Now there's an excellent idea, Pace. Everybody who contributed to this thread do a bit of spiral ascending on a computer. I used to have an IR, infrequently refreshed, and a courtesy IMC to go with it but nobody would let me play in the airspace so I said to heck with it and stay VFR.
And go mountain scraping in gliders in Wales (Talgarth). I could tell you some interesting stories about flying into terrain up there, never mind just flying into IMC. Friend of mine managed to land his K6 on the only bit of furze that wasn't studded with rocks, took half the gliding club and the local mountain rescue chaps all next weekend to trek it down in bits.
Qualified as a very good landing because he was able to fly it again.....