New and experienced climbers over 50 #36

Emil Briggswrote:

Markets respond to underlying macroeconomic conditions but can be pretty random over the short term. And the problem right now is those short term macroeconomic conditions depend to a great extent on the whims of narcissistic toddler. Long term economic growth is going to be hammered though. Just the destruction of US leadership in science ensures that. 

So my point is, if you actually believe this, then you should be taking all of your money out of the stock market NOW.  THIS is the bounce that you have been waiting for (unless you sold at the lows, like many did).    I don’t believe that the market is done, but you do you.

edit:  Emil, I am not talking short term.  What I am saying is that you should get the hell out of the market - long term- right now if the 20% drop made you panic.  Yes, this may be a short term bounce but it is an excellent opportunity to sell if that is your mindset.

T Hockingwrote:

Mine were tubular I tied in 72, 

I don't think I had access to 1 in. flat at my local shop in Riverside back then.

Brad, you guys plan on finishing the PCT sometime this summer?

Looking forward to the final report.   

Carry on...

Tad

I'm keeping my fingers and toes all crossed, Tad.

Tricia now has a full time job and time off becomes an issue. But she's also living in Salem and so getting to far northern Washington to resume the PCT shouldn't be that hard. We've also now got to hike 140 miles instead of 116 to finish since Canada is not going to issue PCT visas for the foreseeable future (from the last trailhead to the Canadian border is 31.2 miles and instead of continuing seven miles into Canada to a county-level park to finish, one must now reverse the 31.2 miles back to that trailhead).

The most likely scenario is that Tricia can take off a week and we can make progress (alllllmost there) but not quite finish. That is, if they don't close that part of the trail because of fires just before we go like they did last summer.

I'd take almost finishing and then planning the last of the last in the summer of 2026 (I'll take anything we can get done). If we do that it will have been 20 years exactly for Tricia and I to do the whole PCT together in consecutive pieces (with Vicki's constant help). I'd take that too.

Meanwhile older daughter Katie has resumed the continuous footsteps with me. She gave me again for Christmas this year a week on the PCT (how lucky can a man be that his grown daughters want to backpack with him!!). Katie and I will do Tuolumne Meadows to Sonora Pass this summer (assuming all works out as planned). This stretch includes some of the very best parts of the whole trail (and finishes a 45 minute drive from our house).

I'll definitely do the usual trip report(s); hopefully two reports about two trips. 

Lori Milaswrote:

PS to Emil:  I was recently tasked with helping a very obese veteran Marine with making healthy food on $250 a month.  I spent a lot of time browsing at Walmart, and creating 30 recipes with their shopping lists.  It took time, but I did it... and he followed through with the plan, lost the weight and got healthy.  "Organic" is not the highest priority.  Healthy food, with enough protein and vegetables is the priority.  It can be done, even on a strict budget. The problem is... no one knows it is even an issue, nor have the training to follow through.

Can you post some of these recipes? Asking for a friend who shops for food at Walmart on a budget.

Are there any female jockeys? 

Lori Milaswrote:

Are there any female jockeys? 

Yes.

Isn't it a bit late for that? You any good with horses?

Brad Youngwrote:

We've also now got to hike 140 miles instead of 116 to finish since Canada is not going to issue PCT visas for the foreseeable future (from the last trailhead to the Canadian border is 31.2 miles and instead of continuing seven miles into Canada to a county-level park to finish, one must now reverse the 31.2 miles back to that trailhead).

Jeebus frickin cripes. That is fecking ridiculous.

Ship Twrote:

Can you post some of these recipes? Asking for a friend who shops for food at Walmart on a budget.

Ship it’s been about eight years since I did that, but I’d be happy to help you out. The problem with Walmart and most stores is they put all the cheap awful crap out front. And you will see most shoppers there loaded to the brim with chips and soda and candy.

If you seriously want some help, send me a message. The short of it is that you are shopping for basic nutrition like meat, eggs, dairy, healthy oils and fats, fruit, and vegetables and a few canned goods. You can make incredible meals out of shopping well at Walmart.

I believe with my friend we had a talk about his non-negotiables, what he loves to eat and also what he truly dislikes.  I built his shopping list and menu from that. I’d be happy to help!

—-

As for horses I used to love to ride, but Erika is our jockey. She’s been riding a long time.

I asked because we were watching the Kentucky Derby and I suddenly noticed there were no female jockeys. Also, my horse number 13 didn’t do so well AT ALL and I suspect he’s already headed for the glue factory.  

But I like all the ladies’ colorful hats and I think I could rock a fancy hat at the Derby.    

Ward Smithwrote:

Funny nobody is talking about the stock market anymore after all the doom and gloom posts. It is up nine days in a row, although still down 8% from all time highs.  For those of you who were in a panic when it was down 20%, now would be an excellent time to lighten up your exposure to stocks and move some money into lower risk assets.  I have no idea where it goes from here, I see both new all time highs and another dump as possibilities.  The most likely scenario IMO is that we are range bound between all time highs and the fear lows for the next few months.  Not financial advice but just saying. 

Okay, you were talking about the stock market, but....

I went to my local farmer's market this morning, this is tomato planting time...but keeping one eye on the (now) unpredictable weather. We have had wild late frosts in recent years, and heat records also. Including days in a row over 100 sort of records.

So...

The conversation, at the tomatoes?

Turned to what varieties will manage to still produce tomatoes, when it gets so hot that the pollen literally is cooked to death. That, takes time, with old fashioned breeding. This is where small to even tiny scale can be helpful, i.e., seed saving, like I used to do. Because the tomatoes will adapt, some of them, but someone has to pay attention, see who's getting the job done, and save those seeds 

That, translates up, too, to University research projects. Plant whole fields of tomatoes. See who survives. 

So add me to the list that thinks we still kinda might like to have some scientists around. And, public sector too, not just private. The world is NOT a better place when huge huge corporations own most of the seed stock out there. 

Oh, and I also now know of a 27 years employed federal biologist, in Boise, who recently lost his job with only a few days notice. Just cut. He lives in Boise, but spends, well, spent, huge amounts of time away from home, as his work was Montana, Nevada, and Utah.

Salmon! The aforementioned market has 2 vendors who are actual fishers, with their own boat, seasonally in Alaska, and sell frozen/canned/smoked here at the market. Great stuff!

Decades ago, a DC3 used to fly in and out of the Boise airport. I'm not the only one who heard those wonderful old engines, and my full attention was to the sky! That, was salmon! Very very fresh salmon!

Best, Helen

Hey, question for those who've climbed both Joshua tree and City of Rocks? Joshua tree pics often look a whole lot like City. I realize it's way bigger, but is the climbing similar? The geology? Why does Joshua tree have a bunch of rocks sticking up there, in the first place? That doesn't look like mountains, just....really big boulders with smaller boulders scattered around that fell off at some point. Kinda like COR. Nothing huge there, or nearby, just boulders big enough ya might wanna rope up, lol!

apogeewrote:

Just visited the ‘new’ REI store in Rancho Mirage. Tiny little place. Tried to avoid eye contact with the store employees, knowing what I know about their typical actual outdoor experience. The climbing ‘department’ is about 15’ x 15’….at least 2/3 of the total floor space is devoted to clothing (typical outdoor retail store reality).

I felt dirty and irritated being there. Gawd I hate REI.

Why were you there?

I prefer to support the “mom n pop” stores or companies.

Buy American seems to be the way to go. The best gear I have ever purchased was from McHale packs, Feathered Friends etc. The 5.10 Guide Tennies that were made in Redlands CA lasted for 2-3 seasons of hard use. Today it’s a new pair every year of the good Italian ones.

Because we’re on the topic. Do you really want to trust your very Life to some gear made by someone who has no idea what they’re making and all they care about is the “hourly quota” and not the fact that the roll pin they pressed in was cracked?

Face it REI is a retail corporation, they have a tenuous connection to climbing. 

I was looking for a replacement set of tips for my BD carbon trekking poles- I tried Nomad first (of course) but they didn’t have them. Did some web searching, and supposedly REI Rancho Mirage had them. I was dubious, but gave it a shot because I was in the desert today. I was disappointed, but not at all surprised.

REI’s history is quite honorable and important. Their decision to go big box corporate, notsomuch. Not at all, in fact.

And their ruse of being a Co-op is simply a marketing ploy that the outdoor masses take hook, line and sinker.

I need a shower.

Edit:

“Because we’re on the topic. Do you really want to trust your very Life to some gear made by someone who has no idea what they’re making and all they care about is the “hourly quota” and not the fact that the roll pin they pressed in was cracked?”

Do you really think we disagree on this point?

ErikaNWwrote:

 I was physics and we spent the time doing things like building vacuum chambers for thin film deposition and learning how to use the machine shop (we had to make all of our own tools). Geology got to do 6 weeks of backpacking!! The idea was that women couldn’t handle it (this was in 1988!!!!). My sister pretty much out-hiked all the men - and also got stuck cooking dinner and doing dishes every night.

It's amazing how technical universities have changed over the years. I was a math major at Georgia Tech 1954-56, and there were only a few women students, and I never saw even one of them. One of the reasons I left Tech was that I, too, had to take a machine shop course which consisted of building an electric motor from scratch, beginning with learning the metal lathe. Then a surveying course, walking around campus in a small group of students carrying surveying equipment. That was it for me, and I transferred to the U of GA with its more traditional curricula. 

But, also, there were phys ed requirements at Tech that seem barbaric today: Intro to Gymnastics, Track and Field, and Swimming. I discovered myself in the gymnastics course, even with little talent. Track and field was OK - we had to run a mile, and do sprints, but the one aspect I did well at was to carry someone your weight for 100 yards as quickly as possible. 

The swimming class was in a category by itself. It turned me against swimming for life. Coach Lanoue taught a drownproofing course that every student at that time had to pass to graduate. There were a number of students who went into their fifth year at Tech just to pass that one course.  One part of the final exam was to stand on the edge of the deep end, hands tied behind one's back and feet tied together, with a fellow student standing behind holding a long pole with a hook. You jumped in - never touching the bottom - and porpoised across the water to the opposite edge, then turned without using the wall and porpoised back. If you started to drown your companion was to hook you and pull you out. There was an alternative for students who were physically challenged: Jump in the deep end wearing a pair of pants, take them off and tie them so they were like balloons, then stay afloat for an hour. The course is used to train Navy Seals now. 

I left the U of GA for the USAF in 1958, and three years later the first African American woman, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, was admitted. A close friend of mine from high school volunteered to stay in a dorm room down the hall to protect her from possible attack by state troopers. 

As for women in mathematics, here's a wonderful story: At the university where I taught I served as department chair for awhile and was on all faculty recruitment committees. One year in the late 1980s or early 1990s, we hired a young Hispanic woman with an MA in the subject, as an instructor. She had been raised, along with a number of older brothers, in poverty in a shack in Mexico. Her parents moved to the USA and she was able to attend college. She  took courses at a university in my state while teaching, and received her PhD in math education. Before I retired I asked that she take over the senior level courses I had been responsible for for many years. I recall talking with her about how I taught certain concepts. I learned recently she had moved to the university where I got my degree and was a full professor. And she became President of the Mathematical Association of America.

Ward Smithwrote:

Funny nobody is talking about the stock market anymore after all the doom and gloom posts. It is up nine days in a row, although still down 8% from all time highs.  For those of you who were in a panic when it was down 20%, now would be an excellent time to lighten up your exposure to stocks and move some money into lower risk assets.  I have no idea where it goes from here, I see both new all time highs and another dump as possibilities.  The most likely scenario IMO is that we are range bound between all time highs and the fear lows for the next few months.  Not financial advice but just saying. 

Most of my money is in cash funds. That’s only because all my stocks have tanked…I haven’t changed the distributions at all.  

Trump has reversed many of his stances, which is good, but he’ll need to reverse the big ones. That’s remove all unilateral tariffs, else China won’t initiate any discussions.

My guess is if Trump backs down, they’ll remove all theirs. 

You guys should invest in Spraguecoin

ErikaNWwrote:

Just have to chime in on the road racing! I was track (pursuit and points) and a roadie for many years. Got to do a few UCI events (all in the US) - Liberty Classic in Philly (it was the men’s US Pro championship) and HP Women’s Challenge in Idaho 3 times. My team won a few stages there - I was a total domestique/workhorse for the real climbers and sprinters. Proudest moment in my career was shepherding my teammate Karen Dunne to her National championship points race win in 1997. It came down to her and Nicole Reinhardt on the last sprint. Nicole sadly died at 23 yrs old when she hit a tree descending during one of the triple crown events on the east coast in 2000. That was the end for a lot of us - it hit hard.

Guess I am feeling nostalgic this morning. Heading out on my bike now!

That’s awesome ErikaNW! You were at a pretty darn high level of racing. And, yes, it is fun when you can work as a team to get the V.
Today, the Vuelta a España Femenina passes a couple of blocks away from where we live in Barcelona, so I’ll wander over and watch. It’s a short (about 8.5km) Team Time Trial over possibly wet roads, according to what I see in the sky at the moment.

As to investments, for the most part, we have just been buying 3-month T Bills on a rotating basis—pretty safe. At our age we are no longer doing anything very risky with our money. 

Old lady Hwrote:

Hey, question for those who've climbed both Joshua tree and City of Rocks? Joshua tree pics often look a whole lot like City. I realize it's way bigger, but is the climbing similar? The geology? Why does Joshua tree have a bunch of rocks sticking up there, in the first place? That doesn't look like mountains, just....really big boulders with smaller boulders scattered around that fell off at some point. Kinda like COR. Nothing huge there, or nearby, just boulders big enough ya might wanna rope up, lol!

Though they look similar and are both of 'granitic' rock, the climbing at COR and JT is actually quite different. I'm not a geologist, so can't go into the details ( though have read about them in the geology sections of guidebooks), but understand that the basic rock in each area are different ' members of the granite family' with somewhat different chemical/mineral composition, are of different ages, and have been exposed to different weathering processes over the millennia. In general the rock at JT is more coarse and abrasive, a bit more 'crumbly' ( at least as compared to the classic routes at COR), and rarely has the 'plates' and incuts that are so characteristic of the best climbs at COR. COR has relatively little of the crimping/edging that is so characteristic of many JT climbs. JT also seems to have more crack climbs. Though there are plenty of exceptions in both areas, it is my impression that overall COR routes might be slightly steeper than those at JT at similar grades. I'm sure that there are other differences, but those are the ones that most immediately come to mind ( and I have had multiple trips to both areas). As should be apparent from my above distinctions, while I have enjoyed climbing at JT, I much prefer COR.
While I don't fully comprehend the geological processes that created them, I know that there are other similar clusters of over-grown granitic boulders scattered around the US west ( and elsewhere, I'm sure) each with their own individual characteristics, though JT and COR are the best-known.

On a different topic. In your other post this morning Helen, you segued from Ward's discussion about the stock market to your visit to the farmer's market. I believe that the latter represents a far better window into the true economy than the former---so how were the prices? If prices rise substantially at farmer's markets--by definition primarily locally grown, raised, or produced, then we will know that a new round of inflation has truly arrived.

Good work Carl, 22 is very solid!!!!

Carl Schneiderwrote:

I led ‘Sardine’ a grade 22 today. Very chuffed. Hardest lead for ages for me.

https://youtu.be/jer5dtKSb3Q?si=ZLnWszlN82Vl48tS

Yeah, I don't know, Carl. Something about your post seems fishy.

(Nice job on the lead!)

Drove to RRG only to have the weather turn to shit. The one day of rain turned into 3.. drove back to Seneca just in time for the Cinco de Mayo party. Did some front porch picking with some really good mandolin playing climbers and saw a cool slide show on climbing in Morocco. Won a big can of chalk in the raffle.