1. Sucking for air and thinking/reacting with the mental capacity of an 8 year old is not my idea of a good time.

2. They are alot more aesthetically pleasing mountains than Everest. let's face it, it's not a pretty peak

3. I don't happen to have 60,000 dollars in my pocket to blow on a climbing trip

4. I'm kind of allergic to other peoples feces

5. i don't feel like sharing my base camp with a bunch of New York City solcialites.

6. I'm tired of my non climbing acquaintances asking me if I am going to climb Everest.

7. If I were in that valley I would rather climb Lhotse

8. I probably couldn't get up everest Anyway, so I'd be wasting the 60k I don't have.

9. I can't use my new fangled leashless tools on Everest.

10. I doubt I could run into town on stormy days to grab some nice steaks and a few boxes of vino tinto.

11. i could climb the local landfill and probably see less trash.

12. I have a strange aversion to seeing half frozen pathologists staggering into my camp.

13. There would probably be more wireless technologhy in basecamp than I am comfortable with. I hate sitting in a restaurant next to a chatty cell phoner. i don't want to travel halfway around the world and pay 60k to do the same thing.

14. I don't want to be on the summit and have some schmo flip out his satellite phone and say "Honey...guess where I am!"

15. I could do the first ascent by a 35 yar old NYer wearing a Wild Things jacket and smoking a fatty on the South Col..but who would care?

16. I'm afraid of Everest because all the newspaper articles say it is the most dangerous and toughest mountain in the world. Think I'll go climb Changabang instead. It's a lot smaller.

17. Fixed lines give me the willies

18. My Mom won't let me

19. There will probably be a Maoist insurgency in Khatmandu while I am there and I will wind up being kidnapped by someone who thinks I am the devil incarnate.

20. The New Paltz climbing film festival is in October and I would miss Ivan Greene's latest bouldering video. On second thought, I'm sure it will be exactly the same as his last video, so nevermind.

Give me a while...I'll come up with more. In the meantime, feel free to add your own reasons. I'm sure we can get this list to 101!

RR

21. Because it's there. And there, people die.

22. Due to a mishap playing king of the hill on the jungle gym in the 5th grade, I can't get myself to walk across horizontal ladders.

23. Because I really, really, really respect mother nature.

24. Because unclimbing Everest is even more deadly than climbing it, and there ain't no escalator back down.

25. Because cragging is more fun.

26. Because if you went on a US road trip for the length of time an Everest trip would take, you'd spend 'way more days climbing than you would on Everest.

27. Because you have to carry really heavy stuff uphill on Everest.

28. Because until global warming is more advanced, you still can't kayak the Khumbu Icefall.

29. (This one clinched it for me when I had an invitation in 1989) Because I would have been away when my younger daughter was born. (Plus nobody got to the top.)


Hmm, but I'll always wonder: Was/am I rationalizing?

30. Because if something went wrong fellow climbers would just ignore me and leave me stranded.

Oops.... who said that.

31. If I travel that far, I would rather put up a new route than do something so many others have done.

32. No crowds when you climb an obscure peak in an obscure valley as opposed to Everest.

33. Permits are cheaper on smaller peaks.

34. Would rather not become a piece of fixed gear in the death zone.

35. Like having all own original appendages (including nose and ears).

36. because climbing with rangerrob is climbing with the fuzz

37. i do not want to pay the maoist "tax"

38. i hate dahl baht!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

39. Cuz ya can't do it on top rope.

40. Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge at 6pm is crowded enough for me.
41. I hate waiting in lines - especially when it's cold out.
42. I find big parties where I have to talk to boring people I don't know depressing.

43. If I wanted to climb near that many people I would just go to the Gunks on a Saturday

44. I feel the need to shower at least once a month

45. I'm an ER nurse, and I'd be afraid other people on the mountain would find out and then I'd never get any sleep.

46. If I had 2 months of free time and $60k I can think of approximately 1.2 million other things I'd rather do.

47. I thoroughly enjoy explaining to non-climbers why I have no interest in doing a really long approach hike without any actual climbing

48. I don't have any male inadequacy issues (read: small dick) that I feel can be resolved by paying a 3rd world citizen to drag my ass up a really big hill

49. Hypoxia is really very bad for you

50. Climbing/living in the Front Range exposes me to quite enough narcissistic assholes, thank you.

I apologize if none of that made sense. I just worked 3 12-hour shifts in a row and then drank a beer. I'm feeling a little hypoxic... I mean drunk.