24 Hours in Outer Space

Timeline for May 6, 2005 climb of Leavenworth Mega-classic 'Outer Space':

2:30 a.m.:Get up.
2:50 a.m.: Leave Maple Ridge, B.C. for Leavenworth WA.
3:30 a.m. Detained at U.S. border due to 'random computer generated flag".
3:35 a.m.:Car searched: no illegal drugs or immigrants found in trunk.
3:45 a.m.: Leave U.S border station.
5:10 a.m.: Arrive at Burger King in Monroe, WA, pick up Peter.
7:00 a.m.: Arrive at Snow Creek trailhead, sort gear and racks.
7:30 a.m.: Leave Snow Creak trailhead.
9:00 a.m.: Arrive at the base of... Outer Space! Gear up, pack small pack.
9:30 a.m.: Start climbing up 'Remorse' direct start to Outer Space - Matt leads first pitch easy pitch.
10:30 a.m.:Matt, who hasn't built an anchor in 18 months, takes 45 minutes to do one (what the hell does 'SRENE' stand for again?).
10:40 ish: Peter leads (difficult) 2nd pitch. Peter, who hasn't built an anchor in almost a year, takes 5 minutes to build a solid anchor.
11:15 ish: Matt arrives at top of 2nd pitch after soiling trousers on difficult 5.9 friction traverse.
11:25 ish: Matt leads 3rd (easy) pitch up easy 5.6 slab which he turns in to a test piece, up cracks and chimney to Two Tree Ledge.
12:00 ish: Matt quickly builds a nice anchor. Hah! Back in the groove!
12:15 ish: Peter arrives at top of 3rd pitch and Matt discovers he built the anchor in the wrong location. Damn! Anchor must be rebuilt in correct location.
12:30 p.m.: Peter leads difficult 4th pitch with 5.9 finger traverse. While belaying Peter, Matt has his first sighting of a tick, crawling up the rope towards him. It is the first tick sighting of the day, but it will not be the last.
1:00 ish: Two climbers stroll up to Two Tree Ledge, short-roped and not using an gear protection, having taken 45 minutes to get there via the original traverse start to OS. Damn! I shall refer to these two climbers as 'Gary' and 'Dean' (because that is their names).
1:30 ish: Matt arrives at the top of the 4th pitch after soiling his trousers (yet again) on difficult 5.9 finger traverse.
time loses all meaning: Matt, quivering with fear, leads easy 5th pitch, up to the top of the pillar. Even with an existing bolt, manages to screw up the anchor.
time passes: Peter arrives at top of 5th pitch, notices Matt sobbing and suggests that Matt lead the easy 6 pitch with 'possibly the best hand crack in the state', so that Matt will not have to lead the difficult start to the 7th pitch. Matt snuffles, wipes the tears from his face and agrees. Peter rebuilds anchor properly, relocating it to the actual start of the 6th pitch.
at some later point: Matt leads up one of the finest pitches in WA but is too concerned about the amount of gear he is placing to notice it's qualities. Runs out the last easy 25 feet (5.6) to conserve gear. Leaves yellow stains on rock while doing so.
later...: Peter arrives at Library Ledge, followed thereafter by Gary, who leads the pitch like a man, unlike Matt who lead it like a snivelling swine.
yet later...: Peter leads up the 5.9 start to pitch 7 and handles it like a pro. Dean climbs quickly to Library Ledge, mainly to escape the swarms of ticks below.
a short while later...: Matt follows on the 5.9 start to pitch 7 and handles it like a man with soiled pants.
sometime later...: Matt arrives at the top of pitch 7.
a few minutes later...: Peter hangs by one hand for his 'dominate the route' pic (see below) and heads up the last short, easy 8th pitch.
5:30 p.m.: Matt arrives at the top of Outer Space and crumples instantly into a quivering, jelly-like mass of blubbering idiocy. Unable to stop hyperventilating until Peter slaps him and tell hims behave like a man. Time on route: 8 hours.
6:00 p.m.: Gary, Dean, Peter and Matt begin the disgusting descent route back to the base of the climb.
7ish: Climbers arrive back at base of Outer Space.
8ish: Arrival back at Snow Creak Trailhead.
8:30 p.m.: 4 dirty, tick ridden climbers arrive at the very nice Visconti's restaurant in Leavenworth (tick check outside restaurant reveals 3 ticks crawling on Dean, 1 on Matt, 1 on Peter, Gary has none but is worried).
8:34 p.m.: After being seated at a table in Visconti's, Peter excuses himself to use the washroom. When he comes back, he informs us that there was a tick on the fly of his pants.
8:37 p.m.:Matt pulls his cellphone from his pocket to make a call and a tick falls out onto the white tablecloth and attempts to scuttle into a crack. Tick is retrieved by Peter and placed in empty wine goblet for waiter to remove.
8:40 p.m.:Toasts are made to the day's work and the bond that only climbers can know: the bond of climbing (and ticks).
9:30 ish: Departure from Leavenworth.
10:55 p.m.: Arrive in Monroe. Kimberly, who had all the work of an early rise and a late night with none of the fun of the climb, picks Peter up. Farewells are said and departures are made for Seattle and Vancouver.
11:05 p.m.: Arrive in Monroe. Again. Matt forgot his rope in Peter's pack. Rope is transferred, farewells are said again.
12:30 a.m.: Stop at Dennys in some small town off I-5 to use bathroom. Feel guilty about that and order a meal. Discover that Denny's in a small town at midnight on a Friday has a high number of extremely obese and/or tattooed and/or died black hair young people who smoke.
2:00 a.m.: Arrive home. Pull camera from pack but leave tick infested gear in car.
2:10 a.m.: Download pictures to PC (camera will only hold pictures as long as batteries are good).
2:15 a.m.: Disrobe, seal all clothing in a garbage bag until it an be washed. Shower all unattached ticks off.
2:25 a.m.: Bed.