Exam Trackstar

It's exam week here at USC. Everyone is uptight, stressed, and suffering a severe lack of sleep. At times like this that the community needs a pick me up - a little laugh to cheer them up and lighten the mood. Enter Exam Trackstar, because what better than a kind of strange dude in your class to come to your final exam dressed like he's about to run in a 1980's track meet only to rip off his breakaway pants and reveal ridiculously too small track shorts, sit down and take the exam?
This morning at 9 am I had my Spanish final exam. Last night I went out to Wally World in an attempted to find the missing pieces of my get-up. Luckily I already had the shoes, jacket, wrist bands, glasses and sweatband. I just had to get real small track shorts and breakaway pants. Now the problem with that is that Walmart doesn't sell breakaway pants or small track shorts in Men's sizes. So I had to delve back into my childhood and shop the boy's section where as luck would have it I found the shorts and pants on sale. Oh, I picked up those slow-pitch-baseball-esque socks there as well.

Explain to me this: if you're going to make breakaway pants why would the top have fake buttons that don't breakaway on the side? Just don't make no damn sense, but that's how mine were. Nothing a few snips with the scissors couldn't solve. Torn apart at the top, I had to binder clip the pants together and wear suspenders under my jacket to hold the pants on.

So here I go at 8: 30 am a loud mess of red 80's track attire biking to class on a white and black striped bike. A few heads were turned to say the least. I made sure to arrive right before class started so everyone would already be sitting down. This was it, I open the door say "Exam time, baby!" rip of the break away pants, and sit down. A few people busted laughing, but mostly confused chuckles played under someone saying "you would." My teacher came in late and only saw me when I went to turn in my test. If you can imagine an older Spanish woman awestruck, confused, and speechless, that is what it was like.

This is one of those moments I think I'm going to look back on and wonder what the hell I was thinking. But hey, I got to lighten up some people's day so I'm glad I did it.

p.s. in regards to the censor bar: You see I've got what my family refers to as Nelson legs, aka real thick legs. Take into account those shorts are boys mediums and you may start to grasp the dilemma of the lack of space I had in the crotchal region. That polyster sheen doesn't hide much to say the least.

New Art IV

The walls of our dorm still felt a bit lacking so our good friend John Youngblood came out and schooled us with some downright awesome graffiti skills. Check it:

Speed Racer!

John heard we liked Mudkips.

Thanks again JYB.

But that's not all! Getting back to Bates West after Thanksgiving break I had the gumption to knock out a third installment to the gallery and draw our good friend Evan Forbes.

from left to right: Evan Forbes, Tim Shipp, Gorilla with moustache and monocle

New Art III

OMG! BRB! Tim Shipp's in my hood and he's after me!

The Big Comeback

Oh snap! The two man adventure crew is back in action, and oh baby did the Dog Faced Horse Man strike again. Ben and I are always looking for bigger and better adventure and to be honest I don't know how we are going to top last night. Last night at 2 am Ben and I set out to summit the highest point in Columbia - the Radio Tower. This project had been in the works for weeks now and before that it existed more as a joke than a real idea.
When the time was finally right we put the plan into motion. During the day Saturday we made sure we had all our supplies prepped : camera, warm dark clothes, and a flag to hang at the top of the tower if we made it. Grim as this may be, we both wrote goodbye notes to leave in our dorm in the off chance that something went terribly wrong and our bodies had to be scraped off the pavement.

2 am we set off into the night. We wanted it to be late enough to where there wouldn't be too many people / cops out. That is kind of impossible on a Saturday night in Columbia, but by that point in the night the cops are too busy dealing with all the drunk people out.

First step : Scale this wall that I swore wasn't this tall last time I saw it. Free climb a pole attached to a 20 foot wall. No problem. Luckily, we ended up on a roof after the wall. Not knowing what was on the other side of the wall, I brought a rope in the off chance we had to climb our way out. On the roof the ladder for the tower begins and I start climbing.

Let me give you a scope of this tower. It's divided into 7 painted sections alternating red and white. Each of those 7 sections has about 45 rungs, and the rungs are about 2 feet apart. Figuring in the initial wall we had to climb it all comes out to being about 650 feet high. The good news is the tower has three platforms so you don't have to be a complete beast and climb all 650 feet at once. However, it is a little more than 200 feet between each platform and the difficulty of climbing that ladder became all too obvious from the very beginning.

The first length was the worst for me. I didn't know what to expect and I was relying too much on my arms to pull my body up. Remember: When climbing tall ladders or even rock climbing, trust and use your leg strength. Grasp with your hands, push with your feet. Thoughts of quitting or falling too my death began circling around my head about half way up the first length, but I kept on a powered my way to the first platform. Ben and I stopped for a much deserved rest. Our arms were screaming and we were scared but confident. Thank God for adrenaline.

Platform One:

Platform Two:

Platform Three:

The Top:

Unveiling the flag:

Ladder of death

If you look real close at the top of the tower you can spot the yellow flag

Night-a-Bates

Oh, Bates West why must you elude us? Ben and I have been trying to get to the roof of Bates West for awhile now, but the only way is through a door that always seems to be locked. So after yet another disappointment of the door locked we decided to just go and explore Bates West's retarded cousin - Bates House.

Well let me back up. We did in fact do a bit of exploring in an attempt to get to Bates West's elevator shaft, but most all the doors were locked. By kicking a door open and knocking down some boxes we were able to enter Bates West's supply shop. Everything for our mechanical desires resided there. So if Ben and I ever need any tools we know where to look.

I don't really know what this is or why it was there. Creepy. On a good note, we found the Bates West blue prints!

Too bad they didn't help us in the least bit. But on another good note, I snagged some super hip safety goggles.

After searching through everything we could for treasures or manuals for the elevators (which we never found) we thought we should leave before our luck ran out.

On to Bates House where we scoured the premises for any secret entrances or ladders to roofs. Between Bates West and Bates House we found a hotbed of good news. It always starts with bad news though. That's just the way things work, because we had thought we found a concealed entrance to the Bates West underground (and we did) but the door was locked. What a disappointing motif. However, we found a ladder to the roof of the building connecting Bates and Bates West, which of course we couldn't resist.

I love how the steam from the kitchen is pouring off this building.

The only real problem with the roof was that it was too easy to get to. On our way back to our dorm Ben saw a tree auspiciously placed next to the roof we had just gotten on and suggested the challenge of getting on the roof via the tree.

So we had a go at it. (This is hard to see due to blur, but I'm in that tree climbing)

 

And we didn't end up dieing! There is the tree beside the roof I'm on. The climb wasn't too tricky but at the top you had to get on a small branch that you had to bend under your weight toward the roof enough where you could jump on to the building.

The best part of the night was the discovery of Bates' cafe's outdoor freezer, conveniently left unlocked during business hours. Can anyone say free bagels?

The Dirty Duz'n Does it

Yay! One show in the bag. Quite a fine show if I may say so myself, and to the small handful of listeners out there - Thank you. But hey, I just found out a way to record the show easily so the Dirty Duz'n podcast should be up after the next show and all you kids at home will be able to access us two whenever your heart desires.

If you have a 6 am radio show here is what not to do: Don't stay up until 3:30 am because you have to wake up at 5 am and it's cold and that is no fun. "3:30...am! Lucius, you're a mad man" I know. Deal with it. Nothing a hot bowl of Ramen didn't fix.

So after we had some hot food in our bellies and we'd rubbed the crusties out of our eyes, Ben and I walked to Russel House on a brisk Saturday morn. We got to the station on time and the DJ there let us in. Being in a rush and not really knowing what the hell I was doing, I was not able to record our first show properly. You have to record on this CD machine and it's confusing.

At 6 AM the Dirty Duz'n sprang into action and brought all of Columbia some down right funky hip hop and jazz with lovely narration by Ben and Lucius (otherwise known as DJ Dogface and DJ Horseman). If you missed out on this week you missed some dynamite talking. We talked about everything from how I can't spell to . We even advanced the entire field of radio broadcast by introducing the "Radio High 5". After asking for callers we actually had a guy call in on his way to work to tell us we rocked. That made our day. We love callers. So if you call in, we'll love you too. There were two other callers but they happened to be Ben's dad prank calling us, and then my parents calling in.


The whole experience was a lot of fun and I can't wait to do it again. Ben and I are hard at work making the show the best it can be to entertain to fool out of you guys, so tune in sometime. WUSC-FM 90.5 or wusc.sc.edu Saturdays from 6-8.

Dirty Duz'n

Let's face it Saturday morning cartoons are dead. What better way to kick off your Saturday morning than with "The Dirty Duz'n" radio show? It's like waking up to find out Ben and Lucius are in your home goofing off and playing sweet tunes. Us guys are going to be giving this show 117% every Saturday morning. So wake up, get your self a bowl of Cap'n Crunch and tune in.

New Art II

The latest instillation in the ongoing :
'While the Roomates Away, Art Will Play' series by Lucius
medium: Spraypaint on wall

If you have not experienced the 'I Like Turtles' video, check it out:

Precision Spitting

Ben reminded me that I forgot to talk about this in the train hopping post and it was such a momentous event that I felt it deserved mentioning.

Ben and I had just got done riding the trains (see September 12) and we were heading home on the tracks. On the way back we passed over a bridge above some fairly busy road. I saw a car coming and without really thinking about it called out "Ben spit on that car." So Ben got to the railing, stuck his head out, waited until the car was just about to pass, spit and - (Neither of thought there was a really a chance at hitting the car but...) PLIP! The spit nailed the car's window right on the mark and made the most satisfying lil' splat sound of all time. I'm sure the driver was thinking, "Hey what are those guys doing on the train tr- Oh what the hell! Those bastards spit on me!" Ben and I, as semi-retarded gentlemen, thought it was the funniest thing.

Bike Makes Headline News, sort of

My bike was in USC's newspaper today. Oh and by the way, it was not altered with duct tape. That's pure spray paint, baby.

The Theater Pt. II

Remember a few weeks back when we explored the Theater and had no pictures? Yeah, so when Ben's camera came in a week after that (I've been putting off writing about this for awhile now) we decided to make a second attempt at the theater, this time documenting the whole adventure.

We knew we were pressing our luck so we were bent on making this a sure shot straight to the roof while picturing the remnants of last trip. Except this time, things went a bit differently than planned.



The back where we snuck in the first time.

We struck with some reverse graffiti (grime writing, clean tagging, dust tagging, etc) The second picture is kind of hard to distinguish, but it reads "D4H" (standing for Dog 4 Horse, a moniker of The Dog Faced Horse Man) with a dog face Ben drew.
The only problem was the back was locked.
So we resorted to the front.


You have to keep in mind how dark all of this was for us. We were just traveling through almost a jet black darkness. This being our first photoed mission I was hesitant to even take pictures, because before we discovered night vision we were using flash (and still do dependent on the risk factor). To anyone who might get wise to us being there a camera flash would be an instant give away to our local.Here comes the problem and the reason you don't "return to the scene of the crime" : As we ascended the stairs to the final door opening to the top catwalk we heard some people coming. Now we are trapped with the only way to go being up. Ben and I silently sprint through the door, over the catwalk, and up the spiral staircase. Two workers rigging stage lights appear on the catwalk below us. We are shaken but remain as still and quiet as possible. They haven't noticed us yet and we realize the only safe bet is to get as far up as possible and pray they don't come that high. Over their sparse conversation we make our way up the ladder to the rafters below the roof, timing each move with a uproar in talking.

Eventually the two men move down to the stage where they begin working pulley s and ropes. Not knowing what to do, Ben and I wait up in the rafters, hiding our figures with the beams and clutching onto pillars to blend in. The phrase 'heat rises' never became so evident as when we were up there literally sweating it out for about 15 minutes now. I stayed put and listened to their conversation which began to take a turn for the worse. They had to work a rig up high and were coming up. Footsteps resonated in the stairwell then creaked past the first catwalk. The spiral stair case began to clamor under the workers weight.

Now I'm freaking out. Ben and I squeeze behind a pillar as close to the wall as we could. That one spot, as poor of a hiding spot as it was, was the only thing concealing our sight from theirs. The lights in the rafters flicker on as the men arrive at the highest catwalk 20 feet away from us. My mind is racing. What am I going to do if they see us? Do we stand any chance? Should we just come out now and throw our selves at the feet of their mercy? Wait. Sometimes you need to just breathe and wait. Fight or flight will kick in when it needs to, if it needs to. A grueling 10 more minutes went by as sweat dripped down our backs and the men teetered on the edge of our capture.

They left the catwalk and relief flowed through our bodies. To an extent, because the appeared a second later on stage and we still had to sneak our way down through two catwalks a ladder and a spiral staircase.

Here's the scenario -
one guy on a catwalk directly across from us on the other side of the stage
one guy on the stage working on rigging ropes

Ben is the first to go. He makes it to the first catwalk and down the ladder. Now comes the tricky part - the guy on the catwalk on other side of the stage can be obscured by the numerous curtains, but Ben must crouch down and keep tabs on the guys location as he moves so he can position himself at an angle where the curtain blocks him. This only allows about a 2 foot space for Ben to stand in at any given time. Watching above, I see Ben jolting back and forth and I wonder how the hell we got in this situation. But he gets to the door and begins to beckon me. He's watching the guy across the way, but he can't see the guy on the stage. So here I am going down this exposed spiral stair case as silently as possible keeping tabs on my guy and then trying to find the perfect moment when Ben gives me the signal and I'm clear both ways. I catch that moment and sprint. We clear the doors and took a few turns to allude our little worker friends and get out of there.

-In the rafters-
-We felt this poster was very relevant. (We took the copy that was on the back and it is now proudly hanging in our dorm)
Till next time theater. We won't go down that easy.

Stay tuned for 'The Theater pt. III' as Ben makes a risky solo attempt at the theater heist.

Summiting the Water Tower

Good God. Last night was the scariest and most incredible adventure Ben and I have been on yet.

At 11:00 pm we were in our dorm talking about the last water tower attempt. The thing was we saw two other older water towers that we hadn't attempted yet. So Ben says,

"Well I've got 3 hours until I want to be asleep."

I had to rudely end a conversation I was having with Tim Shipp online. Sorry Tim.

"Alright. Let's hit it."

So we suited up in our exploring gear - digital camera, multitool, thick long sleeve jackets and jeans, and our own head gear - for Ben a fedora and I a red headband. We looked like more ridiculous versions of Indiana Jones and Rambo, but we didn't care, we thought we were bad-asses. No one even questioned us as we stepped out the door and down the elevator, we did receive some confused looks.
Around 11:30 we arrive at the first water tower. It's on the side of a fairly busy rode between two houses guarded by a barbed wire fence. Waiting until a lull in traffic I jumped the wall and traversed into the brush with Ben shortly behind me. The whole area including the fence was completely overgrown with what I can only assume was some form of kudzu. "The only people barbed wire is keeping out is fat guys and morons," said Ben. And us being skinny and only slightly morons we were able to tackle the barbed wire without much problem.

*Bring and multitool and clip a section of the wire out is the moral of that story*

Underneath the tower we begin to understand how tall and old this thing was. Above all we begin to understand the risk, because the only ladder for one is old and rusty but more importantly is completely exposed to the road right beside it. Had the ladder not looked like it was going to fall apart and kill us we may have been more likely to attempt to take the ladder fast in hopes no one (or more specifically no cops) would drive by as we're suspended in air. Another watertower risk realized. So we marked it off as an examination of the obstacles against us and moved on to our next target - a water tower we saw while on the train.

Not remembering exactly it's local we walked down the tracks and hoped for a train going our way to cut down on time, but to no avail. No trains came and we were only tricked by bright lights that fooled our minds into seeming to grow closer.
After 20 minutes on the track Ben turned around, "Woah!", we had almost walked right past the tower.
With tower in sight we left the tracks and went through the brush. The brush composed of thick agonizing brier thorns that tore away at us as we stepped in. But we got through and felt the worse had to be over cause damn did that brier suck. How we were wrong. So so wrong.

Side quest: We saw some graffiti and a low roof. Consequently this happened:
There was no clear way to the tower. It was in the middle of another tremendously overgrown field. I guess after noone uses something for so long nature starts reclaiming it's place. 'There Will Come Soft Rains" anybody? It's a poem, read it. The Ray Bradbury short story based on it is pretty good too, but I digress.

We have to aproach this problem headlong so we find a spot where the woods opened a bit and the fence had been broken down just enough to get over. The initial wooded area was slow going but fine. Then we descended into the hell storm of the brier patch. A chest high field of nothing but thorns tearing at you as you tried to get through, slicing your legs and entrapping your feet with every move. I led first and took the brunt of the pain kicking down a path for us to get through. It got to a point where I really viewed the brier as a person out to get me and all I could do was curse at it and ignore the pain as I stomped the hell out of it. But for all I did to it, it got me back. (pictures later). This went on for what must have been 15 minutes just getting through 15 yards to arrive at the water tower.
The tower was taller and more overgrown than the last with a ladder so small it made us think the designers were trying to kill us. When I pictured climbing these towers I guess I always envisioned a cage around the ladder for some safety. No such luck. It was a straight shot up 10 feet first on the actual beam leg of the tower and then about 90 feet more of the ladder which was partially engulfed by a tree you had to maneuver around for 20 feet. But if the barbed wire and valley of thorns hadn't stopped us, we weren't going to stop there. Unlike the other tower, this one's ladder was on a side hidden from the street. So I gathered my wits and started climbing.

It was the most frightening climb I've ever done and I've been rock climbing and just straight up climbing anything I could for years. As I climbed my body became hyper aware of what it needed to do. My adrenline kicked in and I forget any pain I had in my body. My mind became entranced in keeping myself alive, turning me virtually into a climbing robot. I never looked down and nothing exsisted beside what I could see in my direct vision. It was just 'right hand, right foot, left hand, left foot.." never moving unless I knew I had three strong holds. 100 feet I climbed until I reached the top which was the scariest of all. You had to dismount the ladder and squeeze under or over a railing with nothing holding you in. One false move and you fall to your death. When I got in and was able to sit down on the tower my heart was racing, my breathing was heavy and I was uttering "Holy shit." ever few moments.

Now it was Ben's turn and I'm sure he was going through everything I went through. I wanted to encourage him as he was climbing but I dared not break his concentration. I didn't say anything or move until he was clear up. We took a moment to get grip of ourselves before we looked around.

The experience was breathtaking, the view incredible, the feeling of the climb unmatched.

Our feet dangling off the edge a hundred feet in the air

The trip down the ladder wasn't too bad after I got myself out from the platform and onto the ladder. A very tricky and risky move. We just didn't want to die in front of each other, so we made it. On the walk home we couldn't believe what we had just done and were only reassured of the reality of it when we saw the numerous cuts on our legs and dozens of hitchhiker seeds stuck to our clothes.

My leg after battling the brier patch

A little Disclaimer for the Reader:
I will never discourage you from adventure, but I will let you know the most important thing I've found. Trust. (and I know that sounds like cheesy team building workshop stuff but still) You need to completely trust yourself before you can even think about attempting something like this. I've been climbing all my life and know my limits - what risks I can take and which I can't. You need to know that you can tell your body to do a move and trust yourself enough to do it. People run into problems when they don't trust themselves and start getting nervous and not committing to what they are doing. There was nothing technical about the water tower climb, the key is convincing yourself that you can do it and nothing will go wrong.

Second off, if you adventure with anyone (which I highly recommend) you need to completely trust that person and understand them. The worst thing you can do is go off and start exploring with people you are not tight with and something goes down and they make a break for it and leave you in the dust. It's about getting everyone to the same point and having each other's backs if all else goes wrong. And if you are going to try to complete a risky physical activity you need to know the level your co-adventurer is at.

At this point in my life, I wouldn't have trusted anyone but Ben to climb that tower with me. He's a great climber and we understand what it takes. I would be too afraid to let anyone else climb that with me.

That's it.

We got home at 2:30. So much for being home in 3 hours. It was all worth it. Adventure is always worth it.