Beacon

[ivan]

22 hours ago, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 70 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/35 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week a paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale their no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a batch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearably in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud

[ivan]

On 9/13/2019 at 8:35 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 70 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/35 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week a paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale their no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a batch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearably in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

Edited September 15, 2019 by ivan

[billcoe]

9 hours ago, ivan said:

9/14 - ... a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario -

 

 

HAHAHA !!!!! Lord thank you for the entertainment. May the Octomama of all laps soon be in your future. BTW, your hook is/was with Adam, hopefully you got it the other day.

[ivan]

On 9/14/2019 at 8:52 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 70 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/35 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week a paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale their no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a batch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearably in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

 

[ivan]

On 9/21/2019 at 10:26 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 70 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/35 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week a paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale their no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a batch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearably in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

 

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

Edited September 25, 2019 by ivan

[ivan]

21 hours ago, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

 

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

Edited September 26, 2019 by ivan

[ivan]

On 9/25/2019 at 6:45 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

[ivan]

On 9/28/2019 at 10:56 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

[ivan]

23 hours ago, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

[ivan]

On 10/1/2019 at 8:39 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

[ivan]

On 10/2/2019 at 9:56 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy

[ivan]

19 hours ago, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

[ivan]

On 10/5/2019 at 7:39 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

[ivan]

On 10/6/2019 at 9:38 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

10/7 -day 43, laps 106-7 - 4 cbi's - an eerie evening, limp air, windless and quiet, the park almost entirely empty after the weekend crowds - clouds creep along the gorge walls - the trains slowly chug by the columbia's shores, the river this side of pierce island so low its reduced to a stagnant swamp - rain upon the way, thank dog, i'm sore n' whooped and could use a good lie down for a couple days...

[ivan]

On 10/7/2019 at 10:46 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

10/7 -day 43, laps 106-7 - 4 cbi's - an eerie evening, limp air, windless and quiet, the park almost entirely empty after the weekend crowds - clouds creep along the gorge walls - the trains slowly chug by the columbia's shores, the river this side of pierce island so low its reduced to a stagnant swamp - rain upon the way, thank dog, i'm sore n' whooped and could use a good lie down for a couple days...

10/9 - day 44, lap 108-9 - fall moves further and subdues the fervor of the season that preceded it - wicked work until the sun was perilously low in the western sky but undeterred shot east-wards w/o question once the querulousness of tomorrow was at least clearly defined - dave post dump n' prior to my own, once in sequence we shuffled down the still sodden trail and achieved the base in the brisk yet damp air - a first lamp by the long way we felt another in order, and soon enough it was 2, a couple copper-ales to cement it all - groceries on the gambol home n' soon enough it'll be tomorrow and the three day what-have-you

[Rad]

I feel like we are watching Groundhog Day for Beowulf, who sets out each day to slay the dragon, returns in drunken triumph each night, and in a curious and cruel twist, each morning wakes to learn that the dreaded dragon yet lives, and the epic battle must be fought all over again. The cycle must repeat until our hero finally learns that the dragon is not his true nemesis, the battle is not the real battle, and victory, it seems, is simply the act of getting out of bed each day, drawing in a lungful of clean air, and yet feeling the beating of his heart, a metronome in flesh and bone, counting the seconds to his eventual death.

[billcoe]

6 hours ago, Rad said:

I feel like we are watching Groundhog Day for Beowulf, who sets out each day to slay the dragon, returns in drunken triumph each night, and in a curious and cruel twist, each morning wakes to learn that the dreaded dragon yet lives, and the epic battle must be fought all over again. The cycle must repeat until our hero finally learns that the dragon is not his true nemesis, the battle is not the real battle, and victory, it seems, is simply the act of getting out of bed each day, drawing in a lungful of clean air, and yet feeling the beating of his heart, a metronome in flesh and bone, counting the seconds to his eventual death.

Wow! A brilliant and erudite analysis Rad. I was checking in to see where the man was yesterday, Ujahn, Ryan and I had it to ourselves all day.

[ivan]

13 hours ago, Rad said:

I feel like we are watching Groundhog Day for Beowulf, who sets out each day to slay the dragon, returns in drunken triumph each night, and in a curious and cruel twist, each morning wakes to learn that the dreaded dragon yet lives, and the epic battle must be fought all over again. The cycle must repeat until our hero finally learns that the dragon is not his true nemesis, the battle is not the real battle, and victory, it seems, is simply the act of getting out of bed each day, drawing in a lungful of clean air, and yet feeling the beating of his heart, a metronome in flesh and bone, counting the seconds to his eventual death.

does this mean i can quit now?!?

[Rad]

1 hour ago, ivan said:

does this mean i can quit now?!?

Beowulf said, "Let whoever can win glory before death."

[ivan]

On 10/9/2019 at 9:13 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

10/7 -day 43, laps 106-7 - 4 cbi's - an eerie evening, limp air, windless and quiet, the park almost entirely empty after the weekend crowds - clouds creep along the gorge walls - the trains slowly chug by the columbia's shores, the river this side of pierce island so low its reduced to a stagnant swamp - rain upon the way, thank dog, i'm sore n' whooped and could use a good lie down for a couple days...

10/9 - day 44, lap 108-9 - fall moves further and subdues the fervor of the season that preceded it - wicked work until the sun was perilously low in the western sky but undeterred shot east-wards w/o question once the querulousness of tomorrow was at least clearly defined - dave post dump n' prior to my own, once in sequence we shuffled down the still sodden trail and achieved the base in the brisk yet damp air - a first lap by the long way we felt another in order, and soon enough it was 2, a couple copper-ales to cement it all - groceries on the gambol home n' soon enough it'll be tomorrow and the three day what-have-you

10/10 - day 45, lap 110 - the poo-dragon strikes back - i dearly detest a fecaphile, so say wave off if you're of the same sentiment and read no further - no time to spare, scooped up the boy-child at school and shot out west to lake vancouver n' then turned my head t'other direction, pounding down amber ale n' changing into my war-gear as the wind beat ever greater upon the windshield - not a second to spare w/o leaving my progeny in limbo, i hit the lot with clear purpose upon my mind, dressed and ready to set out - still, something weren't right on my southern-end, and with the bitter-memory of getting way-laid by the poop-demon on the trail down in the past, i sprinted privy-wise to dispense meself of that ignominious necessity - i'll spare ye the details, but 10 minutes later i was mostly naked and afraid and goddamned if i weren't gonna make the lap happen despite the worst a shit-devil might  distress me with - in turgid winds and already desperately late, i surged skywards alone and don't remember a damn bit other than off-colored blood splotches all over the place come the top of pitch 2 - mostly went well from there on out, w/ a solid birthday snitzel to settle my belly on the other side

[Dennis H]

On ‎10‎/‎10‎/‎2019 at 10:19 PM, ivan said:

10/10 - day 45, lap 110 - the poo-dragon strikes back - i dearly detest a fecaphile, so say wave off if you're of the same sentiment and read no further - no time to spare, scooped up the boy-child at school and shot out west to lake vancouver n' then turned my head t'other direction, pounding down amber ale n' changing into my war-gear as the wind beat ever greater upon the windshield - not a second to spare w/o leaving my progeny in limbo, i hit the lot with clear purpose upon my mind, dressed and ready to set out - still, something weren't right on my southern-end, and with the bitter-memory of getting way-laid by the poop-demon on the trail down in the past, i sprinted privy-wise to dispense meself of that ignominious necessity - i'll spare ye the details, but 10 minutes later i was mostly naked and afraid and goddamned if i weren't gonna make the lap happen despite the worst a shit-devil might  distress me with - in turgid winds and already desperately late, i surged skywards alone and don't remember a damn bit other than off-colored blood splotches all over the place come the top of pitch 2 - mostly went well from there on out, w/ a solid birthday snitzel to settle my belly on the other side

 

[Dennis H]

After all your solo trips up the SE corner route try too make it more interesting reading . Try wearing a blind fold !!!!   

Edited October 12, 2019 by Dennis H

[ivan]

On 10/10/2019 at 10:19 PM, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

10/7 -day 43, laps 106-7 - 4 cbi's - an eerie evening, limp air, windless and quiet, the park almost entirely empty after the weekend crowds - clouds creep along the gorge walls - the trains slowly chug by the columbia's shores, the river this side of pierce island so low its reduced to a stagnant swamp - rain upon the way, thank dog, i'm sore n' whooped and could use a good lie down for a couple days...

10/9 - day 44, lap 108-9 - fall moves further and subdues the fervor of the season that preceded it - wicked work until the sun was perilously low in the western sky but undeterred shot east-wards w/o question once the querulousness of tomorrow was at least clearly defined - dave post dump n' prior to my own, once in sequence we shuffled down the still sodden trail and achieved the base in the brisk yet damp air - a first lap by the long way we felt another in order, and soon enough it was 2, a couple copper-ales to cement it all - groceries on the gambol home n' soon enough it'll be tomorrow and the three day what-have-you 

10/10 - day 45, lap 110 - the poo-dragon strikes back - i dearly detest a fecaphile, so say wave off if you're of the same sentiment and read no further - no time to spare, scooped up the boy-child at school and shot out west to lake vancouver n' then turned my head t'other direction, pounding down amber ale n' changing into my war-gear as the wind beat ever greater upon the windshield - not a second to spare w/o leaving my progeny in limbo, i hit the lot with clear purpose upon my mind, dressed and ready to set out - still, something weren't right on my southern-end, and with the bitter-memory of getting way-laid by the poop-demon on the trail down in the past, i sprinted privy-wise to dispense meself of that ignominious necessity - i'll spare ye the details, but 10 minutes later i was mostly naked and afraid and goddamned if i weren't gonna make the lap happen despite the worst a shit-devil might  distress me with - in turgid winds and already desperately late, i surged skywards alone and don't remember a damn bit other than off-colored blood splotches all over the place come the top of pitch 2 - mostly went well from there on out, w/ a solid birthday snitzel to settle my belly on the other side

10/14 - day 46, laps 111-112 - 3 days at smiff for a mega-dose of nostalgia with big-name old cc.raytards out in the frosty coyote den of skull-fuck-me hollow - abraxas with ben and unholy hordes of sport-climbers and their babies, dogs, drones, etc at the base of the monument, us poised up the wall dumb-founded by just what a decade of progress has done to a place that used to be worth the long drive - i got the tombstone crack lead as evening loomed large and the clouds came in portending a late night downpour - a crowd by the fire n' a fire-sale on cut-rate pork, layton n' britne n' chief apparently deprived of power back home so pushing their once-frozen meats on everybody in sight - talk of bygone days and nostalgia it's been said is the thief of joy so enjoy it judiciously when you dabble - the full shit-show sunday and in the end all i really wanted was to see the place in the rearview mirror n' binge on burgundy n' bullshit w/ ben - a deadline for grade conferences bright and early monday morning meant a good bit of misery upon returning home but it got managed - the day dispensed, a pair of corner laps in the shade was my salvation before coffeeing up to make the long crawl back to catch the tail end of crew practice... 

[tanstaafl]

9 hours ago, ivan said:

unholy hordes of sport-climbers and their babies, dogs, drones, etc at the base of the monument, us poised up the wall dumb-founded by just what a decade of progress has done to a place that used to be worth the long drive

You said it ivan.  Good to see everybody though!

[ivan]

21 hours ago, ivan said:

2018 saw 60 solo laps, a # beyond imagination, but possible by a weird combination of prime weather and a personal calendar no me gusta 

7/20/19 - south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 60 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/30 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total 

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles 

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week in paradise it would seem... 

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale there's no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a patch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearable in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things 

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?  

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not?  we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long  - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory 

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not 

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it 

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns 

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well 

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation 

8/24 - day 19 - laps 41, 42 n' 43 meant it was a douglas adams day (shamefully i must admit i forget my towel, but proudly i can say i did not panic) - 3 days in the alpine lakes wilderness didn't beat me down enough i guess, 'cuz the girl-child asked to get carted out to skamania for the afternoon to cavort w/ her polish friends and i rallied to run laps while letting her have her what-have-you - summer is doomed and so are you 

8/25 - day 20 - laps 44-45 - 11 CBIs n' 13 runs (new stats, to keep things fun n' make a game of the mundane - every meat-popsicle lapped is a Climber Batted In - runs are laps plus CBIs - good lord, the record couldn't be higher than 50 runs in a day could it?) - the coast guard earns its gold from yuppie scum along the banks of the rude columbia - nastia n' her main-squeeze set to scramble up blown-out in the blistering shade under the heavy hail of tourist stone, our beers n' smokes n' smalltalk cut savage short - the experiment to substitute a cordelette in lieu of a bolted anchor at the top an abject failure within 24 hours, though kinda an apollo 13 one since i got the cord returned as requested - 2 cruiser laps in the autumnally-building breeze with the crowds abounding, summer's done been set on a goddamn gibbet  

8/26 - blackjack day - laps 46-7 make me prime again - 4 CBIs for 6 runs - a soft slumber ended in the gentlest fashion - the damned dentist - the dmv denied - summer slams into the brickwall while i straighten out the classroom - a big breeze builds as we stumble eastwards - the first lap looms into the time-traveler and his canadian dame, well over her head on the second pitch, so i stayed to help her suss out the sitch and sacrificed a hat trick - beers and the inevitable bullshiting - the world careens and carries us along in its endless crapulous fucking fashion 

8/27 - summer beacon day double-deuce - laps 48-9 make me prime n' prone to wine - 96 degrees n' a big-breeze in the parking lot - the first day back to the what-have-you and the bullshite-factory appears to have been working overtime in my absence - cryptic runes n' rude cynosures, thank-fuck their clutches are so fleeting - a lap alone in the wild wind, and then another, all to seek and find the freek

8/28 - day 23, laps 50-51 - another hot day, minus the breeze - the mechanisms continue to rumble up to speed on the work machine, the corporate speak as thick as cancer but only half as deadly - hit beacon in a hurry w/ familialial functions to attend to in the soon-time  - 26 minutes car to car on the first lap, but a bit more mellow on the second - a curtailed conversation on retro-bolting an anchor on the corner down in the parking lot, sadly one that seems to have concluded with them deciding to add yet another scar to the recently patched rock in question - i guess we'll see if they go through with it... - lovely thai dinner after back-to-school night at least and so it goes and goes 

8/29 - day 24, laps 52-53 - awoke to the crack of thunder and the cold iron sound of roiling rain in the early hours - such wondrous slumber in a dry place, the wicked world just an open window away - the final pre-season day before the Big Show, the crest of bullshit surmounted and now we ride the flood tide to a preternatural future, knowing what is to come merely from a fleeting look back  - work over, i walked out the door to doom-streaked clouds and rain but bounded east on enthusiasm alone, sure that the universe intended me to climb today or never again at all and not caring which it was to be - the deep funk of strange humidity on the trail down - mama deer and baby deer surprised me at close quarters on the trail and gave me a sudden sharp stab of quicksilver-fear, a sensation too rarely felt in this saccharine world where tomorrow is always assured and death is a landlord easily dispensed with - new friends re-encountered on the warrior path, lovely souls i'll never see again and that's a shame - ruminations atop the ridgeline, soaked in sweat and soon to get heading west, tower-bound yet pleasantly besotted with the present...surely someday this will all make sense? 

8/30 - 7 days in a row at the fabulous beacon-wand summer-sweet spot makes it 25 total so far - corner laps 54-56, plus 11 CBIs for 14 runs on the day, the greatest since gestating the concept - the final friday before the big plunge - easy rising - dishes n' breakfast - the grey-gloom of many summer mornings that inevitably yields to glory soon after noon - adam's afterwards in the shade and breeze was total bliss - felt a bit frazzled n' forlorn before the end of the laps really, maybe a sign i need to sit my ass down for a few days, which would make some sorta sense i reckon given i can't remember a day i devoted to just lying around for a long while - that said it's a tower rock approach n' set-up tomorrow w/ a huge sunday afterwards, so maybe labor day will equal its lamentations and i'll rest then? 

9/3 - day 26 - 1 lap (#57), 2 CBIs - opening day of the 19-20 campaign, the 22nd of my career - old enough now that i'm teaching my daughter's friends, apparently she talks to them so i can actually find out some things about her from them  - only time for one lap before fetching the boy-child from crewing out there on the big lake - for the best really, i'm wicked whooped still from the trial of tower rock

9/4 - day 27 - lap 58 n' 2 CBIs -bill n' ujhan n' the prodigal-son-come-home adam in the parking lot - bill scooped up my dropped hook from tower rock's base yesterday along w/ plenty of other debris left over from my fellow floggers, yet he nay managed to bring it with him (no matter, we know he's good for it) - chris b' n company coming down from the party ledge, near the 2 year anniversary i reckon since i first made his acquaintance, busted badly at the base w/ nastia in the soon-time after the big burn had scorched damn near everything in site - shoulda stuffed in one more lap for sure, but its early school season still and it takes the zap oughta me working for the man, so i slunk back home for salmon n' spades w/ the fam n' an early turn-in

9/6 - day 28 - laps 59-60, plus 6 CBI's for 8 runs - with 6 prime-bacon-wedder-weeks to go, i'm plumb astride last year's all-time record w/ nothing to hold me back but random rain n' the rude restrictions of this love-shackled life - end of a week left me blinking n' bruised n' senselessly tired, thus the start of a third too terrible to comprehend, so home i crawled n' passed out in the midst of pizza n' bill maher, wine-cup perched on chest - clearly this world needs a li'l leg room 

9/7 - day 29 (5 CBIs for 6 runs) - roger morris reclamation day w/ lap 61 i say, my personal best n' for all i can imagine beacon's too, at least for a single year of solo laps - on the horn early w/ adam but we thought it fucked yet somehow separately we crawled to the wall n' didn't say shit when we saw each other, me 'specially w/ only a few minutes of fucking-around time cooked into the cookie - a three-some at tree ledge, the poor sheila below certain she had to do the hard-core-headwall - kincaid n' norman n' the normal nattering high above the hills, me nut-booby n' stupid - could it be that this is it for the simple set?  

9/12 - day 30 - laps 62-63 n' 11 CBIs for 13 runs - the soon-come cloud-bursts of baleful fall crashed down last sunday, tornadoes sweeping the neighbors with their gin n' juice to the middle of the street to natter over armageddon on the wing - 2 days of swimming for my daily-fun 'cuz ducks don't care if its damp out, but it just ain't the same, my soul shackled a wee bit to the corpse of coming winter - a sudden return to summer this morning though revivified my resolutions and at 330 out the door i went - the one-true-kevbone n' arent on the warrior - steve on my tail a few minutes behind, sounds like he lassoed himself a solo golden sombrero today, not too often i get out-cornered... a whole herd of folks suddenly come tree ledge, i cruised on through though on a ninja-mission to score another lap n' bounce back right quick to fetch the crewing feller from lake vancouver's teeming shore - the cherry on top the new-finangled high-tech contraption i plucked from the most obscure of places - my biiiiirthday prezent came early this year 

near-harvest-time-full-moon friday 13, day 31 - hops 64-65 - 6 CBIs for 8 runs, so sad... - 5% of the year in the can we crawl up n' encounter such lovely things - adam n' steve rooting around on rookie nookie - herds higher up - the sigh of september sidling away with wind n' cloud 

9/14 - beacon day 32 since the summer broke open - a Big Day - laps 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 (respectively referred to as the single, double, hat trick, reverse golden sombrero, reverse platinum sombrero, farmer's daughter, and El Cap laps - next will be the shelob's sugar-titties, the nirvana of nazguls, the elizabeth hurley and then the alexandra daddario - after that might need to go back to the well for some creativity, but i've found the increasing adlemindness that accompanies each lap is wicked good in that regard) - unconscious by nine the night before, i still didn't manage to rouse out at 4 a.m. like i'd thunk of a few weeks earlier before the weather got all weird, but woke instead w/ the first twinges of a back-to-school head-cold at 7 and settled for bacon n' eggs n' coffee n' kombucha n' rewatching the bill maher i'd slumbered through earlier, yet somehow still remembered the odd line of - beacon by 10 though, and 8:59:37 later completed the 7th lap, putting me just one shy of tying barry bonds record (sure, he was on the juice, but i doubt i'd pass muster w/ the ioc either at the moment, so will say no more on the matter n' just motor on through 2 more laps n' claim the record fair n' square ) - a kaleidoscope of climbers, some nimble, some not, some titillating, some hawt - 37 (!) cbi's, for a total of 44(!) runs on the day - coulda squeezed more in for certain but spent a few hours sucking down cervezas n' nattering n' guffawing with ole adam keller, a goddamn old man now n' camas grad from the year five, when the world was young n' my gut was tighter...thinking there's at least one more big day left in me before this season siddles over the hill n' my body fails me and out goes the will 

9/21 - the Elizabeth Hurley sequence - 33rd outing since i sauntered back from carefree-cali a short-summer ago  - laps 73-82 (hoooooleeeee shiiiite-muslims batman, the century-mark ain't inconceivable) - my most laps in a day (n' seasonal record for sure), but still 2 shy of pink's legendary send in the by-gone days of yore (plus we hear-tell from jimbo at a remove of some feller named george back in the eon of lbj n' nixon doing more than that firfuksake) - 11:00:26 car to final top-out, a fine clip i feel - did the Farmer's Daughter all alone, then steve lashed me along for the final 4 (through the el cap, sheelob's sugar-titties, nirvana of nazgul n' aforementioned ms. hurley laps respectively) - early to bed after still plenty of wine the night before, still a hunk of hang-over at 4:30 when the siren called - snooze-tag until 5 then up soon thereafter to make the bacon n' eggs n' tea n' coffee n' avocado toast n' berry bowl to see us through most of the what-have-you - a 99% ying n' just 1% yang day but that fatal percent of darkness came early on when at 7:25 a.m., a few feet shy of the railing of uprising, i felt an electric pain permeating my dawn-addled senses n' looked down n' saw the yellow jacket furiously pumping his poison packet into the tender meat of my poor perspiring calf - nonplussed, i accepted ma-nature's censure at having eschewed the original finish n' proceeded well-advised thereafter - at least 2 laps left in my tank afterwards n' the daylight too but i left-them unaccomplished, the alexandra daddario fo'shiz plus the as-yet unnamed #12 - adams n' some fire-side chats w/ dave but then slunk back west for chicken n' wine n' devil-sunday - the most-appropriate conclusion, morphine's "do not go quietly" to quell my swole-tide sense of manliness   

9/24 - day 34, lap 83 - the century mark heaves increasingly into view even as fell fall hies upon the land with its long shadows and its hint of impending death - a frustrating season what with ever accumulating meetings for this that and the other thing, our tps reports all ahoo it would appear - rain for days after the elizabeth hurley what-have-you on saturday, the trail down a sodden mess, me skating on the smooth soles of my crocs, clutching at brush n' carving the mud to keep upright - the rock just dry enough to allay concerns as i cast off in the half-dark of dusk after whiling away the late afternoon in fruitless house-hunting w/ the fam - all alone, not a soul on either side of the stone, just a cursed will tempered by the wind and whimper of the ebb-tide out on the dank columbia

9/25 - day 35, lap 84 - back to school night beyotch - with little leeway for screwing around, sizzled out east at sub-sonic speeds just as soon as the life could be mercilessly squeezed out of the final meeting of the afternoon - jim's old beater in the parking lot and i was crazy-bummed to realize i had exactly zero time for small talk w/ that scion of scoundrels n' sleazebags - him n' steve halfway down the trail n' a micro-holy-hell-and-howz-it-hanging-gold-olde-bullshit and then it was go-go-go - the stone alone i soared along like i had a social disease and soon enough began my dizzying descent - back in time for pizza and the dog-n-pony show for my wonderous patrons - 16 laps to immortality, it may just materialize?

9/28 - day 36, a slippery, sodden saturday hat-trick takes us to 87 laps on the season - the most disturbing of pre-dawn derangements, me awakening to a dream within a dream, a serpent-tongued seraph square above my head, trident in hand, threatening death - in horror i screamed "i'm julius caesar, goddammit!" and, seizing his hay-fork from his childish hands, i stabbed him bodily through and through, again and again, but die he would not, despite his demented and cruel cries to the contrary - mostly assured it was a dream, i set his bloody corpse in a car-seat and retired into the overlook hotel to boulder around the lobby, dimly aware of his mother's sudden intrusion, oddly aware this delusion insisted it must persist and just-maybe holy-jeebus it was for real?  opening my eyes i felt a shower was down-right in order and was strongly afeared it would bathe me in blood at the twist of the handle - that done with, i dispatched the school chores with coffee and kombucha by noon as the beacon-stone sizzled off the damp of days gone by - after 2 i sidled out east as a huge storm-cell to the south knocked the hell out of town in my absence - the street soaked with rain and a vast greyness to the north, beacon seemed a complete waste of time, a sense doubly-reinforced as i entered the parking lot to pregnant drops of sky -dew going pitter-patter upon the window - nearly ate shit on the trail to the base, passing steve-o running right-quick back up - alone, despite all signs to the contrary, the way seemed clear, so into the cloud-murk i ascended - 1 lap, then 2, then, with a storm assured in seconds, i raced up the third as wind and water began to wrack the wall with me still well below the railing - hell didn't want me and heaven was full, so with that firmly in mind i walked back down n' boogied n' boondoggled my way to adam's to jam with him n' dave n' steve n' suss over the awful options still ahead of us in the damp days to come 

9/30 - day 37, laps 88-90 (the pvt ryan's ruination, fight the power, and winston churchill memorial laps respectively) - the last day of september much like the first day of december - 50  degrees in the sun and a searching, probing, penetrating breeze rendering needless small-talk improbable - steve n' dave dithering at the base, disinterested in embracing the full energy of a late-fall feeling ascent -the first lap of the year in pants and hoodie, but no socks nor hobo-gloves necessary yet, so it's still the kinda casual season - the second lap improved by the addition of the thickest hat the floorboards of the government mule could procure - dave managed to muster his mojo after stepping out to fetch beers at skamania mart n' launched up his own lap as i nattered w/ steve in the parking lot, eventually parting ways to wobble my way up number three and the promise of cerveza in the cruel wind on ivan's ledge - the long shadows of fall laid all the way to bonneville, the beacon-wand gone ripe with age and the lazy sun - home in the dark, monday mostly debunked and september too...

10/1 - day 38, lap 91- infernal busy day, dilemmas w/o end - i'm afraid i may have spit the professional bit already and awful early in the season - it's also always just possible its fucking tuesday; when i'm dictator, it will be one of several things taken out and shot w/o discussion on day one - another breezy and shady afternoon, but nicer than yday -- steve n' dave becoming a rather regular crew - some older fellow in the parking lot talking about soloing the corner after not climbing anything in 8 years, and in his street shoes no less - didn't amount to nothing though  

10/2 - on day 39 the phil collins' triptych takes us to 94 laps on the season - a gunmetal sky settles cold upon the stone, but somehow it was still a good deal warmer than that brisk monday when a jacket and a hat were true necessities - 8 climbers batted in - the barges now freed from behind their concrete pens, down the columbia they go barrelling with the produce of our bursting hinterlands - a deep funk and gloom pervaded the zeitgeist, but then dave put in an appearance in the parking lot to wax philosophic and demonstrate his award-winning dance movies, with soon to be in zoot-suits too was the rumor, all good indeed when gestated over a can of gratis beer - 10 laps in 5 days, the augurs are grand for blazing past the century mark this coming weekend when the wedder forecast portends we'll be able to give the pillars of heaven a hella-good shake

10/4 - day 40 - the bill gates n' scott fischer memorial laps push us to 96 on the season - startled on a stormy friday, i set one foot out my trailer n' suddenly realized there was only one place for a sleazeball like meself, n' that was eerily out east - the great nick boam by the door of the dirty-dirty n' me too shit-gripped to make decent conversation - sorry i was oughta sorts old-boy, steve says the sweet-home boulders just a few miles east are better for you? the first lap was silly enough, but then it was dave n' conversational delights n' steve n' i were back for lap 2, expecting him to come along -  lap 2 and it grew dark and rainy and suddenly it was uprising or death, the rain pounding and its intentions clear - dave by the trail, under the overhangs we handled the storm, steve sidling off in the end - then it was daves n' me nearly getting fucking shot at doug's, me dangerously deranged and disoriented in the fog and storm - disco at the no-bo, morphine mo'like, but there's no putting a name to delights like that - bounding back in the dark all cock-eyed to fetch the boy in camas, then the friday-friday fantasy 

10/5 - day 41 - a reverse titanium sombrero encompassing laps 97-101 (the scott bedford, thomas jefferson and unpronounceable symbol's memorial laps respectively, plus the BEN FRANKLIN and SCREAMING EAGLE laps to carry us into 3-digit country, ladies and very bored gentlemen) - last night was a mind-bender deluxe and so i awoke at dawn with the stink of derangement heavy on my heathen senses - bacon n' hateful coffee - the streets still soaked by the dregs of last night great deluge, but promising enough given the gracious forecast for the next few days - beacon-ways we crawl, my mind chewing on the words of "rope on fire" over and endlessly over to the point i thought i might have to pull over and do SOMETHING to make it All Go Away - adam's and its still plenty wet out with plenty of clouds - steve then his buddy stan - coffee and collusion - the trail to the base the most consistently sketchy part of the whole - lap upon lap and the day just grew and grew more fulsome, the crowds endlessly flittering by (33 cbi's, 38 runs) - flat light goes to long shadows and meaning creeps into the season as the sinews tire and flesh slowly tears upon the textured stone - dave joins up on the last one and the circle is closed then broken to the tune of "cuntry boner" thanks to the long-ago received wisdom of lost-cam-kenny

10/6 - the douglas adams' day and a reverse golden-sombrero sunday-sunday-sunday takes it to 105 (24 cbi's or something in that neighborhood if my nattered senses were shot) - thai the night before n' walmart after 9 to get well and truly centered w/ the meth-heads all around-us - aslumber at midnight atop the couch and after 6 slinked upstairs for the top-shelf sleep, man it was sweet on both ends - a day of laps n' laffs n' being nutty all alone - dave drove it along on the back end n' we traded wine bottles n' rainier beers to seal the deal - ben n' asher n' geoff on the warrior in the blistering wind - the world can't end soon enough

10/7 -day 43, laps 106-7 - 4 cbi's - an eerie evening, limp air, windless and quiet, the park almost entirely empty after the weekend crowds - clouds creep along the gorge walls - the trains slowly chug by the columbia's shores, the river this side of pierce island so low its reduced to a stagnant swamp - rain upon the way, thank dog, i'm sore n' whooped and could use a good lie down for a couple days...

10/9 - day 44, lap 108-9 - fall moves further and subdues the fervor of the season that preceded it - wicked work until the sun was perilously low in the western sky but undeterred shot east-wards w/o question once the querulousness of tomorrow was at least clearly defined - dave post dump n' prior to my own, once in sequence we shuffled down the still sodden trail and achieved the base in the brisk yet damp air - a first lap by the long way we felt another in order, and soon enough it was 2, a couple copper-ales to cement it all - groceries on the gambol home n' soon enough it'll be tomorrow and the three day what-have-you 

10/10 - day 45, lap 110 - the poo-dragon strikes back - i dearly detest a fecaphile, so say wave off if you're of the same sentiment and read no further - no time to spare, scooped up the boy-child at school and shot out west to lake vancouver n' then turned my head t'other direction, pounding down amber ale n' changing into my war-gear as the wind beat ever greater upon the windshield - not a second to spare w/o leaving my progeny in limbo, i hit the lot with clear purpose upon my mind, dressed and ready to set out - still, something weren't right on my southern-end, and with the bitter-memory of getting way-laid by the poop-demon on the trail down in the past, i sprinted privy-wise to dispense meself of that ignominious necessity - i'll spare ye the details, but 10 minutes later i was mostly naked and afraid and goddamned if i weren't gonna make the lap happen despite the worst a shit-devil might  distress me with - in turgid winds and already desperately late, i surged skywards alone and don't remember a damn bit other than off-colored blood splotches all over the place come the top of pitch 2 - mostly went well from there on out, w/ a solid birthday snitzel to settle my belly on the other side 

10/14 - day 46, laps 111-112 - 3 days at smiff for a mega-dose of nostalgia with big-name old cc.raytards out in the frosty coyote den of skull-fuck-me hollow - abraxas with ben and unholy hordes of sport-climbers and their babies, dogs, drones, etc at the base of the monument, us poised up the wall dumb-founded by just what a decade of progress has done to a place that used to be worth the long drive - i got the tombstone crack lead as evening loomed large and the clouds came in portending a late night downpour - a crowd by the fire n' a fire-sale on cut-rate pork, layton n' britne n' chief apparently deprived of power back home so pushing their once-frozen meats on everybody in sight - talk of bygone days and nostalgia it's been said is the thief of joy so enjoy it judiciously when you dabble - the full shit-show sunday and in the end all i really wanted was to see the place in the rearview mirror n' binge on burgundy n' bullshit w/ ben - a deadline for grade conferences bright and early monday morning meant a good bit of misery upon returning home but it got managed - the day dispensed, a pair of corner laps in the shade was my salvation before coffeeing up to make the long crawl back to catch the tail end of crew practice... 

10/15 - day 47, laps 113-114 - limpid air, dull breeze, the gorge heavy with a big long soak coming in by midnight - an indifferent hour, this place don't give a fuck and never will, but sweet jeebus, they could at least keep the bathroom from seeping into the crick, right? the first pitch a lady-bug obstacle course these past 2 days - crazy bad karma if you squish one of those beeches, but the stink bugs on pitch 2 are more of a mind-fuck - blending in well w/ the grey stone, they do nothing till they sense you're near, then play dead, falling ballistically downwards from wherever they're perched softly upon you, potentially making a lesser man squeal like a baby despite their innocuousness and just let go out of simple stupidness - dave in the lot after the first lap  but his mojo done took a downturn after a few too many nights flying close to that blackhole sun and he eschewed the invite to accompany me on the 2nd - contemplated a third but the long shadows and the promise of free coffee at the skamania mart if i hurried n' brought my own cup called me home, so westwards i turned, tuning into the inanity of libturds tearing into each other on the debate stage to keep me awake along the way