Climbing Trip 2

Pinnacles again 2/20

Taska and I, East Side

Nipple Jam 5.8? (V)

Thrill Hammer 5.8+ (VK)

??? 5.7 (V)

North end of East Face Discovery wall...

Insubstantial Man 10a (K)

Not its real name, some other word instead of insubstantial...Good lead-one hard mantle move by a bolt, then thin 5.9ish for 3 more bolts

Wet Kiss 5.9 (V)

always fun!

The Big Pucker 10d (TR)

good climb - hard mantle for short folks crux is after the ledge, well protected

Swallow Crack 5.6 (K)

fun way to end the day-easy but fun. Saw some guys at the base of this with what looked like an El Cap rack. Never did see if they did this or something else, but it looked weird...

Brokeback Murrow

Brokeback Mountain

Great movie. Politically, of course, I have to be behind it, but it is
way beyond that. Ang Lee is just plain good at his job, and does a great
job with a really good story from Proulx and McMurtry, and a great
performance by Heath Ledger. Top it off with Wyoming, and a great little
soundtrack (small, almost precious, pieces of guitar music, just enough to
be interesting, but not enough to be distracting)

The oscars for me boil down to this and Good Night and Good Luck. Both
movies I care about politically, as well as appreciating their craft. The
"free speech vs. patriot act/McCarthyism/bigoted idiots" and "gay rights
vs. hate crimes/Pat Robertson/bigoted idiots" aspect
of these movies resonates deeply with me, of course, and it is hard for me
to evaluate them on a purely cinematic basis. I want them both to be
acclaimed, so that more of the country hears these important messages.

However, cinematically, I think Brokeback is the narrow winner. I think.
It's real close. I guess I could sit around and watch them both over and
over just to decide. Wouldn't be bad, that.

2 cool things

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

I'm most of the way through it and really like it. Mostly
autobiographical, somewhat maudlin and very introspective. Always witty,
and often inspiring.

Eggers currently is editor of McSweeney's
which is a nifty site/magazine.

From there I ran into freedarko which is an
interesting and intelligent basketball commentary.

Good sportswriting for those of us who appreciate good writing, but also
follow sports, is sometimes hard to find. Bill Simmons at espn.com was as
good as it got for me until I found freedarko, which is better after a few
glances, to my mind. Gregg Easterbrook used to be pretty interesting,
except that he compared Disney to hitler and lost his spot on espn...

Treos

So I got a treo about 2 weeks ago, and as a consequece haven't been
posting here. Basically this is because I am playing with the Treo on the
train, instead of thinking of interesting blog postings.

Anyway, I haven't forgotten this, and of course, I can post from the treo
too, but I haven't done that yet.

The Treo (650) is pretty darn cool, for those of you considering a
"device".