Holiday Fun; Part II

This past weekend I went to my parents’ house to spend the Christmas holiday with my family. For the long time fans of this blog, you may recall when I talked about the fun I had spending Thanksgiving with my family. Since that was only a short time ago, I went into this most recent holiday with a bit of trepidation. One advantage to this particular trip was spending a few quiet days with just my parents before the house was inundated with small children, toys, games, presents, drinks, and oh yeah, food. Dear god there was a lot of food.

In between all the eating and drinking that occurred there were a few breaks to enjoy some quality time with the family. In particular, the shorties provided for a multitude of laughs that made the weekend all the more memorable. Keep in mind, my seven nieces and nephews range in age from seven to 15 months so not all of them can talk, but that also adds to the fun. Here’s an example of a conversation that occurred this weekend. My dad was talking with my middle nephew who is three. When asked if Santa Claus brought him a lot of presents my nephew said yes. To this my father asked “Did you get any clothes?” My nephew responded by saying, “Grandpa, clothes aren’t presents.”

This was just one of many memorable exchanges that happened over the weekend. I think it would be an understatement to say the entire family had a really great time. I ate way too much food and drank too much wine (but I’m guessing I’m not the only one). While the year is almost over, there is still one more holiday to get through and New Year’s Day is just around the corner. I’m guessing I’ll have a story or two to go along with that, but for now, I’ll bask in the memories from a weekend of fun with the family.

The Dangers of Winter Hiking

This weekend I decided to go for a hike in Shingletown. We recently had a batch of storms bringing rain mixed with sleet and ice. This was followed by a dusting of snow so a healthy layer of frozen white stuff covered all the trails. It was cold but the sun was out so I decided a quick trip up to the ridge would be a good afternoon activity.

When I arrived at the trailhead I discovered the crust was a little heavier than I anticipated so I embarked on my journey with cautious optimism. For the most part, the snow was solid. My footing was a little sketchy in some spots as I was having trouble breaking through the top level of wintry goodness; however I decided to press on and continue my solo trek through the woods.

As I got further into the wilderness I noticed the ground under foot was getting steeper. The grade of the trails coupled with the near hockey rink conditions had me second-guessing my decision to reach the ridge. While I contemplated continuing on or turning back I heard something crashing through the brush not far from where I stood. Suddenly the largest dog I’ve ever seen appeared on the trail about twenty yards behind me. It was at that moment I realized it wasn’t a dog at all, but a bear.

Okay that last part didn’t really happen. I’m glad it didn’t because the hike (and I use the term loosely) back to my car was treacherous enough without being pursued by a large fuzzy pile of claws and teeth. As I slid uncontrollably down the trail it became blatantly obvious I was not hiking. Instead it was more akin to surviving.

After about twenty minutes of continuous sliding interlaced with bouts of tree grabbing to slow my decent (my boots didn’t come with breaks) I came to rest near the creek. The ground finally leveled off and I was able to resume my hike. Maybe next time I’ll take skates, just to be safe.

Here's Your Gold Star

As I’ve said in the past, I have a pretty decent job. It’s challenging yet allows me to incorporate a certain degree of creativity that isn’t always found in the governmental sector. This recently became particularly evident with my end-of-year evaluation.

As policy dictates, all employees are evaluated at the end of the calendar year through a written process that documents work performance. The first half is done by the employee, the second half is done by their direct supervisor, and the third half is done collectively with the intent of setting goals for the upcoming year (Yeah I know that doesn’t add up, but didn’t I say I work for the government?). A few months ago my direct supervisor resigned. Because of this unfortunate incident, we were instructed to complete all three parts of the evaluation solo.

As you can imagine it was difficult to be completely objective while filling out my evaluation. I felt a little stupid using phrases like, “Eric is a team player” or “Eric can thoroughly navigate his way through difficult political situations” or “Eric excels at stakeholder involvement and consensus building” or “Since Eric began his employment, he’s helped foster a positive paradigm shift towards technological advantages” or “Eric is an outside-the-box thinker.” Actually I could have used any generic resume buzz-word and it would have worked (but still sounded unbelievably silly).

In the end I think I provided a relatively unbiased assessment of myself considering the circumstances. I feel very confident knowing that in my personnel file there will be an evaluation which says, “In his brief tenure with our agency, Eric continues to successfully kick ass in a professional manner while encouraging others to be rad. Similarly, his overwhelming command of ironical jokes and unwavering pursuit to seem important while doing as little as possible is a continued benefit to the agency as a whole.”

I’m expecting a big promotion.

The Language of Monkeys

As mentioned in my previous post, I’ve recently started climbing again. While I’m not setting the world on fire with my abilities (not yet anyway), climbing provides a great indoor workout for chilly winter days. Also, I’m fortunate enough to be in a community where there are some amazingly talented climbers to teach me what I’m lacking and provide inspiration. It’s quite remarkable to watch them effortlessly traverse one of the largest fake rock collections I’ve ever seen. One of the greatest challenges, however, is learning the language.

As with most sports, climbing has its own unique vocabulary and learning these foreign terms is one of the hardest tasks. After all, just about anyone can climb, it’s part of our nature (assuming you believe in that wacky theory of evolution). Figuring out the jargon is a whole different challenge.

A conversation among climbers may include any of the following words being used as a noun or verb including crimper, sloper, gaston, pinch, under-cling, jug, lump-o-grapes, flagging, cranking, matching, tracking, campus, getting pumped (followed by de-pumping) and my personal favorite; mailing (okay, it’s actually sending, but that doesn’t seem to make any sense to me so I chose to make up my own term). Also, good beta can make a specific problem a lot easier.

I’ll admit, I don’t know what most of these words mean, at least not in the context of climbing. I’m still not convinced they are even all real. I do know however, that I’m having fun but my skin hurts.

Stupid Brain...

I like to fancy myself as an ordinary guy (except I use 18th century words like fancy). Nothing in my life is too spectacular by my standards. I have a good job, great friends, and lots of activities that keep me busy. What could be wrong with that you ask? Well, I have this stupid brain in my head that always thinks about stuff.

I have this unquenched desire to over-think and over-analyze everything imaginable. It doesn’t matter how trivial or complex the issue, I try to figure out what the outcome is going to be in a situation before any action is initiated. It’s kind of annoying because I’m fully aware I can’t figure out the ending before I even start. That’s just asinine.

I’ve recently gotten back into rock climbing. One of the techniques the real climbers keep telling me to employ is to shut my brain off and just climb. Oddly enough, it works. When you’re not thinking about the moves and where your hands and feet will go, you just instinctively climb. What I need to do is figure out a way to shut off my brain in other situations. So, brain if you’re reading this, please stop thinking and start doing. It’s best for both of us.