Fat Knacker

Quick round up of the last few days.

Climbingworks on Wednesday and a new circuit - managed 36 out of the 40 problems but I was climbing like a fat knacker to say the least. Vertical problems and slabs were OK most of the time - I managed to flash most of those but when the steepness kicked in I was a dead man walking. Flipper on the other hand flashed 38 of them and the other two he was done for by reach related issues as usual. Still it's a very good circuit all in all - technical and featuring nice movement and as an added bonus the Fiendometer quotient (flange to climber ratio) was in the high 8's - it was like your very own DFBWGC wall.

Spent yesterday blowing fuses at a rapid rate of knots trying to wire up the interior lights in pROJECT mAYHEM. Hopefully this is now going to be an issue of the past after a brainwave this morning caused me to wonder why I was so stupid in the first place to think that the way I was doing it would ever work. The new theory also makes sense in my head whereas the old one didn't - a classic scenario of being too close to something to see the obvious errors in the plan really. The best I can liken it to is someone pointing out the obvious beta to a problem that you have been sieging for ages. In retrospect it all seems so obvious but at the time you just get obsessed with a duff sequence that you think must work and it is your own failings that mean it isn't happening. All I need now is to rewire the switch and get some more fuses to test the revised plan.

Following on from that I went to see Kick Ass - a fucking excellent movie that will become a cult classic. Snappy dialogue, a great script and some really funny moments - go and see it.

Stuff, stuff and more stuff.

The weather actually turned out half decent yesterday afternoon so I got cracking on pROJECT mAYHEM for a while. Finished off the wiring looms and got those cable tied in so they are ready to be run down the B pillar when we eventually get a couple of consecutive days worth of decent weather whenever that will be. Also stripped out the reversing camera and painted the hole where the camera goes with a couple of coats of Hammerite to make sure that any idea of rusting is stopped in its tracks.

After that I got side tracked with a stereo wiring issue on some kids car. It has been a while since I saw a wiring job done with such a lack of skill - it was a classic example of letting a monkey do something that they have the minimal knowledge required to get the end result. Honestly the Albanian Rat Hound could have done a better job of it. As if the god awful state of the wiring wasn't enough as final insult to everything the radio had blown a fuse. The usual thing to do in this situation is to buy a new fuse and trying to figure out why it blew in the first place but the Johnny Cock-Shaft option was to wrap the fuse with a strip of copper wire! Fucking monkeys!! From what I can tell this prize piece of engineering has resulted in the live running to the radio burning out so I sent him off to buy a new fuse for the radio and an in-line fuse as I am going to have to run a new live feed in and there is no way that it is going in without some sort of safety mechanism in place. Thankfully the rain saved me from having any further dealings with it yesterday but assuming that the whole thing doesn't catch fire first it will have to be looked at soon. I can see that I will also end up sorting out his sub which has been wired in with a similar skill level from the brief look I had yesterday - expect some more prime ranting when I get round to dealing with that!

After getting away from that it was off to a really quiet Climbingworks with the Flipper - excellent session all round and contrary to expectation I flashed another CWIF problem which I was rather pleased about - probably 6a+ or really soft 6b but still got it sent first go. Did a load of other stuff - if it looked good we tried it and even though we didn't seem to be pushing it that hard I was ragged after two hours. My tips felt like they were on fire which was probably a result of trying a particularly savage CWIF problem featuring an overhanging arête and ridiculously small holds - bloody brutal and equally brilliant at the same time. One thing I can tell is that I am getting some raw power back again and what I consider to be a base level problem is going up all the time - something that I would have expected to take three or fours goes a fortnight ago I now think I should flash. The one area that's proving to be a big weakness at the minute is pulling hard on small holds (half digit sized) - I can hold them fine but just can not do anything with them which is frustrating. Anyway it will come soon I hope but I suspect that it won't be before next Wednesday...

Minimal Progress

Got a bit done on pROJECT mAYHEM yesterday and was hoping for good things from the weather today but it seems to be mainly intermittent hail showers at the minute which is not good. Still one must persist so I am going to try and finish off a few small tasks in between the showers and then off to the Climbingworks tonight with Flipper and Twitter. Maybe I will flash another one of the CWIF qualifying problems though I suspect that in reality I found the one soft problem in the entire circuit and flailed up it manfully because every other problem I tried gave a whole new meaning to the expression "hard as nails".

More 'works related stuff

Went to the Climbingworks with Flipper and met my mate Duncan (another Duncan, not the Broken Beagle) down there. Was feeling a bit trashed after a very frustrating day sorting out the roof panel on pROJECT mAYHEM but after a few easy problems had been dispatched it was time to get on it. Did a few Black problems, some of which I had done before and some I hadn't and threw in a few Purples, Purple and Pink Spots and Reds to really work things out. All in all it was an hour and a half of relentless pulling hard and did I know about it today - I am officially trashed. Didn't bother with the campus board as that would just have been a bridge too far - getting 20 press-ups done at the end of the session near killed me as it was.

Anyway hopefully either the Black circuit or the Purple will get changed soon - the Black has been up since before Christmas and it really starting to show its age but the Purple is in as bad if not worse state. The Purple circuit is probably at the upper end of my limit but the few problems that I have done are really good - loads of slopers requiring a lot of shoulder power and a fair degree of core strength and technique as well. The problem is that it the almost unanimously slopey holds (which is half of the reason why it is so good in the first place) are now caked in multiple layers of chalk and grime. Sure they could be brushed but one suspects that it would be a full on work out just to clean half of the holds on half of the problems. Come on you Climbingworks chaps, get to it and give us some nice new circuits at our level to play on!

Bringing out the A-Game

Saturday night featured copious amounts of beer, vodka and Red Bull before finally culminating in revisiting the Leadmill and then getting in sometime around 2.30AM armed with a greasy kebab and fries.

Given this bringing out the A-Game was never going to be much of an option when I finally joined Flipper at the Climbingworks just before 3PM the following day. In all honesty there would be a necessity to add some more letters to the alphabet to describe the sorry state that was my game when I got there and this transferred directly to my feeble thrashings on the first few greens problems in an effort to warm up. From there it was on the the remaining black problems that hadn't been done the session before and things slowly started to improve - it wasn't a tour de force by any means but at least it wasn't a total waste of an afternoon. As an after thought I decided to have a quick campus and amazed myself by being able to do 1-3-5 on the second largest set of rungs and 1-4 on my left on the largest set. 1-4 on my right was not happening though - I could hit the rung but the extra inch or so to latch it wasn't happening but all in all I was pretty impressed given I a was a fat hungover knacker! Next time the mission is to have a go at the new red circuit, nail 1-4 on my right and then try 1-4-6 on both - ah the joys of being foolish!

Bury My Beagle At Bummers Knee.

Got out of work early last night and went to the works with the Flipper last night - turned out to be a good session all round for fat weak punters like us on the Black circuit. The black circuit has been up for ages now and still retains its brilliance but it is really bloody annoying when you are trying a problem that has had a random hold removed from it for reasons that a simpleton like me fails to understand. Why do it - surely the Climbingworks can afford more than one of every hold and not be forced to "steal" a hold from a good circuit for (I am guessing) the comp wall? Just don't do it!

Other than that managed almost half a circuit before I had to remove my climbing shoes which is great as it makes forgetting my shoes on the Wales trip and having to pay large for a new pair seem like a good plan in retrospect. Now getting them through the breaking in period and really happy with them - in fact I am so happy with them I am going to buy another pair when I can afford to which judging by the state of my bank account at the minute will be sometime after 2015.

Saw the Broken Beagle as well who was going to get an assessment from The Clinic chaps but the initial prognosis I heard was 6-8 weeks out of the game which is not good. It was obviously depressing for him as he wouldn't come down the Sheaf for a post climb pint afterwards - punter... ;-)

Edit: just got this update via the power of email about a mate who met us in the pub last night in a state that would be called merry by the extremely charitable:

"...what a mess. He stumbled around, set off home the wrong way, twatted around a bit more, fell into the kebab shop, and thats where I left him! I hastily set off up the hill not looking back. There were no bodies on the road this morning so presumably he got home."

Bless him...