catbirdseat

What's that Mexican sauce made with chocolate? What part is used for that?

Dru, I think it is foolish to even joke about such things.

Kurt, the point I was trying to make about the clove hitch is that strength is not an issue. Don't get all excited for nothing. Both the bowline with the Yosemite finish and the rewoven bowline are good knots that will not come untied. I would not hesitate to use either of them myself for safety's sake. They are great if you know how to tie them properly. So here, instead of going from memory, I looked it up. Bowline 63 percent Clove Hitch 60 percent Figure Eight Loop 80 percent Sources: http://www.layhands.com/knots/ and Boat Crew Seamanship Manual COMDTINST M16114.5B (Feb 27, 1998) I reiterate, all these knots are strong enough. I don't think a single bowline is a good knot, even with a half fisherman as backup. I sometimes use a half fisherman on my figure eights to use up an extra long tail. The half fisherman sometimes comes untied. If the backup knot comes untied the bowline can come untied. (Double fisherman knots, by the way never come untied because the two knots are cinched against one another, something that is difficult to do when a half fisherman is used as a backup knot).

Why do you even need a zero degree bag, let alone a -15? This the Cascades, not Minnesota. A 15 degree bag is fine for winter use and a 30 degree is fine for every thing else.

Another average trask avatar. But honestly Joe, if you are serious, trask will lend you his 45 so you can blow your brains out and end your misery. It works on possums.

Dwayner continues to haunt this website from the beyond. Wooooo. It's scary. If you are spraying late one night and your quickdraws start to levitate out the window, you will know that the Dwayner poltergeist is at work.

Disappointed, are we now?

Why is it that we call consumer protection laws and automobile licensing laws "regulation", but we call any laws as applied to gun, "control"? We don't use that word in any other instance I can think of. Gun Control is a phrase coined by the NRA because it sounds bad.

Well that explains an awful lot. I'm just recovering financially from nine months of unemployment. It was fun while it lasted. This has got to be the worst time of year to get laid off. All you can hope for is either a job or snow. I'm going wine tasting on Saturday and alpine climbing on Sunday. Probably should do it the other way around, but that's the plan.

This rivals the Bronco Andy Rooney resurrection for bringing back dead threads from the grave.

It's Michael Layton, The teacher of small children. He's "Avalanche Dude"

It appears that trask faces a Sisyphean task. "He is, as much through his passions as through his torture. His scorn of the gods, his hatred of death, and his passion for life won him that unspeakable penalty in which the whole being is exerted toward accomplishing nothing. This is the price that must be paid for the passions of this earth." --Albert Camus (italics mine)

I am sure they were. Too bad, you were supposed to be looking UP at the sky.

A knot which which fails at 70% of the rope strength is weaker than one that fails at 85% of the rope strength, but the difference is not necessarily significant, as ropes are very strong, indeed. An anchor tie-in needs to be even stronger than a climber tie-in I am sure you will agree, because it needs to hold the weight of two. You seldom hear of ropes breaking so obviously all the commonly used knots are plenty strong. It is much more common for knots to come untied.

There never has been meaningful gun control, so how can anyone tell wether it works or not?

If you let the clew of your jib flog for any length of time, there's a chance that the bowline can come untied. Since spinnakers often are flogged during setting and taking down, I switch from the bowline to the inside clove hitch. It never comes untied and is easy to untie. It is also strong.

I think you need to study your knots a little more CBS. You always seem to come up with bad info; like saying a clove hitch isn't very strong, etc. As an example: I drop chunks of wood that are heavier than most people on rope that is much more static than rock climbing rope, and the clove hitch is the knot of choice for a tie off knot. I've never had a c hitch fail; however from one of your posts a while back you said the knot was not very strong. Show me where I said a clove hitch is not a good not for tying in. There's nothing wrong with it (although John Long often uses figure eight loops in the photos in Climbing Anchors). They can slip some, which may in fact be a good thing.

This is proof that nobody is climbing shit this week. Help! the sky is falling!

I knew from sailing how to tie a bowline long before I ever knew how to tie a rewoven figure eight. I can tie it quickly while upside down, hanging by my toes, with a spray blasting me in the face. The figure eight is a better knot for climbing. The fact is born out by the number of people who use it.

Bowline not as strong as figure eight and does not absorb energy like an eight.

Let's see who votes for an increased gas tax. Nobody that's who. It ain't gonna happen. We're doomed and there isn't anything we have the will to do that will change it. Can we change the subject?

Okay, I answered my own question. Mites The Africanized bees may be more resistant to the mite than the European variety.

There is a mite that has pretty much wiped out the European honey bee here in Washington, except for domesticated bees that are treated with chemicals by their keepers. So, I wonder if this mite affects the africanized bee?

Well, no surprises there, but the graphics were still cool and worth watching.

My commute takes 15 minutes. You won't hear me complaining. Trask, you probably have one of those headsets so you can talk on the phone and sell your insurance and spray at the same time.