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FOX will ensure that you remain profoundly stupid if you look to it for news, of course. As a popular indicator of how human communication is evolving, and as a business, its interesting. Not innovative, but interesting. FOX uses the profitable reality TV model: Hire 4 or 5 talking heads to be on camera, angry white guys and leggy tarts, then a combination of automatic feeds from Aryan Nation bloggers, heart warming tidbits about Homecoming Queens (the only queens you'll read about) from small town rags, tabloid mom-kills-baby-with-chainsaw stories from god knows where, and subscription feeds from the WSJ, all implement by a couple of unpaid, teenage interns. Special guests include any republican who has had their ass handed to them in primary, and officials who've been fired for cause or otherwise narrowly escaped prison. If you've written a kooky book, even better. Serve this corn-slurry up to an audience of metal detector enthusiasts and End Times nutters - an unvarying (conservatives do NOT like surprises) diet of 'freedom', 'America', and 3 or four other fatty staples in 'irony quotes' (no marketing department required), spiced up with STATUS QUO BUSTING QUESTIONS (Is 'education' really a good thing?), all with a side of Viagra advertisements and you've got a money gusher. You've got to admire this implementation of pure capitalism. Utterly cynical to the point of psychopathy, but then, psychopaths tend to do very well in America. We provide the perfect environment for them to flourish.

A few days ago FOX issued a BIAS ALERT (an automatic feed from a blogger in some basement somewhere) against...wait for it: Mother Jones. The fact that for profit media has always explicitly endorsed both candidates and issues seems to have been lost on FOX's readership. Just another concept that's a little too complicated.

About a 4th of FOXNEWS articles focus on what the NYTIMES does or doesn't print. This weird media bullying tactic (which saves them a bundle in investigative reporting costs, of course) can, and often does backfire: Why is the NYTIMES keeping Libya off the front page? Oh, it isn't LOL: No Shame Plus, I think I'm one of about 3 people in America who read both, so its hard to see the point of such a maneuver, other than, perhaps, that FOX doesn't have anyone on their writing staff older than 19. It's all part of their lamestream librul media propaganda campaign, which in itself is kind of laughable, since FOX has the highest viewership of any outlet, and the WSJ the highest of any newspaper. Definitely entertaining to witness the infantilization of media. Let's hope Gen Y says 'let's get real for a change. We'll see.

Get your geek on... Micro fractures are more of a problem with fatigue (high cycle) loading, particularly with AL, which, unlike steel, has no theoretically infinite fatigue life. That's not to say other materials wont' fail spectacularly (Tacoma Narrows, baby) if the cyclic loading isn't properly characterized during design, or some modification later on doesn't screw up the works. If you can see a fracture at all, of course, get rid of it. The sharp end of a fracture concentrates stress; the smaller the crack tip radius, the more the concentration. The area of maximum stress on a biner is at the surface, so any visible crack has the potential of propagating inward until the cross sectional area is too small to bear the load and it snaps all of a sudden like. larger radius divots are usually less of a problem unless they're so big that the metal has been work hardened (made more brittle) due to the impact. Personally, I'd use nuts thrown off El Cap - small moment arm on that loading and the alloys are more ductile, but not biners. I'd probably use the cams, too, cuz I'm that much of a cheapskate.

Ha! Irish nuns represent!

First Main Street v Wall Street suit since the meltdown: ACLU sues Morgan Stanley for racial bias in predatory lending

L.A. Confidentiel!

Never forget that Lance Armstrong beat cancer and went on to completely destroy the sport of cycling.

Well, then you have my sympathies, and I mean that. I've been lucky (and I know it) regarding my health. Not that I haven't put some work into it, and not that its all that much to write home about, but I've never really been injured out there, other than the usual pulled muscle and one or two cases of epic induced PTSD. Then again I'm more risk averse than some, which I'm cool with. Works for me. I've also always been a generalist with a lot of various interests, meaning I pretty much suck at all of them. If an injury or something curtailed climbing, I'd just switch to my other interests; making cheap junk into expensive junk, kayaking, compulsive masturbation, or a new sport, like very low altitude base jumping.

Yeah, I knew the denial comment would follow my post, but we can only speak for ourselves, no? Your tragic Glory Days ego analogy is nothing I recognize in my own aging experience. Quite the opposite. I don't buy the bullshit contractive narrative so popular in this country. If you've suffered a debilitating injury or illness, that's one thing. Barring that, one should be able to expand the depth and meaning of one's experience regardless of age. Personally, I've had just about the most exciting, interesting, and wonderful year ever. Big walls, skiing, family life, the list goes on. I enjoy the people around me more than ever before. Sure, I'm blind as a bat and can't run a 10K as fast as 20 years ago, and I don't really care much. Hey, I can swim farther, though. This expansive experience in later age is shared by friends now in their sixties. Ego is a weakness, in my view. Guess you younger folks will find out what I'm talking about one way or the other or not. It depends the attitude you face each day with, I reckon.

Speak for yourself.

And Felix jumps from Heaven.

Just enjoy yourself. If you feel like a challenge, take one on. If not, relax.

Does relevance not require the ability to influence? Is contempt not vulgar? Does not a Bible burn like any other book?

Joe was so MEAN to poor Paul! So RUDE! You know, the poor Paul who advocates cutting millions of poor, old, and sick Americans loose to fend for themselves.

A prescription for anti-psychotics?

Till next week, Raindawg! Good luck with your new lobbying career. Or will it be a ballot initiative, given your appeal to the eco friendly youth (who don't generally serve in the legislature, BTW). If the latter: 1) you'll need a cool million to gather enough signatures 2) youth, eco minded or not, have a low voter turn out and 3) they're doing most of the bolting, anyway, so that's probably a good thing for your quest. If you're going directly to the legislature, you won't be the first lone wolf to approach them about a pet non-issue. Lawmakers quickly develop an early warning radar for such individuals.

I'm in the process of writing a prophasequal where Jesus returns for Armageddon but encounters the US military instead. "White Dawn." Could make for one hell of a future historical biopic.

We're just now discovering the mechanism that makes us take a breath (it's not O2 or CO2 levels) - it appears to be an autonomic rythm that produces a sense of extreme discomfort when forcefully repressed. Experimental subjects who've had their body and breathing artificially paralyzed such that they signal (with one unparalyzed arm) for a breath from a ventilator when they feel they need it, happily don't take a breath for 3 to 4 minutes at a pop. This experiment was done back when you could get away with something so dangerous. They used curare as the paralytic. I'd guess since this discover pretty new, the mechanism behind Cheyne Stokes remains a mystery. Perhaps that part of the brain which produces the breath signal 'skips' when hypoxic.

4. Honey attracts more bees than vinegar. Use your sense of humor, such as it is, more, and I don't mean another posting of the BLT shot. Funny humor is what I'm talking about. 5. If your issue hasn't gotten any traction after - how many years has it been? - drop it. It didn't take. Not all of them do.

Sleeping is a common difficulty at altitude. Last trip I took was with a doc, who provided our tiny party with a before-bed pain cocktail consisting of very light doses of cough suppressant (a persistent cough is common), pain reliever (whatev works for you for headaches) and a sleeping pill. This really helped us maintain good health by getting good sleeping. It also made for a hell of a Heath Ledger style par-tay when combined with locally made beer. Some weird stuff can happen at altitude. Cheyne Stokes syndrome, for example. This is when you hyperventalate, then don't take a breath for 30 seconds to a minute. It's not dangerous (your lungs easily hold several minutes worth of oxygen), but it's quite strange to be happily sitting there for so long without the urge to take a breath. I had an out of body experience, too, while plying some neve penetente with a heavy load. I couldn't feel my body at all, yet it kept on climbing - not a hint of stumbling, so I just said 'cool, no pain!' and kept going. My partner eventually got cerebral embolisms - which can be a precursor to cerebral edema. If the blood vessels in your eyeballs start rupturing and you find that you don't much in the way of stamina, it might be time to bail. Check for it if someone's performance starts to inexplicably flag. That IS potentially very dangerous. Aaaand, of course, pink, gurgling sputum doesn't usually signal an imminent increase in climbing pace. Often, the afflicted is the last one who considers bailure...they can feel bad at night when hypoxia is at its worst, then sort of 'wake up' during the day a bit...but go down they must.

The day you fade away will be the day I urge my fellow church goers to vote Republican. You're not going quietly into the night, or anywhere else, for that matter.

or buy a GPS.

Ditto on climbing out of La Paz, Bolivia. The Cordillera Real is a mere 4 hour's drive from town...some 20,000 footers are even closer. The standards of the area: Ancohoma, Illampu, Pico Shulz, Illimani, Huayna Potosi, Condoriri, and the more remote Sajama, offer an efficient way to get in lots of high altitude experience in their winter (their dry season) which is, unfortunately, also our summer. Temps high in the Andes can be similar to the lower altitudes in the summer AK range - zero F at night, etc - but generally warmer during the day. Getting to La Paz isn't exactly a hop, skip and jump, however.

Back on topic, FOX has a piece today that explains sharp drop in church attendance: we're all disappointed in the 'church experience, but strongly driven to know God nonetheless'. Ie, we're all becoming Born Again. I was once invited to debate censorship with an Everett evangelical pastor in front of his congregation. I went to his church's website and noted that it kept referring to those outside the church as 'pre-Christians'. The good pastor cancelled at the last minute, unfortunately. Not an unsurprising narrative for a historically recent movement that, due to its fundamental inflexibility, must eventually meet a historical dead end. The Born Again movement is a reaction to the age old perception that we're all going to Hell in a hand basket (or is it hen basket?) and the world's going to end soon as a result. It is, in essence, just one more of a long line of reactions to modernity. In the end, modernity, which requires more reasonable, flexible, and philosophical beliefs, will win (no one really wants to go backward once they get a sour taste of it) and the Born Again movement will become a strange and colorful historical footnote in the annals of spirituality. Technology and a growing world wide middle class is killing xenophobia - the white bread and margarine of the evangelical movement.