v1c1ous has been training to hike up Rainier this year (higher than Anne and I went), and has thusly been taking hiking expeditions on the weekends. On Saturday, he decided to go up a trail on Rattlesnake Ridge, and I invited myself along, because that is what I do.
When Sean arrived, he asked if everyone had eaten breakfast so no one would get dizzy and pass out–because no one wanted to use their beautiful Saturday explaining over and over to the police why their once-vibrant friend was now a corpse impaled on a broken tree trunk about halfway down the mountain. I didn’t LIE and say I had eaten…but I also avoided answering the question. It’s not that I have a deathwish, but rather, since my surgery, it’s always a gamble as to how my body will react to my first meal of the day, and thus I tend to put it off as long as possible. It’s like playing an awful game of roulette, where 30% of the time I’ll win the big prize and get to feel like a normal human being, and the rest of the time varies wildly between cold sweats, nausea, shaking, and praying to the porcelain god. Of course, the longer I put it off, the worse my odds become, but I wanted to have fun with my friends without having to worry about being in the middle of a hike and all of a sudden having a desperate need to hug a toilet.
As usual, I traveled light. Some may call it ‘unprepared’. I call it Traveling With A Mind For Survivalist Adventure And Relying On Group Resources, also known as Flailing Girl Mooching From Others. This time I didn’t even bother to bring a camera, as the proprietary battery in my lighter camera wasn’t charged (DAMN YOU, NIKON!), and my DSLR weighs approximately as much as a small child.
I’m not going to lie to you. I could certainly be in better shape, there is no doubt about that. But at no point beforehand did I have even the slightest niggling thought that “Hey, maybe this will end badly.”
This is typical of the Mellzah experience. I am overconfident, overzealous, and a bad artist. (The below is from a different day of Hiking Fail, because I’m also bad at learning lessons.)
I was gung-ho about this. I was excited to be outside, excited to be with friends, and furthermore had some sort of asinine point to prove about how fatties aren’t bloated gastropods and could exercise out in the sunshine just like anyone else. Thus, I led the charge up the trail. I would like to note that occasionally, I can be wrong. Occasionally, I like to wave a big stick around without the proper ammunition to back it up.
I still maintain that I’m good at walks over distance, and much longer distance than the actual trail; what killed me on Saturday was the elevation. About halfway up, the backs of my legs started burning, and I fell to the back of the group. Shortly after that, I really started lagging. Shortly after that, I was overcome by the feeling that all of my muscles and internal organs were dancing a jitterbug inside my body in order to best express their rebellion against my cause, and their dancing caused me to begin to see spots. It was about this time that I informed the group that they were free to leave me behind to die the undignified death of a fatty who tried to pretend she could exercise, and once they returned from the top, if they could just roll my corpulent mass over the edge to be eaten by the squirrels and cockroaches, that would be swell.
Tristan was kind enough to wait with me whilst I regained control of my limbs, and we hiked the rest of the way to the top together. It was really, really beautiful.
Afterward, we all went back to the Fortress of Nerditude for a bbq, I managed to repel nearly everyone with a fruit salad, and I believe only one actual vegetable was present at the table, which by most counts constitutes a success. Even their raccoon came out from underneath the porch to visit for a while.
After dinner, I needed to scoot out pretty quickly so as to get home and shower before I was supposed to go see Dead Snow with mrsamedi. On the way home, my body let me know that thanks to my First Meal Of The Day, it had different plans, and that I was to spend the rest of my Saturday lying on the couch in a cold sweat with the room spinning around me.
I can’t wait until I can get a robot body. Seriously, guys. This is the last motherfucking zombie nazi movie this sack of meat, organs, and crap is going to make me miss.
