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Messages 41 - 60 of total 105 in this topic << First  |  < Previous  |  Show All  |  Next >  |  Last >>
bhilden

Trad climber
Mountain View, CA
Aug 30, 2007 - 01:38am PT
I'd love to share it with this forum, but I don't think the statute of limitations has run out yet!

Bruce
WBraun

climber
Aug 30, 2007 - 01:48am PT
Worst thing I've done is gone there to this "Valley".

I could have been an astronaut instead ......
Jaybro

Social climber
The West
Aug 30, 2007 - 09:51am PT
But what would your sound bite have been when you stepped on to the 'moon'?
M.Tea

Trad climber
Utah
Aug 30, 2007 - 10:57am PT
"If Space is a vacum why is the flag fluttering?"
wack-N-dangle

Gym climber
the ground up
Aug 30, 2007 - 11:54am PT
Worst thing: Hiked to the base of Leaning Tower to solo my first wall (with very little previous experience). I needed help to stand up with the pig on my back.
Best thing: dumped a few gallons of water when I saw the queue and walked back down.

Worst thing: hung on gear while "free climbing"
Best thing: hung on gear while aid climbing, free climbs.

Worst thing: bought a "used only once" harness from a guy
Best thing: saved money on safety equipment.

Worst thing: left my tent roof unzipped at Camp 4.
Best thing: practiced solo aid all afternoon on a very dry right leaning dihedral/roof on elephant rock (sorry for the fixed wire near your tick mark).

Worst thing: slept in the back of my truck.
Best thing: slept in the back of my truck.

or vice versa?

Worst thing: left
LuckyPink

climber
the last bivy
Aug 30, 2007 - 02:14pm PT
worst thing was take a married guy from the midwest for his first time to the Valley,first time climbing, which totally blew out all his sensibilities , had great sex just because he had a gorgeous big wang and then encouraged him to go home to his wife refreshed..but .... he was all blown out with the possibilities opening up so he left the wife/life and last I heard was living in a half built dome on some muddy forested slope in Oregon. Seemed like it ruined his previous life but I hope what grew out of that was something better in some way., I still feel at least somewhat guilty..no interest in affairs ever again.. it was like striking a match at a fuel spill.

Risk

Mountain climber
Minkler, CA
Sep 2, 2007 - 03:05pm PT
Back in the summer of 1977, a bunch of us frequented the Curry Village Terrace Bar in the evening most every day. We would swill till night’s end with whoever showed up; it was a great time and we knew it. Airplane crash rounds were happening, and altogether things were good. One night Chuck Goldman had an awful toothache and summoned those present to perform “emergency extraction” over yonder from the Terrace bar at the men’s restroom behind the Curry lounge. After administration of a sedative (at least 4 stiff drinks), we led the patient to the “dental office” (the restroom). Here, sophisticated instruments (pliers) were used to perform the procedure. I believe it was A. Crowley who held the patient’s head as he sat in a chair. I will never forget turning away and hearing Chuck’s soft but primordial and guttural “aaahhughllleaghhllahhh” when the procedure was finally carried out.

Now for “worst thing” story that I just recalled this week. It was from this same Curry Terrace bar that A. Crowley and I contrived our stunt. Goldman’s dental office was also a place where perverts would carve peepholes in the partitions to spy unsuspecting tourists. The urinal peephole was obvious to us since we stumbled and traipsed back and forth between the Terrace and the head 3 or 4 times a night. We inadvertently took notice of an “occupant” one night inhabiting this stall for hours. The peephole would be blocked by an eyeball each time the urinal was used. Upon our request, the bartender (Riley?) gave us a 5-gallon bucket filled with ice and water, and we proceeded to the bathroom, where upon we promptly doused the peeper with the cold slush from over the stall partition. We heard a “HEY, WHAT THE . . . .” as we dashed out the door. A drenched and sorry-looking middle-aged night-auditor type emerged a few moments later and disappeared quietly into the Curry tent area nearby. We were successful, but I have always felt bad for doing this to the guy. What was supposed to be funny turned out sad. Poor Senator Larry Craig. . . .
Jaybro

Social climber
The West
Sep 2, 2007 - 05:23pm PT
Thanks for the Candor LPink, there are single climbers out there, you know ;-) I think we all start things and never know how they will turn out.

Jesse, don't feel too bad, could have been much worse. Though I would feel sorry for him, too.
chappy

Social climber
ventura
Sep 2, 2007 - 05:29pm PT
Werner,
You may not be astronaut but you are an Astroman...
Jaybro

Social climber
The West
Sep 2, 2007 - 07:10pm PT
Not in the valley, but still potentially bad; once upon a time ('03? It was the day before they reported that guy cutting his arm off) I was camped on the ground in one of the pullout campgrounds on the river road east of Moab. In the middle of the night I was awakened by a huge, loud, rockfall, it went on for a long time. I had woken abruptly, taking it all in, not knowing which way was which. The sound was so loud, that it occured to me that the highway, where ever it lay, might have been covered in boulders, it also occured to me that I should warn someone.
Then I heard cars. "Where's the road?" I thought in a panic. But instead of jumping up to be a boxer clad nightmare on the road I just grimaced.
The cars sped by, on what seemed to be the wrong side, in the wrong direction.

No collisions, or even brakes screeching.

I went back to sleep.

Got up the next morning and drove to the crackhouse, never could see where the landslide was.

The bad part? I didn't pay for the site, that money was earmarked for a quad mocha, after all!
lars johansen

Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
Sep 2, 2007 - 10:07pm PT
Steve Bosque and I made some rivet hangers out of aluminum angle iron and actually placed them on the 9 o'clock wall. I'm sorry.
Ricardo Carlos

Trad climber
Off center, CO.
Sep 2, 2007 - 11:30pm PT
Worst? In my eyes? Climbers, Curry’s, Park Rangers?

I had wicked addiction to Curry Maids and Free sweetshop Ice Cream.
Never worked for Curry but had name tag on my rucksack that was sorta free pass to employee showers and discount food.
I ate out of 4 seasons salad bowls for twenty plus years.
Master key to tent showers across from C4 was better (but you needed to dress up). Coed showering was safer at employee showers. Unless with a tourist as that pissed off the Curry gals.
Tipping big for small check at 4 seasons?
But hey I was one of the few who walked back in the night lighting blew the power ($75.00 tip). Boy after the lights came back on the place was empty.

I never helped make the stamp for deposits cans out of a potato or the next one from a rubber eraser. The guy in the green 240z got greedy and did not wait for the ink to dry one time dumb sh#t. He should have gone and hit golf balls a little longer.
What’s a ranger suppose to do as he is counting the cans and purple marks start showing up his hands? Mark,Marks
I never D&D (dined and dashed)
Whew
As I grew up a good Catholic boy I feel so much better now.
RCS
pimp daddy wayne

climber
The Bat Caves
Sep 3, 2007 - 09:08am PT
I can catch squirrels in big potato chip bags. I wait untill that little f*#ker gets in there and I grab that little f*#ker and shake him hard.

Catch and release
cintune

climber
Penn's Woods
Sep 3, 2007 - 12:19pm PT
Paranoia strikes deep,
Into your life it will creep.
Risk

Mountain climber
Minkler, CA
Sep 3, 2007 - 01:08pm PT
Not the worst thin I ever did in the valley, but close, was when I was once horribly disturbed trying to sleep in a Curry tent with the neighbor snoring very loudly. I locked him in by hooking the outside latch. There was probably minor commotion in the morning, but I was long gone. I remain unrepentant for this deed. The guy really messed up my night’s sleep.
cintune

climber
Penn's Woods
Sep 3, 2007 - 02:57pm PT
I love the Jim Morrison vs. Dr. Drew interpretations of this event.

See and be seen. Pitch black roads call for either preternatural senses OR flashlights. If you don't have one, you'd better have the other or all bets are off. Feral onlookers have nothing to do with what happened.
bvb

Social climber
flagstaff arizona
Sep 3, 2007 - 03:02pm PT
what's the worst thing i've done in the valley? i'd have to say it was some chosspile about halfway between serenity crack and the arches apron. two pitches of grass, grain, dirt, and dust. we probably did the second ascent. had to dig out every placement. jesus, what a pile.

uhhh...this was a climbing thread, right??
coiler

Trad climber
The Rock Monkey Ranch
Sep 3, 2007 - 03:11pm PT
That's easy... I lived there, and got involved with SAR! It totaly blew my cover!
Jaybro

Social climber
The West
Sep 3, 2007 - 04:36pm PT
"My take on it is that you were either stoned out of your mind and/or drunk to the point where your perceptions of time, speed and spacial relations were warped."

I think you are obsessed with a minor tangent to the story he is telling. One that makes no sense and has no importance, imho. I don't think his state really enters into the story. Is it in some way, telling, that you keep insisting on the importance you (and only you) put on this?

Having myself ridden a bike with no light, at night, more times than anyone should, between the ahwhanee and camp four, I'm guessing you can't imagine how dark (and unnerving) it really is, in some of those spots. Not talking somewhere with street lights.

When you travel in the dark, with no light, your other senses really do, dial up. A fractal comparison is how much more you see travelling a given road , in broad daylight, on a bike than when you're in a car.

When we were kids, if you'd have taken me up on those pedaling with no lights dares, this would make a lot more sense, now.


I'm with you on the possible analysis of what happened, though.
Jaybro

Social climber
The West
Sep 3, 2007 - 05:27pm PT
I think you're still missing the point. He is bearing witness. He feels bad. He is second guessing. (I'm not inclined to find him culpable either; not by the facts he states or the the conditions you need to add to the situtation.) still don't know why you need the stoned/drunk explanation, or what that exonerates.

"The fault rests entirely with the man who chose to ride a bicycle with zero visability." -yup!

I guess my point is, don't write off his heightened senses as a naive, druggy, interpretation. When some senses are comprimised others compensate, to a degree you can't imagine without experiencing it. Climbing is all about that.

Try it tonight, walk around your fields without supplementary light, you Will be aware of things you never knew about.


Just caught your insightful highway 31 post. Isn't that kinda what I'm saying about your assumptions?

'prolly was a boy, though.
Messages 41 - 60 of total 105 in this topic << First  |  < Previous  |  Show All  |  Next >  |  Last >>
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