2 new book reviews

Mark, seriously, read the second book and then call me.

Happy Birthday to Me!

For my birthday, Mel, Mom, and Dad teamed up to buy me a lift ticket to Crystal Mountain: a great ski resort near our home.

Today, the planets finally aligned and I was able to take advantage of the opportunity.

File photo.
Any relation to persons, living or dead,
is purely coincidental and unintentional.

I learned quite a few new things while on the slopes. Some things I learned include

1. Spring Conditions
2. Slumbering Habits of Mountains
3. A Colloquial Definition of "Clearing Up"
4. Relative Growth Rates of Various Senses

I always understood "spring conditions" to generally mean that the snow is slow and slushy, the weather warm (images of people skiing in less clothes than I wear around the house), and you might get rained on.
That is not, apparently, the case. Or at least not always. Today, "spring conditions" mean that the weather forecast will be dead wrong, you will have no idea what condition the snow will be in, groomed, scraped ice, powder, powder over groomed, or crusty. The crusty is extra special, as it is >1' deep powder-crust. So, you can't push off of it - too much give and collapse, and you can't plow straight through it - it sucks and grabs you, then acts like powder when you try to stand.

Along with spring conditions are the slumbering habits of mountains. As I was driving away, I noticed several patches of snow that were subliming in the sunlight. That was new to me. I typically ski/snowboard at a time of year and in a clime where that is not really common.
It did explain a lot, however.
The mountain was perpetually shrouded in a cloud. No matter that it was snowing/slushing - that didn't impair me too much. However, not being able to see far enough ahead to plan out more than a single turn made things difficult. It also made it very difficult to notice small changes in the surface. We have already discussed variable snow conditions, but there were additionally bumps, depressions, rolls, and even moguls that I did not notice until I fell off of them. It was exhilarating in a sense, but it made the control freak in me a mite upset.
Every time I thought that the could/fog was thinning, it would redouble its efforts and clamp back down on the hillside. I attribute this to the mountain. Every time its warm foggy blanket (warm in the mountain's opinion) would be stripped off, it would simply regenerate a new one. Imagine if you were able to do the same. No one would ever fight over blankets again. You could just grow one when your partner hogged the blankets. Maybe Dad could teach his feet how to grow an especially thick one. In any case, I faulted this annoyingly intriguing attribute for the ever-present, ever-regenerating fog.

Right along with that is a new meaning (for me) of the phrase "clearing up". I understand that to mean that the clouds are breaking up and I should soon expect to see the sun poking through. However, in Washington, or at least on Crystal, "clearing up" actually means that the cloud bank is rising a bit in elevation. This does have the same net effect of improving visibility (albeit temporarily - the mountain didn't like his blanket slipping off and grabbed it back. or regrew it. It is tough to say). It was nice to be able to see the bottom of the ledge/roll I was about to start down. Even if my visibility was still severely impaired, I was making the most of it. 10 minutes round trip from lift line, up, down and back into lift line. There is no telling how long the respite would be, so it was best to assume that it wouldn't last. It didn't.

Relative growth rates. I have noticed that my sense of confidence has not grown as fast as some of my other senses, one in particular, to be mentioned shortly. In part, this is based on my confidence in my equipment, my familiarity with the terrain and mountain (and my ability to see it), and my confidence in my skill. My skills have lost their edge. I don't think they have much deteriorated, but it did take more than a single run to remind myself how things work. I was able to work myself back to a position where I felt, all things considered, that I was back on par with where I had been, years ago. It has been ~4 years since I was last on the slopes, and that was on skis. It had been at least 2 additional years (I think) since I was last on a board. For conservatism's sake, let's say 5 years since I last snowboarded. I am not at all disappointed with my muscle memory. However, I did notice that my sense of caution has caught up to my sense of confidence. Unfortunately, the factors which stunt the growth of confidence spur the growth of caution. Now, I am not a fuddy-duddy, or Mom, yet. While I did feel some hesitation and self-restraint at some things I did, I still did them. And did them fine in all cases but one. So caution has not, thankfully, grown so large and to dominate and smother confidence, but the argument was not as lopsided as it had once been. I'm okay with that.

Well, this post is already much longer than I had intended it to be, and I have truncated it severely and left off numerous topics of consideration. So I won't belabor the point any further.

I had a great day and really enjoyed my birthday present. Thanks and love to those who sent me up to stretch neglected muscles.

Australia

In deference to chronology, I had to do Australia before my next post, but I will have to come back to it. So this is my official Australia post. An unnamed post soon to come, which may or may not speak of Australia, will be the unauthorized, editor's/director's bootleg cut, stolen from the black market (that seems ironic).