Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Le Fin 2013

Happy new year all! Not a big fan of Christmas, but I do enjoy ticking into another year. I wish for a safe and cheerful 2014 to all!

So, a quick recap on what I've been up to in the last moments of 2013!

On the 21st of December, I went to play paint ball with quite a lot of people, for Tiffanie and Lilian's joint birthday event! It was a long, tiring and hot day; especially in those overalls. I don't remember too much, but Chew and I were constantly yelling back and forth; and the free for all at the end, bloody hurt.

The nicer photo


On the 22nd, only had a morning of climbing out with Thanjon at Boronia. Ended up meeting up with Seann, Damo, Evan and Chris. Had a play on some easy routes on the ancient mariner buttress, before heading over to the main wall to try Lyptus... fucking Lyptus. It escapes me again this time, but I'm sure next time I'll be able to send it.
Oh Snapchat.
Chris Simpson on Lyptus. Photo by Seann Osborn

Anyway, we left early; got some pies at Wentworth Falls for lunch! Always delicious. Afterwards, I went home to have our early Christmas dinner with mum, dad, brother and his girlfriend. We had some pippies (clams) stir-fried in XO sauce, BBQ mussels with this fancy sauce mum made and then lamb and salad, delicious!!

Gourmet.


Christmas Eve, I met up with Sid to go to ClimbOz during the day. Pretty sure I had lunch at home, and not in Blacktown. I gave him my Christmas gift to him, just a nice organic tee from Kathmandu. We climbed a few routes, but didn't really chat about other things at that time. Ended up leaving and having a snack at Sushi Bay and then main dinner over at Nandos, which has refurbished and looks really good! After dinner, we stayed a bit longer and just caught up. That night, I played late night TF2 and L4D2 with all the boys, until Christmas Day ticked over; a very good way to spend the night !!

I spent Christmas Day by myself at home, playing the piano and watching Reel Rock 8, which I had just downloaded. Ended up watching a few movies, playing games and eating lots of food!



On the Friday after, 27th, had a crazy day at work; being the first day open after the two public holidays. Seriously love each of my co-workers, couldn't ask for a better crew! I spent the majority of the day wearing a Santa hat which I stuffed with plastic, so it would sit on my head as straight and high as possible. Got a lot of smiles for it!

Sarmila posing in the hat

After work, I went home to have a quick bowl of Pho for dinner, and then headed to Fletcher's house to meet up with him and Sid. Gave Sid our (Thanjon and I)'s joint Christmas present, which was absolute gold. 2014 Calendar, the girls of my life. As always, whenever a house has a piano, I go and play it! Messed around playing with my motorcycle gloves and helmet on. I didn't stay very long as I had an early day out with Paul and the posse on the next day!



28th, met up with Paul and Youngie at 6:45am in Penrith, and we headed up to Barden's Lookout to climb. It is the only crag open on Mount York Rd at the moment, due to the bush fires back in October. Over the course of the day, more people came, including Nathan, Dana, Leith and his friends. I got on a couple of climbs, including a 19/22/25/22/24, and was entirely broken by the end of the day. Also made a new nemesis, which was the 24 I tried at the end of the day, called Goosebumps. A nice, short bouldery route.

Paul after the dyno on Goosebumps

Dana, Paul, Youngie and I all ended up at the Alex right at the end of the day, it was a long day out; and I definitely deserved that T-bone steak. Oh yes. Headed back down the mountain with Dana, and we had a long chat about everything, really. Family, relationships, aspirations; it was really quite nice.



Went to Reservoir Dogs on the 29th with Thanjon, to do some nice exposed rap-in short multipitches! We met up with Paul and Gene in the morning, as Gene just topped out Mr Orange, and was belaying Paul up. They did two routes in this area to warm up, doing them each as one long pitch. We sorted our gear out and rapped down using Paul's rope; and climbed two of the multipitches that day. We did them to the halfway anchors, leading a pitch each.
Gene bringing Paul up
Time at crag posing > Time at crag climbing

Walked out, and had kebabs at Hazelbrook, yet again!



30th; went to Shipley with Gene and Thanjon. Met up with Damo, Lee and Chad at the Grey Slab. Warmed up on Scramble Syndrome, a pretty cool slab; then headed down to the Glen because it was ridiculously populated up in Shipley. Didn't climb too much today, had to leave quite early to make dinner with the boys! Made some hilarious (I'd like to think so) snapchat videos that we sent to people on the drive back.


All smiles.
More smiles!

Got home, showered, and eventually rode off to Daniel's house, where I met up with Daniel (obviously), Shehan, Himmat, Sean and Ankita. Played some table tennis, piano, a little bit of TF2 and then headed off to Barluck in Cabramatta! Himmat has never tasted crab in his life, we were going to change that.

A snap from Sean's phone, I think?

Everyone went in Daniel's car, but Himmat and I rode down instead (more fun). Parking was straight forward, Himmat and I won, of course. Got two servings of crab, fried rice and some sizzling beef; and boy it was delicious! Afterwards, went downstairs and most of us got Froyo for dessert. Headed back to Daniel's place for a little chill session afterwards, before heading home.



New Year's Eve, woke up fairly late; had the last Red Rooster meal of the year, always delicious. In the late afternoon, I rode over to Chris's house to have a nice little house party for the new year! Chris, Sarah, Matt and their parents all invited their groups of friends over and there were quite a lot of people over! One of the first things I did when I got over was to immediately play on his piano, oh Yamaha, you sound so good!! The rest of the evening consisted of great food, watching TV, trying to play his Xbox, Monopoly and the best card game I have ever played, called Cards Against Humanity; ridiculously funny. Didn't drink, as I needed to ride home after the fireworks to go climbing on New Years Day. Had a mini night club set up, with a set of speakers, a disco ball and fog machine after the fireworks!

Monopoly!!

It was a great way to spend New Years Eve, much better than getting wasted out in a club; but hey, that's just me.

Once again, happy new year!
Next post will be out soon!

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