Wet and Dry

As Nat is away this week and next the aim was to get out as much as possible and do very little work. However, next week I have a rather large progress meeting and this simply isn't possible. I'm starting to get very disillusioned with my studies as a lot of the time I feel I'm scratching around in the dust looking for something of novel interest. Add to this that I struggle to justify the increasing complexities of my models; they don't give better results (in fact they're arguably worse) and computationally they take much longer. Currently I have around 18 all queued up on various university accounts. Each one takes 160 hours on the grid computing system I have access to. Thats a lot, althought not as bad as an earlier one which took nigh on 28 days of iterations, night and day.
Due to this, I didn't leave the office until after 8 today and made it to the Foundry by about half past. A brief hello on the way in made me a few minutes later and by the time I'd finished re-filling chalk and lacing on my new pair of boots it wasn't that far off 9.
I hate time-pressured sessions in or out. There's so much risk that you either won't warm up enough, or you'll warm up too quickly and ruin what little time you have etc. Thankfully tonight I did none of these things and the session felt very like a good (dare I say it?) School session. The wave is a great wall, even to this day I've never come across a wall thats as good at introducing steep footwork and power in a realistic manner, granted the feet are always going to be a bit bigger than when out but its not bad is it?
Anyhow, I climbed well and with little rest. I felt powerful but more importantly I seemed to be moving well (which is a good feeling). I think there's something to this getting out lark?

Unfortunately something tonight really boiled my piss. Talking to someone whose name I really ought to know by now (I don't), the conversation drifted to Kilnsey and I made mention of the recent changes in condition seemingly overnight to which he laughed. He then made a fly-away comment about how 'his mate' had been bragging that he was going to post a false 'wet' conditions report. Now if this is the case I think its fairly off. People base their (treasured) weekends/evenings/days-off on the information supplied by freinds and the good people of UKB trusting them to be accurate with maybe a little pinch of salt thrown in for the needlessly pessimsitic (*cough*). To undermine this system in such a manner seems to me needlessly selfish, maybe it secured a quiet crag, maybe it was just for fun but personally I don't find it very funny.

Thats all a bit heavy so feel free to click on the recent Flickr uploads link for a laugh. If anyone is interested (which I'm sure they're not) I'm keen to get a piccie of someone on powerband using rim lights etc. Recently I flicked onto the Beastyboys channel and saw some of Mark S's recent off-camera flash and thought I'd stop neglecting mine and aim to use them in a climbing context. Which as until now (apart from an indoor shot:

at the works), I've failed to do. I wasn't really happy with that one either, can't put my finger on exactly why. Maybe 'cos its shit.