"You're Just So Ridiculous..."

The title pretty much sums it up.

Last weekend I went rock climbing in the Red River Gorge near Lexington, Kentucky with Nina and Stephanie.

This is the view as we pulled up to Torrent Falls Climbing Adventure. Behind the building were cliffs on which you could do the Via Ferrata. We signed up for a full day of rock climbing and rappelling with our own guide.

Nina and Stephanie demonstrate how to properly check each other's gear.


I sucked at climbing. No big surprise there. I am uncoordinated and unathletic. But, I still did it. At one point, our guide Rick (whose middle name is James) told me I was doing something awkwardly. I explained to him that awkward is my middle name. And then we tormented him for the rest of the day for being Rick James.

It was so so cold! Our hands were numb, making it difficult to climb.

Nina was a rock star and loved it.

It was Steph's first time, and she was a bit apprehensive at first, having Googled "rock climbing deaths in the Red River Gorge" beforehand. But she did really well- she was a natural!

Then it was time for rappelling. I don't have those pictures yet (they're on Nina's camera), but I'll post them when I get them. I LOVED rappelling! That required no skill, but involved walking off a cliff. Perfect for me. The scariest part is when you let your feet go and you're just dangling there in space. So fun. I felt like I could've done that all day. The other cool thing was that we got to climb part of the Via Ferrata to get to the top of the cliff, and I really enjoyed that, too.

After 9 hours of fun, the sun was setting and it was time to go. Rick James mentioned where he was going to dinner and asked us to join him. It's at this point that things got interesting.

Rick's friend, Lang, joined us, and Lang was super cool. I kind of want to be best friends with him. A few interesting things about Lang:

1. He majored in Political and Environmental Science

2. He really loves goats and taught us how to milk one

3. He wants to work for a nonprofit
4. He's from Alaska

5. He recites Shakespeare

I'm sure everyone is thinking I must like him, but let me assure you, this is just platonic. He is 23 and a half. It's just like when I met Amanda and fell in love with her and wanted to be BFF's.

Anyway, during dinner I made a joke about buying a "gettin' lucky in Kentucky" shirt. Rick said, "I'm pretty sure you have to actually get lucky here to buy one of those."

"Well, we are going out to the bars tonight..." I said.

"Or, you could just come back to my camper with me..." Rick replied. (He has a place in Lexington, but stays in a camper in the woods on weekends closer to where the rock climbing place is.) Lang informed us there was bourbon. And Rick told us about his awesome dog. And the stars. I think that was deciding factor. We were in.

We stopped at the beer trailer to buy beer. (It is seriously a trailer that just sells beer. I now own a tee shirt.) Then we headed to Rick's place, way back in the woods in the hills. Steph worried that the bourbon might be roofied and volunteered to be DD. When we saw the camper, Nina was reminded of Into the Wild. Then the boys took us on a walk through the woods to The Point, and I started having visions of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. But our fears disappeared when we reached The Point, an open area on top of a cliff where you could see millions of stars, including the Milky Way and numerous shooting stars. We laid under blankets and looked at the stars and laughed and laughed. Lang told us this ghost story, which was particularly entertaining.

(He didn't know I was recording. When Nina is cracking up about the closet, it's because she's referencing that silly R. Kelly song. Also, this video contains some rough language. Oh, and you can't actually see anything because, you know, it's nighttime.)

As you can see, we had a blast with these boys. Rick told us that we could come back and climb with him for free, and I'd love to take him up on that.

At one point, we asked Rick if he'd brought lots of other girls back to his camper. He insisted that we were the only ones. "Well, what makes us so special?" I asked.

"You guys are just so... ridiculous," he said. "I mean, you're so much fun and really awesome... but you're just so ridiculous."

Yup, that's us.