UKC

Last week my ten year old spent his birthday money on two new Helium quick draws.
Like a numpty, he left them at the climbing wall, with four old, tired quick draws.
Today, we returned to the wall, (Kendal), to find that some **** had stolen the new quick draws, but thoughtfully left the tat behind.

I fully accept that we were foolish, careless, and frankly lucky to get anything back.
But I sincerely hope the **** who took them dies a very slow, unpleasant death; what goes around, comes around.

In reply to charliesdad:

Horrible feeling loosing anything especially when those things are taken. Hope they turn up.

Lets all hope that when we get our morals tested, we come up trumps.

In reply to charliesdad:

a slow unpleasant death? for 2 quick draws? that would be a little harsh on anyone's karma scale.

In reply to charliesdad:

might of been another 10yr old!

Aye mate, nae bother. Job goin in Huntsville, Texas was your name on it.

In reply to charliesdad:

Did the person that 'stole' them do it intentionally as they new the equipment was owned by a 10 yr old?

Really gets my goat when people make statements like that used in the title.

In reply to Run_Ross_Run:

But that's what happened...the person stole from a child, whether or not they were aware of it.

In reply to Queenie:


all we really know is that the gear was forgotten, everything else is supposition

In reply to Queenie:

A crime is a crime. Who it impacts on does not dilute on enhance its seriousness.

In reply to charliesdad:

Have you really registered as a new user on this forum solely to enlighten our lives with this rant? As a first topic you've certainly chosen a corker. Perhaps your time, and my patience, would have been better served in reporting this heinous theft to the police.

In reply to rj_townsend:

It's a reminder to beware of dishonest people I guess.

In reply to charliesdad:
What dishonesty - you forget something and the next week it's gone. My sons leave a vapour trail of stuff, i regard it's loss as tragisk rather than a crime

In reply to Run_Ross_Run:


Stole 3 wine gums from Timmy last night.
In retribution he commited assault and battery, attempted grevious bodily harm and blackmail.
The guilt hangs over both of us.

In reply to jimtitt:

I find that children are easier to steal from than adults. They're smaller and easier to intimidate.

In reply to charliesdad:





Reading your post made me think it had been written by a 14 year old, then on reflection I realised that as you have a 10 year old son, you couldn't be.

Get real. On your own admission you were foolish and careless.

Yes, the person who took this was dishonest and a decent person would have handed it in, but it happens and it's highly unlikely they realised they belonged to a child. Also keeping "abandoned" "crag swag", which what they did, even for a wall, is nothing like as bad as actually setting out to steal from someone.

Your evil wishes against them are just childish. Shit happens. Treat it as a lesson, and don't be so careless in future.

In reply to charliesdad:
Why are you allowing him to climb with tat for quickdraws? Surely any responsible person would make sure the kit he committed his child's life to was better than that.

Instead of wishing a slow & painful death (seriously?) on someone for nicking some quickdraws you could use your energy to grow up and get a sense of perspective.

Perhaps you & your child might learn that after being foolish and careless, something like this was bound to happen. You and he are fully responsible for this.

Titling your post "stealing from children" makes you sound like a Daily Mail reader.

In reply to Trangia:
The Op is just venting his anger. True, they were careless, but whatever you call it , it is theft whether they knew it was a child's or not.

In reply to charliesdad:

At least you got some back you could have got nothing back so don't be so ungrateful

In reply to Skol:
Exactly so, on all counts. Anger duly vented, new quick draws purchased, lesson learned, all well with the world.

To all those who chose to waste their time responding critically to what was, (surely self evidently?), an emotional response, you really need to get over yourselves. The title was chosen to attract attention, (what else?). No, I haven't actually killed anyone for a QuickDraw, and no, I don't literally believe theft justifies the death of the perpetrator.

In reply to charliesdad:
It,s a forum

In reply to charliesdad:

2/10 Good choice of topic well presented. Let down by new profile and rookie mistake of returning to thread. Back under your bridge.

LD

In reply to Lurking Dave:

Wow!! How did you work all that out? And giving him a score! That's so clever.

In reply to Trangia:


Agree with much of this but I think taking stuff left at a wall IS stealing when you can just hand it in to lost property. Over the years I've left loads of stuff at walls including my grigri multiple times. I've almost always got everything back though. So it seems like most climbers are pretty honest and this was an unfortunate incident.

Not sure why anyone would take their quickdraws to an indoor wall in the first place though?

In reply to charliesdad:



Over the years no 2 son was permanently leaving things around including 3 wallets, one of which contained £80 of Christmas money and vouchers. We only got 1 back once with £5 in.

I never replaced or re-imbursed anything. I can't help thinking your son's "lesson learned" is that Dad will sort anything no matter how cavalier he is with his possessions.

In reply to stp:



Kendal wall doesn't have all lines equipped

In reply to charliesdad:

Just goes to show what sort of people go to climbing walls... places to avoid IMO.

In reply to GrahamD:

Wow!! That's amazing. It's so long since the Sheffield walls have had full quickdraws in place permanently I'd almost forgotten things were like that once upon time. Seems like a huge waste time stripping and replacing all the quickdraws for every ascent but I guess if the wall isn't that busy it's not quite so important.

In reply to stp:
Good training for gripper-clippers when you're pumped.

In reply to stp:

Its only on a few lines, though.

In reply to GrahamD:

Isn't that what Lindsay Lohan said?

In reply to Bruce Hooker:

Congratulations - you are now front-runner in the UKC 'moronic post of the month' competition. Admittedly soppygob is running a close second.

In reply to Sally Bustyerface:

Why moronic? Lot's of real climbers have never been near one of these dens of evil in their lives... this is just one more piece of evidence against them. On a real crag nobody would ever have dreamt of keeping two brand new crabs left lying around. Not the same sort of people. If the BMC were really doing their job they would be campaigning for all climbing walls to be reduced to powder and directing people towards the hills.

In reply to Bruce Hooker: Dens of evil?! Brilliant!

Sorry to disillusion you Bruce, but stuff gets taken from real crags too.

In reply to Bruce Hooker:

You gotta love Bruce really; always at the vanguard of opinion-forming rhetoric.

Unfortunately the opinions thus formed are likely to be that UKC forums contain so much inane drivel they no longer justify the effort of wading through it all, which is a shame since there still are many people on here with interesting and helpful things to contribute.

In reply to charliesdad:

I keep coming back to this topic wasn't sure why until I realised I steal from my daughter all the time there is no safe place for sweets in this house........

In reply to Alyson:



Never, you could leave a crisp new five pound note at the bottom of Cloggy for a month and no one would touch it.... unlike artificial climbing walls where even a turd would be swiftly stolen from the hands of babes. Get real!

In reply to stp:


Gloucester wall didn't used to equip any of their routes ('94 - '98 when I went). perhaps it's changed.

In reply to graeme jackson:


It now has a mix of equipped and unequipped lines.

I like walls to have unequipped lines, it's good to be able to get into the flow of clipping bolts whilst moving efficiently up a route.

Redpoint on the other hand has all lines equipped but some of the keepers on the draws are so tired that clipping can be a real PITA.

In reply to Bruce Hooker:

Get real?

Things can and do get taken from rucksacks at the bottom of crags Bruce, and dishonest climbers have always existed. I'm thinking of how some members from The Rock & Ice dealt with a dishonest climber after finding one of their party's labelled gear in the top of somebody else's rucksack in a pub, they told him the gear in it couldn't possible be his as it had somebody else' name on and took all the climbing gear off him, though they gave him back the rucksack.

Some of my best friends and relatives are people your age who've been climbers since the 60's and have encountered dis/honest climbers...

In reply to Timmd:


Sorry, but that can't be true, men of those days would rather cut their left hand off than steal an abandoned bit of gear! Not sure about women though.

In reply to Bruce Hooker:


You must have done your climbing with Vicar's Bruce.

My recollection of the old days, was that they would consider nicking your gear as foreplay to then doing the same to your girlfriend

In reply to Goucho:

Mostly Vicars, yes, a few Bishops thrown in for good measure though

In reply to Bruce Hooker:


I've actually been using Cloggy as a bank for the last five years, there is nowhere safer to keep my money.
I was expecting an interest rate of Zero, but it turns out I'm getting 2% - real mountain craggers are so honest they actually add money to the pile.

In reply to Bruce Hooker:


You're wasting your time Bruce, the po faced "no-one is bad" brigade here wouldn't recognise sarcasm if someone drowned them in a bucket of it.

In reply to stroppygob:

They do seem a bit slow it's true

In reply to Bruce Hooker:


Are you from some sort of parallel universe? Granted, if I left a pile of gear at the bottom of a crag while I went to do a route or have a dump or something, I'd be surprised and pissed off if someone stole it, but there's no way I'd expect gear to be there a week later if I forgot to take it home with me.

In reply to Bruce Hooker:


that because after a few minutes the rain would have rendered it unusable?