Scotch-a-Go-Go

I WANT to get laid off, can I move back too? We need two jobs, one for me and one for my wife. I'm a geologist and she is in I don't know what the hell she does. Won't you please help us? Hire us, we're full of love.... We'll even live in Federal Way if we have to.

So my "Trees Overseas, Watershed to Hell" bumpersticker wouldn't have gone over well? Would it get positive or negative points for being on a rusty, '74 Ford Bronco?

quote: Originally posted by Dru: "Blotter is my spotter" : Snark! So that's what that little gerbil is chewing on!

Ugh. I retired my fig. 8 around 10 years ago. Yes they DO twist ropes. Or at least they did on me but maybe I don't know how to use one. Anyway, I don't care because there is much better gear out there. I'm partial to the Kong Robot for rapping but I don't know if they make it anymore?

Always loved to hear Chris rant on Climbing. [ 10-14-2002, 04:46 PM: Message edited by: Scotch-a-Go-Go ]

It makes..... Sense.

Pointless hate. Is there really any other kind? How 'bout some hate with a point? Pointy hate!

I would go to Placencia, Belize.

Wanted to add about the experience/mentoring thing. Unlike the lucky folks in the PNW we are stuck with a small climbing crowd here. It's tough to find more experienced people to go with who are "sympatico". You are on the right track, stick with it. Realistically, as far as gear goes it takes a helluva long time to figure out what not to take, and what you actually NEED. It's almost always less than you think. Don't worry about "the stuff", it's all about "the experience". But you already know that!

I'm fine with Midwest, it's a love-hate thing. Mountain bucks is what they used to call their employee discount program. Generally described by my friends that worked there at the time as "a rip-off". But I'm sure times are different now. I'm also fine with 1st! and yeah, one Suburbs show is plenty. Just like one U-Men or YFF show would be plenty for Seattlites. But there aren't enough Iggy shows left in this lifetime!

Yeah Man! Hey are you from Sultan? I know a guy that logs there. Do ya know him?

Hey Carolyn! You aren't working for "mountain bucks" are ya? I like Haireball's advice and would further say that for ice climbing and cold mountain climbing and really for most stuff except for minimal snow mountain routes, leather boots suck ass and plastic is the way to go. I've wasted more money on La Sportiva's and each new round of supposedly great leather boots and finally gave up. They suck. No matter what you do, your feet get wet and cold and they don't seem to hold up (scree cuffs blow out, rivets come off, etc.). In fact, a few years ago when I was framing a house in Vail in the winter I wore my old Asolo 101's exclusively and they worked great! So I would also say to just load up on biners. Nobody has enough and they often go on sale. Plus, individually they are cheap so you can say each day, hmmm or a biner? My rack show that I've been doing this for a while since I almost always went for the Look for used ice gear (screws, axes, crampons), it rarely wears out, people often just churn it to get this years model or because they wised up. Buying your own rope ain't a bad idea, especially if you aren't very sure of the care your partners take of theirs.... The Edelweiss Stratos 9mm extra-long double ropes are a great way to go (do they still make these?) since if you can only find one person to climb with you can still make a full rap. Plus you can use just one for glacier travel and they supposedly don't get cut over edges. Get the most comfortable harness you can find too, everybody's opinion is different so use your time in the shop to find out. Hang in them in the store with all your gear on. You will KNOW FOR SURE then!! As for belay/rappel tools, I am not fond of those air jammer pieces of crap. They use the one thing between you and the long drop as a sacrificial friction surface. Namely, your main harness biner! Plus they are really tough to deal with when the rope is frozen (that never happens by the way...) Get a tool like the Kong Robot that uses just the tool and not your biner as a friction surface! The tool is made for that, your biner is not. Thanks for the PM by the way. Send me another if you would like more ideas. And don't forget to to the Suburbs!

Yes. You are the one I am talking about Obvious Descent Gully, and your friend, Exposed Scree-covered Traverse. Yes we may tremble in your presence but with the power of Ramen, you WILL be overcome!

I didn't know Goran and don't know the route and don't know the area. In fact I don't know shit! But despite that I will send off my opinion, purely as an academic exercise. Don't rename routes, post plaques or carve inscriptions on the routes of our grandchildren please. It may seem a small thing now but start multiplying this kind of activity over time and you can maybe appreciate the impact. Not to take anything away from Goran or those who mourn his passing, generally I just don't think it is a good way to go. Maybe if this topic weren't related to just one person or instance it would be easier to talk about without sounding like a heartless

I didn't mean to put the Olympics down. There are some really fun climbs over there and I was facetiously talking about bagging lame walkups since I've done plenty! For Dru on Nirvana ridge. That is one of the weirdest and coolest climbs. Kind of like skinnying up the side of the Millenium Falcon. A very nice exposed cross onto the face and when I did it twenty years ago just very rare rusty old 1/4 inch bolts for pro. The cool overhanging rap off the top is fun too.

Heh, I've got some old (and I DO MEAN OLD }guidebooks for Peshastin, Darrington, Index, etc., that calls the routes "practice climbs". Seems that the worm turns in what is fashionable. Best thing to do is not worry about labels and climb Nirvana Ridge on acid. Trust me you won't do anything more stupid in your life and so you won't worry about whether you are a geek for wanting to tick lame Olympic walkups! Cheers!!!!

[ 10-10-2002, 05:36 PM: Message edited by: Scotch-a-Go-Go ]

Ed Hommer was from Duluth, Minnesota. I didn't know him but my wife's family did. This is the account in the Duluth paper. I'm suprised that it seems logical; most news stories about mountain accidents don't. Anyway, a tough break and sad. Posted on Tue, Sep. 24, 2002 Hommer killed by falling rock Duluth double-amputee was climbing Mount Rainier BY STEVE KUCHERA NEWS TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER Twenty years after the mountains took Ed Hommer's legs, they took his life. A falling rock killed the Duluth climber Monday morning on Washington's Mount Rainier. Hommer, 46, was training for his second attempt to become the first double-amputee to reach the summit of Mount Everest, the world's highest point. "He's going to be missed far and wide by a lot of people," said Brian McCullough, a climbing partner and longtime friend from Talkeetna, Alaska. "He was a unique spirit, there's no doubt. He was a leader, not a follower." Hommer, an American Airlines pilot, had three children and had been climbing for 26 years. Kandace Olsen, communications manager for Great River Energy, worked with Hommer as he prepared for an unsuccessful attempt to scale Mount Everest last fall. Hommer offered her instructions should he die climbing the mountain. "You just tell people I died doing what I loved," he told Olsen. "I believe Ed died doing what he loved the most." Hommer died at about 6 a.m. Monday when a basketball-sized rock hit him in the head, killing him instantly, as he and three teammates were ascending Disappointment Cleaver. Rangers with the National Park Service believe the rock was loosened from the top of a 400-foot outcrop. "Ed Hommer was just in the wrong place at the wrong time," said Nick Jiguere, one of two climbing park rangers who recovered Hommer's body later Monday. "It was a matter of circumstance. There have been lots of close calls from Disappointment Cleaver rock fall." The other climbers didn't know anything had happened until they noticed that Hommer, the last man in the roped-together line, wasn't moving, Mount Rainier National Park spokeswoman Lee Taylor said. None of the other team members were injured. CALL FROM THE MOUNTAIN The team's leader, Jim Wickwire, 62, of Seattle, called park rangers by cell phone at 6:16 a.m. and told them one of his party had been killed by a rock. The two climbing rangers were airlifted by helicopter to above the accident scene, then climbed down to remove Hommer's body. Wickwire and the other two climbers, Tim Herlehy and Scott Rose, both of San Diego, Calif., descended back to Camp Muir on the mountain, then were airlifted off Mount Rainier by helicopter. Wickwire was with Hommer on Mount Everest for part of last fall's expedition until health problems forced him off the mountain. His 1978 ascent of Pakistan's K2 ranks as one of the most remarkable accomplishments by any American climber. K2 is the world's second-highest mountain. "Wickwire is an experienced climber and is well-known in the climbing community," Taylor said. "The other two were not experienced climbers. It's my understanding they had sponsored some of Ed's earlier trips." A POPULAR ROUTE The route Hommer and his teammates were ascending on Mount Rainier is the most popular on the peak. "On this side of the mountain, it's the easiest route to the summit," Taylor said. "But this time of year, climbing conditions have deteriorated a bit and there's more rock fall danger" since melting snow and ice have exposed more of rock. Hommer was the sixth climber killed this year on Mount Rainier, which annually attracts about 11,000 climbers. Since 1887, 76 climbers have died on the mountain, four of them killed by falling rock. Hommer understood the risks involved in climbing. "The mountain ultimately decides who succeeds, who fails, who goes home and who doesn't," he said last year after failing to summit Mount Everest. During the same interview, he announced he would return to Mount Everest. Great River Energy helped sponsor Hommer's 2001 Everest climb. Olsen said Hommer had submitted a funding proposal last week for a second Mount Everest expedition in May. "He didn't believe in failure," Olsen said. HOMMER'S HISTORY Hommer nearly died on Mount McKinley in 1981 when his small commercial plane crashed on the mountain after being caught in a severe downdraft. He and three passengers were trapped for five days by a winter storm. When it was over, two passengers -- one was his brother-in-law -- were dead, and Hommer lost the lower part of both legs to frostbite. But Hommer didn't let the twin amputations stop him. Fitted with prostheses, he became the first double-amputee to receive a medical certification to fly commercial airliners. An American Airlines pilot, Hommer lived near Fish Lake, north of Duluth. "He's one of the greatest guys I've ever known," friend and climbing partner Scott Anderson, of Two Harbors, said. "He inspires a lot of people to try new things or to improve what they're doing." Besides returning to flying, Hommer also returned to climbing, setting his sights on the 20,320-foot summit of Mount McKinley, North America's highest peak and the mountain that had cost him his legs. Bad weather in 1998 -- which contributed to three deaths in other parties -- foiled Hommer's first attempt to climb Mount McKinley. But the next year he became the first double-amputee to climb the mountain. EVEREST'S CHALLENGE With McKinley behind him, he turned his attention to Mount Everest -- at 29,035 feet, the world's highest peak. Last October, his first attempt to scale Mount Everest was called off when he and his team, hampered by bad weather, had to turn back 3,000 feet short of the summit. McCullough was one of the climbers who rescued Hommer in 1981, and was with him on Everest. "He had a way about him. He was fun to be around," McCullough said. "When we were back at base camp (on Everest), we were just howling at his antics. He was a natural comedian. "He never, ever whined... and he had huge, huge sores," where his false limbs met skin, McCullough said. "Yet he would go day after day. It was incredible. You didn't get the impression he was handicapped, because his spirit was not handicapped." Hommer formed the nonprofit foundation High Exposure to help get prostheses to those who need them in Nepal and to raise money for U.S. children who have lost limbs and need prostheses. "He helped many patients," said longtime friend Tom Halvorson of Duluth, who made Hommer's prosthetic limbs. "Not only inspiring them by what he does, but he would like to sit down and talk to other amputees and let them know that his life was not always a bowl of roses. It was a very tough road from the time he was injured in 1981 to being able to stand on top of McKinley. "He was a very caring, friendly, articulate professional by day," Halvorson said. "And he liked to play the role of a dirtbag climber by night. Ed loved to climb. He loved the mountains." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- News Tribune staff writer Melanie Evans and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer contributed to this report.

Gotta agree; Makalus do suck! Came back to the Cascades a couple years ago and burned up White Horse in what I thought were nice boots for it. After around 15 minutes in wet snow my feet were soaking. Swore never again in anything but plastic. Plus after that they just started to deteriorate. Eyelets popping off, scree-cuff disintegrating. Real expensive pieces of junk. So my question is how water-proof are these gore-tex boots? Better than plastic? So this is where people say PAGE TOP!!!???? [ 09-22-2002, 12:57 AM: Message edited by: Scotch-a-Go-Go ]

Somebody should print out this thread and send it to the local paper. CC the sheriff on it so he and everyone else knows that they are asleep up there and people are getting ready to go vigilante. Delete whatever posts you need to to "protect the innocent".

So happy things haven't changed at FF! Love their down stuff though. Yippee, it's Friday!!!!

HAR! I think we have a winner. Bada dump tschhhh.

Oops, Mtngrrl, I spoke too soon about bedding down. I will respond with my humble thought before laying my aged head to rest. Mid 5th class means one of two things; either, "I can't remember how hard it was but it must have been easy since I didn't lead it", or it means "damn, there were some hard moves there even if my hiking boots WERE wet.". Either way, it means that "a rope was used", in much the same way that "mistakes were made" or maybe "it was decided that". Expect possible awkward, grabby stuff; read between the lines, prepare for worst, expect best. Or vice versa. Beddy bye

Actually, I was just joking around. If I remember right, 4th class was where you had two potential techniques; either pray and spin your legs like road runner and if yr behind make sure you aren't far behind your partners "wake", or go the ballet route and simul/belay using tie offs on shrubbery and the larger blocks that haven't yet slid. And maybe pound a pin into dirt if you are really sweating acid. If Beckey is updating the books is he now including definitions like that? It might be helpful to those new to the area. Nite all, off to take the Geritol.

Calling on the new turks to do an old guy a favor and explain this for my memories sake. Is 4th class REALLY only low grade 5th on rotten rock with no pro? Or was it all just a bad dream?