and now for something completely different

2010 street change

just back from my winter excursion to california (more snow, rain and wind than sun, so don't go imagining me lounging on the beach or anything), and I've just completed that all-important new year's task of counting last year's haul of street change: 

folding money: $24 (a twenty in a Sacramento gutter sweetened this figure)
cold hard cash: $12.68
foreign currency: $0.31 (canadian and australian, converted using today's exchange rates)
one train-flattened penny (can't spend it, so it's not counted, but it was a penny)

grand total: $36.99!

snow day

It's true, Seattlites are snow-wusses, but today it gives me a lovely sunny (if very cold) snow day, so I'll take it.  I've just baked gingersnaps, a blueberry coffee cake is in the oven, and I'll sit down with some knitting soon, before turning my attention back to school (the campus may be closed, but I still have lots to do). 

steamboat springs

Steamboat Springs Ski Resort, Yampa Valley, Routt County, Colorado

Eric and I at the top of the Hevenly Daze run, which was a doozy...

This was the second incarnation of a ski trip put together by my dear friend Jana, and her incredbly organized husband, Mike. They live in Boulder, CO, and have now organized two fantastic ski weekends for their friends, some as near as their own town, some as far-flung as Seattle, San Diego and Boston. Mike researches resorts, condo and lift ticket packages, transportation and of course, calculates just how much beer is needed, Jana plans the menu and whips up a mean vegetarian chili -- the rest of us just have to show up on the appointed day. Did I mention how fantastic that is? In 2006, we went to Keystone, and this year, Steamboat Springs. The snow was powdery, but on the heavy side. Perhaps not five-star Colorado snow, but leaps and bounds better than the "Cascade concrete" we get here. Next year, maybe Whistler....

Karen, myself and Jana, doing our self portrait on a chairlift thing

Jana and I have known each other for 26 years. I remember meeting her shortly after I moved to Sunnyvale. My mom met her mom, and they introduced us. Jana had just come home from "hat day" at her school, and was wearing a white eyelet lace bonnet. I have known Karen for 22 years. We met in the fourth grade, when we sat next to each other on the school bus on the way to the San Francisco Mint -- the fourth grade field trip. The three of us were in Girl Scouts together, from the seventh to twelvth grade. It's almost mind-boggling to think that we're still friends after all these years, and still get to see each other every now and again.

the City of Steamboat Springs, below the resort

the sunlight left this tree's ice-crusted branches moments after I took this picture...

solo christmas

I spent christmas lounging and enjoying. After waking up to a new half-inch of snow and more falling, I made a lovely scramble and toast for breakfast, made biscuits for Finn, continued to bind the red & white quilt (binding has been tricksy for this one -- not sure what I did wrong), watched no fewer than seven cars get stuck in the slushy snowy mess that surrounds the roundabout I live next to (I threw on my boots and helped one motorist get unstuck), called relatives near and far to wish them happy holidays, and then trekked down to what I am calling a make-shift off-leash park, but is in actuallity a pair of fenced in tennis courts. Finn and I stopped there yesterday on our way home from Penny's house, and I threw snowball after snowball for him. I knew the quality of the snow was degrading fast as the snow drifts become puddles, but I thought it might still be good enough for a few more snowballs. If his snoozing away after we got home is any indication, I'd say I was right....

nine inches (22.8 cm)

my official reading from the back yard.



The dogwood tree in the back yard.... see that little layer of ice between the twig and the snow? Now think of that all over the streets....


the Japanese maple....


I walked Finn to day care.... this is Roosevelt Avenue


happy holidays!!

(note: officially, I hate english holly)

Finn, I don't think we're in Seattle anymore...

As I waited for the bus* to take me downtown, I saw this....

These are two of the skiers I saw today. Five cross-country (including one skijourer) and one downhiller.

* skiing really might have been faster than the bus today, but my hat goes off to the Metro and Sound Transit drivers these snowy days -- they've been doing a helluva job, under very trying circumstances. Bravo!

snow daze

Some photos from my increasingly snowy neighborhood....

Seattle skyline from Maple Leaf Reservoir

NE 15th Ave, looking north


Finn has taken up a little "donkey kick" to get through the crusty snow

I know the ground is down here somewhere....


my backyard, this morning

Houses across the street -- I love the subtle color pallette here...

Icicles on the car (photo taken yesterday -- you can tell because you can see the ice [that is now under six inches of snow] on the ground).

it's beginning to look a lot like christmas

Even after the National Weather Service cancelled the winter storm warning for last Friday, it started snowing last night, leaving about 1.5 inches in my neighborhood. It's 28 degrees F as I write, and they're saying that we're in for a blast of Arctic air over the next several days, taking us into the teens, which is pretty cold for this area.

climate change

April freakin' eighteenth, in a city that sees a couple of dustings of snow annually, and we've got snow again! It's supposed to be in the mid-thirties tomorrow -- good thing Eric and I planned a day of indoor activities (art history lecture at UW, then off to see the Roman Art from the Louvre exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum).

I think I'm in luv...

I went skiing with Jen and company at Stevens Pass yesterday. I have some decent Rossi skis (circa 2003), but they're adorned with bindings from the last century which have finally decided to call it quits. So while I did take them to the mountain with me yesterday, I had in mind to rent some skis with working bindings when I got there. And since one of Jen's cohorts was able to get me a $12 discount on my lift ticket, I used those 12 clams to upgrade from a basic rental to a demo. I demoed these skis, and I think that they and I would be very happy together. When I returned them after a very satisfying day on the slopes (easily my best day of Cascades skiing), I asked the rental guy how much they wanted for these lovelies, figuring that they'd be selling of their demos soon, as Stevens Pass will be shuttering the lodges and rolling up the lifts in about two weeks. He quoted me about $450 ($479 minus the cost of the rental). Hmmm. While I did consider it (a quick internet seach tells me that they retail at around $900), I can't really justify spending that much on an activity I only do three times a year. The price of luv...

in like a lion, out like a.... snowplow

OK, perhaps plows won't be necessary, but it's snowing outside now as though it were December. Bad for the garden, but tomorrow's skiing should be pretty nice!

hat, coat, gloves...

...skis, boots...pole? It's seldom that one arrives at the ski resort with two ski poles, and leaves with only one, but that's what I did today.

Knowing that Eric would have today off, and that mid-week would be an ideal time to hit the slopes, we planned this trip a few weeks ago. I wiggled out of the office--I don't look forward to my desk or inbox tomorrow). This morning, we set off for breakfast at one of our favorite places on the way, only to be informed that they were hosting a banquet and therefore not serving breakfast to the public. Not an auspicious start, but we pressed on.

We watched the outside temperature drop and the wind pick up as we approached Stevens Pass, and we started to really think about how cold it was going to be on the slopes. Brrrr. And boy, was it ever cold. I remember only a couple of times ever being so cold as I felt as we got ready at the car. My fingers were in true pain from the low temperature, even inside my gloves. All bundled up, we arrived on the slopes to some truly great snow (well, as great as it gets here in the PacNW--no boasting from my readers in Utah and Colorado, ok?). It was cold, but not windy, and it was absolutely cloudless. Blue sky from north to south and east to west. I scarcely remember such a perfect ski day on the west coast.

We were having a great day, and about three runs in, Eric told me on the lift that "something clicked" with his turning (he's always been a very cautious skier and focused mainly on getting down the hill in one piece, not how to do it with flair), and that he was feeling much more comfortable. We refer to it now as the epiphany. He skied here, and he skied there. He skied on the backside of the mountain (where they seem to apply a different set of criteria when categorizing the runs, so if you ask me, he even skied some mild black diamonds!), and he did it faster than I've ever seen him move on snow. It was fantastic! Did I mention that it was cold?

On the backside, we took one run that had more moguls than we'd anticipated, and after negotiating them, I called up to Eric that he would be better off on a different route. He took that route and skied out of sight. We hadn't yet skied this portion of the mountain, so I wasn't sure that where he had gone was going to meet back up with the trail I was headed towards. So I kicked off my skis and started hiking, rather than polling and skating uphill. After about six steps, Eric came gliding around the corner, no problem. But when I went to put my skis back on, the left binding refused to lock me in. Eric had to lean over and manualy pull the locking device into place. It worked, but it was clear that these (15 year old) bindings were showing their age. I've been considering new boots for a few years now, but it's hard to justify the cost when we only ski once or twice a season. After the binding incident, Eric pointed out that there will likely be some decent prices on boot/binding combos towards the end of the season, and we headed for the lift.

Apparently, I got carried away with his rapid improvement, and when we were loading onto one of the lifts, I completely spaced out on when to move forward from the "wait here" line, and my right hip collided with the approaching quad chair. I am just fine -- not so much as a tiny bruise on me. Fortunately, my pole took the brunt of the impact, and afterwards it jutted out at about a 45 degree angle. The liftie had done his best to scoot me out of the way, and I felt awful about making such a gratuitous error. No real harm done, Eric scooted up and we boarded the next chair. I was (am) just embarassed for my mistake -- I've been boarding ski lifts for over twenty years now, and suddenly I forgot to look out for the approaching chair! Well, my poor ski pole paid the ultimate price -- knowing that it would need to be replaced, and not wanting to have to deal with a rediculously tweaked pole, I tried to bend it back, but ended up snapping it into two pieces. Hm. So I pitched it into the trash can at the top of the lift and skied with my lone remaining pole for the rest of the day. Now I'll have to add poles to my boot and binding shopping this spring.

The rest of the day on the mountain was good, but more dropping temperatures and rising exhaustion drove us in at 3:00. We concluded the day with coffee and a brownie, packed up our stuff and headed home.

I had to take a photo of this tiny two-seater lift that serves one and only one run, a double black diamond called Seventh Heaven. We passed it several times, but I only ever saw one person on the run or the lift.