Reasons to be cheerful (about ukb)

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Came for the climbing news, stayed for the informative expositions on medieval church spires.
 
I think I joined up in 2009 sometime. I hadn’t been climbing long and had very quickly realised that while there were active climbers who knew what they were talking about on the UKC forum, reading what they had to say involved wading through the posts of lots of people who either weren’t active climbers or didn’t know what they were talking about. Because fools weren’t suffered gladly on UKB the ratio was far, far better on here.

But even though it was full of banter and had a reputation for being offensive and abrasive it was actually welcoming in a strange way. Although I was inexperienced, over-keen and hugely aware that I was rubbish by the forum’s lofty standards (pre-emptively mentioning it in almost every post I made) the only time I ever got called a punter was by Dan Varian when I listed a load of what I thought were obvious (but unbeknown to me, completely holdless) gaps in a thread about great unclimbed lines of the Peak or something :lol:

I’ve learnt massive amounts about climbing from this forum and know loads of members in real life, some of whom are just as they seem online, some of whom are astonishingly different, some I met offline first and some online first, many I can’t remember which. Some people I’ve never actually met but I feel like I know them. One guy who I climbed with for years after meeting on here only ever posted three or four times! Some posters’ contributions are so idiosyncratic that I sometimes wonder if they’ve been replaced by an AI bot at some point. Christ knows what people think about me.

I bought my first decent camera from PaulB after getting seriously psyched for climbing photography from here (for a few years there was a year-end spray thread where people posted their best pictures and it made me feel like “they’re just taking a camera to the crag like I do so I can take pictures that good if I try”), got similarly inspired to make climbing films, got the initial idea to make The Seaside from a post by Muenchener, cast almost all of that film with people on here and their friends and had an unforgettable summer (that ironically lives in a surreal semi-distant memory pit with the rest of 2016 & 2017 now) making it :wave: then when I had to relearn climbing and pretty much everything else from scratch I got loads of support from people on here, both on Power Club and similar threads and in DMs :hug:.

I’ve always seen myself as a bit of a peripheral UKB user, partly because I never bother with most non-climbing threads and have only ever had a passing interest in what people at the top end of climbing are doing, partly because despite being a similar age to the classic core user group I started climbing much later, but the previous paragraph shows it has been pretty important to me really.

Oh yeah, the absolute best thing about UKB apart from the unanimously-agreed end-of-year threads is the brilliant anecdotes that unexpectedly appear every so often. There should be a Best of UKB highlights thread that collates them. Maybe if I get Covid or break every bone in my body again I’ll do it.
 
Relatively new here (2012) but had lurked for a while before that, I dislike joining anything actually.
Don't post very often, I often find that what I was going say has already been said.
Stay away from political discourse on this site, save it for IRL.
Don't know too many folk on here due to location but still doesn't feel cliquey to me!
Like the rapid news and have received support over the years re.il health so thanks all for that!
Always inspiring, often very funny.
This reads like a survey, is there a prize?
 
sherlock said:
andy popp said:
sherlock said:
This reads like a survey, is there a prize?

Only a warm fuzzy glow.
And you can't put a price on that :icon_beerchug:

I know of a few places locally, where an attractive person of pleasant demeanour, will provide you with a quotation for just that. To the penny…
 
sherlock said:
The advertising is hard to miss, it’s very open here. This is surprising after being away so long and returning to find such huge changes and a very liberal society. Almost all of the top hotels provide “Spa” services for men and women, which range from getting you nails done to something else entirely. There was an article in a local paper about a young woman who came from Thailand (trafficked in the bad old days) and now owns a respected chain of “Spas” across the country. ‍♂️
Sorry to drag the topic with my joke. But I drive passed one of her billboards every day:
https://www.instagram.com/anna_spa_dxb?igsh=ZzE4MDcyaGgwc3F3
Sorry, no idea on prices.
 
Wow, I did actually realise how long I’d been here for. Originally signed up in 2010 after Ian Cooper encouraged me to join power club. 2016 for this iteration after a bit of an absence. I’m also outside the Sheffield core but I certainly haven’t felt excluded. I was really quite surprised by how many people seemed to be following along when I was trying to climb my first 8a and the encouragement to keep going was helpful when it became my longest siege.

I try not to argue about politics etc on the internet because it is totally pointless, but on UKB I get the impression that even though people might disagree they do it agreeably. For the most part. Seems like a bit of an internet outlier. It’s the only place I’ll really even get into a conversation with people I don’t know.

That said definitely the end of year/start of year threads are a highlight with power club keeping some accountability during the year.
 
cheque said:
There should be a Best of UKB highlights thread that collates them.
A few months ago I tried to search for what I remembered as being my favourite ever UKB post from years ago. I think it was by Dave Parry replying to Stevie Haston. It went something like, "Being able to use a chairlift or eat a chapati in its natural habitat isn't what matters. The mark of a true all-round climber is being able to cut it at Burbage, Rubicon AND the Tor."

I drew `a blank though. Did I just dream it?
 
Nope, pretty sure that happened.

Also another reason to be cheerful about UKB: stone (I'm not the only one who thinks this)
 
stone said:
A few months ago I tried to search for what I remembered as being my favourite ever UKB post from years ago. I think it was by Dave Parry replying to Stevie Haston…

I drew `a blank though. Did I just dream it?

It’s tough to find things from before a certain point. Even tougher when the account it was posted from was deleted.
 
I think without a shadow of doubt. this thread is my all time favourite...

https://ukbouldering.com/board/index.php/topic,5617.0.html

Just had me wetting myself..(looking at you Nik at Work) which is worth of its own post in that thread I guess.
 
Wowzers, 17 years! I always felt like I'd come into something quite long running and it certainly took me a while to feel like I "got" the lingo, atmosphere, spcial norms etc.

It was a wee bit like walking into a village pub...

My first ever post was about a finger injury, where (quite ahead of my time if I do say so myself, with some amount of smug self-satisfaction) I asked about using a fingerboard for rehab....

Houdini said:
This thread cracks me up!



You want scientific proof that fire is hot?




I hear guillotines are great for migraines...

Aaaah, the old days.

What I particularly like is that you can tentatively suggest ideas, theories, half formed hunches and, instead of being shut down and labelled a fool, you get considered responses.

I also like that you can occasionally say things you're not proud of, and you know you've crossed the line. This is only online place that's ever actually changed my viewpoint on a subject, and it's happened a few times. So thanks everyone for that!

I love the training and injury geekery, Stu doing critical force analysis for me, Barrows' pdf, loads of other random shit.

Chris (SA) is the only person I'm aware that I knew from outside, but there are a few other lurkers that I see at the wall occasionally, Fiend who I try my best to avoid at all costs (kidding...) how did we never actually climb outside together?, bumping into Nibs in the dolomites and almost doing my only ever 7C boulder....

As others have said, it would be great to have more women on. But the look my OH gives me whenever she see's me on here makes it clear it's an uphill battle.
 
Fultonius said:
Wowzers, 17 years! I always felt like I'd come into something quite long running and it certainly took me a while to feel like I "got" the lingo, atmosphere, spcial norms etc.

It was a wee bit like walking into a village pub...

My first ever post was about a finger injury, where (quite ahead of my time if I do say so myself, with some amount of smug self-satisfaction) I asked about using a fingerboard for rehab....

Houdini said:
This thread cracks me up!



You want scientific proof that fire is hot?




I hear guillotines are great for migraines...

Aaaah, the old days.

What I particularly like is that you can tentatively suggest ideas, theories, half formed hunches and, instead of being shut down and labelled a fool, you get considered responses.

I also like that you can occasionally say things you're not proud of, and you know you've crossed the line. This is only online place that's ever actually changed my viewpoint on a subject, and it's happened a few times. So thanks everyone for that!

I love the training and injury geekery, Stu doing critical force analysis for me, Barrows' pdf, loads of other random shit.

Chris (SA) is the only person I'm aware that I knew from outside, but there are a few other lurkers that I see at the wall occasionally, Fiend who I try my best to avoid at all costs (kidding...) how did we never actually climb outside together?, bumping into Nibs in the dolomites and almost doing my only ever 7C boulder....

As others have said, it would be great to have more women on. But the look my OH gives me whenever she see's me on here makes it clear it's an uphill battle.
Mrs OMM occasionally posts here as Pollylolly and refers to it as UKBollocks, both as an insult and in reference to the male domination…

Edit: realised I couldn’t remember any of her posts, searched profile and she only posted twice. She lurks sometimes I guess, because I occasionally get shit for something I posted. The daughter too…
 

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