Off_White

Don't forget enhanced hook placements, not as obvious as a full on bat hook hole, but a few taps with the drill here and there to make a more secure dimple in that edge for your hook to sit in. One of the dirty little secrets of modern aid.

Because it would be too much work for the moderators to try and keep it confined to just the one forum, Dru.

Yep, I've found it an entertaining thread, but please credit Lummox with the original creation.

Requests made for more posts from newbies and lurkers, and there you two go, spraying all over her thread. Not to mention you bastards beat me to the punchline that the thread topic immediately brought to mind. Around here anyway it seems more like chocolate espresso cheesecake weather than time for layered ice cream... More severe side effects for overconsumption too: glassy eyed groaning forms prone on the floor, helplessly vibrating.

It's a technique called "trolling" and some around here practice it as a high art, but DFA never complained about anything. Your use of a "he was provoked" defense is like asking "what were you wearing that made him rape you?"

So, the clean climbing revolution had NOTHING to do with a change in the way climbers approached wilderness and the preservation thereof? You're telling me that nuts caught on ONLY BECAUSE THEY ARE EASY TO USE AND MADE CLIMBS EASIER FOR JOE AVERAGE? "If it's practical, I'll do it. If it helps me get up the cliff, shoot.....IT'S ALL GOOD!" May I summarize your approach to climbing ethics in the previous pseudo-quote? Is this what really motivates you? Just so long as it makes the climb easy, anything goes? Because, my friend, when you begin to allow for permanent alterations to the rock (bolts) in order to facilitate an easier ascent, and when you're Hell-bent on affirming the latest fad for fear of being accused of living in the past, YOU MAY HAVE DIFFICULTY TELLING THE NEXT GENERATION OF CLIMBERS (WHO WISH TO MAKE THINGS EVEN EASIER BY, SAY, CHIPPING A LINE OF BUCKETS) THAT WE SHOULD RESPECT THE NATURAL LIMITATIONS OF THE CLIFF INSTEAD OF MURDERING THE IMPOSSIBLE. You either have the reading comprehension abilities of the average ten year old or you're a devotee of malevolent obfuscation. I was not discussing my approach to climbing ethics, but poking a hole in your fatuous assertion that the noble giants of yesteryear who lived through the clean climbing revolution were ethical purists of the first water who acted against self interest for the sake of the environment. It's like arguing that the Civil War was only about freeing the slaves, or that we invaded Iraq because Saddam Hussein murdered those women and children whose graves we've recently uncovered. It's a simple fact of history and psychology that humans generally act out of self interest. Are you trying to argue that nuts would have taken over if they were more difficult, slower, and more dangerous to use? Did you ever lead a hard free route with a rack of pins? Odds are you're one of those whose access to climbing was enabled by the proliferation of the new technology. Yes, the real reason clean climbing caught on was because it made climbing easier and safer, and it did lead to a large increase in the number of climbers. The fact that it had less impact on the rock just let you feel good about doing the easy thing. Your histrionic blather about chipping is just more handwaving to distract from the issue at hand. This self serving revision of history to imbue the forefathers (which you count yourself one of) with glory only serves to convince folks like Scott Harpell that ethics really are in decline, and that people in this debased decadent era really are less worthy than they used to be. It's the same tired load of bullshit that elders have fed to their younger successors since the dawn of time.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Well, I'll be hog-tied and dipped in honey. And I thought you'd have to PM our "esteemed and ethical" moderators in order to ascertain my identity, which I so obviously wished would remain private. Kurt, you suggest that Dwayner is a prick. Well you've just demonstrated your capacity for being lower than a snake's butt in a wagon track. Kurt only has access to IP address data in the Freshiez forum that he moderates, so his conclusion does not come from either the avatar identity unravelling that the unique address you are posting from can reveal, or a discussion in the moderator forum. I'd assume he used the same information and skills that Rudy had available.

yeah, and I hear the guy has an across the board disdain for volcanos too, damned bigot.

Ahh, you have been watching.

Lots of good suggestions here, but I'd add Spring Mountain in Eastern Oregon, between Pendleton and La Grande. (probably at the limits of your 4-5 hour requirement from Seattle) It has some good moderate cracks, and would fit your social requirements, but I bet the season is closing out unless we get another heat wave. It'll be good come spring.

I'm not at all trying to pooh-pooh your sense of outrage, but lots of things posted in Spray are not okay to someone or other. The list of things that are officially "not okay" down here in the mudwrestling arena is pretty damn short. Necro and some of his avatars have gotten banned at times due to his Jonathan Swift on PCP antics, but generally speaking inducing moral outrage will not get anyone ejected from the moshpit. While many may be virulently repulsed by DFA's suggestion (which I believe he actually recanted and apologized for), its not the same thing as a direct threat of physical harm, and the line is not that fuzzy.

Fairweather, Necro made a tasteless malevolent "wish" towards GW Bush, which is quite a different thing than a specific "I'm going to hunt you down and beat you until you spit up blood" sincere personal threat. It's like the difference between talking trash about Hilary Clinton and offering to kick the shit out of your wife if she says just one more thing.

I think the whole cant about how bold the oldies were and how pure and ideal the development of clean climbing was is fundamentalist history revision. Despite impassioned pleas in Chouinard Catalogs, the reason nuts caught on was not because pin scars were so abhorent, but because they were easier, faster, and safer. I could hang from one hand and place a nut, hell, even do it left handed, but dangle and set a pin? Clean climbing brought the sport down to a level that average folks could do more routes. People were no more bold then than they are now, I think Rudy's hit the nail right on the head about how many bold climbers are in the game, the percentage hasn't changed much through the years. For the most part, trad climbs are not that dangerous, or else we'd see a lot more fatalities from falls. To rewrite history so that you can feel special about how brave you were is a little twisted. I'd rather think about what I'm going to do next season than dwell on what I did 25 years ago, and I'd rather find a new favorite band than fawn over a remastered Cream re-release. Which way do you choose to face, forwards or back? Elders have always complained about the following generation, you can find examples as far back as there is writing, and when I was younger I vowed not to grow up to be one of those people. I'd appreciate a short sharp reminder from any of you folks if I fall into that stodgy posture. And no JKassidy, that's not at all the same thing as saying that everything new is good and ignoring the past. Back to a part of the original thrust of the thread, if you want to talk about impact on the rock for the general public, the issue should not be bolts, but chalk, an argument that purists "lost" long ago. Even in the hotly contested lava tubes, I think it was the chalk smears everywhere that alarmed others more than any bolt placements. I confess to using it too often, as much as a physical assist, it functions as a ritual, a calming and focusing mantra, like clearing your throat.

wait...i'm pretty sure i was you last year

How is it that a discussion of the impact of the expanding number of climbers has become focused on bolts? I'm with whoever complained about finding a campsite, there was a time when you could drive into Hidden Valley Campground in J Tree on a friday night and find a site, or spend two months living in your car in the Yosemite Lodge parking lot. How's that for a definition of the "golden age?"

Inlaws coming for the holiday again?

Sixty Million Dollar Man was completely brilliant, subtitled Hong Kong flick, more surreal than stereotypical Hong Kong action flick. I mean, who wouldn't want to have the power to transform into a giant tube of toothpaste?

Yeah, but I heard Ted Bundy could really crank back in the day...

So you passed it to me... Thanks AK, thanks a whole bunch.

Dude should spray over here, he'd fit right in.

No, not the same thing at all Trask. I just read a profile on Pickton up in BC and had a similar reaction as Necro's.

In a rare moment of candor, Washington insiders discuss the size of their dicks.

Layton's foot hurts. Your ass hurts. You do the math.

Hey, shouldn't this be in the New Rock Climbing Forum ?

Peter, maybe you should see Glassgowkiss for some massage therapy, your knee seems to be jerking again.