Five Words to Retire From Climbing Right Now

Whoever in the climbing media was in charge of making that token year-end list of “words to retire” in the forthcoming annum dropped the ball in December 2013, because I didn’t see shit online about all the garbage clichés currently stinking up our sport’s proud lexicon.

Well, now is as good a time as any to make a list like that. The following words are outdated, overused, and just plain lame. They all had their heydays, but now, they’re over. Let’s get rid of them. Agreed? OK, good.

 

Dawn Patrol: Unless you’re a Texas Ranger walking fence-line between the hours of 4 and 6 a.m., don’t say you’re on “dawn patrol” when really you’re just going skiing before work. You’re not Alex Lowe. You’re not patrolling anything. Stop saying dawn patrol.

 

Pebble Wrestling: It’s sort of a cute image, I guess. Bouldering kinda does look like wrestling, I guess. Boulders are kinda like pebbles, I guess. It’s a cute little phrase. I guess.

alex-honnold-camp-4-collective

Honnolding: You know those jokes that are funny because “you had to be there”? And you know how when you try to explain one of those jokes to someone who wasn’t there, they don’t get it … because it’s not really a joke in the first place? Because it’s not really funny and, in fact, it’s actually just embarrassing. This word is kinda like that: a lame joke between two sycophants that should’ve never made it to the light of day. Delete all your #honnolding Instagrams now, and let’s just pretend this whole thing never happened.

 

“The Office”: Stop calling crags, El Cap, the mountains, or anyplace that isn’t a miserable little cubicle filled with TPS reports, your “office.” You’re not in the office, you’re at the office, and you most certainly aren’t putting in “Another Day at the Office.” More than anything, you aren’t doing work. Get a job and shut the fuck up.

 

Bone Crush:  Jonathan Thesenga is credited with introducing this fantastic phrase into climbing’s lexicon sometime last year. It’s a great phrase. I really loved using it, too. Unfortunately, I’ve seen too many other media-dorks on the Internet writing about how Daniel Woods (et al) bone crushed the latest shit. Now it’s so overused it’s just not cool anymore. Sorry, JT. You must know how black people feel when white people try to talk like them to sound cool. It was good while it lasted …

About The Author

Andrew Bisharat

Andrew Bisharat is a writer and climber based in western Colorado. He is the publisher of Evening Sends and the co-host of The RunOut podcast.

Free Climb. Free Thought.

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Comments

8 Comments

  1. Avatar

    Only 5 words? I feel like this was an awesome trailer for the real deal. Let me help you add to the list: Venga (for those that have never climbed in Spain), epic (whippers on sport climbs are not considered epics.), proj. (unless your project is so hard that it disables your speaking abilities, say the entire word.), 5.hard (shut up and just tell me the real rating.)

    Reply
  2. Avatar

    Ben, your comments are epic…dammit!

    Reply
  3. Avatar

    Tired of hearing about people “shitting on” and “pissing on” their projects. If I wanted potty play, I’d go hang out under my glass coffee table and order up some prostitutes, same as always.

    Reply
  4. Avatar

    Actually, let’s ban “venga” for all climbers whose native language isn’t Spanish.

    Reply
    • Avatar

      This and Allez for the love of God

      Reply
  5. Avatar

    You know what word is really overused by climbers? “Send”. Just saying.

    Reply
    • Avatar

      and the phrase “just saying.” Nobody ever needs to add that at the end of what they say. 🙂

      Reply
  6. Avatar

    haha

    Reply

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