Frustration

I'm starting to get very frustrated at the difficulty in finding partners to go to Yosemite.  After a dream trip to Indian Creek where finding partners is never a problem, it sucks.

What the hell?  Why is it that hard?  When people go to Yosemite, unless they are bouldering, they usually have a plan.  People want to get shit done.  This is why sport climbing and climbing at Indian Creek are so amazing.  There is something for everyone at every wall.  

I would boulder, except that I sprained my ankle in a bike accident and don't want to land on pads.  I think routes would be ok.

And continuing on my rant: It's freakin' impossible to find people to train on routes with at Pipeworks.  Even if I could find someone, they haven't set any new routes in over a month.  I was gone for 4 weeks, came back to the gym and there were only 3-4 new lead routes.  And they're by Peter, who typically sets crap.  It's frustrating being back.

9 things rock climbing has taught me about life

This video is completely amazing.  Thanks Townsend for finding it!

I'm a complainer

I drove into Moab today because it was raining.  Upon arrival, naturally the rain stopped and the sun came out.  So I was thinking that everyone I'm camped with was probably climbing, and that I should have stayed to climb as well.

But honestly I don't really want to.  My hands hurt SO badly.  The thought of putting them in a crack makes me want to cry.  

The time when I need to be back in Davis is approaching.  Maybe this is part of my lack of motivation.  That combined with the pain of crack climbing.  

However I don't really want to go home.  The only people who I'd consider my friends in Davis, or in the Bay Area for that matter, are people who probably would never contact me if I didn't make an effort.  And I'm starting to get a little bitter about it.  I'm tired of being peoples' fucking charity case, or at least feeling like it.  Everyone has their own glorious lives.

I guess the weather and the inevitable return to "real life" has gotten me down.  And by being down, I don't feel like doing what I came here to do, which is climb.  

Is this what happens when we get older?  We just sort through all the crap and and put things into little piles of differing priorities?  I miss genuine people and people who aren't so fucking distracted all the time.  But we get older and we get/or get out of relationships, have obligations and need to make money in order to survive and have money to eat and live and maybe some extra in case we get sick or something fucked up happens, but we also need to be happy, and enjoy the moment and value our friends and respect our elders (even if they don't deserve it) and take care of ourselves and get enough sleep, but not so much that we miss out on what's going on and we can't be too straight edge, because then we're not "letting go" and getting outside of our "comfort zone" - but not too much! - everything in moderation.  Not to mention we have to be environmentally conscious, not drive too much, especially don't drive and SUV, be politically conscious, but not just about the US - be politically conscious about events around the world, eat right and turn off the lights when we aren't in the room.  It's a lot to take on.

So I suppose I can understand why I have to be the one to initiate hanging out.  Or maybe I just suck.

Way Rambo Part III

Only one climbing day since my last post.  

We went to Way Rambo yesterday, and I warmed up on the Cockometer, which I'd never done.  Then I TRed Slice and Dice Clean, tried to redpoint but slipped while pulling the roof.  Walked over to the right side and onsighted The Inhabitants, and thin hands changing corner crack.  After that I TRed The Hostess, which btw, is a RAD route!!!

I think I'm starting to be influenced by Tom's choice in routes: pick the ones that vary.  Splitters and corners get boring.  I do love the splitters and corners, but some of the varied routes are so WILD!!  The Hostess has a block start to a corner, then you traverse under a roof to another corner (this is the crux), and then you go up a varied corner to a short offwidth  section.  It's safe and fun and super cool.  I think it's safe to say, however, that I'm done with Way Rambo for a while.

I just got this in my inbox today.  When I first started going into the infusion center in Davis, I met Melanie.  She was upbeat and friendly, and I had plans to stay in touch with her, but I really never did.  In fact when I was in there getting my infusions, I kind of hoped that she wouldn't show up, because she was always talking about these crazy treatments, and it was just so hard.  Anyway, I feel horrible about not putting more effort into the friendship.  I'm sitting here in the coffee shop with tears streaming down my face like an idiot.

Hi Mandi,

   I hope that you don't think this is weird.  I don't know you but Melanie would speak of you and the struggles that you both were enduring.  I thought that you should know and maybe you do already, that Melanie passed away on February 21st.  She was such a fighter.  The cancer had spread to her brain in December.  She had radiation for 2 weeks and had to be off chemo for that time.  After completing radiation, she had a scan that showed her lung tumors had grown larger, with one measuring 9 cm.  Melanie went back on chemo but it had little effect.  She began to have pain in her lower back from the cancer in her spine which we couldn't control very well with pills.  Her doctor decided that we needed to just keep her comfortable and took her off chemo.  She was put on a morphine drip in early February which gave her the ability to somewhat control the pain.  Over a period of a couple of weeks we had to keep increasing the dose to keep her comfortable.  At 6:35 am on Saturday morning she took her final breath on this earth. 

   We had a beautiful Memorial service for Melanie on Saturday, March 7th.   The kids are doing as well as can be expected.  I will miss her.  She was my best friend.

   Thank you for your friendship and support.

Take care of yourself,

Kevin Gibbs

Quick update

I'm in the Love Muffin Cafe again after 3 days on.  We finally had splitter weather until today (it's windy as hell outside right now), so I felt obligated to take advantage, and now I'm suffering for it.

Anyway, on Sunday, I left Moab and drove back to the creek to climb at Way Rambo Wall in the afternoon.  There was still a ton of snow, so I was skeptical that it would be good.  Fortunately, it was perfect in the sun.  I did a toprope lape on the 5.9, the 5.10 to the right of it called "Fuzz" and Way Rambo (which I sent on TR - yay!).  Then I tried Slice and Dice, fell early, and then had a hard time getting psyched to try hard for the rest of it.  By then it was getting dark, so I ran a quick TR lap on it while I was still pumped, got worked, and then belayed Seth on Way Rambo.  As there were no sends, I hope that we go back up there before I go back to CA.  I'd also like do to this thin hands crack called "The Inhabitants" that I remember toproping 3 years ago.  I recall it being difficult.

Monday we went to Second Meat Wall, and I led Cube Steaks, which is a cool .10+.  After that I tried T-Bones Tonight (see previous post for a photo), fell low, and then hung in the roof.  I tried it again, made it through the bottom, and took the winger out of the roof after a desperate and valiant fight.  By now it's become clear to me that I was much much fitter last year!  I guess that given the health issues I had in my past year, it's not too unexpected.  After that I ran a toprope lap on Top Sirloin, a corner thin hands splitter that I'd done last year.

Tuesday I was feeling pretty rough when I woke up.  In fact, I woke up in the middle of the night groping desperately and blindly for aleve, neosporin, and band-aids.  I felt a little better in the morning.  We decided on Scarface wall, and I decided that I was going to love the toprope.  I toproped an unnamed 5.11 thin hands crack to the left of Big Guy, then I toproped Steel Pulse, an .11+ that is super hard!  there's an awkward start to an offset .5 splitter over a roof.  As soon as I saw Tom put in .5s in that section, I knew that I was going to bring cams to aid that shit if need be.  The rest of it was greens and reds through a small roof and a flare, and that was fun.  Seth and Steve had put a toprope on Torque Wrench by that time, and I was convinced to toprope it.  I think that Torque Wrench is my favorite route in the creek now.  It's 150 feet long!  It starts in a varied lieback up a face/arete, and then you get into a rad chimney, and then you're climbing on the right side of this huge fin that's wedged into the rock.  You jam the steep right side of the fin, stem your left foot waaay out, and desperately get higher until you can reach a jug on top of the fin and pull yourself up on to it so that you can squeeze it with your thighs, and subsequently hump it to get on top.  Then it's a lot more of a corner crack that varies and has lots of holds and feet.  Epic.  Oh and then I tried some .10+ crack which I whipped on the bottom of called Dirt Cheap.  Fitting, because that's how I felt by pitch for on day 3 on.  I'm seriously wrecked.

Today I rest.  I'm hoping that I'm not coming down with a cold, because that would suck.  I also hope that the heinous winds that came up today stop, and I hope that it doesn't rain on Saturday, which the forecast says it's supposed to do.  At the moment, I want to do as many new routes as possible.  I dream of sandstone.

Right now I'm looking out of the window at clouds of dust blowing by, and it's not making me psyched to get back to the creek.

Flint's photos

I stole these photos from Flint's page: 

Kasey and her prized Valley Giant cam.

Jeremy on T-Bones tonight...I fell when my foot was where his hand is going...one day I will crush the big hands roofs!

me on Slice and Dice. no send. I was much fitter last year.

Again displaying my man-arms.

Erika on the big hands roof: 4x4

Trout, Joe, and Joe's dog Boone.