Boy, are my legs tired

As in, this morning, when i woke up and rolled out of bed? I tried to stand up, and ended up falling on the floor. Now, granted, I'd been out to a trivia night at the local pub the night previous (amazingly fun - but more on that later), but that really wasn't the issue. My legs (quads specifically) were out of it. Very muchly.

2 things before I wax lyrical about the mountain climb:
1 - why do mosquitos make that annoying buzzing sound? If you are going to bite me, fine. But why do they need to wake you up to do it? Surely buzzing isn't a super useful skill to have from an evolutionary perspective, right?
2 - this blog is really good.
3 - I can't count.
4 - the big question time. Gentlemen, look at your hands. That's right, your hands. Girly style, like you are checking out your nails. Yeah, you like that, don't you?
Anyway, your fingers can be viewed in three segments (which I will call "bits"), the nail bit, and middle bit, and the bit that connects to your hand, and that rings generally... ring. Around. The posie.
the nail bits don't have any hair on them - but all the other bits do. EXCEPT that on my (more hirstute than average) bits, the right index finger middle bit? One hair. On the left hand - nada. And I've never met a guy who has hair there.
I'm seriously asking guys about their bits... I'm about to go to the local gay club (well, not here in SL, they don't have them) and start asking guys about their bits. I already freaked out one super-hairy dude I met by asking him. If anyone can find a study that explains why the bits all have hair except the middle index bit? I'd love to know!

Ok! Onto more travel stuff...

There's a nice photo of the mountiain on this page which is, really and truly, what I climbed. Hectic, much! Ok, so let me describe the climb.
Awoke at 2:30 am (or, I rolled out of bed at 2:30am, because I'd had no real sleep - the place we were at DID have a mosquito net, but it was more based on the "lobster pot" concept - they got in, and couldn't get out) - and left the guesthouse at about 2:50 in the morning.
Wandered up with Steve, past the sellers of a-grade rubbish, and onto the steps! They start out like a, uh, set of easy steps, that lull you into false security by getting VERY steep a good 30 mins into it. 5000 steps? That's alot gang, and the dude who cut them decided that:
a) quantity is better than quality
b) size doesn't really matter
c) nor does width

Steve is alot fitter than me, so as we are going up I get the distinct feeling that I am going to die. We stop intermittently - say, everytime I run out of breath - say every 4 mins - and then, to inspire me, Steve decides we RUN up one section, and then have a 10 min break.
Ok, now all this time, I've been keeping up with Steve's pace as best I can. Even as we run up 100m or pure step, I'm right behind him. ....and then my quads decide to take a vacation.
After nearly falling all the bloody way back down, and with Steve (aka Rocky) throwing his hands in the air at the top of the little section, we part ways for the time being. He heads on up, and I do it... at a more Andrew pace. I'm counting from 10 as I go up, ANYTHING to keep on going.
But I get to the top. View is nice - I have some photos, and I prayed at a buddhist thingy at the top. The top is kind of disappointing - in the West, we'd have, say, a revolving restaurant, a maccas, a view deck, and whatnot. Here, we have about 100 pilgrims, a loudspeaker that blares our religious mantras, and a wall that tries to block the view.
Oh, but I totally climbed it in approx 2-2.5 hours. From 3am until 5am (roughly).

Ok, get some photos, head back down, and head on - to Colombo! And back to a trivia night that I was at a week back. Good night - out team, the "Vestigial Women" (don't ask. Just don't) was Steve (ever ready), Paul (a britisher who buys and sells companies), Navim (a sri-lankan who owns a company that paints warhammer models for rich americans), Fiona (a sydney-sider [hooray!] poet-cum journalist), and me (the Greatest Man Alive). We're obviously the pick for the competition, but somehow we totally blow out chances by, well, not knowing a damn thing. Except I totally knew that a photo of Pol-Pot was, um, Pol Pot. Only we put down chairman mao because I was at the toilets at the time, and didn't see the photo until later.

Today I am either - going to a beach, or going to India, or not doing anything. It's a tough life here, but someone has to do it.

And that someone is me.

Have I mentioned how wonderful sri-lanka, and sri-lankans generally are yet? Well, let me mention that now - sri-lanka, and sri-lankans generally, are super wonderful. It's a great place to visit!