Liberty Ridge ... Our Summit Camp

After summitting we set up camp in the saddle at 13,500 feet, between Liberty Cap and the true summit. Flat, spacious, sheltered from the wind, everything I could ask for. A shame we only stayed one night.

Liberty Ridge ... Done

Rainier by Liberty Ridge: brutal and amazing at once. Rockfall to the head and arm, a torn-up shoulder, ice climbing above a 6,000-foot drop, and a glissade so fast I flew past everyone. None of my other climbs even compares. Here's the day-by-day.

Liberty Ridge

Made it to Ashford, a crazy little town. Gear checked, pack down to a glorious forty pounds, my lightest yet. Four days ahead, including a midnight summit push and four thousand feet of real climbing. It seems rather daunting right now.

MoneyWell is Amazing

MoneyWell is amazing. After years suffering through Quicken and MYOB and retreating to Excel, I entered every transaction back to the start of 2008 in one evening, and the totals line up perfectly. As awesome as finance software gets for a Type A personality.

Communist *#$^@!*$ Idiotic #$%*@$!

Apple announced the iPhone 3GS, no big surprises. AT&T, on the other hand, won't extend subsidized pricing to people mid-contract, and people are grumbling. Imagine that: you sign a two-year contract and you're expected to honor it. Difficult to fathom.

Mountain Hardwear South Col

I crammed seventy-three pounds of gear and weights into the Mountain Hardwear South Col for a stair session. The external suspension strap is a nice touch and it weighs half what my Osprey does, though the shoulder cinches are stingy on leverage. Off to Rainier with it Saturday.

Fiction vs Reality

I'm a third of the way into Atlas Shrugged, and I can't help laughing at the headlines about government stimulus packages and their intended benefits.

Denali 2010 Changes

My part-time Denali team wants a return trip in 2010, so here are my notes, mostly aimed at shaving weight: lighter sleeping bag, hybrid ice tool, one gallon of gas, replaceable batteries, no Clif bars, and one roll of toilet paper is plenty.

Background Pictures

I'm picky about desktop pictures, usually settling on plain grey. But reading Atlas Shrugged this evening, I noticed the moon behind a figurehead statue on a distant building, and after a lot of toying around in Photoshop, here's the result.

High[er] Resolution

Google finally added higher-res imagery of Denali, in a strip that conveniently misses the summit. Why bother? Anyway, I stitched my GPS tracks from two years into one route: three weeks up the white line, about a day back down.