Yesterday I went climbing for the first time out here! We drove about 30 mins and hiked up a near-vertical scree hill to get to the cliff. I was only able to do two climbs (one on lead and one on toprope) but it felt great to get back into it. I also learned this lesson: always bring warm layers and always bring a raincoat.
I don't have a raincoat.
Afterwards I smoked a doob with one of the guys I climbed with. At the end of the month he's taking off for Alaska for three months to be the cook on a fishing boat. Goddamn.
Now that I'm finally meeting some dudes my age, I'm beginning to feel more comfortable in this place. Much to be said for chillin' with people just as broke as you are.
In other news, I just finished 1984, and I finally have a word for the growing illiteracy of our culture! Newspeak! Everyone should read the book before it's too late. Uncommonly brilliant and perceptive, and its message is perhaps more pertinent today than it was even when Orwell wrote it. (And by the way, for anyone who thinks it's about the USSR and China--you're dead wrong. It's about the U.S.A.)
Much love.