I need some worms

Maybe my immune system is all fucked up because it hasn't been fine-tuned by the presence of parasites.  Evolution, I hate you.

so much to say

I've been thinking about what I would write over the weekend and early this week, but it's been hard because there's been a pretty radical shift in my thought processes, expectations, etc.  Which is fucking welcome, I'll tell you right now.

I went to Boulder Thursday morning through Sunday night.  In a word, it was awesome.  Cassie picked me up, and I stayed with her.  I got to hang out with an old friend, spent time climbing with Joe, ran into an old Jailhouse friend...I think.

The pub scene there is awesome. We went to both the Mountain Sun and the Southern Sun. Being there made me realize that every person I hang out with in Davis is married.  No wonder I feel like a leper here. There's a huge demographic hole between undergraduates and families here...a hole that I've fallen into.

I'd been beating myself up for wasting time over the last 4 years not looking, or doing other things, or whatever.  But in reality, I feel pretty ok in blaming it on the place.  Checking out Boulder and seeing all the young professionals made me pretty psyched.

I know I'm being very optimistic and my vision of the city is very biased, but if that's what it takes to get me to finish my PhD and get out of this rut, then so be it. I'm right on track to finish in a year, and I've got great prospects for getting a job or a post-doc out there - either in Boulder, Denver or Ft. Collins.  I've got quite a few friends out there (not all of them are climbers - which is a big deal to me).

I'm ready for a change.

I got to climb at the gym Movement, which is almost reason enough to move. On Sunday I climbed in Eldo with Joe - pretty tough stuff.  It's like a gigantic, chossy, crowded sandstone version of Donner. There were cliff swallow carcasses all over the place from the peregrines.  And a rescue.

People say the climbing around Boulder is chossy and not that good.  But holy shit is it close.  I drive 2.5 hours each way to climb on choss here.  If I could only drive 20 minutes to climb on choss that would be a vast improvement.

I'd like to go back and check out Fort Collins this summer, maybe climb up in Rocky Mountain, check out some of the other local climbing.  I also want to meet some professors/agency folks to talk about jobs.

One of the concerns I have about moving to Boulder is that it will be difficult to avoid the outdoor industry/pro-climber scene.  In Davis all of my friends are scientists first. Some of them climb, but it's certainly not their priority.  Nobody moves to Davis to be a pro-athlete.  It's different in the Front Range. You have all kinds of dirtbags moving there for the scene and it scares the shit out of me.  After my brief experience on the outermost periphery of the pro-climber scene, I don't want anything to do with it.  Joe made a good point though that with all of the agencies, biotech/atmospheric science centers and universities, there are many many people who do sports recreationally, not as their identity.

I want more.  I'm getting after it.

Donner party!

Not cannibals?

Exercise and weight loss: life isn't fair.

Interesting NYTimes piece on the relationship between exercise and weight loss.  A choice quote:

"In practical terms the results are scientific proof that life is unfair."

Cool interview on NPR

Last night I heard a really great interview with Michael J. Fox on NPR.  I wasn't expecting much, just listening to NPR's most emailed stories of the day, but I really liked a lot of what he had to say.  I've cut and pasted the bits I liked from the transcript.

The first excerpt is his interpretation of loss and failure and disappointment.  I've been thinking lately about how, not only have I learned a lot from the tougher times in my life, but that I actually feel defined by them.  And not by my successes.  In fact, I can't even think of a single life-event that I would define as a success.  I'm so lucky and privileged in life, that all of the things that might be considered "successes", I view as things I should be doing anyway.  

SIMON: Mr. Fox, do you learn more from success or disappointment and even failure?

Mr. FOX: I think you learn more from disappointment. But I think that success loses its sheen after a while and you begin to see that there's no such thing as absolute success, that there's always failure and there's always disappointment and there's always loss. But the secret is learning from the loss and realizing that none of those holes are vacuums.

Theyll be filled up. And if you try to fill them up with ego or a kind of immediate gratification, you're going to short-shrift yourself and you're going to lose the opportunity to find out what happens when you give the loss space to fill itself and let life kind of come in and fill the cracks.

The second excerpt is him talking about his Parkinson's disease.  I can only hope that if my body fails due to MS I can maintain such a positive attitude:

Mr. FOX: And so I have a choice: I can either kind of quit and say, well, you know, this is not ideal, I'm going to give in. Or I can just push through.

The thing about, that Im always trying to explain to people - because so much of the time, actually, my pills are working and Im feeling great. And people say you look so good and you look so smooth, and I have to remind them and myself that when I am smooth and I am - the medication is working, thats not my natural state.

My natural state is one thats affected by the shortage of dopamine production in my brain. So my natural state is to be halting and at times tremulous and kind of just physically disturbed. I mean thats my natural state, given the situation in my brain. But Im always as happy either way. And so when it comes to me, body language lies.

The last excerpt that I enjoyed was about expectations.  Not only the expectations of others but the expectations of ourselves.  I wish I could unburden myself with such expectations. Because, really, it's awful. I'll never live up to them. I especially like the quote: "I think your happiness grows in direct proportion to your acceptance and in inverse proportion to your expectations." I suppose this is part of the philosophy behind radical acceptance.

SIMON: Mr. Fox, can I ask - do you think people have expectations of you?

Mr. FOX: It doesnt really matter, because I think they may, but Im pretty set on my path and pretty comfortable with what Im doing. And I have enough experience to know that I seem to be pleasing the people who I most want to please. And when Im not pleasing them, Im learning from their disappointment and it's pushing me in the right direction.

So I dont burden myself too much with others' expectations or even my own expectations. I think your happiness grows in direct proportion to your acceptance and in inverse proportion to your expectations. It's just a matter of putting one foot in front of the other, or doing the next right thing, so to speak.

Food for thought.

Spring wildflowers

Flowers from today's site visit in Napa/Sonoma.

Poison oak is such a handsome plant - Toxicodendron diversilobum

Who can resist a California poppy? Eschscholzia californica

Owl clover - Castilleja spp.

Zigadenus lily - Zigadenus fremontii

Naturalists among goldfields and blue dicks

Iris

Baby blue eyes - Nemopila insignis

Hound's tongue - Cynoglossum grande

Mule's ears - Wyethia mollis

Blue eyed grass - Sisyrinchium bellum

Sun cups - Camissonia ovata

Our prize: the endangered Clara Hunt's milkvetch

Lovely day, lots of flowers!  Walking through the goldfields.

Parting shot of the endangered Astragalus clarianus

Finishing up the season on a high note

I went to Gold Wall Saturday with Maki, a couple of her friends, and Ethan and his buddy Ben.  Ethan had never been there before.

Anyway, I sent Hippy Speedball, which was cool, considering I'd never even gotten a 1-hang.  I just grred and made it happen (even with a wet key hold).  I love it when that happens.  I'd worked it a little in the Winter before it got wet and just got back on it a week or two ago.  But then it kept raining...

That route is awesome.

Maki TRed and got a bit worked; she's a Tuolumne technical master and doesn't get to climb on steep jugs very often. I think if she came out a little bit more she'd crush.

Ethan climbed the shit out of the place, finally admitting that the climbing was pretty fun and "I might come back". For the first part of the day he had his poopy pants on, but that could be because he forgot his harness and had originally wanted to go to the Valley. After GW left dried out a bit he took the poopy pants off and had a good time. James Markovsky was there, with two minions...

I had a special request for the cookie-topped brownies that I've made made many times before. This was a particularly good batch, and the crew devoured them.  They are always a winner.

The wall was amazingly uncrowded, and although we expected it to be scorching, some inversion-layer magic happened and it was lovely most of the day.  It was so lovely that I stayed much longer than I normally do, and even ran a lap on Hillbilly Limestone at the end of the day (not clean). Ethan was belaying and could tell I was hesitant and started yelling at me until I actually started climbing and got so pumped I climbed past a clip and took a massive whipper.  YES!  Sometimes we all need to be encouraged in order to push beyond our comfort zone. Plus it's nice to know that really good climbers don't always expect you to be as good as them...he's fun to climb with. I'm thinking about going to Clark weekend after next. Ethan and some other folks will be down there.  I've never been.

I'm so excited about Boulder!

It was great to hang out with Maki and Ethan and company.  Good weekend for sure.

Sunday I slept in, went to an orchid show in Sacramento (and didn't buy anything! Whoa!). In Savannah when we lived on the island I had these big tables covered with orchids.  It was so easy to grow them it felt like I was cheating.  In Davis everything dies.  The water sucks and the summers are scorching and dry.  In the evening Maki and I went out for sushi - softshell crab. mmmmm. Tempura mango ice cream.  yummmmm.