You jam your toe into a pocket

I was looking through threadbare shirts in a charity shop when I became aware of a presence behind me. I turned around to see a small man looking at me. He had a funny half-smile and was holding t-shirts on old wire hangers. He waited politely until I had fully turned to face him.

Then he started blinking rapidly. "Hello," he said, eventually.
"Umm. Hello."
"It is very hot today."
"Yes. Yes it is."
He latched onto my accent. "Oh," he said. "Where are you from?"
"Well," I replied, "sort of England and sort of Scotland."
He beamed at me. "It is very cold in Scotland."
"... ... Yes. Yes it is."
"And it snows in England."
"Yes, sometimes."
"Not like here!"
"No."
"Because here it is sunny."
"Yes."

His smile flickered, and he turned quickly and began hanging the shirts on the rack. I waited politely, then started edging away towards the books.

"Does it snow in Scotland, too?" He was quiet, as if talking privately to the shirts.
"Umm, yes. More than England."

He fell silent. I was browsing paperbacks before he spoke again. Perhaps two minutes had passed and he was sweating.

"Glasgow Rangers. Well. They're a good team, aren't they! They play football... or soccer." He seemed pleased about all of this.
"Yes, " I said. "Celtic are good too."

There was a sudden horror in his eyes. He had got it wrong, badly, and we both knew it. He grinned awkwardly - apologetically - and went back to colour-coordinating his shirts. I couldn't help thinking that there is probably an old Rangers top kicking around somewhere in the shop, discarded years ago by a Scottish backpacker.

Yesterday I went climbing down at Blackwall Reach. This is the same Swan River cliff Inday and I were jumping off - I met a couple of the regulars from the climbing wall and donned my swimming trunks for my first try at not-so-deep water soloing* (an abridged rock-climbing glossary is included below for the gravitationally-challenged). We started with the traverse along the base of the cliff, in the roof that overhangs high tide. The rock is limestone, riddled with monos* and pockets* and extremely sharp crimps*. There is much in the way of BS/E* poo from the doves and gulls that huddle in the windbreaks. The traverse is about twenty metres across, and I fell in twice. After the first fall my arms were so pumped* I couldn't close my fist. At the end of the traverse you have to solo the cliff to get to the path. We collected our gear and walked over to the cave area, where there is a spectacular (but easy) dyno* for a prow of rock that overhangs by three or four metres. The jump itself is quite easy but the swing out from the rock is wild. When stable, you jam your toe into a pocket, pull up for a good handle and haul yourself up to the top. Mike filmed the whole thing - if I can work out how, I'll put the video up, as well as my failed attempt to climb the underside of the prow (another dunking in the Swan) and my first (and never to-be-repeated) ascent/descent of a totally new climb, 'Toothbrush' at tentative Aussie grade 16*. It was good climbing, though I've scratched and bloodied my arms, legs, back, hands. Yesterday was also the first day of rain in Perth since I've been here; two months of scorching sunshine and we pick the first day of rain, wind, and temperatures below 30 oC to splash about in the river wearing nothing but trunks and rockboots.

For anyone who has not yet discovered the joy of rocks:

Deep water solo - Climbing without ropes because your landing is cushioned by water, usually the sea. Done in everything from swimmies to drysuits, depending on where you climb. Some lunatic Canadian called Trotter is planning on combining deep-water-soloing with base-jumping because he wants to climb over thirty metres.

Mono/mono-doight - Adapted from the French for 'single-finger', a mono is any hold that will only take one finger. Obviously. This also pretty much guarantees a break/tear/sprain/dislocation/partial amputation if you take fall on a mono and don't act quickly; also giving a new and immediate meaning to the idea of 'pulling your finger out' when in a hurry.

Crimp - A minging hold such as a tiny ledge onto which you can only fit the ends of the top digits of your fingers; which will, if your entire body weight is being suspended by said hold, create an inverse arch between the first and second digits, leading to pain, cursing, and much enthusiasm for a decent pocket...

...pocket - Another kind of hold, hollow and two/three/four fingers/hand size, loved by climbers because it is hopefully quite good and you can hold onto it for a while before conceding you should probably try to finish the climb. The biggest pockets are called jugs. The Antichrist of all climbing holds is the Sloper.

BS/E - Invented yesterday by Chris, the BS scale refers to the amount of Bird Shit on any given route. 'E' is Extreme - a lot of Bird Shit.

Pumped - Whereby the extreme and relatively unusual strain of using the muscles in your forearms causes them to flood with lactic acid. Your arms become taut, numb, laced with previously unknown veins and hard to do things with - until normal service is resumed. On any tough climb, being pumped is a good excuse for falling off. As in: "Man, I got pumped towards the top. That's why I fell off, you know."

Dyno - Short for 'dynamic', regarding any move that involves leaving the rock face either significantly or entirely to secure the next hold. This typically means using good holds to jump upwards because the next hold is not reachable any other way.

Grade - I will ignore, for the moment, the fact that there are dozens of different grading systems that concur, disagree, contradict, confirm and ridicule each other and focus only on the Australian system, which is - in typically Australian fashion - very straightforward. It is numbered from 1 to (currently) 34 where 1 means you are lying on a bed and 34 means you are one of the dozen best climbers in the world - congratulations! I'm pushing for grade 20 at the moment. Grades are a matter of constant debate depending on how you climb. For example, I climb two attempts from three a nice, reachy grade 19 involving a big dyno and very wide moves on good holds. Chris is quite a lot smaller than me and he can't climb the big moves. He can, however, climb a grade 19 on the other side of the hall which I fall off every time because he can hold the tiny crimps and my legs are too long for a crucial move where you jam your knee into a crack in the wall. It's just how it goes. This also leads to speculation and sniffy comments such as:

"Well, all I'm saying is I think it's tough for the grade."
"That's an 18? That's not an 18. That's a 17, maybe 17/18."
"Man, did they change the holds and keep the same grade or something?"
"Oh, it's very easy for a 21 you know. The easiest 21 on the wall."
"She just climbed 27? Holy shit."

We watched 'The Last King of Scotland' last night. It is an exceptional movie. See it.