Dumb things other climbers have said

nerdlet wrote: "I'm in direct" doesn't mean off belay to me or anyone I know. If I'm being lowered off an anchor I'm about to clean the draws off of "in direct" means you can give me a load of slack because I've clipped into the anchor and need to thread the rope to lower, but don't take me off belay or else I'll end up the dumbo who got dropped while lowering off a climb. If I'm dogging up a climb and I don't feel like punishing my patient belayer, "in direct" means I've clipped into a draw so he can leave a little slack so that they don't have to bear the weight of my hangdogging carcass for the next 5 minutes... but it also says please don't think I'm off belay and go have a picnic or I'll die if this bolt fails. So, "in direct" is actually a fairly word efficient statement.

I've seen at least two people take their partner off belay when their partner called "in direct" at an anchor. One of them hit the ground. Noob belayers? Sure. I agree that it can be a useful command at protection bolts for the reasons you mentioned, but it is a virtually useless and potentially dangerous command when used at the anchors. If you want slack, use the command "slack". If you use the "in direct" command, be 100% sure your partner knows what "in direct" means and don't assume. After seeing someone hit the ground from 40ft up (by some miracle, they were fine BTW) I cringe every time I hear some noob get to the anchors and say "in direct" or "off belay" at someplace where lowering is the norm.

And dumb things climbers have said?
For the win... (drumroll)
"I don't know, ask on Mountain Project."

"In direct" sounds like unnecessary confounding crap that's gonna kill somebody.

Maybe I'm simplistic and stuff, but keep commands simple, concise, and original.

"In direct" sounds like the guy's not using a condom.

nerdlet wrote: So what do you do when you get to an anchor out the belayer's sight and are prepping to be lowered?

I would just pull up slack and maybe add something like "i am at the anchor" but usually that is not necessary cause my partner already knows that i am the anchor when i pull up a lots of slack.

I dislike 'in direct'. Belay commands are commands, and in direct is not a clear command, it is a statement. It's ambiguous when used as an imperative. Does it mean slack? Off belay? Knowing which depends on having had a conversation about it beforehand (which you should always do anyway as part of the belay check).

Cut the shit with the BS argumentative posts on terms! This thread has been a gold mine! Fuck off if you can't maintain the spirit of the OP.

nerdlet wrote: Slack means give me some slack. It doesn't imply that I am clipped into an anchor point/bolt. If I say "I'm in direct" you don't have to give me slack an inch at a time and worry that I am about to plummet out of the sky, or conversely worry that you are about to short rope me off a stance if you don't feed the slack fast enough. "In direct" is actually a really simple and useful climbing term when cragging if the people you climb with gets its implication. If the people you are climbing (and yourself) with don't get it, it is the same as any misunderstood climbing term (like climbers about to fall on steep terrain and yell "take".). So what do you do when you get to an anchor out the belayer's sight and are prepping to be lowered? Do you just say "slack" and hope your belayer realizes you are clipped into the anchor? "Off belay" and "slack" (you aren't really asking to be taken off belay though, and people have gotten hurt this way)? Don't say anything and hope for the best? Try out "in direct", you might like it.

Completely unnecessary with a competent belayer.

djh860 wrote:Cut the shit with the BS argumentative posts on terms! This thread has been a gold mine! Fuck off if you can't maintain the spirit of the OP.

+1

nerdlet wrote: So what do you do when you get to an anchor out the belayer's sight and are prepping to be lowered? Do you just say "slack" and hope your belayer realizes you are clipped into the anchor?

Do they need to? If you ask for slack and they give you slack, does it matter whether they know you are clipped into the anchor or not?

djh860 wrote: Fuck off if you can't maintain the spirit of the OP.

uh-huh. Take your "in direct" argument to another thread.

Lets get this back on track...not my story but I always liked it - my partner was climbing next to a party and the leader is way up the pitch starting to get a little gripped and pumping out. Not sure how far ahead the anchors are he yells down to his belayer "how much rope I got left?" The belayer looks down at the rope on the ground and yells back up "about 4 coils". The leader, now really pumped and freaking out screams back "what the fuck is a coil?!?!!?"

Was waiting to climb Calypso in Eldo and a guy was guiding a couple up the route. The couple seemed very inexperienced but you could tell the guide had been around. He is about 3/4 of the way up the first pitch and his belayer(the husband of the couple) calls out: "You're off belay!" To which the guide replies: "WHY AM I OFF BELAY!?!?!?"The wife of the couple was tied into the rope halfway and the belayer was concerned about passing her through the belay device so instead of putting the rope behind her in the belay device and clipping it with another locker, he just took the leader off belay mid lead.

Luckily the guide was at a good spot but damn. Could have ended badly.

Keith W wrote:Was waiting to climb Calypso in Eldo and a guy was guiding a couple up the route. The couple seemed very inexperienced but you could tell the guide had been around. He is about 3/4 of the way up the first pitch and his belayer(the husband of the couple) calls out: "You're off belay!" To which the guide replies: "WHY AM I OFF BELAY!?!?!?"The wife of the couple was tied into the rope halfway and the belayer was concerned about passing her through the belay device so instead of putting the rope behind her in the belay device and clipping it with another locker, he just took the leader off belay mid lead. Luckily the guide was at a good spot but damn. Could have ended badly.

I can't visualize this as you've described it, but it sounds dangerous.

Eric Chabot wrote:I dislike 'in direct'. Belay commands are commands, and in direct is not a clear command, it is a statement. It's ambiguous when used as an imperative. Does it mean slack? Off belay? Knowing which depends on having had a conversation about it beforehand (which you should always do anyway as part of the belay check).

Sorry to pick on you Eric, but your post is representative of a group of people on this thread.

All climbing commands require that both climber and belayer agree on its meaning and the proper response by the belayer. This is old news, eh? You should have learned this when you took your first climbing class.

I climbed with at least three dozen different belayers this season in Rifle and every one of them knew what "In straight" meant. I learned it in the late '90s, so what rock have you guys been under the last 18 years?

I will grant that its use in trad and alpine climbing is rare, nonetheless if you don't know what it means and the proper response, you should LEARN what it means instead of being annoying curmudgeons. Doh!

P.S. I use/understand "In direct", "In straight" and just "I'm in".

Greg D wrote: Why learn a useless command when pretty much every necessary command was invented decades ago. Some people just need to say stuff. But, Mr Admin. You are the expert?

What bloody nonsense.

Perhaps you are still climbing with hemp ropes, knickers and nailed boots but most climbers have moved on.

Sport climbing has only been around since the mid-80's, and with its introduction and evolution came lots of new terms and a few commands.

"Take", for example, comes from sport climbing. Have you learned that one Greg? Have you been climbing long enough to remember the first time you heard "take"?

So nobody really cares if you're unwilling to learn new things, Greg, but maybe you should keep it to yourself.

FrankPS wrote: I can't visualize this as you've described it, but it sounds dangerous.

The whole situation was pretty dangerous. Especially with inexperienced belayers. And also I am not very elegant at describing things.

This whole page is no longer funny, but I'm pretty sure it's still dumb.

After being tight roped for a few clips in a row, a frustrated leader finally yells to his belayer, "Slack, Asshole!!!"

The belayer responds, "You have a what?"

Overheard in Squamish: "... I can't get my knee up, cause I'm too #$@%ing old!"

Girl is about to rappel down Stolen Chimney with her belay device clipped through her tie in points and no prussic in the dark. I comment, "maybe you should put on a prussic; this thing is pretty much a mud castle.. loose rock everywhere" she calmly replies, "whats a prussic?"

After it takes her friend 1.5 hours to do 1 double rope rap from the top of the chimney (wrong rappel beta), she calmly slides down the chimney and goes off rappel at anchor 1 and tries to pull the rope. Rope stuck. Y'all should have seen the double backed up cluster bomb they tied their ropes together with. Somehow her friend is on the ground (must have down climbed off the end of the 2 ropes) and is yelling non-sense commands at us. Eventually we do some rope finagling work and chuck their ropes off the anchor. We slide down to the 1st anchor and this girl is just standing there not tied into anything. She wants to rappel down in the dark with no prussic and try and free the stuck ropes. Since we didn't want to see anyone get fucked up we threw their stuck ropes off the side of the wall and get her to slide down our ropes and give her a fireman.

Most mind boggling thing is this girl had zero sense of panic or worries at all - it was 10pm and getting cold - 2+ hours into a 200 ft rappel.