The week off

After a weekend of climbing at Echo Cliffs, then racing Sat & Sun, all while having some sort of flu, I foolishly went to the gym to work out on Monday. Not only that, I climbed with Julio in the lead cave, where I was creeping along the ceiling like a bat. So it's no surprise that I ended up with a booboo. It felt like a muscle spasm or cramp, on one side of my upper back. It didn't come on fast, like a cramp would, but rather as I cooled down I felt it congeal there. Then overnight I developed a twinge in my knee, like I'd over-extended it.

So I decided two sprained fingers, a wrist that won't go through its full range of motion, a spastic back and a twingey knee probably meant I should take the week off. In a way I think all these minor injuries are related: it started with the fingers, and I probably started favoring my other arm, exacerbating that wrist, then my handwork was weak, so I had to crank with my back more, and finally I have NO idea what happened to my knee. I've taken the week off and I've been doing very slow very deliberate yoga, which has helped tremendously, and icing things whenever it crosses my mind. Everything feels so much better now, and hopefully the antibiotics I was prescribed yesterday will clear up the bacterial sinus infection that followed the flu.

This is all in preparation for next week, when I get to climb with two -- two! at the same time! -- of my favorite people in the world: my regular partner, and Davide, a friend who sticks to the rock like a little froggy. DVD moved to France a couple months after he, Wil (my old housemate) and I got together in Feb. 2008 and decided to get serious about climbing. He's never climbed granite or cracks, so Ben and I are taking him to the Needles to do some multi-pitch crack climbing on excellent granite! I'm hoping the fingers will be well enough that I won't have to buddy-tape them, so that it's easier to place and clean gear. Ideally, I'd like to swing leads with Ben, and it'll be a lot easier if I have my full complement of five fingers on the right, instead of four. I'm so stoked!

Throwdown

I was looking over some routes in the Needles so I could send a friend some links and I came upon Igor Unchained. Holy crap! It's beautiful! So I fired off email to Ben:

- I want to be able to lead this by next spring.

In all likelihood I would be able to lead this now, but it would be in bad form and epic, and maybe a little dangerous. And the Needles have a very definite season during which they're both accessible and pleasant, so I can't say let's do it in 6 months. So, OK, let's be generous: next spring. And back came the reply:

- Saturday, May 1, 2010. It's on my calendar.
- Time to do some more laps at the gym.

Good partners rock the firmament! And it's been thrown down :-)

Too much work!

I'm sitting at work, writing, totally stressed about the fact that I may not have enough time to go climb tonight.

But I'm being sustained by the fact that climbing partner and I are headed to the Kernville Slabs, Voodoo and Demon Domes this weekend. It's spring in the Sierra!

An afterthought: wouldn't it be better if they were called Voodoo Child and Demon Lover Dome?

New toys

Excited about the upcoming trip to Indian Creek, UT, I went on ebay last night and ordered a set of 7 used rigid stem friends. Fingers crossed that they'll arrive before we leave for the trip.

In the meantime another couple highly anticipated pieces of gear have arrived: my Marmot cloudlight jacket, and my icebreaker 200 leggings. I've been wanting these for months!

Ben got a couple rigid friends on ebay as well, but, more importantly, he's managed to borrow what sounds like a veritable arsenal of cams. When I asked him how on earth we'd carry 500 lbs of gear to the cracks in IC, he replied something to the effect of that's why he loves me. Hah! He's got another thing coming!

Forgot to mention that I did my second lead at Crag full o' Dynamite a couple weeks ago. It wasn't The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (which I've toproped several times now), but rather the shorter, but, in my opinion, prettier route to the right of it. Left of Tuco and left of the super short one, I think. Anyway... Yesterday evening Ben and I went up to Fire Crag and I led the super easy 5.7 on the left. Two bolts. Sigh... Then I couldn't do the 5.10 that comes out of the cave to the right of the gully and left of Grib dat Hole. Double-sigh... My head wasn't in it. It was the most gorgeous sunset ever, though!

This weekend we're planning a trip to Bishop. We're going to try to stop at the Eureka Dunes for a day, or maybe overnight, and then head to Owen's River Gorge for some sport climbing. There's so much good stuff up there! I'm looking forward to hitting some hot springs, too!