Thursday, November 29, 2007

The Jones Factor

This is The Ma and I playing Indiana Jones. She's in the back "holding up" the bolder and I'm running. It was fun.

Don't worry, we went up the other way, not this way


Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Bad F-ing Day

If you think you had a bad day, I think I get to trump that. I turn on my desktop after a week of being gone, casually chatting on gmail to Tasha and wroop my computer shuts down and I see the blue screen of death. I try rebooting it in several ways but nothing works. Safe Mode. Blue screen bats that down. Do the restart from previous date. Smack, blue screen. Oh, but that's the start. I am driving up a little hill to go tutor and my car turns off. "weird" I think. I turn the key and vroom, vroom, putter. Nope, it dies. I try again. Nope it continues to be dead. When he AAA man shows up he looks at me and goes "I bet you are wishing you didn't buy that car." Um, what booze smelling man? Oh that's right you, Mr. AAA man, showed up in a normal tow truck... I have all wheel drive. Not going to work so well. So after he lays on the ground hitting my fuel pump while I rev my engine we give up and roll it down a hill and lock it up. Oh yes, the day well, at least it's over.

Thanksgiving in Joshua Tree

This year I opped out of the family festivities and did Thanksgiving with Apple Jacks' side of the "family" (aka. his friends). For the past 18 years a group of people who went to college in Arizona have been coming out to J-Tree, as it's fondly called, to celibrate Thanksgiving with their substitute family. Most of them couldn't fly home for the four day holiday so they'd drove to Joshua Tree National Park to climb and eat.




It was a great trip. Some of the group came out on Sunday, Apple Jacks and I came out on Tues night while most showed up Wed. There were about 20 people who camped and about 2/3 of them climbed. The rest socialized and hiked. Everyone was really friendly and positive. You could tell the "old timers" were happy to have some new blood but that never pulled away from the fact they were really there to see their old friends. As some stated, "Most of these people I only get to see once a year. That's here so I take advantiage of that."



The climbing was sharp but I must admit I feel like I've been come a stronger climber in just those 5 short days. For those of you who aren't "up" on climbing terms I'll do a brief run down. Climbs are rated from 5.2 to 5.13. 2 is easy, like walking up a really steap hill, and 13 is like over hanging cliff that is smooth like butter. Some climbs have an added a, b, c, d rateing.


Here I am on a face climb that was a 5.10

Okay, the whole reason for that blurp is to brag. The first day we started with some easy climbs of 5.7 and 5.8, but we ended on a kick as crack. It's just what it sounds like, a crack going vertically up a rock face. At some points the crack was an inch and half wide, others it had a half centimeter lip. It was a 5.10d and I did it. It wasn't graceful or pretty but with some help and encouraging words I did it and I'm still proud of it.



Here's Jen on a different crack climb. This was a 5.9

Over all it was a good trip. I think all there had a good time. Thanksgiving was good, fried turky and stuffing and salad and potatos and sweet potatos. It was all great food.

The spread!

This is me at the top of Driving Limitations a fun 5.7

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Hair

I went and got my hair dyed... I'm not sure how I feel about it yet. I've been dark before... but this is a little red for me... we'll see. It's just hair right.

Sunday, November 04, 2007

Las Vegas


This weekend I was in Las Vegas for a horse show. I did not stay any where near "the strip" and never left "campus" as we called the horse show and hotel facility. Anyway, the show went well. I rode constantly well. I won my speed class on Saturday and for anyone who knows me they'll know speed is not my problem.
Anyway, the thing that I notices most about being in LV was the people. It is the hubbub of middle class America. Being in California 90% of the time I see a lot of Californians. We are not fat people. Maybe 1 out of every 20 Californians are slightly obese. In Vegas I understand the grotesqueness of America. I saw more fat people and fat kids than i thought were out there. People who's fat over flowed over the slot chairs. People who's whole bodies waddled back and forth as they walked 'cause they couldn't bend their knees. It was amazing. No, it was appalling. I just... eww... i just don't really understand how you can get that way. How you can no longer see your toes let alone your crotch. Do those men even know if they have penises any more? It's disturbing.
The worst part is I wasn't even in the center of it all. I was at the out skirts. I'm not sure if that meant i got more morbidly obese because they wanted cheaper rooms, or less. I'm not sure if standing at the elevator bays of the MGM Grand that you'd wonder if those five people could fit in one elevator. I was recently in Vegas is April, on the strip, and i remember seeing fat people, but this weekend gave me a new level of understanding of the largeness of the United States.

Thursday, November 01, 2007

Happy Halloween

This year I took a different path. I didn't do any glitter, just blood! It was fun.
Violet was a pea and Abbie enjoyed trick-0-treating and letting everyone know she was a fairy princess NOT an angel or butterfly.
Oh My God, who let the vampire hold the baby!