Third weekend in a row at the Gunks. Gas at the 209/44 intersection has gone from $3.41 to $3.63 to $3.73 in just a 14 day span. I'm just recording that information in case there is any historical interest... No... I'm complaining because I was driving by myself. Nobody from Ithaca wanted to go because the weather forecast was terrible. Just like two weeks ago, the forecast was terrible, but the actual weather was great. Luckily Marah was willing to drive up from PA to climb with me.

Drove down Friday night and was really tired, so I got to sleep as soon as I arrived. Saturday we got an early start and climbed High E, Insuhlation, Sleepwalk, Ant's Line, Ent's Line and Ursula. It was only 5pm but we were hungry, so we went off to see Marah's friends Greg and Joan. They fed us a wonderful dinner and let us play with their three adorable border collies. It was a really good day. Insuhlation, Sleepwalk and Ursula were all new for me, so that was exciting. And I got to play with puppies!

It rained a bit Saturday night, and Sunday started overcast. But it never rained and continued to clear. The sun even came out in the afternoon. So we could have climbed, but we decided to play cards instead. Marah taught me canasta, which is a lot like rummy, but with more rules.

I was going to try to record all the rules here so I'd remember how to play, but I realized that Google will always and forever be able to turn up a web page with exhaustively listed rules. Still, I'll summarize the rules, at least enough to trip my memory: Two decks plus six jokers; deal 15 cards; pick and discard; pick entire discard pile, but must be able to play the top card; 50 points to open (90 if over 1500, 120 if over 3000); must have one canasta (seven or more of a kind) to go out; 2s and jokers are wild; melds are 3 cards minimum and may not have more wild than natural cards; red 3s are 100, played and replaced immediately, 200 each if a player gets all four; black 3s can't be picked up and block the discard pile for one turn; wild discard freezes the discard pile and requires that a player have two naturals in their hand to pick up; you may pick an unfrozen discard pile to add to a meld, but not to a canasta (though you may add to a canasta from your hand); going out scores 100, natural canasta 500, canasta with wilds 300, 3-7 are 5 points each, 8-K are 10 points each, A and 2 are 20 each, jokers are 50 each; 5000 points wins the game. Unlike rummy there are no runs and you may not play off your opponent's cards. We played what one web site calls the classic game, but we didn't allow melds of black 3s to go out, and we didn't give a 100 point bonus for going out concealed, and we played with six jokers not four.

That should do it... Now on to the pictures. I didn't take many, we were climbing instead.