catbirdseat

It seems to me that all those problems could be solved through design changes. The burr problem could be solved by addition of a steel strike plate (an has been on some models). The release problem could be solved by adding a retrieval cord. They carry just fine in a shovel pocket, although they aren't terribly handy there.

That "stick" is a bull hook, I believe.

Fairweather, you must have the day off. You are right, he needs to be tried in court, but we can still have our fun with him. He's the one putting on the spectacle.

When the snow is soft, flukes work much better, and yet I've talked with many people who say they never use flukes because, "they don't trust them". Granted, the chances of an unarrested fall are less when the snow is soft, but I've seen many cases where you have soft snow with a crust on top that would allow a body to slide and yet prevent self-arrest. So I'm trying to get at the reason. Is it a misunderstanding of when and how to use them, or is it just that the situation where they are useful doesn't occur frequently enough to justify carrying them?

Someone has been abusing Stephen Hawking.

Doctorb is right on about the spraying, but he needs to elaborate on the corporate greed part.

Fig Newtons , toast always has some.

Uri Geller says he hypnotized Michael Jackson three years ago. That's how he knows. Well if a reliable mystic like Uri says so...

You're damn right!

Dude, save you other eight lives for climbing.

Yes, the road is ploughed as far as Bridge Creek. I forgot to mention how iceguy and I helped a fellow get his truck out of a ditch in Tumwater canyon. He'd spun out and was up against the snow bank. He didn't have chains or a shovel. We dug him out, but when he tried to move, the truck just moved sideways. There was a nice woman there who had stopped to help. She had sand bags in the bed of her pickup truck. We cut one open and spread sand about under the wheels of the stuck vehicle and thus extracted it just as a State Trooper pulled up. We might have saved the poor guy a ticket or a towing fee.

My day couldn't have been better. Fat ice within 2-1/2 hours of Seattle.

Hire professionals. The take home message is if you are felling a 100 foot tree, you should remove all people in all directions for more than 100 feet from the base of the tree. Duh.

Packed boot trail Low avy danger Nice fat ice Iceguy and catbirdseat It was fun Thank you geordie

Here come the science heavyweights.

My wife was given two years to live by her doctor in 2000. The drugs she was taking weren't working. I'd done some reading about new class of drugs that has only become available recently. I suggested to her doctor that he prescribe one of them and he did. Her tumor regressed and apparently has disappeared. Her doctor says they don't use the term "remission" any more. They now call it "stable" or something like that. In any case, it pays to stay up on developments in science, even if you aren't an expert.

Dude, that one is getting a bit long in the tooth. Time to fire up the ol' Photoshop and make a new one.

Nothing is obvious, Scott. There is no basis to debate this doctor's scientific merit, only the ethics of cloning a human. There is no reason to believe that the experience with humans will be any different than with animals, and that is one can expect many malformed and self-aborted fetuses and offspring with short and sickly lives. This is in addition to any other religious and moral concerns one might raise.

Yes, let's not forget ehmic.

Will, it sounds like a three dog night.

It kind of makes you appreciate all that Dave Schuldt does for us each week.

She can say she is a Latvian and be telling the truth.

You seek certainty from science. Science isn't about certainty. A theory is true as long as experiments continue to support it, otherwise, it goes out and is replace by a new one. If this guy is a fake, he will be exposed, eventually.