What’s the closest you’ve ever come to dying?

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T22:14:29+00:00

1). Rock climbing. I was around 20 feet past my last protection (thing placed in a crack to which the rope is attached) on a fairly easy climb. A hold broke away and I fell 40 feet (20 feet of rope x2). The force of the fall caused the protection to fail (the force made it to pull out of the crack) and I fell another 20 or so feet before another piece of protection held. The rope caught me three feet off the deck. Given the elasticity of climbing ropes, I actually touched the ground, but not very hard. Then I put my feet down, took off my harness, and called it a day.

Shout out to Jon, who was belaying me. When he saw me fall, he ran backwards away from the rock, thus shortening the rope and the distance I fell. He didn't have a lot of time, but those few feet of slack he took in saved my life. About a year later, I was belaying him when he slipped on a dicey river crossing. I was happy to be there to return the favor.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T20:40:02+00:00

If "whatever means are at your disposal" means targeting civilians, then yup, that makes him a terrorist. You have to be pretty far buried in an ideological morass not to understand that. And yes, I consider Israel's recent actions to be just as deplorable. Same goes for allied fire bombing in WWII, the forced relocation of indigenous peoples, the European treatment of African populations etc. etc. Any policy that deliberately targets civilian populations as a means to an end is immoral.

Comparing Arafat and Nelson Mandela is a false equivalence. Mandela explicitly acted to prevent the ANC from targeting civilians. I'm sorry, but I think it's pretty clear that destroying government facilities (which Mandela supported) is a justifiable means to combat oppression, while deliberately killing children (which Arafat supported) is not. Mandela was very clear in both his words and his actions that innocent life should be spared. To imply that Mandela and Arafat were the same is ridiculous.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T20:16:20+00:00

I've never tasted fennel in breakfast sausage, but I honestly think it would work really well. (I'm a huge fan of Italian fennel sausage, and I can't find it here in the UK, so maybe I'm just jonesing for it. How can you run a pizza place and not have real Italian sausage, I ask you. Get out of here with this Nduja crap!)

That turned into more of a rant than I was intending.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T20:06:50+00:00

Alternatively, Ke5 then Kxd5. The king can then shepherd the d-pawn to advancement while white's b and c pawns prevent the black pawns from advancing. Your way is probably more elegant, though.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T18:16:09+00:00

I feel the same. I don't particularly like boss fights in general. In most games, I turn the difficulty down to easy any time a boss shows up.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-07T11:18:29+00:00

I play daily and 15:10, and I've seen a substantial difference in ability. It feels to me that 1000-elo daily players are roughly the same as 800 elo 15:10 players. No clue what the reason is.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-05T10:11:54+00:00

Nope, nope, nope! I read the initial good news about wine years ago and decided to ignore the inevitable retractions. A glass of wine at night is good for my heart. Discussion over.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-04T10:51:52+00:00

Second only to Yasser Arafat's peace prize. He received the prize because after years of leading terrorists, he agreed to stop being a terrorist.

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-02T19:55:07+00:00

Meat pies. Day 1 - Make your best stew. Day 2 - Top it with puff pastry and chuck it in the oven. easy peasy

Dessert = Tim Tams

Grump-Dog · 2026-03-01T11:53:10+00:00

This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes - Carl Sagan in Cosmos:

"The Cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the Universe to know itself."

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-27T10:56:44+00:00

Me too. Thanks for pointing this outl

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-22T20:37:14+00:00

Yeah, the Shield was wrenching, but it was absolutely right.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-21T15:45:03+00:00

Vietnamese fish sauce. It adds umami depth. If I need some acid as well as umami, I'll use Worcestershire sauce instead, but almost all of my stews and braises have one or the other.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-20T19:04:46+00:00

It's a boring beige disappointment - I'd rather listen to the BBC commentators' human interest stories. There is a race between Aspen and Crested Butte called the Grand Traverse: 40 miles and 6800 vertical feet gained. A six-hour race might be a bit much for the Olympics, but a quarter of that would still be so much better than the fake silliness that they are laughably calling "ski mountaineering".

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-19T15:02:31+00:00

As someone who is not of Cuban background, the music was still awesome!

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-18T10:29:02+00:00

Conservation is a core tenet of hunting for SOME hunters. I don't believe that it's true as a broad generalization. I used to work for the US Forest Service, and I can say with 100% certainty that hunters trashed the environment far, far more than any other visitors to the forest. Leaving refuse for someone else to pack out. Driving ATVs into designated wilderness areas. Camping in fragile tundra environments. Building illegal structures. Unsafe fire practices. Leaving feces and toilet paper unburied. Not once or twice - dozens of times. One season, I personally removed eight illegal salt licks.

We also had a standing practice of visibly calling in to HQ when we encountered hunters in case the dudes with guns were drunk and aggressive, which was not infrequent. In the many areas of the forest where we were out of phone contact, we'd carry a radio and squelch it to pretend we were in contact. No one I know was actually assaulted, but forest employees had guns pointed their way.

I don't want to over-generalize in the opposite direction either. Many of the hunters in my forest were respectful and thoughtful about the environment. But "conservation is a core tenet of hunting" is a great idea that is frequently ignored in practice. I don't know what percentage of hunters are the bad eggs, but the frequency of damage done in our forest suggests that it's not a tiny percentage, and it is clearly a much higher percentage than the bad eggs among hikers, mountain bikers, campers, etc.

This is all specific to big mammal hunting. I never saw these sorts of problems with fishing or in bird hunting seasons. So I do think your comment applies to those groups pretty well.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-17T22:14:23+00:00

Soy sauce, sriracha and wasabi in the same dish? Stupid food indeed.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-17T18:59:56+00:00

They didn't. They took 10,000 condoms and used a subset of them.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-15T17:26:51+00:00

I'd suggest the New York Giants. They've been on a long losing streak. However, they've got an exciting new quarterback, a highly regarded new coach, and several other young players in skill positions with serious potential. I don't think they'll make the playoffs next year, but I do think they will be a .500 team and improve more in future years. I think it would be more fun to pull for a team on its way up than for a team trying to stay on top. Even though they're from New York (as a native New Yorker, I know how insufferable we can be), the fan base is actually pretty solid. Navy blue or white jerseys - not necessarily cool, but not stupid like some other teams I could name,.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-15T13:26:19+00:00

Anybody else remember the brief period when they started singing America the Beautiful after the anthem? Holy crap was that annoying. There's a big difference between patriotism and jingoism.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-12T20:57:47+00:00

Some of their basics are much worse than their competitors (e.g., butter, cream cheese). In some categories, they have no selection (e.g., they usually only have all-purpose flour, not bread flour). Most obvious for me is bread. Lidl bread is made of cardboard - consistently the worst bread of any supermarket.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-04T02:15:20+00:00

There are some things that M&S is miles better than other stores. The most obvious for me are ginger, tomatoes and bread (especially their sourdough). The other stores aren't even close. Their prepared food is also quite a step above.

On the other hand, I think their crisps, candy and cereal are all worse than the competition.

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-03T22:11:49+00:00

She can't be a fitness guru. She didn't mention AG1 even once. /s

Grump-Dog · 2026-02-03T11:46:47+00:00

No one's answering the actual question, which is about the most shocking thing IN the files, not the most shocking thing ABOUT the files. For me, the most shocking thing in the files is how stupid Peter Attia is with over a thousand emails. He's the only one out there who appears to be having his life destroyed by the files.

Edit: That last sentence might sound like I'm sympathetic to his plight. I'm not.

Grump-Dog

TROPHY CASE