catbirdseat

Do you think so?

To me a ski pole glissade is when I am doing an easy snow scramble in boots or snowshoes using ski poles as an aid. If I don't have an ice axe or don't want to bother taking it off my pack for glissading a minor slope, I'll put both poles together and grasp them just above the baskets with one hand and half-way up the shaft with the other and use the poles to control speed while sliding down the hill.

I was just reading about the hot spot that underlies Yellowstone National Park. The geologists were looking for a caldera that they knew must be there, but they weren't finding it. Then they looked at aerial photos and they said, "holy crap, the whole park is a caldera ". The Yellowstone region has produced three caldera-forming eruptions in the past 2 million years, two of those among the largest eruptions known to have occurred on Earth (each more than 1,000 cubic kilometers). In one explosive event at Yellowstone, enough material was ejected to cover Nebraska under 10 feet of ash. If St. Helens' eruption of 1980 were the size of a golf ball, the Yellowstone event would be equivalent to the Topanga Boulder. I don't want to be around the next time Yellowstone blows.

Hell, even Coors Lite tastes good in a can if it is hot out, and you are thirsty enough, and it was a hard day, and and...

It was some time after the spill had been cleaned up, but the odor remains in the soil.

I don't care how good it is, they'll have to sell it for less if it is in a can, before I'll buy it.

This being Bellevue, some were sitting in Hummers, but I didn't see anyone getting one.

I know of a guy who kept a significant part of his wealth in the form of gold coin, buried in a plastic bag in the soil of his crawlspace. One day there was a large sewage spill that filled the entire crawlspace. He had to dig through the filth to recover his treasure.

I was at my local park today for a run. It was nice and sunny. I had a great run. There were lots of other people there too, the vast majority of whom sat in their cars the whole time, either eating, smoking, or talking on the cell phone.

I hope I am not missing smth. If each piece is holding mostly on its own, why have opposing setup at all? Is this for the (belay) anchors? I thought opposing is necessary for horisontal placements... Please elaborate. Thanks. This particular setup is most often used as an omni-directional as the first placement set after leaving the belay, when you really want to protect the belay by having a bomber placement that won't jiggle out as you go by it. It is good when you want something that absolutely won't pull out when the rope is pulling out and up when you fall on a higher piece, that is to prevent zippering. So basically, it is a situation where the upper piece would hold a downward fall just fine, but might jiggle out from rope drag and the lower piece might fall out by gravity.

Iain, that isn't far from the truth. Hey, where the heck is Dru?

It looks like a fat butt sitting on someone's face.

Yep, I know about that one. ChrisW taught it to me. It is very fast.

They should put the returns in a display case along with the name of the person who returned them.

Thanks for the clarification, Joseph. It makes perfect sense.

Grosvenor is an unlikely name for a Chinese peak.

JosephH's thread on modified gear got into talk of using elastic cord for opposition pieces. This is something of which I've never read or even heard about. It is a very interesting idea to me for a couple of reasons. First opposition pieces can take quite a bit of time to set up to get the tension just right. The use of elastic could save time. Also, use of opposition with inelastic slings can potentially cause triaxial loading on biners or mechanical leverage, depending on the geometry of the placement. Use of elastic on an upward facing piece can allow extension of the downward facing piece to reduce strain while still preventing rope wiggle from displacing that piece. Of course I could foresee instances in which elastic would be disavantageous as well. Some placements would not tolerate ANY change in direction. Thus, an inelastic sling would be preferred. Are there others who have used this system or would care to comment on it?

Anything to liven the place up would be an improvement.

It's hard, but not impossible. The way to do it is by having flush, inset holds such as blocks or disks on which various small features are cut.

An updated metaphor for the Twentyfirst Century: to use language that would make trask blush. Most people nowadays have never met the proverbial sailor.

Slabs! There must be a reason why there aren't more slab climbs at gyms. People must avoid them for the same reasons they avoid them in the outdoors.

The road is plowed to that point.

Damn! I was all set to go.

Talk about a great ridge traverse! You can start out headed west and end up back at your starting point without ever changing direction.

Man, I really feel left out. I've never had colleagues nearly as interesting as you folks. Maybe that's because I am a chemist. Doh!