In reply to BALD EAGLE:
Well, that's pretty funny...but... Confession time.
I left university and started work in 1985. In 1986 my employer sent me to Colorado for meeting that no one else wanted to do. The work bits spanned the weekend.
So on the Saturday I went out to the flatirons and tried to climb the middle one, in trainers.
Now, I've got no excuse - I had done a reasonable amount of climbing in the UK, but youth, opportunity and a misplaced sense of competence got the better if me. Anyway it was slabby and inviting and with nice lines if weakness and resting places to follow.
I got maybe 2/3rds of the way up and then got gripped so decided to climb down. Now, the downclimb was also easy *provided that* I could pick the right runnels ...and if course I couldn't and was very soon sketching down terrain that I hadn't come up and was really unhappy on. So much so that I went back up and down twice before finally getting to the foot, chastened.
I was an idiot; so is this chap but it doesn't mean we can't empathise a little?