A Rocknasium Rant

okay, sorry Justin, but I'm a little peeved right now after attempting to climb at the Rocknasium Friday night comp.  

It was SO FREAKIN' CROWDED!!!!  Seriously.  

Partly it's me...I just don't like big sweaty crowds (I never moshed in the '90s)...but it was kind of insane.  There weren't enough problems, in my opinion, or enough topropes.  Granted, this is a small space, and I'm sure that they try to make the best of it...but it felt even smaller tonight.  After I did 2 boulder problems and waited about 20 minutes to try 2 routes, I decided not to waste my energy and go to one of the Touchstone gyms tomorrow instead.  Disappointing.  On the other hand, all I really want to do is get a good workout.  So it makes sense that I would be better served going somewhere else.

I feel kind of bad that I couldn't muster up the psyche and get over my negative attitude, but I couldn't.  It's frustrating being psyched to climb and not being able to due to crowds.  I guess next time I'll know better.

I think that I've also been spoiled by climbing at Pipeworks.  I'm sure that if I climbed at Rocknasium, I'd learn to enjoy it...but maybe not.  I'm not a huge fan of the route-setting, and the holds are SLICK!!!  Hopefully they can put my 15$ "donation" (I consider it a donation because I left without beer and before the pizza arrived) towards some new holds.  It would be a worthy investment for them.

One more thing. I'm going to go ahead and say it, and there is NO ARGUMENT THAT CAN CONVINCE ME OTHERWISE:  THE  ROUTE GRADES AT THE ROCKNASIUM ARE RETARDED!!  What the fuck?!

Gym climbing has become a problem for me.  I find it so difficult to even see the lines...I miss holds, can't read the beta, mix up thin orange tape with thick orange tape...are the features on?  Why is this sloper so slick?!

On the (small) positive side, it was good to see folks like Renee, Vicken and Sarah.  In addition, I have been reminded of why the Touchstone gyms - Pipeworks in particular - are so rad.  It must be hard being a small business in Davis and trying to compete with the Touchstone gyms.  I'd like to support a local Davis gym, but I have more fun with the corporate giant.  I am a bad, bad person...

time to update

Okay it's time to update.  Of course, the busier I am the less likely I am to write...probably because I have a lot less time to fester, which is good!

Last weekend was awesome - I went to Gold Wall Friday and Sunday, and spent Saturday at Stanford presenting a tui chub proposal at the Bay Area Conservation Biology Symposium.  Friday was mellow, it was only my party (Drew and Beth) and one other party.  The left side was pretty wet, so we stuck to the middle.  I sent President's Day, which is an awesome route.  It's long - tons of different kinds of moves, jugs, crimps...and the crux is not a one move wonder.  It's thin and pumpy and long!  I was kind of sad to finish it. 

On Sunday I tried Luther, and was a little concerned about the big moves until I saw Lyn CRUSH them.  I really like climbing with smaller women, because often when I am climbing with taller people, and I come up against a big move, I'll just give up.  Seeing smaller people do the bigger moves is really motivating.  Not to mention the fact that I think I'm going to start bouldering more - Lyn pretty much ONLY boulders, and still crushes routes.  Maybe if I start bouldering more, the crux moves won't seem as hard on routes.

Other fitness stuff: 30 mile ride on Monday, bouldering at PW on Tues, Pilates class (my first) in Sac on Wed...jack shit yesterday, and I'm planning on doing the Rocknasium comp with Sarah and Renee tonight.  Last year I won 200 bucks!!  Definitely incentive to return, especially with the weekend forecast looking a bit grim.  Next week I'd like to spend 4-5 days in Bishop with Nunley.  I hope that Siemay and Noah will be there - I haven't seen them in ages!

Mostly work has been consuming me lately.  I was hoping to get this manuscript (Joint estimation of admixture and effective population size in a hybrid trout population...otherwise known as "the trout paper") fleshed out a bit more, but I didnt' reckon on how busy I'd be with other "thought stuff" this quarter.  I feel like grad school is divided into "thought stuff" and "do stuff".  Lab work, which I haven't done in over a year, is "do stuff".  You can feel pretty accomplished when you are doing lab work.  And it seems as if I can spend more time doing than thinking.  Thinking/writing/reading/data analysis takes up a lot more energy, you aren't moving around, and it requires real concentration.  I can't seem to do as much thinking stuff as doing stuff in any given day.

Anyway, I have a lot of thinking stuff to do these days.  I'm teaching a section on population genetics software on Feb 19.  I'm working the fishes of the Tuolumne River book (which is taking a LOT of time).  Plus the trout paper, plus getting together an abstract (and a coherent talk) for the Western Division American Fisheries Society meeting in May, plus potentially participating in another course next quarter on the Tuolumne River.

I wonder how much I should be doing work that is not related to my actual research...if I was not participating in the TR course, I could probably be getting a lot more done that moves me towards publications/graduating.  On the other hand, participating in these other projects allows networking, it's fun, and you learn a lot of cool stuff.  

Another problem I have is with absorbing and organizing information I glean from primary literature.  I can't tell you how many times I've picked up a paper that I haven't read before, made it to page 2 or 3, only to see that I've written a bunch of notes in the margin. WTF?  How do you a) remember the shit that you read and b) somehow organize the papers so that you know WHICH paper to go back to if you remember something that you read?  Spreading them out all over my living room floor is NOT working.  I have an Endnote system, and files in a file cabinet in my cubicle, but I think that the perfect (or even better) system is still out there.

Balance.  It's hard.

unbelievable psyche

I've had a ton of energy the last few days...I'm staying up late, waking up early...biking, climbing, staying at the lab more than usual, being social.  I don't know what it is, but I feel really good!  I'm super excited about everything.  

I think part of it is that I've worked some stuff out lately in my head.  Stuff about work, friends, climbing, life, etc.  Maybe I have some sort of clarity of vision for the moment.  

I've been toying with the idea of doing a double century ride.  There's one in May that goes from Davis to Clear Lake and back, but I think that doing another century ride would probably be wiser.  Honestly I can't imagine biking 200 miles in howling winds, rain, etc.  I guess at least the SAG vehicles could always deliver you to the finishing dinner and keg if you couldn't make it.  I think I would probably destroy myself before I'd give up though, which might not be the best decision given my lack of bicycle experience.  

So: anyone want to do a century ride near Davis in the next few months?  Yes?  RAD!

In addition, I've become psyched on training in the gym again...ok, well bouldering more and doing more post-climbing exercise to keep everything balanced.  After doing the bouldering comp, I remembered how much fun it is to work problems with people.  I definitely need to boulder with other people, because otherwise I'd get on a problem and try it once or twice, either do it or decide that I couldn't, get bored and move on.  When I'm with people though, it's a collective effort.  I try much harder, try harder grades, climb for much longer, and have a much better time.  It's cool.

Tomorrow I'm going to Gold Wall with the Rodden-ator and Drew.  Maybe Stanley will show up, but that's always a crap shoot.  I haven't seen Drew in a while, so that should be good.  It will also be cool to show Beth the crag, and help her to further appreciate the spectacular rock quality of El Cap.  Gold Wall, like Jailhouse, is fun climbing once you pull off all the loose blocks and glue them all back together.  It takes a special kind of place for the belayer to wear the helmet more often than the leader.  

I haven't climbed outdoors in 2 weeks, and somewhat embarrassingly, I'm excited to see if there are any new mushrooms on the approach to the wall.  Fun from start to finish!  I guess I'm easily amused.

From Gold Wall I'm going to either Berkeley or Redwood City to spend the night; I'm giving a talk at the Bay Area Conservation Symposium on Saturday.  I submitted my abstract spontaneously, partly because the conference is cheap and close, and partly because I'm giving the talk that I gave for my qualifying exam (tui chubs).  I like having been in grad school long enough that I have a few Powerpoints on hand to give on short notice.  Maybe I'm gaining some Grad School Skillz despite my best efforts...

Then back to Davis for the night, and then back to GW Sunday.  I think Shannon should be there, maybe Drew?!  Holy shit that would be something.  Maybe Townsend?  Probably Rachel and Matt too.  

So yeah, life is really good right now.  Hope I can ride this one out for a while...

By the way, make sure to check out the raging debate on hand jammies.  Choose a side, and post a comment that either destroys or boosts Alan's ego.

I have too much energy

Which would explain the recent flurry of climbing/biking/blogging, etc.

I was going to bike with Sandrine this afternoon, but 20mph gusts deterred us.  So I'll wait 'til tomorrow to do a bouldering/training session with Shags, Nunsquatch, Jake etc.  Should be good!  I think I'll also go to a potluck thingie that some folks have in Sac the last Tues of every month.  I've been wanting to go, but sometimes driving to Sac seems like such a long way.  But, my resolution is to be more social, so here I go.

This excess energy has prompted me to walk aimlessly around my neighborhood in Davis.  I live on the greenbelt, so the walking is good.  To my surprise, I found some edible mushrooms: blewits (Clitocybe nuda) on the overpass on the way to the Nugget, inky caps (Coprinopsus atramentaria) growing in the sod next to Covell, and a common volvariella (Volvariella speciosa) growing in someone's yard.  It seems that most of the shrooms to be found in Davis are easily found in yard compost: mulch, oak leaves, pine straw, whatever.  I have to wonder if people think I'm strange, walking slowly through the trees, while they run, bike or walk by.  When I'm old, it's going to be embarrassing.  I'll probably still be single, except with maybe a few cats that I'll dress up like dolls and walk on a leash while wandering around the suburbs looking for mushrooms in peoples' compost piles.  Awesome.

Check out this video.

this is INSANE! checking out the structure of an ant city by filling it with concrete and then excavating. seriously. social insects are rad.

Irreverent new (for me) climbing blog

I love this guy.  Check out this post on quitting 8a.

And this post on how rock climbing can be silly.

from the blog: bluegrassbouldering.wordpress.com

smiley rocks, Tuolumne River, rock climbing... you know.

This has nothing to do with rivers, but these rocks are cool.

Ok back to the tuolumne river:

This is the subject of a book that I am co-authoring (along with about 10 other people).  My topic falls in the Aquatic Ecology and Fishes section.  I am fishes.

I'm not exactly sure how I became the fishes person.  Plenty of people in the class know a lot more about fishes than I do, particularly CA fish assemblages.  Maybe default, since I know even less about the other topics (geological history, human impact, terrestrial ecosystems of the Tuolumne River).  At any rate, it's kind of a cool thing to be a part of.  I'm developing an interest in Central Valley aquatic ecosystems, partially because they are unique (it's been isolated from other aquatic ecosystems for some time, CA is a young landscape), and partly because of the challenges stemming from human demand for water in a water-poor environment.  In fact, I just heard on the news that Sacramento is in a Stage 1 drought.  In JANUARY!!  Wow.  Apparently a lot of the forecasting for human water needs was based on a period that had higher than normal rainfall and snowmelt.  So "they" developed land thinking that there would be more water than there actually is.

Anyway, I guess my point is that water and aquatic ecosystems in CA are pretty interesting.  When you think of writing about a river, there are a lot of things that you end up writing about that you may not have originally thought of.  For example, did you know that the San Joaquin and all of its tributaries (the Tuolumne River, Stanislaus River and the Merced (I think). all used to have millions of spring-run chinook and fall-run chinook salmon?  The spring-run fish come up in the spring, spend the summer in cold deep pools at high elevation while they mature, and then spawn in the fall so that the fry can go downstream with the winter pulses:

  

The fall-run fish stay in the lower elevations (mainstem Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers), spawn an die.  The fall-run chinook are doing okay, but mostly because of subsidies from hatcheries.

The San Joaquin spring-run chinook effectively went extinct when Friant Dam was built in the 1940s.  Water diversion downstream in the 1948 (for potatoes and other crops) prevented the fish from going upstream, so they were trucked to below Friant dam where they managed to survive the summer and spawn in the Fall.  The water coming from dams is usually cold, so they were able to hang out at a lower elevation.  Unfortunately, the young that emerged were stranded in a dry stretch of the river on their way to the ocean.  San Joaquin spring-run chinook were extinct by 1950.  Millions of fish.  An entire life history.  A HUGE fishery.  Gone.

Historically, the spring-run chinook were far more abundant in the San Joaquin watershed than the Sacramento watershed, because there is a lot more snowpack in the mid and southern Sierra Nevada than the northern Sierra Nevada.  This was crucial to allow the fish to reach elevations high enough where they could survive for the summer - locations with cold temps and permanent pools in clean, fast-flowing water.  Currently there are still some spring-run chinook in the Sacramento watershed.  I think that these fish will be used as stock for restoring the San Joaquin spring-run chinook.

On the brighter side (depending on what side you are on), there are attempts to restore spring-run chinook in the San Joaquin river.  What's cool is that our lab got the contract to do the genetics work for the restoration.  It would be awesome to be a part of this project.  Post-doc maybe?  Who knows.

Lots of other things are going on in the Tuolumne River.  Native Americans managed the landscape far before Europeans arrived, but the majority of the change has happened since the 1800s, with hydraulic mining for gold destroying the rocky river bottom, followed by logging, grazing, and the final insult: dams.  Not to mention destruction of riparian vegetation and introduced species - inadvertently and on purpose.  All bad for salmon.

A lot of times I am surprised by the sources of information I find when I am looking up particular topics.  For example, when I was studying methods in historical ecology for my qualifying exam, I would google carbon dating, or dendrochronology.  I shit you not, 9 times out of ten I got a creationist/intelligent design website that was attempting to hijack the science in order to prove that humans rode dinosaurs less than 6,000 years ago.  Going back to the Tuolumne River, most of the information I'm finding about trout and fishes in the river comes from flyfishing outfitters.  Those dudes KNOW their trout.  It's impressive.  Too bad a lot of those companies depend on planted trout...but that's pages of more blathering about fish that no one who reads this blog is interested in.

Okay!  So rock climbing...um...we're all interested in that right?  I did the comp Friday, climbed a bunch of routes in the gym today...going to Gold Wall Friday, biking a bunch.  Yep that's about it for climbing.  Oh wait! I know what I was going to ask you guys!  I did the comp Friday night, biked 20 miles yesterday, and climbed in the gym today.  Today I felt GREAT!  Do you think doing cardio helps recovery between climbing days?