constance.

Forecast:

Saturday: Snow showers likely. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 37. West southwest wind between 11 and 14 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%. New snow accumulation of around an inch possible.

Saturday Night: A 30 percent chance of snow showers before 11pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 25. West southwest wind between 3 and 11 mph. New snow accumulation of less than a half inch possible.

Sunday: Mostly cloudy, with a high near 47.

That picture shows most of the route from the middle of the frame - the smaller pointy feature at the base of the V-shaped ridge is called the Cat's Ear and is where you gain that ridge from the other (west) side. We'll camp at the base of that since with the weather there's no point in camping near the Ear which - in good weather - would afford incredible views of the Olympics and across the Sound to Seattle and the Cascades.

The route we'll climb requires crossing either what is called The Fingertip Traverse or (below that) the Terrible Traverse. Sort of hairy with thousands of feet of exposure apparently. So we'll bring a 30m glacier rope and a couple of pickets.

STS-131.

Savor this. Only three more shuttle flights remaining.

the resistance.

Muse. Key Arena. 4/2/2010.

They played Ruled By Secrecy which was a surprise (they did not back in 2007) and quite spectacular. Love those big fat chords! Sound was very good and the set was amazing. Their stage entrance was amazing. The lights were amazing. Top-notch production. Brilliant. Very Muse.

the wildest dream.

Touching the Void has long-since had my vote for greatest mountaineering film. Ever. Much of it was filmed on location, and the cinematography was excellent and well done. The interview segments of Joe (and to only a slightly lesser extent Simon) were splendid. The emotions during the film are incredible, and I still end up getting slightly teary near the end Joe crying out in the dark alone. And it can easily appeal to climbers and armchair adventurers alike - an incredible story of survival and inspiration.

But this upcoming motion picture The Wildest Dream for National Geographic seems like it might be a very serious contender. The trailer is brilliant (linked here since Blogger only embeds 400 pixel-wide images/videos). Narrated by Liam Neeson (who also, coincidentally, narrated the Everest IMAX movie shot by renowned climber/cinematographer David Brashears) and voiceovers from some cool people (Ralph Fiennes to name one) this looks dramatic in every way imaginable.

Based on the 1999 climb undertaken by a team of mountaineers led by Tacoma-based climber Andy Simonsen searching for George Mallory's remains, the film looks like it chronicles that expedition as well as something I did not realize happened - a climb of Everest's north face simulating the gear available in 1923. I have always been amazed at how climbers succeeded even half a century earlier, but before that - with hob-nailed boots, wool pants and jackets, flimsy cotton tents and hemp ropes. Everything weighed ten times what we take for granted today. Incredible. Matthew and I have discussed this on our climbs - imagining chopping steps up steep snow and ice faces rather than relying on steel crampons and refined ice tools.

In any regards, I'll wait to give my take on it of course until I actually see it - but count me first in line.

(The only bit I do not approve of is the use of the word 'conquest' in the title - we climbers do not conquer, do not conquest a mountain particularly one of Everest's might and caliber - we are fortunate to be able to sneak up and back down in its graces as put by one well-respected high-altitude mountaineer ... )

why.

' ... You cannot stay on the summit forever; you have to come down again.
So why bother in the first place?

Just this:
What is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above.
One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen.
There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up.
When one can no longer see, one can at least still know ... '

~ Rene' Daumal, 'The Art of Climbing Mountains,' from Mount Analogue

reblog_001.

So when I first started this blog, I remember (at least I think I remember) writing that I would try to pull out some of the better posts from my previous blog that my brother had so graciously hosted for me for a few years before I decided to make the switch, pull the plug, and move to a blog that, uh, looked at least a little more personalized than his bare-bones site allowed. And I mean that with no dis-respect (since he might just read this).

But anyway, along those lines and because of that link from my last post I found myself randomly hitting a month on the left sidebar (wow it is absolutely dumping rain outside my living room window as I sit in the corner typing this when really what I should be doing is working on my house and yes it was completely random) and came across this little post that will be my first reblog ~

03/06/2007 9:41pm

Miscellany -

Rachmaninoff's pianism is generally considered among the finest of the twentieth century. It displayed features characteristic of the Russian school of piano playing: effortless technical ability; interpretative freedom that is now frowned on; creative freedom in dynamics and phrasing.

Agreed. It is sensational.

I was reading some reviews of David Helfgott's playing (of Liszt's Etude No.3 Un Sospiro which in pure Liszt tradition is impossibly difficult and marvelously beautiful played in that link by Sviatoslav Richter who is arguably one of the greatest pianists of all time with few exceptions one being of course Wilhelm Backhaus). Got me thinking.

So I realize this is getting off-topic with the bit about Liszt ... as I was just earlier banging on the Bechstein this afternoon coming up with this admittedly random chord progression using augmented chords, lots of chromatic notes, flattening thirds to transpose major chords to minor chords (a wonderful transition but not to be overused) the vocal bending to match chords that don't belong so much that it took a bit to figure out what the key signature and tonic were (C♯ minor) and it made me think a little to the other week getting together with a couple of guys to run through some songs and one of them commenting about how it made more sense if the progression went a different way than I had written it but really why should it make sense?

There has to be a boundary between a musical progression that yes makes sense and one that completely does not and is impossible to follow but in between those two extremes is that 'effortless freedom' Rachmaninov displayed in his writing. That creative freedom of dynamics (lots of triple forte!) and phrasing - random notes, chromatics everywhere, difficult to follow. Difficult - not impossible - to follow. A motif that is beautiful and textured and chromatic. Rich. Lyrical. But with unexpected harmony, melody, counterpoint.

There was an evening years ago alone watching Shine stumbling over to the rented piano along the living room wall the room dark only halfway through the movie to discover a completely new method of composition based heavily on the use of chromatics and motifs that did not convey to any structure or preconceived rule (not that I necessarily knew of any rules being wholly self-taught for better or for worse times like these and certainly lately likely for worse). Back to that comment someone had left on a video of Helfgott playing that Liszt Etude that his life was transformed after hearing Rachmaninoff. Dynamic. Interpretive. Monumental.

Well, mine too. Mine too.

another reason.

It all started with a new pair of glasses.

"You look like that guy from Shine."
"Noah Taylor?"
"Sure."

(I took this as a compliment, actually).

...

"I wish I played piano as good as he did. Well, his character anyway."
"He took lessons for years and years."

Touché.

My laziness and complacency in my twenties has officially caught up to me.

I once blogged about a quote from Ansel Adams. It fit then. It fits even more now. I could not say it any better.

So I won't.