Buckaroo

Trying to decide between the eTrex Legend CX and the eTrex Vista CX. The Vista is $50 more and has an additional magnetic compass and barometric altimeter. How useful are these for GPS navigation? the sales guy said the Legend doesn't point a bearing until you start moving?

The Column at The Rambles Peterson Smaridge Dihedral, thin but full length Peterson Smaridge Dihedral Closet Secrets, pitch 1 grade 3-4, in thin conditions Closet Secrets, pitch 2 , grade 4, Shreddie on the right, lens makes it look off angle, but top 2/3 is vertical Shreddie, Grade 5, the camera lens distorts distances, the 3 to 4 ramp to the big cave is 1/3 height, the upper vertical grade 5 section is 2/3 of total length, about 40M.

Messner was bad but Jerzy Kukuczka did the 14ers in better style, all either first ascents or first winter ascents. Messner had titanium crampons, Kukuczka had ham and vodka. Dave Cheesemond George Lowe Catherine Destivelle Wanda Rutkiewicz

the approach pitches are 3, the main upper falls are 4 by the easiest line and 5 by the hardest. Your results may vary because waterfall ice doesn't always form up the same way. the pencil is 5 the crux to these climbs is finding them in condition. The river can sometimes be crossed at the Drury drainage but it's more reliable to cross the lake and snowshoe if you want it to be real interesting like we did it, cross in one of those really cheap inflatables that could easily pop and has very little directional stability. The crossing is in the dark both ways and with a really small inflatable you have to make two trips each way to carry the packs then the partner. It's best also to keep the inflatable stored for several years before the attempt, that way there's a risk of dry rot. then drift across in the dark wondering if there's some tree branches just underneath the surface and how hard it's going to be to swim with plastic boots and full winter gear.

Yeah, the weather channel ehh? We all know the forecast is right/wrong 50 percent of the time. Oh well guess we have to go to Banff now. You never know though, the canyons are higher than the town, so if it gets cold again, these things could still be there in a week or so.

Yeah, I always carry two prussiks but had just used them on the abakalov. I know about backing up a rap with a prussik but have never seen it done. Does it work on iced ropes?

everything a little thin, but stuff that usually doesn't form was in Jan 16th drive up and did Icy BC 1st pitch, thinner than usual but do-able. Upper pitch looks in but not fat. Top roped the Deeping Wall, steep all the way but picked out. Hooked almost all the way but partner found an relatively unmolested line. having done all the regulars, loose lady, carls berg, syncronicity, tried for some other stuff. 17th, the Rambles, the cirque in plain site directly across from the hiway from the bridge, did The Column (4-) and The Peterson Smaridge Dihedral, (4+) it was fully formed, full 50 meters, very nice, thin but good screws and the last 30' was bolt protected cuz the top is usually very thin if it's even in, the book says it usually only forms 1/2 height. 18th, the Rambles, the cirque viewable across the hiway and right from the bridge. Closet secrets, very interestingly thin but ok screws, shallow ice in spots, rocked the tools. Alpine traversed toward Shreddy (fully formed, rare) to try for a top rope, ledge tapered to featureless slab, abakalov off a little shroom, rap and tension traverse into below the top of Shreddy, climbed up, cleaned the anchor and twin 60's reach the ground! AWESOME 5!, fun on toprope, should have led it, several marginal rests on the upper curtain but screws maybe not easy. Lots of shrooms, lots of chandeliers, sort of wet on the right side. Beta, the "foot/snowmobile bridge" described in the new guide as being 3k past Carls Berg is more like 3 miles past Carls Berg. The foot bridge got washed away, now it's a full one lane vehicle bridge, you can't miss it about 150' off the road in plain site. The approach to the Column cirque was icy rock, a beater set of crampons would make it faster. The Shreddy cirque should not be approached in warm conditions, it's a box canyon gully, if the huge free hanging daggers come down on Shreddy it's not going to be pretty for anything within the upper 300' of the gully and there's nowhere to go. Almost had an epic, toproping my buddy on Shreddy, noted one of the ropes was getting icy. We'd put a directional to keep the climber out of the wet but the other side of the rope was in the wet. Decided I could pull up our third rope if it got too iced before I needed to rap. It seemed ok, NOT. the rope was iced in spots, the REI gloves got iced from the climb and started slipping on rapel. Wound the rope around my arm and ripped the shell off, luckily the liner glove was dry and got traction. All the while free hanging at 120'. big sigh back on the ground. The rope is pretty new dry. Just a bad combo of conditions. The Lillooet weather report on TV at the hotel said below freezing for the next couple weeks except for next tues (0C), and -14C on the 27th.

Ice is in, did 4 climbs in the Rambles and ICBC, get it while it's cold, looks cold enough for the next couple weeks except for tues. will write a better TR later today.

""these same people would probably be clever enough to leak some morsels of "secret" information"" oh yeah, it's called "disinformation" and some estimates say 80 percent of the CIA's resources are spent there. but just on the face of it, an atrocity is necessary to foment war among a generally unwilling populace, because they are the ones who go and die. That war though is highly beneficial to those who build for and promote it. It's entirely possible they could be connected to the fabrication of an "atrocity" triggering event. ""Tactical ruses, strategic head-fakes on the way to the real goal."" a recent example would be Clinton, in only token ways liberal, really a corporatist* at heart, big huge Monica distraction, meanwhile he allowed a big corporate push via media dereg and "free trade" agreements. True Democracy needs a strong middle class, something the global elites have been trying to bring down in this country for the last 40 or so years. Ever seen him so pal with bush sr.? It's the same team. Remember he was Ark gov when the Iran contra CIA was flying drugs and weapons in and out of Mena. *just look at Hillary now, on the board of Walmart and meetings with Murdoch.

"Life Sucks, Then You Die" WARNING EXPLICIT LYRICS Recorded by: "The Fools" My house burned down in a flash of thunder. My wife ran off with a one-legged plumber. My crops fell dead when the riverbed went dry. My dog got squashed by a pickup truck. My son ran away and got hooked on drugs. My daughter's knocked up by the class of '85. People say that life is good; It don't seem good to me. I'm lost without a paddle, And I'm headed up shit creek. People say that life is fun, But I don't know why. As far as I can tell, LIFE SUCKS then you die. The government dumps its toxic waste Right on top of my mother's grave. A team of experts say it won't do her no harm. But my sheep went crazy and killed my mule. I cut off my dick with a power tool Fixin' the hole where the meteor hit the barn. (And it hurt, too!) People say that life is good, But I just piss and moan. I got one foot on a banana peel, The other in the Twilight Zone. People say that life is fun, But I don't know why. As far as I can tell, LIFE SUCKS then you die. Let me hear some "yee-hah"s out there! I went to the store to buy some shells. My gun went off and blew the owner to hell. Now I'm sittin' here in jail, singin' this song. And one guy wants to cut me with a knife. Another guy wants me to be his wife. Hey, I wish they'd hang me before somethin' really goes wrong! People say that life is good, Give thanks for what you have. When all you have is nothin', Nothin' makes you glad. People say that life is fun, But I don't know why. As far as I can tell, LIFE SUCKS, then you die. I said, people say that life is fun, But I don't know why. As far as I can tell, LIFE SUCKS, LIFE SUCKS LIFE SUCKS, then you die.

""Holy crap this thread needs to die."" hey we're not to 50 pages yet! don't mind me Kevbone, just having a little bout of keyboard diarrhea, someone must have spiked my tofu smoothie with a dose of fluoride.

""I'd also be interested in hearing whether or not he has considered that he may be unwittingly furthering the aims of a larger conspiracy by laying bare the evidence and analysis that have hitherto escaped the general public's notice."" I'd be interested if you would expand on this, what theories are you talking about specifically? Some recent stuff that is most interesting to me would be the Builderbergs and the Bohemian Grove. Due to the industrial revolution, power and wealth has been concentrated into the hands of a few individuals. And like no other time in history this has been in a more or less stable fashion, where they can settle down and concentrate their power and wealth even further. And now with the unexpectedness of the internet we are shown these long held secrets, of secret societies and the occult, sex fetishes and such, very interesting. The Builderberg meetings where the participants have been identified. A secret meeting of the tip top of the wealthy global elite, with no specific details released to the "general public" sheeple. And Bohemian Grove, a secret meeting place of the very same top global elite, occult worship. A place where every single president of the US has attended and been vetted for the last 100 years. A Stone owl is at the center of the altar of worship. It's a steel framework with a stone facade that houses the controls of an elaborate display of pyrotechnics that go off during the ceremonies. Why are the global elites meeting to worship an owl? And pedophilia, because I guess when you're that rich the normal pleasures become sort of blase. Alex Jones, who may portray the image of a kook just for plausible deniability (cover), was the first one to film the "cremation of care" occult worship at the Grove, and get it out past security, and they were pissed. And more recently an employee smuggled some even better footage out of the Grove, really interesting video.

"tell us if he has ever come across a conspiracy theory that he found unconvincing, and on what grounds." That would be the gov's conspiracy theory on 911. Where 19 hijackers from dirt camps armed with boxcutters. (7 of which are still alive? If the indentities are false who is real?) Who's flight instructors said couldn't solo a cessna and could barely drive a car, managed to get around the defenses of the most hi tech and heavily defended area on the planet. Flying around in hijacked jets in restricted airspace for over an hour before the last plane hit with no intercepts in sight. The pentagon strike being a highly skilled manuver at the limits of the plane's capacity. Stock trades in the millions cashing on the airlines and businesses involved, but the SEC can't trace the perps because most of them led to a CIA bank? Disappearing black boxes, steel evidence sent to recycle. 50 million spent on crashed shuttle investigation but only 3 million on the WTC? A subset of this conspiracy would be the disinformation of it not being a large passenger jet that hit the pentagon. This is a false theory also propagated by the gov because the fistagon has plenty of vid, there should have been a clear shot of the plane but they won't release it to keep the waters muddy. ""unwittingly furthering the aims of a larger conspiracy"" there is no heaven or hell, it's all in the same place ""It would also be interesting to hear a short story....in which there was no sinister subtext"" I've done a few long TR's, you don't read much? I'll post my Shuksan story, thought I almost died at the time, first one I ever wrote, may want to polish it first. ""Like the neighbors dog, who always seems to cock his head to the side and perk up his ears suspiciously whenever anyone in earshot utters the word "Zionist."" warning warning, JayB in full-on personal attack mode, all hands, battle stations, all hands, whoooooop, whooooop.

"how long do (you) intend to live" agree and it's not length necessarily but quality of life "watch out for black helicopters" they do exist, the black choppers and the other colors aren't dangerous also? Reminds me of the stories my budd tells me at work, he was on a tank crew of 4 in Gulf war 1. He's in his mid 30's? and he's the only survivor from that crew, gulf war syndrome got the others. The only thing he said he did different from the others is to drink water through the mask on the chem suit, the others took off their masks real quick, drank and put them back on, because the mask had a foul tasting rubber tube to sip through. I thought maybe too the others just weren't as resistant as this guy. He did have all kinds of medical problems including PTSD and not getting enough sleep and hypersensitivity to noises and splitting headaches. Anyway he went on to special forces, trained for 3(?) years and did missions in the middle east, became a team leader. His commander would sometimes tag along but this would not be good because the team was limited to a certain number and everyone had a specialty so one specialist would have to be left behind to make room for the tag along. Anyone who talked too much about women or acquired a girlfriend would be booted from this elite force because it was considered too much of a distraction from total focus. Hi tech, all the latest gadgets, phone with GPS and bulletproof. Plastic explosives, they also had phosphorous(?) bombs which they could set on top of a tank and not really an explosion but it would melt right through the top of the tank. They would also take a very small amount of this material to heat MRE's, which they totally hated, but very good for compaction if there was no time to #2 on the mission. The most dangerous insertion was a night time parachute (base jump type chute?) where they would have to freefall until under radar. Basically from very high up and totally relying on wrist altimeter, hit the chute under 800' (?) up. One chance only, no time for reserve. WARNING GRAPHIC TEXT BELOW, BLOOD, GUTS, DEATH, don't say I didn't warn you!!! At one point he had to go in and pull the electronics from a disabled tank. Don't think this was a covert mission just a regular op before he went to special forces. Apparently a grenade or something had gone off inside. All 4 of the crew were gone, the biggest thing left was a foot in a boot. Inside a tank the shrapnel ricochets quite a bit because everything is hardened. He surmised that someone was "playing" with a grenade but not sure how it happened as it's pretty hard to "accidentally" pull a pin. And modern grenades are not like in the movies. First off they are very heavy and hard to throw any distance. Your arm is gone after 3 or 4. You find cover before you throw because the range of the shrapnel is much further than you can throw. And one guy falling on a grenade and saving everyone? Not going to happen. He was also at the hiway of death where they sealed off this long hiway that the Iraqis had used to retreat from Kuwait. And then they just strafed and bombed them until there was nothing left moving. Afterwards they bulldozed everything into the sand. So on these special ops missions they would infiltrate camps or whatever, recovering stolen military stuff or hitting individuals. The best way to silently kill someone apparently wasn't necessarily learned in training. Because the first few times he would slash the throat. But apparently this was a noisy way to kill someone because they are alive for about 30 seconds or more and breathing loudly through the opening. So bad he would stuff a rag or something in the opening. So it was determined the best way is up from the back with a longish knife, trying for the heart and lung at the same time. This guy is of German heritage go figure. He's back in society now and living a normal life, really likes music and DJ's on the side. Nice loving family with a little boy and now a new little girl.

* conduct no research * avoid the real issues when possible * never engage in any debate where actual research data will be used * attack the opponent, not the issue * persuade; do not inform * use emotional phrases to distract people from the real issues * when confronted, change the subject * cover up the real studies; never refer to them * Keep repeating unfounded falsehoods about the safety and effectiveness of proven poisons * Remind people how many decades fluoridation has been going on * Favor mandatory fluoridation legislation, removing all opportunity for free discussion when possible * Try to keep all opposing evidence from being seen or considered by any policy-making agency * Omit pertinent data from actual studies * Above all, never stop repeating the same falsehoods, over and over.

"Since 2001" and how long have we known mercury is toxic? So why did it take so long to get the thimerosol out? "with the exception of inactivated influenza vaccine." so THAT'S why they push flu vaccines every year on the "news", gotta get that mercury dose in there somehow cuz people are waking up to amalgam fillings ehh?

""At first I thought you were serious and then I realized you were a comic genius! link The good Doctor also opposed vaccines."" As well he should, vaccines have been corrupted, especially in the US by some of the very same people that gave us flouride. Why do you need thimerosal (mercury) in your vaccine? Gotta start those tots off right, all aboard the cancer train.

"I simply take the issue off my plate entirely." totally agree, we are a natural organism, why pollute yourself with unnatural chemicals. Why be a test dummy for the chem/healthcare corps. "not a single one of us on this forum really know jack shit about fluoridation one way or the other" allow me to do some mind exercise then. It's a very long and sordid story of how big money convinces the sheeple that black is indeed white. And fluoride also acts as a sedative, what better way to continue to control the sheeple. As far as filters, read the fine print, the small low budget filters don't get chlorine or flouride. Sometimes it won't say on the box you have to go to the website. the following is a condensed article, full article HERE Is Fluoride Really As Safe As You Are Told? The fluoride added to 90% of drinking water is hydrofluoric acid which is a compound of fluorine that is a chemical byproduct of aluminum, steel, cement, phosphate, and nuclear weapons manufacturing. Such fluoride is manmade. In this form, fluoride has no nutrient value whatsoever. It is one of the most caustic of industrial chemicals. Fluoride is the active toxin in rat poisons and cockroach powder. ....a toxic industrial waste could be passed off on the public as a nutrient with necessary health benefits, to the tune of $10 billion per year. Or more. Once in the body, fluoride is a destroyer of human enzymes. It does this by changing their shapes. Since enzymes are proteins, once they've been changed, they're now foreign-looking. The body now treats them as invaders, even though they're part of that body. This is known as an autoimmune situation - the body attacks itself. The most thorough explanation of the origin, action, diseases, and politics of fluoride was presented in a book called Fluoride the Aging Factor by John Yiamouyiannis, PhD. Dr. Y starts by citing hundreds of international studies of fluoridation that have been conducted all over the world since the 1930s. After awhile, there seem to be just two types: * Studies that were really looking to find out about fluoride * Studies that were trying to cover up what had already been discovered "Fluoride is more poisonous than lead, and just less poisonous than arsenic."- Clinical Toxicology of Commercial Products - 1984 Today, the recommended level remains at 1 - 1.2 PPM, with the maximum allowable level set at 4 PPM by the EPA. Maximum Contaminant Level Allowed In U.S. Drinking Water: Arsenic -- 50 Parts Per Billion Lead -- 15 Parts Per Billion Fluoride -- 4000 Parts Per Billion Source: EPA National Primary Drinking Water Standards (July 1987) As California Medical Association president Dr. Alesen points out, concentration in parts per million sidesteps the issue, regarding something that accumulates in the body year after year. The EPA is comparing fluorine to vitamins, for which there are minimum daily requirements. But vitamins are completely used up in a day or less. They don't accumulate. Fluoride Accelerates Your Aging Process Collagen Is The Body's Glue and Fluoride Ruins It Fluoride Ruins Your Teeth Fluoride And Osteoporosis Cancer And Fluoride But what if lobbyists from these industries could present "scientific studies" paid for by the industries, and provide for a continual stream of media presentations about the health benefits of fluoride, and create unimaginably lucrative positions for "research" and "education" within the American Dental Association and the AMA, and do all these things in a consistent and unending way, year after year? The Players: ALCOA Aluminum, mega-giant producer of aluminum, was founded by Andrew Mellon, who was also appointed Secretary of Treasury, since he seemed to know something about money. ALCOA funded a top research facility known as the Mellon Institute. In 1931, a Mellon Institute report by Gerald Cox suggested that 1 PPM fluoride added to drinking water would be good for the teeth. That was it. No studies, no comparisons, no data. All previous research studies had shown that fluoride was toxic. The US Public Health Service (USPHS) at that time was under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of Treasury - Andrew Mellon, who also owned ALCOA. The USPHS sponsored some research put out by their own Dr. HT Dean, manipulating data so that it "proved" that this same figure of 1 PPM resulted in reduction of tooth decay. Next problem: sell it to the American Medical Association and the American Dental Association. This took years. Even in 1943, an article in JAMA described fluoride as a poison that damaged enzyme systems even at a concentration of 1 PPM. The article showed concern about 25,000 tons of fluorine released into the atmosphere every year from the phosphate fertilizer industry. (JAMA, Sept 18, 1943). The following year Journal of the American Dental Association ran another article warning that fluoridated water caused osteoporosis, goiter, and spinal disease. They stated that "the potentialities for harm far outweigh those for good." (JADA, 1 Oct 1944) In 1944, ALCOA hired an attorney named Oscar Ewing at a salary of $750,000 per year. That same year Ewing was appointed to the Federal Security Administration. The USPHS was a division of the Federal Security Association. So now ALCOA's boy was in a position to control the policies of the Public Health Service. Ewing chose his PR man for fluoridation: Edward Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud. Edward L. Bernays, described by the Washington Post as the 'original spin doctor" was responsible for evolving the pro-fluoridation propaganda and disinformation machine. How anxious he was to put his uncle's ideas and methods of persuasion into action. (Dr. Y, p143) " ... those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country ... our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of ... " - Bernays, (Propaganda) Using classical Freudian principles, Bernays maintained that a well-oiled propaganda machine could make the public believe practically anything, even the exact opposite of what had been already proven by all existing scientific research. And this is exactly what Ewing needed in the case of fluoridation. By 1952, the American Dental Association had turned completely, publishing the articles of radical fluoride advocate Frank Bull in the JADA. Bull's whole focus was disinformation; avoiding confrontation with actual studies. As the B in BS, Bull put the propaganda theories of Bernays into actual practice. Next, Procter and Gamble scored big when they got the ADA to endorse fluoride in toothpaste. Any dentists who spoke out against this ADA decision were censured, lost grant funding, or were thrown out of the ADA. By 1960 the alliance was formed: * ALCOA * the US Public Health Service * the Federal Security Administration * the American Dental Association * Procter&Gamble. Always remember - the ADA is a trade union, a lobby whose main purpose is furthering the economic advancement of the dental profession. The ADA Doesn't Represent Dental Health. And in many cases the ADA doesn't represent the dentists themselves. This is especially true in the class action suit filed by some 40 dentists against the ADA in a DC Superior Court. The charges? Ethical breach of the public trust for recommending fluoridation while failing to inform its members and the public of the widespread available literature proving toxicity. What Do The Real Experts Say? "When historians come to write about this period, they will single out fluoridation as the single biggest mistake in public policy that we've ever had." - Paul Connett, PhD, Biochemistry "Water fluoridation is the single largest case of scientific fraud, promoted by the government, supported by taxpayer dollars, aided and abetted by the ADA and the AMA, in the history of the planet." - David Kennedy, DDS President International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology "Sodium fluoride is a registered rat poison and roach poison. It has been a protected pollutant for a very long time." - William Hirzy, PhD President of the Union of Professional Employees of the EPA "sodium fluoride is a very toxic chemical, acting as an enzyme poison, direct irritant and calcium inactivator ... .It reacts with growing tooth enamel and with bones to produce irreversible damage." - Granville Knight, MD president of the American Academy of Nutrition Congressional Record, 31 July 56 "I am appalled at the prospect of using water as a vehicle for drugs. Fluoride is a corrosive poison that will produce serious effects on a long range basis. Any attempt to use water this way is deplorable." - Charles Gordon Heyd, MD, president, AMA "no physician in his right mind would hand to his patient a bottled filled with a dangerous drug with instructions to take as much or as little of it as he wished ... And yet, the Public Health Service is engaged upon a widespread propaganda program to insist that communities do exactly that ... The purpose of administering fluoride is not to render the water supply pure and potable but to contaminate it with a dangerous, toxic drug for the purpose of administering mass medication to the consumer, without regard to age or physical condition." - L. Alesen, MD, president of the California Medical Association Robotry, p14 "Fluoridation is the greatest fraud that has ever been perpetrated and it has been perpetrated on more people than any other fraud has." - Albert Schatz, PhD Nobel Laureate for discovering streptomycin quoted in Sutton's Fluoridation:The Greatest Fraud "More people have died in the last 30 years from cancer connected with fluoridation than all the military deaths in the entire history of the United States." - Dean Burk, PhD National Cancer Institute -- Fluoridation:A Burning Controversy "Fluoridation is the greatest case of scientific fraud of this century, if not of all time." - EPA scientist, Dr. Robert Carton (Downey, 2 May 99) Why do we never hear any of this? Because the corps control the US media? Only about 2% of the population of Europe is subjected to fluoridated water. If fluoridation is as safe and effective as the American Dental Association says it is, why don't other countries do it? Locked In Three reasons why we're so far down the road of toxic fluoridation, it's hard to come back: 1. To reverse the policy of fluoridation now would be for the ADA, the EPA, the FDA, and the USPHS, Congress, and all the municipal water polluters in the US to admit that they made a mistake. Not a good move for re-election. 2.To criticize fluoridation as a policy would challenge the billions of tons of fluoride being released into the air and water by the nuclear, aluminum, phosphate, steel, glass, cement, and petrochemical industries. 3. If fluoridation stopped, a multi-billion dollar gravy train of research grants, propaganda contracts, and sweetheart arrangements between government and industry would vaporize overnight. Fluoridation is a totally new idea, from a Constitutional point of view. It's nothing like adding chlorine. Although chlorine has toxic side effects, it actually does something beneficial to the water - chlorine purifies the water. Fluoride does no such thing. Fluoride is a drug, a medication that supposedly has beneficial effects for a small percentage of the population. "Buy a filter or be a filter." but cheap filters don't filter chlorine or fluoride....But to really get the resistant biologicals, the fluoride, heavy metals, and other contaminants, the customer may consider one of the high-end drinking water filters. These cost between two and four hundred dollars and come in models for both over and under the sink.

Don't worry Moto, there's plenty of us out here that agree with you. The US is inundated with toxins. It's part of industrialized life but I think it's also a corporate greed thing. Riding the cancer train. It's just good for business both in sale of the chemicals and treating the cancer caused by them. Like the Dow chemical ad. "We make possible the film used in breast cancer exams, Dow chemical "for life"", yeah, and you create the chemicals that caused the breast cancer in the first place. And the gov is in on it because it's p-owned by the corps. Just look at aspartame. Approved by the FDA after it had more complaints in it's trial period than any others in history. And look who coerced it through the approval process, none other than deathskull himself Donald Rumsfeld when he was with Searl(?). Nuff said. So can you really trust the "studies" that say fluoride is safe? You have to believe that science can not possibly be corrupted. Which is always in question when BIG money is involved. Fluoride, Chlorine, Amalgam (mercury), aspartame, DU, agent orange. Hey, like the lawyers that argued in court that agent orange isn't toxic. Bring out a 55 gallon drum of the stuff and invite them to take a dunk in it. And "big cancer" never ever addresses the cause, they only cure the symptom. Just like the rest of the US healthcare system and why it's so hella expensive, always the symptom, never the cause. More money to be made that way. Doctors don't now jack about diet and nutrition but they damn sure know which pharmaceutical will mask or treat the symptoms. The only upside to all the crap is it might be strengthening the gene pool's general tolerance/resistance and immune system.

"The incidence of diagnosed cases will be higher in countries with adequate health care systems." adequate? Isn't the US near the bottom of the industrialized nations?

The snow creek parking lot has always been bad, saw about 10 cars broken into in one night. Alpental is bad too, got broken into there before.

From sea level to summit in two days will kick your a** no matter what shape your in, it's comparable to a marathon and for some it's too much of a sufferfest. Try to get up to at least 5,000' as soon as you get off the plane. I usually car camp at one of the 5,000' trailheads at least one day before. One time I spent 3 days at elevation (below 9k) before summiting. Turned it from a grind into something more enjoyable.

I don't even think Osama is alive. The last 2 vids were pretty fake. Very poor quality, when all the previous vids were high quality. Even if he is alive, he's still just a patsy.

""OK, all the recent deaths in the climbing world"" Don't buy the Faux News hype. Just because you see it on TV doesn't mean it's happening at any faster rate than it ever has been. Percentage wise climbing deaths probably haven't changed. Much of the stuff on TV news is abberation type stuff that has no relation or consequence to real life. Lot better chance of a car accident to and from the climb than death on the climb. You could just let all the recent hype make you climb safer. Like not putting daisies on your belay loop. And taking food/stove/insul.jacket on winter volcano ascents.