After my last root canal the dentist called to tell me he had gone over the x-rays and was concerned with how the digging went. I figured if he's worried, then I'm concerned. He said he wanted to get back in there and try again. As I enjoy drooling and having sharp things poked into my head I said yes.

I went in yesterday and got the nitrous. I was going to pass on it until we started as I figured I should man up and take the shots without it. The nice assistant said I might as well use the nitrous. So I got the nitrous and even had the nice assistant turn it up. And that was the end of feeling anything. It was like last time except I was at the bottom of a well and didn't really experience too much (besides the assitant hitting on me again.) I did take a gander at the drill bit they used - either the nitrous makes things seem larger or it really is 2 feet long.

In the end nothing new was done on the tooth. But I didn't care too much as I was high on nitrous. They just need nitrous bars and I'd be a happy man.

Last weekend Jill and I went up to Cape Alava on the Olympic Penninsula in Washington. It's a cool hike in to the beach - 3 miles of mostly boardwalk hiking through a rain forest. We got an awesome campsite right next to the beach on soft grass.

We lucked out with the weather and got sun and clear skies until Sunday morning when we were sleeping in my condo of a tent. We spent most of the time hanging out and going on short hikes down the beach. I showed Jill I was still mature enough to swear at the stove when I couldn't get it to work. That passed and we were able to to eat our mushy pasta dinner with a side of Gatorade.

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Esther, Matt, Keevin and I took an ice climbing class fromTimberline Mountain Guides up on the Elliot Glacier on Mt. Hood. Our guide Ben showed us the basics and let us practice on the side of the glacier. We started on WI4 and WI5 - whatever that really means. It was totally bad ass.

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I got my first root canal yesterday. Half of the people I talked to said it wouldn't hurt, the other half said it was painful. So I took the offer for nitrous oxide.

It took a bit for the gas to kick in and have any affect and I thought it was kinda lame. Then it felt like I was drunk - and that was good. Except I thought the dental assistant was hitting on me. But that happens when they see how hot I am with a dental dam covering my face.

The Dr came in and started excavating my jaw. That's what it seems like at any rate. I heard them talking but things went in and out as I can't hold my NOS. The Dr. said 'No, the longshank' and the longest bit I've seen since I drilled holes for the hot tub conduit passed in front of my face. I thought it'd be a good time to breath deeper and get all numblike. 10 minutes later we were all done and I was just drooling out of the side of my mouth.

Jill was nice enough to drive me to and from the appointment and deal with my bitching. She even got me peaches which I ate while chewing on the side of my mouth.

Last weekend I threw another pig roast. We learned a few things from the last years roast, namely to start drinking beer earlier. This year I got larger lava rock from the Cascades and we started the fire earlier and had about 8 hours of rock cook time.

The pig ended up getting cooked to 160 degrees by 1pm, in just 5 hours. Where as last year it took at least 10 hours to get to 140. So it was more sucessful with the hotter rock. Steve (the pig) came out nicely cooked at 173 degrees and the skin just fell off and it was very easy to get the meat off of Steve.

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Not to knock the Mazamas too much, but I thought this was too funny to not make.

Esther, Matt, Kate, Dan and I went up to Washington to climb Ingalls Peak over the weekend. We were going to do Mt. Stuart but changed our minds after we heard that it'd be over 16 hours. We figured we should try something smaller first. So our friend Bob told us to do Ingalls Peak right next door.

On Saturday we did the easier (5.4-5.6) South Ridge route. It was super fun and easy. Great views from the top of Rainier and the Cascades and of course Stuart off to the East. We got attacked by swarms of biting flies and mosquitos and had an early night. I tried out my new bivy sack, which worked great except for the exposure to the bugs. Bastards.

On Sunday we rose to a nice sunrise over Mt. Stuart. We huffed it over to the East Ridge after a quick breakfast. I lugged up over 11 liters of water to the base, thinking we'd need it all. It was way to heavy and after drinking our fill I dumped close to 6 liters of water. Matt joked that we'd regret it later, luckily we didn't.

The East route was a bit harder than the South but was more exciting with great exposure and great climbing. I learned a cheap lesson to always wear your helmet. While Matt was climbing I took my helmet off for a second and got hit with a fist sized rock in my back, luckily missing my naked head.

The route was super fun, good protection when needed and a few really fun hand traverses with cool exposure. We all enjoyed our first real alpine climbing experience and hope to get in a few more this season. We ended up getting down kindof late and returned to the cars around 10pm and back to Portland at 3am.

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Over the weekend I went down to the beach with Sheri to take some photos. Although we didn't have the light we wanted we took quite a few pictures and got comfortable taking shots. After Sheri left to go surfing my friend Jill came down and with her came the sun. We spent our time looking at Jill's recent travel pictures and eating Spanish tortilla. I took entirely too many pictures of Jill's sandals at the beach on Saturday night.

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This weekend Jami, Matt, Keevin and I went up to Beacon Rock in Washington to practice our trad climbing. I had done the route last year with my buddy Ben. Unfortunetely this time I didn't drink enough water and got dehydrated to the point of having trouble talking. I'm sure my partner Jami really enjoyed that. We didn't get lost per se, but I wasn't 100% sure of where to go after 4 or so pitches. A friend was up on a different route and gave us enough beta to get off the damn rock. Keevin and Matt were at the bottom wondering where the hell we were and even talked to the rangers to look for us. Anyway, here are our pics.

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Over the 4th of July weekend we (Esther, Keevin, Matt and I) went over to Eastern Oregon to tackle the Middle Sister. We had plans to do the "East Arete" as it looked like a super cool line with some easy rock climbing inbetween technical snow climbing.

On Saturday we climbed at Smith to get warmed up and practice our trad placement. I started talking to an older guy next to us about the East Arete on Middle Sister. He told us outright that it was shitty rock and unprotectable. So there went that.

So we switched up to doing the North-East ridge instead. We went through Sisters after finishing climbing and got some awesome pizza at Martoleous? before heading up to camp. We got up and left camp at 4am and were on the summit around noon. There wasn't anything really technical and we definetly had more gear than necessary with pickets, rope, crampons, axes and tools. But better to have than not.

Smith Rock Photos

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Middle Sister Photos

On our way to Middle Sister we went to Sisters for awesome pizza before bedding down Saturday night to rest. We left camp at 4am and reached the summit around 11 - not too bad for a 7-8 mile trek. There was a lot of scree on the ridge to the summit and one short pitch of quasi-technical climbing. The views were awesome and we came up with new Summit Poses.

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Smith Rock pictures

Middle Sister pictures