Here's Phil and Kitty getting the climbing knot correct for their instructor for belay certification.  Turns out that Phil's an ex-sailor and is good with rope.  I won't be asking for Sally's confirmation on that, however. 

It's cool that they are getting certified, as I ended up getting a lot of practice belaying the group until Jo showed up.  It's nice to see everyone pulling their proverbial load.

It was also bad that Jo showed up, because that meant that I had to climb, and she wasn't letting me slack out of it.  She's a natural (and I believe was using stick'em on her hands) as she literally ran up the walls.  That's bad because it wasn't giving me much time to rest between climbs.   More of that in a minute.


Here's Beth, Mary, and Jo for a shot I asked them to take.  They had a good laugh on my account since I'm not sure they all knew each other.  Heck, I thought I was the "new" guy.  Maybe not so much anymore. 

Beth's obviously done this before as she made little effort climbing and Mary showed courage, having my affliction for high places. 

So Jo is going up these things like rungs on a ladder.   Maybe humble pie would taste better without all the chalk flying around as she runs up the pitch?  Seriously, she has exquisite balance, really nice technique.  I'll learn a lot from her.  Especially about my bum hanging too far out over the wall.  I didn't think it was all that big, but turns out it is truly a gluteus maximus when I'm climbing.  While I didn't get that quite right, I did understand about activating my legs much more instead of trying to pull up with my arms.  On one of my last runs, I got lazy, kind of reached and pulled up at the same time on a reasonable hold only to miss my grip and be jetisoned from the wall kind of like Jonah from the Whale (or for you agnostics, like a sunflower seed in a baseball dugout).  Jo was watching as I started to fall, so no worries, even though I outweigh her by about a metric ton.  That was my first really surprise fall and it got to me a bit, but it also taught me to balance and be in control with my legs, not the arms.  I fell, I learned.

At the end of the evening, my forearms just wouldn't calm down.  I had problems marking the sushi menu with a pencil.  I had issues carring a gallon of juice up in a bag in the elevator.   Typing up a blog was a moot point.  The great thing is if I can get better, I know they'll hurt even more next time!  Thinking about going Thursday night.  I should be there by 6 or 7p if you're game to come out!