JosephH

So, despite the hassle of fighting it, and despite Ranger Vicky's protestations about "all the good the money goes toward," And by that, you mean the states general fund. None of that money goes back into the parks. The only thing that has changed from before the passes to now is the parking tickets. Hey, none of it goes to the WA General Fund. 84% of the Discover Pass receipts goes directly to the WSP and is the only funding WSP now gets - they receive no general funds. Every one of you who are so miserably cheap you have to try and scam around it instead of dropping the staggering sum of $30 a year for WA parks should just stay out of them.

Renters insurance is definitely the way to go - they replaced my rack in under three weeks back when it was stolen (quite a few years ago at this point).

Yes, thanks for the heads up, it's much appreciated.

Calling the left fascists is all the rage on the right. Save energy - fascism. Protect air and water - fascism. Provide a degree of consumer protection - fascism. Where have you been?

Wait, he sneers the word "progressive" he then goes on to layout an absolutely radical restructuring of the financial industry to remove it as a [sham] 'market' in it's own right and direct the captial contained therein to more productive purposed. That 'redirection' of capital would be by government in a "top down" manner in sync with long-term goals - ala China. This latter point has some validity in terms of breaking the institutional paralysis and timelines associated with pretty much all large U.S. infrasctructure projects - China has no such logjams. If China needs 48 highspeed rail lines, a thousand mile by ten mile wall of trees planted to restrain western deserts, or fifty high tension power lines to connect various parts of the country they just wave a wand and do it and it gets done fast. So in pretty much no uncertain terms the good professor is calling for what would almost surely be condemned as a 'fascist left' with vastly more direct government control over financial and manufacturing industries to bend them to the 'common good' of the nation and it's people - a benevolent dictatorship as it were. They aren't bad ideas per se in the face of Chinese agility and our declining educational capabilities. Brazil has adopted this basic approach of late and to great success. But he is most assuredly one of the most radical folks out there and is wanting government to [finally] take up the reins and lead / rule America's fate and future. Hey, I'm all for it but I'm guessing a bullet awaits anyone attempting to actually do it.

The chicks, still in their downy white breast stage (they will darken significantly over the next month), are up and walking out to the edge and looking out, but have not yet started extending or flapping their wings at all once there. When they are getting closer to flying they will be darker and come out to the edge when there are updrafts and kind of awkwardly put their wings out and just attempt to hold them outspread and maybe give a flap or two to get a feel for it. They do that for awhile until they start getting a couple of inches lift and manage a soft set down. Sometime shortly after that they are flying. Once they are flying they start doing very short, ugly crash-landing hops which take them further and further from the nest and back. These short-hop flights typically range in increments to the Flying Swallow ledge or top of Upper Grassy Ledges to the top of Blownout or LoLP and eventually work all the way across the ledges to the SE Corner tree and occasionally down to Snag Ledge (which is hard for them to get back from initially). These are really bad landings at first in general with the fledges tumbling or desperately scratching up onto ledges or landing flat, open-winged onto trees boughs and getting stuck. At that point it takes a couple of weeks to get the hang of landing and build up the continuous flight endurance to become competent enough fliers to train to aerial hunt with the parents and which is when the rock will open. Judging from where they are now, looks to be on track for a normal July 15 open or possibly a couple of days before.

Bump for a fairly expensive pile of gear...

No!! No!! No!! I absolutely cannot believe I am reading this! It seems utterly inconceivable to me to the point of not being able to really process it. These past couple of years Mark has been super busy transitioning companies in the apparel industry, working on their home, and spending time with his family so it was pretty hard to sync up schedules to get out to Beacon together. But despite the fact we didn't know each other super-well, a couple of times each season I'd get THE call out of the blue and know he was itching to get on Borderline, BS&S or something similar. It also always meant I needed to dig out my A-game and get it on damn quick just to keep up with him. He was always super, super solid, totally calm, and relentlessly methodical on rock just this side of being a machine no matter how long it had been since getting out last. I met he and Darryl one day around '89 or '90 after rope-soloing up to them at the lower anchor on Iron Maiden. I was just getting back in shape for what ended up being a short season for me and couldn't give it a whirl myself, yet they were totally inviting and watching them swap goes on it is still seared in my mind as some of the more inspired climbing I have ever witnessed. And Mark was the very first person to jump on Flying Circus the instant he heard it had been all cleaned up. He told me of having forgotten a big cam for the offwidth at the top because it had been so many years since doing it last, but rather than back off he simply sank a small cam at the base of it and ran it out to the anchor - typical Mark - smart, sure and the very essence of what bold free climbing is all about. I had very much hoped there would still be many more pitches to come with him in the months and years ahead - my deepest condolences and sympathy to the family he loved so much, all his close friends and partners, co-workers, and to all NW climbers. A true light has been lost this day and I cannot stop weeping at the very thought of it - he will be profoundly missed.

Should be noted for old tradsters not to let the slings go on forever as there have been cases of sling failures. Have them reslung after some reasonable period. http://www.mtntools.com/cat/rclimb/cams/mt_camresling.htm

Well, I do have various never-claimed booty items from other occasions over the past few years that I am for sure never going to use so you'd be more than welcome to them. PM me sometime and I'll see if I can find that box in the basement.

What's the word on the other 23...?

bump for wayward gear...

As am I. All the placements I'm talking about were small and if I were just talking about good small pro I wouldn't be talking screamers. I've taken six 25' whippers in a row on a good #3 Loweball without a screamer, ditto for falls onto unscreamered small nuts and crack 'n ups that were as bomb as they can be. That's not what I'm talking about - when I clip a screamer on a piece it's because I consider the piece marginalized in some fashion. And I don't use screamers for comfort either, if I don't think they'll make a difference I won't bother with a truly marginal placement at all. But your point should be well-taken - don't count on a screamer to turn utter shite into a good piece. If you don't know what you're looking at to begin with they aren't going to substantially improve your odds or track record.

I've blown a couple of dozen screamers in falls over the years without any of those pieces blowing so I'm somewhat forced to believe the screamers played a contributing role to that outcome given all of those placements were small and / or marginalized in some way or another. All the screamers blew either partially or for their full length - typically blowing about half their length over all and we reused the partially blown ones after sport taping them back together, so a bunch of those screamers saw multiple falls until they were fully deployed. Lots over those falls were on micronuts, crack 'n ups, and 2-3# loweballs. And I've taken an equal or greater number of falls on similar placements without screamers; some held, some blew so I over time I've developed a reasonable feel for what's likely and unlikely to hold in the way of small / marginal pro. I typically only carry the screamers on occasion, usually on FAs where I suspect the rock quality and / or placements are likely to be somewhat marginal in some way or another.

Well, I suppose there are people out there who are capable of thinking about this sort of thing while placing pro, but I've never met one, and can't imagine it myself. In the end I guess I couldn't really care less what the numbers are and in any case I wouldn't be capable of looking at a placement and somehow relating it to relatively abstract numbers in that way. But I do place and climb over a lot of small / marginal gear, however, and to my mind it's way more about taking the time to get intimately familiar with the capabilities of your gear, the characteristics of the rock, and about developing a more intuitive sense and feel of what any hypothetical or actual placement can bear. Once you have that, then the numbers are basically irrelevant (for me anyway) as placements naturally just boil down to 'yes' / 'maybe' / 'possibly-if-everything-is-and-remains-just-so' / 'no' / 'hell no'! ('possibly' typically gets a screamer). But it does takes time, yardage and, in the end, falls to develop an solid intuitive feel for it all and I can't think of any useful shortcuts to shorten the learning curve besides climbing with better leaders and getting in even more yardage.

Pretty much the only caveat with kids is that their strength/weight ratio changes radically over the course of puberty dumping said children out the other side with an adult version of that ratio which is much less than in children. I've seen some phenomenal kid climbers just walk away for a year or two and some push through it. It can be a rough transition either way and whether they push through it or come back to climbing with an adult body it's a big adjustment. Some are still superstars afterwords, some become merely human depending on the changes. Should be interesting to see how your boy rides it out - clearly has the goods.

I don't believe there is any confusion at all from what I've read.

Pile of gear - id and it's yours.

They had their time and still do in some pocketed rock and crags with lots of horizontals like the Gunks. Permanently parked mine in the basement once climbing primarily on basalt.

True, being from snow country, the last thing I want is a weak algorithm managing any skids I happen to get into. So yeah, I similarly don't delegate belaying to a device either and don't think belaying off anchors is a particularly good idea. But it does play into doing other things than belaying when belaying if one is already so inclined. Modern ABS is pretty refined, in fact I'm pretty certain you couldn't outbrake it on a majority of slippery surfaces with manual brakes, especially on turns. I know exactly how modern abs units work, half of what I do of late is write sensor-related apps. The problem is they don't help at all in the Gorge when I want it most, are worse when dealing with snow skids, and only excel during emergency stops on dry/somewhat wet pavement. Not enough benefit for the intrusion from my perspective. Basically the two things I for sure don't want a computer doing is braking an automobile and talking (ever). Exactly. "Easier" is certainly one word for it I suppose. But it's tough enough as is these days to get people to simply STFUAB without introducing a habit which encourages even more slovenly habits. Belaying a second on a big wall aid line? Sure, but that's pretty much it. As for the other, I don't like climbing in threesomes, don't ever want two followers climbing at the same time, and don't really like seeing someone taking pictures, eating or picking their nose when some else is climbing.

True, being from snow country, the last thing I want is a weak algorithm managing any skids I happen to get into. So yeah, I similarly don't delegate belaying to a device either and don't think belaying off anchors is a particularly good idea. But it does play into doing other things than belaying when belaying if one is already so inclined. Weak algorithm? You obviously don't know anything about antilock brakes produced after 1990. Is the advice your doling out regarding climbing as up to date as your opinions towards automotive technology? I know they make zero, zip difference when you are hydro-planing on a sheet of water or flying over black ice in the Gorge and I can manage a skid on snow way better than they can. Oh, and I'm a software engineer with aviation and automotive experience and do actually know about abs performance which, like autoblocks, is why I don't use them.

True, being from snow country, the last thing I want is a weak algorithm managing any skids I happen to get into. So yeah, I similarly don't delegate belaying to a device either and don't think belaying off anchors is a particularly good idea. But it does play into doing other things than belaying when belaying if one is already so inclined.

Never use autoblock devices or belay off anchors, ever, so it's not an issue.

Have never carried a cordalette or other dedicated anchor gear.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/wicked-lasers-shark/