Ropes are such functional items, compliant, innocuous. They thread so willingly through pulleys and fairleads and take tremendous tensional stresses one moment, and lay passively the next. They stay where they are put, jammed in cleats waiting for the controlling hand, or lay coiled obediently, such loyal slaves. Until they sense their users' lack of concentration or a sign of weakness. Once loose and powered by water, gravity and wind they rise up ensnaring and entwining. They wrap around any unsuspecting appendage to trick and trap.