Off_White

Oh bullshit, you'd totally buy a beer there if they were offering...

Okay, we're on for today, June 8th. Weather looks fine and we've had several RSVP's.

I'm sorry Mike, but I've trademarked that phrase about being passed, and you'll have to cease and desist. I'll have my lawyers contact cafeshops.com.

That's a grim tale Marie, I'm glad it turned out well. MtnGoat (am I the only person who misses that guy?) had a similar event with his wife thwarting a home invasion with her gun, even had to fire it if I recall correctly. That was the first time I heard of that kind of event from someone I "knew." Speaking for myself, in 47 years I've never had an occasion where I wished I had a gun, or been in a situation where it would be helpful. On the otherhand, my friend Mickey Judge shot his younger brother Jamie to death through the bathroom door while playing a chase game with daddy's revolver. Both were in my Boy Scout troop, and I recall walking home from school that day with ambulance and cop car racing past me, wondering what had happened. My nephew Gabe also blinded his (former) best friend in one eye with a pellet gun, fortunately not with anything more powerful. I've always chosen not to have a gun in my house, and in years gone by I've had a few prickly conversations with the parents of my son Ben's friends regarding just what weapons they had in their house and how they chose to store them. Ben is 23 now, and I've just returned from his college graduation. At least one of the students in his rural Washington high school won't be graduating anything, ever, having used a family gun to make a dramatic exit. The single biggest thing you can do to increase the chance that you or a family member will die by gunfire is to own a gun. It is, thankfully, a free country, and each of you can make your own decision on the issue and act accordingly.

Wilkeson/Carbonado is a pretty cool area. Don't forget, Fairweather is in Pierce County, not King, and it's a different market than what most of ya'll are thinking about. On the other hand, Tacoma is pushing hard on downtown revitalization, and it's a different place than 10 years ago. I think a clever investor could make some long haul money buying up some downtown T-town periphery property now, though it may not be a place you'd want to move your family to for another 5 or 10 years. Me, I'm happy to be a seller in this market rather than a buyer, just don't let that bubble burst for another 3 weeks.

Okay, let's take a stab at reviving the Wednesday night thing, from about 5 until too dark to see. This week and every week. As it evolved last year, this event was much more about climbing than drinking. PM me for directions.

It did help make that summer very entertaining in the valley. Some of the stuff had the annoying habit of bursting into flame when smoked in a joint, rumor was that this was due to getting soaked in fuel. Best enjoyed in a pipe. This shot is from that summer, in the Lodge lot, back in the day when you could sleep in your van for free there for the entire summer. Note the home made india print curtain on the window.

What do you call a group of Irishmen? A thicket!

I thought the rub was the desired effect.

My favorite for Leavenworth is simply "Der"

Worse yet, your beer gets warm

A Sumatran Rat-Monkey?!! The horror....

Yup, military is public sector Me, I just can't take polls. I accidentally clicked "public sector" but I are self employed.

Why is it that when I read your heading, "Hey Klenke!!!" I hear it in Jerry Lewis' voice?

I think there would be some, those formations continue to drop at the same angle below the water. You do have to watch out for the slabby stuff, bouncing, rolling, and bellyflopping are poor form in the deepwater solo game.

I spent a great Memorial Day weekend climbing at Banks Lake one year in the mid 90's, we actually saw another party climbing, perhaps a first for the area at that time. We rented a boat to go play in the really cool aquatic dome stuff. There were a lot of fast bass boats buzzing about with the stately beer bellied Men of Banks Lake at the helm. I thought it was funny that they all seemed to have the same brand outboard, "Contest" printed on a fluorescent green band. Silly me, there was a fishing contest and this was a stretchy band the contestants used to identify themselves. If I were to go this Memorial Day weekend, I'd take a rowboat and put one of those bands on a hat to wear while I was powering it. Here's a bouldering shot, note the life preserver self belay.

That's more or less right Scott, though it also climbs the lower triangular face too. Somehow I thought we'd put them both on a photo, I can even see it in my mind, but I can't find a copy anywhere, so maybe we just talked about it. Anyway, here's a view of that route (right hand start includes optional 5.11a face pitch)

Well, if you pre-protect it from above by dangling long slings on hexes through the crack (as I believe was commonly done), it's sort of like a sport climb.

Owning a small business, I sometimes receive solictations for charitable donations. The other day, the Washington Search & Rescue Support Council called looking for money, and as business is doing alright so far this year, I told them to send me some info and a form. Something about seeing the title in print made my scamdar tingle, and I was thinking to PM Freeman on this site to check these people out. Instead, I opted for a simple websearch which turned up this link Essentially, this is one of those fundraising groups that keeps the majority of the funds for itself (for "administrative" purposes) and doesn't do anything for what you think it does. Law enforcement/fire department fundraising is a notorious category for this jive. Anyway, having almost fallen for it, I thought I'd bring up the topic.

Winter said: Did you happen to catch their set down at Dantes this fall? It had been awhile since I went to a show that featured multiple full on rolling on the floor kicking and punching multi person brawls. It was a good time, youbetcha.

I've got an older FF goretex/down 2lb bag, I couldn't tell you the model, I just refer to it as the precious. I'd buy one from them again for sure. I've been okay in it down to 20 or so, but I wouldn't really take it winter camping. I did take a down bag on Rainier in the winter years ago, wound up with a nylon sack and fist size lumps of frozen down in each baffle.

I've heard that ANWR oil would most likely be exported to China. And here's a fact: a google search on "Frank Murkowski" and "piece of shit" yields a full six pages of mostly relevant hits.

Well RIP Terri, hopefully the various factions of her family can now move on. I suppose it's nice to have a Karen Anne Quinlan for a new generation

I got it the first time around Sobo, don't you just hate it when you have to go back and explain your clever jab to the joker who just took it on the chin?

You just wait until they put the first squid into space, then you'll eat those words!