crackers

great tr! and congrats on a fantastic route!

WTF?? baa Well, since sales of my SuperRescueBelt have gone through the roof with their MRE and P38 crampon adjusting can opener, my TaunTaun and I are having a great time!

Despite the serious and sad developments over in Oregon Cascades, I think this is the funniest week of Spray I've ever read. I don't post that often in Spray, mostly because Dru seems to have it under control. But I've been reading it for a couple of years...and this week has just produced some true gems of wit. I've been rolling around on the floor laughing, and I'd like to thank all of you wits for contributing!

I'm sure the media would love to cover a guy and a girl on mt hood, but china is just too far away...no 'news conferences' with a woodsy sheriff and live pictures of a mountain background. I'm sure that the geographic distribution and the religious nature of at least one of the guys was a great contribution to the media circus. Somehow, I suspect if it was three gay climbers it wouldn't have gotten nearly as much coverage, although there probably would have been more bad taste jokes... I was thinking of making a super utility belt with special pockets for your MRE, your P38 can opener, your LED light and your trioxane tabs. And your PLIRB and your MLU...Everybody wants one, right?

it would be interesting to see the contributions of the two richest liberals versus the rest of America. I'd like to know what percent of total giving are represented by the tens of billions given away by Gates and Buffet. Bill gave $200 million to my wife's non-profit alone this year.

done. When I read them after writing them, I didn't notice how mindnumbingly repetitive it got. I'll get better at blogging. thanks for the props.

amazon? thera-band...

jeez. you know you're jet lagged when you get yoda'd like that. thanks porter. blog.cilogear.biz

Here's my blog. Part 'corporate' description of what I'm doing over at CiloGear, some rock and mountain porn from Turkey and points beyond, and a lot of exercising crap. I'm trying to keep stuff coming up regular like for the packs, especially on the product development side.

serious

I got a preproduction (?) version of the jacket to try out. There was a piece of masking tape in the pocket. It had writing in Chinese on it. I asked a handy chinese friend what the writing meant. She said: 'needs significant improvement, not very good.'

GNA has the gecko which supposed to be for ski mountaineering and free riding as well as alpine pursuits.

Don't forget the acmg! http://www.acmg.ca/public/html/courses/coursetitle.asp

Slight variant if you don't trust the people to simul... lower the first two, have them set up the next rap and rap it.

Damian Gildea, Jed Brown, and the rest of their crew are down there now climbing...there might not BE any unclimbed peaks when they're done! Have a great time!

WOW! that is incredible! thanks for the heads up colin!

well. I guess that might be true if you reproduce so fast that all the money was made after 1913.

that assumes that soil quality is the same, that the distribution network is the same, that irrigation is available and a bunch of other big assumptions, doesn't it?

Mt. WA is an idiot test area. If it's brutally cold down in the valley, and high winds and storms are forecast, well, are you an idiot? Horseman, btw, is a left/north facing corner, the precise type of climb to avoid in non warm conditions. Rumney in November can be suicidal. Most of the crag faces south, but with just a few hours of 'warm' daylight, a normal temperature day can have, erm, 'terrific friction'. neice.com has great conditions for ice, and a nice forum, and gunks.com has a broken search link, but generally friendly folks who will add to the list of warm winter climbs. From 98 till 02,I climbed at least five days a month in the gunks in every month of the year. I'm afraid that I will be doing the family thing on T-Day.

definitely maybe. As the gunks are south facing, you'll probably be okay in everything except super cold or wet conditions. The secret is to stay on the (perferably above the GT ledge) white faces, which mostly face south, and away from the corners like High Exposure, which faces northish, and is butt ass cold. If you stay on the GT ledge, and keep climbing up from there, you'll be in good shape too. I'd recommend megaclassics like Arrow, CCK, or modern times, but not megaclassics like ant's line, madame g's wulst (if there's wind, it's really exposed), or erect direction. You might still want a belay parka for your second. If you're near boston, go climb ice on Mt Washington.

In slovenia they use baling wire and chicken wire to give the ice a structure to form on. Have you called the guys at Ouray?

That's the same argument Kelly tries to use on me. I don't buy it. You're such a bad ass climber that you don't really need a tent or any of that stuff, right? Unfortunately, I have to admit that it's true. I can carry 120 pounds around for a mile or two without too much effort. I doubt that kelly can as easily... As for "filling the pack", come on...I thought you were a disciplined person? I carry one of my 60L's around with the sides closed down all the time. Personally, I sometimes find it nice to have extra room in the pack so I don't have to pack well. I guess I'm just lazy.

i find it highly unlikely you can find it, but Silk Road A La Turka is awesome.

THIS IS A NEW RECALL. The first was for 5-10% of them, now it's for ALL of them made in a certain time window...or at least thats what I made of the recall they just sent me.

Taken from the new Petzl Recall Page Ball-Lock carabiners product safety bulletin Name of product: Am'D Ball-Lock, William Ball-Lock USA only Clearfield, Utah (October 18, 2006) Petzl America voluntarily announced a recall of Petzl M34 BL Am'D BALL-LOCK and M36 BL WILLIAM BALL-LOCK carabiners with the new metal locking sleeve due to the possibility that the sleeve can be unlocked without pressing the green button, so the locking system acts as a TWIST-LOCK, instead of a BALL-LOCK. Affected units were sold during March and July, 2006. No incidents or injuries have been reported. This information does not apply to the older nylon-sleeve locking system, but only to BALL-LOCK carabiners with the metal locking sleeve manufactured in March and July, 2006. This recall is in effect only in the USA - it does not affect BALL LOCK carabiners sold in other countries (see press release - pdf format, 50 Kb). If you have a Ball-Lock carabiner with the metal sleeve, check the batch number engraved on the spine of the carabiner. Affected product will display a number between 06076 and 06178. If you have any affected product, you may: 1. Inspect it following the simple procedure below, or return it to the place of purchase or to Petzl America for inspection and possible replacement. 2. If you do your own inspection, you may return any non-conforming product to the place of purchase or to Petzl America for replacement. For assistance in any matter related to this recall, please contact Petzl America at 877 807 3805 or rcl.bl06@petzl.com. BALL-LOCK metal sleeve inspection procedure 1. Unlock, open and close the carabiner once as shown in the technical notice: - Am'D BALL-LOCK technical notice - WILLIAM BALL-LOCK technical notice 2. Grip the spine of the carabiner with your right hand so that your thumb is on the wider end of the carabiner (end opposite the hinge). 3. Firmly grip the locking sleeve by wrapping the fingers of your left hand around it. 4. Without pressing the green button, twist the sleeve firmly in the direction normally used to unlock the carabiner. Inspection results A non-conforming product will unlock easily with a single firm twist. Please do not apply excessive force as a single firm twist is all that is required to unlock a non-conforming product. Conforming product will resist a firm twist and remain locked; again, please avoid excesssive force. Am'D BALL-LOCK - M34 BLWILLIAM BALL-LOCK - M36 BL