Minding My Own Business

Last night, J & I went to the Bike Portland Social hour at Roots Brewing. I decided I wanted more RAM for my Mac and Macforce is just a few blocks from the bar. Dual purpose/double occupancy always makes me feel better about driving. And luckily, we weren't stoned for arriving at the bike party by car.

When the noise level exceeded tolerance, we headed up to Hoda's Mediterranean restaurant on 34th & Belmont, where a helpful, familiar-looking woman helped me park the car (we were deciding whether we had enough clearance from the driveway--she thought we did. It was very SE PDX).

I hadn't been to Hoda's since last year after the Pedalpalooza Parade, where I had the misfortune to discover that I had contracted food poisoning (NOT from Hoda's--Sushiland on Weidler if you care to avoid it). Jess ate and I spent the whole time in the bathroom being turned inside out like a shirt. It was good to go back and have a more positive experience.

I was facing away from the door so Jess reported any interesting people watching opportunities. There was a young interracial couple with the cutest little boy (has anyone ever seen an ugly interracial baby?). They were seated behind us and then a few minutes later, Jess said, "That women is smoking outside the door. Do you want to go have a chat with her?"

I chuckled, thinking she was just referring to a random person creating a smoke gauntlet for us to run through when we left the restaurant, but in fact she was talking about the mother of the little boy. That really did make me want to go talk to her. I probably would've said something like, "I guess you don't want to live to see your kid's 30th birthday huh?" I resisted, knowing how obnoxious it would sound and that there was a .00000001% chance of doing any good and a 99.999999999% chance of pissing her off.

Just one more of the side effects of being half-orphaned--the sudden urge to confront almost every smoker I see and make them understand the real consequences of their deeply ill-advised choice.

My New Bike

I went and test road some more bikes this week but this is the one I really had my eye on. It's what all the cool kids (AKA bike shop employees are riding). That's good enough for me. Now that spring is around the corner, I'm itching to hit the trails. I almost got one this week, but I'm going to wait for the next sale, which should be sometime in April. Guess I better do my taxes...

Down the--Oh Crap I Already Used That One

We're in our home office, which still looks like a baby room because there hasn't really been time for decorating in the past year. Jess is writing in her blog, which officially makes us hopelessly disgusting. I swear, five years ago, I couldn't have stood to be around us. But now I think we're the cutest thing ever. And apparently so does John Francis, but that's another story.

I had a dream about my friend Adrienne, so I sent her an email, and she sent me an invitation to the play she is doing right now with Artist Reperatory Theatre, called Rabbit Hole.

The play is about a family dealing with grief from the unexpected death of a child. I don't know if it's in spite of or because of the subject, but I really enjoyed it. I'm sure a big part of that is because it has plenty of funny moments as well. And also because it's superbly written. The playwright David Lindsay-Abaire, really gets it. And the actors made it feel more like peeping into someone's kitchen window than watching a play.

The hardest part about watching was really all the sweets they eat. Every five minutes, they're eating cake, or lemon bars, or creme caramel something. I wanted some bad. I even texted Adrienne during intermission to inquire about what happens to the left-overs, but she said it was a free for all--the cake was really good tonight. I'm sure for the actors it gets old, but watching, I just wanted to poach the leftovers out of the fridge when it was all over. But Adrienne confirmed that she and cake will probably part ways forever when this is all over.

Rabbit Hole runs until March 23rd and there's half price coupons in the Chinook Book if you happen to own one. I highly recommend it.

In other news, Jess is continuing the healing process. She started physical therapy today and they expect her to make quick progress. She's out of her brace a lot, doing exercises, and using her hand as much as possible without too much pain or strain. But most exciting to me is that the dishes have been washed twice now without my assistance. Oh it's the little things that bring so much joy. When she gets back on her bike (probably another month), there will be serious celebrating. And pedaling.

Down the Rabbit Hole

Stranger #74 Craig
Originally uploaded by i5prof

I got a cryptic message that said someone had found five of my social networks using Spokeo. I had never heard of it before so of course I went to take a look-see. It's a social network aggregator that finds all the public Internet content of anyone in your address book.

Talk about a TIME SUCK!

Of course I joined.

Although I can't seem to help a propensity for public navel gazing, most of my friends do not suffer the same affliction--which makes it very hard to stay in touch. Spokeo promised me new and amazing information about where the lurkers in my life are hanging out on line.

So far I've been able to dip into it in quick spurts, like a bag of Frittos that you force into a friend's hands to hide from you after a few chips. That way I get to look forward to new surprises every day.

Like the photo, taken by the director of my educational teen theater group from high school, seen above.

It turns out she's quite the photographer and she's participating in a project called 100 Strangers. Go read about it and then go check out her 100 Strangers Flickr set. Totally mesmerizing.

Hey, you had a few hours to kill, right?

How to Have a Weekend

I tried this new thing all the cool kids are doing this past weekend: I had some fun.

Sure I had to stay up till 4:30am Saturday morning to finish enough homework to justify it, but it was worth it. I think it's the first weekend I've had all term that I wasn't super stressed out about finishing something.

It wasn't easy to get out of work mode, but I managed.

Saturday:

Slept until noonish and made Challah French toast for breakfast. Later we met up with Jess's friends T & L to help them with their bike shopping. We met at River City to start. It was a MADHOUSE. I haven't seen it like that since last summer. Turns out they're having a spring sale and it was a Saturday with pretty nice weather. Do the math.

While T & L tried out a few Specialized Globes, I took another spin on the Cannondale Rush mountain bike. I tried this bike out a few weeks ago when I test rode a bunch of stuff. I thought I had my heart set on a Specialized, but those all felt weird and this bike fit the best. Not to mention a large percentage of RC employees own and race this bike. That's a pretty big endorsement, considering that most of them get new bikes every year. Our sales guy was going on his third year with the Rush. The big question is how I'm going to fit another bike into our garage, especially in it's current state of disarray...

From there we went to Urban Grind for caffenation before moving on to REI, where we had one of the most painful shopping experiences I've ever had. I had someone paged to help us (REI is also having a sale, go figure) and he promptly helped someone else ahead of us. Another 10 minutes of waiting got us another employee, who didn't listen, was sort of rude and not very helpful. Then he deserted us and in his stead, brought over a woman who was just dumb. I had to ask the same question about six times and I did more to help them try out the bikes than she did.

Before we left, I used my dividend refund and a coupon to get the last winter item on my list (smartwool base layer shirt) and some new hiking pants.

We decompressed from insane shopping world with a short hike on the Macleay trail in Forest park. I really should go up there more often. Maybe I'll do that in my spare time between 2-4am.

Sunday:

We stayed up late (again) and slept late (again). A game of phone tag with Ru ended in the mid afternoon with confirmed plans for dinner at Laughing Planet later. Then she made fun of us for still being inside on such a gorgeous day.

So I prodded us into going for a walk. I even wore 'summer' clothes, in the form of capris pants and sandals. It was plenty warm when we left, and we wandered south and east towards our friend Rox's house. She and her gf J were in Sunday chill mode and we ended up visiting with them for several hours. R loaned us her car to go to dinner so we could stay longer and come back for J's fire spinning later that night in the backyard. Jess and I both took pictures but as usual, she got the money shot:



That one is from her new camera on Fireworks mode. My camera doesn't have that feature, but nightscene worked some pretty cool magic as well:



I have some video as well, which I'm sure I'll upload to Youtube--in my spare time between (say it with me now) 2 and 4am.

It was nice having some guilt-free time off and now it's back to the books for one last push.

Cycle Seen

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Cycle Seen is an exhibition celebrating the diverse and dynamic culture of cycling/cyclists in Portland, Oregon. The exhibition will take place in June 2008, throughout metro Portland. Some Cycle Seen events such as rides to gallery locations will occur during Pedal Palooza, Portland’s bike fun festival.

Cycle Seen is currently seeking submissions for a juried exhibition. Portland area Photographers and Artists are invited to submit up to 10 images for consideration. We are interested in showcasing work that addresses the theme of Portland’s diverse bike culture. Work in all two-dimensional media is eligible for consideration.

I got invited to this from a Flickr friend several weeks ago, but of course, I didn't get my submissions in until tonight, 30 minutes before deadline to be exact. Jess sent some photos in too--she takes excellent photos. I've just spent some time perusing through most of the submissions and if you like bikes, Portland or both, it's definitely a fun way to kill some time.

Check it out here.

Distraction

All I wanted, was to find this link, so I could put it into an email. But the link was posted by my sister on Facebook. So I logged on to Facebook. But then I had to read the mini-feed. I saw a link for Twitterfeed, which takes your tweets and updates your Facebook status with them. I've been meaning to try it so I subscribed, which meant going over to the Twitter page to remember my password (turns out I didn't need it anyway).

What was I doing? Oh yeah, I need to send that email. Switch back over to Gmail. Remember why I opened Facebook in the first place, but now 20 minutes have gone by in which no productivity has been seen or heard of.

And that is why the Internet is EVIL.

What? No, I'm not blogging to procrastinate, why do you ask? Excuse me, I have to get back to work.


Posted from XP on Mac

Rambles

I feel like this is becoming the dead mom blog so I'm going to ramble on about some other stuff for a while. I will say, the house is finally empty, but things got much worse before they got better.

I'm still in school. I realize what a glorious luxury it is not to have to work while I'm in school full time. Thanks Ford! I really really hope to continue that trend for the rest of my school career. Mostly my days are filled with homework right now, trying to finish up projects for the end of the term. Today was Java, tomorrow is PHP and CSS. If you followed that last sentence, then you are probably somewhat geeky.

I'm working becoming more geeky but it's slow going. I finally installed Ubuntu Linux as an extra OS on my Mac so I could see what all the fuss is about. I used VMWare Fusion, which I originally got so I could defile my Mac with a Windows installation. It's a necessary evil for school purposes and truth-be-told, it's not Windows I mind, so much as the viruses and crashes that seem to come with it. But it's been fine so far.

I haven't had much time to monkey around with the Linux, but I noticed that the mouse functions weren't what they could be. I needed to install VMWare tools to get more seamless functionality but the graphical installer wasn't working. So I successfully used my root user privileges in the command terminal and installed it that way. Go me. So now I'm posting this from Firefox in Ubuntu.

All my t's and i's are just about crossed and dotted for my transfer to AIP next fall. I'm really looking forward to my last term at PCC. I designed my schedule with an eye for classes that will definitely transfer over to my new (very expensive) school and as a result, my schedule is structured to stretch my brain (and body) in every possible direction:

Drawing: Although I will eventually focus on programming, I have been adamant that I wanted a program where I could learn design principles as well. Hence the art school. Everyone takes drawing and color theory. At this point in my life, I can draw a stick figure and that's about it. I'm both excited and nervous about this class.

Math: My math requirements are sufficient for the two-year plan I started out with, but for a bachelor's, there's a little more math in my future. I had a choice of three different focuses: A) Liberal Arts, B) Business/management/life/social science or C) hardcore science/engineering. I'm not sure how you skew math in those different directions, but I chose B as soon as I saw the name of my old math teacher from last year in front of it. I like his teaching style and he wrote me an awesome recommendation letter for my Ford scholarship. Plus he's totally into bikes, so we were always talking about our steeds after class. He came to a Dirty Martini show at happy hour when class was over and was a witness to my first drunken binge--but that's another story. Math will be hard, but cool.

Since it's my last hurrah, I decided to totally indulge, so my third class is Creative Writing Nonfiction. Can you say, 'Excuse to blog?"

Last but certainly not least, I signed up for a yoga class, three times a week. I've only been talking about taking yoga for the last 15 years, so now I'm taking the plunge. My new massage therapist forbade me to stand on my head and ruin all her hard work on my neck.

See? Mind and body. Since I'm not taking any programming or hard core geekery this term, that means I can take all my classes at the Cascade campus 15 minutes from home. My schedule is 9-2 MWF, and 2-5 TH which means I'll have to get off my butt and ride my bike to school every day. I'm sure that will do wonders for my mental health.

In other news, I have an actual paid writing gig for a new magazine all about the Portland bike scene. I never really thought about it, but it is kind of ridiculous that we are widely considered to be the best cycling city in the U.S. but we don't have our own magazine. My friend Curt aims to fill the gap. I ran into him last fall while working a rest stop on the Bike to the Future ride. I met Curt a few years ago when I was still on a long term mission to get mom a bike. He was working at River City Bikes and he was extremely helpful and nice to us. Mom actually put a down payment on a Specialized Sirrus, but then changed her mind. Stubborn. It was another two years before I forced her into buying a bike, which she took one ride on before things went downhill (and there we go down the forbidden path again...)

Anyway...of course I mentioned that I was a writer so Curt promptly offered me the Women on Bikes monthly column. The first issue will be out in April, check your local bike shops.

Jess and I are having a hard time getting to bed before 2am these days, what with her out of work because of her wrist and me not having any classes before 1pm. She has become quite the social butterfly, and is always off on some date or another with her friends, since all I do is read and mumble unintelligible things about objects and methods. Her old camera died (RIP Casio) and the new one arrived today and she's been obsessing about photo organizing programs, and picture hosting for the last several days. She even started her own blog, which you should add to your feed reader immediately. Her new camera makes movies with sounds and she's busy learning to edit with her Movie Maker program and if I hear myself say, "Hi movie watching people" one more time, I'm going to pull out what's left of my hair, but since I've been the one behind the camera till now, I guess I'll just suck it up.

OK, I'm going to stop typing now and go to bed, despite the fact that I just discovered the built in games in Linux, one of which is Tetris. I *really* did not need to know that.

Hard Day's Work

I've spent most of this week working on my mom's house. It's been a series of fits and starts in terms of sorting through a lifetime's worth of stuff. I've been fortunate to have lots of willing helpers along the way, but it's still a sucky task.

For a long time I couldn't visit without having a breakdown. After this happened on a simple trip to grab a shovel out of the shed, I boycotted the house for several months. My friend and old neighbor was kind enough to mow the out of control grass and keep an eye on it.

Of course, time marches on, and we can't really afford to have the house sit vacant forever, so this past month I've been formulating a strategy for getting the rest of the stuff out.

When Jess gets the whiff of a hint that I'm working on something, she will usually start researching and sending me information. I love her for this, even as I often find it annoying, because it brings up completely irrational feelings of inadequacy--but I can't deny that she is a huge help in making things happen. Even when mom was sick, and I was spending almost as much time at her house as ours, Jess would quietly request that maybe we could think about getting X house project done in the next few weeks--we had just moved after all--and I would somehow find the time and energy and life at home remained somewhat normal. And that's why she wears the BGOTP crown.

Jess also found Nora and after a bit more stalling, I finally called and she agreed to come look at the house. Nora was completely unfazed by the piles of furniture, boxes and dust that have been overwhelming me for months. She thought it wouldn't even take a full day to get the job done, and she quoted me a price that was more than fair.

With a third neutral party involved, I really had to start following through. I called Oregon Community Warehouse and made an appointment to have them pick up a donation of furniture and kitchen items. Then came the hard part. I didn't want to be slowing Nora down by trying to sort through papers, pictures and sentimental items while she worked.

I went over on Tuesday and spent three hours boxing up things I either knew I should keep or would need to go through later. I was simultaneously amused and annoyed at how much stuff mom saved. Among other things, I found two envelopes of baby teeth, many pages of elementary school homework from me and Traci, entire boxes of loose pictures, newspaper clippings and the invitation to my great grandparents wedding anniversary party. I'm sure I'm going to enjoy going through it at leisure sometime, now that it's not taking up space in the house.

Thursday came and Nora showed up promptly at 9:00am. Her basic task was to go through everything in the house and sort into piles to be donated, recycled or trashed. She was a whirlwind and mostly I just carried furniture into the living room for pick up the next day and made runs back and forth to the recycling center and Goodwill. On my first trip, there was a field trip of school children touring the recycling center and I had another 'I love Portland' moment.

I had thought about using my new Zipcar membership to get a pick up truck, but by the time I made up my mind, none were available. So Jess came over and helped ferry loads of stuff to Goodwill.

In six hours, the worst was over and I let Nora go with a bonus that wasn't enough and free lunch. It's definitely the best money I've spent all year.

I put the broken stove on craigslist and met someone this morning to pick it up and took the rest of the recycling away. I'm one dump run away from having an empty house. It's kind of strange, but seeing the house filthy is actually more depressing than seeing it empty. I think I will feel much better when it's cleaned with a new stove and carpeting (the smoking, in addition to taking her life, ruined the carpet).

Till then, I keep this picture up on the wall, just so it still feels a little like home.

Happy Birthday Mom

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Happy Birthday Mom. A year ago we had dinner at the Equinox (free, 'cause they never let you pay for anything after you got sick). You had the shrimp appetizer named after Desmond's daughter (that you couldn't eat) and he made you a specially created sugar free dessert that was the envy of all the tables around us.

And a few days later we had a huge birthday party at SEI with decorations and a DJ and about a hundred of your closest friends and family. I don't know what pain you bulled your way through to even get there, considering you spent all your energy out shopping with your sisters earlier in the day, but you did get there (late of course!) and you even danced, and I knew it would be your last time.

Hard to believe that was only a year ago. Hard to believe that was a whole year ago. Hard to believe your ashes are sitting in a pretty urn on my bookshelf and I'm never going to hear your laugh or get to say the same thing at the same time or finish your sentences, or get you that granny bike that I promised you.

Hard to believe that from now on, on this day, I'll think to myself, today she would have been __ (56).

I sure do miss you. Hope you and uncle Jonathan are having a party, wherever you are.

Love,
K

New Love

Well I didn't really expect to meet anyone special on Valentines day...it's not like I'm not insanely happy with the sweetie I've got (and vice versa). But we went on a date to the Portland Cello Project with our friends Lisa and Spike and were unexpectedly smitten with one of the special guest performers named Lindsay Mac.

The MC let it be known that Lindsay was what's known as a 'stander' in cello circles and we got the feeling she was sort of a lovable black sheep of the classically trained set.

And then we saw what he meant:



You've never heard cello played like this. If you like what you hear, check out these sites:

Lindsay's page
Lindsay's MySpace

We're already working on getting her to move from Boston to Portland so we can stalk her properly.

Baby Steps

I've been making noises about getting back on my bike more for a couple of weeks now. I told a few too many people my plan so this morning I actually had to follow through.

The plan was simple. Start riding my bike to school. Not the 'ride to Cascade campus a few miles away and take the shuttle' ride, but the 'get off your lazy butt and ride the 13 hilly miles to Sylvania campus' ride.

In my sadly out of shape condition, I wouldn't think of doing this on anything but my trusty road bike, even though I don't normally like to commute on it. Things were going to be challenging enough already.

Last night I even got her down, filled the tires, lubed the chain and put the fenders on, just so I wouldn't have any excuses.

I made the trip in about 1 hour, 20 minutes and it confirmed without a doubt that I'm in sad shape.

Class is supposed to be two hours, but usually runs short--but I was there the full two hours today and a good thing too. I needed the rest. The whole round trip was 26 miles and when I got home, I was whipped. I had planned to do more homework tonight, but it's been all I could do to hold my head up. It feels like it weighs fifty pounds (shut up Traci) and when did my eyelids get so heavy?

In another way though, I feel fantastic. I've missed that pleasantly sore feeling that means I've actually used my body for something. I'm also not as cold. I'm wearing one layer of clothing for the first time in what seems like months. We've been sitting around the house with the heat on 70 most of the time, still shivering and putting on extra clothes and I'm sure it's because we're not moving as much as we used to.

I've missed the other perks of a long commute too, like getting to really notice the environment I'm moving through. I can check out the bikes of other commuters without worrying about running someone over. I can enjoy the little bit of sun that made it through our partly cloudy day. I got great views coming down Terwilleger and stopped to take some pictures.



And then there's the little gems that spring up in passing.

There's also the frustration of getting passed by other bikers, but that's just good motivation.

Speaking of motivation, I have another one--I kinda said I'd race at least a few PIR events with the team this summer and there's no way I'll survive if I can't handle my basic commute without barfing up a lung. Not that I'm going to win anything, but it'd be nice to not get dropped on the very first lap.

Now I just need to get back to the point where the traveling itself doesn't ruin me for any other activities.

Sadly out of shape but back on the road to recovery.

Pimpin'

Elden, AKA The Fat Cyclist, has a very informative recycled post up today about getting along on the road. If you're a driver or a biker, you should go read it right now.

Where the Day Takes You

Jess had another doctor appointment yestereday and came away with a shiny new purple cast. The only nice thing about the visit was Barry, the Physician's Assistant who sees her. Most of the people working the front desk are routinely rude and unhelpful.

Last week she left a form that needed to be filled out and faxed to her job for disability and when we walked in today, it hadn't been touched--despite several follow up calls during the week. Then they condescendingly announced that she should never give the form to the doctor, only to the front desk so it gets properly recorded etc. Like they couldn't have mentioned that any of the four times she called. Then they had the nerve to put a received stamp with today's date on it, though they've had the form for a week. We took our seats in the waiting room and resisted the urge to smite them.

She got called back fairly quickly and the casting room was filled to capacity--which is to say, there were two other women at the other bed--and older woman in a wheelchair who also had a broken wrist and another woman who was probably her daughter. The nurse came in to see them and the daughter explained that she had moved her mom in with her since she couldn't do anything for herself. Later Barry came in to see them and put on the cast. When the mom asked, "Well, do you think you can put up with me for six weeks?" the daughter touchingly replied, "It looks like I don't have a choice!"

We didn't even try to hold back our laughter. "Aw, honey, that's the same thing I said to you!" I joked.

The nurse came in for Jess and I watched nervously as she sawed off the cast. It was loud and messy and she nicked the arm once, despite her promise of "Don't worry, I won't get you with it." Jess didn't seem too disturbed but the whole process was creepy.

Jess asked if she could wash her arm while she waited to go to X-ray so the nurse got her some wipes with alcohol on them. Jess spent the next hour or so wiping her arm meticulously from every direction. I never understood how she could do floor nursing, with all the mess and bodily fluids involved, cause she's one of the cleanest people I know. I can't imagine how crazy-making it is to not be able to wash that arm for weeks on end. It looked so pale and puny outside the cast and she took great care not to bend it.

X-rays didn't take long and Barry came in with print outs. He said nothing seems to have moved and everything looks good. His plan is to put on a new cast for a couple more weeks and then go to a (REMOVABLE, YAY!) brace and start her on hand therapy. Barry is actually the only nice person in the office (which is good, since he's the one we see the most) and he was chatty today, even noticing Jess's new hair cut.

She picked purple for the new cast and it looks great.

Next we went on our weekly trip to REI. For once I had no agenda but Jess was on a mission to get down slippers like the ones she got me for Christmas. My feet were freezing before then, but the slippers really are toasty and her circulation is much worse than mine so she really needed them. (See, this is how we end up with all the same stuff).

As soon as we walked in, she was off. "I'm going to check on my pants." These would be the cross country skiing pants she's had her eye on for a few weeks. We made a plan to meet upstairs and I left her to it and went to amuse myself in the snowboarding section. When I went upstairs, I didn't see her and couldn't spot her on the first floor, even with a bird's eye view. I walked back down and finally found her at the online kiosk, looking up the pants to see if she could get the REI Outlet discount. Her shoes were still untied from trying on the pants.

"You should tie my shoes, it's not safe."

I bent down to comply but said, "Aren't you just going upstairs to try on slippers?"

She looked confused. "What?"

I laughed. REI fever had gotten her! "Ha, you don't even remember your original mission!" I teased.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she sputtered and then went upstairs to the shoe section.

I decided to try on some snowboarding boots but it's the end of the season so there wasn't anything in my size. And besides, I probably should go back and make sure I'm not going to kill myself before I start buying my own equipment.

You know you spend too much time in a retail store when people start to recognize you. As we walked up to the counter, a black guy with dreads who's rung me up often said, "Hey, there you are, you two come here all the time!"

You don't get much more busted than that. As he rang Jess up, he let her know that the .83 sale starts on Friday (everything that ends in 83 cents is half price) so she could come back and get her discount. He noticed her cast of course, which sparked his show and tell of the chipped front tooth he's slowly having repaired. He was snowboarding and stopped to watch people go by and some kid ran into his face with a helmet. Ouch. Yes, I know, I still want to try again. Maybe I should wear a motorcycle helmet when I go.

We left REI with the cashier's "See you soon!" echoing in our ears and headed over to the Whole Foods neighborhood. We had a box and two bags of used music CDs to sell at Everyday Music. That's right, we're going digital baby.

Jess carried one bag while I labored with stops every few feet with the box and the other bag because I was too stubborn to make two trips. The guys at the counter seemed totally unfazed by our loot.

"Half an hour?" said one, and we made sure they knew who's was who's and then left. After many humiliating trips to Buffalo Exchange for the clothing version of this scenario, I was fully prepared to get most of the CDs back when we returned, with a polite but condescending, "We're going to pass on these—for now." as if there might be some hope that they'd take them next month.

Next, we walked over to AIP (Art Institute of Portland) so I could turn in some paperwork and pay my tuition deposit. The path is starting to feel real now. I have a meeting tomorrow with the financial aid adviser to see if I'm really going to be able to make this work and just how poor I'm going to be.

After that we stopped at Powells so I could look for a new moleskin calendar. They have an entire wall of nothing but moleskin books, but no calendar. I was wavering between a little reporter style flip up notebook and a little package of three 64 page book-style notebooks. Jess said I should get the pack of three. When I agreed with her, she got a mischievous grin and said, "Good, then I can have one."

That hadn't occurred to me and now I felt like a dork for being so easily had. "I'm just kidding, you don't have to give me one," she said. Well of course I didn't *have* to but since I'm whipped, I probably would. But I didn't say that.

We went back to EM to pick up our CDs. What we heard when we walked in left me with my jaw on the floor. "$70 for the box" and $34 for the bags."

"You're taking them all?" Jess asked, while I mentally gaped.

"Oh yeah," was the enthusiastic reply.

"Wow, this is so much better than Buffalo Exchange," I mused, while I pulled out my ID and signed my name and my new friend handed me thirty four shiny gold rocks. I was so happy, I barely complained that Jess was getting twice as much money for less music, although I did make a play to get the guy to hand me her cash, practically out of habit. He didn't take the bait. Since my collection included Another Bad Creation and at least one Celine Dion album, I felt it best not to delve too deeply into the payout formula.

On the way to the store, we had been discussing whether or not to go to Cacao, which was taunting us just across the street. I allowed as how I could probably resist just this once. But after things went so well with the CDs, I decided we had to celebrate with some chocolate.

"You know, if we go every time, then it's not going to seem like such a treat," Jess warned.

"You're right honey. You don't have to have any, I wouldn't want you to get bored with it." Somehow that answer didn't fly so we shared our usual large cup of the cinnamon drinking chocolate and a few salted caramels. Since Jess got twice as much for her music, I felt I should at least help her spend it. "My suger mama will pay," I said to the salesman, as I picked up our mug and carried it to a table.

It was probably good that we had a snack because our last stop was a big shopping trip at Whole Foods and it's no good to go in hungry. Since we were in the neighborhood anyway, we decided to use our WF coupon from the Chinook Book. We stuck to our list and our coupons and I picked out veggies while Jess chatted with a coworker from her old job that she ran into in the produce section. Seems like she's getting more popular every month.

It was weird shopping in a different store, not knowing where things were and not knowing the cashier personally, but we managed. And we had no trouble meeting the $50 spending requirement for our $10 off coupon. Since it was late, we also got lunch from the deli to take home. The curry chicken with currants and almonds was severely overpriced, but really good. Lately we're both in a phase where we're pretty much sick of all our regular foods, so the curry was a welcome change.

When we got home, I opened my pack of moleskins and handed one to Jess. She was very excited. "I get one? I get one!?"

"Of course you get one, honey."

"Ha, that's cause you're a sucker and you loooooooooooooooooove me!"

"Um yeah. You might want to leave off the 'sucker' part."

"What? I don't know what you're talking about," she said, eyes darting everywhere.

I smiled, in spite of the knowledge that I was, in fact, a sucker. "It's the shifty eyes that really make that so darn cute." I probably shouldn't tell her things like that but oh well.

We ended our evening by watching Shrek the Third (in one sitting even!) and eating too much popcorn and ice cream. After that, there was nothing to do, but sleep it off.

Wonder Twin Powers

I'm here to confess. Jess and I have a problem. It started innocently enough. When we first started going out, we noticed that we owned a lot of the same things; a Mountain Hardware bag here, a pair of Keen's there. Wow, we're so compatible and well matched, we thought.

She was shopping for a new bike and just happened to find a great commuter bike with all the features I'd been wanting.  So I got one too.  Well, it was a little more round about than that, but that's another story. 

She got cool new bike shoes.  Wow, those are perfect, I thought. A few months later, I had a pair.

Over time, it became clear that when it comes to clothes and sporting gear, we have exactly the same taste in just about everything.  Yeah, we're those lesbians.

The really sad part is that we barely try to hold back anymore (if we ever did).  I mean, when you find what you like, you gotta have it right?

Consider a recent trip to REI. We were both looking for some new pants, something non-cotton that would be good to ride in, but also look nice when we got to our destination.  I took a few things into the dressing room, but wasn't happy with them.  She kindly offered to go out and look for some other brands.

A few minutes later she came back with a new option, but the fit was terrible.  She went back out again.  When she came back, she had some tan pants that looked like casual dress slacks, but were stretchy and comfortable and would dry quickly. "I'm going to try them on too," she said.  (The warning bell should have gone off then).  

"These are cool, I like them," I said.  And they were on sale of course.  Jess rarely pays full price for anything at Really Expensive Items.  That's when she suddenly turned on me.

"I found them," she said, holding them protectively.  "They're mine."

"What!? I sent you out to look for pants for me!"

"Well, I could have said I didn't find anything and come back later without you," she said.

"Oh HO! I see how you are! You had no intention of letting me leave with these pants!"

A Cheshire cat grin was her only reply.

Buying two pair was out of the question.  We've sunk pretty low in the matching department, but we do have limits.  We tend to be a bit more strict about 'regular' clothes than sports-specific stuff.  If we both bought them, there's no way we'd both wear them at the same time anyway.  After much cajoling on my part and a promise not to wear them everyday and get bike grease on them, we agreed to a shared pants arrangement.

I had made many similar agreements with mom over the years but this time I didn't have to argue over who's closet the clothes would live in.

In our defense, we do try to get different colors when we can.  But in the case of bike gear (rain jacket, rain pants, shoes, bike shorts), there's usually not much choice.  So at this point you're wondering---how bad can it be? Off the top of my head, here's a list of all the matching gear we own.  

Exact:

Scott Sportster P4 bikes (J)*
Keen Blackcomb winter boots (K)
REI down slippers (K)
REI bike capris shorts (KJ)
Smartwool base layer tank top (J)
Smartwool base layer tights (KJ)
Showers Pass rain jackets (K)
OnGuard mini U-Lock (K)
Outdoor Research Snowline Mittens (KJ)
Specialized Motodiva cycling shoes (J)
Specialized BG gel gloves (JK)
Mountain Hardware fanny pack (b.d)
Nike sports bras (2) (J)
Kleankanteen water bottles (KJ)
REI water bottles (b.d.)
LG 8600 Verizon Wireless phone (J)
Giro Havoc bike helmets (J)
Various Ani Difranco CDs (b.d.)
SHIFT short sleeve jersey (KJ)
SheBeast bike shorts (J)
Sorella Forte 2008 jersey & shorts (K)
Rossignol BC3 Back country ski boots (J)

Similar:

Various Smartwool socks (b.d.)
Timbuk2 Messenger bags (K)
Mini backpacks (J)
Cotton Cloud bed frame (K)
Trek Road bikes (b.d.)
Keen Sandals (K)
Keen Low hikers (J)
Zeroshock laptop cases (KJ)
Cats (b.d.)
Ortlieb Panniers (K)
Pearl Izumi winter biking gloves (b.d.)


(* Indicates who had the item first. Both initials means we got them at the same time. B.D. is Before Dating).

When we rode our bikes around Crater lake last August, we pulled into a view point and a woman there said, "Oh look at you, you must be on some kind of team."

"Nope, we're just matching dorks who dress alike," I confessed. But now we really are on a team.  Jess joined Sorella Forte cycling club this year and we're picking up our new kits this month.

Hi. We're Jess and Kronda. And we're matching dorks. 

Date Night

Mondays are a great night for dates.  I didn't plan to have a date last night, but I happened to check my Powell's events email and saw a couple of interesting options.  Plus, I got my homework done for the week which meant I was free of deadlines for the next seven days and I felt like celebrating.

We went to the Powells flagship store downtown and heard Bich Minh Nguyen read from her memoir, Stealing Buddha's Dinner. We found parking right away in front of Whole Foods and I stopped to get some snap peas to snack on.  Oddly, I've been finding pretty good ones lately even though it's January. 

We walked over to Powell's and found out that we were forty minutes early, so I suggested going over to Cacao for some chocolate.  Because apparently, I can't be within a square mile of the place anymore and not go have some chocolate.  At least it's cheaper than my REI addiction.  We called ahead to make sure they were still open.  They were.

"If we walk in there and they recognize us, we're in trouble," I said to Jess.   Sure enough, the look on the guy's face said it all. Ah it's those girls who called just now, he must have been thinking.

We shared a big cup of the cinnamon drinking chocolate and enjoyed a couple of samples.

When we got back to Powell's, we went into the Burnside entrance where the all but useless bike rack is stationed.  It's one of those 'artsy' bike racks that's not actually any good for it's intended purpose which bugs the crap out of me.  I picked up a comment card at the front info desk.

When we got back to the Pearl room where the reading was being held, there were a respectable amount of people gathered.  I went to the counter to borrow a pen for my comment card and the woman behind the counter gave me the 'I know you' look, so then we had to figure out how. "Sarah," she said and I figured out that she meant Skelly, who's no longer a friend of mine.  I seem to be running into a lot of her friends lately (the last on my cross country ski trip).  I don't bother mentioning that she's not my friend anymore and hasn't been for a long time as I think it would just serve to make things awkward. 

We got seats in front of a rude woman who took up the chair next to her to hold her tea cup and monopolized the Q & A session after the reading. 

The reading itself was very good and funny.  The book is about her family's arrival from Vietnam in 1975 to Grand Rapids, MI and her growing up caught between two cultures and desperately trying to fit into a conservative blond-blue eyed town.  It didn't work of course.  Her brother was in the audience and it seemed half the people there were friends of his.  Always nice to see family supporting each other.

The Q & A session was good too, lots of good questions asked, except the the rude women who had to ask Bich if her grandmother was still living--she wasn't and she died recently.  The odds on that being the case weren't too hard to figure out and I wanted to smack the rude woman for making her talk about it in front of an audience.  What a bitch.

I still had money on a Powells card someone gave to mom so I used the last of it to buy her book and get it signed, and then we asked Vin (her brother, who lives in Portland) where to get good Vietnamese food in town.  Seeing as the book talks a lot about food, I thought it would be good information to have and Vin was a fountain of knowledge on the subject.  If you're wondering, the general rule is to go east, beyond at least 40th street and the farther east you go, the better. 

I turned in my comment card and we set about figuring out what to feed ourselves.  We've been in a food rut lately and I didn't feel like cooking at home so we ended up a t P.F. Chang's a few blocks over.  I had never been.  It was practically deserted on a Monday night and we had the best server that I've had in a very long time.  She was completely unfazed by Jess's dietary restrictions and let me tell you, finding menu options for a lactose intolerant vegetarian who can't eat tofu is not the easiest trick.  Elizabeth knew the answer to almost every menu question we asked, had helpful things to add about the suitability of various dishes and never once showed any impatience with us, in fact, just the opposite.

We had a great dinner, and afterward, I wrote Elizabeth a nice comment one the back of a P.F.C. business card, since they didn't have comment cards.

When we got home, we continued our Dexter marathon.  We love it, but it's so stressful that we often end up watching two at a time because I can't stand the cliff hangers.  We discovered, late in our viewing, that it was actually easier to stop in the middle of an episode.  We just finished up season two tonight and it was even more twisted than season one.  I hope the writer's get a deal soon so we can find out what happens next.

Friday, I'm taking Jess out on a new and improved secret date that's kid tested, dead-mother approved and does not involve strapping anything to our feet.  But I can't tell you what it is because then...well...I've been watching Dexter, you figure it out. 
 

For the Record

Jess won at Rummikub tonight. It's her first time so I wanted to note it for the record. Also, she says I don't blog about her enough. :)

Close ups

Last year I did a modeling shoot for Getty Images that I got through my cycling team. I got paid really well to ride my bike slowly back and forth out on Sauvie Island. If only my entire career could be more like that day.

Well, the pictures are finally up. I'm too cheap to buy them, but you can click here to go see the light box from the whole day's shoot.

It's All Fun and Games...

Our anniversary snowboarding trip last week went really well. Until it didn't. For the past two years, Jess has been trying to tell me that she has bad luck. And it's not that I didn't believe her, so much as I thought that maybe my life-long good luck could win out. But last year wasn't exactly an example of my rosy, stress free life so I guess I should have taken the hint.

But let's start with the good stuff.

Early Wednesday morning, we packed up all our gear and headed east into the sunrise. The drive was picturesque, the kind of post-card living one is privileged to get used to living in the the Pacific Northwest. As we left the little town of Sandy, we were surrounded by a dense morning fog that ended abruptly a few minutes later. It literally looked like we came out of a weather-made tunnel. Jess managed to capture some of the effect with some quick camera work.



The road sign on the way up advised carrying chains, but didn't mandate them. The roads were fairly decent, packed snow, but not icy. We wound our way up behind several large buses. We were shooting for a 10am lesson, but that would've required getting up at 5:00am.

We arrived at 9:50 and spent the next 90 minutes in various lines, behind several bus loads of Adventists on a group trip who arrived just ahead of us. Jess wasted no opportunity to comment on the fact that crowds such as the ones we were caught up in are a major reason why she could never seriously get into snowboarding. I'm used to her low tolerance for crowds and mostly ignored the griping. Fun awaited.

By the time we were got our boards and boots and found a locker for our stuff, it was almost lunch time. The next lesson wasn't till 1:00 so we decided to eat before hand. Also, we were already dehydrated and my elevation headache was making itself felt. We ate garden burgers in the cafeteria while we watched people come down the last insanely steep hill to the main lifts. I remembered well inching my way down that hill after a coworker stranded me at the top of the mountain with all of 5 minutes of 'instructions.'

After lunch we still had an hour to kill. "Come on, let's go up," I said. From the look on her face, Jess would've been content to hang out inside, but she agreed. I felt it was time to bring on the fun. I remembered how to strap my board on and how to skate with one leg strapped in. It was, as they say, all downhill from there.

I managed to exit the lift without too much trouble, but as soon as I was strapped in, I pretty much fell my way down the bunny hill. At one point, I got going too fast. I knew I didn't want to catch my toe edge and face plant at that speed but that led to overcompensating in the other direction, which put me flat on my back. Hard. I lay there for a moment while cartoon birds tweeted around my head. Well, at least my helmet had just paid for itself.

I was too busy falling to see Jess get down the hill, but it seemed to go a lot better for her. "I think I need a lesson," I said when we reached the bottom. My butt was really hurting and the slap to the head did not help my altitude headache one bit. I kept thinking if I could just take my laptop case (made of memory foam) and stick it down my pants, that would be so awesome. (I learned later, that someone has already thought of this, and yes, I went straight out and bought a pair!)

We made our way over to the lesson meet-up area. We had noticed throughout the morning that there didn't seem to be too many friendly people working at Mt Hood Meadows. They weren't exactly unfriendly but they weren't what you'd call welcoming either. This trend continued as I waited in the lesson area and the instructor standing two feet away and facing me ignored me steadily while talking to the two men beside me.

Fortunately, he was not to be our guide for the day. A woman named Rebecca turned out to be saddled with the newbies today. We were in the first timers group. Jess could've moved up, but didn't want to abandon me. She's sweet like that.

Rebecca collected all our vouchers and questioned us to see what our experience was. "Have you ever snowboarded before?" she asked me.

"Successfully?" I responded.

"Say no more," she said.

After waiting for some late comers, we finally got going. She spent some time talking about the equipment, how to maneuver on and off the lift etc and then the magic moment came and we headed to the lift. As students in ski/board school, we got a special lift line that let us cut in front of everyone else.

When we got to the top, we all clustered together out of the way. Rebecca went over strapping in and then she did the single most helpful thing of the day. She talked us through the mechanics of controlling your speed and steering but then she demonstrated as well, using her hands to illustrate what her feet were doing. It was like being able to watch the rudder of a ship underwater and see exactly which movements made what turns. Light bulbs went off all over the place over my head.

It's worth noting that I didn't have another hard fall for the rest of the day and my speed didn't get out of control anymore.

The day pretty much continued in the same pattern. She would demo a technique and then we would meet up halfway down the hill. Jess already knew this stuff of course and I felt like I had discovered the keys to the kingdom. The two of us were always way ahead of the nine others in our class, and spent a lot of time waiting for them to reach the rendezvous points.

By the time our lesson ended, Jess and I were working on something called 'linking our J turns,' which are the precursor to real turning (AKA carving) down the mountain.

We took a break to get some water (I'm definitely bringing my camelbak next time) and have a snack before going back out to keep practicing.

We kept at it until the sun set and we got cold. Then we drove back down to the Resort at the Mountain in Welches, where we enjoyed a completely swank fireside lodge with kitchenette. We had pre-made dinner of fried rice and a few other things which was maybe the most brilliant suggestion ever (made by Jess of course). We were so sore we could barely walk, and hauling our stuff up the stairs was a bit of a trial. I expected my butt to hurt (and it did not disappoint), but I wasn't prepared for the throb in my lower quads, no doubt from trying to squat down and stay on the right edge all day.

Long showers and lots of Arnica later, we settled into the king sized bed for the night with some DVDs and prepared to abuse ourselves some more the next day.

Day Two
We were up bright and early, not wanting to spend our whole morning in lines again. We got to Meadows at 9:00am and there were no bus loads of Adventists or anyone else so we walked right through all the rental lines and reported for our lesson at 9:50am.

We decided to upgrade to "Green" status, which supposedly meant that you were comfortable on Green Diamond areas of the mountain. I'm not sure that was the case, but we were definitely beyond the first timer class.

As luck would have it, we had our instructor, who's name was Nate, all to ourselves. Nate turned out to be the second nice staff person we'd met. Rebecca gave us a great review at the lesson meet up so we didn't dally, but headed right to the lift.

The day was clear, gorgeous and warm and Nate put us right to work. My big goal for the day was not to fall hard on my butt because it was wickedly sore from the day before and the snow was packed down hard and fast. We started out reviewing the linking turns we'd worked on the day before for a couple of runs. The first trip down went OK, but on the second run I got going too fast again and did my classic butt/head plant. My goggles slanted sideways off my face from the impact, and my helmet's value went up another infinite amount.

Nate and Jess came to a stop just above me. The fall must have looked bad because they both seemed really concerned. "Are you OK?" asked Nate.

"Oh yeah, that's just how I like to start the day," I joked, to try to put them at ease. I actually wasn't hurting as much as I did the first time. Maybe my butt was too numb already. In any case, I was able to get up and finish the run with no problem.

We went up again and Nate wanted us to try putting our J turns together into actual back and forth turns, or carving down the mountain. He kept trying to explain how we could make very wide swaths across the hill by sitting on our heel edge a certain amount. "You're just going to have to get it once to see what I mean," he told us.

So with that, Jess started off, and a second later, I went after her. Unfortunately, she had started a little ways up the hill from me, and our wide, crossing trajectories were now carrying us straight towards each other in an X formation. I tried to make a sharp left that would bring me parallel instead of across, but didn't quite make it. We didn't collide, but I went by just in front of her and she brushed the back of my board. We both went down. We were going pretty slowly when it happened and my fall wasn't bad. But as I lay on my back, I could hear Jess yelling. She has a much higher pain tolerance than I do, so when the yelling didn't stop and I flipped over and saw her holding her wrist up in the air as still as possible, I knew in my gut that our day was over.

Nate slide to a stop close by and I crawled up to where she was and convinced her to let me unstrap her board. We got her sitting up and took off her mitten and put some icy snow on her wrist. (Damn snow--if it had only been softer---this was the first of a never ending series of 'if-onlys' my brain would rotate for the foreseeable future: if only I'd bought her a pair of the small wrist guards that fit under her mittens; If only I'd started a few seconds later; if only I'd turned faster--you get the idea).

Nate called ski patrol and even though we were halfway down the bunny hill in sight of the clinic, the patrolman put her in the sled and took off with her. Nate took care of her board and I strapped mine back on (I had taken if off while we waited) to board down the rest of the way. The clinic was across the hill from where we were and, in a final twist of irony, I figured out what Nate meant about the heel edge and successfully traversed the hill instead of going straight down.

By the time we de-boarded and got to the clinic, Jess had her own bed next to a woman who was in truly bad shape from a ski accident. They were having trouble finding her husband. Apparently it had been a while but, she said, he wasn't the type to read the signs posted at all the lifts advising him to get the hell down the mountain and check on his wife.

They took an X-Ray on site, and as soon as the pictures came up, the nurse offered Jess some Vicodin. "I'm afraid you've broken your wrist honey," she said.

So this is what she means when she said she has bad luck...

Jess was holding up pretty well, all things considered but I could tell she was in a lot of pain. Not only was our day over, so were most of our plans for the next six months. She wouldn't be able to work for a while (Hi, IV nurse here, I usually do this with my right, but we'll just see how it goes...). She can get short term disability, but first they'd make her eat up every bit of vacation/sick time (it's all combined). There went our plans to visit her friends in Colorado for some cross country ski fun in March (or any cross country skiing close to home for the rest of the season). There went our plans to do the Oregon or Washington bike tour this summer (no vacation time). The suckage just seemed to go on and on, and the long weeks of house chores and care taking I was looking at was the very least of it.

Fortunately, (or not, since it comes from too much experience), if there's one thing Jess is good at, it's handling adversity. Minor annoyances like getting cut off in traffic, or me forgetting to change the toilet paper drive her crazy. But give her real challenge and she shines. This makes her an excellent person to have around say, when your mom is dying. It also means that, aside from a few moments of understandable frustration, she's a good patient who's really easy to take care of. We've settled into a nice routine, I make the meals and tie her shoes and write things down and she does whatever she can, which includes more things every day.

In some ways I feel like I'm living two lives (three if you count the fact that I still need to deal with my mom's house), but this is a risk we both took when we went up to the mountain. I've learned my lesson about her luck. She's retiring from all downhill sports (she broke a leg skiing at 16, which ended that sport), and I don't think she'll be needing a mountain bike either...

Despite everything, I'm not quite ready to give up on the sport. Aside from the fact that I'm hoping my own luck will hold out, I felt like I was making good progress and could probably get the hang of it in a few more sessions. Besides, I already bought the wrist guards, helmet and now, the padded shorts. We bought a package of three lessons and got vouchers for our ruined day, so there's still two lessons left that I can use anytime this season. Rentals and all-mountain passes included. Now all I need is a buddy who's crazy enough to join me.

Any takers?

Too late for me

Here's something I wish I'd read two years ago.

A Plan Comes Together

Remember my great revelation that winter sports would make the time fly by? Dear reader, it's working already!

This week is our two year anniversary and we're celebrating by going up to the mountain (Mt Hood for you non-locals) overnight and taking some snowboarding lessons. It's a good thing it's only week two of the term since I'll be skipping classes already.

Although Jess has the sportier car, it doesn't have the clearance for tire chains so we'll be traveling in the hoop-d, as my car is affectionately known. I had the tires checked today (nail in the right rear) and yesterday we practiced putting on the chains. We're ready.

Jess' friends who just moved to Colorado have discovered cross country skiing and invited us to visit. We might be able to go after Easter if Jess can get time off. We'd also like to take a trip to Bend to ski, since the snow there is legendary for it's powdery perfection. Trying to find a good weekend between now and March makes it seem as if winter is already over and I actually had a moment of sadness, that maybe we won't be able to fit it in.

Yup, this strategy is working out great.

In the gear department, things are coming together as well. There was an almost-panic as I had to search the house four times for the snowboarding pants that mom got me for Christmas a few years ago. I've used them all of twice and had stored in them in a place that was a little too safe. I found an awesome snowboarding jacket for super cheap online with no shipping last month. The $20 I spent on wrist guards seems like a grand investment in leiu of the deductible for broken wrist treatment. And of course, a helmet is a smart fashion statement for any hair-brained activity and they were on sale at Next Adventure.

If I should happen to get hooked on this new venture, as I probably will, then I can see next about aquiring my own board and boots next winter. Jess doesn't think she's going to want to do it all that regularly, given the fear factor and the ongoing expense of lift tickets. I'm a little more into adrenaline thrills than she is, although she's been boarding more times than I have.

If there's a downside to all this winter fun, it is this: having convinced ourselves that we would actually spend some time at home this winter, we vowed to work on the ever present list of in-house projects. Things like, making the house look lived in (we still have no pictures on the walls), unpacking the last of our boxes (Jess has way more than I do), re-organizing the garage (haven't we done this twice already?). Not to mention the 16 credits I'm taking, that will start demanding some serious attention in the not-to-distant future.

But hey, I can sleep when I'm dead. Right mom?

Is there anything more irritating...

...than voice mails in grave, urgent tones proclaiming to call back ASAP? At this point in my life, I think not.

Here's a tip:

If you have bad news for me and you get my voice mail, either fake normalcy, hang up and call back later, or just say what you have to say. Trust me, I can take it.

Body of sand

While I was at the campus bookstore last week, buying my books early like a good girl, I saw lots of textbooks that simply looked interesting. I succumbed to only one, "The Best American Magazine Writing." More on why later.

Last night I decided to delve into it, with the first article I flipped to, "The Recruit" about a boy's decision to join the military and the consequences of that decision. Somewhere between talking to Jess and starting to read, my eye grazed another title, "A Matter of Life and Death." by Marjorie Williams. The article was an account of her diagnosis with an incurable liver cancer at age 43 and her subsequent acceptance of her fate.

A few of the more resonant sentences for me:

Notice, though, that I don't include my husband among those to whom my death was an imminent fact...
It could make me crazy, lying awake...wanting to talk about death, while Tim lay awake...trying to figure out the next five moves he had to make to keep me alive, and then, beyond that, to find the magic bullet in which I did not believe....drifted into a tacit, provisional agreement to act as if... I were in some genuine suspense about the outcome.

Yet it made me furious anytime someone tried to cheer me up by reciting the happy tale of a sister-in-law's cousin who had liver cancer but now he's eighty and he hasn't been troubled by it in forty years...I was working so hard to accept my death: I felt abandoned, evaded, when someone insisted that I would live.

This is so akin to my experience with mom that it was both a shock and a relief. There I was, trying to prepare (you can't, but I had to try) for the inevitable, deal with the ugly practicalities and have some kind of meaningful closure. And it seemed as if just about everyone around me was entrenched behind their wall of denial with an unlimited supply of non-perishable foods and they weren't coming out until the bomb went off right in their shelter. It made me crazy. If I had hair, I would have pulled it out.

Well, it's no surprise where my dream from last night came from. I was dying and I had gone around to say goodbye to everyone that I could. And now I was laying in a bed, in a room, by myself, waiting for the end. I couldn't leave the bed anymore because my body was slowly turning to sand and if I tried to get up, I would literally fall apart. As time when on, I felt more and more tired. More tired than I thought was possible. Any time now, I thought, I'm going to go to sleep and not wake up. But then I decided I needed to have the last word. So, struggling against the tired, I sat up in bed, laptop perched on my sandy legs and composed my last blog.

I never did get to finish it.

Take your life in your hands

Let's start today's post with a generalization: Women are more safety conscious than men. You can ruminate on that thought as you read my tale.

The wind and the pounding rain kept both of us up most of the night. I seriously considered the wisdom of heading up the mountain in the morning. When Jess came in to say goodbye before leaving for work, she said, "Have fun skiing today honey," so I decided I might as well go. It doesn't take long for the weather to 180 around here.

I packed up all my new gear and headed to the 97th and Sandy Blvd park & Ride. I arrived right on time and saw a group of people with skis. Larry was the group leader and organizer. Once upon a time he volunteered for my mom at SEI. He's retired and as far as I can tell, spends most of his time doing fun outdoor activities and traveling. In 2003, he took us to Siouxon creek in Washington for a hike, where the infamous hiking-while-reading picture was taken. We just recently got back in touch after I emailed him about the dedication ceremony last month.

He came over and gave me a big hug. "Kronda, it's so good to see you! I feel so sorry for you..."

"I'm alright." I really didn't want o get into it in front of a big group of strangers.

Things got down to business and it was quickly revealed that organization isn't Larry's strong suit, nor does he particularly care too much about it. Though he was ostensibly 'leading' this trip for the Nordic ski club, he had a terrible time sorting out who would ride with whom. He had assured me through email that I would ride with him so when he announced that he was riding with a woman who was driving a Subaru SUV, I got a little concerned. "Um, Larry, you said I was riding with you."

"Oh right, I forgot! Wow, looks like we don't have enough drivers. OK, we'll take my car, and John can drive it." That struck me as odd, and I was a little annoyed. Especially when I saw that his car was a 20 year old hatchback that probably hadn't been cleaned in that entire time. He regularly carries his three dogs in it, and when I got into it, the smell was overpowering, as if I were trapped in a kennel. Since it was just John and I, I'd be expected to be social and make conversation. I was hoping for a car with two other folks in it, so they could talk while I read my book. It didn't make me feel better either when John said, "I haven't driven in snow in years," and started tooling around the parking lot so he could get used to the stick shift, which seemed to stick a lot.

Finally everyone got sorted into vehicles and we got going. Larry had decided that because it was so windy, our original destination of Clear Lake was too exposed. Instead we would head to the Frog Lake sno-park, where there was also Skijoring races happening. We agreed to stop in Sandy so one person who'd brought the wrong skis could rent some and people could get coffee and gas.

I wasn't having a great feeling about Larry's forgetfulness and apparent lack of organization, but I went from concerned to downright angry at John's words once we were already on the road. "Larry forgot to bring his chains today."

My stomach clenched and I was furious. Chains were mandatory after a certain point on the road up the mountain, and for good reason. We'd already seen the police out patrolling and ticketing people without chains when Jess and I went up two weekends before. Not to mention the very real chance of sliding all over the road or getting stuck in a snowy parking lot. There wasn't much I could do about it now so I made small talk with John. He turned out to be something of an adventurer, although I took it with a shaker of salt when he claimed to be one of the first people to bike across the U.S. He talked about his hitchhiking travels and the fact that he commutes by bike quite a bit. "I know it's all the rage now, but I just don't like wearing a helmet," he said.

I resisted the urge to give him my tirade on why I think people who don't wear helmets are stupid said something neutral in response. I don't know him, so what do I care if he cracks his head open? I noted that he didn't mind wearing his seatbelt. But maybe that was a combination of the law and the fact that we were headed for snowy roads.

After our coffee stop, we pulled over again so that the prepared people with brains chains could put them on. If only I'd known the situation in advance, I probably would have offered to drive. I have chains in my trunk. I'd never put them on, but I'd watched Terra do hers two weeks ago and could probably have managed, and gotten help if I need it.

To his credit, John got out and told Larry that he needed to drive his own car. I'm sure he didn't want to pay the ticket if we got pulled over. Larry agreed amiably and he and Marley came and got in. "I hope the Po-Po doesn't get us," I said.

"The Poco?"

"No, the Po-Po.

"The P-O-C-O?"

"No, P-O-P-O. You know, slang for Police."

"Oh, I'm not going to worry about it." How nice for him. He said this just as we passed a cop that had pulled a semi over to the side of the road. Luckily the cop was too busy with the truck to come after us.

Larry didn't seem to worry about the road conditions either. Our side of the road was fairly plowed and sanded, and we weren't slipping around any. But I looked over at the other side and worried. The snow was deeper and who knew if it would be plowed when we left? Completely oblivious to my inner panic, Larry talked casually about how long he'd had the car, that it would probably die soon, and what he might get as a replacement. Eventually I took refuge in my book, and he turned on the radio.

A couple of chapters later, we were still alive and pulling into the parking lot. The snow covered parking lot. Now we did slip a little bit, but made it into a spot. "Are we going to get stuck in here?" I wondered out loud.

"Oh, I'll worry about that when we come to it," said Larry. At least he was consistent. I got out of the car and my ears were met with a cacophony of barking. The lot was full of huge trucks and trailers, sleds and dogs all here for the racing. Marley was thrilled and wasted no time in jumping out of the car and adding his own voice to the chorus. I only had time to meet and greet a few of the closer dogs before getting into my boots and other gear and making sure I had everything I needed in my pack.

When we were all pretty much ready, A woman in our group who was clearly Larry's opposite, asked, "Does everyone have proper safety gear?" and proceeded to recite the list; extra food, water clothing etc. "If anyone doesn't have these things, speak up and maybe we can see if someone has extra." No one said anything. Her pack looked like she was about to camp for three days. I certainly appreciated the counterpoint to Larry's complete disregard, but I probably fall somewhere in the middle. I had enough food to last me all day and into the night if I stretched it, extra mittens, hat and socks and lots of water. Safety Girl, as I came to think of her, also had walkie talkies, which is probably not a bad investment.

As far as I could see, about the only thing Larry did that was remotely leader-like was to bring a few extra maps and hand them out, after asking about people's ski speeds.

I was already having tiny bladder syndrome and it occurred to me there might be a bathroom in the lot. I had to ask three times before anyone in the group responded, but there was a vault toilet right next to the start of our trail. It wasn't fun getting all my layers off, but better than going in the woods, in a big group of strangers. The delay meant I didn't have time to go watch the start of any of the racing though, since everyone else was already on the trail. I would have loved to make a little video of the start.

Once on the trail, my day finally improved. For one thing, the weather was better than I would have believed possible when I was laying in bed awake listening to the wind howl just 12 hours before. The sky wasn't sunny by any means, but it was bright and for the moment, it wasn't snowing. There was no wind at all.

The snow conditions weren't as nice as two weeks before, but it was decent. The trail was wide enough that I didn't have to adjust my poles from their standard length and the snow was packed and fairly hard, but not super icy. The going was all uphill at the start, but fairly gradual. There were clearly some beginners in our group and some people, like John, who hadn't skied in ten years. One woman said, "Is this uphill the whole way?" clearly freaking out about going on a prolonged downhill run on the way back.

"It goes up until we get to the top," responded Larry, and I thought it was a good thing he was out of reach of her poles when he said it. I kept my thoughts to myself and focused on my new skis, which were awesome. As were my poles and my new boots. I'd gotten a different brand of ski than Jess but with the same type of tread on the bottom and I seemed to be having a lot easier time getting up some of the trickier sections than my fellows on traditional cx skis. A few times the women in front of me asked for tips on how to do things. But all that was overshadowed by the triple awesomeness of my toe warmers, which, thanks to the beauty of mitten liners, I was also using on my hands. I was toasty warm for the entire trip.

After the first mile and a half, we reached a turn off and the front runners, including Safety Girl, were waiting for us. There was discussion of doing a loop that went up to and around a different lake. Larry wanted to know what time it was, but when someone offered to check their cell phone, he had a mock tantrum. "If your cell phone rings while you're skiing with me, I'll throw you down the mountain!" He was smiling when he said it, but I got the impression he was only half kidding. When someone else offered that she had a watch, he insisted on getting the time from her. He had also already made clear his feelings on walkie talkies and they were similar. "If I had it, I'd just turn it off." If he's not face to face with someone, he doesn't want to talk to them. I could understand the sentiment, I just hope nothing ever goes wrong for him on one of these trips.

But for today, there were plenty of people about to help if we got in trouble. In fact, we ran into another group from the Nordic ski club, about twenty snow shoers from a different club and, as I slowed to a stop at a large fork in the trail, who should I see but Terra, our ski buddy of two weeks before. "Dude! What's up!" I greeted. They were out with two other friends and probably bemoaning the number of people they were meeting on the trail. As I tried to line up for my turn, I took my first fall of the day. "Terra, you jinxed me," I said. "I hadn't fallen once till I saw you."

"It's probably true," she chuckled. "I've certainly spent some time on the ground today." I saw Leslie a little further along the trail and she admired my new skis. They went off ahead and I didn't see them again.

There was a fun downhill section for a while and then we started going up again. I passed a guy from our group who had lost the basket from his pole. He and John and a couple of others turned back. I ended up skiing with Larry and two other women, Sam and Leah. We got into some pretty tricky uphill sections that included switchbacks and a lot of side stepping and falling on my part. It was as if, having fallen once, I had opened the floodgates of gravity. Sam gave me some helpful tips as we went along. At one point she said out of the blue, "Aren't you friends with Skelly?"

My day seemed to be full of moments requiring diplomacy. For this one I settle on, "Yes, I know her," and did not add that she would was now definitely in the category of 'ex-friend' after being completely radio silent during my year of hell and well before then. I have this funny basic requirement that says my friends should actually respond when I reach out to them. Go figure.

"She's up here today too," Sam said, but from her tone I gathered that she was probably at a different sno park altogether. I was glad I wouldn't have to run into her.

We reached a second lake and and there was no sign of Safety Girl and crew. Perhaps they got too cold. I was surprised though since she seemed so concerned with everyone keeping people informed of their intentions. She'd made a whole speech about not putting people in the position of assuming what others in the group had done, and now here she'd gone and done it. Our choices were to keep going around the lake and possibly hooking up with the Pacific Crest Trail to go down which was reported to be easier than what we'd just come up. But that section was outside the small area maps we had no idea how long it would take us. And it was already 2:00pm. Larry voted to go back the way we'd come, which seemed to be the first sensible thing he'd said all day. We agreed, and after a snack, started back.

We made a deal with the snow shoers, who had stopped in the same place, to let them pass us on the uphill, if they would return the favor on the downhill. When we came to the evil switchback, three of us (guess which three?) took our skis off and walked down it. After that the going was not too bad, except for the unrelenting uphill slog. It had seemed so fun on the way down, but now that I was getting tired and ready for some downhill, it just made me cranky and seemed as if it would never end.

But end it did, and I was thrilled to see the sign telling us we could now enjoy a sweet mile and a half of downhill bliss. The snow shoers were as good as their word, and after we passed them there was no stopping us.

Back at the parking lot, the folks who'd turned back, were also just arriving from a sojourn in the other direction. The Skijoring races were long over but there were still dogs to pet. This guy had fourteen dogs with him in a triple decker trailer on top of his truck. I never imagined people not living Alaska would have that many dogs. Larry saw someone he knew skiing in with three dogs attached and got caught up talking to her and then going to see her new trailer, which really looked more like a motor home, in which she carried all her dogs.

I felt like Jess must feel trying to get me to leave a party. I figured it might be a good time to see about getting home in one piece. Leah and Sam were riding together in Leah's car, which I noted had chains on it. Sam had commitments back in town so they were headed straight back. I told the guy who'd ridden up with them that I needed to go directly back too (which was true) and he graciously agreed to trade cars with me. I wasted no time getting my stuff out of Larry's rolling kennel and into Leah's car and we got going after a tiny bump into the snow-mobile parked behind us.

Hwy 26 was a mess. We watched fools with no chains sliding all over the road in front of us including a sixteen foot U-Haul. One truck was involuntarily parked perpendicular in the right hand lane of the road and they finally decided it might be a good idea to put their chains on.

After sitting in the road going nowhere for ten minutes Leah decided to turn around and head down Hwy 35 to Hood River. I had no doubt, based on the amount of stupidity I'd already seen, that there was an accident ahead of us. After we turned around, the road was suddenly a ghost town and we made our slow, careful way down the mountain, talking of men, women, safety and other things. My only regret was that our new direction meant not reaching a real bathroom for at least an hour or more. I should've gone in the parking lot. As it was, I ended up squatting in some knee-deep dirty snow by the side of road on one of our stops to check the road surface. By that point I really didn't care who saw me, but I did wish I'd still had my gaiters handy as snow sunk into the cracks between my waterproof pants and shoes. My ankles were cold and wet for the rest of the ride.

Once we reached Hood River and Hwy 84, things sped right along, but the whole adventure took three hours and I didn't get home till 7:00pm. I ate first, then showered and later on Larry called to ask if I'd left something in his car, so I knew he'd gotten home safely, no thanks to himself. I was tempted to ask him about the trip home, but decided against it.

On this week's to-do list: Get car tires checked and practice putting on chains.

Frustrated Elation

I went and bought books for my classes today like a smart girl who doesn't like to wait in line. Though I'm not sure what section of writing class I'll end up in so I covered all the bases and will eventually have to wait in line to return one of the books. Ah well, at least I won't get behind in class.

Then I went to Next Adventure to pick up my skis. They weren't done yet (bindings were being put on) but the wait was only 5 minutes. Got caught up in the helmet section and found myself going home with a new snowboarding helmet. But mom, it's got a really warm liner that goes down the back of your neck! And it was really cheap (for a snowboarding helmet). And I actually have plans to snowboard in less than two weeks, so now I won't have to rent some ill fitting, possibly lice-ridden hand-me-down.

I did look longingly at the used boards in the bargain basement, but I have sworn off buying my own until next season, depending on how the lessons/rental adventures go. I suggested to Jess that we take at least one trip to Bend this winter. Could be dangerous.

When I left the store, the sun was shining in earnest, and I looked forward to riding over to the Red Bike for lunch with Curt and some other bikey errands in the afternoon. When I got home, my boots were waiting for me on the porch and they fit perfectly.

But wait! What's this chip in my skis? Crap. So I call the store and now I have to drive (need to get that Xtracycle!) back after lunch and have them exchanged, which means waiting while they remount the bindings. Annoying. But it will all be forgotten when I hit the slopes tomorrow in all my glory. Plus, there will be dogs! I wouldn't take it amiss if the sun would like to stay out tomorrow as well.

Hopeful

The sun IS still up there. Somewhere. Even as we got spit on by some evil dark clouds on our way home with our new bookshelf, this little patch served as my ray of hope.

But while the weather continues to be cold and miserable, people still have to get places and do things and some of them are still on two wheels. To those people, there's no such thing as bad weather, just bad gear. The hardest part is just getting out the door, and then I usually start to enjoy myself. This biker was clearly up for whatever the sky throws down.

There's a kind of relief in the unambiguity of weather that's just gross. You don't have to wonder what to put on, just load up for bear: booties or waterproof shoes, rain pants & jacket, facemask, warm gloves (there's no such thing as waterproof gloves) and in my case, I've been known to wear my ski goggles. Nothing makes me happier than to bike around for five hours in the rain, as I did a couple of weeks ago, and come home dry underneath it all. Sure, I'm wearing $500 to do it, and that's not to say there aren't much cheaper ways to be comfortable, but to me, it's worth it.

Be Nice To Me

I gave blood today. It's a nice way to start the year--giving life, instead of losing them.

Let it snow

I had an epiphany during our first cross country ski trip of the season, about winter sports. It seems pretty obvious now that I've had it, but since I didn't really have easy access before, it just didn't occur to me. But having spent four glorious hours in winter wonderland, I realized that getting outside in the winter in a way I can really look forward to, is a way to combat S.A.D., make the long dreary months between Jan and March go by quicker and even avoid that feeling of dread I get during Fall every year because winter is coming.

Aside from the exercise and the endorphins, just the fact of getting out into the postcard that is the pacific NW gives me a new perspective. Endless rain in town means snow on the mountain.

Jess already owned cross country skis when we met. She's been doing it since she was six years old. I had been a few times in high school and then not again till last year with her.

I had a much better time on this trip, what with the better snow and the not having hives from an extreme allergy to hidden Brazil nuts in my bread. I had enough fun that I've spent the last week shopping for my own gear and it'll all be delivered/ready for pick up on Friday. And like magic, I got an invite from an old friend of mom's to go skiing on Saturday.

After lots of shopping around, I managed to get pretty good deals on my kit. The skis and poles from Next Adventure, boots from Backcountry.com and bindings on sale at REI. And if my feet were smaller I could've gotten the boots at REI for $80.

Alpina Control Skis: $109.00
Rottefella bindings: $46.99
Rossignol BC X3 boots: $114.00
Leki Back Country Air Ergo adjustable poles: $79.99

(Keeping up with your girlfriend on the slopes: Priceless --yeah I had to do it :)

I'll report back after Saturday on the performance of all my new gear.

ETA: This also counts as Art#2 since I made the movie after midnight. I'm slowing learning my way around the IMovie. It's fun.

Art #1

My committment to the art thing is mostly a ploy to force myself to make time to write. But I also have some other ideas brewing so I expect my interpretation of this project will be pretty liberal:


"Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!"