Yes Man!
Tuesday, July 26th, 2011
Fist of all, I’m sorry it’s been a while. Honestly, I have no real excuse other than I’ve been rock climbing a LOT, traveling some, basically, just trying to soak up as much summer love as possible. It was a hard winter and now it’s on and there’s no time for the intraweb.
Ever see YES man, that movie with Jim Carrey? That’s how I feel sometimes. I’m considered a professional climber because that’s my chosen field and that’s what I love to do, and somehow, that’s how I’ve managed to hustle a living. But effectively, I am also running my own business. I’m self employed, and for those who know, when you’re self employed and you have bills to pay, and you don’t know when the next job is coming, you say YES to everything. You become a yes man. Working overtime. Whatever it takes to make it happen. It’s only until things settle down and work becomes more predictable that you learn to say no to anything. But I’m not sure (given my chosen lifestyle) when that predictability will arrive. So for now, and since I can remember, I’ve been a yes man of sorts.
Yesterday I was in the most heavenly place on earth, (no, not Squamish) Lake Louise, Alberta. I was out there in the sun, and mixed cloud, climbing with Lydia, getting pumped, clipping bolts, it was awesome. There’s a new 5.13c/d there for anyone interested, it’s to the right of Jason Lives and it’s actually REALLY good value. Here’s a photo I took in the meadow on route to the climbing.
And today, like a time warp, I am back in So Ho, New York. I wish I wasn’t, I miss the mountains already, and even more, I miss my girlfriend, but it’s just sort of fucked how we can move from one place to another so fast, it’s scary, it’s sort of irresponsible, and I look forward to the day when flying is so expensive we just don’t do it anymore. Maybe ‘medium’ speed trains are the future, running on some form of clean electric energy. Hmm, SOLAR?
So here I am now, on the 11th floor of a Sheraton Hotel. I’m doing a very last minute gig with the Discovery Channel, something about Adrenaline sports, I don’t really know all the details, just that it’s with some guy named Bear Gryll’s, who I guess is some sort of adventurer turned charismatic TV persona.
The funniest part about all this is that I got picked up at the airport by a limo-driver in a black tinted towncar. Seriously, I felt like a gangstar, he held a card in his hand that read “TROTTER” and everything, I was like, YUP, that’s me chief. I didn’t even take off my sunglasses:) ha ha. He told me his good stories, of driving Donald Trump around Manhattan, shopping for $20 Million Dollar homes with a lady from Malibu, and rockstars doing lines of coke in the backseat in the late 80’s. He said things have mellowed out a lot since the golden years, mostly because of the internet and CD sales are down, so the artists aren’t getting as rich as they used to. We got to the hotel, and all I had was $20 bucks Canadian crumpled up in my pocket, so I flipped him the bill and thanked him for the ride. I have to get up at 5am so I’m off to sleep. Just like the Beastie Boys say, Yes yes y’all. And you don’t stop.
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