foolscongress

yes, that's probably true. it's not the opinion, but the obsessive need for attention.

good.

pope, i hope you die soon. and i really mean that. i hope it's painful, but i'd be willing to trade the suffering for your death occurring before summer.

" Iran had a decent government, but we didn't like them, so got the Shaw put into power there. By doing that we created the seeds of the Iranian revolution. " yeah, that was a sweet plan on our part. i always explain that to my students when they're like, 'why don't people in iran like us?' that's what you get when you fuck a stranger in the ass.

i'm pretty far left, but even to me the progress in the region has been impressive since 9/11. look at the efforts in pakistan to limit the power of radicals, new work on a palestinian peace deal, the fall of the pro-syrian gov't in lebanon, libya making nice noises, egypt making chanes. pretty excellent stuff. in the end, i don't think our methods are morally defensible (and the good effects are correlative, not causal), but i'm thrilled we seem to be getting some good out of the war. and on the home front i think it's a good sign that anyone here can begin to see some good in the other side.

yeah, the u.s. economy is about to tank. same nonsense we worried about in the nineties, eighties, and seventies. be calm, people.

every good game has three elements: balance, consequences, and a loser. this is a good game, and this monkey is the loser. the only difference between the stupid friends of my teen years and this kid is that if i missed a jump, my friends would point and laugh. and if i tried to blame it on someone else they'd slap me silly.

find something that is cheap and will fit over all your clothing. you'll never notice 2 oz. of weight if it has the features you want.

lars: you're an idiot, a coward, and an asshole. and not very original. 'your' heartfelt opinions have, nearly word for word, come from other sources. shut it.

check out the montrails. they'll do what you need, though probably you'll need new crampons.

you forgot one: president claims to nationally respected reporter and biographer that he regularly talks to god and knows god approves of u.s. foreign policy.

look, i'm as left as the next guy, but the idea that one of the most important factors of any energy policy we might adopt should be to deny revenue to certain elements of certain states is silly, IMO. look at the converse: our energy policy reduces oil revenues in the middle east, creating poverty and making it easier for radicals to recruit terrorists. while i absolutely support a dollar (two dollar, even) tax on gas, i think you may be oversimplifying the complexity of these issues.

you'll have a very hard time finding a bag lighter and smaller than the western mountaineering highlite.

at 17,500 my XGK worked well, while my whisperlite did not. i vote for the XGK for extended stays over 14K.

jesus fucking hates us.

yeah, i'm familiar with the tests, but i don't replace on their schedule, or after a single baseball-sized rock strike. i'm pretty serious about safety, but not two new helmets a year serious. climbing ice i get smacked all the time and i haven't broken one yet (though ice shatters, and rock doesn't). as for bike helmets, if i had to buy a new helmet every time i fell off my bike and hit my head, i'd may as well just wear my ecrin to save money.

right, because i know what my helmet's been up to. i'd take a used helmet from a friend, one i know has similar standards as i do, but not from a stranger. that may be a double standard, i don't know. the way things have been going, i'm more likely to bust my current lid than have to worry about when to retire it. rocks love me for some reason.

no cracky, no replacy. small falls don't bother me. at this point i've learned it takes a hell of a whack to bust an ecrin. even a bike helmet takes a good hit.

go ahead. spend the 20 bucks you save on farewell cards from you to your friends. seriously, why risk it? it's your BRAIN, man. i've broken a climbing helmet and two bike helmets. probably you're not as clumsy as me, but again, why risk it?

raven

i've used the little orange wheelies. they're o.k., but then i decided, why not just bring a pulley? sometimes the rope jumps off the wheel, but not often. i think that if you're in a place where you might really drop into a hole, may as well bring real rescue gear.

they should fix it. call them for an RA number so they'll know what to expect. they've always been very helpful to me, though i should say i've had few problems with their gear.

metolius now makes all its harnesses with full strength loops (or they did last year). they thought it would reduce the chance of an accident in which someone clips the wrong loop to the belay, or to rappell with. it's a nice idea, but the harnesses are a bit heavy.

went ice climbing in the catskills. ice was formed up well, but a couple of warm days knocked some pillars down. my back and hands are sore, so it must have been a good trip.

his take on clothing was what helped me most. don't know if they were his ideas first, but i read about them first in that book. his training ideas don't suck either, but i'm not man enough to do them fully.