TimmyC

I can see some possible sling strength loss but the DMM thumb loop is bomber. Ahh, I see now, yeah. I should've watched that video before asking -- cord would tweak the thumb loop way worse than skinny webbing. Huh. That answers my question perfectly.

Out of curiosity, is there a safety reason one wouldn't just tie a piece of appropriate cord with a double fisherman's, instead of having new tape sewn in? Or is it just aesthetics?

I am not hardcore enough for these bindings. They came on a pair of craigslisted skis; I dumbed down to some Voile 3-pins, which are more my speed. All the parts are here, but you'll likely need new fasteners (these were mounted in an [ahem] interesting fashion by the previous owner). Riser plates fore and aft, complete with heel bails. Ooh, and they're red! Shipped $50; picked up in Seattle $40 -- or two growlers of a fierce IPA (I keep the glass).

Short version: I like to pay fees. Longer version follows. If you drive up out of Roslyn and Ronald toward Salmon La Sac, there's a huge rock in the middle of the river right before bridge #2 (Cooper Lake). The camping areas around there have been developed to a certain extent, i.e. parking has been cut out and graveled, kybos are in place most of the year. There is no fee collected for camping there and no pass needs to be displayed. THESE SITES GET TRASHED every weekend from Memorial Day to Labor Day. The Forest Service has workers -- many of them volunteers -- out there every week during the peak dates, cleaning up trash, picking up toilet paper, dismantling many, many new fire rings that are built and used during burn bans, etc. Every week. They are out there hauling out huge bags of trash every week. The NFS gets no money for this. They do it as part of their tax-funded charter. It's their land, so they take care of it, with minimal staff and many kind volunteers and nowhere near enough money. I don't wanna be the guy who says "well, for the price of one [bomber/tank/day of operations in Kandahar], we could..." but that's not productive, since that's not a change I or we can affect. But I CAN pay my fees. I buy my annual National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass, and I buy my state lands pass (i.e. the new yellow one), and I volunteer, and my friends and I always hike with a spare trash bag. And as a voting citizen who doesn't make enough money to own his own politicians, that's really all I can do. I don't have kids, but my taxes pay for schools (which, to be clear, I don't mind at all; I like education, and we should spend more money on it). Flip side? I ride a bike, so I don't pay gas taxes that fix the roads. Does it balance out? Dunno. My taxes also go toward killing people I've never met on the other side of the planet, which I'm supposed to feel good about cuz, y'know, freedom or something, but I don't. If I could choose where my taxes went, it would all go to the NPS and NFS. But I can't. My taxes buy books and bullets, for the most part (and way more bullets than books), with only a few pennies here or there for the woods. So I pay fees instead. I agree that being out in the woods should be about freedom. Paying fees doesn't make me less free, though; it simply means I'm helping, in a very small way, to pay for the maintenance of the woods in which I like to feel free. Humans, Americans especially, are really bad at taking care of nature. On a national/institutional level, the point could be argued. On a personal level, the level at which you find toilet paper and cigarette butts and Doritos bags mere feet from a pullout or parking area, where humans couldn't even be bothered to take their trash the extra few feet to their cars, and subsequent humans couldn't be bothered to pick it up because [it's gross/not theirs/someone gets paid to pick it up], it simply cannot be argued. I could go on about how if you buy an annual NP/Fed Lands pass, it actually saves you money, but some folks don't like fees no matter how you couch the argument. So. [Edited to tone down some language; it's too early in the day for me to be shouting at the computer.]

No e-reader (sadly), so pre-ordered the print version. Can't wait!