Happy New Year, I love boulders, etc.

This majestic beast is named Bananas. All photo cred to Sista Fran. 

I like to think that New Year's at Rocktown is now a thing. We went last year, and yesterday, we went again — although we rolled in pretty late post-NYE-ing. January 1st is probably the only day I will ever be OK with leaving at 7 a.m. for a climbing trip. Until I move somewhere with climbing less than three hours away, I guess. Which hopefully will be soonish but you know.

Anyway, this time, Sista Fran got to come! Taylor has been climbing for longer than I have, but she had to take a bunch of time off and stays so busy she had never made it outside. It was really exciting getting to show her around Rocktown, which I think is a pretty epic first taste of outdoor bouldering.

Seester + Lucy.

+ Lucy's hair.

In the weeks leading up to this particular trip (during which every day I had off was a day when it rained >:[ ), I for some reason imagined our crew as the only one in the park. I dunno, I guess I thought the rest of the South's climbers would be sleeping off hangovers? Well, I was wrong, and there were tons of people at the crag. Fortunately, they all turned out to be lovely folks full of friendly beta and encouragement, and they had dogs. So that was great.

Don't you love that girl's hat? She has strong fingers and a little dog named Rumi.

Since the Orb area was packed when we arrived, we headed to some apparently classic other climbs to warm up. One was called El Clásico, but I don't recall which one it was or what the other thing we climbed was called. They were both kinda highbally for my tastes, but Taylor was pretty fearless on them. Still, I was excited when I finally got to show her my favorite zeros and ones in the Orb area at the end of the day.

There was so much joy in the day. See Nick's joy?

More joy. And Sam. And Sam's hat.

Since we really only had about seven hours of good climbing time, we didn't go all over the place like we otherwise might have. The guys worked on Golden Harvest (V10) and The Orb (V8), and Lucy and I projected The Hobbit (V5), Golden Showers (V5), and Soap on a Rope (V4) — all of which I think we can send in another session or two. I worked on them with Elaine a couple of weeks ago, and I am more psyched on these three problems than on anything else I've tried, ever. I < 3 slopers!

Me < 3-ing slopers.

I found myself feeling unreasonably relieved at the end of the day (which by the way was perfect and ended with vegan pizza at Mellow Mushroom) when I realized that with the exception of a single bloody pinky, I had not injured myself. You see, a year ago yesterday I fell while attempting what would become my first V3, Super Mario, and sprained my ankle. It wasn't really that bad, but that was when I first developed a teensy fear of falling. (It reached the ludicrous proportions we now know after my first bad lead fall, but we can talk about that later.) My ankle is still swollen... maybe I should be worried about that? Anyway. I didn't get hurt, and I'm happy about that, because maybe it means I broke some kind of curse under which the climbing gods would otherwise have me dwell.

I really think my pull-up obsession (I'm up to eight!) is starting to pay off. Not in the ways I thought it would — lock offs are still just ugh — but my abs are definitely stronger, and static-but-strengthy movement is way more possible than it was a few months ago. I so recommend pull-ups to any girl (or, I guess, person) trying to get stronger fast.

Do you have new year's resolutions? I am very pro-resolution, any time of year. I have a bunch, but they don't have anything to do with climbing. I'll tell them to you anyway, though, because this seems like a good spot for a list:

~*~

1. Be more of an adult. This means wear "real clothes," budget better, spend my time wisely, and wear makeup when I feel like it.

2. Make more music, see more music. It's always been a huge part of my life, except recently, and I miss it a lot.

3. Don't say "no" without a reason. I'm in the terrible habit of turning people down when they ask me to do something simply because it wasn't part of how I originally envisioned my evening. Or saying that I'll go to a show or something and then not because my bed is so cozy or it's cold outside or I don't wanna put on pants or whatever. And I just need to start going.

~*~

I don't want to make resolutions about climbing. I'd rather see what happens. I know I'm working hard and that's how you progress. But I'm also realizing climbing can't be my number one priority right now; I've got to make money and study and apply for jobs and graduate and all that.

But I'm not worried : ) 2015 is off to a great start — I climbed at my favorite place with some of my favorite people yesterday, and today Taylor and I started Yoga with Adriene's 30 Days of Yoga. Tomorrow, I'll finish up an article for Flagpole, and I might paint my nails post-gym!

Oh, and did I mention I cleaned my room? It was an ankle-trapping minefield before, but now it is yoga-ready and smells like macaroons. < 3

Boulders, pho, and self-improvement

Alabama Sky.

Oh, my gosh. It's been two weeks.

Life is getting hectic here in college land. Bouldering season is finally upon us, and so are midterms. And bills...always bills.

But I have gotten out a bit since my last post! Two weekends ago, we did indeed return to Horsepens, where we night bouldered, camped, and bouldered some more in a big happy group. After a long — long — battle with the Panty Shields (V3) topout, I finally sent it. It was one of those "I'll try it just one more time, but it probably won't happen, but I'll kick myself if I don't" kind of successes after three sessions and many frustration tears. And it finally went!

We also got on a really cool V3 called The Thespian. The beta is straightforward for some folks (watch this guy do it at 1:44 — just nope. NOPE.), but between Caroline, Lucy, Elaine and me, some heelhookey, toejammy, footmatchey madness occurred. I can't wait to get the last move on this one — by the time we returned to it at day's end, my skin was, well, not.

Some other fun/weird climbs attacked by our crew included Bum Boy (V3), Millipede (V5), Hammerhead (V5), and Lowdown (V4).  I'm reluctant to attribute sends to specific people since it's been so long and my memory is not the greatest, but I'm ~*~pretty~*~ sure Elaine sent The Thespian, Lucy sent Bum Boy, and Evan and Nick sent Hammerhead. Caroline got her longstanding V2 proj, The Stranger, too (!), and I just remember Remi being tall.

So tall. So low.

I didn't get tons of photos like I said I would, but I did get a few pretty shots with my new Samsung Galaxy S5 Active (*which I love*):

Evan bein' burly on Hammerhead.

Lucy bein'...really good at climbing...on Bum Boy.

#nofilter!

So that was fun. And then this past Sunday, folks wanted to go to LRC, but it rained there, so we (Evan, Nick, Thomas, Lucy, and I) went to Mount Yonah for a pre-pour halfday instead.

I didn't get any pictures.

Yonah is a granitey ouchfest located near Cleveland, Ga. It's better than Shaking Rock but bereft of Horsepen's boulder magic. It does have routes, though. And it's only about an hour from Athens, so it's the place to go when you don't have all day to climb.

But let's be honest. We hardly climbed. We took forEVer to leave Athens after a groggy Kroger meetup and an impromptu stop at Dunkin' Donuts (they didn't have peanut butter for their bagels! Is that not a staple among bagel condiments? But Thomas shared his almond butter <3 #magnanimous). It was a nice relaxed morning — one of those days when you warm up for 10 minutes, chat for 15, move to another boulder, chat for another 15... it was great. We spent a few hours bouldering, but I really didn't have it in me after an exhausting week of being a stressed-out, sleep-deprived, future-fearing college student. Lucy flashed a V4 (crusher!), which I don't know the name of, and that's the only thing I really worked. I got every move except the first one, which is a sit start (ugh) to a pretty-good hold that I just couldn't make myself grab onto because I hate pain and it was pebbly which means potentially hurt-y and why am I a climber again?

Other than that, I just goofed around on juggy things and kinda-sorta practiced mantling on tiny boulders. I don't even know what the others were working on outside of my little sleepy-eyed world. I believe the Yonah triumvirate was worked, maybe, I dunno, I was staring at a caterpillar. I took a nap kind of, and something stung my butt. I was just not feeling the whole climbing thing. Also, I didn't bring any food.

So imagine my euphoria when we left mid-afternoon (it never rained) and ate delicious Vietnamese food at a restaurant with a decidedly Vietnamese name! (Hint: it was great.) And then we were gonna go to Stone Summit to try on shoes, but Google was wrong and they close at 5 on Sundays, so we tried on shoes at REI instead. Which was almost as awesome because Athens doesn't have an REI and it is an amazing place, like an adventure Walmart but prettier. So like an adventure Target.

And then we went to this Chinese bakery, and it was super cute, and I couldn't eat anything, but here is a photo of a mooncake:

And we were all home by 9 o' clock.

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Also, here is the ice cream I had for second breakfast yesterday:

Recipe: Slice bananas. Freeze them. Blend, with a little vegan milk if your blender is terrible or you're a soft-serve person. Sprinkle on buckwheat for crunch and class. Cocoa powder optional (as all things are).

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And I still haven't explained the end of my no-poo adventure.  Basically, I went at it for a few months with vinegar and baking soda, and my hair definitely luxed up as I freed it from the effects of chemical shampoos. It kind of "transitioned" to being not-disgusting, but I am just too active — and Georgia is just too humid — for me to maintain the twice-a-week routine. It never smelled bad or anything, but whenever I had a rinse-only day, it dried pretty flat and just didn't look good. And if I didn't scrub really hard in every spot with the baking soda, it was not gonna look clean either. I dunno, maybe that's health.

I will say, though, that the first wash after three months without shampoo left it looking the best it ever has. Seriously. It was full and shiny and beautiful until I put a cap on it and went to work for eight hours. But since then, it has never looked quite as awesome. I am back to whatever was sitting in my bathroom at home-home for now, and I'm hoping to make some sort of natural shampoo and conditioner once I get some time slash money. Then again, it's getting cool, so I might be able to pull it off now. There is a gallon of vinegar in my bathroom cabinet...

Additionally, I have casually taken up doing yoga with Adriene in the comfort of my sister's bedroom. I do it in there because mine is too messy. But I'm working on that, because I hope that organized surroundings will give me a sense of control over my mental chaos. That's part of why I'm doing yoga; although I know it will help me gain balance and flexibility for climbing, the real draw for me is its emphasis on internal wellbeing. I feel a bit conflicted about it because of the culturally appropriative aspects of Western interpretations of yoga, but after reading/listening to multiple qualified parties' thoughts on the issue, I think I can practice it while maintaining respect for the religion and culture from whence it came.

And I recently began reading 9 Out of 10 Climbers Make the Same Mistakes by Dave MacLeod. Evan insists that it will make me a better climber, and the first 50 pages have already prompted me to change my mental game. I will elaborate, you know, eventually, but for now I leave you with these words, which I am trying to keep as my longwinded training sort-of mantra:

"The ideal attitude is that failure is an absolutely integral and central part of any worthwhile endeavor...Failure can and should be relished as a psychological tool to motivate, a practical source of essential feedback for those who don't have a coach and even the spice that makes eventual success taste so sweet when it finally comes."