When 127 hours came out, I thought, “What if social media were around back then?”

I tend to think the real Ralston would have tweeted those selfie snaps he took – or at least updated fellow Facebook canyoneers about where he was headed had networking sites been around. Somebody that egotistical (as he shames himself for) doesn’t perform random acts of badassery just to keep it to himself. You share that shit.

And much like the 127 hours tale, a similar story that made the news this week was that of John All’s. ‘cept, this was more like 127 degrees below zero. (Well, not really – but I’m sure it felt like that to a guy internally bleeding in snowy Nepal.) Dr. All (a climber and geo/enviro professor) and his team were on a research excursion in the Himalayas when he fell 70 feet into a crevasse, breaking five ribs, an arm, dislocating both shoulders, and a buncha other shit. As the professor found himself in this chilly pickle, you know what he did? Like any technology addict worth their weight, he took out his phone with his good arm and captured that shit on video:

After falling that far down, having most limbs injured, and standing on a three foot wide ledge (that might collapse under me at any second), I don’t even think I would have been speaking intelligible English. My video would have just been a camera panning between the peripheral ice walls and my wide-eyed face repeating “FUUAAAAACK.”

Over and over again.

Until I slowly ran out of batteries and froze to death.

But, nope. The doc took about six hours to work his way up with his tool, and then another three to wiggle back to camp. Fortunately for him, this frigid hell had cell service. Or wifi. Or something – because he was able to use his device to post a rescue plea on the American Climber Science Facebook page…

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You might be wondering what I was – where the eff is his team while this shit’s going down?!

Yeah… Apparently the Himalayas aren’t so small. His colleagues were at a lower camp that was too far away to reach him before nightfall. Worse made worse – the weather was too poor for air-rescue to swoop in and scoop him up. So, homeboy did what any American might do to quell the pain of such a miserable situation: munch some painkillers and hop on social media.(Actually, there’s plenty who just do that anyway, to celebrate it being 3:00 on a Tuesday.)

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By morning, the ice-fairing bad ass still had blood pumping through his veins, so the rescue dudes arrived, took him to hospital, and the whole thing made him famous. And like most adrenaline junkies I know, he’s already amped to get back out there. Right after his…uh… everything heals. Except like maybe half an arm (which is still probably hurting after dragging the rest of his dead-ass weight around for a million hours in the snow).

‘least All’s got “all” his limbs!

I’m just glad “All” is well.

Okay, that’s enough. Seriously… that’s “all” folks!

#zing.zing.everwhere