is disconcerting)- topped out to trail on dastardly, then a run to the skamania mart for burritos n' beacon-rock brand beer - beerz in the shade by the boat-ramp, then back to the rock for a hybrid corner/warriors lap - international bring-yer-hawt-girlfriend to the crag day, w/ a saucy-shiela the lady in question along w/ her aussie-blokefriend - the boyfriend and our respective wives being but 3 obstacles in our path to awesomeness, that and i suppose also my plug-ugliness and the fact that ole'ben's so gawd-damned raytarded if he get's dropped on his head one more time he'll be eating applesauce from plastic spoons the rest of his life phrase of the day, from the burrito ingredients: "intensified soy oil" first i've seen of the elk today - them high-lonesome fuck-me-now bugles but days away 8/21 - #22 - moonlight ascent - tvash n' i rally at mike's in twilight camas after each enduring a hard days labor on our abodes, i sun-stroked n' wobbly from shoveling dirt all day - the moon gloaming through the gauzy sheets of smoke straggling through the gorge - fire-fucked, hazy light, like a septic bandage slapped across the lunar face, leaky and pus-red orange - the corner in t-shirts, hardly a breath of wind - kenny appears out of the heavens for a helluva session of gut-laughing on the ledge - top out on uprising and over the railing at 3 AM for more of the same - the long, illucid orbit back home, i nearly sail off the road at steigerwald - a lascivious plunge under my domestic sheets even at the arrival of the dawn... 8/23-25 - days 23-25 - couple nights on the ledge w/ the powderhund n' nocturnal ambulations up the corner by the light of a big moon, whiskey-addled n' howling at the hills - ranger lecture when it was all over on unpaid camping fees n' crushed cans of pbr in the car-trash - young warriors n' jills n' whatnot - hot n' sunny saturday, gloomy n' rainy sunday - dave n' the eternal shit-show of the NoBoTrfecta came rambling down the way in the saturday dark 8/27 - #26 - warriors w/ good'ole-kenny - jim n' sal, the stewarts rocking a parents day-out, rick n' his long-haired hippie-son - muggy but pleasingly breezy up high - pbr's n' american spirits along the way - tales of august vernal ventures - plans laid for seasons to come - that rat-bastard 'nastia appears to have beat me to the pirate-booty, but all for a good cause - who wouldn't want an autographed copy of a bikini-clad clamberer from our Proud Cascades? 8/28 - day #27 - soggy on the trail w/ the recent rains, fall's come quick - steve-o on ground zero, jim n' sal providing sage advice from below - 2 laps on the corner, my first solo climbing of the season - got a goal of 30 such laps before the season ends, so 1/15th of the way now 8/30 - #28 - 2 more corner laps for 4/30 total for the season - solo-aided wild turkey, p1 - left it fixed for tomorrow w/ geoff - what's up w/ these hard men stealing our aid lines, we gotta go take'em back, i say! christ, that second pitch of wild turkeys looks like sparse gear, at least grunge book has them nice shiny new bolts and helpful chalk hints found a #7 bd nut, should its owner's wish for its speedy return - too many lying around my garage already, plus i have sympathy - got a tcu so stuck on wild turkey i had to bring out the hammer to reason it out old larry lounging solo-style out there tonight w/ not a beer nor a bottle on him 8/31 - #29 - 10 days dry-humping the bacon-wand this aestival august - the last one to be spent w/ geoff - we split the grunge book in half, resplendent in the scorching sun its 4 shiny new bolts - geoff had the first bit, the 4 bolts, most interspersed w/ some thin nailing and fine brassies - i did the bunch above the last bolt, pumping in pins like a pre-teen caffeine-free baboon, all bitch-scared n' whatnot - amazing that matt feller freed it all beers n' bottles n' bull-shitting down at the boat ramp afterwards - crusty beacon politics n' gut-busting nautical ventures comprehended - cop talk - a big old wind-born craft cast upon the piers, moribund n' motor-fucked, pleasing to see the pigs w/ someone else to fuck with left the fixed line up to the beacon-towers should anyone care to make use of it in the next week - figuring on the full wild turkeys next weekend - beacon's 2 most recently freed aid-lines returned to the fold! dod's n' grudge-book (adam's pic) 9/2/13 - day #30 - labor day, day before the bidness begins - up at 730 to practice awaking for honest employment - out to beacon by the time it was already hot - 2 laps on the corner, now 6/30 for the season - wasps still untouched on the 2nd pitch - plaid laying photo-siege to the crux 2 on p2 - met up w/ teacher-matt afterwards w/ enough time for him to rope-gun me up wind-surfer (muchas gracias!) - dumped larry off at the no-bo-trifecta for some beerz n' laffs w/ dave, then followed ranger karl back to beacon only to encounter the kewlest car-wreck i've ever seen there - a big-ass bus-sized rv, complete w/ towed-jeep, totally in the ditch across from the b-room in the main-lot, rangers n' cops everywhere w/ 10-foot hard-ons for their sudden importantness of purpose 9/3 - #31 - back 2 skewl - strange days and tales of human transformers - dashed out for a lap afterwards - kenny n' tim n' hijinx up on grassy - 7/30 corner laps for the season 9/4 - #32 - 2 more corner laps, 9/30 so far - elks bugling from the big beyond - grey and gloomy, wind off n' on - cluster-fuck kenny, a goddamn pater-familias now we find, n' denali-dave on round 2 - tiger woods by the banks of the mighty columbia - beers n' butts n' bullshitting as the day waned 9/7 - #33 - trail dayz - a herd assembled after 9 - ranger lecturz - why shouldn't i lick the saw-blade again? buncha beatards in attendance - adam n' kenny, the silvermanz, lucky larry, matt the hulk, crackman, nastia n' oleg n' some other slavic folk, plus no small number of imps n' goons of all sorts n' stripes - built a right nifty set of belay platforms for the se corner, finally a comfy place to put your shoes on and rope-wrangle, should you be into that sorta thing - jim'll hate it of course, but i notice all his routes have sweet set-ups at the base solo lap off at the end of hte work day, 10/30 now for the season, then beerz n' bullshitting w/ many folks back up in the lot - geoff n' i had a breezy cruise up cruis'n'jillz afterward, bumping up against oleg n' nastia along the way - krazy foolz bathign in the columbia over the fence - motorboats bottoming out in the low, low river - a cool kid named dasan the third soloist on the corner today, him fresh from alaska and the wild, high life of youth.... 9/11 - day #34 - somber day as always this time of year, though interesting - the first crop of seniors i've had none of whom could remember the happenings of but 12 years ago - mismangled comms w/ the powderhound, him sitting out at the parking lot, soaking up the intense sols, me hanging round camas waiting for the call meet old boy at the base and a solo lap we had, 11/31 so far with summer surging and a successful completion all but assured roped round on free4all soon thereafter - the biggest surprise on the rap - goddamn 8.9 mm rope, w/ 260 lbs of bubble-gum attached to it on an overhanging rappel, results in massive laser-burns through the palm unless you add some biners or wear gloves woven w/ space-shuttle-tile style wonder-fabric 9/12 - #35 - a jibber-jabber up cruis'n/middle-aged warriors w/ miker in the wind and dying desert heat - prizes in the fenceposts - what a wonderful world? 9/14 - day 36 - awoke hungover n' horrid 'round 6 on the couch - straggled upstairs for a sad attempt at a few extra hours of snoozing - appropriate to be horror-struck n' hairy-tongued for climbing a route called wild turkeys, wutcha say? wild-turkeys w/ geoff - wondrous times, woe-struck by heat, tongue thick w/ wine-slick - hairy recollections of halcyon dayz - me the first, him the last - small cams, tiny nutz, off-sets n' hammering aplenty on kniveblades n' soft euro-trash - the smiths n' tom waits wailing in endless loops on the what-have-you - jim at the base - philosophies n' philanderous frippery -burgundy n' beer n' bullshit'n - lounging along the new-laid sou'east co'ner - the way bent back to the beginning n' pat all pulled up n' waiting - booze n' bereavement n' bitzes soon returning "The world don't care what a sailor does in town It's all hanging in the windows by the pound" 9/17 - day 37 - 151st anniversary of the worst day in american history, why not court my own bold disaster? work done at 3, i walked to the parking lot, licked my fore-finger n' thrust it up into the air to measure the mendacious breeze - the augors were awe-fucked - purple piss in every direction, but maybe, just maybe, i could squeeze in a lap? wife n' kids not home until 6 at any rate, i had no reason not too, and figured a hike up the trail or even just a book-worm sesh in the red-devil would suffice to chase away the inevitable tuesday-blues, should i arrive to find it all a'cock-billed i've long held you can climb a hundred days at beacon and each day have a new distraction - this day it was a curious chem-trail on the 1st pitch - like the shimmery trail of a slug in morning, but strait up and down the full height to snag-ledge, and harder and cruncher than any slug-juice i've seen before - that and the merry martial site of what certainly appeared to be two apache attack helicopters making the dance of death up and down the gorge surprised to find the first lap of the day so dry after all this grim grayness of late, i figured on a second when i reached the trail only for the heavens to open and the rain to fall eagerly on this fell-earth - back at the car i had a leisurely 40 minutes fumbling through rick atkinson's robust apogee of awesomeness, the guns at last light - the rain raged on the rooftop as i made my own private anabasis, ambling through the penultimate tale of a near-dead generation - then it cleared and the mist moved off - a second lap then and all for the better - the lead out the pencil, i pushed off for home and hearth and the Promise of a Better Tomorrow 13/30 laps for the year now 9/18 -#38 - full-moonlight ascent of the corner w/ geoff - the weather god's relented after gray and damp all week - a full cast of clowns in addition to ourselves, their leader did a helen-keller style ascent of cruising to start lovely night - calm - the high moon on the river, the ripples hypnotic 9/20 - deo XXXIX - II laps for XIV towards XXX for the season, half-way bitzes, even as september sags sadly towards fall - the leaves on the wing, the thick lead sky-cloud ever lower towards dusk - fat gray raindrops on the windshield on the way-back - bunches of them bastard elk down the crick, bugling all the damn evening - jim n'an old-time vantucky friend round the base - kenny and a right curious feller from way-back east on the corner - a quick blow-by for the first lap, then a pause and some great goddamn gut laughs w/ them on the ledge - tales from the land of way-ago - pickens n' roanaoke n' hickory n' fucking appalachia 'n general discussed upon winter is coming 9/26 - day 40 - almost a week of solid rain and fucking work, no adventure at all - nastia's all stoked after a spell in the valley and wants to be a big waller, not that i know a damn bit of useful beta 'bout that - figured she oughta learn to solo-aid and gain some experience that way w/o making demands on dim-witted belayers (though, in truth, it ought not be that hard to round up some young'uns willing to hold the other end and stare up at here bouncing nether-bits) - she did well on the first third of free for all, and as evening grew to dusk, she lowered off her funky gri-gri setup and i had a bit of fun down-aiding and cleaning fucking torrential rain coming in a day - seems unlikely there'll be much more post-work beatarding this season 10/4 - day 41 - keeeerist, the fall fell down like a fucking bear trap on the balls some time ago it seems, and awful early too - nastia a bit waylaid by portland traffic - beacon's base looking a good bit like the argonne after old alvin york's big day - blasted tree debris all about the forest floor, the remnants of last weekend's big windstorm and great goddamn deluge - fresh broken blocks - oozing gashes on the upper edges of trees on grassy ledges - still a bit damp but it'll be a good weekend for clambering - we did the bastard warrior, finishing up just as dusk descended 10/5 - douglas adams day! - winter's upon the wall, albeit its adolescent, easy face - pure sunlight streaming through but somewhat weak - strong winds - battle debris from the week gone by all astrew - 3 laps on the corner then home for an afternoon w/ the kids n' wife n' parents 10/8 - 43rd beacon-wrangling day for the year - big fall in the gorge, the trees grown gaunt and dead-orange - damp, dull air on the evening orbit out, my head ringing w/ union-noise, deep wondrous woe - krazy late to met long-suffering kenny - up the corner in a damp, damp tizzy - S1+/2 conditions on the corner - a nut rescue - booty cordellete, cha-ching! babylyon fading, i fumble back in darkness gut-hungry to sad tales - dogs run demented, poor pat sure needs hisself a holy synod sometime soon 10/11 - #44 - epic fall beacon day - WRONG GULL IS GONE - the pillar damn near the size of a trailer that you used to jam to get up to the anchors below the off-width came out yesterday sometime, knocking down the massive old-growth tree below it and forever altering the trail - a fine little boulder for the kids to clamber on lots of rockfall throughout the morning - nastia thrown at wind surfer for aid-testing - many beers - dogs and kids and hard-core grown ups - jim and kenny - chemtrails, johnson, shakespeare, fucking kennedy - good times on the tumble back - now off for a birthday feast, and a monkey face party on the 'morrow 10/15 - day 45 - 2 solo laps, one w/ the irascible denaliduckdave - 19 for the year now - jim n' steve n' tim n' kenny n' Various Others - breezy n' fall-balmy - jeff thomas' big black cock cable all athwart the corner - gut laughs n' the grand history of the bacon-wand considered - home at dusk to take out the trash and taste a most excellent gumbo whipped up by the little woman 10/17 - #46 - BLACK-JACK! kenny is formally awarded the Order of Beacon, 3rd Class for today bringing two pair of boobies to our sacred stone 10/19 - #47 - oregon forum blowing up w/ cruel threats to your friend n' humble narrator as the dawn broke, whiskey-drunk hungover - a gut full of greasy egg n' iced coffee - geoff at the b.k. via mike's - jensen's w/ kyle n' steve too for a tr on the arena of terror - i really need to remember to bring a #5 next time - topped out in the golden glow of the late-day sun - beers n' bullshitting w/ steve in the frosty parking lot after, eventually a run down to the skamania mart for a resupply - another beer later we rambled down for a full moon frolic on the corner, more good beers in tow - belting out big tunes in the darkness, nary a headlamp in sight Trafalgar this day but a bit more than 2 centuries ago! lord nelson dead on the deck of his flagship, who among us could fear such a demise or wish one more wondrous? - "kizmet" he clamored as death clamped its chokehold along his wind-hole, or was "kiss me hardy" more the thing? my 48th beacon-ramble for the fast-rotting year - the Breath of God on the wall, fall colors and fecund smells - the south side to meself - 2 laps, 23/30 for the year and me feeling suddenly like the weather-lords will allow the whole solo set 10/22 - day 49 - 24/30 laps this season - the Indian Summer Endures - breezy n' balmy - the base empty, save for the echoes of jim's recent remodel of the rock-blasted bits - mixes right well w/ the corner's new platform - just need to drop 2 more trees n' it'll be purrfect dave cat-calling from the ground as i began the 2nd pitch - lingered at tree ledge till he reached me, than had a ramble on up the rest of the corner together, bullshiting about the Life Beatardia 10/23 - A Hat Trick of Days at beacon this week so far, my 50th of the year - 26/30 laps now - jim's ride in the lot but lost he was somewhere in the immensity of the park - the Banal Ballad of the Big Breeze blowing down the Columbia - sport climbers wide-eyed on the way down st crispin's eve LI de die ascensus editi! 7 corner clambers in 4 dayz, hang in indian what have you - 28/30 laps now as the autumn augurs roar on just rightly - busy day at bacon - jim n' steve n' the horror of a kamikaze kamera - a crew of girlz on uprising and a nice right sight to follow behind for a few minutes, untethered from terrestrial concerns calamitous tragedy on st crispins - beacon bound, all hepped up n' frantic on a friday in the fall - the red devil, dead - i ain't quite laid 'er in her grave yet, but i'm assembling the titanic quantity of liquor likely to be needed to make it through the wake even as we speak - calling all nations - the universe conspires to deny me the finish to my heroic warrior-poet-god-king quest - i coast into a pro-christian octogenarian-infested polystyrene paneled diner as her soul ascends to heaven - later i work the diner's phone, star-dazzled on a true and wondrous high, hanging out on hold while reading photocopies of old billy graham prayers, trying not to sweat diamonds - the cavalry comes in at the cusp of evening, and i begin my sulk towards bethlehem to be reborn sweet, sweet devil, don't be dead! 10/29 - day 52 of the year - redemption on what seems certain to be the dead last of the dancing days about the bacon-wand as fall upends and bumbles ever faster towards blasted winter - cold and crisp, dead air - i arrive w/o the red devil, desolate and gripped by autumnal angst - not a climber in sight and the sun rapidly setting on the south face - i scramble up to the last licks of light upon the first pitch, and pause, frog-like, in the frenzy of the fading furnace and Gather Strength - 2 laps on the corner, making me 30/30 for the year - from now on, like bj's after 7, every lap from here to the hereafter Pure Gravy Dia de Los Muertos putas! #53, a fine prime figure - my first head cold of fall bubbling up through my snot-ports, a weekend on the couch portending - Gravy Lap 1, snuck in on the dead-last work-day of the pre-daylight savings body-blow upcoming this sabbath - kenny n' adam n' jim n' steve n' scads of Portlanderz all about the damp n' doomy sunset slabs - a beer n' some butts, then a squinty-eyed slither back down the gorge to gullet-fulls of italian food n' a friday-night nap 11/10 - day 54 - a weekend of cavorting like a cave-contained wildman - rick's big five-o - the dynamite cave - party of 11, including da phuzzy - beer guzzling in the gut of the earth - howling music in the halls of the drowned god - all hepped up n' Heavy Crazy - bonfires n' bluegrass bands - chain smoking n' chili n' chilled coffee-touched stout - pissed n' damn near passed out in jim's ride after the party went down by the head - sunday morning whiskey-sick n' weak-souled - bacon n' greasy eggs n' beacon-rock brand beer - a wobbly orbit beacon-ways - blustery, strangely so - the wind in fits n' bursts - buxom girls all garbed in their autumnal get-up - cruising, panic-striken n' panting - up n' over n' back to the humble homestead for spring-rolls, sunday-night tv, n' getting soused 11/17 - #55 - the corner w/ nastia in full-on slippery conditions - damp, dead air, only the occasional catspaw on the placid columbia - the face alive w/ water, thick like buck-snot - french freeing to even start onto the slab 11/23 - day 56 - low in spirits and drifting in the dank doldrums of dead autumn for a fearful long stretch it seems - dastard showers at all hours, wind and wet and a general wilting of the soul as the sap sucks down into the dying earth - friday afternoon dawned frosty yet clear and i threw my shoes into the red devil on the off hope of a gravy lap in the gaudy afternoon, but emerged from work to a woesome wind - a gale w/o ale, grim and determined, no mettle in me - friday night spent getting good n' soused, a nap at nine, midnight w/ the wife in wondrous modes - saturday slept in a proper hour, then up n' coffeed n' cast off w/o partner or plan for a beacon-wand i imagined ever-much as weather-wrapped as the day before - the lot at mid-morning, much adled the Big Breath of the Bog-god - waves stetched long by the fetch of the far channel - a jog in crocs to the corner-pad, all lit by sun n' sheltered from storm - socks under shoes and three-quarter glove shod, i wandered up, the way so much drier than it has been for weeks now - to the true top and all is well, save that big old jug on pitch 2 that is now a ticking time-bomb if ever there was one the parking lot after - a passage to the boat-launch - wind beats upon wave upon bumper upon brain - a few chapters of my book with a couple of beers n' butts - cross-cat-harpings n' snatch-blocks n' the sweltering chilblains - back to the beacon for a circumnavigation n' curious long-orbit back mike-ways a Fall Jewel For Sure - 2 gravy-laps now since the season's been sucked away... 11/25 - day 57 - a rare-auold wintery plum - shuttered up the work-shed even at the last chiming of the bell, blasted off lickety-split up the columbia-way, wailing at fat-arsed fuck-wad lorries lumbering all too slow as my late-afternoon sun set into the western cloud-sluff - the red devil's engine whining w/ a lack of petrol, that vital stuff - into the lot at the first tendrils of twilight - jim n' sal about to set off - me getting all euro-nekkid as i changed into my war-kit, double-thick, while we jibbered n' jabbered about the way of it - shivering - skert - life slipping away so soon it seems - the very reason for coming - the wind in gusts and lulls, all schizo-like, no where near as bad as saturday gravy lap #3 as the vernal season sets hard into the hibernal - happy look upon my face i reckon as i snot n' snort my way up in the half-gale, hands numb n' fading - gloves off at the slab for the finger-swap - the reborative gut-rumble of safety at tree ledge, reckless as that might seem - a world apart - the short stroke onto the trail - the day's last light fading, fading, fading 11/26 - 58th beatard day of this becalmed annum - 4th corner crawl of the cruel late fall - tuesday afore tgiving and proud, proud weather - a 5-day weekend waxing full - balmy n' still in camas, but bright cold n' gusty out in the heart of the gorge - growing dark as i pulled into the desolate lot - big old ice block on the approach trail below the east face - a happy ramble up the dry, dry way - anchor booty on tree-ledge, should the offending parties wish recompense - the long way off, half-sweat through my wind-wracked coat - skert the shit out of a falcon all contemplating on his impending incestuous fornicating as i fingered me way up the very last bit - spent the last 100 feet duckign n' diving as i made for the sanctuary of the swaying forest 12/14 - day 59 n' can i possibly squeeze one last visit before the year fuckers off? too slimy for climbing rocks today, so i suited up the chilluns n' put the dogdamned god in the car too n' headed on out in the early afternoon - side visit to fallen-leaf park in camas along the way for chucking rocks across frozen lake vistas - franzia lake too for swan oogling - swaggered up the trail w/ the kids in tow n' had a picnic up on the summit, then back down for hot-cider n' a quick transit back to st clouds, via the skamania mart for cervazas - wandered along the riverside amongst the mud n' ice n' spent shotgun shells, chucking branches into the river for the dog to fish out, then wobbled on back home for ravioli n' rare-hot red sauce n' bunches of burgundy

Best answer what though is your definition of "news?" in theory, every jackass w/ a twitter account or a smartphone or access to teh intrewebs can provide you with news, and thus put whatever cooties said person contains into said news...

the liberal media can't answer you right now - they're too busy sleeping off the annual hangover after once again losing the fucking War on Christmas !