The TV, which was constantly on in our room kept the books in our bags and our brains washed with shows like “What Would Jesus Really do?” “Locked Up: Extended Stay” and “Real O.C. Housewives”. Speaking of the Orange County, apparently Natasha’s dad lives in the neighborhood in which that show is filmed.

We made a couple visits to the local cinemas where we saw the town’s only attractive females that prompted quotes from my accomplice like “She’s no ten, but for Mesquite, I’d grill it.”

With the Winter solstice upon us, the sun would set at a premature time around 4:30. Even though we usually wouldn’t rush out the door in the morning, we, I, would rush to get on as many climbs at the cliff as time would allow.

On our rest days we would jog up to the Cathedral’s wailing wall, wishing it was ten degrees warmer so we could climb there. But instead we had the short and bouldery Black and Tan and Gorilla Cliffs to work with, and of course, the Gorge.

I used an extremely wet and humid day at the Black (pronounced Brack) and Tan to figure out a really neat project with Isaac Caldiero and Dave Graham. “Let the love Die…” At first the route seemed nearly impossible, just a series of almost un-usable holds with no real connection between. But after figuring out a really wide stem, a knee-bar and some tricky drop-knees and funky body positions, a sequence formulated to link all the cryptic moves together. It was like a little dog park that day with my friend’s two Blue Nosed Pits, Isaac’s dog Sage, Rob’s dog Sadie, and Lauren’s dog Pierre.

The next dry day, it was 35 degrees at the B and T, which would have been fine, without the 20MPH gusts of wind that seemed to pick up just as I was ready to climb. I had to employ some old tricks in between burns to stay warm including layering (duh), jogging around to keep the blood moving, staying hydrated (as always), wearing pants over my harness and performing the “Freeze-Thaw” technique, where you climb around the base of the cliff or fondle sharp crimps until your fingers freeze, then warm them up in your pockets to get the blood moving before you quickly get ready to climb. I also had to climb in shorts because I needed to wear a kneepad on my left leg. That made the experience slightly less comfortable when the gusts came. I sent the route my third time up it that day after a couple more attempts to sus beta. All said and done the route turned out to be really cool, with really nice moves between cool grips following an obvious feature. Short and sweet.

After one more day at the VRG, I was ready to bail. One night there was a Baileys Promotion at the Smiths, so we sipped a couple shots of the chocolaty liquor with the Baileys girls and they said they would send me a picture of my climbing partner and I posing with the younger girl and our drinks, but of course they never did. Sorry.