Today.... (or yesterday by the time I got around to writing this) today we got up and loaded up the trailer, van, and car and headed out of denver. From there we took a few detours and then made our way to our various destinations.
The detours mentioned began when we were behind where our schedules (the ones written, implied, or functionally agreed to the night before) said we should have been. At this point people began to get frustrated (as travel does to almost everyone, and traveling with others does to the rest) so by the time we arrived at the olive garden to eat lunch people and found out that they had no idea we were coming so we would have to wait for 45 minutes there was a small mutiny and instead the plan was changed and we went to a collection of faster foods for lunch.
In some ways this was frustrating (I'm a big fan of the seafood portifino at olive garden) but on the other hand I got to get qdoba for lunch and coldstone for dessert, so it turned out quite well. Primed with this level of frustration we again piled into the van and headed to Ft. Collins where we needed to pick up a few climbing ropes for the next few camps, it was nifty to see an actual REI store (I usually shop online with them) but it was a bit frustrating when everyone was kinda chomping at the bit to get home. We got the ropes without much difficulty and then carried on to Cheyenne where we needed to drop off a cooler, aquire a missing comerade, trade back a van and so on and so forth.
So we arrive in cheyenne begin the transfers of things, cooler ends up where it needs to be, comerade is in good health and welcomed, things lent to us are on their way to be returned, so a small handful of us that are headed to casper but not by means of torington hop in the car and hit the road. We're having some difficulty finding the interstate because of a wrong turn (another frustration, albeit a no-fault one since none of us know cheyenne that well) when I got the first phone call... I had forgotten that I had the spare van key and we needed to return that along with the van... so we semi-quickly backtrack and turn in the van key, use the bathroom (a good idea before traveling) and swear a pact that we shall not stop again until casper wyoming.
We get on the road and start up an involved discussion (you all know i'm a sucker for a good discussion) and the miles begin to add up. It is here that I received calls... (consults phone) 2,3,4, and 5. Turns out the van that took the rest of the staff to torington, needs to be in casper by monday morning, and I might be the best candidate to do that. It was also suggested that I could come back on saturday and then drive back to casper again with the van, and various other ideas were tossed about. I also found it somewhat interesting that several of the calls I got described the same idea, but didn't seem to have talked to each other. Eventually the plans got more involved and strange... and I recall at one point saying (admittedly snippishly) that I wouldn't ruin saturday because I desperately needed a day off. (and do, although even just the last night and a full amount of sleep have been incredibly restorative, further updates on this one hopefully tonight)
Eventually we arrived in casper, split our tiny group of grumpy introverts (or at least semi-introverts) and two of us went to grab a bite to eat. Delicious food was had and we carried on our conversation from the drive up here.
After that I was dropped at the place I get to call 'home' for the next few days. It's a very nice little apartment complete with a real bed (I'm getting a bit spoiled) working air conditioning, comfy couch, and a actual decent inet connection! I'll be in great shape after another day of this... and then back to camp for 2 weeks.
Now, at first glance this update seems pretty negative, and to be honest it was a pretty frustrating day for many people (myself among them at times). But one of the things that has been seen this summer is that we're a gracious bunch and given time and a little space to process and recoup we're very capable of bouncing back to working smoothly and happily again.
I'm hoping that I'll write a more philosophical post later today but who knows? It's a day off... I might just be lazy instead. (also I'm probably going to brave... yay!)
-Nick
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