Charleston

I'm so excited to be here. So many good memories originated in this town and it's great to hang out with old friends that share the same memories. Blake and Stacey have been great... letting me stay with them while I'm here in town. Dragging me here and there and picking me up from the airport... Thanks girls! I'm definitely looking forward to New Years here. I'm sure it's going to be a long night of drunken debauchery, that is if thursday night was any indication.

A Change of Plans

it seems the airlines have had a schedule change of sorts and my flight back to Kalispell will now occur on the 1st, rather than the 31st. This is both good and bad. Good because now I'll at least be able to spend New Years Eve with my friends, but bad because that day to recover from jet lag/hangover is now reduced to 7 hours. I'm going to have to arrange a luggage swap at the airport. Warm clothes for cold clothes and a snowboard. A special thanks to g-ma and g-pa by the way, for the new travel bag for my snowboard. My trip would not have been possible with out it. And to my sis: Thanks for letting me come visit and chill with the baby... and I left my fleece jacket there, so if you could mail it when you get the chance, that would be great!

The Journey Begins

this is the second day of my holiday excursions. I have a 17 day long insane vacation planned. Yesterday, I traveled to Olympia, WA, to visit my lovely pregnant sister, Liberty. Perhaps you've heard of her. She's kind of a big deal. Well, the trip was long, and full of minor annoyances. For example: spilling coffee all over myself and my car, having to buy more windshield wiper fluid and, at the next stop, new wipers. But it was all worth it. I gave her her Christmas presents from myself and others, and forced her to open them a few days early. Today, the plan is to go finish this year's Christmas shopping. Then, tomorrow I head back home for Christmas Eve and Christmas. I'm off again on the 27th to Charleston, SC, to visit some much-missed friends. I return home again on the 31st, flying in just 15 minutes before the New Year. Good luck finding a ride from the airport, right? I'll have one day to recover from the jet lag (and the hangover) before I'll be on my way to Whistler, B.C.! This is definitely the most anticipated part of my trip, for sure. Five whole days of snowboarding and Canadian Beer. Yummers.

Another painful weekend

this is me on the ride up the chairlift, spending the weekend doing what I love to do... trying to kill myself snowboarding. This weekend I was a bit more successful in doing that than last weekend. Injuries include: ramming my hip into a tree, almost impaling myself between the shoulder blades on a thick broken branch, and slamming my elbow into a jagged boulder. I think I made a smart decision to skip out and recover this Sunday. A few hours in the massage chair is in order. Can't wait to do it again in another week!

But Blacktail will have to wait. There were wayyy too many hidden obstacles just inches below the snow, resulting in many of the injuries listed above, and also taking a toll on my brandy-new board. I've been afraid to look at it since yesterday, because I know I put some fresh gouges on the bottom... my poor baby. A few more snowstorms should do the trick, and I'll be back to get revenge on Blacktail Mountain.

It's ON!!

beerfest round two! The DVD came out today, so Brett and I decided to celebrate the only way we saw fit... we bought 3 huge beer mugs and 18 beers to split three ways (Terry joined in with us), and settled in for a Beerfest of our own. It was a good time, for sure. Wooo!

Ugggh.

today will be a test of my strength and will power. I arrived to work this morning and was overwhelmed with exhaustion. The kind of exhaustion only achieved through two straight days of battling the Mountain, armed with a snowboard. I ache. It's true, I am out of shape. But now I have a full 5 days of "recuperation time" at work! Hopefully the soreness goes away in a few days and I'll be ready for round 2 next weekend. Time to get out there and start the day... wish me luck.

Poachin powder...

finally the moment has come! I got to do two marvelous days of snowboarding with all new gear, reduced llift ticket prices, and plenty of powder to satisfy my cravings. It was great! Brett came with me today, and it was only his second time snowboarding. Not second season... second time. It was entertaining at first to see him eat snow so many times, but after awhile, I just felt sorry for the guy. He was doing waaay better than I was on my second day, that's for sure. Connected turns and everything! I was seriously impressed. He did have to ride my old beat up boad and about halfway through the day, one of the bindings broke, but he just kept on riding. What a trooper! Props to Brett! We'll see how he does next weekend when I take him through some powder :)

Here you can see that we didn't hesitate to start the day off right with a few Fat Tires. Gets you loosened up and warms you from the inside. By the end of the day though, we decided to switch over to some hot chocolate and schnapps for extra warmth. All around a very memorable weekend. Thinking I might see how the snow is over at Blacktail next weekend, and if it's anything like Big Mountain was, it's on!