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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Jul 20, 2005 - 12:02am PT
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"Wow! Even Lobo avoids Pitons Pete!
Now THERE is something Pete can teach all of us!"
Pay attention Young Bulls, and learn from the wisdom of an Old Bull, one who "gets it". There are a few others who have written above. Heed their words.
I am as delinquent and reprobate as the next dirtbag, at least I try to be. I come to Yosemite to go climbing and escape the humdrum existence of being an insurance man, and try to scare the bejeepers out of myself high on a wall, and live to tell the tale - with two functioning legs.
But that doesn't mean I'm out to be an obvious jerk. Rangers are looking for people who are obviously jerks. Read what Lober has to say - he actually talks about identifying dirtbags by their [lack of] personal hygiene. Quel surpris.
The best way to avoid the attention of the rangers - besides doing nothing obviously illegal or annoying - is to not look like a dirtbag. I think I look like either a touroid, or an employee. I try to stay reasonably clean, wear reasonably nice clothes, have short reasonably-trimmed hair, and display no obvious tattoos or body piercings! [Note: If you are a hottie with tattoos and/or body piercings, please identify yourself to me. We need to talk.... {wink}]
I drink beer virtually every day in the Valley, and I am known to walk around with an open bottle or can. I do not understand why this is [apparently] not illegal, but I have never once been hassled for it. Neither do I ever appear intoxicated, although on occasion it's possible I might be. If I am, I would not make a point of being noisy or obnoxious.
It's all about appearance. Don't set yourself up to be an obvious target! What kind of vehicle do you drive? Do you have some rusty beater, or do you drive a nerdy Chrysler mini-van like me? [Note: My van might appear uncool, but if you asked it - after a few beers - it might be able to tell you some very cool stories]
It's also about keeping a low profile. Why would you want to attract attention to yourself? While I am not surprised by Aaron Young's comments to the newspaper [he has already demonstrated to me a certain leap-before-you-look mentality] I was quite amazed to read Bullwinkle's remarks. Dean really ought to have been a bit quieter, however we all know that he stays with friends in El Portal most of the time.
It's not that Lobo avoids me, nor I him. Were I to run across him, I would most likely go up and say hi, just like I would to anyone else from this forum whose name I recognize. I'm a salesman, and schmoozing comes naturally. I just don't give Lobo - nor any other ranger - a reason to hassle me.
And neither should you.
If you break the rules, don't be obvious about it.
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Minnie
Mountain climber
Menlo Park, CA
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Jul 20, 2005 - 03:27am PT
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I have to side with Pete. If climbing is where your heart is at, then wouldn't it make sense to do what ever it took to placate the Tools so you could climb? Quit looking like what they are looking for. When in Rome, do as the Romanians.
On another note, but still appropriate. For those that think the rules suck. Take this into consideration. What kind of unwritten laws do our community have in place? Ones that will toss someone if they breach them? You know them. So we all live by rules. Some that others create and some that we create. You don't like them...try to live amongst your brethren and violate the law and see how far you get.
js
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California now Ireland
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Jul 20, 2005 - 10:42am PT
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Minnie, I really do hope for your sake that 'When in Rome, do as the Romanians' was just tongue in cheek, or at worse a typo. Never met this ranger, but since I have been out of the country for a number of years that doesn't surprise me. Back in the mid-1970s there were some pr*ck rangers that I heard of but I only ran in to one once, otherwise most of the rangers I met were okay, though most were not LEOs.
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Steve L.
Trad climber
LA
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Jul 20, 2005 - 12:11pm PT
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So what the hell was "the rugby team on the pizza deck incident"??
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ThomasKeefer
Trad climber
Monterey, CA
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Jul 20, 2005 - 12:14pm PT
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"'you will not stay in MY park for free!'"
"That is not your park as#@&%es! It actually OUR park."
"Wrong, its the federal governments park. We are just allowed to use it, at least for now.... "
Interesting viewpoint in that the taxpayer is the ultimate 'owner' of the government. The taxpayer does own the national parks.. another interesting side note is that national parks were originally conceived for preservation of hunting grounds... now you cant hunt in any of them! (I am not a hunter but just find this interesting)
BTW.. just to weigh in on the pissing contest for job associated danger, up until the start of the war in Iraq, the park rangers had the most dangerous of any federal law enforcement job (incl. FBI DEA etc)
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/01/0110_030113_organpipeclynes.html
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Good Morning!
climber
Prescott, AZ
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Jul 20, 2005 - 03:36pm PT
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Hey Keith: Great thread, huh?
MZ
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smokin_nolens
Social climber
California Valley, California
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Jul 20, 2005 - 07:31pm PT
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What really pisses me off about rangers in general is the total lack of any introspection. Example: we have been loitering at Joshua Tree for over 20 years. When we first started climbing there, because of the general natural of the area, we were treated like dirtbags by the rangers. They have bugged us, watched us, lied to us, and generally acted like dicks. We were there before Curt Sauer, Kevin, Jimmy, or Nina the Narc (good eye, Mr. Bridwell, thank-you once again), and we will be there after they are gone.
2 years ago, they all acted like the typical ass**les they are paid to be, and gave us sh*t. (I am friggin' 40 years old, man, get a life already!!!) Jimmy left a note on my Yukon, stating the site was reserved. I found Jimmy within minutes of him leaving his mark. His first words to me were. "If I had known that was YOUR vehicle, I would not have left a note." Like that changes a friggin' thing! When did the rangers start saving sites? I chewed his ass good, and did not see him again until he needed OUR help. Seems some 'punks' were up to no good, and he wanted us to help spot them. He actually came into our site and asked us to help him do his job.
He did not have much of an ass after I was done with him.
The point: The #1 rule of being a dick: don't let being a dick backfire on you.
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Shack
Trad climber
So. Cal.
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Jul 20, 2005 - 07:33pm PT
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Who is the dorky looking, glasses wearing, blonde female LEO
Ranger that hassled me. Can anyone put a name on that beotch?
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Fluoride
Trad climber
on a rock or mountain out west
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Jul 20, 2005 - 08:12pm PT
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Thomas, your post is misleading cause it involves ONE park that's the most dangerous, and that's cause it's a leading pipeline of immigrant and drug smuggling. And it's in Arizona on the Mexican border. We were talking Yosemite here. I don't see Yosemite bordering a foreign country, being a dangerous pipeline for immigrant, gun and drug smuggling by armed criminals. Hell, that'd be GREAT if it were, would give the LEO's something to do other than hassle tourists about stop signs and climbers about having open cans of beverages on bridges.
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Jul 20, 2005 - 09:15pm PT
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I'm kind of touchy about slamfests since they bring out the worst side of people. Often enough I have been the object of them and have been blamed for all sorts of BS. Sometimes its not so much scapegoating as pure fantasy. So to engage in it myself smacks of the worst hypocracy.
But....
Back in the seventies I met a climber in Estes Park named Keith Lober. Sort of a sanctimonious Ahole I was never interested in climbing with him. A few years later Scott Fischer introduced me to Dave Mondeau, Dave and I put up a lot of climbs in the eighties.
Dave had climbed the Black Dagger with Lober and once in July '82 I was waiting for Dave in the Long's Peak campground when Lober sauntered by. I had wanted to call Dave from the payphone 2 miles away but was losing parts from my Mazda every time I drove the washboarded road (remember this was 23 years ago).
Lober was loading up his truck about to take off and I asked him if he'd give me a lift to the phone and back, and told him he could say hi to his old Diamond partner. I explained that my car wasn't nearly as durable as his truck and I was losing my heat shield.
Lober asked me if I had any weed. My positive response perked him up. He said that if I got him stoned he could see his way to giving me a lift.
I proceeded to pull out some truly high end reefer and saw that Keith got a full dose and then some.
He then got up, went over to his truck and before leaving smirked and said I should have gotten the lift first.
I didn't see him again but heard he went and became a park ranger. Guess he couldn't make the grade as a real cop. Sure, power corrupts, but some more than others.
Some people get a little authority and it turns them into petty tyrants.
I think I know how this country's founding fathers would choose to deal with it.....
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'Pass the Pitons' Pete
Big Wall climber
like Oakville, Ontario, Canada, eh?
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Jul 21, 2005 - 12:15pm PT
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Wait a minute .... I don't get it.
Are you saying he didn't give you the lift after all that??
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Jul 21, 2005 - 05:53pm PT
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Not much to the story if he HAD given me the ride.
Not a troll. This is the truth. Feel free to ask him, though I wonder if he "remembers" anything.
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Good Morning!
climber
Prescott, AZ
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Jul 21, 2005 - 07:24pm PT
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" Feel free to ask him, though I wonder if he "remembers" anything."
Oh yeah, like ANYONE who trashes Lober on Supertopo has a face-to-face conversation with him about it. It takes minimal (none even) character, honor and decency to sit in front of a computer screen dragging Lober's name through the mud. It takes a whole lot of gulibility to believe even a small fraction of what is written here.
Got a problem with Lober? How about talking to him face-to-face about it instead of making annonymous and cowardly accusations on supertopo.
Geez, McNamara! Oughta change the name of the page to "Super-Kindergarden"...
M. Ziebell
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Jul 21, 2005 - 07:49pm PT
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Good Morning you don't know me.
I'd be more than happy to say it to his face.
My name is Ron Olevsky. I make no attempt to be anonymous. I'm in Utah and haven't run into him in 23 years.
WHO THE HELL ARE YOU????
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Fluoride
Trad climber
on a rock or mountain out west
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Jul 21, 2005 - 08:07pm PT
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If Ron ever went to the valley, I'm sure he would have NO trouble saying that to Lober in person. He's one of the most straightforward people in the climbing world, and has taken a lot of heat for that for better or worse. He doesn't pull punches.
I don't think this is a lot of innuendo or gossip. The pepper spray incidents at the pizza deck and with the grandmother are well documented, and he was moved out of the park and stripped of LEO status as a result. He returned in SAR capacity.
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Good Morning!
climber
Prescott, AZ
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Jul 21, 2005 - 08:08pm PT
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Hello Ron,
My name is Martin Ziebell. I live in Prescott, Arizona. I worked with Keith Lober for five years. I was a climber, TM Ranger and SAR tech.
I think that my comments above may appear to be overly directed at you. I apologize. I had just finished reading the whole thread and my comments were made in response to the overall tone.
I enjoyed your story.
Martin
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Good Morning!
climber
Prescott, AZ
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Jul 21, 2005 - 08:15pm PT
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"The pepper spray incidents at the pizza deck and with the grandmother are well documented, and he was moved out of the park and stripped of LEO status as a result. He returned in SAR capacity."
This is classic supertopo half-truth construed as fact.
Oh well...
I bet there are a few folks out there smiling: "Ziebell defends Lober..."
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WBraun
climber
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Jul 21, 2005 - 08:58pm PT
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So Ron Olevsky
Your story happened 20 some years ago, a long time by our lifetime standards. Now it’s brought up here to thrash someone whom you haven’t seen in that time on an internet forum.
What also seems strange is me knowing Lober for a good 15 years. I can’t really seem to picture him leaving you there without some reason that hasn’t been made clear at all yet here.
A lot of unanswered questions remain ......
You can get a hold of him to tell it to his face, at YOSAR 209-372-0216
Are you up for it ..........?
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Link
Trad climber
Yosemite, CA
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Jul 21, 2005 - 10:17pm PT
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I tend to steer clear of these personal bashing sessions, but since everyone from Martin to Werner to Ron to god knows who else is weighing in, I gotta toss in a few cents. Like Werner, I work with Keith on a daily basis and have done so for years.
Keith is a strong personality, and he’s clearly pissed off more than a few of his fellow climbers over the years, but I will gladly stand up in his defense in the midst of this super-topo crap tossing session.
I really only have one thing to say on this topic: move on. Stop rehashing stories from years past and start living in the Yosemite of today. Sheesh, I hope no one dredges up MY past and paints it in sloppy strokes across the internet canvass.
Will I defend everything Keith has ever done? Probably not, and he won't defend everything I've ever done either. But neither one of us (and none of you) are the same person we were five, ten, fifteen years ago. Move on. The “pizza deck” incident or whatever other golden oldy you want to dredge up has been played to exhaustion.
Move on. Go climbing, you might run into Keith (he's the one out climbing while we're debating rumors about him from ten years ago). If you talk to him, he might piss you off, but he’ll definitely make you laugh…
We all want so badly to be angry; angry at the rangers, angry at the climbers, angry at the concession, angry at the government, angry at the tourists... Move on. Get over it, and stop by the rescue office some time. Werner, Keith, myself, and everyone else will be happy to let bygones be bygones kick off a heart felt round of Khumbaya.
-Link
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Jul 21, 2005 - 11:44pm PT
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Well I just tried the YOSAR number and he's gone home.
I very much much WOULD like to hear his lame excuse for his four flushing way back when.
Why bring it up now? Very goddamn simple. People who assume a mantle of authority MUST be held to the highest standard of ethical and honorable behavior. He wasn't a ranger at the time, BUT he was the person who was about to become one. The way he treats people as a civilian is a pretty good indicator of the cloth he's cut from.
At the start of my first post in this thread I indicated how I felt about slamfests. But I'm also a person who was brutalized by some LEOs and fought for years to get some small measure of justice winning a case in federal court for violation of my civil rights under color of authority. During this endeavor I saw full on the rotten underbelly of a system that coddles officers that have no business with a badge and throws up specious roadblocks to honesty and candor.
While I myself have been the victim of the "where there's smoke there's fire" mentality I have said not one word of the multitude of first person accounts I have heard about the slimy weasel.
Rather my entire allegation is based entirely on WHAT I KNOW TO BE TRUE.
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