catbirdseat

Muffy, can you give an astrological analysis about the reasons why so many capricorns climb?

They should be held accountable if they don't show up today. Slackers.

I detect bias. Someone who has had a birthday recently is more likely to vote.

The power went out last night. My car was encased in a capsule of ice this morning. The cherry tree in my back yard had icicles hanging from every limb, and the sound of breaking branches sounded periodically in the neighborhood. This is the first time in 14 years living here that I've seen it like this. I hear it is much more common in Portland.

Here's a related question. What would you carry as an emergency bolt kit for bailing off of routes, for example at Darrington? I would assume it would consist of quarter inch gear only.

Dwayner says he isn't coming back as some lowly avatar. It's Dwayner or nothing.

I can reach 3 but...OK nevermind I'm all set! Doh!

Just got back from my ski trip. It was fun. The snow is a little thin. It was okay if I stayed on the grass. It is too thin for the gravel paths.

Try the new version in which electric shock is repaced by small guillotine-like blades. You're sure to get a laugh.

Arsenic is now being used to treat some forms of leukemia. CTI sells it's arsenic trioxide formulation as Trisenox .

How about that waterfall at Frenchman's Coulee? Does it ever form up good for climbing?

Talk about snow or skiing and you can count on the PDXers to show up.

Has anyone ever put blades on a board in place of wheels? It seems logical.

I've looked for the Green Flash, but never have seen it. It must be absolutely clear and dry. They say the best placeto see it is on a boat out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean in the center of the Pacific High.

My nordic skis are in the back of the truck and the snow is coming down outside the lab. I'm praying we get at least 5 inches before lunch break so I can take a trip around the office park on my skis. Let there be snow, snow, snow!

I think he had downhill gear- fixed heels and no skins. Once you get into those valley bottoms, it's going to be very difficult to move efficiently. I heard from the TV last night he had entered the Pratt River valley drainage.

I'm told that most of the mercury simply leached out of the ores in abandoned mines and from tailings dumped into the river, mostly by the Canadians (the Okanogan River). Relatively little comes from mercury used for processing of gold. That stuff is pretty expensive. They don't lose it if they can help it.

The Buddhist would say that it is bad karma to derive pleasure from the misfortune of others, even if that misfortune is well deserved.

Tellurium is in the same group in the periodic table as sulfur and selenium. My mining expert friend claims that it is common in both the cascades and rockies for sulfides to be found closer to the surface and tellurides at greater depths. Tellurides cannot be smelted, that is reduced, by just roasting. They must be chemically treated. Supposedly 100 years ago, the gold was getting dumped into the river because their assay method could not detect it. There is a process for reducing tellurides which involves ordinary table salt. My limited understanding of the process is that a solution of sodium chloride is electrolyzed to produce sodium chlorate. The chlorate extracts the gold as Au(I) into solution. The gold is then easily precipitated as the metal by reaction with zinc chloride. Here's another odd mining story that I believe to be a tall tale. Supposedly there is a deep pool of mercury behind Grand Coulee Dam under Lake Roosevelt. Furthermore, it reportedly generates so much pressure against the dam that there is concern of it blowing out the footings. There have indeed been reports of pools of mercury in the upper Columbia River and tributaries.

The buddhists believe that when we hurt others we hurt ourselves. In other words, "bad karma". Supposedly the chickens come home to roost in the next life, but there is ample evidence that it affects this life too.

Didn't the Count of Monte Cristo dose himself with small doses poison to build up an immunity?

These are desperate times, aren't they? Actually, the mining history of Monte Cristo is pretty darn interesting. Klenke, I know, had read a bit on it.

That ore is indeed very high in arsenic. In fact, they extracted it for agricultural use . If you go visit the old concentrator site, you will notice that there isn't a lot of plant life growing there to this day. The reason for that, I believe, is the arsenic in the crushed ore that was spilled all over the place.

Drivel? It's mother's milk to him.

If you knuckleheads had read the article, you would have seen that all precious metal prices are rising, including silver. Furthermore, there WAS some gold recovered in Monte Cristo along with the silver. A friend of mine who is a mining expert claims that there is far more gold there than anyone realized at the time, because it was hidden from them in the form of telluride. They only had technology at that time for recovering gold and silver from sulfide mineral.