The Motorola University

 I’ve been thinking about this Yosemite trip for the whole year, and I can finally say I’m on my way to the centre of the universe. Stay tuned for updates. 

Hamish’s new rig. Omg it’s so pretty. Sweet barn in Peterborough. In Ontario for Shelby’s grad! Eating well and watching the oilers lose. Since the injury I’ve been a walking enthusiast. This is from an evening stroll. J star and I on break at Sakura Mart Flexing for the camera (I can’t do a one armer) Eric PTRD (put the rig down) Deck beer with Isaac back in Comox I felt like I was on a tear for a little while. I had sent my sport climbing project, onsighted some routes in Skaha, and did another thing in a couple tries. Wow! I’m on such good form.  So there I was, running it out on the first 11a pitch of freeway. I made it past the bolt and the crux and charged up the corner. I got to a little stance, and fiddle an orange metolius cam in. I like that cam, and still do, despite the events that followed.  I knew the placement was no good. I felt a bit shaky as I took the cam out, and tried to wiggle it back in again. I couldn’t see it well in the corner, as I was laybacking. Th...

 Adventuring with Arlo     Our friend was leaving El Salto to make her way to Turkey for another climbing trip, so Arlo and I decided to use our rest day to head to town with her. The hitchhike down was smooth because we picked up a ride almost immediately. I did, however, get quite carsick on the ride down. Amanda showed us where the AAA bus stop was on the side of the highway, and how to get a ticket into the city. The bus was packed to the brim and hot like a sauna. I was deep in a mental battle with my stomach and luckily I won. Lunch was pretty good and we spent three hours in the contemporary art museum. I'm no art connoisseur, but while I thought some of it was beautiful, it was mostly strange and disturbing. We made a point to view all the exhibits. After filling up a haul bag full of groceries we said goodbye to Amanda and hopped on the bus back to  Santiago. Once at the base of the pass we stuck our thumbs out yet again and started walking up the hill. It t...

      The climbing destination known as El Salto is nestled in the Sierra Madre at 1400m above the city of Monterrey by a small town called La  Ciénega de González. I knew where it was  on the map. I was to find a cafe called "Hanuman" and they'd be able to give me directions to Ramon's place from there. A large storm in Texas delayed my flights out  of Vancouver. Naturally, they sent me to Seattle, short checked  my bag so I had to go out of security, and then continued to f@!k me by canceling my flight once again. Needless to say I now know the best sleeping spots in the Seattle  Airport. After a night of binging Squid Game and couple planes later I landed in Monterrey a full  day later than I planned. No matter, I was so psyched to arrive. Airport Bivy     I stayed in a cheap hotel near the airport that night and sorted out my plans for the following day.  A bus ride to a town called Santiago, at which point I would hitchhik...

I'm sitting waiting to board the plane in the airport and so in my effort to write more this year I thought I'd force out some crap just for the sake of upholding my promise to myself.    I've been staying with Holden in Vancouver the last two days in his little apartment. We went to the UBC "climbing gym" AKA "The Coop". He tells me to wait outside and walks in and hands his card to the lady at the desk. Five minutes later he's back out again and I meet him in the washroom. He slips me his gym card and I walked in the with confidence holding his gym card. She didn't bat an eye at the fact that there were two very different looking Holdens entering the gym within ten minutes of one-another. I felt stupid at my racing heart but I played it cool. We laughed later when Holden admitted he was nervous too. We would've looked like such punters getting caught sneaking me into the "climbing gym" for free. I use the quotations for a reason, ...

      As of the end of the Fall semester, my degree is complete save for one easy class I'll take this spring. All of my upper level math classes are complete. Whilst this feels like some relief, I do feel a bit sad because I know that unless I further my studies in math, I have essentially peaked academically. I worked quite hard this last semester, and now that it's over I know that the definitions and theorems which constructed the world I have been studying will begin to slip from my mind.     The most engaging course I took this fall (and in my degree) was Math 493: Topics in Pure Mathematics. The subject we focused on was commutative algebra. The course was roughly followed on text from Aaliyah-MacDonald, which was written to provide an introduction to commutative algebra for undergraduate/beginning graduates. This textbook is available free online for some light reading if one wishes to find it. In this course we studied what are called commutative r...

    Hello! I spent the better part of May in Europe, then half of June in Comox, and the rest of the summer in Squamish. I went through a few rolls of film so I'll just dump it all here and add some captions along the way! "The Blue Route"    Set by yours truly, this thing was my spring training project. Started working the route in January and finally sent the thing near the end of April. Such a great process.   Shenanigans Hamish working "Quote the Raven" Sophie on "Ari's Arete"     As the weather improved in April we found ourselves outside more frequently. Lots of great climbing on the island if you have a look around.     Come May, Sophie left for Europe and I left shortly after. My travels began with a nasty bout of food  poisoning courtesy of Air Canada's finest coleslaw. I never thought I'd be the poor soul throwing up uncontrollably on the airplane. test      My week in Dublin visiting my parents was followed by a...